#Microbial Magic

[microbzcouk]

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[kheoni2024]

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[ravewing]

cambrian period dashboard simulator

redlichiida-realdeactivated0455414

petition to ban anomalocarises from the local sandbar. theyre so fucking big and it's freaking everyone out and me personally ion want a trilobite muncher looming over me when im trying to have a drink.

🪲 trillybite17 Follow

they dont call them the ABNORMAL shrimp for nothing, they're fucking weird

🎸 punkrock-halluci Follow

No, you know what petition needs to be started? One to get rid of ignorant bigots like you. Have you ever SEEN an Anomalocaris ever eat– let alone ATTACK– a trilobite? No, you haven't. Because they DON'T EAT TRILOBITES. Do some fucking research before you say shit like this.

⚜️ splendidmarrella Follow

fyi if you get rid of anomalocarises from public spaces then you will quite literally starve. you know those dead soft-bodied organisms yall scavenge and eat? yeah anomalocaris is the one providing those for you. as a scavenger myself i have been personally impacted by loss of food due to unfair treatment of anomalocarises that have forced them to leave the shallows that i live in and let me tell you eating detritus and nothing else is literally awful. please think twice before you post something prejudiced like this.

🩶 pleurae71 Follow

common hallucigenia + marrella W

ignore the OP, i promise most of us trilobites aren't like them- i don't even know why this is a debate. i guarantee they've never stepped outside of their little rock cave in their life

🌀 xcorynexospikesx Follow

LMFAOO they deactivated☠️

32,354 notes

🫧 cambripuns Follow

What do you call a Hurdiidae without any eyes? A Hurddae!

♟️vampeytoia Follow

actually you'd call it 'uncle maximilien' because my uncle maximilien was hatched with no eyes

💼 stanley-shrimp Follow

Valerie, you and I both know damn well that you do not have an "Uncle Maximilien," let alone one with no eyes. Stop lying on the internet and stop leaving your soft-bodied organism carcasses on my front sandbed. It smells putrid.

♟️ vampeytoia Follow

wow ok mr fun police. just go and piss on my parade like that

51,039 notes

👾 fiveeyedcoolguy Follow

giys i.m tripping bals rn lol. shuld not hv eaten tge 'detritus " browni e from the hallucigna.. i saw thr magic anomllcrais

🪱 pinkpikaiapage Follow

What?? Elaborate

👾 fiveeyedcoolguy Follow

He told me a prophecy

6,211 notes

🦐 apexshrimpy Follow

she cambrian on my period till i explosion

#anomalo talks #misc tag #is this hash tag funny or no?

211 notes

🎸 punkrock-halluci Follow

thinking about dying my spikes again. what color should i get?

🍢 leancho852 Follow

Do magenta to match your skateboard!!

🎸 punkrock-halluci Follow

ohh that's actually really smart thanks🙏

17 notes

🪨 shalesifters Follow

🧽 the-odontogriphus767 Follow

yo wtf. none of these fuck the landmasses. we're all in the ocean for a REASON

🦪 biofilmer08 Follow

Hey, actually, a few other molluscs and I browse on the microbial biofilm :)

♟️ vampeytoia Follow

🤓

9,761 notes

🕸️ arthropodstemz Follow

reblog if u get around by undulating ur lateral lobes

21,006 notes

📜 g-wiwaxia Follow

Did anyone else happen to see @shalesifters poll on the landmasses (followed by the reblog of the mollusc)? I'd like to think that I was born in the wrong generation. I should have been able to experience the joys of being a land-dweller. I may just have grown tired of being in the ocean every day; quite frankly I just want some sort of change or reform (especially considering the incredulous prices of jellyfish nowadays...)

#Rant #I hope you guys get the idea. I expect some (likely a copious amount of, actually) hate for this one, but regardless I thought that I'd share my thoughts here #I'd like to move to Laurentia

74 notes

📸 daily-cambrian-pics Follow

⚜️ splendidmarrella Follow

omg thats me on the bottom in the middle! @romip51212 @kookykootenia look its us from earlier today

🫑 kookykootenia Follow

Woah whatt this is actually crazy

🍤 romip51212 Follow

yo i look rad in that.. changing my header immediately

8,121 notes

�� radiodont-radiostatic Follow

DNI if you support any of the anti-anomalocaris propaganda that's circling around. Sick and tired of the twisted lies that are being spread on here. I won't stand for the slandering of my brethren.

#static speaks #dni #will not hesitate to block and report any of you bigoted assholes

93 notes

🪼 jlyfsgh224256 Follow

q

79,343 notes

🍌 nectocarisking69420 Follow

I FUCKING LOVE DETRITUS

🍌 nectocarisking69420 Follow

Yo wtf was i on last night

🍢 leancho852 Follow

You were speaking your truth king. Don't hold back

755 notes

🪸 see-you-lagerstatte Follow

thought too long about the big white orb beyond the surface and broke down crying. What to do about this?

#why is it there?????? what is it???? #please im going insane over this

23 notes

🐾 catboycanadaspis Follow

born to say "nya!" and meow. forced to consume the coarse particles found on the sediment surface

886 notes

🌊 tidal-trilobite Follow

hey has anyone else noticed that it's been harder to breathe lately or is it just me? can't afford to go to the doctor for an exam rn

🦀 clackyappendages Follow

I thought that it was just me! I might sound crazy but have there been less archaeocyathids lately??

🐚 sand-muncher-757 Follow

i've had TWO neighbors pass away from hypoxia in the past month, definitely have noticed the breathing issues too. also i havent seen an archaeocyathid in so long either. so weird😬😬

682 notes

[charlott2n]

callout for charlotte: she keeps shrinking down to microbial size and having magic school bus adventures in my pussy

its fun in yhere........

[cloudyswritings]

More vessel biology headcanons?

