Japanese Braille (and why it’s easier than written Japanese)

Okay, so I thought I’d write a post about a topic that’s really close to my heart, being a Legally Blind person: Japanese Braille. 

There are 1.64 million people in Japan with an Uncorrectable Vision Impairments, 187,000 of which are listed as Blind.

Japanese Braille sounds really difficult, but in reality it’s not actually that hard! Especially once you get a few hundred Kanji in, learning Japanese Braille is honestly super simple. 

First of all, a note: Japanese Braille (99% of the time, at least) is completely phonetic; there’s no differentiation between Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji like there is in Written Japanese.

Additionally, it follows really basic patterns; with the exception of a few Punctuation-type characters, you basically only have to learn 21 basic pieces, as everything else follows basic patterns beyond that. 

First off, the vowels: 

All other Syllables use these same Vowels, in the same places

Following this, there comes all of the Consonants

Note that the vowels are in the exact same spot as in the AIUEO characters, just with an added mark for the Consonant.

Here is probably a good place to point out: Dakuten is marked by a single dot on the middle of the right side of the cell, placed BEFORE the character that gets changed by the Dakuten (Handakuten is the same, except the dot was lowered to the bottom right of the cell)

You’ll note that this brings us up to 14 characters…. where are all the rest?

If you’re observant, you’ll note that Ya, Yu, Yo, and Wa and (W)o are missing from the chart here. That’s because these 5 characters break the rules, just a little bit.

(Note that the Wi & We characters are only there for Ancient Japanese; don’t worry if you never learned them before, they’re gone from Japanese now)

Note that the -y- character there is placed BEFORE another consonant to make it a _y_ version of it (i.e. put it before Ka to make Kya), and that the -w- character is used to make all the irregular Little Characters (i.e. put it before Ha and you’ll get Fa).

There’s 2  more characters to learn, and they’re pretty easy. 

They’re made for doubling consonants, and doubling vowels respectively

For example, putting a Sokuon before Ka makes Kka, and a Chouon AFTER A makes Aa

Anyways, that covers all the fundamentals of Japanese Braille, hopefully enabling even more people to make Blind Literacy possible, in an entire other language!

Watching Star Trek as an adult shines new light on why my dad used to look really uncomfortable sometimes during our late-night marathons.

Weed Whacker vs Scythe. [video]

grasscon

What a farce. Not only is the contest weighted towards the scythe because Weed Whackers are meant for edging and trimming of WEEDS in hard to reach places, not thick grass, but the scythe cut that patch super uneven and it looks like absolute shit. The WeedWhacker took slightly longer but did a much neater, better job with less effort. 

Really thought he comparison is absurd, Nobody would ever use a WeedWhacker to replace a scythe, they do completely different things, just like you’d never use a scythe to cut down weeds growing out of a sidewalk. If it’s for trimming a lawn it should be against a lawnmower, which would fucking destroy it, and if it’s for harvesting hay it should be against a combine harvester, which would destroy it exponentially more.

This is nothing more than lies and propaganda from butthurt scythelovers and I for one will not stand for it.

unrest in the grass fandom

boutta go the fuck back to hamon cause I can’t stand yall bitches

FUCK

NO

OHMYGOD

hit the reblog so fast i think i broke my mouse

holY F U cKKKKkKKKkkkkkKKKKK 

HOLY FUCK THIS KNOCKED MY SIDEWAYS

do yourself a favor and hit play. then reblog it for all to experience.

I can never not reblog this

she dicked cockily down stairs

https://www.paypal.me/emilypyro

i actually got two donations and the “keep it up” one was bigger so anyway she penised phalluciously

Toonami:

Black Lives Matter.

Fucking TOONAMI. I’m about to cry. My childhood just spoke some deep as truth.

Vulgar Teacup & Saucers from EthansLunchMoney

x / x / x / x / x x / x / x / x / x

I’ll take all of them and then throw a tea party for all my friends

Tag urselves im twat waffle

he’s literally rigging the election and next to nothing’s being done about it what the actual fucking living hell

HE’S LITERALLY TARGETING USPS IN BLUE AREAS WHERE HE LOST THE LAST ELECTION

If you feel unsafe about voting in person (because, y’know, we’re in the middle of a goddam pandemic) but now fear the USPS will be unable to deliver a “mail-in” ballot in a timely fashion….

