#History of Medicine Division

[monkeyssalad-blog]

New York Medical College for Women by National Library of Medicine Via Flickr: Collection: Images from the History of Medicine (IHM) Publication: April 16, 1870 Format: Still image Abstract: Woman student dissecting the leg of a cadaver. Extent: 1 print Technique: wood engraving NLM Unique ID: 101436227 NLM Image ID: A013010 Permanent Link: resource.nlm.nih.gov/101436227

[wunderkammerett]

Photographs Illustrative of the Cololian Method of Treating Stiff Joints: Elbow Exercises by National Library of Medicine Via Flickr: Collection: Images from the History of Medicine (IHM) Format: Still image Extent: 1 photoprint. NLM Unique ID: 101406474 NLM Image ID: A023090 Permanent Link: resource.nlm.nih.gov/101406474

[bethanythebogwitch]

I listened to reading of some askreddit threads (don't judge me, it's a guilty pleasure) about doctors and healthcare and I notices some major division on topics when the answers were from the doctor's POV and patients' POV. I'm of course not qualified to draw conclusions from this, nor is Reddit a good place to get data, but here are some recurring points I found where the doctor and patient position appeared to be different.

Doctor POV: we can always tell when people are faking pain for opioids. It's extremely obvious.

Patient POV: multiple doctors accused me of drug seeking when I was actually in agony from stones, appendicitis, endometriosis, a tumor, etc.

Doctor POV: people who try to diagnose themselves are really annoying and counter productive.

Patient POV: I only figured out what was wrong with me by searching the internet after multiple doctors dismissed or failed to diagnose me. Alternatively: I went in with a good idea of what was wrong based on past experiences/family history/ etc and the doctors didn't take me seriously. Some would even refuse to do tests to check if the self-diagnosis was correct.

Doctor POV: the phrase "I know my body" is usually used by people who don't know what they're talking about. We are the ones who know medicine so we can tell if you're sick or not.

Patient POV: I knew something was wrong with me because I know my body and know when something isn't normal. The doctors wouldn't take me seriously and told me nothing was wrong after only doing basic tests.

Again, Reddit is not a good place to get data as the nature of the website encourages people posting more sensational stories and exaggerating or fabricating stories to get upvotes. In addition, most of these stories are likely far from the average doctor and patient experience. However, it appears that there may (emphasis, may) be a disconnect between doctors and patients that involves doctors not taking patients seriously and thinking they know better than patients about their own bodies. It seems like defaulting to thinking patients exaggerate pain to seek drugs and that patients don't have any way of understanding their own health is really detrimental.

Do not take this post as me saying you shouldn't go to the doctor. If you need medical help, go to the doctor. The medical system isn't perfect, but it's the best we have. And go to an actual doctor, not a naturopath, homeopath, or other quack.

[thatdisasterauthor]

@teagantheamazing Hope you don't mind, but I wanted to pull this reply out to talk about a little more in depth, because I think it is important that people understand this as we move forward.

Also, I am speaking as a private citizen here, not as an employee of the Forest Service.

In the United States, wildland fire response is handled at three basic levels: Federal, State, and Local.

Federally, it is further broken down into the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service. (Some parks have their own fire crews as well, but that varies from park to park, and they're usually still technically Forest Service.) There's really not a ton of difference between the two aside from whose name is on your paycheck. Pay is the same across each, structure is the same across each, training is the same across each. Federal crews and resources are, generally, the main and biggest responders to wildfires because wildfires tend to happen primarily on federal lands.

At the state and local level things vary a lot from state to state. You can have things like the Colorado Division of Fire Prevention and Control in Colorado and Cal Fire in California, and you can have local structure departments that also have wildland divisions and/or training. Some of the local departments will be volunteer. State and local responders also work closely with federal responders, but how much and for how long varies from fire to fire.

Then, on top of all of that, you have private/contract crews. They are what it says on the tin: private crews of firefighters. Some of these crews are great! Very professional, very skilled. Others are...ah...not.

Now, what I am concerned about specifically as we head into this new administration is what is going to happen at the federal level. As I mentioned in the original post, the Forest Service is already struggling. It has ALWAYS been struggling. Without giving you a whole huge history lesson, the Forest Service was founded in the early 1900s by Teddy Roosevelt to protect public lands and preserve them for future use. People threw a FIT about it, specifically people who wanted to basically strip mine the forests for every single available resource. Taft was elected after Roosevelt and basically started undoing everything his predecessor had done. The budget for the Forest Service was destroyed, protections were rolled back. The only reason the Forest Service survived was because in 1910 there was a MASSIVE fire. It was, at the time, unprecedented and the Forest Service was able to use it to lobby for better funding going forward. But the same cycle has repeated ever since. An administration that doesn't value conservation will come in, shred the budget, there will be deadly consequences that make the next administration pad the budget some, and then it will start again.

It's a lot like people who stop taking their medicine because they think they're cured since they feel better, but they only feel better because they were taking their medicine.

So what happens now? Well, it's already happening and it happened under Biden, and will only get worse under Trump. To keep it simple, there are two kinds of federal employment: seasonal, and year-round. Most of the federal Forest Service jobs are seasonal, because the work is seasonal. This includes firefighters, but it also includes things like park rangers and trail maintenance crews. From late spring to early fall there are tooooons of people working. Then, the rest of the year, its a skeleton crew of year-rounders doing mostly maintenance work, controlled burns, paperwork, stuff like that.

Now, with all of that said, here is where we stand at this specific moment: the decision has already been made that the Forest Service will not be hiring seasonal workers outside of firefighting next year. This means no seasonal park rangers, no seasonal maintenance people, none of that. This means next year parks are going to be a MESS. Bathrooms will not be cleaned regularly, campgrounds will not be maintained, trails will not be maintained, and a ton of other stuff. The year-rounder skeleton crew will be all we've got. And, crucially, there will be less professionals monitoring the woods looking for new fires. Rangers, even ones not working directly on fire stuff, are a crucial level of protection for spotting and reporting fires.

Secondary to that is the pay issue. Even if you're a year-rounder, the pay is abysmal. Your average out the gate, newbie wildland firefighter is going to make around $17/hr base pay if they work for a federal agency. Now, there's a ton of random stuff that can bump that pay up even without the retention bonus we're currently getting. You get a night differential and a Sunday differential for starters, and hazard pay when you are actively working a fire, plus there's ALWAYS overtime, sometimes an insane amount of it. Then there's per diem if you are traveling for a fire, and that can be a nice little bump too. But the point/problem is that the pay is VERY unpredictable. You can have a massively busy season and be swimming in money, or you can have a slow as fuck season and end up scrapping by because the base pay isn't enough. The Wildland Firefighter Paycheck Protection Act is supposed to fix this by bumping up the base pay, but that can has been kicked back and forth in the government for yeeeears now.

Now, as you mentioned, people CAN transfer their federal qualifications for fire to state and private crews. It generally pays better if you do. But we do not want to privatize fire response. Given the size of this country, given the spread of the population within it, we have to have a federal firefighting force. Leaving it to the states and private companies will not be enough.

That is where we are starting the new administration: abysmal pay, failing departments, and slimmed back hiring. Given Trump's repeated insistence on slimming down the government, on withholding aid in blue states, on getting rid of things like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (which is also crucial for firefighting), and other things in that vein, I think we are staring down the barrel of a very, very dangerous time.

