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Welcome to the Shadows, darlings

@shetanshadowwolf / shetanshadowwolf.tumblr.com

30+ . Mostly random stuff. I am a supportive friendo, so here's a clear fucking warning. If you're a racist, homophobic, queer-phobic asshole?? You're not welcome here. GET THE UNHOLY FUCK OFF MY BLOG
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mrknaogan

Knitting youtuber: I like to knit for 25 minute long blocks at most at a time with a 5 minute break within each so I do not get injuries.

Me who did a 14 hour marathon on the weekend with a team of 7 spinners and knitters to shear a sheep and knit a man's jumper in as short a possible time:

Here's the jumper by the way. 14 hours earlier it was on a sheep.

We came second out of the three teams competing.

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Pros of reading authors you don't agree with:

  • You can make informed rants about how wrong they are.
  • A+ practice for learning to read texts critically and thinking for yourself, even among people you do agree with.
  • Occasionally, begrudgingly, they may have a point.
  • Even if they don't, being able to articulate why helps you understand your own beliefs and spot errors in your thinking.
  • You'll be much more persuasive to the other side if you understand their arguments and aren't just making assumptions based on what you've heard from others.
  • Academic drama is incredible.
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reblogged
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aorryn47

Please appreciate the most beautiful sourdough loaf I’ve ever made. Since it’s Passover, it’s exclusively for my wife. Look at this gorgeous loaf she gets to consume all by herself. It’s even. An herbed loaf.

My body is ready.

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not-mary-sue

Alright, to ao3's soon to be arriving Wattpad Refugees, a basic guide to general user culture:

1.) Unlike Wattpads vote system that let's you like each chapter, the ao3 equivalent kudos only allows one per work. Everyone is generally quietly annoyed about this. To engage with each chapter, you're heavily encouraged to comment. Trust me, it makes people's day.

2.) Ao3 has no algorithm. By default it's latest updated work first. You can find things to your taste through searches, filters and tags.

3.) 'No archive warnings apply' and 'user has chosen not to use archive warnings' mean two very different things. No archives warnings means the work is free from any content that could require a warning tag (character death, graphic depictions of violence, non-con, etc). User has chosen not to use archive warnings means it could contain any of the warning content, be it hasn't been explicitly tagged. Treat it like an allergen. No archive warnings apply is allergen free. User has chosen not to use archive warnings, may contain traces or whole chunks of the allergen. If you're likely to have a bad reaction, maybe don't take the risk.

4.) Speaking of warnings, ao3 has very few restrictions on the type of work that's allowed. Whatever your personal thoughts or feelings on that are, thats how the site is. You're likely to run across some dark subject matters and a lot of people are uncomfortable with reading that. You're well within your rights not like these works and have your opinion on whether they should be allowed, but harassing the authors of such works (or any works) is more likely to come back on you than them. Ao3 operates on a strong policy of 'don't like, don't read'. Use the tagging system to your full advantage to only engage with the kind of works you want to see.

We look forward to welcoming you all and seeing the fantastic works you create. Happy writing!

I for one am not annoyed about the one kudos per work rule; I think it works very well to 1) level the playing field between one-shots and longfics, since the latter naturally gain more hits and comments and otherwise tend to become the default form and 2) to incentivize commenting.

I have never wanted to leave More Kudos and I am very happy with the fact that each kudos on my work represents a unique account. I like when the one-kudo-limit means I get a 'bonus kudos! <3' comment.

I think that was an excellent design choice overall.

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Paraglider and black vulture chilling

(via)

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theriu

I NEVER get tired of this video. It would be fantastic if the bird was just flying near him, but the fact it feels safe and comfortable enough to land ON his paraglider, isn't startled when he pets it, and is NIBBLING HIS SHOES... blessed moment, absolutely fabulous, 10/10 gold stars.

Okay but the bird isn't just nibbling

Note that it doesn't start nibbling until he starts smoothing its feathers.

They're grooming each other.

This is called parahawking! That vulture is tame -- it’s wearing jesses (a leather tie around the leg that a falconer will use to hold a bird when it’s on the glove). In fact that vulture is employed. Parahawking birds seek out thermals the same way they would naturally, allowing paragliders to follow them in the process.

Vultures are often used for parahawking both because of their attraction to thermals, and because vultures, as scavengers, are comparatively gentler and more sociable than birds of prey!