1. Request a mail-in ballot.

2. Do not mail it.

3. Google your supervisor of elections to see where you can drop off your mail-in ballot. It’s usually NOT THE POLLING PLACE.

All states allow this! Here is what you’re accomplishing by doing this:

1. Your ballot gets in on time no matter what happens to the USPS.

2. You don’t have to worry about standing in long lines and risking infection. You’re just stopping by to drop it off.

3. You voted! Hooray! I have no doubt Trump and his supporters are doing to try to call into question the legitimacy of mail-in voting (which is more enthusiastically embraced by Democratic supporters, especially now.)

Also, when you drop it off, find out how to track it online to make sure it is verified. California, Oregon, Washington, and Colorado have systems that can track your ballot just like tracking a package from Amazon.

All CA vote centers (which are open for weeks to a month before election day) have ballot drop-off boxes too! Many government buildings have them as well, so there’s no need to wait until election day when it’s crowded to drop them off. The list of drop-off sites is always posted on each county’s voter info website.

This is important! This election is crucial! Get out and vote! We! Cannot! Afford! To! Get! Complacent! This year, every vote matters!

If you want a woman president in 2020 then you should vote libertarian Jo Jorgensen!

Vote Gold! She's going to be on the ballot in all 50 states! #JoJo2020!!!

VOTE TRUMP OUT

KEEP JOE BIDEN OUT

KEEP KANYE WEST OUT

Want more information? Here's her website: https://joj2020.com/

VOTE THRID PARTY!!!

no offense but why does anyone other than me get to control the way my hair looks

bosses are like “ummmmm it’s unprofessional to have fun hair :/” families are like “why would you ruin the way your hair naturally looks” some weirdos call you a slut for a specific hairstyle………………….. fuck off it’s hair???????? and it’s mine????????????? none of your goddamn business????????????

and this extends to tattoos and piercings and stuff too. the only thing colorful hair, tattoos, and piercings say about me is that I thought they would look cool and they do so fuck off

THANK YOU ALL!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/drinkingquest/your-friend-is-sad

Pages 52, 53, 54, 55, and 56 all at once!!!  Whaaat?!

this will probably never happen again

Ooh this is sweet

Wow, this was actually really helpful for helping me understand demisexuality more. I never really got it before but now I feel like I know a bit more about it, thanks OP.

Guys I found the only good thing on Facebook.

Update:

Oh fuck they’re inclusive ants, too?!?

Image Descriptions

[Image 1: A Screenshot of an invitation to a Facebook group named: “A group where we all pretend to be ants in an ant colony.” Under that is a post in the group that reads: “We reached the center of the Earth. Now what?” Four people commented saying one word each in this order: scurry, dig, work, melt. These words are in capital letters and have spaces between each letter.]

[Image 2: Another Screenshot of a post in the group that reads: “It has come to my attention that when we put the spaces in-between letters it makes it difficult for visually impaired ants to know what we’re saying and so I was wondering if we could try to make this group more accessible for them. (The text to voice can’t figure out what we are saying with the spaces) (Picture of an ant for attention)” This text is then followed by a close up picture of an ant.]

[Image 3: A screenshot of some comments on the post in Image 2. Five people commented: adapt, adapt, inclusion, love adapt, adapt. These words are in capital letters and have no spaces between the letters.]

End of IDs.

Please do not reblog this post without image descriptions! The irony of sharing undescribed images that talk about inclusivity for the visually impaired is… Painful.

💉 HRT ANNOUNCEMENT 💉

YOU NEED TO ASPIRATE BEFORE INJECTING.

I’ve known many individuals who were never told by medical professionals to aspirate, which is unacceptable on behalf of endocrinology. This is an extremely important step because if you accidentally inject into a vein, you can literally die.

How To Aspirate: Stick yourself with the needle and then draw back on the syringe. If your syringe fills with blood, you need to reposition your needle. If it doesn’t fill with blood, you’re safe to inject there.

Literally just aspirate because it takes 2 seconds and can save your life.

Please share this post so that this practice becomes more common!

This is extremely important, I personally know several people who were never told this and had pretty dangerous experiences because of it.

I’ve never even heard of this so it needs to be spread!!