So, some action items if you want to help:

Call your local representatives and insist they pass the Wildland Firefighter Protection Act NOW, before the new administration comes in. The new administration could still screw it up, but we've gotta at least try.

Be patient and understanding with Park Rangers in the coming years. They are doing their best with what they've got.

Take responsibility for your use of public lands. Clean up after yourself, pick up litter when you see it, and donate if there is a way for you to do so.

Educate yourself and your community on wildland fire even if you don't think you are in a wildland fire prone area. Learn about and implement defensible space around your homes and communities. I'll be doing a lot of education around this going forward, so if you have questions or want help please ask me!

[komsomolka]

Women in the GDR were the largest group to lose out through unification. They may now have access to material goods not available before, but they have been pushed back into dependence by a dominant ideology of women serving men. In the GDR, 88% of all adult women worked and another 8.5% were in full-time education, which meant that 96.5% took an active part in the wider social context outside the home and they also had their own income. Work was the basis for economic independence, a sense of self-worth, a place for communication and social interaction, not just a source for additional household income or, as some critics have argued, a state-imposed, obligatory activity.

Women were highly skilled - only 6% had no qualification at all, as against 24% of West German working women. In the GDR, 50% of all jobs in medicine and law were carried out by women and a third of women worked in technical professions.

Given the great importance that work represented to women in terms of their identity, unemployment on the scale, that happened after unification, had a devastating effect. Even after 20 years, on the territory of the former GDR, two thirds of the unemployed were women (in agriculture it was as much as 75%) and they made up at least 70% of the long-term unemployed. Post-unification, the labour market was biased against women; men had a better chance of finding alternative work. [...]

Although gender discrimination was by no means completely abolished in the GDR, this blatant disparaging of women as a group appeared like history going into reverse. This perception is underlined by the fact that, in the general hunt for jobs, children are now deemed to represent a problem. It is well-known that the GDR had excellent childcare facilities which made it possible to combine work and parenthood without financial hardship. In 1989, 68% of working women in the GDR had children under the age of 18, whereas in the Federal Republic it was only 25%. [...]

Unification brought another considerable change for women: the abolition of their right to an abortion on demand. In the GDR, since 1972, women had had the legal right to terminate their pregnancy free of charge within the first 12 weeks. West Germany has a penal code (paragraph 218) which states that abortion is unlawful and those who attempt to abort face up to three years in prison or a fine. After unification it became necessary to bring West German and East German law on this issue into alignment. In 1992, paragraph 218 was amended to adopt GDR legislation, but a compulsory consultation prior to the procedure was added. After protests from the CDU/CSU and the Bavarian state government, which wanted abortion itself to remain illegal, even this amendment was declared null and void by Germany’s Constitutional Court only one year later. [...]

Even after 25 years since unification there still exists a very different perception of equal rights among women in the territory of the former GDR. According to an investigation undertaken in 2008, 80% of East German women wanted an equal division of labour in the family, but only 50% of West German women, among whom traditional family models still exerted a strong force. In fact, the more emancipated consciousness of GDR women has increasingly influenced women in the West, even though they often appear to be unaware of where their new confidence has come.

Stasi State or Socialist Paradise? The German Democratic Republic and What Became of It by Bruni de la Motte & John Green with Seumas Milne (Contributor), 2015.

[archeo-starwars]

You wouldn't happen to have an extensive layout dissection of the Jedi Temple on Coruscant? Or even a list of all notable and obscure sections of the Jedi Temple? OR or even labelled areas that are public and reserved for only temple residents. Both from canon and legends, please and thank you!!!

The best I managed to find comes from Star Wars Complete Locations - you may check out the whole archived version here. The “zoom in” option is pretty good for reading details. Below the pages (I suppose the best is to open them in new tab for better reading):

As for the list of locations, I recommend wookiepedia's list. Plenty of data, both for Legends and New Canon.

Additional sources worth to check out:

Jedi Temple Locations & Jedi Temple History - both published as official material on star wars.com in regard to prequels and New Canon sources. Pictures and references to various places inside Temple.

Star Wars.com's The Clone Wars episode guide + videoclips from the series, like

A) Jedi Archives Tour (the entrance to one of the most restricted areas of the temple: The Holocron Vault).

B) Layout of Jedi Temple Library (source)

C) Jedi Temple funeral room + environment illustration by Tara Rueping (source)

Old Data Bank for Jedi Temple

HoloNews mentioning "a mob of 20 university students attempted to infiltrate the Jedi Temple" and "managing to get as far as the Second Atrium Lobby"

Star Wars Battlefront (2) game wiki provides some map and location description

and if you have time (and patience) you can watch gameplay from 501st Legion's mission in Jedi Temple for reference, like this one

The wookiepedia's articles should give enough good idea of the rooms, their location and functions, but I'm adding a few source pages:

STAR WARS: FACT FILES #36 provides a lot informations what and where was inside the Temple and some general data about visitors, security, Grand Balcony, Grand Corridor & Towers. Not all is super specific, but worth checking out for sure.

The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia mentions this:

and for Jedi Temple entry:

As for the named locations that are public or reserved for only temple residents, there is definitely a division like that, however I'm not sure if this issue was very well explained. The source gives us some ideas, like for example, Jedi Archives have data accessible only for Jedi with rank of Master or higher (thus most likely separated areas to study). At the same time, Fact Files #25 says that Jedi Archives offers an "excellent resources to researchers, including star-map hologram consoles", but also an access to entire scientific and historical knowledge of the Republic

so non-Jedi were allowed to use Jedi Library/Archives for their own research and work-related needs. We also must remember that the Jedi Order had various scientific branches, including archaeology, exploring unknown regions, and medicine, so logically thinking Jedi worked with other, non-Jedi specialists of many fields.

We also know from various sources, that politicians and important guests were invited for various occasions. We could see in Republic comics series that Bail Organa, Mon Mothma and senator Ask Aak were allowed to listen to Jedi reporting before High Council about his last battle

or attending Jedi Funeral like Duchess Satine and Padme Amidala did for the (fake) Obi-Wan's one or just visiting as a friend/comrade-in-arm

I would need to make more research about this issue as there is plenty tie-in material to Jedi Temple on Coruscant that would take a lot time to study, but at this moment, I think the best is assume how far a non-Jedi may walk into Temple will depend greatly who is that person and what is nature of their business with Jedi.

At the same time, Purge: Seconds to Die has this line "Clone Troopers? This deep in the Temple? Not permitted."

The Jedi was in Archives herself, so it is worth to take into account that clones could have more limited access to Temple than the average guest before war did. At the same time, clone troopers could make a report before Yoda and Mace Windu/High Council, as was presented by Star Wars Tales (Honor Bound):

so it is not like they were outright forbidden to enter the temple either.

Hope it will help!

[theoxenfree]

FATHOMLESS

eldritch detective x reader | 2.1k | 18+

everyone at the precinct spoke at length about detective arsenè being the best in watt city. others claimed he'd always been there; meanwhile, he seemed to have just appeared one day. more concerning than that, however, was the fact no one ever pointed out he had no face.

warnings; dubcon, alcohol consumption, fictitious precinct + detective work, roughly proofread.

repost from my old blog 2kmps. please interact + reblog of you enjoyed!!

