#Local Grains
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A kulustaig bull, the distinctive cattle landrace of the highlands.
Kulustaig have striking differences to other native cattle found across the Imperial Wardi claimed territory. Their aurochs ancestors were domesticated in a separate event from those found south of the Inner Seaways, and the broader cattle population kulustaig derived from may have trace bison genetics. The progenitors of this landrace were brought south across the Viper seaway by the ancestors of the contemporary Hill Tribes, and were gradually shaped into the kulustaig in adaption to the high altitudes, mild but dry summers, and cool/snowy wet seasons.
These cattle are mid-sized and stocky in build with large, broad faces, most distinguished by curly manes and 'beards' and thick, V-shaped horns. Genetically undiluted kulustaig are almost ubiquitously black, white, and/or gray, though breeding with other cattle has introduced a greater variety of coloration in contemporary stocks.
They are adapted to higher altitudes, having larger hearts and a bigger lung capacity than comparable lowland breeds, and grow thick, curly winter coats that allow for superior resistance to seasonally cooler temperatures. They can maintain condition on less food and lower-nutrition grasses than the average cattle, and are excellent instinctive foragers. This particular quality makes them attractive for crossbreeding efforts with cattle stock of the dry scrublands in the south of Imperial Wardin, though most of their other traits are highly unfavorable for hot, low altitude environments, and scrub-kulustaig hybrids with idealized traits are rare (and highly sought after as studs).
These are all-purpose cattle that can adequately fulfill roles as meat, draft, and dairy animals, though the latter role has the most importance in day to day life, and they show the most selection for milk production (though are not as high-yield as pure dairy breeds). Their meat is mostly lean and somewhat gamey, as they rely more on thick winter coats than fat stores to manage cold, and the vast majority subsist entirely on wild grasses and forage.
Most kulustaig have fairly calm, gentle temperaments, and accommodate well to human handling (it is not uncommon for cows and geldings to be passively ridden by herders otherwise traveling on foot). Their herds have strong, well defined, and stable dominance hierarchy structures, which reduces actual fighting and lends to them being more easily managed by their human herders. In most traditions, the dominant female in each herd is regarded as blessed by and belonging to the agricultural goddess Od, and will not be milked or slaughtered (this untouchable status is often maintained even if the cow's rank in the hierarchy is displaced, though traditions vary).
Bulls are almost ubiquitously given personal names by their owners (the honor often belonging to a family or clan's matriarch, who is generally considered the owner of the herd and other familial assets), while other traditions vary between just the bulls and dominant cows, personal favorites, or entire herds receiving names.
These cattle are of tremendous importance to the peoples of the highlands (particularly tribes and/or individual clans living above the river valleys, who fundamentally rely upon them for subsistence). They provide much of the meat and dairy that the core diet revolves around, and are the greatest measure of wealth within the highlands. Non-native cattle can be commonly found in parts of the highlands in the contemporary (and may be bred in to impart unique qualities to established stock, such as improved milk production or fattier meat), but kulustaig are typically prized above all the rest. These cattle are often a source of great pride for individual clans, and one of few agreed upon markers of shared identity and pride for all of the collective Hill Tribes.
Cattle raiding is a near-ubiquitous practice (both as a practical resource acquisition, and a less immediately lethal method of settling larger disputes than open warfare), and most cattle will be branded with a mark identifying their owning clan as a method of dissuading theft (often futile, particularly given cattle marked as belonging to certain wealthy clans may be especially prized). Nose rings are commonly used to assist in the handling of bulls, but have secondary protective functions that lend to their common use in even the most docile of cattle. Rings are usually blessed or have spells woven into their making as a supernatural barrier against theft, or against malicious (or at least devious) mountain spirits such as tiirgranul (who take pleasure in frightening cattle (and their herders) and are known to cause stampedes) or wildfolk (who are known to sometimes steal or curse cattle when offended, or just bored).
The word kulustaig derives from the common word 'taig'/'taigr', which refers to cattle in the contemporary languages of both the Hill Tribes and Finns, and the 'kul' root (heavily antiquated and not used in contemporary speech, most commonly recognizable in the name of the kulys plant), which has connotations of hardiness/robust qualities. The name would have derived from complimentary descriptions of the animals as 'the best and most robust of cattle'.
