#89 Earthquake

[newsbrand]

Larry June & The Alchemist - 89 Earthquake (Official Music Video)

Here is a music video that I forgot to post months ago but here you go!

[musictyme]

Larry June & The Alchemist - 89 Earthquake

[emperornorton47]

Cats as Earthquake Predictors

Every time there's an earthquake here in California, right after "Did you feel it?", people ask "Did your pets act crazy just before the quake?"

My cats tend to sleep through the moments before earthquakes and sometimes through the actual quake. If you expect them to monitor seismic rumblings in the Earth, they do a terrible job of it. They do what they normally do: sleep like the meatloafs that they are.

There's the story of two earthquakes in China. Before the first one, people saw animals acting crazy. So they evacuated their homes. When the ground did indeed shake, many thousands were saved.

In the second case, the animals went about their business. Then the quake hit. Thousands died.

I think the first story might well be urban legend. The only time when I saw a rumbler affect animal behavior was _after_ the Quake of '89 when all the cats in our apartment complex went into hiding. We did not see them for a few days.

The USGS page that asks people if they felt it does not include a question about animal behavior. The experts don't put much stock in the stories. Neither do I.

[nyaskitten]

maybe he IS the First Spinjitsu Master. He's already got the continent-splitting and Wu dad-ness anyways

WOAH!!! We have an official measuring unit people!!!!

[heartlaboratory]

Claudia, one of your friends, invited you to attend to her beach volley match. The match is held indoor so, given the fact that its summer and in this country summer is also very humid, temperatures are going to be torrid. Beside this fact you're still quite surprised to see that the majority of the players are playing naked, females too (in this parallel univers human are not ashamed by their own bodies). After all sweating is the best way to cool down. She's quite skinny but look really good with that blue bikini, you always liked her so, secretely, you're very happy to see her playing covered just with air. Given the fact that the playground is going to be free the whole day, organizers decided to complete the tournament without skippying to next day.

Some hours have passed and she has played for a lot of time now. Room temperature went higher than 36°C for the whole last matches and now Claudia looks pretty torn. She's always been a warrior, someone who don't surrender easily but all that jumping in this particular condition had an effect on her too. She's covered by sweat, her skin has assumed a reddish tone and her panting has become so deep anyone can clearly hear her fast inspirations and exales. The thing that tunrs on a light in your mind though is the fact that her entire upper body is rhythmically shaking like it's thrusted by a sort of internal earthquake. You suddenly realize that you recently activated a medical app on your phone developped at the laboratory where you work that makes possible medical analises through the phone camera thanks to experimental sensors placed in the camera. You activate the app and feel pretty lifted up by the fact you already added her profile. A thin ensamble of laser rays, almost invisible, is projeced towards her and the selected target orgal (obviously Claudia's heart) becomes visible on the screen. Her heart is beating like crazy, not only considering the pace but also the strenght of each beat, the app says her heart is beating at around 195 bpm but it's probably even higher. It's something that is completely out of any safety zone for someone who is 34 years old... and not even a younger person should push its heart like this. The device can also work as a digital stethoscope and by wearing headphones to listen to her you remained schoked. Her blood is pushed so violently that it's making strange wooshing-like noises by rubbing against her heart internal structures, sounds that almost cover up her slamming valves. Suddenly the software gives a diagnosis: High cardiac risk- probability of a sudden cardiac arrest of 89%-potentially lethal arrhythias occurring. By looking at her detected heart electrical activities, her organ is so over-stimulated that PVCs and VTACs burst are already present. You know exactly what to do, Claudia's life has an 89% probability to end in the next few minutes and it's increasing. You decide to get up from your seat and run towards the referee to show him the analysis of your device. One of the players' heart is going to stop very soon.

A second before you move, on the ecg a strange beat appears and suddenly Claudia's heart interrupts any activity, it doesn't even fibrillate, it just ceases to beat as silence arises from your headphones. Terrified you see her taking a couple of deep breath, the ball she was holding fell on the ground and her left hand is placed in between her bare breasts... after a moment she collapses on the ground.

You have always wanted to place your hand on her chest to feel her heartbeat but now you have to do this to make it beat again. CPR has to be started immediately.

