self-flagellation and self-bullying are all bad motivators for change BTW. it can be hard to escape from a spiral but genuinely u have to be nice to urself or nothing will change
you have to take care of yourself and not punch yourself down because you feel like you 'deserve it'. if you feel like the world is against you, you should at least be on your own side while you work through things.
if anyone needs me i'll be frothing at the mouth thinking about the origin of language and interspecies communication. happy wednesday.
how did we learn this? who taught us this? is it coincidental? is it observational? is it that something in the source of these sixteen languages stems from the same animal instinct that causes each of these species to call out to their own kind? I Am Going To Lose It.
every so often I remember that whales molt
I’m not sure why I feel this way, but imo this is the most cursed marine mammal fact I have ever heard
THAT’S RIGHT AND THANK YOU FOR REMINDING ME SO I CAN INFLICT THIS ON EVERYONE AT 1AM!
Mammals normally shed their skin in small flakes all the time when their skin cells die off, but because whales are living in the ocean -AKA, Bacteria Stew- flaking off like that would cause microabrasions (really tiny cuts) that would mean the whale is continually fighting off infections. So, when a whale needs to replace it’s dead skin cells, it preps it’s new skin underneath, then sheds all it’s dead skin cells at once, like a lizard:
but not having hands makes it hard to remove this gross film, so molting brings many whales clsoe to shore where they can roll around on rocky/sandy coastal seabeds to scratch it off. Here’s a bunch of Beluga coming in for a mass scratch:
And THIS is what a chunk of Sperm Whale Molt looks like, floating in the water before it’s devoured by pelagic microfauna, because you take what calories you can get in the open ocean:
Nature is Amazing!
wish it still held in one big piece like a snake though. Wish you could be swimming in the ocean and you see a huge empty whale billowing like a balloon. like a latex glove a hundred feet long. imagine getting tangled in that. what if you died cause you got caught in an empty whale like it’s a big blanket
sorry but I am not subscribing to our society's disgusting obsession with youth. when I turn 30 I'm going to be really happy and throw a party and be elated at how much I will have grown by then, the same way I did when I turned 10 and celebrated finally being 'double digits'. When I turn 40 I will be ecstatic. There are good and bad things about every age but there is no way my 20s are going to be the best years of my life because I am still barely getting to know myself. By 30 I hope to be very well-acquainted
Ewan McGregor proving there's no instrument he can't play 😌
seeing reddit refugees repeatedly hit their post limits and comment their thoughts on every reblog is kind of refreshing. site migration be damned these guys know how to blog
i was talking to one of my coworkers about my trip and she asked me where i was going and i said austria and she looked at me all confused and then she said “like…austria-hungary?” and i wasn’t quite sure how to break it to her
if i ever write something set in the united states im just going to do zero research whatsoever and make stuff up to sound cool it’s equality
the lush impenetrable jungles of massachusetts
I wish I was a female tiger because then if I was talking to someone and I was getting off topic I could say “but I tigress,” and then kill and eat them because I am a tiger
instead of mourning some stupid billionaires, please consider donating to sos mediterranée, sea watch, and sos humanity, three NGOs assisting asylum seekers in the mediterranean sea
btvs really said “sex is the most transcendent happiness a man can have and the worst thing that can happen to a girl” and it would have been way cooler if they hadn’t
My new mission in life is to impart this wisdom to as many people as possible
IT'S ALSO USEFUL IF YOU HAVE TMJ DISORDER
in both cases: always start on the lowest setting and wrapped in something soft!! if it hurts, stop!!
But, re: sinuses: look up a diagram of where they are, and when a spot feels particularly good or is particularly congested, hold it there longer. Definitely keep tissues handy for when it drains. Also it can help if your sinuses hurt like fuck but aren't actually congested (which happened when I had covid), but the effect doesn't last long.
