My spouse and I are both multiply disabled, queer, and native. We have been struggling with rent. Our rent for March was paid very late, and we now need to figure out April. We’re desperate for help.
We need $2600 this month, for rent and bills.
Anything helps, even just reblogging. Thank you.
V: KajiW
C: $kajiw
800/$2600
Already received a 30 day notice. This needs paid ASAP!
i saw a production of sweeny todd last week and im officially Obsessed now...
April 15th: Global Strike
"*April 15 is a day of global strike*.. No schools, no movement, no work, no electronic payment, no gas stations. Make more noise and disturb the peace of terrorist politicians in America and IsraHell."
this morning the United Nations Human Rights Council voted on a resolution calling for a ban on arms sales to Israel and the resolution passed. two Israeli border points opened for aid routes (they were supposedly open? lmao), Biden is calling for an immediate ceasefire, last night was the first without air attacks on Gaza.. the killing of seven foreign aid workers shook the world apparently, but oh god how late. the journey to recognising genocide for some seems to avoid acknowledging the humanity of thousands of Palestinians who have been murdered
"The Yurok will be the first Tribal nation to co-manage land with the National Park Service under a historic memorandum of understanding signed on Tuesday [March 19, 2024] by the tribe, Redwood national and state parks, and the non-profit Save the Redwoods League, according to news reports.
The Yurok tribe has seen a wave of successes in recent years, successfully campaigning for the removal of a series of dams on the Klamath River, where salmon once ran up to their territory, and with the signing of a new memorandum of understanding, the Yurok are set to reclaim more of what was theirs.
Save the Redwoods League bought a property containing these remarkable trees in 2013, and began working with the tribe to restore it, planting 50,000 native plants in the process. The location was within lands the Yurok once owned but were taken during the Gold Rush period.
Centuries passed, and by the time it was purchased it had been used as a lumber operation for 50 years, and the nearby Prairie Creek where the Yurok once harvested salmon had been buried.
Currently located on the fringe of Redwoods National and State Parks which receive over 1 million visitors every year and is a UNESCO Natural Heritage Site, the property has been renamed ‘O Rew, a Yurok word for the area.
“Today we acknowledge and celebrate the opportunity to return Indigenous guardianship to ‘O Rew and reimagine how millions of visitors from around the world experience the redwoods,” said Sam Hodder, president and CEO of Save the Redwoods League.
Having restored Prarie Creek and filled it with chinook and coho salmon, red-legged frogs, northwestern salamanders, waterfowl, and other species, the tribe has said they will build a traditional village site to showcase their culture, including redwood-plank huts, a sweat house, and a museum to contain many of the tribal artifacts they’ve recovered from museum collections.
Believing the giant trees sacred, they only use fallen trees to build their lodges.
“As the original stewards of this land, we look forward to working together with the Redwood national and state parks to manage it,” said Rosie Clayburn, the tribe’s cultural resources director.
It will add an additional mile of trails to the park system, and connect them with popular redwood groves as well as new interactive exhibits.
“This is a first-of-its-kind arrangement, where Tribal land is co-stewarded with a national park as its gateway to millions of visitors. This action will deepen the relationship between Tribes and the National Park Service,” said Redwoods National Park Superintendent Steve Mietz, adding that it would “heal the land while healing the relationships among all the people who inhabit this magnificent forest.”"
-via Good News Network, March 25, 2024
netizens are desensitising gruesome things that are taking place in Palestine.
even the internet’s reaction to graphic things such as - pictures of injured children, civilians stuck under rubble, dead bodies of families in their destroyed homes etc. is beyond underwhelming.
DO NOT NORMALISE GENOCIDE.
BREAK THE STIGMA.
#save palestine
reminder to worldbuilders: don't get caught up in things that aren't important to the story you're writing, like plot and characters! instead, try to focus on what readers actually care about: detailed plate tectonics
@dragonpyre any chance you could elaborate on this
I grew up learning about land formations. Seeing fictional maps that don’t follow the logic and science of them makes me upset
What are the most common sins you’ve seen relating to this? I wanna know
Mordor.
Why is the mountain range square. How did the mountain range form. Why is there one singular volcano in the center. Why does it act like a composite volcano but have magma that acts like it’s from a shield. If it’s hotspot based volcanic activity why is there only one volcano.