[rainbowdaisy13]

*As always, these are my thoughts and connections Im making as I watch—I do not claim to know anything secret or for this to be taken as fact*

So we start out the Spotify Video with a pan out of the whole scene which is essentially Taylor-World with her as the centerpiece—song choice is Cruel Summer which is heavily Kaylor coded

The next scene is these two people in love in what we find out later is Taylor’s eye. Shes wearing Miss Americana and the other person is a taller woman with her face covered by leaves—why would her face need to be covered? The infamous red scarf is present which has now become a symbol for Taylor’s affections (IBYTAM video)

Next we see the clock moving closer to Midnight and a woman dressed in lavendar answering the phone upside down. Shes got clock earrings on and seems to be real excited about whatever she’s talking about

Next a close up of the Lover House burning in Taylors hand—this symbolism is so important to Taylor it’s *the* thing she has in her hand—could’ve been anything but it’s that

Pan out and we get another tall face covered (again why can’t we see who these people are?) stranger step into frame next to the Sunset and Vine street crossing—a Gorgeous reference, which is also heavily Kaylor coded

We switch to seeing the clock again move closer to Midnight and hear the lyrics “I’m always waiting for you to be waiting below” as we see this gentlemen covered in clocks checking both his watches—is it time yet?? Is it happening?? I believe the people in yellow represent us in this fandom constantly checking our watches asking WHEN TAYLOR

Next we get an Angel / Devil scene where the dice seem to add up to 89 and 13 at different times. What interests me more is that the Angel first aims for the dice—she’s gonna kill The Game—and at the last second changes her mind and decides nope she’s gonna take down the Devil who is playing the Game

After the Angel presumably takes out the Devil, the clock finally strikes Midnight and an ensuing earthquake appears shaking everyone up—this is wild to me—once we meet her after Midnight she knows the world will be shaken by her truth. But don’t worry! Tree is there measuring the aftershocks and noting how TS The Business is impacted

Next we get shots of a girl with her face covered playing guitar, 2 people fishing, and people dancing in the snow in a cave—if yall have any connections with those add on, nothing super jumped out to me. I DID love the Fox peaking out of the KT boot though

Then we see another person in yellow trying to see through the leaves in the snowglobe—again I think this represents this fandom. There’s also another woman in Orange, with her face covered, sitting next to a dog that resembles Karlie’s dog

And my fave part where it all comes together, the closing shot of all the small people in Taylor World is again focused on the 2 lovebirds—it’s revealed they are in Taylor’s eye, and she winks as we hear “I don’t wanna keep secrets just to keep you”

A Masterpiece as always well done Mastermind

[animefeminist]

Evangelion, alienation, and Japan’s 1990s economic crisis

Francis Fukuyama suffered more than a few oversights when he first theorized his “end of history.” It was understandable—it was 1989 and the vibe was different. It had been morning in America for almost an entire decade and only a matter of time before the Berlin Wall and communism finally fell to their knees. It’s natural that at such a moment a capitalist ideologue like Fukuyama would wax poetic about history rendering Marxism antiquated; capitalism, as he saw it, had resolved all class conflict in America.

It is clear in hindsight that Fukuyama was a little too sunny in his analysis of America. While the global control of capitalism seems here to stay, given it is easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism, the social problems it creates are felt deeply by all in America except the extremely wealthy. However, Fukuyama reserved some of his most blissfully optimistic predictions for his ancestral homeland. Japanese society, as he saw it, had become an economic utopia; the tenth page of Fukuyama’s original ‘89 thesis states that “the very fact that the essential elements of economic and political liberalism have been so successfully grafted onto uniquely Japanese traditions and institutions guarantees their survival in the long run.”

It would only take a few short years before these lofty predictions hit their snag. Japan’s bubble economy suffered an explosive pop in 1992, resulting in a recession that plagued the nation for years to come. The early signs of misfortune came in waves: the Nikkei index had fallen below 15,000 by the time August had rolled around, corporations were forced to engage in massive lay-offs and hiring freezes, and chaos erupted all over the Japanese government. Bureaucrats and businessmen alike were embroiled in scandal after scandal after scandal after scandal, opening wide a revolving door of an inconsistent 11 prime ministers in 12 years. The Kobe earthquake and Tokyo subway attacks administered a coup de grace on any semblance of optimism, throwing the entire nation into a spiritual crisis. 