Everyone at the precinct called him Detective Arsené, but they never said anything about his face. It was simply that there wasn't one there, not that you were able to discern in any instance you'd seen him wandering the floor. You'd blamed the long hours, the glowing blue screens and useless eye prescriptions and corporate greed and mixing alcohol with allergy medicine before you finally accepted what you were seeing was real, yet no one else noticed it apart from you.

“What's wrong with his face?” you'd ask anyone with the time to spare to listen.

“Who? Arsené?” they'd laugh, whether in disbelief that you were speaking about Watt City’s genius detective in such a fashion, or that they thought you were the funniest person in the office. “What are you talking about? He's always looked like that! Lay off the booze, yeah?”

Those responses had never been satisfactory enough, going as far to set you ill at ease for the remainder of your shift, sufficiently distracting you from furthering your workload because your mind always came back to the detective and his non-existent face.

“He looks pretty normal to me,” said a senior member in your division, an older man you'd come to know as forthright and virtuous with a history showing that integrity. He had taken eyes off his computer screen, set aside his bifocals and pinched the high-point between his brows. “What's this about, really? I've worked with Arsené for years. You know that. He's been here since before I started. Good guy, hard worker. Drinks too much, though. Just like someone else I know.”

But, this was the first time you had heard he'd worked with Arsené, let alone acknowledged his existence at all. There was no reason for him to lie; he had spoken without inflection, warily, almost accusatory towards the end when he spoke about the alcohol.

“Detective Arsené? Well, I think he's really handsome. He just has that look about him, y'know?” The next person you questioned was a junior at the precinct, a pretty woman with silky black hair and long, blunt nails she used the tips of to clack away on her keyboard. “I've heard he has a really specific type, though. I've also never seen him take anyone out, or take a partner on cases, now that I think about it. Isn't he just a stand-up guy? I'd say he's the sort to bring home to mom and dad, but I hear he's got a drinking problem. Why do all the hot ones have vices like that?”

She particularly enjoyed her gossip, especially if it involved the detectives at the precinct; you were positive she'd never mentioned Arsené before now. As smart as she was, she didn't look below the surface very often when it came to men, so for her to say nothing at all of the detective’s smooth face was mystifying.

After that, you started paying attention to Arsené in a way you convinced yourself was discreet: slowly peeking your eyes above your computer screen to observe his movements across the floor. Always in motion, he stalked around the place with undaunted familiarity, maneuvering the razored corners of desks and blockades from doors and walls, and languidly sidestepped the oncoming traffic of bodies in such a way that seemed premeditated. Practiced. Repeated.

This staunch dedication of yours lasted well over a week before anything came of it; until one morning you found him waiting in your seat, teetering a bloated manila folder on a thigh while bouncing it impatiently. A very real sensation of unease took hold of the back of your neck, like a cold hand stroking lightly at the downy hairs there until they stood straight.

You thought about pretending you hadn't seen him, swiveling around, and leaving in a burst of urgency. It'd be easy to call in to say you had a personal emergency or became suddenly, very viscously ill and wouldn't be able to handle staring at a screen for twelve hours. No one would ask questions because you were exemplary, always on time, and seldom took time off as you couldn't afford to do so.

Arsené’s head slanting sideways and the waxy, flat face pointing directly towards you prevented you from acting on that impulse, however. He gestured you over with a lethargic wave, though the jitteriness in his leg seemed to worsen from impatience into sheer excitability.

“Clocked in early, aren't you? You have quite the habit of doing that, I've noticed.” He greeted, voice simultaneously undefinable and velvety. It wasn't so deep that you felt like it was gravelly or reverberated in the same way a baritone would, but there was a heftiness to it that weighted in your mind, as if it were possible for someone to reach through all your blood, tissue, and bone and press down directly on your brain. “I've seen you come in a few times, hours before anyone else. And you know what I think? I think, ‘That’s the kind of person who keeps a place like this running. That's the kind of person we want here in this precinct. That's the type of person who believes in the work that we do and who I’d want as my partner’.”

As much as you wanted to get away from the horrid sight before you, the no-face and potent voice wriggling around the wrinkles in your brain, you couldn't bring yourself to do so just yet. Not while you had questions you couldn't find answers to, not while you needed to sedate yourself at night because they ruthlessly endangered your dreams and were thieves of peaceful slumber.

“I've never met you before,” you said, giving a cordial handshake when he had offered it to you. The skin of his palm was warm and humanlike, though his grip was all wrong and entirely too firm. You didn't convey this to him, though. “I've seen you around, though. Were you transferred from a different department or precinct? Everyone says you've been around for a long time, but I find it hard to believe I've noticed.”

“Oh? Well, they'd be right.” Arsené said, finally releasing your hand to take up the thick folder. “I've always been there, and I'm always here. Now, that aside, I've cleared it with the Chief and I'd like you to help me on a case that I'm stuck on. If I've read right, you're the most recent person who's looked through everything to update the records, correct?”

“Probably.” You didn't move when he rolled up another chair from a desk nearby. “I'm a Recorder. It's my job to go through files and periodically update them. I'm not qualified to help detectives on their cases, though. You'd need to speak to the Chief about getting an Assistant for that.”

“Ah, didn't you hear me? That's all been handled. Sit down. Sit down.” He waved you close, then took you by the arm to sit you in the chair next to him. “We have a lot to cover. I think we should start from the beginning and work our way through the evidence list, and then the interrogation tapes. After that, it'd be a good idea to revisit the site of the crime. Don't worry about clearances, I've got everything we need.”

It wasn't often that you saw the inside of the precinct after that day as Arsené particularly enjoyed his busywork and bringing you along for it. Most days you simply operated as a Field Recorder by transcribing statements into the handheld device provided by the precinct to maintain a digital trail. The work wasn't especially difficult, but it did take a level of skill and technological literacy to be able to do effectively, more so to be the sort allowed to tail after a detective on his cases and still maintain an overall ninety-eight percent accuracy.

Despite your job dictating it as such, Arsené never allowed you to fade into the background or stand around as a fancy accessory to go with his title. Oftentimes, he utilized you as his sole confidant as he worked through evidence and suspects, waiting in revered silence for you to offer your insight (however weak it actually was), and afterwards only let you bask in a glow of confidence through streams of unending praise.

“Egads! Eureka! Genius! How is it that it never occurred to me that way? Truly, you're spectacular! You're divine! Who knows how long I’d be running around in circles if I didn't have you as my partner.” They were all slightly variating compliments, though essentially all the same at the core and all very untrue.

You'd never forgotten about the things your colleagues had said about him, of his unrivaled prowess and veneration as the best detective Watt City had ever come to witness. He didn't need you. He had never needed you to solve a case, so you had learned to take his praise in the same vein as you did the silky-haired woman’s comments on men: uninspired and shallow.

When your disinterest became palpable, he seemed to only rely on you more as though he couldn't stand to be burdened with the idea of a rift. He had started calling you late at night about cases, going as far to come knocking at your door and walking inside reeking of stale smoke and a haze of booze, neither of which you could comprehend as possible considering he had no face.

“I just don't get it. I just don't get it! Where am I going wrong?!” He said so wretchedly, sides of his head cradled in his hands that were tucked between his legs. “This case, it’s getting to me. It's getting under my skin. I can't figure it out. Have I finally met my match? Have I finally been defeated? You! You’ve got to help me. It can't end like this.”