#GET EXCITED: 9 COW PARAGRAPHS#creatures#hill tribes#Just in general an obsolete word that was something like 'kulus' was used as a modifier to describe something as THE MOST hardy/robust#The name 'kulys' for the plant would have been derived from ancestral populations just referring to it as 'the hardiest' plant#Or like it's possible that the culture hero Kulyos was named after the plant but also very possible that the word was actually#an epithet meaning 'the hardiest' which over generations and linguistic change was reinterpreted as his actual given name#The -kul in Brakul's name also comes from this root but no longer has any literal meanings of hardiness. A name with -kul in it will#at least be associated with hardy/robust Things like tough plants and cattle#I don't have a word for the local strain of barley yet but it's probably got a kul root in there somewhere (given it would be especially#noted as the hardiest of all grains)
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Masters' Academy AU: Magic Types
Art by @okkennymay
One of the million bit of lore I'll eventually need to explain is that magic users are divided by the energy source they draw upon...
Different energies are better at different things, but with time and effort they can be put to any task. For example someone born with an affinity for fire magic could throw a fireball better than any of our trio, but that doesn't mean the boys couldn't do it too.
There are also some passive effects holding the energies within you; like a proto-spell it's something a magic user does automatically and unconsciously to digest the energy they naturally draw in but aren't doing anything with.
The effects are the kind of thing you'd expect; to use the example of the fire mage again, they'd not really notice hot or cold weather. Norman can see the dead, Dipper has near perfect recall, and Danny has heightened empathy.
#masters’ academy au#danny phantom#gravity falls#paranorman#Little bonus think Kenny did for me and I love it so much! :)#and yes Danny has gaydar#also legit I have a whole chart#I think there's 16 mana types#(yes I call it mana sometimes)#and it's all broken down into groups and types#all of them having matching and opposite energy types in the local group and across the larger table#Life - Death - Knowledge - Emotion is the set of four that make up the “living things” category#the names change sometimes depending on who you ask for example Soul and Emotion are considered interchangeable as are Knowledge and Though#a highschool is an excellent place to draw Life Knowledge and Emotion energy from. Shame there's not much of the other one.#(for fictional death wizards please keep the amount of death mana at your school to a minimum)#that's 50% joke I have a whole other post about the cycle of life/death and how death mana can be found in every grain of dirt#Norman would not enjoy places rich in death energy
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Local Bovines want your Headscritches!
Look @bovineblogger
I love these ladies, their pasture is just near my standard walking route and if theyre out they always wanna say hello.
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happy bisexual day to those who celebrate
#dragalia lost#dragalia#orion#orion dragalia#I don't usually cross reference JP translations for Dragalia stuff but I was curious if some of the Really Gay Lines in English were#the same in the original text. Turns out some of them weren't#which just makes the localization funnier#Like. Grain of salt because I don't speak Japanese and rely on machine translations and friends who speak the language#But the really sus “receiving end” line was originally just. “Haha it'd be nice to be the one getting escorted for once :)”#I'm sure it's not an entirely indulgent translation but. Phrasing!!!#then there's the infamous(?) “I seek to have a relationship with everyone here!” where in JP it's clearer that by “everyone”#Orion means “every woman” and not literally “everyone”#bc JP Elly says “In your case won't just any woman do?” while in EN she just calls him shameless LOL#there's a few more#like the scene where Orion says “You're the first man I've ever wanted to protect” and Euden says “damn bro I thought you weren't gay?”#and he responds calmly like “You really are slow when it comes to these matters! I'm just saying you're more charming than you know.”#it's a letdown but it's kinda coy#meanwhile since JP has some extra animations#namely Orion jumping in shock and making a cringing face before responding#the No Homo vibe is off the charts 😭😭😭#and then theres that xmas seasonal line that's about picking up women ...when voices are set to JP.#The EN line is about being broke. For some reason.#But even with all that it's not like there's no gay subtext in JP Orion's dialogue. It's just deeply funny how the EN localizers went#Yup. This one. Bisexual. We gotta make it more obvious.