Read it at Anime Feminist!

[nfcomics]

BATMAN NO MANS LAND OMNIBUS HC VOL 02 • cover art • Bill Sienkiewicz [Sept 2022]

Months after a massive earthquake cut off Gotham City from the rest of the United States, Batman and his allies are still struggling to maintain law and order. When an unlikely savior arrives offering to help rebuild Gotham, their assistance might come at a grave cost.

The epic conclusion to Gotham’s darkest hour includes all of the crossover issues from one of the biggest story events in DC Comics history.

Contains: Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight no.122-126; Azrael: Agent of the Bat no.58-61; Batman no.569-574; Batman: Shadow of the Bat no.89-94; Detective Comics no.736-741; Catwoman no.75-77; Robin no.68-73; The Batman Chronicles no18; Nightwing no.38-39; Batman No Man's Land no.0; Batman: No Man's Land Secret Files no.1

Written by Chuck Dixon, Greg Rucka, Dennis O'Neil, and others Art by Dale Eaglesham, Scott McDaniel, and others (W) Various (A) Various (CA) Bill Sienkiewicz

[stoneqoldcrazy]

I headcanon that Harvey is half white half any other race tbh. I have this headcanon because I think it'd be neat as him being mixed-race would show how duality has always been an important part of his life. Duality comes to play in this with him having one foot in White/American culture and another foot in Hispanic, Native, or Black culture. Living with two different cultures that make up who he is, pretty much. I just think it'd be a neat thing to see.

Another reason why is because he can canonically speak spanish as seen in The Batman Chronicles #16 (I know that speaking spanish doesnt make you latino but I'm just pointing these things out), and in that same comic, he stays and helps out the mexican community in gotham after the earthquake and stuff. He also definitely does Not look white in the batman animated series like come On. And not to mention that Billy Dee Williams, a black man, could've played the role of 2face (he voiced him in the lego movie though) and was 2face's design in the comic Batman '89.

[remembertheplunge]

They talk earth quake there

12/30/1989

I drove to the sun.. Its warmth pervaded my soul. My warmth reached out and joined it. We both glowed through cool grey mists and the  electric blue blanket sky. And, the beacon of December 31 guided us home through the holy terror black cold blanket and I am home and I am alive.

They talk Earthquake there.

The 880 still shoots off in double fisted fashion into the cool air like some saddened amputee.

“My best friend’s boss would have been free of the upper freeway  in 3 seconds" said Richard at the Twin Peaks Bar. “His was the silver car that  they showed on TV…” Free flashlights were given out on the Castro. The Castro came through the earth quake alright. “It’s built on a rock.” “We saw a plume of smoke coming up from the Marina like a bomb had gone off” The Marina is built on landfill from ruins of the 1906 quake.

People are scared.

The City was quiet. Calendar pages littered Market Street and Montgomery. I gathered up a few, including 2 from October 17. Bart on the way back was the most crowded ever. I wore my SCAP T shirt openly. I got weird looks.

1990 rang across bar walls and radio speakers. You’d think ’89 had been gone for months. “Get out of the damed past” said one radio DJ.

Oh, we Americans. Always living 10 paces ahead of our position.

There is so much sweet uniqueness sitting here on the brink.

I enjoyed slipping my ladle into the bucket of swirling days and confetti and lifting out choice fresh deep blue green memories who splashed and gurgled on my face and down my parched mind throat.

With the decade goes so much. I just wanted to sit in the parlor with them all one more time. The dear sweet fog enshrouds and encloses us tonight. It keeps our meeting place safe. Keeps it protected. Sweet, soft , gentle, touch, kiss of the now.

End of this part of the entry

Notes 6/6/2024

In the above entry I am describing my drive from the California central valley where I lived to San Fransisco and the Castro District on December 30, 1989. It must have been foggy in the valley and sunny in the Bay Area. There had been a 7.1 earth quake in the Bay Area on October 17, 1989. It was called the Loma Prieta Quake.

It caused a large section of the upper level of the 880 freeway in Oakland to collapse into the bottom section, crushing the silver car mentioned in the entry. The Marina District was heavily damaged, but, the Castro came through ok because it was built on “a rock”. 