For all his dramatics, there was something obscenely cruel behind his words. Perhaps he thought you wouldn't have caught onto it because you simply a Field Recorder, just a person at the end of the day.

“Why haven't you mentioned anything about the victim? You're acting like they don't exist, Arsené. Is this about solving the crime so they get justice and the family gets closure, or for your reputation?” you asked.

He immediately stopped complaining and jolted upright, taken by surprise like he had realized this oversight and wasn't sure how to navigate around it. On that glossy slate of a face, one you knew was piercing deep into you despite a lack of hollow sockets and rolling gelatinous orbs within, you could tell he was now thinking of an answer.

“Neither,” was what he gave you. “It's neither of those. Come here. Sit down and talk to me for a while. I can't go home like this.”

The pitying part of you usually won in those moments where Arsené presented himself as his weakest. There was a part of you that believed he was taking advantage of your feeble heart, your kindness, your blind generosity because at his worst, he'd find a way to strip you down and fuck you.

At least, that's what you assumed happened. You never really could remember as the memory was pitch black, his body was unfathomable above yours, but you were sure you felt his cock penetrating you, his hands desperately fondling your flesh and fat like there was too much to touch yet too little time to feel it all. He said things to you inside your head, words that you couldn’t seem to piece together yet ignited the tension between your legs, lit your skin on fire, and delivered lewd, high-pitched sounds to his ears that he reveled in.

He never left you a mess and he never spoke about those times after they happened. Since you were never sure of them yourself, they suffered the same indifference as his praise and the days simply moved onward in a similar way.

“Another case solved!” Arsené cheered, lifting a stout mug in the air for you to reciprocate with the long stem of your wine glass. It was a fragile tinkling sound, a gentle vibration up your fingers and into your wrist as you toasted his success. “I couldn't have done it without you, my beloved partner! If it's you and I, I could do this forever.”

You swirled the liquid inside; a light and dry, raspberry and vaguely earthy smell wafted up your nostrils before you tasted it and let your cheeks pucker. As you drank, you watched as Arsené lifted the stout towards the expanse of taut, clear skin that should've been his face, and saw liquid inside empty into nowhere.

[accord-vn]

Subject: Archon Program Candidates

From: ██████

To: Flora Pearson <fpearson@mail.asc>

Timestamp: 2088.09.24.6138

Dir. Pearson:

It took some time to process the data we've received from the Dept/Statistics request, and your patience in that matter is deeply appreciated. Our diligence has paid off, and we have narrowed to 54 potential candidates across the Republic. I've attached the full portfolio--note that among the 54, 7 in particular stand out. I've flagged these subjects accordingly. While a thorough examination of *all* prospective candidates is paramount for expedience and risk mitigation, the attached dossiers will surely speak for themselves with regards to their fit for the program.

Saklas

Raithe Desmont

b.2057.12.30 / 193cm / 66kg / B+

int-SYN/TRA compatibility: 83.25%

d-SYN/TRA compatibility: 57.29%

Minor irreversible microgravitational osteoporosis from offworld childhood

History of childhood asthma, no noted persistent chronic obstructive pulmonary disorders in adulthood

Existing psychiatric profile suggests an intense need for approval, acknowledgement

Medical records became publicly available when he was processed following the dismantling of Synesia

Immediate family:

- Estranged father, younger sister

- deceased mother

Census records indicate no other family or partner

Criminal records indicate a history of activism that ended following an arrest with no conviction

Church records confirm status as hylikos

Currently works an administrative role within the Automation Division of the Dept/Research

Evaluation:

Desmont's department shows fantastic efficiency and produces incredible results at the expense of high turnover rates. Exit interviews indicate that his aggressive and controlling management style is to blame, however the growth in his department was undeniable to his superiors. Were he not a hylikos, he would surely be head of the division by now.

Desmont's ego is thoroughly immodest, and his focus solely on the Material. He refuses to accept that he cannot rise above his position without aid from the Church.

His methodical yet aggressive nature and relatively high d-SYN/TRA compatibility score suggest that he would be an ideal candidate for the archon of kings.

Iao

Zoe Katab

b.2070.07.19 / 170cm / 70kg / A-

int-SYN/TRA compatibility: 95.66%

d-SYN/TRA compatibility: 71.90%

Several childhood hospitalizations for frequent upper and lower extremity fractures

History of self harm attributed to survivor's guilt/PTSD

Existing psychiatric profile indicates a need for control that stems from severe anxiety

Medical records became publicly available following her adoption as a ward of the state

Immediate family:

- deceased mother, father, sister

Census records indicate no other family or partner

Criminal records indicate that she was arrested for the murder of her parents, but ultimately found innocent

Church records confirm status as hylikos

Currently unemployed

Evaluation:

Katab's past indicates that she is capable of bloodshed yet more interested in the stability of total control. Behavioral reports from her childhood describe a deeply protective personality with recurring accusations of attempting to manipulate others.

Katab's exceptional d-SYN/TRA compatibility alongside her complex psychiatric profile indicate that she is an ideal archon candidate, with the most synergy with the archon of lordship.

Sabaoth

Sera ████

b.2060.10.30 / 180cm / 102kg / AB+

int-SYN/TRA compatibility: 98.92%

d-SYN/TRA compatibility: 89.01%

Significant medical records were removed from public record following her involvement in the destruction of the Caesarea

Existing psychiatric profile indicates a deeply emotionally disturbed individual

Immediate family:

- estranged mother, father

- aunt, living apart

Census records indicate no other family or partner

Criminal records indicate that she is currently convicted for criminal negligence, manslaughter, and practicing medicine without a license

Church records confirm status as hylikos

Currently imprisoned

Evaluation:

████ 's involvement has been previously confirmed, as she was sponsored by █████.

Nonetheless, ████ 's unprecedentedly high SYN/TRA compatibility, unique physiology, and damaged psyche suggest that she is an ideal archon candidate, such that she may be a possible match with the archon of deity.

Adonaios

Ash Ward

b.2074.08.16 / 175cm / 58kg / B-

int-SYN/TRA compatibility: 84.11%

d-SYN/TRA compatibility: 74.39%

Childhood history of malnourishment

Reports of several scars from infections secondary to insufficient wound care

Existing psychiatric profile indicate difficulty controlling anger

Medical records became publicly available upon becoming a ward of the state

Immediate family:

- deceased mother, father, uncle

Census records indicate no other family or partner

Criminal records indicate a predisposition to violence

Church records confirm status as hylikos

Currently a ward of the state

Evaluation:

Ward's behavioral reports indicate a tendency to lash out against authorities and classmates alike. He is quick to violence and has little patience for others.

His exceptional SYN/TRA compatibilities and temperament suggest a strong compatibility for the tyrant archon.

Elaios

Adrien Hein

b.2059.03.03 / 187cm / 40kg / O+

int-SYN/TRA compatibility: 74.29%

d-SYN/TRA compatibility: 52.63%

Bilateral below-knee amputation secondary to explosion during an attempted live-munitions terrorist attack

Existing psychiatric profile indicates severe anxiety bordering on paranoia

Medical records became public record upon arrest

Immediate family:

- deceased husband, son

- mother, father live apart

Census records indicate no other family or partner

Criminal records indicate that he has been convicted for terrorism, conspiracy, possession of illegal explosives, destruction of property

Church records confirm status as hylikos

Currently imprisoned

Evaluation:

Hein lost his husband and son in a riot started by immigrants protesting the stride of Stauros. He was radicalized by the experience and subsequently became involved with a group of nationalists. During an attempt to bomb a train station the explosives were improperly timed, resulting in the loss of both of Hein's legs.