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s/o to that time I referred to the valkyries serving mead to the slain warriors in Valhöll as "the Hooters of the slain"
#seriously not what they are at all#but it was funny af don't you tell me i was wrong about that#i might post the whole note here later if I have the energy and tbh it's much more interesting than just this lil' quip#I'm also not a professional researcher#so if I post that thing take yer grains of salt before believing everything I say at face value#norse mythology#i felt funny#just your local myhtology hobbyist having a laugh at my own brain
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I know I haven't said much about it, but legitimately, "running away" was one of the most pivotal life decisions I've ever made. Probably THE first major life decision I've made, and also the best. If you have an opportunity to go, leave. Get out of there. If you are not safe at home, emotionally, physically, whatever, and you're able to leave, do it. It's going to suck such major ass for a while because you're going to have to deal with the scars they've left on you, but I wholeheartedly, full-throatedly, with-my-chest promise you that it is going to be better. You're going to be better. If you have the privilege of being able to escape, no matter how difficult it feels, then RUN.
#whatever you leave behind is not your responsibility. sometimes you're gonna have a fucked relationship with the siblings you 'abandoned'#but they have to understand that you had to leave. and that you were actively fighting to take them with you the entire time#it's okay to be selfish. you need to be selfish to start to recover.#if you have to be homeless please look up and do your research on local resources first. plan things out.#i was lucky enough to have family who'd been waiting years and years for this moment to happen#if you can go and have your college dorm as a safe haven then absolutely take that chance#if you can go and rent an apartment with the money from your job then take that chance#plan shit. do it. even if your brain fights you. you do not want to be out there without proper precautions or else you could end up-#-seriously fucked over.#also i know i'm encouraging people to get out but in equal measure:#if it isn't safe to leave you are not lesser for staying.#if it's winter and you can't be out there alone you are not complicit in your own abuse yk?#if you have family you CANNOT leave behind like extremely young siblings then you are not at fault for staying.#i was lucky enough to be able to leave quickly and (relatively) painlessly and i'm aware that not everybody can do that#sometimes staying IS the better choice. but that's a choice YOU have to make not me#assess your situation properly. are you staying for your own safety or because you're scared?#etc etc. obviously take all of this with a grain of salt i don't have all the life experience in the world just what little i have#also: prepaid phones are a godsend. MRIs. canned food. make sure to have first aid kits if needed. plan ahead. have a stash somewhere safe#rox rumblings#me things
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I know you said FNAF is placeless but it's also really funny when you get to consider it's also canonically set in Utah. There's lawsuit forms in Pizza Sim mentioning Washington County, Utah.
I didn't know that; good catch, anon!
It's frankly rather America-centric of me to say that anyway, but North America is pretty big population-wise and it spans a number of distinct groups- which is why it's notable to me that it feels like a story that could take place in Utah or on the East Coast or in the South or even in Canada. This thing is vaguely familiar or even relatable in a lot of small towns; who, from any of these places, hasn't been to a local restaurant that just didn't feel quite right?
#i love learning new niche facts about stuff like this /gen#passenger comms#i imagine mexico knows better than to mess with that shit but i've never been so. grain of salt#i wish i could shoutout my local offputting restaurant but. well. internet privacy <3
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⭐️Currently reading: The One-Straw Revolution by Masanobu Fukuoka ⭐️
‘Just playing or doing nothing at all, children are happy. A discriminating adult, on the other hand, decides what will make him happy, and when these conditions are met he feels satisfied.’
The synopsis calls it ‘Zen and the Art of Farming.’ This book is about his experience over 30 years of using the ‘do-nothing’ farming method. He lets his orchard and rice/barley fields grow wild without any pest controls or fertilizers. That’s the basis of it (kinda?) — but what makes this book amazing is that he goes deep into why it works for him. Explaining why he doesn’t have to use chemicals to treat weeds and pests. Into the full circle of life & how to actually grow ‘natural’ food. We always want bigger and better quality & focus on high yields and money. How disconnected we really are growing from nature in agriculture.
If you aren’t into agriculture or learning about the exact ‘whys’ of his experiences from growing rice, barley & citrus on his personal field —- skip to part 2 of the book. I honestly wouldn’t recommend skipping(it holds a lot of useful information), but after part 2 is where I really got interested.