A tradition in San Fransisco was, and may still be , to. drop pages from the years calendar out of the building windows around New Years.

I wore my Stanislaus County Aids Project T shirt on Bart. (I was a volunteer with the project. We supportd people with Aids through their illness and death). BART is and was then Bay Area Rapid Transit. You could see the collapsed 880 freeway from the Bart train.

The Twin Peaks is and was then a gay bar located at Market and Castro Street, San Fransisco.

[artemistorm]

Would you be interested in writing something Four/Shadow? Anything at all!

While I’m not much for shipping in general, I do have headcanon about Four and Shadow black cats that you can take however you want. (1354 words)

*****

At last, Four found himself alone.

He was hiding way back in a narrow alleyway between two random shops in the Village of Men that bordered two sides of the Gerudo Town walls. This was the home of the families, the husbands and non-Gerudo children of the Gerudo women and girls who lived inside the City’s walls. And given that this was a desert, it was hot.

Four leaned against the plastered wall and slid to the ground, sitting behind a couple crates and pots and not visible from the street. He and the rest of the Chain were given “Town Pass” as Warriors called it, freedom to go anywhere or do anything in the local area for two days as long as it wasn’t harmful, destructive, or illegal.

They certainly needed the downtime. Traveling in the blazing desert tended to make young hot-blooded heroes irritable at best or downright defiant and combative at the worst (cough cough Wind cough cough). And Four was tired of constantly being surrounded by people.

Four settled in to consume the hydromelon lemonade and goat meat hand pie he’d purchased in the market and read the newspapers he’d picked up from his Grandfather the last time they were in his Hyrule. His grandfather had saved him quite the stack of the twice weekly papers and Four had only made it a third of the way so far through the stack in his offtime in the evenings and on days of rest.

A stray black cat appeared from between the crates and rubbed against his leg.

“Hello kitty,” Four said and gave it a couple pets. “I hope you’re not here for my meat pie. It’s my brunch and I don’t feel like sharing.”

“Rrrror?” The cat trilled. It rubbed against him a few more times, then settled into to sniff-inspect his boots intently. Four ignored the cat and unfolded the first newspaper in the stack.

LOCAL FARMER BURNS DOWN OWN BARN TO DESTROY SNAKE INFESTATION

VILLAGE ELDER MARRIED AT LAST AT AGE 89

FERRYMAN’S DAUGHTER DROWNS IN MYSTERIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES

ALMANAC FORECASTS HEAVY SUMMER STORMS

“Mrrrp?” Four looked down to see a second black cat sitting politely and expectantly next to him.

“Well hello there,” He gave the cats ears a polite scratch.

“Mrrrr?” The cat asked again.

“What? Do you want some meat?” Even though he’d told the other cat off, Four couldn’t say no to those round amber eyes. He offered the cat a chunk of goat meat from his hand pie, but the cat promptly turned around and walked away without so much as a sniff.

“Fine then. I’ll eat it myself,” Four popped it in his mouth and carried on reading.

PRINCESS BEGINS TOUR OF HYRULE’S REGIONAL CAPITALS

FLOODS DESTROY BRIDGE AT ECTON VILLAGE ROAD

ANONYMOUS BENEFACTOR GIVES GENEROUS DONATION TO BOXHILL CHILDREN’S HOME

BELL PEPPER BUMPER CROP EXPECTED THIS SEASON

Four jumped, startled when a third black cat leapt down from somewhere onto his shoulders and then to the ground.

“Kitty! I almost spilled my drink!” He exclaimed, dismayed. The cat ignored him and instead bumped heads with one of the other cats which lounged beside him on the cool shaded packed earth. The new cat lair down between the other two and stretched out long and languid. The cats didn’t seem to want anything from him other than his company, which Four was fine with. He came here to get away from interaction after all.

CATTLE RANCHER’S TODDLER ACTUALLY A CHANGELING

NUMEROUS REPORTS OF CLOTHED MICE FROM CHILDREN IN THREE VILLAGES

EARTHQUAKE RATTLES CASTLETOWN, CAUSES MINOR DAMAGE

LOST HORSE RECOVERED IN EXTRAORDINARY CIRCUMSTANCES

Four finished his drink and set it aside, then blinked in surprise when he realized there were in fact now seven black cats laying next to him on the ground.