I had no idea people WEREN’T taught this. My endocrinologist was very VERY clear on the fact that aspirating is VERY necessary, and what could happen if I chose not to. I hate that this post even has to exist, because people are clearly not being taught how to do it correctly. I’m glad that it exists for the people who need it, but I hate that it’s even a thing that needs to be shared. This is a very serious issue.

This is the part that the wealthy hate about most people being satisfied with what they have.  If we strive for more then they can threaten us with it, but if we don’t care they have nothing to steal nor to threaten.

In case you ever feel badly about spending the money you work hard to earn.

ok so i screenshotted this moment because i thought it was pretty cool

the first time we get to see all four elements working together for a common enemy, blah blah blah, but i started laughing because

sokka’s fucking boomerang. sokka threw a fucking boomerang at princess azula, renowned lightning bender and heir-apparent to the throne of the fire nation.

and sokka threw a boomerang at her.

I said it once and i say it again.

Azula considered Sokka to be the biggest threat in this group and countered him first. What this picture miss is Sokka sanding nearby. All members of this group unleash their attack at same time, but Azula reacts to boomerang first. If you watch this part in slow motion, you could see that Sokka’s boomerang was the first thing that would hit Azula and may even incapacitate her making her unable to continue to fight. So she had to counter in first. She deflected it with well placed shoot.

Then and only then, when there is no immediate threat, she starts to create her blue fire wall to counter other elements.

Lets think about this. How hard should you have to throw something to make it move faster that any elemental attack? Either all elemental attacks are slow or you are pretty strong. That said nonbenders with good aim and strong hands could easily overpower benders if they timed it right.(Aang got captured by Yuan archers who are all nonbenders.) Azula knew of this and acted according to it. She is talented bender and you may think that she should enlist other benders to help her track and capture Zuko, Iroh, and later avatar, but instead she uses her nonbender friend to help her.

Even if you have no bending you can still fight… and win.

Let’s not forget that on the Day of Black Sun, Sokka was the one in charge and Azula was no idiot Azula knew that.

When Aang, Sokka, and Toph all confronted Azula, she proceeded to make them chase her and waste their time. Azula is not only talented, she’s sly and smart as hell. WHO WAS THE ONE WHO SAW THROUGH THAT BS CHASE?

Sokka.

NOT ONLY THAT but after Sokka explains to the Gaang that Azula is just baiting them, Azula actually verbally attacks Sokka. Not through fighting, but through words, knowing not only that an intelligent person like him could only be brought down with emotions BUT that Sokka was the leader and if she could get him the stay, Aang and Toph would follow his lead.

Azula knew Sokka was their strength and took him down. WOULD SHE DO THAT IF HE WASNT A SIGNIFICANT THREAT TO HER!!??!

No. She wouldn’t waste her time and energy on someone she didn’t think was capable of actually getting in her way.

WHEN SHE GETS HER FIREBENDING BACK SHE HAS THE OPTION OF ATTACKING BADASS METAL BENDING TOPH AND THE FUCKING AVATAR WHO DOES SHE ATTACK?!?!

Azula never underestimated the power of non benders especially an intelligent one like Sokka. Sokka was a huge threat to fucking Azula on multiple occasions. 

Remember that.

Look at this spot on fucking discourse. LOOK AT IT.

Just thought I’d drop this 

into the debate as well, (instead of actually fighting him she backs off, and who blames her? Sokka’s club looks like it could shatter bones…).

Along with this:

Scenes with Azula confronting Sokka are few and far in between but they paint a pretty interesting picture, don’t they? 

I mean, Azula’s friends/most trusted warriors were two non-benders. Mai was an expert with thrown weapons and Tai Lee was the only chi blocker shown in the first series, and she was able to take down half a groups of earth nation soldiers like that. Azula knows that non-benders are dangerous and she sees sokka for the genius he is

She’s knows she can take bending, she can redirect fire and she’s fought Katara a lot- but unlike Zuko she was probably never trained with weapons, she knows she has no defense to a sword or a club, and she knows that one of Ty Lee’s biggest advantage is that people underestimate her

Let me sum this up;

It doesn’t matter how much crazy magic bullshit you have, a sword to the face is a sword to the face. 

My man Sokka getting the recognition he deserves