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Okay but does anyone else think the Kracken could have just been what a pack of 1000+ squid in a feeding frenzy looks like from the surface? Because that’s a lot of tentacles and I sure wouldn’t waste time sticking my head under the foaming water to get a clearer look.

I know it's unfair vilification and stuff but it's also a lot of fun to see old media and stuff where people were SO scared of big animals like lions, sharks, crocodiles and wolves were fully expected to just come and eat you the moment you stepped into their territory. In older media we also made that assumption about gorillas and in still older we thought it'd be whales. But some animals that will actually fuck you up got left behind. Boars will kill you and eat you. They're way more likely to do so than any of those other things actually. Hippos, obviously, got off like bandits always being depicted as cute and dopey. And then there's the squids. Not giant kraken size squids. The eight foot squids that hunt in packs and will fuck you up if you fall in the water at night. I can't BELIEVE people slept on that. It's like all they cared about were the huge deep sea ones we never see. The medium size wolf pack squids were right there.

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I can’t get over the implication that Lindsey expects op to carry this cadaver with them long enough to have it on hand when they text her back.

Some guy in an avengers Tshirt I just met at a coffee shop: so who's your favorite superhero?

Me too exhausted to explain there's more than one Robin: Batman

Guy: oh! Did you watch the Joker movie? It was surprisingly good for a DC film haha

Me: yeah it was something

Guy: you know they really fucked up on Justice League, but I've got to say Wonder Woman was better than Captain Marvel. Like, we get it, "yay girl power." That's great but it was so over the top. It totally ostracized half of it's audience.

Me: wow really

Guy: yeah. You know, you seem pretty chill. Maybe we could hang out sometime and watch some decent superhero movies? You know, Marvel movies haha

Me: i never asked, who's your favorite hero?

Guy: Iron Man. Like Batman but richer and cooler haha

Me: you know, Batman's rule? No killing?

Guy: yeah?

Me: i have no such rule. Lindsey, I found another one. My usual, please

Lindsey, the barista: *hands me my sword*

Guy: wow that's a poor replica of the God Killer blade, it should have more- *beheaded*

Me: thank god that's over

Lindsey: yeah. Hey want to watch Birds of Prey with me sometime?

Me: oh? You mean like as... a date?

Her: well yeah... is that okay?

Me: of course it's okay! all this time, all these years, i never knew you felt that way

Her: i don't keep a replica of Wonder Woman's sword under the counter for just anyone

Me: i never thought about it that way

Her: *writes her number on the forehead of dead guy* text me ;)

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It’s beyond true that rich neighborhoods don’t DO public transportation. But I live in a rural area that recently clear cut a bunch of forrest to out in a collection of massive ugly McMansions and the thing rich people Do love is golf-carts. They drive them on roads, on sidewalks, on park trails, on yards, on all sorts of places they’re not supposed to.

I absolutely believe Jack Drake would have one of these outrageously overpriced golf carts that he’s never home to use, and I can absolutely see Tiny Timmy driving it far enough into Gotham to access a buss stop.

Is there any confirmation that Tim was born Gotham City? It’s said that he moved a lot growning up, but was it just around Gotham? The USA? The whole world? Does canon even specify that?

Fun Fact: New 52!Tim is actually from New York City.

We don't have a specific on page confirmation that Tim was born in Gotham, however the Drakes as a family are very much from Gotham. Tim mentions during Gates of Gotham #1 that his grandfather called the bridges "the Gates", an old turn of the 20th century term for the main bridges. The family have been in Gotham a long time.

Every house we know about is in Gotham: there are several different apartments or condos mentioned over the years in various parts of the city proper. Jack was uncomfortable about the idea of a move out to Bristol as it was too quiet and he was used to the city itself. Drake Industries was headquartered in Gotham.

Tim hypothetically could have been born somewhere else, if you want Jack and Janet travelling around even while Janet is extremely pregnant or getting stuck in a city when Janet was no longer cleared to fly, but he's from Gotham, as is his father and grandfather.

(Witness protection not!Tim Drake from n52 aside)

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No one lays a lily on their grave…

UnitedHealthcare CEO shooting (4 December 2024)

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

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The problem with loving something is that once you reach a certain level of affection for a thing you enjoy; a switch flips in your brain and it becomes “important”. Then the demand avoidance kicks in and prevents you from doing the thing for no other reason than that you love it too much.

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at 3 am

Tim: You can say 'Have a nice day!' without a problem.

Tim: But you can't say 'Enjoy the next 24 hours' without sounding vaguely threatening.

Jason: How the fuck did you get into my safehouse again?!

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The Sound of Music (1965) dir. Robert Wise

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I want to thank everyone who updated fic this week. I don’t think you know how essential your work is to maintaining my emotional stability right now, and I think I’m probably not alone. Thank you.

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I was really anxious when someone told me Bards (my favorite class) would use “prepared spells” instead of “known spells” in the new rule book. There’s a reason I never played “prepared” castors in 5e. The idea of changing out my spell list every rest stressed me out. What if I pick the wrong thing?

I needn’t have worried

Bards aren’t changing, we’re just using the same words to describe two entirely different mechanics. I’m sure this streamlining of language will be the cause of no confusion or strife whatsoever around our game tables.

There is a chart to solve these arguments waaay later in chapter 7:

The description of spell preparation here also just makes me sad. We’re just preparing spells “in our mind”. There’s no explanation for why this works so differently for different classes.

In 5e we were told that during a long rest the Wizard prepared by studying their spellbook, the Druid by meditating, and the Cleric by praying to their deity. These were maintenance practices that flowed naturally from their relationship to the source of their understanding and power.