And then the misty mountains!!!! Why isn’t there a rain shadow!! And why is there a FOREST where the rain shadow should be!!!!!!!!
So what is a rain shadow?
Wind blows clouds in from the sea, but mountains are so tall the clouds can't get past 'em, so you get deserts on the windward side of mountain ranges because clouds can't get there to water the land, or do so only very rarely.
Oh yeah nothing is more annoying than fantasy maps that can't get mountains, rivers and rain shadows right.
May I recommend my new favorite tool: Mapgen4. You start with a random seed and then add mountains, valleys, shallow water, or oceans as you like. You can adjust the wind direction to make wind shadows off the mountains fall where you want. You can adjust overall raininess to make the rivers larger or smaller, or have more or fewer tributaries. It works best for small, isolated landmasses (think islands more than continents) but as there’s no scale bar and it’s all slightly abstracted anyway you can do whatever you want with it. I’ve only just started playing with it but it’s SO FUN.
I do think this could be useful for writers! ...Caveat, if you're going to use this for making a map for anything published (digital or paper, even if it's only in a fanfic archive or whatever), please, please credit the creator and their program as how you made that map! The more ways information like this gets out there, the more useful it'll be to other writers, roleplaying game DMs/GMs, creators, etc.
One of my favourites for mapping plates, biomes, etc is Tectonics.js. If you're familiar with how tectonics shape a planet, you can guess where the features go by toggling plates, crust thickness, etc. Between Mapgen4 and Tectonics.js, we've got some pretty sweet tools at our disposal.
More stuff!:
- European Geosciences Union Blog — Beyond Tectonics: Building fictional worlds to better understand our own
- Reshaping Reality's Worldbuilding Tips
- Worldbuilding pasta's series, An Apple Pie from Scratch also check their resources page!
- R/worldbuilding's Reading List. Also check out their collected resources link. This basic geology guide from 11 years ago is still nice.
- Creating an Earth-Like Planet, and The Climate Cookbook (aka Geoff's Climate Cookbook) technically the climate cookbook is a part of Creating an Earth like Planet I think.
- Related: Worldbuilding Workshop's "Working Out Climates Using Geoff’s Climate Cookbook." Which goes through using the resource in order to map make. Also just the Worldbuilding Workshop in General.
- Madeline James Writes's Worldbuilding Guide
- Worldbuilding 101 (this links to the Biomes section but there's like...everything.)
Also I would recommend looking into Landscape Archaeology as well! That's because Landscape archeology is basically adding the social/cultural layer on top of all that geology and geography. Environments change when communities live in them, and communities likewise adapt to various environments.
This is a short free introduction to the concept: "Notes on Landscape Archaeology." To summarize, Landscape archaeology sort of like...studies the relation of people to places/spaces (that is, landscapes) in time.
Also this paper [An Archeology of Landscapes] breaks down/introduces the key concepts that I learned which is first that you can form the "construct paradigm" of a landscape from settlement ecology, ritual landscapes, and ethnic landscapes.
And then the highlights of their summary of what constitutes defining a landscape:
- Landscapes are not synonymous with natural environments. Landscapes are synthetic (Jackson, 1984, p. 156), with cultural systems structuring and organizing peoples’ interactions with their natural environments ...
- Landscapes are worlds of cultural product ... Through their daily activities, beliefs, and values, communities transform physical spaces into meaningful places. ...
- Landscapes are the arena for all of a community’s activities. Thus landscapes not only are constructs of human populations but they also are the milieu in which those populations survive and sustain themselves. A landscape’s domain involves patterning in both within-place and between-place contexts ...
- Landscapes are dynamic constructions, with each community and each generation imposing its own cognitive map on an anthropogenic world of interconnected morphology, arrangement, and coherent meaning ...
Basically a "landscape" is made by a community living in an environment. Once you have a geological environment that makes sense, landscape archaeology is like... Basically how I feel confident knowing where trade routes would be on a map, where there are areas of continual high conflict, what kinds of agriculture exists where, etc. once the geological stuff is hammered out, it's like...I know how that would influence the local cultures and vice versa. At that point, it's easy to start marking the natural borders, settlements, trade/port cities, and even strategic fortresses. If you have properly put rivers on a map, then marking your port cities is effortless, basically.
Also:
- This course syllabus for a Landscape Archaeology class is freely accessible. It includes an online resources page.