Vessels are actually really, really good at burrowing. It’s probably how so many escaped the abyss after they got sealed. They got it from both parents, and the void. Which per my silly little brain, can old be contained in round glass.

the void basically erodes/decays things in fast forward otherwise?

Vessels all have one major flaw or imperfection the void couldn’t remove, THKs was either a desire for perfection or being able to make familial bonds.

Ghosts flaw is an endless well of willpower. They will never, ever, stop. They inherited from their mothers conceptual side, because their will is the slow burrowing of roots through stone and the deceptively gentle trickle of water on metal. Greenpath vessels was a sense of adventure/desire to explore. And the nosk vessels all had a sense of longing for companionship which led to their deaths.

The vessels also seem to have physical flaws too? Like structurally I mean. The prime example is THKs missing arm, in the pure vessel boss fight that same arm is what they use for the void tendrils attack and by the time we fight them in the egg it’s entirely rotted off. I think it honestly was never as strong or stable as the other arm and was bound to be lost eventually. Broken Vessels flaw would be their third horn(the one that’s broken off).

Vessels actually do still have some of their own light, you can see this in game actually—even without the lantern you give off a subtle glow. I think that some vessels actually retained some of the godly light and status they otherwise would have had, only a little though.

The above idea comes from my headcanon that Wyrms specifically are really resistant to void as far as gods go, because they always dig deep and far and in that sometimes burrow into pockets of void far below the surface. They need to be able to survive contact with it in the short term at least. This nature would explain how some vessels retain minute traces of light, and why the pale king was the one actually standing at the mouth of the abyss waiting for vessels.

given time, soul, and light a vessel can grow to enormous sizes- or eventually metamorphose into a wyrm proper. Albeit one still tarnished by the void

in fact I wonder if any of the seeds/eggs dropped into the abyss hatched young Wyrms instead of vessels? Maybe they escaped or something? I don’t think this is likely but it’s a cool idea.

vessels are deceptively light, as in like hornet could carry THK on her back if she needed to- they’re literally hollow in a way

Void and water don’t mix, it’s like oil and water. That’s why we float in the blue lake.

The void itself might be the remnants of an ancient sea that covered the world beyond Hallownest before the age of bright gods. It would explain the trilobite creature we see in deepnest and the way the abyss and the rest of Hallownest appear to be made of fossilized shells. Plus if it’s the remnants of the sea then it could be something like a microbial mat that’s really toxic to life? Like maybe it’s a magic microbial soup? Magic microbial goop even. Vessels are goop.

Vessels are really really strong compared to other ways of containing things, like THK held the radiance for a long ass time. If a vessel tried to contain a weaker god they’d probably just be able to tbh. Like anything weaker than the nightmare heart if probably fair game for yoinking.

Vessels also sometimes inherit the hunger of Wyrms, and looking into their eyes gives the sensation of falling into the maw of some great beast. Godseaker did call Little Ghost a wielder of nail and eater of soul

Vessels are also really susceptible to outside influences, kinda like evee if they were Pokémon. This is how Ghost can use so many charms at once but also why said charms can change them so easily.

Theoretically a vessel raised by or containing a god could take on some of their traits-either by force or by accident.

Unrelatedly THK has a voice to cry out with…

I think radiance may have eventually tried turning them into something more like Grimm is for the heart, a body for her to use and a mind thoroughly broken to her will.

after-all she shines brightest against the darkness…

If they could eat, Vessels would have a truly remarkable number of tastebuds, because Wyrms will eat anything and I feel like the white lady has ways to “taste” the soil to see if it’s nutrient rich and has fertilizer.

man I’m just realizing, vessels would like some weird food, they’d definitely eat dirt

THK crunching on crystals?? Likely

Finally the horns of vessels are actually their “branches” and will keep growing indefinitely unless trimmed or broken periodically, this comes from both parents. Wyrms need to constantly replace burrowing teeth and Roots are beings of constant growth and pruning.

[amiactuallydoingthisblog]

Ok. Spoilers for Ash’s bound lore today.

There’s void goo now. And while we don’t know a ton about it yet, I want to talk about what it could be. I’m using my made-up pathogen, Vocivos pathogenesis as a base, so go read that post for more context.

When V. pathogenesis is surviving outside of a host, it acts like a bacterium. And something certain bacteria can do is form a biofilm, which is basically a mat of bacteria held together with proteins, polysaccharides, and even DNA. In these biofilms, they can recycle nutrients, coordinate their actions across cells, and are more resilient against environmental pressures.

This does make them particularly difficult to treat as an infection, but that’s for a different post when we know more about how void sickness impacts avians. We know that people cough up this void goo (Ash’s mom, for example), but not much more than that.

And while these biofilms are made of cells, they can absolutely get big enough to be seen by human eye, growing to be inches thick and the largest microbial mats spread out over tens of kilometers. Our few meters of goo is no problem.

So why are we seeing this goo now? V. pathogenesis has been existing in the ecosystem in low levels and infecting the mobs for a while now, ever since the Halloween party. When the beacons went down a second time, it was able to surge through more of the mobs. But then we re-stabilized the islands and killed the mobs. With the islands ambient magic at a lower level, the bacteria don’t die off, but with no mobs they had nowhere to go except to aggregate into a biofilm.

Now, I’m not 100% on this theory. We haven’t actually looked at the goo yet, and there’s a possibility that it could act more like a slime mold or another mold than a biofilm. But the basics are the same: a bunch of single-celled organisms living together and almost acting like a multi-celled one.