Re: TMJ disorder: You can just push it against the joint, obviously; if your vibe has a small contact point you can REALLY dig in there (but again: stop if it hurts). But don't forget the whole area around the joint, around your ears, and up your scalp. There's a lot of muscles that tighten when your jaw is tight/stiff/in pain. Be especially careful when on a spot that's just skin over a bone without a lot of padding.
vibrators can also help if you have restless legs syndrome! Especially ones with fancy pulse patterns. When my RLS is severe I tuck them behind my knees or wherever & can finally lie still & sleep. You might need to wrap them in fabric to avoid skin irritation ymmv. There was even a paper published somewhere called "counter stimulatory devices for RLS" that was hilariously vague about saying the word "vibrator"
Once again adding also useful if you have dystonia or any kind of muscle spasticity. I have cervical dystonia (neck spasms) and dystonia in my left leg that's essentially like persistent Charley horse cramps from my neuromuscular issues and bought a Hitachi expressly for this purpose lol
A vibrator has been recommended to me to unblock clogged milk ducts for anyone that may apply to
I learned about the sinus thing and immediately bought a vibrator for that purpose. And yes, it DOES help with sinus headaches.
I use mine to cum as well
“Close the door. Remove the dust. Stop being who you were, and change into who you are.”
— Paulo Coelho
it's easy to dunk on people with poor reading comprehension or to look down on them (consciously or not) even if you're not actively shaming them for "not getting it" or "being stupid" but it's not actually helpful. it's a worrying development that many people (particularly many young people) are becoming resistant to the idea that complex and/or challenging books have value but it's also an understandable development, because in many cases it's a reaction to being shamed for their struggles with literacy and not given the help they would've needed to develop an adequate level of literacy.
that's not even going into what should even be considered an "adequate" level of literacy to begin with, because the truth is that a lot of people will simply never be able to read better than absolutely necessary to navigate their daily life, and this shouldn't be treated as some kind of failure on their part. the goal of literacy education should be to give people the tools for self-sufficiency.
what's worrying is not that there are a lot of people who don't engage with complex texts, but that there are a lot of people who refuse to believe that there is something to be gained from engaging with complex texts. someone doesn't have to read or understand shakespeare or kafka or what-have-you in order to live a fulfilling life, but when they become resistant to the idea that a text can have something going on beyond what's immediately apparent on the surface, they become easy targets for deception. this hinders the self-sufficiency that literacy is supposed to provide them with.
the goal of you high school language class is not just to get you to analyze texts, but to introduce you to the idea that texts can be analyzed in the first place, even if you don't go on to be particularly good at actually analyzing them yourself. you don't need to be able to read between the lines to understand that it is possible to read between the lines, and that therefore a text that seems nonsensical to you at first may simply be written for an audience of a different skill level - this is only a problem if there is a mismatch between the complexity of the text and the literacy of its target audience. an inability to read for subtext is not a personal failure, nor does the ability to read for subtext make you a better person than someone who can't. literacy is a skill, and like any skill there are people to whom it comes more easily than others.
calling people who are drawn to anti-intellectual rhetoric due to their struggles with literacy stupid is not going to encourage them to change their mind. developing media literacy and reading comprehension is something that is very difficult to do on your own, and doubly so if any attempt at trying to learn is met with derision for not already being able to do it. the problem is not people who only engage with easy texts, the problem is people growing hostile towards the idea that there is worth in engaging with more complex texts
if reading comprehension has always come naturally to you, it can be difficult to grasp how someone can fail to understand a text that you thought was easy enough to follow. I myself am guilty of snapping at people for misinterpreting me so wildly it seemed like they were doing it on purpose. you need to learn to suppress this kneejerk reaction, and instead see this frustration as common ground: you are both facing a situation where your communication skills are insufficient. what can you do to bridge this gap? how can you present this information in different ways that better suit how the other party processes information? keep in mind that this does not necessarily mean to simplify the information, because nobody likes being condescended to, and being condescended to is in many cases exactly what made these people hostile towards more complex ideas to begin with.
I don't have an easy solution, because this is a complex problem, and what helps some people will inevitably be useless to many others. but I believe fostering a culture where you won't be met with derision or ridicule for not understanding something or needing more explanation will go a long way. next time someone comments on your post with an absolutely baffling take that makes you wonder if they even read what you said, consider that maybe they are trying to engage with a text that is above their reading level, and they genuinely lack the ability to parse and retain the information you presented in the way you presented it. if you're going to respond, try to do so in good faith.
okay Jaques 😭😭 why is this so funny
it’s tragic because i didn’t include Orlando’s response, it’s even funnier. get him Orlando. you tell him.
