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Child's Writing Exercises and Doodles, from Egypt, c. 1000-1200 CE: this was made by a child who was practicing Hebrew, creating doodles and scribbles on the page as they worked

This writing fragment is nearly 1,000 years old, and it was made by a child who lived in Egypt during the Middle Ages. Several letters of the Hebrew alphabet are written on the page, probably as part of a writing exercise, but the child apparently got a little bored/distracted, as they also left a drawing of a camel (or possibly a person), a doodle that resembles a menorah, and an assortment of other scribbles on the page.

This is the work of a Jewish child from Fustat (Old Cairo), and it was preserved in the collection known as the Cairo Genizah Manuscripts. As the University of Cambridge Library explains:

For a thousand years, the Jewish community of Fustat placed their worn-out books and other writings in a storeroom (genizah) of the Ben Ezra Synagogue ... According to rabbinic law, once a holy book can no longer be used (because it is too old, or because its text is no longer relevant) it cannot be destroyed or casually discarded: texts containing the name of God should be buried or, if burial is not possible, placed in a genizah.

At least from the early 11th century, the Jews of Fustat ... reverently placed their old texts in the Genizah. Remarkably, however, they placed not only the expected religious works, such as Bibles, prayer books and compendia of Jewish law, but also what we would regard as secular works and everyday documents: shopping lists, marriage contracts, divorce deeds, pages from Arabic fables, works of Sufi and Shi'ite philosophy, medical books, magical amulets, business letters and accounts, and hundreds of letters: examples of practically every kind of written text produced by the Jewish communities of the Near East can now be found in the Genizah Collection, and it presents an unparalleled insight into the medieval Jewish world.

Sources & More Info:

Cambridge Digital Library: Writing Exercises with Child's Drawings

Cambridge Digital Library: More About the Cairo Genizah Manuscripts

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SOUTH OF MIDNIGHT dev. Compulsion Games

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i mean this in the nicest way possible but making pieces of media your whole personality is not a good idea. not just cause individual authors can turn out to be horrible people that you might want to distance yourselves from later, but also because your self deserves to not be flattened by one story (no matter how important it seems to be). you deserve to be a person who cannot be defined in a few sentences.

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Fishy things

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Belphie made a super strange beep-screech when I picked him up, and I though “oh god, he’s got abdominal sensitivity, he’s ill,” but then I followed his line of sight and saw a large stick that I’d been inadvertently taking him away from.

so now he has his stick, and everything is fine

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i see a post talking doom and gloom about how we'll never escape toxic masculinity. i think about back in 2017 when american girl released their first boy doll, and a review for him went viral in the collecting community. the review was written by a mom, who said they went into the store to get their daughter a doll, only to see their son's eyes light up like fire when he saw a doll that looked like him, and now every night he puts his doll in pajamas and rocks him to sleep. i think about the toddler in my daycare room a few years back who was obsessed with baby dolls, carrying them everywhere, and his mom proudly told us he uses his sisters' old baby dolls and wants to be just like them. that toddler saw another toddler crying one day and gave her the doll he had to cheer her up. i think about the eight-year-old boy i saw a few years back, excitedly waving around raya's sword in a target checkout line like all his dreams were coming true. there was a video on my instagram the other day of a little boy at disneyworld crying with joy upon meeting his hero, mulan. i think about the voice actor for bow in the she-ra reboot saying his nephews only wanted adora action figures. celebrity men are wearing dresses on tv now. last halloween i saw a little boy dressed as elsa. i went to go see spiderverse over the summer, and in the line ahead of me was a boy who couldn't be older than twelve or thirteen, bouncing and beaming, giddy with excitement over getting to see the female-led romance movie elemental. i think about the five-year-old boy at my library who breathlessly asked me where the pinkalicious books were, eyes widening when i had more on my cart, his mom explaining that he is all about pinkalicious and fancy nancy. i saw so many pictures online of boys and men dressed in pink to see barbie. teenage boys are gonna open their phones and see the man who wrote fucking game of thrones dressed in pink to see barbie. when i was a kid, a boy dressing in pink was practically a social death sentence. there are boys running around in pink on my street right now.

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i would be a kittypet all the way in the warrior cats universe. if i heard a bunch of guys were in the woods killing each other for survival and they think i'm the lame one for getting mediocre banquets i would be like you guys are stupidd and then when the thunderclan medicine cat comes by my fenced lot to pick yarrow i would be like what are doing and shes like medicine so my clanmates don't die and i'm like wow you guys really have it that rough. and she keeps encountering me and one day i'm like why don't you come inside there's plenty of kibble and she averts her eyes shyly and is like ...no that would be against starclan and i'd go To have a little kibble? and she's like You know what i mean. and i do. 5 moons later she is getting adopted by my people and visions of her ancestors still haunt her and she is from time to time like Did I do the right thing...? how could i be so selfish...? and i'm like my toy mouse squeaks

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sir what flavor do you want your drink we have coca cola and swamp water

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having one of those executive function days where everything is too many steps

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One thing I appreciate about my cat son is that if he, who knows how it feels to be trapped in a room, so much as begins to suspect that I, his father, am trapped in a room, then he will immediately do everything in his meager power to rescue me

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blood bank keychain

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i call him and he runs over with his big sweet eyes