His willingness to shed blood, loyalty to Stauros, and obsessive mental state make him an ideal candidate for the archon of jealousy.

Oraios

Surya Marit

b.2068.09.25 / 175cm / 68kg / B+

int-SYN/TRA compatibility: 88.04%

d-SYN/TRA compatibility: 73.43%

Minor broken bones in youth, negative growth plate abnormalities noted

Possible TBI secondary to concussion received during routine training though MRI/CT inconclusive

Existing psychiatric profile indicates an antisocial personality disorder diagnosis as well as a need for connection

Medical records became publicly available upon joining the ExoCorps

Immediate family:

- estranged brother, mother

- deceased mother

Census records indicate no other family or partner

Criminal records return no charges

Church records confirm status as hylikos

Currently unemployed

Evaluation:

Marit is an unusual individual. She was initially chosen to be a Cataphract though her surgery regimen was cut short by a traumatic head injury during a routine training exercise. This purportedly spawned a change in her behavior, at which point she was ejected from the ExoCorps.

Marit's fantastic SYN/TRA compatibility, her experience as a pilot, and her alienation from others make her a strong candidate for the archon of wealth.

Astaphaios

Elena Casaubon

b.2069.09.09 / 158cm / 53kg / O-

int-SYN/TRA compatibility: 63.14%

d-SYN/TRA compatibility: 47.69%

Irreversible microgravitational osteoporosis from offworld childhood

Existing psychiatric profile indicates obsessive tendencies and a thirst for the forbidden

Medical records not publicly available

Immediate family:

- absentee mother

- deceased father

Census records indicate no other family or partner

Criminal records return no charges

Church records confirm status as hylikos

Currently employed by the Dept/Research as a part of the Archon program

Evaluation:

Casaubon's participation was, of course, previously confirmed due to her connection to the Rite.

Casaubon's SYN/TRA compatibilities barely meet program minimums, and though her psychiatric profile does not indicate any particular affinity, the archon of wisdom will likely be the most fitting for her potential as a pilot.

Thank you for your patience,

██████

[mxmajor]

Cool things i learned abt the Dora Milaje from the dora milaje training manual

this is canon to the 616 and comics, not the MCU, but it was cool to learn about and definitely impacts my canon compliant AU fic. So it might be useful to others. Its not the full book, not even a chapters worth of info, but if you were considering getting it, do so. It made me look at wakanda forever differently, too.

Joining

they accept women from all 5 tribes (17 in the comics) between the ages of 15-20 to become Dora

They have to bring a gift and be accepted by Bast to begin training

If accepted they are called Kanwata and the process takes 4 years to complete.

Upon initiation they go through an ori ceremony where their heads are shaved and they received their first ritual tattoo. They receive another tattoo each year, an ink with vibranium, until the second and final ori ceremony where they receive the final tattoo after their acceptance from Bast.

Training

They have to learn 7 of 10 languages: Wakandan, Xhosa, Hausa, Arabic, Yoruba, English, Igbo, Mandarin, Swahili, and Korean. They have 9 additional elective languages they can learn, especially to connect to the diaspora and blend in: cantonese, Hebrew, Japanese, French, Farsi, Spanish, Amharic, and Portuguese. They get to conversation and translation in the following years.

In the first year they must learn hand to hand combat in the forms of Ngolo, Laamb, Silat, Muay Thai, Musangwe, and Krav Maga. Once the required mastery has been met they add weapons in the second year. The Dora are considered "living weapons".

In the comic verse, they have a mystical and supernatural combat section. The kanwata training is in 3 pillars: physical, mental, and spiritual/herbal. They study vibranium application and properties as well as herbal practices like identifying plants for food and medicinal purposes.

Essentially, Dora are super smart and well trained so it takes a unique situation for them to be unprepared lol. There is even more that goes into what was listed above.

Structure

The DM have 3 major units: Guard Units, Airborne Units, and Support Staff Units. This includes Domestic, international, and Off world teams in the comics.

Dora can be broken into units, squads, or teams (helpful when trying to name group that they might be on a mission in)

They are all trained in combat and munitions (weapons) but some units are researchers, mechanics, pilots, healers, or apart of a secret division (like the cia) but no one knows who is in that secret division

Kanwata are the trainees, the 3rd and 4th years apprentice with Iya Dora and/or train younger Kanwata.

Ile Dora Milaje is what the group of active, graduated, and fully initiated Dora are called.

Iya Dora is the council that confers with wakandan leadership (Taifa Ngao, the council of elders), determines the graduation passage of kanwata, and governs the active duty, dismissal or removal from Dora ranks. There are Dora that have been re-instated after dismissal.

There are some cool excerpts if you clicked the link below. I am tired of typing lol.

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved on our archive

NIH-funded study focused on original virus strain, unvaccinated participants during pandemic.

Infection from COVID-19 appeared to significantly increase the risk of heart attack, stroke, and death for up to three years among unvaccinated people early in the pandemic when the original SARS-CoV-2 virus strain emerged, according to a National Institutes of Health (NIH)-supported study. The findings, among people with or without heart disease, confirm previous research showing an associated higher risk of cardiovascular events after a COVID-19 infection but are the first to suggest the heightened risk might last up to three years following initial infection, at least among people infected in the first wave of the pandemic.

Compared to people with no COVID-19 history, the study found those who developed COVID-19 early in the pandemic had double the risk for cardiovascular events, while those with severe cases had nearly four times the risk. The findings were published in the journal Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology.

“This study sheds new light on the potential long-term cardiovascular effects of COVID-19, a still-looming public health threat,” said David Goff, M.D., Ph.D., director for the Division of Cardiovascular Sciences at NIH’s National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), which largely funded the study. “These results, especially if confirmed by longer term follow-up, support efforts to identify effective heart disease prevention strategies for patients who’ve had severe COVID-19. But more studies are needed to demonstrate effectiveness.”

The study is also the first to show that increased risk of heart attack and stroke in patients with severe COVID-19 may have a genetic component involving blood type. Researchers found that hospitalization for COVID-19 more than doubled the risk of heart attack or stroke among patients with A, B, or AB blood types, but not in patients with O types, which seemed to be associated with a lower risk of severe COVID-19.

Scientists studied data from 10,000 people enrolled in the UK Biobank, a large biomedical database of European patients. Patients were ages 40 to 69 at the time of enrollment and included 8,000 who had tested positive for the COVID-19 virus and 2,000 who were hospitalized with severe COVID-19 between Feb. 1, 2020, and Dec. 31, 2020. None of the patients had been vaccinated, as vaccines were not available during that period.

The researchers compared the two COVID-19 subgroups to a group of nearly 218,000 people who did not have the condition. They then tracked the patients from the time of their COVID-19 diagnosis until the development of either heart attack, stroke, or death, up to nearly three years.