TL;DR: the void goo is probably a biofilm, and that will have implications for when it infects an avian

[gender-luster]

*terms and conditions apply

stone: you can only swap consciousnesses with another stone holder. be careful who you swap with, you never know what they might get up to in your body... and be sure you know how to sever the connection, lest you end up stuck inside one another

dagger: as you receive your new dagger, you notice that your name has become etched upon its blade. not only does this dagger grant you immortality, it grants you other magic as well! be warned, though, all magic comes with a price! and this price? your life! your life is now permanently bound to this dagger. you cannot be killed except for by the dagger, and whoever is in possession of the dagger has full control over you. you also now possess The Darkness, an ancient being forged with the spirits of all the dagger's previous owners. welcome, new Dark One!

microbes: while these microbial life forms now live and colonize inside your brain, they are harmless, and allow you to understand all languages spoken around you

amulet: welcome, new Trollhunter!! fate has chosen you, and you are now in possession of magic forged by the great Merlin himself! one small thing, though, you are now the Trollhunter, protector of both the human and the troll worlds! it is your destiny now, and you cannot escape it except for in death

puzzle: this artifact is not what it seems, and you are now being hunted by hoards of Githyanki desperate to get it back, as well as a couple cults also vying for its ownership. maybe you can unlock its secrets before they get you. good luck

[illarian-rambling]

You know what, I AM having a bitchin day, and hope you are too!

I have come for your ask game >:)

Hit me with Sepo, Yewbury, and Aloe Vera pls!

Sepo - What's something that, without fail, will always make this character angry?

I'm not gonna answer for Sepo, because he gets angry at every minor inconvenience, so let's hear from one of my new guys!

Faalgun is a kind and understanding man. He knows what it's like to fail others and, more importantly, to fail himself. He makes an effort to be forgiving, especially when he knows someone isn't lashing out on purpose. That said, he has zero tolerance for laziness or insubordination. Faalgun practically grew up in the Flying City navy. He has had it drilled into his skull again and again to always do his part, and to always shut up and listen to those who outrank him. So when others don't do that, it just baffles his mind. He usually ends up going full drill sargent. After all, in a place as deadly as the void of space, the hesitation that insubordination can bring might be deadly, and letting ship maintainence slide is surely a recipe for disaster.

Yewbury - What classes could you find at a college in this world?

A lot of the normal ones, though they'd cover more in-world themes. The main difference involves magic. On Illaros, magic and science are so closely intertwined as to be inseparable. Chemistry and alchemy are studied side by side, runes are integral to the field of mechanics, and magic is even involved in things like archeology and art. Sorcerers (people with inborn magic) also need a specific education to hone their gifts. They're common enough that most universities will offer classes for sorcerer-specific studies.

Here are some class names you might see:

Runic and Mundane Engineering 102

Advanced Microbial Alchemy

Araunian Studies

Elven Culture (This one is controversial because there are two main elven cultures and they hate each other)

Arcane Signature Reading: Sorcerers Only

Aloe Vera - Are there any skills you have in real life that you've been able to include in your writing? (Ex. chef describing food, martial artist writing fight scenes)

Ok, so the martial arts example is just me, but I've talked about that before, so I'll talk about something else instead. I write pretty good jargon. I'm good at making some fake word for alchemy or runic science sound real. I get this from being in STEM. Honest to god, this is what I'll use my chem minor for. Arnoflouric acid, Tamm units, tonality, Anbane's equation. I'm turning my academic terror into something fun!

Thanks for the asks!

[flygrlalchemy]

grimoire — herbs 001: cinnamon

cinnamon is so diverse in its magical uses. a fiery and energizing spice, cinnamon makes great use for:

𖦹 success

𖦹 love, lust, + passion

𖦹 protection, especially when working with archangel michael

𖦹 prosperity + quick money

𖦹 a good alternative to frankincense

𖦹 healing due to its anti-inflammatory + anti-microbial properties

[duhragonball]

Neon Genesis Evangelion 13

I was looking forward to this, because it was a Ritsuko episode, but it kind of falls flat. At least she's nice to look at.

Let's get this part out of the way. The Eva pilot kids are participating in some weird experiment where they have to sit in simulations of their Eva units and they gotta be butt-ass naked the entire time. Ritsuko says some bullshit about how they're trying to eliminate any interference in their bodies' connection to the user-interface. So they had to get super-clean and I guess even wearing the plugsuits would introduce unknown variables to the experiment.

I mean, the real reason is to do another gag where the kids are made to feel uncomfortable for the audience's amusement. It's also to write them out of the story, because they'll spend the whole episode stuck inside their entry plugs, unable to leave because of an evacuation order and their nudity.

However, the experiment has to be aborted when some sort of unknown corrosion occurs and contaminants enter the purified water that the Eva simulators are soaking in. All efforts to remove the contamination fail, and when Ritsuko tries to burn it off the simulators, its protected by an AT field, which means...

It's an Angel. I'm not clear on whether it's been inside the NERV base for a long time, and it's only now just making its move, or whether it just got here. But check this out first.

While Admiral Clownshoes gets the report from Ritsuko, Gendo Ikari just rises up from the floor like Cody Rhodes on his magic stage elevator.

Except it looks like his lower body has been cropped off. I think he's supposed to be sitting at a desk that's rising up with him, but it's the same color as the wall, so it looks really, really bad.

Gendo immediately orders that the Evas should be launched. The real ones, not the simulators. His staff point out that they'll need the Evas to defeat the Angel that's infiltrated their base, but Gendo is worried that the Evas might be compromised by the contamination. At least this way, if they lose the base, the Evas will be safe outside.

As for the pilots, they were already ejected from the simulators when the crisis began. Here, let me skip to the end real quick.

Those are their entry plugs, which are just... floating in a lake for some reason? The kids spend the rest of the episode here. I guess they could climb out and swim to shore, but...

... they're nude, and also they have no idea what's going on, or that their Evas are also outside the base. I guess in theory they could mount up and fight the Angel as usual, but this isn't your typical Angel.