It’s not only about farming though - it also incorporates our health, diet and how basic our knowledge is as humans. It makes you think.
Even this book being written in 1978 - it still holds up to today. We’ve had all this knowledge since then and we still continue to do industrial agriculture and live/eat the way we do. It’s eye opening, for sure.
I’m not completely finished yet - I have about 40 pages left - but that’s what I think so far ☺️ You should definitely give it a try.
#one straw revolution#sustainable agriculture#natural farming#masanobu fukuoka#agriculture#agriculture books#currently reading#sustainable gardening#grow organic#organic gardening#green manure#farming#eat locals#grow your own food#food not lawns#ecology#guerrilla gardening#indoor garden#container gardening#vegetable gardening#starting seeds#growing food#gardening blog#gardening tips#plant mom#plant life#homesteading#growing grains
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the thing about being someone who likes to go to farmers markets and shopping local vendors is your favorite stuff can and will disappear without a trace because the one person running the show gets tired of slinging cookies or w/e in a crowded hot market every weekend. And one day you'll look up and realize you haven't seen them there in a while, and you go to their instagram, and their last post is from January like 'see you at the market this weekend!', but you won't. You won't ever again.
#this is about a local milk tea vendor I miss a lot#on the other hand I used to get this nut milk from a local vendor and one day I squinted at the bottle and saw in extremely tiny font#“not pasteurized” so you know#take your local artisanal vendors with a grain of salt
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i keep seeing people who aren't usamerican reblogging that post about being protected under the migratory birds act and im like lol no tf u arent
#google ur local bird protection legislation resist the americanisation of the nature conversation!!!;#p sure theres treaties w places like canada under the usa migratory birds act#but idk if thats the same as birds being protected under the same legislation in canada so take with a grain of salt#you Might have a migratory birds protection act!#here in the uk tho im pretty sure birds are protected under the countryside & wildlife act overall#ecology#rowanposting
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at the oral surgeon and barely spent any time in the waiting room, where I could have been fooling around in my sketchbook and Vibing. I have, however, spent a LOT of time sitting here waiting in the exam room after watching their friendly informed consent video about how all procedures involving sedation include a risk of death
#cool vibe thanks#I could see my lovely little car from the waiting room I could have been sketching...#okay well he came in while I was writing tags and suggests it sounds like local anesthetic and novacaine might be better for me anyway#but also I can Think About It and let them know ahead of my actual appointment#which is nice#THE THING IS I'M NOT SURE LMAO.#I am very afraid of general anesthetic tbqh but I also don't wanna be Miss Big Balls and do it awake and be Wrong about being fine :'D#getting a filling has so far been Fine though....#doc: it's easier for me if you're awake? but we recommend anaesthesia for very bad anxiety-- I'll be drilling I may have to cut the bone etc#me: I mean the Drilling Sounds have never been my problem but I've never had a man digging chunks of tooth out of the depths of my flesh SO-#I'm gonna consult with my team (people who have had theirs out already) and see what we think I guess#my mom said hers went great and she went to work the next day and had no issues and I BET she stayed awake. similar types of anxiety I think#meanwhile justin severely oversold how horrible the anaesthetic shots are for fillings so I'll take his counsel with a grain of salt#about me
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Working more on the local group of Synchronized Light and hoo boy. There's smth wrong with these guys.