“Where did you all come from?” He asked the one laying with its back against his leg. “Are you all part of the same family? The same cat colony?” The cat looked up at him, slow blinked, then yawned.

“I thought so,” Four said stroking its fur. The cat stretched along the entire length of Four’s legs. The other cats laid along the wall two cats wide except for the cat on the end which was curled up in a perfectly circular disk. The cats were arranged next to him almost like they were his… shadow.

It was just coincidence, Four told himself, but his heart clung to the smallest fragment of hope. He quickly went back to reading.

SUTTON NOBLES ADOPT NEW FAMILY CREST

DEFENSIVE CASTLE BUILT ON LAKESHORE TO BE COMPLETED NEXT FALL

FAMOUS MUSIC TROUPE TO PERFORM AT AMPITHEATER ON SOLSTICE

BANDITS SEIZE CONTROL OF MONASTERY FRUIT ORCHARD

The noises of the village and the market grew louder as the morning wore on. The sun shifted and shadows shifted as the sun drifted back down toward the horizon, but the cats stayed only in the shade, refusing to let even the tips of their tails touch the sunlight. Four crossed his legs so that they wouldn’t burn in the ever-rising sunlight. The alleyway was rapidly warming up and Four started to think about finding somewhere else to escape the heat.

“What do you guys do when it gets too hot out?” Four asked. “Where do you go? A cave or an underground den perhaps?” There were only six cats still there, apparently one of them had left. Still they were arranged beside him in a pattern like what his shadow would take—if he still had one.

Four folded up the paper he finished and moved on to the next one.

RARE WATERSPOUT SPOTTED NEAR COASTAL VILLAGE

LOCAL FARMER CONVICTED OF SETTING RIVAL FARM ON FIRE

Four was starting to feel warm and thirsty. The shade he occupied rapidly dwindled and two more of the cats were no longer there, undoubtably seeking shady respite somewhere else. But Four might be able to read a few more articles before the heat chased him out of his secluded refuge.

SCHOOLBOYS INVENT NEW POTTERY STYLE

FAMILY OF ORPHAN CHILDREN SUCCESSFULLY RUN FRUIT RANCH ON THEIR OWN

It was too hot to finish reading the article. Already Four could feel his arms starting to sunburn. The sun was almost directly overhead; high noon was upon him. Only one cat remained beside him, sitting next to him in the narrow strip is shade still remaining along the wall.

“So you’re the last one, eh?”

“Mrow,” The cat replied.

“I’ve enjoyed your company, hopefully as much as you all seemed to enjoy mine,” Four scratched the cat’s cheeks and head and it leaned into his hand, but only for a moment.

“I’m off now, I’ll probably go to the underground lake I’ve heard some of the locals—and my younger brothers—mention. Go swimming or something.”

The cat licked his arm once, stared into Four’s eyes for another moment, then turned and walked off down the alleyway. Four gathered his things and departed in the other direction, trying not to read too much into what had just happened. He probably would never see those cats again.

Except that he did.

They kept showing up wherever Four went. If he was in the market, one of them would rub against his leg then vanish into the crowd. If he was at the inn, two of them would watch him come and go from their perch in the rafters of the common room. When he walked along the streets, several would follow him for a block or two. Wherever he went, they were there. Four didn’t quite understand their behavior, but it gave him comfort to know that he wasn’t alone.

Even after they left the desert and left that Hyrule, everywhere he went, black cats inexplicably seemed to gravitate toward him. Four conflicted. Was it a sign? Was it a sign? Was Shadow still out there? Still alive somewhere and trying to communicate with him through the behavior of black cats? Or was his own mind playing tricks on him? Was he hyper aware and hypervigilant of black cats now?

Maybe he’d never know.