Accounting for patients who had pre-existing heart disease – about 11% in both groups – the researchers found that the risk of heart attack, stroke, and death was twice as high among all the COVID-19 patients and four times as high among those who had severe cases that required hospitalization, compared to those who had never been infected. The data further show that, within each of the three follow-up years, the risk of having a major cardiovascular event was still significantly elevated compared to the controls – in some cases, the researchers said, almost as high or even higher than having a known cardiovascular risk factor, such as Type 2 diabetes.

“Given that more than 1 billion people worldwide have already experienced COVID-19 infection, the implications for global heart health are significant,” said study leader Hooman Allayee, Ph.D., a professor of population and public health sciences at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine in Los Angeles. “The question now is whether or not severe COVID-19 should be considered another risk factor for cardiovascular disease, much like type 2 diabetes or peripheral artery disease, where treatment focused on cardiovascular disease prevention may be valuable.”

Allayee notes that the findings apply mainly to people who were infected early in the pandemic. It is unclear whether the risk of cardiovascular disease is persistent or may be persistent for people who have had severe COVID-19 more recently (from 2021 to the present).

Scientists state that the study was limited due to inclusion of patients from only the UK Biobank, a group that is mostly white. Whether the results will differ in a population with more racial and ethnic diversity is unclear and awaits further study. As the study participants were unvaccinated, future studies will be needed to determine whether vaccines influence cardiovascular risk. Studies on the connection between blood type and COVID-19 infection are also needed as the mechanism for the gene-virus interaction remains unclear.

This study was supported by NIH grants R01HL148110, R01HL168493, U54HL170326, R01DK132735, P01HL147823, R01HL147883, and P30ES007048.

About the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI): NHLBI is the global leader in conducting and supporting research in heart, lung, and blood diseases and sleep disorders that advances scientific knowledge, improves public health, and saves lives. For more information, visit www.nhlbi.nih.gov.

About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.

NIH…Turning Discovery Into Health®

Study Allayee, H, et al. COVID-19 Is a Coronary Artery Disease Risk Equivalent and Exhibits a Genetic Interaction With ABO Blood Type(link is external). [2024] Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology. DOI: 10.1161/ATVBAHA.124.321001

[monkeyssalad-blog]

Alchymya by National Library of Medicine Via Flickr: Author(s): Gesner, Konrad, 1516-1565, Author Publication: London: Peter Short, 1599 Format: Still image Subject(s): Alchemy, Equipment and Supplies Genre(s): Book Illustrations Abstract: A woman is standing among various chemical apparatus, she is holding a pair of tongs and a glass container; a furnace is to the left. Related Title(s): Is part of: Practise of old and new phisicke, title page vignette.; See related catalog record: 2246053R Extent: 1 print Technique: woodcut NLM Unique ID:101435994 NLM Image ID: A016359 Permanent Link: resource.nlm.nih.gov/101435994

[gaiasgrimoire]

Herb Spotlight: Thyme

History & Origins

Thyme (Thymus vulgaris) is a perennial herb that has been cherished for its culinary, medicinal, and spiritual properties for thousands of years. Originating from the Mediterranean region, thyme was used by the ancient Egyptians for embalming, while the Greeks and Romans valued it for its antiseptic properties and burned it as incense in temples to purify spaces.

The name "thyme" is believed to come from the Greek word "thymos," meaning courage or strength. Roman soldiers would bathe in thyme-infused water to gain bravery before battles. In the Middle Ages, it was also tucked under pillows to ward off nightmares and given to knights and warriors as a symbol of courage.

Where & How to Grow Thyme

Thyme is a resilient, sun-loving herb that thrives in well-drained soil and can be grown both indoors and outdoors.

Climate: Thyme prefers warm, sunny climates with at least 6 hours of sunlight daily. It's drought-tolerant and does well in zones 5-9.

Soil: Grows best in well-drained, sandy soil with a slightly alkaline pH. Avoid overwatering, as thyme doesn't tolerate soggy soil.

Growing from seeds: Start thyme seeds indoors 6-8 weeks before the last frost, or plant cuttings directly in the garden in spring or early summer. Thyme can also be propagated easily by root division.

Spacing: Plant thyme about 12 inches apart in a sunny location. It can also be grown in pots or as a ground cover, as it only grows to about 6-12 inches tall.

Harvesting: Harvest thyme when the plants are dry, preferably in the morning, by cutting sprigs just before the flowers bloom. The leaves can be used fresh or dried for later use.

Health Benefits

Thyme offers numerous medicinal benefits when used orally or topically.

Oral Uses:

Respiratory support: Thyme is a natural expectorant, helping to clear mucus and ease symptoms of coughs, colds, bronchitis, and sore throats. Drinking thyme tea or using thyme honey is particularly effective.

Antimicrobial properties: Thyme contains thymol, an essential oil with antibacterial, antifungal, and antiviral properties. It helps fight infections and boost the immune system.

Digestive aid: Thyme is excellent for relieving indigestion, bloating, and gas. It can also help regulate gut bacteria and support digestive health.

Antioxidant support: Rich in vitamin C and other antioxidants, thyme helps reduce oxidative stress, supporting overall wellness and aging.

Topical Uses:

Skin health: Thyme can be used as a natural antiseptic for treating wounds, cuts, and infections. It also helps soothe skin conditions such as acne, eczema, and fungal infections due to its antimicrobial properties.

Anti-inflammatory: When applied topically, thyme can reduce inflammation and swelling, making it useful for treating skin irritations or minor burns.

Hair growth: Thyme oil is often used in natural hair care products for stimulating hair growth and treating dandruff due to its antimicrobial properties.

Magical Properties

Thyme has long been associated with purification, protection, and courage in magical practices.

Purification: Thyme is used in cleansing rituals, either burned as incense or added to baths to cleanse one's aura or energy field. It is believed to purify spaces, removing negative energies or spirits.

Protection: Thyme is often carried or placed in doorways for protection from harm or ill intentions. It can also be worn as a charm to ward off negative energies and bad dreams.

Courage & Strength: Thyme is associated with bravery. In magical workings, it’s used to summon strength and courage, especially when facing difficult situations or challenges. It can be carried as a talisman or burned before spell work to empower the caster.

Healing: Thyme is often used in spells related to healing, vitality, and renewal. It's added to healing potions, incense, and sachets to promote physical and emotional recovery.

Love & Attraction: In love magic, thyme is believed to attract love and affection. It’s often included in love sachets, charms, or baths to draw positive relationships and strengthen existing ones.

Using Thyme in Your Practice

Thyme tea: Brewed as tea, thyme can be sipped to promote healing, clear the mind, and fortify the spirit before rituals.

Burning thyme: Burn dried thyme as an offering to deities, or use the smoke to cleanse and purify spaces, objects, or yourself.

Thyme oil: Dilute thyme essential oil in a carrier oil and use it in healing rituals or anointing candles to promote health and protection.

Thyme is a versatile herb with deep roots in history, known for its medicinal, culinary, and magical uses. Whether you're growing it in your garden or using it in your magical practice, thyme offers powerful healing, protective, and purifying qualities that make it a must-have in any herbalist's or witch’s collection.

[misfitwashere]

September 9, 2024 

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

SEP 10

Last night, Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign launched a new section of its website detailing her policy positions. Titling her plans “A New Way Forward,” Harris vows to build the American middle class through an “opportunity economy.” Her vision for the future, she says, “protects our fundamental freedoms, strengthens our democracy, and ensures every person has the opportunity to not just get by, but to get ahead.” 