#rat rambles#oc posting#rain posting#theyre mostly a different flavor of messed up than my other guys as theyre all like family drama messed up#these guys are not family except for the obvious two they're just all either the worst or going thru it#oh also the girlfired of my ancient girl is a part of the group and they have a name now theyre twisted orbit 👍#orbit has gotten the pleasure of not just having an upsetting backstory but also an upsetting present due to one of her neighbors#and funnily enough its not synchronized light she basically never interacts with those two#instead its the circles second most fucked up lil guy named putity preserved#he is an absolute ass and has been absolutely obsessed with the idea of being the one to find the tripple affirmative for ages#back when the ancients were around he managed to convince his city's council to allow him to experiment on prisioners and after the mass#ascension he has continued to experiment on the various lifeforms he can get his hands on#for most of the time before the mass ascension orbit wasnt particularly invested in solving the great problem so he didn't pay her much#mind but after a certain incident where she broke down and had her memoried shifted through and selectively romoved he started to pay more#attention to her even though for the first while up until the mass ascension she mostly just seemed hollow#eventually after the mass ascension they seemingly suddenly gained an immense interest in solving the great problem#and that was when purity reached out offering to work with them on the project#at first orbit was unwilling but after the sliver incident they seemed a lot more willing to hear him out#which was perfect news for him because the sliver invident made him Furious and he was desperate for a way to revise history#and thankfully orbit's motivation for solving the great problem was exactly what he had been hoping for.#then theres the other two members of the local group endless grains of sand and deep coated mist who are the old ladies of the group#and theyre like old old they were some of the first iterators constructed and it shows#mist especially as her structure is both much larger than a modern iterator and also way less efficient and with much higher steam output#the quirk of this local group is that they all sorta use the same water that's rotated through them all#sand being located by the ocean and mist being located far away on the peak of a huge mountain being the connecting points of the loop#sand fiters a bunch of the water and sends the excess upwards towards a variety of water resavoirs and also mist#mist then slurps up a shit ton of it and outputs a shit ton of steam which condenses to water and flows downwards through the mountainous#area she's perched atop from#this water then forms a series of rivers and lakes downwards through the other 3 and since they require way less water than her theyre able#to all safely recycle mist's outputted water
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I wonder if the old world didn’t have so many different people groups if we would have only had a single grain that we would have turned into something like corn instead of the large variety of lower yield grains that we ended up with
#corn had to become something amazing because it was the only grain they domesticated#but in the old word they domesticated a bunch of different grains so they didn’t have as focused of a development#I wonder if grain domestication occurred independently or if different peoples learned about it from others then used their own local grains#I imagine there were some independent discoveries of it and some people that learned it#but it’s so interesting that in the new world they only domesticated a single grain and were all eating it#I imagine lower populations and more easily exploitable natural environments had something to do with it
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They had Greece, southern Iraq, and central Asia by 6000, Egypt and central Europe by 5000, and the shores of the Atlantic by 4000 (Figure 2.4). (...) The second theory says none of these things happened, because the first farmers across most of the regions shown in Figure 2.4 were not descendants of immigrants from the Hilly Flanks at all. They were local hunter-gatherers who settled down and became farmers themselves. (...) After sweeping from what is now Poland to the Paris Basin in a couple of hundred years before 5200 BCE, the wave of agricultural advance ground to a halt (Figure 2.4).
"Why the West Rules – For Now: The patterns of history and what they reveal about the future" - Ian Morris
#book quotes#why the west rules – for now#ian morris#nonfiction#cereals#cereal grains#farming#greece#iraq#central asia#egypt#central europe#atlantic ocean#ocean shores#passage of time#theory#immigration#hilly flanks#locals#hunter gatherer#settling down#poland#paris basin#agriculture#advancement#halt
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oh oh and the local grains stand was back today after a hiatus and they had my favorite brown sticky rice again!
#i made a beeline for it when i saw lmaoo#the girls working the stand were asking what i do with it and i said it's great for rice bowls and stuff#but honestly it's so tasty i'll just eat it straight up#and they were so excited to hear lol apparently they're new to working the stand and don't know the ins and outs of all their products yet#but boyy i'm glad they're back. i've gotten a few different varieties of brown rice now from the farmers market (i still have some actually#but i LOVE that variety of stick rice specifically. it's sooo tasty it has the best texture and it's so versatile to cook with#i'm really really glad they're selling it again :)#when i use up the cornmeal i have rn i'll probably buy some from them next too#it's so cool seeing how many grains are actually grown local here. until like two years ago i had no idea rice was grown in MD#sasha speaks
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I'm currently eating the best burrito I've ever put in my mouth and it's truly a shame that this place is nearly two hrs from where I live bc it's so good like please put a location in my city 😭
#It's a local place that sells Mexican food#It's like Chipotle but authentic and they actually use seasoning#They also have whole wheat tortillas which is chefs kiss#If your restaurant is good AND it has whole grain options I'm there#Words#Personal#I hate it when you travel and eat the best food you've ever had at a local restaurant#Bc you're like “my taste buds will never be blessed like that again”
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