- Place, Landscape, and Environment: Anthropological Archaeology in 2009
- (Landscape Biographies is open access, as is Landscape Archaeology between Art and Science: From a Multi- to an Interdisciplinary Approach. But I wouldn't try to read every essay.)
If you are like me and find it helpful to have video reference for a process/activity in addition to a written guide, Artifexian is a YouTube channel that does a LOT of world building stuff and specifically he's in the process of creating a world following a lot of Worldbuilding Pasta's methodology!
This is all definitely great and if you want to do it, that's fine, but I'll remind you that Middle Earth was sung into existence by a divine being, and is round or flat, depending on the state of your soul and your species, so...plate tectonics aren't really a concern here.
The important thing is consistency. If your world is scientific, then go for it. But nobody ever complains about Discworld in this situation FOR A REASON. Middle Earth is the same, as are most fantasy worlds. Their function is to the story, not to realism. And that's perfectly fine.
Tick season is already in full swing and it’s going to be one of the worst years for ticks and lyme disease. Make sure your pets are on flea/tick/heartworm prevention and get your dogs vaccinated against lyme!
The sun is shining and the grass is green in minnesota today, what a lovely beginning to the impending TICKPOCALYPSE
Remember to cover yourselves appropriately if you’re going places with lots of wildlife! Ticks are dangerous for people as well as pets!
I’ve always heard to avoid long pants because ticks are easier to notice and remove when they try to climb a bare leg, but I think it’s a matter of preference tbh.
What you really need is to use a good repellant made for use in tick heavy areas. I’m not talking citronella essential oils, I mean a real repellant like Deep woods OFF that uses DDT. Spray it on your shoes and inside your shoes. You would be surprised how many ticks start in your socks and work their way up. I have had waaaaaay fewer guests on me after spraying my shoes as well as my legs.
If you want to get REALLY serious you can treat your hiking gear in permethrin, or get permethrin treated exercise gear. It’s a very potent, effective substance that kills ticks and other parasites on contact. It’s present in some flea and tick treatments for dogs. But the kicker is, permethrin is also VERY toxic to cats, so if you have a cat and you feel like you need permethrin treated gear, you MUST keep the gear where kitty can’t get it.
Friendly reminder to stock up on tick meds for your pets, and repellent for yourself! This year is going to be a BAD one.
ALWAYS check yourself after a hike, or any trip outside. Wear bright clothes so it’s easier to see ticks on you, and make sure to do a full-body check when you’re done. This includes checking your hair line and under waistbands or underwear (last tick I found on me was on my butt, and I had been hiking with pants and a long shirt on…trust me, check under your underwear).
Remove ticks as soon as you find them, and keep them in a small container or bag (heads completely squished) for identification purposes just in case your bite looks iffy later on. Clean the bite site thoroughly. Be on the look out for any flu-like symptoms, rashes, or red rings around the bite site like a bulls-eye (note: a slight red ring right afterward is normal, see below for what “bad” looks like). Usually if you get a tick off in the first 24 hours you’ll be ok, so long as you didn’t agitate the tick, but if you notice anything abnormal go to the doctor ASAP. If your tick was engorged when removed, be especially on the lookout. It’s always better to be safe than sorry when it comes to the nasty diseases ticks can carry.
Remember: if you’re buying tick preventatives for your pets, make sure you get one that’s meant for them. Don’t use dog-specific medicine on cats, or vice-versa, and make sure you get the correct weight range for your pet. Failure to do so can lead to serious complications for your pets. If you’re not sure what you should use or what’s safe for pets, contact your local veterinarian and ask. If your pet is bitten by a tick and displays any abnormal behaviors or symptoms of sickness get them to your vet as soon as you can and bring the tick with you.
This has been your tick safety reminder post for the season.
Reblogging for both human tick safety and the note that permethrin is really deadly to cats.
Or you can take 0 preventative measures and just fucken get Lyme disease, like I did.
Ok, I adore the Frogs to begin with, but the sheer finesse and dedication of this one boggles my mind.
You can donate to the Palestine Children's Relief Fund for as little as $1.00.
There is a fee you can choose to apply to cover processing.
Which if you choose to do leaves you with a total of ~$1.35 (USD) depending on the type of card you have.
PCRF has a score of 97% on Charity Navigator.
Adults and children alike are currently dying in Palestine due to starvation. (World Health Organization Link)
The Gaza Strip is one of two places in the entire world that is categorized as Phase 5 (the highest phase) on the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification scale.