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fruitviking

Some internet language things I really like:

  • Phrases like “that’s certainly a thing”, “it’s so shaped”, or “one of the most animals” (is there a name for this?)
  • when people write with little to no punctuation like they are just so done
  • More specifically, asking questions without punctuation i.e. ‘what’ or ‘why’. It’s like, you want to know but also you are resigned to the answer?
  • When people capitalise The Thing for emphasis - particularly if they add a trademark symbol to really drive The Point™ home
  • How we use both bold and italic text for emphasis, but they convey it in different ways and I can’t quite explain how
  • Responding to things exclusively with punctuation, because sometimes words fail you and all you can say is !!!
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dirtboy

My interpretation

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draconym

Let us suppose that the "average" horse would have equal proportions of all these parts. The degree to which each part in this poll deviates from the "average" size (20% of total) will determine how large or small that part of our horse will be (i.e a horse with only 10% in Legs will have legs half the size of the average horse).

I will draw a picture of the horse we make!

Thank you for your patience, tumblr. I have been at work all day but now I am home and ready to build this horse you asked for.

First, let's pull up the poll results alongside an average looking horse. I have calculated the size of each part of our horse in relation to Average Size.

Next we will adjust our horse's components according to the specifications.

animated gif of the horse sketch being manipulated and resized
ALT

Finally, let us properly assemble these parts and see how it looks.

And there you have it. Great work team. No notes.

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so: masking: good, unequivocally. please mask and please educate others on why they should mask to make the world safer for immune compromised people to participate in.

however: masking is not my policy focus and it shouldn't be yours, either. masking is a very good mitigation against droplet-born illnesses and a slightly less effective (but still very good) mitigation against airborne illnesses, but its place in the pyramid of mitigation demands is pretty low, for several reasons:

  • it's an individual mitigation, not a systemic one. the best mitigations to make public life more accessible affect everyone without distributing the majority of the effort among individuals (who may not be able to comply, may not have access to education on how to comply, or may be actively malicious).
  • it's a post-hoc mitigation, or to put it another way, it's a band-aid over the underlying problem. even if it was possible to enforce, universal masking still wouldn't address the underlying problem that it is dangerous for sick people and immune compromised people to be in the same public locations to begin with. this is a solvable problem! we have created the societal conditions for this problem!

here are my policy focuses:

  • upgraded air filtration and ventilation systems for all public buildings. appropriate ventilation should be just as bog-standard as appropriately clean running water. an indoor venue without a ventilation system capable of performing 5 complete air changes per hour should be like encountering a public restroom without any sinks or hand sanitizer stations whatsoever.
  • enforced paid sick leave for all employees until 3-5 days without symptoms. the vast majority of respiratory and food-borne illnesses circulate through industry sectors where employees come into work while experiencing symptoms. a taco bell worker should never be making food while experiencing strep throat symptoms, even without a strep diagnosis.
  • enforced virtual schooling options for sick students. the other vast majority of respiratory and food-borne illnesses circulate through schools. the proximity of so many kids and teenagers together indoors (with little to no proper ventilation and high levels of physical activity) means that if even one person comes to school sick, hundreds will be infected in the following few days. those students will most likely infect their parents as well. allowing students to complete all readings and coursework through sites like blackboard or compass while sick will cut down massively on disease transmission.
  • accessible testing for everyone. not just for COVID; if there's a test for any contagious illness capable of being performed outside of lab conditions, there should be a regulated option for performing that test at home (similar to COVID rapid tests). if a test can only be performed under lab conditions, there should be a government-subsidized program to provide free of charge testing to anyone who needs it, through urgent cares and pharmacies.

the last thing to note is that these things stack; upgraded ventilation systems in all public buildings mean that students and employees get sick less often to begin with, making it less burdensome for students and employees to be absent due to sickness, and making it more likely that sick individuals will choose to stay home themselves (since it's not so costly for them).

masking is great! keep masking! please use masking as a rhetorical "this is what we can do as individuals to make public life safer while we're pushing for drastic policy changes," and don't get complacent in either direction--don't assume that masking is all you need to do or an acceptable forever-solution, and equally, don't fall prey to thinking that pushing for policy change "makes up" for not masking in public. it's not a game with scores and sides; masking is a material thing you can do to help the individual people you interact with one by one, and policy changes are what's going to make the entirety of public life safer for all immune compromised people.

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