It's more like a microbial infection, or an algal bloom. Somehow, it's evolving, becoming hardier and more powerful as it makes its way through the base. Briefly, the gang notice that it might have an aversion to the ozone they use to sterilize the water, so they pump more ozone into try to kill it. That works... for a little while, until the Angel suddenly recovers and flourishes in the ozone-rich environment. It adapted to its new conditions.

I think when it made contact with Rei's Eva simulator, it learned... computers? I don't know a more sophisticated way to say that. Anyway, once that happened, the Angel started moving through NERV's... computer... stuff. Eventually it got into the MAGI.

All right, let's talk about the MAGI. These are a trio of supercomputers that run all of Tokyo-3. In particular, the MAGI function as the main OS for the NERV base, but they also serve as the de facto municipal government of the city. They have elections and human officials, but that's just a dog and pony show. The real decisions are made by AI.

When the Angel infects one of the three MAGI, Melchior, it attempts to trigger a self-destruct command, but the other two MAGI overrule it. So the Angel infects a second MAGI, Belshazzar, and Ritsuko manages to halt its advance by... well, I don't actually know how she does it.

This gives them two hours to figure out how to deal with this. Misato proposes destroying the MAGI before it's too late, but Ritsuko objects, since that would mean destroying their entire base. I don't know if she means that literally or metaphorically. I mean, the Angel is trying to destroy the base literally, so it sounds like Misato's plan would just be giving the Angel what it wants.

The problem is that the Angel keeps evolving to cope with any threat, so if they can't destroy the MAGI, then the only other alternative is to accelerate its evolution until it reaches a dead end. Uh, okay?

Eventually, the Angel might "choose to co-exist with the MAGI system", if its only alternative is to stagnate and die. I feel like we're making a lot of assumptions about what the Angel is and what its motivations are.

I just assumed these things are sentient life forms, an their attacks on NERV were deliberate acts against an enemy. This particular Angel infiltrated their base and immediately went into the heart of their operation--the computer that controls everything-- and tried to activate a self-destruct mechanism. It's not trying to communicate, and it's not an emergent consciousness. It seems to know exactly what's its doing, and it's trying to kill them, just like the last several Angels that made a beeline for this base.

My point here is that I don't think it has a strong survival instinct beyond completing its mission. Given the choice between co-existing with the MAGI and mutually assured destruction, I think the Angel would choose the latter. But maybe I've been misreading these things all along.

Ritsuko's proposal is to reprogram the third MAGI, Casper to... I don't even know. She's going to do something to it. Then they'll allow the Angel to contaminate that MAGI as well, and whichever one is faster will win. If the Angel can take control of all three MAGI, it can trigger the self-destruct, so unless Casper wins, they all die.

So Ritsuko crawls inside of Casper's... uh... computer junk, to make the necessary changes to its program. Inside, they find a bunch of handwritten developer notes, which supposedly will help them reprogram this thing even faster. Wouldn't these notes have been more helpful on the outside of the computer? I get that they were going for a particular visual here, but I'm really having a hard time keeping up.

While Ritsuko works, Misato asks her about the MAGI, which... okay, this is a huge pet peeve of mine, where I'm trying to fix some complicated piece of equipment, and someone tries to make idle conversation while I need to concentrate on what I'm doing. And this is a hundred times worse than that, because Ritsuko's on the clock, and when the clock runs out, they all die.

But Ritsuko plays along, so either she's just that good at multi-tasking, or she's too polite to object. Anyway, her mother was the one who invented the MAGI technology, and she imprinted her own personality into its systems. Ritsuko says her mom set them up to represent three aspects of her personality: Scientists, mother, and woman. Ritsuko always respected her mother as a scientist, and she could never relate to her as a mother, but she hated her as a woman. Okay?

Basically, Ritsuko didn't like her mom much, but she feels a special connection with the MAGI anyway, because they carry her mother's personality and legacy. It's a lot like the deal with Misato and her dad, or Shinji with his dad. Is this a theme, or did the writers just only have the one idea?

It's a good thing Ritsuko is so hot, or this episode would be a total mess. She does whatever she does, and it works, but with less than a second to spare. The Angel is... gone? They don't really get into that, but it doesn't explode like all the others, and the contamination is eliminated, so I don't know what exactly happened to it. Maybe it really is co-existing with the MAGI system.

Oh, wow, I'm out of episode. This was the pits.

A huge chunk of this one was just technobabble, which works pretty well on a show like Star Trek: The Next Generation, but not on an anime like this, which relies on flashy visuals instead of live actors. The problem is fairly simple: An Angel got in their base and tried to hack the supercomputer. But the solution is utter gobbledygook. I have no idea what they did to fix it, or even whether the Angel was alive or dead afterward.

I'm reminded a lot of the TNG episode "Final Mission". It's about Wesley Crusher's last day on the Enterprise before he goes to Starfleet Academy, and he, Captain Picard, and a dirtbag shuttle pilot get marooned on a desert planet. Picard is injured and the pilot gets killed, so it's up to Wesley to save Picard from some weird energy sentry that's preventing them from getting fresh water. Wesley figures it out, but the climax of the episode is just him tapping buttons on his tricorder until the sentry finally just... goes away.

It's a real letdown, because the rest of the episode was really good. The problem is that normally when they solve a problem on Star Trek, you have one of the crew explain the solution to the others, and they mull it over and eventually agree to a plan. But in "Final Mission", Wesley's got no one to talk to. Picard's unconscious and Dirgo's dead, and the Enterprise hasn't found them yet. So he's stuck in the unfortunate position of having to come up with this clever solution with his tricorder, but never getting the chance to tell anyone how he did it.

A good counterexample to this is "The Enemy", where Geordi La Forge is marooned on a planet with a hostile Romulan, and they have to work together to track a homing beacon to escape. It's much more effective, because it's two characters in a collaboration, so they have to explain what they're doing. Geordi has a tricorder and his VISOR, but the planet's environment has messed up his brain to where he can't use the VISOR, and his tricorder isn't sensitive to the beacon. So the Romulan suggests he connect them together. Good idea, but Geordi can't do it because he can't see, so the Romulan does it while Geordi talks him through the procedure.