So even if you think it isn't enough, remember that donating even as little as $1.35 helps! It's $1.35 they wouldn't have had otherwise. So donate if you can. 🇵🇸
The website for all of the bomb factories being listed in this video below:
The engineers, rocket scientists, metalworkers working there would've been building better subjects if they weren't hired into making BOMBS FOR ISRAEL TO KILL INNOCENT PALESTINIANS. Some of these factories listed there can be a part of normal everyday things and those kinds of people have jobs , but there are offices and factories across every state that are from weapon companies, great people that are in the aforementioned topics above shouldn't be working with a company that makes WEAPONS. Go find and boycott the factories that are making the bombs for Israel, not the ones that are making other things aside from bombing.
A quote from this video:
"The people who are protesting weapons factories aren't against people having jobs or feeding families. They are against a system which forces people to make weapons in order to feed their families."
The UK government has received advice from its own lawyers stating that Israel has breached international humanitarian law in Gaza but has refused to make the advice public, a prominent British lawmaker has stated. The Guardian reported on 30 March that Alicia Kearns, the Conservative chair of the House of Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, said, “The Foreign Office has received official legal advice that Israel has broken international humanitarian law, but the government has not announced it.” She added that as a result, the UK must end arms sales to Israel without delay.
Fundraiser masterpost
This is a masterpost for the evacuation fundraisers I've vetted so far, a few other fundraisers I find trustworthy but have not been able to vet (inability to communicate with the organizer), and a few semi-completed fundraisers or fundraisers for a different purpose (like house rebuilding, or aid distribution). The numbers next to the names have no significance beyond ease of navigation for me for when I check their progress in the future. Occasionally I will update these with new info.
VETTED FAMILY ESCAPE FUNDRAISERS
- Walaa Abusamra (1). 10 family members. 13k out of 80k €.
- Ezzideen Shehab (2). 6 family members. 3.7k out of 32.5k €.
- Madleen Abu Jayyab (3). 4 family members. 4k out of 70k USD.
- Jehad Shehada (4). 1 individual. 1.7k out of 15k CAD.
- Aser Alassar (5). 5 family members. 258k out of 550k SEK. Or 24k out of 51k USD.
- My friend Mona Abu Hamda (6). 9 family members. 52k out of 75k USD.
- Mohammed Shamia (7). 7 family members. 1.9k out of 35k USD.
- Abdullah Al-Saghir (8). 9 family members. 65k out of 100k €.
- Randa Abubakr (9). 6 family members. 10.1k out of 14k €.
- Fadi Alshrafi (10). 9 family members. 40k out of 85k USD.
- Osama Abdelrahman. (11). 9 family members. 27k out of 45k €.
- Alhaw family and the Albittar family (12). Between 18 and 12 family members. 1.9k out of 90k €. (EXTREMELY LOW, NEEDS FUNDS)
- Verified Fundraiser by Palestine Asdiqa to help a malnourished baby with cerebral palsy. (13) 6.3k out of 31k USD.
- Rana Abu Ahmed (14). 6 family members. 63.8k out of 66k CAD. NEARLY COMPLETE.
- Mohammed Abu Matar (15). 6 family members. 5k out of 34k CAD.
- Moataz Abu Sakran (16). 3 family members. 10.4k out of 20k $.
- Ayah Abu Sidu (17). 10 family members. 15.2k out of 50.4k USD.
- Said Fadel (18). 7 family members. 19k out of 50k USD.
- Tasneem Nabil Musa (19). 7 family members (ALL INJURED, NEED MEDICAL CARE.) 13.2k out of 50k USD
- Belal Azmi Msallam (20). 14 family members. 7.1k out of 160k AUD.
- Mortaja Family (21). 11 family members. 28k out of 70k €.
- Abu Ramadan family (22). 14 family members. 10k out of 148k €.
- Mai Rajab (23). 42.3k out of 50k USD (CLOSE TO COMPLETION)
- Amal Abu Shammala (24). 4 family members. 33.1k out of 42k €.
- Maryam & family (25). 29.5k out of 50k USD.
- Haneem Abdelhalim (26). 8 family members. 31k out of 40k USD raised.
- Ahmed Masoud (27). 12 family members. 8.3k out of 60k €.
- Mohammed Fareed (28). 21.7k out of 60k CAD.