Harris’s economic plan builds on that of the Biden-Harris administration. This makes sense, since their focus on investing in the middle class has created the strongest economy in the world. Harris is emphasizing the need to bring down household costs of food, medicine, housing, healthcare, and childcare, all issues important to Americans.  

The website provides concrete economic actions she plans to take with a willing Congress. They include expanding the Child Tax Credit and the Earned Income Tax Credit, investing in more housing, and supporting the PRO Act, which protects the rights of workers to unionize, while continuing the crackdown on business consolidation that kills competition and rolling back the Trump tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations.

The biggest economic shift from the current administration is pegging a new capital gains tax for those earning more than a million dollars a year at 28%, significantly lower than the 39.6% President Joe Biden proposed in his 2025 budget. The plans also call for the first-ever national ban on corporate price gouging on food and groceries (37 states already have such laws). 

Aside from strictly economic plans, the policy pages say Harris backs passing the bipartisan immigration bill that Republicans killed on Trump’s orders, protecting reproductive healthcare and restoring Roe v. Wade, and protecting the right to vote and ending partisan gerrymandering through the John Lewis Voting Rights and the Freedom to Vote Acts.

Republicans have charged that Harris has not offered specifics for her policies, but much of what is now clearly laid out is already in the public record. By the standards of American history, it is a strikingly moderate agenda that reflects the belief that the best way for the government to protect opportunity and nurture the economy is to make sure that the system is fair and that ordinary people have access to opportunity.

The “New Way Forward” in Harris’s plan seems to be less a new set of policies than a rejection of the politics of the past several decades. She and her running mate Minnesota governor Tim Walz appear to be attempting to reshape the political landscape to bring Americans of all parties together to stand against Trump’s MAGA Republicans. The campaign has actively reached out to Republicans, several of whom spoke at the Democratic National Convention. On Saturday, Harris said she was “honored” to have the endorsement of former representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) and former vice president Dick Cheney, both staunch Republicans. “People are exhausted about the division and the attempt to divide us as Americans,” she said. “We love our country and we have more in common than what separates us.” 

Trump’s website offers slogans rather than policies, so Harris’s website compares her policies to the comparable sections of Project 2025, the playbook for a second Trump term laid out by a number of right-wing institutions led by the Heritage Foundation. Trump and his campaign have tried to distance themselves from Project 2025, but at his rallies, he has offered the policies in it—like firing nonpartisan civil servants and replacing them with loyalists, and abolishing the Department of Education—as his top priorities. 

While Harris focused on policy, as critics have demanded, MAGA Republicans today spread slurs about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, claiming they are eating other people’s pets and local wildlife. Right-wing media figure Benny Johnson, who was one of the six commenters whose paychecks at now-disbanded Tenet Media were paid by Russia, was one of those pushing the false stories. So was X owner Elon Musk. 

The story was debunked almost immediately by the Springfield police, but Republican politicians ran with it. The X account for Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee ran it; so did Texas senator Ted Cruz, who shared an image with two kittens saying: “PLEASE VOTE FOR TRUMP SO IMMIGRANTS DON’T EAT US.” And the Republican vice presidential nominee, Ohio senator J.D. Vance, posted: “Reports now show that people have had their pets abducted and eaten by people who shouldn't be in this country.” (The Haitians in Springfield are in the U.S. legally.)

Perhaps most significantly, Republican Senate candidate Bernie Moreno, who is challenging Democratic Ohio senator Sherrod Brown, pushed the story. That Senate seat is crucial to the Republican attempt to take control of the Senate, and Moreno has just launched a $25 million ad campaign against Brown, accusing him of giving undocumented immigrants taxpayer-funded benefits. Today’s disinformation was well timed for that ad campaign. 

The Justice Department today announced  charges against two leaders of the white supremacist Terrorgram Collective, an international terrorist group that operates on the platform Telegram. Dallas Humber of California and Matthew Allison of Idaho have been charged with “soliciting hate crimes, soliciting the murder of federal officials, and conspiring to provide material support to terrorists.” They “solicited murders and hate crimes based on the race, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, and gender identity of others,” U.S. Attorney Phillip Talbert said. They had a hit list of federal, state, and local officials, as well as corporate leaders, and they encouraged attacks on government infrastructure, including energy facilities. Their plan was to create a race war. 

“Hate crimes fueled by bigotry and white supremacy, and amplified by the weaponization of digital messaging platforms, are on the rise and have no place in our society,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division said.

Congress is back in session today and must fund the government before October 1 or face a government shutdown. Although Congress negotiated spending levels for 2024 and 2025 back in June 2023, the House has been unable to pass appropriations bills because MAGA extremists either refuse to accept those levels or insist on inserting culture war poison pills into the bills. 

Now, Trump has demanded that a continuing resolution to fund the government must include a measure requiring proof of citizenship to vote. Since it is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in elections for president or members of Congress and there is no evidence it is anything but vanishingly rare, the measure actually seems designed to suppress voting. House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) went along and put the measure in the bill. He also designed for the measure to last until next March, making the budget so late a new president could write it, but also blowing through a January 1 deadline set in the June 2023 bill to require automatic cuts to spending.

House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) wrote to his colleagues: “House Democrats have made it clear that we will find bipartisan common ground on any issue with our Republican colleagues wherever possible, while pushing back against MAGA extremism.” Jeffries called the Republican bill “unserious and unacceptable.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told House and Senate leaders that the cuts required by law if Congress pushes the budget into March would drastically affect the military. “The repercussions of Congress failing to pass regular appropriations legislation for the first half of [fiscal] 2025 would be devastating to our readiness and ability to execute the National Defense Strategy,” Austin wrote.

Meanwhile, Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) is back to his old trick of blocking a military promotion, this time of Lieutenant General Ronald Clark, one of Austin’s top aides. Tuberville says he placed the hold because he has concerns that Clark did not alert Biden when Austin had surgery. Biden has nominated Clark to become the Commanding General of the U.S. Army Pacific, a position currently held by General Charles A. Flynn, younger brother of Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, Trump’s first National Security Advisor who resigned after news broke that he had hidden conversations with Russian operatives. 

Today, ten retired senior military officials endorsed Harris, saying she “is the best—and only—presidential candidate in this race who is fit to serve as our commander-in-chief…. Frankly stated, Donald Trump is a danger to our national security and our democracy. His own former National Security Advisors, Defense Secretaries, and Chiefs of Staff have said so.”

—

[bonefall]

I know in canon if a medicine cat dies with no successor they will often have the other Clans come over to help train an apprentice (like Leafpool with Puddleshine) or have a cat from another Clan outright move over to the Clan with no medicine cat to replace them (i.e Ravenwing and TC!Cloudberry?) But given you have all these other positions you've added to the allegiances which are one cat only, what would happen if someone died without training an apprentice in one of those conditions? It feels like taking the cleric approach would have problems, since while clerics are supposed to be (in theory at least) apolitical noncombatants who go beyond Clan divisions, I'm not sure either party would be happy if a cat from another Clan got brought in to train a new head of construction, given the head of construction is a fully trained warrior who can and will rip the other Clan's warriors to shreds. Or a cook from another Clan who doesn't know the Clan-specific recipes or what to do with that particular territory's prey. And especially with the educator, while by definition all of the cats in the Clan would have learned history from the educator you would probably need special training to be good enough to teach it. "Cat from another Clan barges in to teach THEIR Clan's propaganda which is so much more inaccurate and biased than OUR Clan's propaganda" seems like it would be a political tinderbox. So how would these situations be handled in BB?