That's not what we get in NGE 13. The Angel contaminates the base, and you have a lot of panicky dialogue and characters giving status updates and issuing orders, but none of it means anything.

"Reroute the main server into the backup neurohub!" "Disengage Pipe #6!" "It's entered the Matthew vinculum! Heading for Mark, now Luke! Isolate the John vinculum, quickly!" "Execute protocols A, F, and 37." "Shut off the frammistat and bring the Longius Introspection online." "But sir...!" "To hell with the safety checks, there's no time!"

You can kind of get away with this stuff, but there has to be a balance. Technobabble is for aesthetic purposes, to establish that it's science fiction. At some point you gotta come up for air and fill in your audience on the stakes. Let them know what the problem is and what obstacles the characters need to overcome to fix it. Otherwise you're just showing people typing on computers until the alarms switch off.

The biggest gripe I have with this episode is that Ritsuko's plan worked perfectly. There was zero tension or conflict to any of it. The alternative--destroying the MAGI, as Misato proposed-- was apparently so unthinkable that it barely got any traction. So Ritsuko's plan was the only option. Ritsuko herself had no problem implementing the plan. It would have been nice if she felt some sort of inner turmoil over this. Like, maybe she could have been worried that she wasn't good enough to pull this off. Maybe she had some unpleasant memory of her mother inside Casper's inner workings, so she just has an aversion to crawling back inside. Anything, as long as it's more than just sitting inside a computer and typing on another computer.

Well, at least she looks good doing it.

[quotesfrommyreading]

For other species, the moon’s light is more important as a navigational cue than as an aphrodisiac. Migrating chum salmon swim more quickly and at shallower depths during a full moon, likely because they are using its light as a lodestar. Albatrosses and streaked shearwaters often fly more frequently and for longer periods of time under a full moon, perhaps because they can travel farther with increased visual acuity, or to avoid lurking ocean predators whose eyesight is improved by moonlit water. Newborn rabbit fish seem to depend on moon phases to reach safety: on the day before or during the new moon, when the sea is darkest, rabbit fish fry born in the open sea migrate en masse to the haven of coral reefs.

Even plankton move differently beneath the moon. Every day, in oceans around the world, plankton sink to greater depths, and rise again at night, most likely to avoid predation and feed in shallower waters under the cover of dark. Scientists are still not sure what drives this daily rhythm, but a biochemical clock synced to the sun is one of the primary hypotheses. During the Arctic winter, however, sunlight never reaches some regions of the ocean. A recent study suggests that plankton living in this frigid continuous dusk rely instead on the moon.

Some animals do not just change beneath the moon; they change into the moon. During the day, bobtail squid—speckled, peanut-sized cephalopods related to cuttlefish—bury themselves in sand to rest and hide from predators. At night, they emerge to feed on shrimp and worms. Having abandoned the seafloor and exposed themselves to potential danger, the tiny mollusks cloak themselves in an entirely different kind of camouflage. Bobtail squid have evolved one of the most magical symbioses on the planet. Bioluminescent bacteria live within the folds of a chambered sac in the squid’s mantle, generating light that spills from the squid’s underside. A lens and color filter attached to this internal lantern—known as the light organ— modulate the microbial glow to mimic the light of the moon and stars filtering down through the water. In this way, bobtail squid erase their own shadow. Instead of seeing a conspicuous squid-shaped silhouette, any predator gazing up from below sees only more moonlit sea. Several other species—including deepwater fish, crustaceans, and true squid—use similar counter-illumination strategies.

 —   The Lunar Sea

[beecreeper]

A bit of a self-indulgent ask here, but what are some of your favorite things about your Tavs and Durges? Parts of their design, personalities, little things of yourself you put into them etc? :3c

Uuuuuugh this is such a hard ask to answer because they’re my babies!!! I love so much about them so I’ll try to put things here that I haven’t had the chance to talk about anywhere else.

Putting it all under a cut because it's long

One thing I really like about Briar is her homebrew alcohol hobby, inspired by my real life experience with like four of my friends all getting into homebrewing mead at the same time. A lot of those meads were really good but some of them were uuuuuuhh. Questionable. The point being that I am now very familiar now with the funky microbial taste of partially successful homebrew experiments and I find it delightful imagining that my gross daughter likes that taste specifically.

There’s a BUNCH of myself in Molli because she’s literally a self insert but one aspect that makes me really happy that I never get to talk about it Molli’s brother, Kae! Inspired by my irl brother, Molli’s brother is a trans man who left their hometown they were both still teenagers. He shows up as Molli’s dream guardian, but Molli doesn’t recognize him because the last time she saw him was before his transition! I really like the wibbly wobbly psychic magic implied by the fact that her brother’s form is somehow in her head despite not having seen him like that yet. Molli meets back up with him in Act 3 because he’s working at for the Guild (I just got done playing through that section and I even used a hireling to have him in the party in game!). Something else I think is fun is that his name and his deadname are inspired by my brother’s names but in the opposite direction, so his name is inspired by my brother’s deadname and his deadname is inspired by my brother’s actual name (I ran this by him first and he agrees with me that it’s funny).

One of my favorite little details about Ferox is that he really loves poetry (which is NOT inspired by me at all I hate poetry tbh). He’s not good with words himself, but he really appreciates people who are. He likes to read or (even better) listen to poetry and just chew on the meaning of it or the interplay of the words and whatnot. He’s got a lot of thoughts about it but has a hard time articulating any of them. I think maybe in far off epilogue land I'll have him try his hand at composing his own.