[gayleviticus]

dont know how to really put this into words and its not a very Easter-y post per se but something ive been thinking abt, and especially since Good Friday, is almost... how slender yet hugely significant a thread the passion of Jesus is in the Christian Bible?

my NRSV is 1102 pages (897 without deuterocanon). the Gospels take up 89 of those pages. 8-10% of the Christian Bible is about the life of Jesus (although ofc the rest of the NT is about unpacking what that means). and then the passion itself is an even smaller slice.

i often pray the catholic liturgy of the hours, which is at its core a bunch of psalms and then some other miscellaneous stuff depending on the time of day, and something i oddly appreciate abt it is all this time spent with OT Psalms makes explicitly Christian stuff like the Trinity or Jesus more exciting when it pops up, because you feel their absence a bit?

Christianity is very Jesus-drenched, and obviously that's because he's literally the core and namesake of the religion. but i sorta feel like sometimes it can be too much. Jesus overload. the significance of what it means for God to become human flesh and suffer and die as the culmination of this whole century-long epic of redemption fades a little. we don't always appreciate Jesus as the climax to the story because we start with him as the beginning.

sometimes i go thru phases where I spend most of my Bible reading time in the Old Testament, and for various reasons - it's got a different feel and scope, it speaks to different things (more of an emphasis on societal social justice), it's more dramatic in certain ways, it has nice poetry, it has a very rich tradition of people getting angry with God and pouring out their souls in suffering.

but i think deliberately spending this time away from the NT makes me appreciate what a big deal the Incarnation is - and i feel a bit in awe of the way that all the threads in this massive story of God's work culminate in the life of just one guy and his humiliating, brutal, embarrassing murder. A story that's weaved its way through global floods and plagues and revolution and kingdoms and wars and exile finds its thesis statement in One Man standing before Pilate, beaten by soldiers, dragging his cross through the streets, nailed to a tree.

it's a bizarre kind of narrative understatement. the Bible rejects the temptation of many a long-running franchise to go bigger and bigger, to keep on raising the stakes, and instead sits you down with the most humiliating, degrading, hopeless moment in Jesus' life and says: this is the face of God. This is what God looks like. The Lord is not to be found in whirlwinds nor earthquakes nor fire but in the face of the oppressed, the falsely accused, the suffering.

of course, there's a cosmic dimension to it as well. in a sense as it simultaneously lowers the physical stakes to one man, one soul, the Passion is also raising the cosmic stakes tremendously. 'now is the judgment of the world, now is the ruler of this world cast out - and i, when i am lifted up, will draw all people to myself.'

but on the face of it, the idea that it should be this Holy Week that's the crux of the story - not the great flood, not the destruction of Jerusalem, not the apocalyptic terrors of Revelation - is a bit odd, and for that endless fascinating to me.

[brookebeebe-blog]

July 12 - Tour of Taipei 101

Today, we got to tour Taipei 101, which used to be the world’s tallest building and had the world’s fastest elevator from 2004-2015. On the first few floors, there were a bunch of designer brand stores like Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Tiffany, and Cartier. There was a huge food court at the bottom too. It was funny because McDonald’s probably had the longest line out of every other restaurant. The main attraction is of course the observation deck, but the elevator was honestly probably my favorite part. It was crazy how fast we went up 89 floors. The observation deck had a café, shops, and backgrounds for pictures. After the tour, some of us split up and got lunch. The food was pretty good, and extremely cheap for how much we got! The staff was super helpful because we had gone to a restaurant a bit out of our budget, but we explained how much we wanted to pay and the waiter told us he would pick out specific foods in our budget for all of us to eat. They were all shrimp oriented, which was very interesting because shrimp would be more pricey in America. Maybe it’s a cheaper protein option here? Then, we all went to the mall and finally figured out the train station to come back home with the help of a local who spoke English.

Academic Reflection

The reading today was based on the structural integrity and engineering behind Taipei 101 and a bit about its cultural significance. The tower was opened in late 2004, but it was an engineering feat because Taiwan is exposed to both earthquakes and high winds, which both call for separate designs. Earthquakes require the building to be flexible in order to distribute the energy and a sturdy frame is best suited against high winds. In order to counteract this, a damper was placed, which is a basically a huge pendulum hung from the 92nd floor. It sways in winds, so the building does not. To counteract the damage an earthquake could cause, the building was formed with a pliant steel exoskeleton. Lastly, the architecture of the building reflects Chinese culture. The building is composed of tiers and each one expands outward as it rises. which signifies financial success and vitality. I got to see the incredible damper in person, along with the architecture. I will attach pictures of the damper and building below!