The answer is actually super simple; It's a tragedy, but other cats are fully capable of stepping up and filling in the Patrol Head's duties.

Unlike Clerics, which have a huge amount of specialized, sacred knowledge that other cats aren't educated on, at any given time you will have cats who spend most of their time on that Patrol. Kitchen Patrol isn't holy, almost everyone knows how to cook.

The "Head" of a Patrol is a coordinator. Greenclaw was the one who might have done most of the skinning, Bluetail knows where all the spices grow, Yellowfur was the best at starting fires. The other three don't forget their knowledge suddenly when Chef Redheart dies without an appointment.

What Redheart will take to the grave is a lot of really helpful, specialized knowledge that the new Head would have really appreciated.

"Bluetail doesn't like working when it's raining, so try to remind them the spice stocks are low a few days before so they can pick a good, sunny shift."

"Tell apprentices to practice skinning by taking the tail off, too. They think it's pointless at first, but remind them that today's mouse is tomorrow's bushy squirrel, and they won't want to mess up the tail on that."

"Those clouds don't look so good; let's go gather kindle before a storm soaks the whole forest."

So, they never "import" a head from another Clan if their own dies, not even after the mass death event that was the ThunderClan plague. It would be a huge embarrassment if that was the case!

[gallifreyinstituteforlearning]

Hello Gallifreyan Institue!! So recently my time lord has started talking about this woman called Tecteun? Apparently they were important or something? Who exactly are they?

Who is Tecteun?

Now, we're about to stir up quite a few debates over tea in the Panopticon. If your Time Lord has started talking about Tecteun, you've stumbled into some of Gallifreyan history's deepest, most secretive, and confusing lore.

🪐 The Shobogan Explorer

Tecteun started out as a Shobogan, the original inhabitants of ancient Gallifrey. Tecteun was one of the first Shobogans to venture into outer space, driven by an insatiable curiosity to explore other planets.

Somewhere along the way, they say Tecteun discovered something extraordinary: a child with mysterious origins, who would later be known as the Timeless Child. And here's where things get less straightforward.

🧬 The Birth of Regeneration

Some say the Timeless Child had a unique ability—regeneration. Tecteun wasn't content with just observing this phenomenon—she wanted in on it. She adopted the Timeless Child and began a series of experiments that would certainly interest child protection services.

After countless attempts, Tecteun finally cracked the code, unlocking the secret of regeneration. But she didn't stop there—Tecteun spliced this ability into her own DNA, allegedly becoming the first Gallifreyan to regenerate.

👑 A Founding Figure of Gallifrey

In his next incarnation, Tecteun supposedly played a pivotal role in the rise of Gallifreyan civilisation. The Shobogans evolved, building the grand Capitol, and with Tecteun at the helm, alongside the more famous figures of Rassilon and Omega, Gallifrey began its transformation into the powerful society we know today. These three are often called the Founding Triumvirate of Gallifrey - Rassilon, Omega, and the Other. Here, it's assumed Tecteun was the Other.

🌌 Tecteun and the Division

In one of Tecteun's later female incarnations, she took on a new role as the leader of the Division, a shadowy organisation operating from the Void after Gallifrey's destruction. The Division's mission started well enough, but it eventually came to operate in more morally dubious ways.

The Division were behind the creation of the Flux, a destructive force meant to reset the universe as part of the Division's grand design. In quite a large misjudgment, Tecteun released a Ravager named Swarm from imprisonment to further her goals, who unsurprisingly eventually killed her.

🏫 So ...

Tecteun's life and legacy is complicated. In the best version of history, Tecteun was a pioneer, a scientist and a leader. In the worst version ... well, make your own mind up. But remember, the history of Gallifrey isn't as straightforward as it might seem ... 🤔

Related:

Who are Swarm and Azure?: Profiles of these two scallywags.

What was the Flux?: What is was and how it happened.

Why is Rassilon everywhere?: Who Rassilon is and why he’s so important.

Hope that helped! 😃

Any purple text is educated guesswork or theoretical. More content ... →📫Got a question? | 📚Complete list of Q+A and factoids →😆Jokes |🩻Biology |🗨️Language |🕰️Throwbacks |🤓Facts →🫀Gallifreyan Anatomy and Physiology Guide (pending) →⚕️Gallifreyan Emergency Medicine Guides →📝Source list (WIP) →📜Masterpost If you're finding your happy place in this part of the internet, feel free to buy a coffee to help keep our exhausted human conscious. She works full-time in medicine and is so very tired 😴

[one-idea]

I honestly find it kind of funny that when you read the novels for Ace we find out that Deuce left home because of having bad grades in medical school and instead was wanting to be a writer by adventuring out to sea. Yet in some twist of fate he ends up being a doctor anyway

Honestly I have mixed feelings about this.

Because it is both funny but also sad and sweet at the same time.

He was a medical school drop out. He left his family, his past, his name, even his face behind because of the disappointment his family had in him and his dream. I’m sure he has a lot of hurt feelings tied to the field of medicine. Especially if his family were doctors, they don’t seem to be the kindest people to him.

I’m sure he left because he felt he could never measure up. He could never match them in skill. Never live up to the expectations and never be excepted for dreaming something different.

So he leaves it all behind to chase his dream.

And almost immediately dies.

If Ace hadn’t arrived of Sixis could Duece have found a way off?

But that doesn’t matter because Ace comes. And sure it’s a rough start but in the end Deuce leaves with the person who will change his life (whether you see them as romantic or not Ace changed his life forever) even giving Masked Deuce his new name. And he gives him the opportunity to chase his dream. To seek adventure and write his novel. And Deuce has to be so excited

But being a pirate is dangerous. People get hurt. And suddenly Deuce is in a position where instead of knowing the least about Medicine he knows the most. And that has to be terrifying for him. He’s a medical school DROP OUT he shouldn’t be trusted the patients! And yet here Ace is trusting him with his life and the life of their crew.

It has to be equal parts touching and terrifying to have that trust. Trust he feels like he can’t live up to. His family never would have believed in him like this, and yet they were also right not to do so. (In his point of veiw) a drop out should have patients.

Yet when they join the Whitebeards he is put under Marco in the medical division. If he was truly a failure as a medic they would have moved him. So either his skills improved with the Spades to the point where he only needed some guidance from the Whitebeards or he was never truly a failure he felt he was in the first place. And maybe he just needed a different environment to learn in. Maybe the Whitebeards were better at teaching then his previous school. But either way there has to be so much resentment and self doubt in that field.

But also he left being a doctor behind to be an author. It’s his dream. Yet he puts it on the back burner for Ace. For their crew(s). I’m sure he still writes but that’s not his title on the boat. Imagine if Zoro’s goal was to be the world’s greatest swords man but he was known as the watchman because of how much time he spent in the crows nest. If that’s the only way the crew referred to him. How enemy’s saw him. Not the swordsman of his dreams but the job he did for the crew. It’s hard to sacrifice for the people around you. Especially with something that Deuce must have trauma with.

It’s so fascinating and I wish more people would dig into him. He’s a great doctor. But his history with it and his conflicting dream make him fascinating to me.