This isn’t so much about Myrala as an oc but I’m excited to play her in game because I’m gonna dedicate myself to roleplaying the one handed thing in game. Like, no dual wielding, no two handed weapons, no long bows, stuff like that. It’s a small detail and probably won’t be toooo relevant since she’s a cleric BUT it makes me happy regardless.

If I’m gonna be perfectly honest one of my favorite details about Poppy is her full name – Porpentina Namethief. I had pulled the name Porpentina from the Harry Potter wiki (this was over ten years ago forgive me 😔) and felt completely Big Brain Moments when I thought of using Poppy as a nickname (imagine my disgust when terf supreme went with “Tina” instead. Even Penny would have been better! But I will die on the hill that Poppy is the clear best nickname for Porpentina.) And her last name is derived from some old homebrew dwarf lore that me and a friend came up with where there’s a dwarven city state thing where your last name is determined by a ceremony where babies are placed in a room with a bunch of metals and minerals and whatever the baby does determined not only their name but their position in society. Names like Goldbiter and Ironbanger and stuff like that. It's her mom's hometown, but Poppy, being raised outside of that city, never got her name there. She visited the city as an adult for a job and went out of her way to steal everything valuable from the naming chamber while she was there, earning her the moniker “Namethief”.

Thanks for the ask! Sorry it took me so long to answer!

[nysocboy]

Agatha All Along: Gay teen and witch trapped in a bad tv-show world

Agatha All Along appeared without warning on my Disney Plus page, showing two elderly women and a teenager on a dark wilderness road.  The teenager is Joe Locke, who played a gay character in Heartstopper, and came out in real life twice, at age 12 and 15, so no doubt he plays a gay character here.  I'm not even going to bother with preliminary research.

Scene 1: An elderly woman, maybe Agatha, driving to a crime scene: she's a small town cop suspended for punching a suspect,  but called back for a case only she can work on -- a woman has been found dead in the woods.  Why is it always a woman, never a man?  

Crushed by a heavy object, no id except for one of those old library check-out cards. 

Scene 2:Wait -- her name is Agnes, not Agatha, so who is "all along"?  

She goes to the library, where there's a long line to check out books. Have you been to a library lately?   She cuts -- "Only suckers wait their turn" -- to ask the sarcastic librarian Miss Jones about the check-out card found on the victim.

Miss Jones: "Ooh, is she dead?"

Agnes: "Why do you assume it was a woman?"  Because it's always a woman, nitwit.

Miss Jones: "It's more tit-ilating." Boob joke, har har.

They don't use old-fashioned check-out cards anymore.  The book -- Dialogue and Rhetoric: Known History of Learning & Debate, was marked stolen three years ago.  But there are lots of other copies in Natural Sciences.  Not in English?.

Agnes hits the stacks, and there were indeed a dozen copies -- all burnt up. "There was a fire," a mysterious man whispers.  Odd that Miss Jones didn't know that.

Scene 3: At the station, the Chief is played by David Lengel, who looks like Ross from Friends with a porn stash.  

The body shows traces of "a particular microbial sediment found only in Eastern Europe."  That makes no sense.  The woman was killed across the ocean and transported to their quiet New England town. 

Scene 4: In other news, Agnes has to work with the snarky Federal Agent Vidal, whom she hates.  To be fair, Agnes hates everyone.  They may be ex-lovers: Agnes thinks that she requested the assignment just so they could get back together.

Ex-Lover notes that there are no drag marks on the soil, nothing disturbed: the body just got zapped there, as if by magic! 

Agnes scoffs."In stories about small-town murders, it's always about the hidden secrets of the townsfolk, so let's investigate those."

Scene 5: Norm the pawn shop guy,  played by Asif Ali,  is examining a cameo locket that Agnes brought in: New England, late 17th century, with a lock of hair inside.  He offers $200. 

She just wanted an expert opinion so she could sell it on ebay, har har.  Agnes is rather a jerk, isn't she?

Scene 6: Late at night, Agnes is fiddling around at the station.  She discovers that the first letters of the book's title spell DARKH.   So?

Later, in her huge "TV middle class" house, Agnes goes into a child's bedroom with a teddy bear on the bed and drawings on the table, and music awards: "Nicholas Scratch, First Place." Dead kid?  But Nick and Scratch are both names for the Devil.

Scene 7: Knock on the door: It's the Ex-Girlfriend, with pizza!  Isn't it, like, the middle of the night?

Agnes has a lead: car crash in the town of Eastview an hour before the body was found. Ex-Girlfriend wants to know if she's ever been to Eastview.  "Sure, I'm a world traveler."  Wait...it dawns on Agnes that she's never actually left town.  How is that possible?  

Next Ex-Girlfriend asks "Do you remember why you hate me?"  "No."  It's like it was written into the script, with no back story.  Something is wrong here.

They're interrupted by a clattering -- an intruder in her bedroom, going through her stuff!  She chases him out onto the roof, down a gutter, and through the deserted streets, until Debra Jo Rupp, Grandma Kitty on That 90s Show, accidentally hits him.

Scene 8: The perp is a teenager, played by Joe Locke.  He's sarcastic and insulting, leading Agnes to kick him -- that's what got you suspended, Girl.  Finally he admits that he broke in to look for the Road. 

Agnes thinks he means the road to the murder site, so he's a suspect!  "What you were doing last night between 1 and 3 am?"  "Asleep in bed." "Loser!"  Wait -- being asleep in the middle of the night makes you a loser? 

She pulls out pictures of the murdered woman to confront him with, but suddenly they turn into pictures of flowers on someone's front lawn!   He starts chanting in Latin....and now her Ex-Girlfriend has vanished!  There never was a murder, so of course she would not have been called in.

Scene 9: Agnes visits the coroner's office  -- no body.  Until one appears, with a check-out card instead of a toe-tag, and the last person who checked the book out was Wanda Maximoff!  Agnes is shocked!

