cnoocy

[cnoocy]

patricia allott, “tolstoi,” 1969, screenprint

[cnoocy]

One of my favorite historical tidbits is that Arab traders, for centuries, fooled Europeans into thinking cinnamon came from a rare, vicious and fearsome cinnamon bird.

The belief was so prevalent, in fact, that the mythical cinnamon bird shows up in the writings of Herodotus and Aristotle, all the way into medieval European manuscripts where it’s illustrated in all its fierce, cinnamony glory:

Pliny the Elder expressed skepticism of the bird in his writings, rightly assuming that it was a tale invented to keep control on the trade and prices by reducing competition, but the belief was already so widespread that it persisted in many areas into the early 1300’s.

[cnoocy]

wip :)

[cnoocy]

studying roman history is a fucking nightmare

[cnoocy]

can you imagine if trans people and allies said the kinds of things that transphobes who see themselves as reasonable and accepting are constantly saying

“look, im a lifelong democrat. you can believe whatever you want, and you should absolutely never be discriminated against for your belief that sex is immutable. i think it’s fine for there to be some bathrooms that aren’t gender-neutral if that makes a few people more comfortable. but stopping innocent children from using their preferred names at school or limiting people’s access to healthcare and demonizing anyone who disagrees is a step too far, and the anti-trans movement needs to recognize that”

[cnoocy]

Stoat in his winter coat, Kodiak, Alaska

krisluckphoto

[cnoocy]

ghost stories are alarmingly easy to spread tbh

when I was like ten I was walking back from the chip shop near my gran's house with a neighbour and we took a short cut down an alley which was enclosed by garages except for one part which was wire fenced and led to the electricity shack

and while I was walking I chucked a chip over the fence. the girl walking with me, C, reasonably asks why I did that

"oh, don't you know?" I say, as if I'm not equally out of my own loop

she shakes her head. the enclosed alleyway has no streetlights. it's after dark. the shack is isolated in the distance.

"a little girl who lived up on the court climbed the fence once on a dare. she went up to the shack and touched it, but there was a wire sticking out, and when she touched it, she got electrocuted and died, right there. if you come back in the daylight, you can still see the black mark."

[editor's note: the court was the smaller road off the side of the crescent, which was the one C's family and my gran lived on. the houses there were slightly more expensive and newer, almost all occupied by wealthy commuters to the city, where most of the crescent houses were occupied by retirees and locals who worked on the trading estate. naturally, crescent kids hated the court. houses there got bricked about once a month.]

"no she didn't," C says

I made up this story for absolutely no reason and with no plan, but I'm not gonna back down now. "sure she did. and if you go past on your way back from the shops and you don't leave her an offering, she'll follow you home through the streetlights. one flickers behind you, then the next, then the next, until you get home. and then the lights start to flocked inside the house. even if you turn out all the electrics before bed, it'll be too late. she's inside. and you'll wake up on the night and see her, and she'll be so awful to see it'll stop your heart."

[editor's note: the streetlights always flickered. this was because our neighbour monkey george kept setting the junction boxes on fire]

"I never did before and she never followed me home!"

"do you come down the alley after dark? or do you take the main road with the streetlights?" I knew she didn't use the shortcut, because I'd been the one to talk her into it that night. she was three years younger than me and scared of the dark.

C claims not to believe me, but she throws a chip over the fence too, and walks the rest of the way looking over her shoulder. I get to pride myself for the night on being good at scary stories, and don't think much more about it.

fast forward six or seven years. I'm back in town. I'm on my way back from the chip shop, taking the same shortcut home. ahead of me on the road are a couple of kids I vaguely recognise as old playmates' younger siblings.

they stop, and I watch one fish out three sweeties from the pack they're sharing. they take one each and throw them over the fence. they carry on walking.

I realise that this is probably my fault, as are any resulting pest control issues around the old electricity shack.

when I get to the fence, I throw a chip over.

[cnoocy]

Color practice by ICE VII

[cnoocy]

fuck it

had to eliminate some more specific ones for space, shout out to “intelligent alien species have not developed advanced technologies”

[cnoocy]

Accidentally bought my cat cantrip instead of catnip and now she’s casting eldritch blast at me from the overlook of her cat tree while demanding wet food only

[cnoocy]

Me: What a beautiful day.

The demon that lives in my refrigerator: You should learn Latin.

Me: *slams the fridge door on the demon’s hand* I think I shall go for a walk and not think about dead languages at all.

[cnoocy]

rb this to give the person you reblogged from a very tiny frog

[cnoocy]

PSA

"specialest girl" - the most special, likely sufferer of tummy ache

"specialist girl" - trained in operating advanced equipment

[cnoocy]

[cnoocy]

in some aspects tumblr users see a like but no reblog in the same way a business sees piracy as lost income

[cnoocy]

really enjoying all the videos Muslims have been posting of their cats looking like this

when the humans are up at 4 am for suhoor

[cnoocy]

A lunar eclipse…from both sides!!

On March 13-14, 2025, the Earth passed directly between the Sun and the Moon. Earth cast its shadow, turning the Moon's typically gray and cratered surface red, aka a "Blood Moon."

While NASA’s Glenn Research Center was looking up to see the Blood Moon Eclipse last night, Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lunar lander was looking back at us!

Perspective is everything….

Image Credit & Copyright:

- image 1: Credit: NASA/Sara Lowthian-Hanna

- image 2: Credit: Firefly Aerospace