It made sense that a bard, sorcerer, or warlock would learn things more slowly over time and work from a more limited pool since their relationship to magic isn’t so straightforward. They gained their understanding more slowly (or in the case of warlocks haphazardly) over time.

This book has stripped away the flavor of the classes leaving behind sterile mechanics that do little to inspire the imagination of a new player building a character.

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I don’t know if I can explain to you all how bad a read the new D&D Player’s Handbook is. This needs editing just so desperately. It’s possibly the most redundant thing I’ve ever read.

Here’s some samples from the Feats Section:

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Easter was started in 325 by the Council of Nicaea. Christians who pay attention to the boring history bits might recognize this as the council that defined what a Christian is with the advent of the Nicaean Creed.

After the first few books of the New Testament that chronicle the life and teachings of Jesus most of the rest of the new testament is about the early church differentiating itself from the practice of Judaism and a lot of trial and error in power structures and over-reach as they tried to learn to love like Christ. The Gospel was meant for every Tribe and Nation and Tongue and the very first hurdle was learning to accept gentiles and letting go of the Jewish Law from the old-testament (Note: American Evangelicals work very very hard to avoid most of the rest of the New Testament with the exception of Titus 2 and several other favored passages, instructions about the acceptable and unacceptable behavior of the church are very inconvenient to western power structures.) the long and short of it is that by the 300s the church was spread throughout the Roman Empire and really didn’t care about the Jewish calendar at all.

Most of our modern holidays commemorate specific historical events. We observe chosen anniversaries. It’s natural for us to assume that the historicity was central to the decision.

Holidays at the time were more metaphorical observations. Set aside time to reflect on a concept and honor a deity. They did it in a matter similar to many of the contemporary pegan practices; based on the solar and lunar calendars (and also badly.)

It was decided Easter would be the First Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. (This resulted in more conflict as Eastern and Western churches disagreed about how to calculate the vernal equinox)

I think people from a Christian background probably think Easter is a Jewish holiday because it's so tired to Passover in Christian tradition. According to the Christian Bible, Jesus was betrayed during a Passover sedar. So I think they probably think something like Jesus was Jewish, he was celebrating a holiday, we celebrate Easter, so Easter must be a Jewish holiday.

lemme see if I can parse this out; my brain is on standby mode rn.

Step one: jesus is jewish. Okay, got that.

Step two: he was betrayed during a passover seder. I've heard this said a lot, but I've never seen any proof? Idk I'll look it up later, people have probably given it a lot of thought.

Step three: this is where I'm getting lost. Why is easter tied to pesach? What happened on easter that people attach it to pesach?

Step four: jesus celebrated pesach (still don't get how it's tied to easter!) And that's why easter is jewish?

Huh?

I think I had someone tell me that pesach is translated in Spanish as "jewish easter" so I thought THAT was where the confusion came from.

Also all the pesach appropriation but like. Yeah.

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Not to be THAT fan, but those Ukranian scientists need a new field of research.

Probably nothing that focuses explicitly on rockets or DNA. They don’t want to draw the attention of the same people after their kid now, but they could start over in a new field that still utilizes their skill sets. Something obscure and niche.

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So here’s what gets me. Everyone has cameras in their phones. If you are selling a product online you have access to a camera.

So WHY all the bad photo-shop and ai on shopping sites?

You can just put up a real picture of the thing, you don’t have to go to all this trouble faking it poorly. It exists, you have it, you can just show it to me.

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I appreciate that there’s a montage indicating a visual medium, but we also know the air smells of acetone.

A faithful adaptation of this premise will demand the presence of a 3rd character to convey the scent to our audience. Someone who hasn’t grown numb to the fragrance with prolonged exposure.

Is it the master’s personal cook? A visiting delivery boy dropping off his weekly order of cotton swabs? The student’s unglamorous monochromatic rival?

A master to his action-hero trainee says, "Your movements are sloppy. You lack awareness of your body when you fight. Your hands move and yet you do not hold them in your mind's eye. Come. We will remedy this."

And then the master paints his trainee's fingernails and orders the trainee to complete a series of complicated tasks without smudging the nail polish.

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DC premise I don’t see enough of

Massive Villain attacks a significant public event.

JL dealing with actual threat, but Titans or YJ are stuck on crowd control, including wrangling person-of-interest Bruce Wayne’s nepo-brat.

This entitled squirt does not seem to care that they’re here to protect him. He keeps trying to give them the slip.

Mostly they just wish Robin was here because he’d know how to Deal with this conniving little hellion.

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I want this more than I want daylight savings time ended

From NPR this morning:

President Biden called for term limits and an enforceable ethics code for Supreme Court justices yesterday. The White House said that the proposal would appoint a justice every two years to spend 18 years in active service to the Supreme Court. He also called on Congress to pass binding, enforceable conduct and ethics rules that require high court justices to disclose gifts, refrain from public political activity and remove themselves from cases if they or their spouses have financial or other conflicts of interest. The president also called for a constitutional amendment that would limit the broad immunity presidents now enjoy due to a recent Supreme Court decision.

...Yes please.

Le source: Up First briefing: Trump shooter update; Crypto and the 2024 election

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Reading Recommendations Pls

My new job is holding a reading challenge for the month of August.

1. A book with a knife on the cover

2. A book turned into a movie

3. A book recommended by a friend

4. A book that’s been on your TBR (to be read list)

5. A book set in the Pacific Northwest

6. A Rom-Com or A Beach Read

7. A Graphic Novel

8. A book that “everyone” but you has read

9. A book set in a different culture

10. A book whose author has passed away

Note: I don’t need graphic novel recommendations unless they also meet one of the other criteria, I purchased the first four issues of Witch Hat Atelier yesterday and am already head over heels for the series. That slot will fill itself.