Who the heck is Wanda Maximoff?  Answers and nekkid men after the break

Agnes figures out the truth, but the viewer won't without research. It's a slog, so here's a random photo of Mike Guzman to keep your spirits up.

Wanda Maximoff is the Scarlet Witch in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  In the earlier series Wandavision, powerful witch Agatha Harkness zapped her memory and trapped her in a small town sitcom world. Townsfolk played various characters, and she herself dropped in as the Wacky Next Door Neighbor. 

At the end of the series, Wanda regained her memory, and for punishment, trapped Agatha in the small-town world, with her powers gone, forced to live through various badly-written tv show plotlines.

Ex-Girlfriend notes that Wanda is dead, and all of the copies of the magic book Darkhold went with her, so now there's no way out.

Scene 10: Uh-oh, the story is shifting.  Agnes turns into a 1980s jiggle-show aerobics instructor, then a 1950s sitcom housewife, then a 1990s liberated woman -- ugh, she's naked. The former police chief, sarcastic librarian, and coworker Herb are now her neighbors.  They say that she hasn't been herself for a few days, acting like a small town cop instead of a liberated woman.

She remembers that she is Agatha, but her magic powers are gone.... 

Muffled screams from upstairs -- it's the Teen, tied up in the closet.  So in this plotline she kidnapped him.  

Ex-Girlfriend appears to kill Agatha.  They sexy-fight, the homoerotic tension dripping from every lick.

More research: Ex-Girlfriend is Rio Vidal, a former member of Agatha's coven, but Agatha found the Darkhold book and betrayed her, keeping all of the magic for herself.  Now she's out for revenge.

Agatha suggests that it wouldn't be fun to kill her now, when she's lost her powers.  Wait until she gets them back, to make the fight more interesting.

Ex-Girlfriend agrees, but warns Agatha that the Salem Seven also want her dead, and so...

She leaves.  The Teen is still in the closet.  The end.

Beefcake: None.  This is a very-women centered show. The IMDB doesn't list the whole cast, so I had to sit through five minutes of executive producers to get a cast list. And that only lists five men: Joe Locke, David Payton, David Lengel, Asif Ali, and Amos Glick. 

Gay Characters:  Agatha and Vidal act very much like ex-lovers.  The Teen turns out to be gay, and in a later episode he gets a boyfriend, played by Miles Gutierrez-Riley, left and below. Miles also played a gay character on The Wilds.

Heterosexism: None.

The full review, with nude photos, is on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

[tubetrading]

Behind the Scenes:  A Day in the Life of a Hot Sauce Producer

Morning:  Sourcing the Best Ingredients

The day starts early at Modern Food Products with the sourcing of fresh ingredients.  As a leading hot sauce supplier in KSA, the company emphasizes quality and consistency.  The procurement team works closely with local farmers to ensure a steady supply of high-quality peppers, garlic, and other essential ingredients.  The team conducts thorough inspections to ensure that only the best produce makes it into their sauces.

Farm Inspections and Quality Control

Farm Visits:  Regular visits to farms are essential to maintain strong relationships with farmers and to ensure sustainable farming practices.

Quality Checks:  Each batch of peppers is inspected for color, size, and heat level.  Only the peppers that meet the strict standards are approved for processing.

Late Morning: Production Begins

Once the ingredients arrive at the production facility, the real magic begins.  The production process at Modern Food Products is a well-oiled machine, designed to maximize efficiency while maintaining the highest standards of quality.

Washing and Preparing Ingredients

Cleaning:  All ingredients undergo a rigorous cleaning process to remove any dirt, pesticides, or contaminants.  This step is crucial for maintaining the purity and safety of the hot sauce.

Preparation:  Peppers are sorted, and stems are removed.  Garlic is peeled, and other ingredients are prepped according to the recipe specifications.

Mixing and Cooking

Recipe Formulation:  Modern Food Products prides itself on its proprietary recipes, which are carefully guarded secrets.  Each recipe is a precise blend of ingredients designed to deliver a unique flavor profile.

Cooking:  The ingredients are then cooked in large vats.  The cooking process is closely monitored to ensure that the flavors meld perfectly and that the sauce achieves the desired consistency.  Temperature control is critical, as overheating can alter the flavor and texture of the sauce.

Afternoon:  Bottling and Packaging

After cooking, the hot sauce is ready to be bottled.  This stage is as crucial as the preparation and cooking stages, involving stringent hygiene and quality control measures.

Bottling Process

Sterilization:  Bottles are sterilized to prevent any contamination.  This is a key step in ensuring the shelf stability of the hot sauce.

Filling:  The hot sauce is poured into bottles using automated machines that ensure uniformity and prevent spillage.  Each bottle is filled to the exact level to maintain consistency across batches.

Labeling and Packaging

Labeling:  Bottles are labeled with the brand’s distinctive design.  For clients interested in hot sauce private labelling in Saudi Arabia, Modern Food Products offers customization options to create unique labels that reflect their brand identity.

Packaging:  The labeled bottles are packed into boxes for distribution.  Packaging is designed to protect the bottles during transit and storage, ensuring that the product reaches consumers in perfect condition.

Late Afternoon:  Quality Assurance and Testing

Quality assurance is a cornerstone of Modern Food Products' operations.  Throughout the day, samples from each batch are tested to ensure they meet the company’s high standards.

Sensory Evaluation

Taste Testing:  A team of experienced tasters evaluates the flavor, heat level, and consistency of the hot sauce.  This step ensures that every batch delivers the expected taste experience.

Visual Inspection:  The color and texture of the sauce are inspected to ensure they align with the product specifications.

Laboratory Testing

Microbial Testing:  Samples are tested for microbial contamination to ensure the hot sauce is safe for consumption.

Chemical Analysis:  The pH levels and other chemical properties are analyzed to ensure the sauce’s stability and shelf life.