- Lena Nofal (29). 32.7k out of 35k € (NEARLY COMPLETE)
- Rasheda Alfaiomy (30). 6+ family members. 22.3k out of 65k USD.
- Ula El Hindi (31). 1+ individuals. 8.2k out of 15k €.
- Muhammad Safi (32). 5+ family members. 4k out of 30k BP.
- Yazan Khalaf (33). 18 family members. 12.4k out of 40k USD.
- Afaf Masoud (34). 5+ family members. 55.1k out of 75k €.
- Motasem Khayal (35). 5 family members. 442 out of 43k € (26.5k needed for escape.)
- Youseff Abu Saeed (36). 3 family members (1 is already out for treatment). 154k out of 200k USD.
- Abdulaziz & Abdullah, escape & surgery (37). 2+ family members (1 has already been treated, 1 NEEDS TREATMENT). 95k out of 150k BP.
- Nadine Abdullatif (38). 8 family members. 103k out of 130k AUD.
- Sami Salhab (39). 6 family members (5 already evacuated). 13.1k out of 26k €.
- Jehad Al Ghandour (40). 5 family members (1 already evacuated). 30.6k out of 100k USD.
MORE VETTED FAMILY ESCAPE FUNDRAISERS (tumblr has a character-per-block limit, there's no difference between the following fundraisers and the previous ones).
- Mahmoud Algharabli (41). 16 family members (4 already evacuated). 48k out of 57.6k USD.
- Dr. Marah & family (42). 2+ family members. 5.1k out of 40k USD.
- Khaled Alshabrawi (43). 5 family members. 1.4k out of 35k € (25k needed for escape, but will begin with 10k for stable housing).
- Muhammad Osama Alzaq (44). 5 family members. 2.1k out of 60k BP.
- Mohammed Wishah (45). 7 family members + 1 pet. 2.3k out of 71.5k €.
- Muhe Ayman (46). 5+ family members. 3.6k out of 60k €. (CAUTION: If you scroll down in the GFM there are photos of mutilated and dead babies.)
- Abdallah Animal Rescue (47). 1 individual + lots of pets. 30.4k out of 40k USD.
- Haya Orouq (48). 5 family members (1 injured, NEEDS TREATMENT). 29.5k out of 50k.
- Ottawa4Palestine’s vetted fundraiser spreadsheet (76 different families with listed fundraisers)
UNVETTED, BUT HIGHLY LIKELY LEGITIMATE ESCAPE FUNDRAISERS:
- Rasha family (1). 5 family members. 483 out of 15k € (EXTREMELY LOW, NEED FUNDS)
- Natasha Matar (2). 14 family members. 18.1k out of 200k CAD (140k needed for escape).
- Islam Daher (3). 6 family members. 2.3k out of 50k CAD.
- Qasim Al-Kafarneh (4). 12 family members. 5.7k out of 80k AUD.
- Ahmed M. Saleh (5). 4 family members. 7.8k out of 35k €.
- Salwa Zarifa (6). 4 family members. 1.6k out of 50k €.
- Moutasem Quffa (7). 6+ family members. 7k out of 65k €.
OTHER FUNDRAISERS:
- Rebuilding Developers Plus and Gaza’s community. 2.4k out of 47k €. SUSTAINABLE AID.
- Eman Abdel Rahman. Need help rebuilding home and access to food. 7.1k out of 42.6k USD.
- Ibrahim Adil Osman. All intended beneficiaries have escaped, they just need some financial support to start being stable enough to make money to get more family members to escape.
- Abd Al Karim Adnan Alakklouk. Most intended beneficiaries have escaped, they just need some financial support to start a new life and send more family members money to survive.
- Samar Elrayih Hydoub. It seems that most family members have been evacuated, but they need an emergency 1.5k for medical expenses.
- Bana AZ. All intended beneficiaries have escaped, they just need a bit of support in establishing a new life. (only 866 € left to meet goal)
- Kareem Abu Samra. All intended beneficiaries have been able to escape. They just need support to establish a new life.
- Helping the People of Gaza – Mutual Aid Fund (run by my friend Mona)
- Supporting Displaced Families in Gaza (CareForGaza)
- Emergency Medical Relief for Gaza Refugees.
- Help Sudan Tarada Initiative.
- Amer Qudaih’s Relief efforts in Gaza.