Evening:  Logistics and Distribution

As the day winds down, the focus shifts to logistics and distribution.  Modern Food Products, being a prominent hot sauce producer in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, has a well-established distribution network that ensures timely delivery to retailers and customers.

Inventory Management

Stock Monitoring:  Inventory levels are monitored in real-time to ensure there is always enough stock to meet demand.

Order Fulfillment:  Orders from retailers and private label clients are processed and prepared for shipping.

Shipping and Delivery

Distribution:  The packed hot sauce bottles are loaded onto trucks for delivery to various locations across KSA.  The logistics team ensures that the products are delivered on time and in perfect condition.

Export:  For international clients, including those looking for a hot sauce supplier in KSA, the export team handles all the necessary documentation and logistics to ensure smooth international shipping.

Conclusion:  The Passion Behind the Spice

The journey of hot sauce from farm to bottle is a testament to the dedication and passion of the team at Modern Food Products.  As a leading hot sauce producer in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the company’s commitment to quality, innovation, and customer satisfaction is evident in every bottle they produce.  Whether you are enjoying their signature hot sauce or benefiting from their hot sauce private labelling in Saudi Arabia, you can be sure that each drop is crafted with care and expertise.

So, the next time you reach for that bottle of hot sauce, remember the intricate process and the hardworking individuals behind it.  From the early morning farm inspections to the late evening logistics operations, every step is a crucial part of bringing that fiery flavor to your table.

[vanilla-cigarillos]

Black Drawing Salve Recipe

Activated charcoal, plantain, and other healing herbs can help draw toxins from your skin in a safe, non-invasive, and effective manner. This is an easy recipe to relieve and draw out splinters, venom from bug bites, stings, infection and boils, or soothe rashes or itching, etc. This funky little jar of magic is one of the most natural ways to treat a variety of issues.

How Does It Work?

Activated charcoal has been used since ancient times as a detoxifier and purifier. The charcoal helps clean the wound and pull out the offending object.

Comfrey is well known to speed up wound healing (A.K.A. knit-bone). Plantain and St. John's Wort are great healing herbs. St. John's Wort is also great for helping soothe pain. Castor oil is a viscous oil that has excellent anti-microbial properties. Bentonite clay is used because it enhances the detoxification and drawing action of the activated charcoal. Beeswax is not only healing to the skin, but it is what creates the "salve" feel of this remedy.

Ingredients:

A scant 1/3 cup of the herb infused oil (it's ok to use regular olive oil in a pinch, however consider getting a Mason jar of oil infusing so it's ready for next time!) The herbs used are Plantain, Comfrey, and St. John's Wort in equal measures

2 - 3 teaspoons beeswax (if you like a looser, more “ointment” of a salve, go with 2 teaspoons, but otherwise I recommend using all 3)

If you live in a very hot area, then consider a bit more beeswax in your salves

If you live in a very cold area, then you may be able to get away with less beeswax

1 1/2 - 2 tablespoons Castor oil

1 tablespoon Activated Charcoal

1 tablespoon Bentonite Clay

Around 30 - 60 drops of your essential oils of choice (make sure to research impacts!)

Instructions:

Combine your infused (or not) olive oil and the beeswax in a double boiler. I just use a pint size (wide mouth) Mason jar set in a pan of shallow water---about 1 1/2 to 2 inches. Set the burner on low. Melt the beeswax into the oil. Once the mixture is all liquid, remove from the heat.

Add the charcoal and the bentonite clay. Make sure you stir well

Add in your essential oils (if using)

Pour your salve into a jar

Leave it to set up until it's firm

How To Use:

Remember that charcoal stains!

Spread it over the wound or splinter, then wrap it with a bandage

Make sure to keep it stored in a dark and cool place!

[a-beneficial-union]

I've been returning to how the really old version of this AU (prior to its several year abandonment) involved the targeted spread of a magical plague. It was a walking sort of infection— similar to how zombies are?

Let me find my old, old art on it:

(I believe my inspiration for this walking curse was the Candy Mare).

I really need to figure out hoe to redesign it.

These beasties (“Tattered Delights” or “Tats”) can be taken down really easily if you know what you're doing and are prepared— but good luck on that, given that if you are not prepared and do not know what you're doing than you're very likely a goner. If you survive an encounter, you're very likely infected with microbials that will consume the flesh to reproduce itself.

Anyhow, I was taking this old idea and put it in context with the rest of what was happening in the AU at the time; the plurality of Omnitrixs' AIs were generating a network of programs, databases, and algorithms (culminating in a generative AI later called “the System”); Eon's war against certain allied forces (namely the U.S. government and the Plumbers) was in full swing; and both sides of the Time War had started targeting -ens, be they bystander or otherwise.

Given how I characterize the System as arming itself with other people's strategies, I realized that it would likely generate a bio weapon of its own. It isn’t one that would work on Eon's side, since they all have Omnitrixs of their own (thus have immunity) but the other side didn’t have that.

The targets for this bioweapon would largely be humans at first, since the war was originally between Eon and the U.S.. The contagent, then, would have been designed around that target. As the System was drawing its reference data from Tat attacks, its weapon would have been proximity based, likely through the injection of venom (which was a common disablement strategy for -ens), absorption through mucous membranes (as is common in earth infections), or through skin contact. For this, the System repurposes the existence of bodily secretions (sweat, saliva) for the production of the contaigent. Drawing from many poisonous animals on earth, there would likely be a distinct indicator for the presence of this toxin, say colour.

So let's have the secretion be a bright or stark hue, such as cherry red. That would mean that -ens who produce this toxin would appear to be smattered with blood, drooling it in more extreme cases. This trait would likely be most prominent in designer forms rather than, say, base forms (like Ben's standard human one).

Okay, cool, we have the concept for a very edgy looking whatsit. The problem then is that the Plumbers eventually get involved and they are varied in species. Many diseases and infections do not contaminate others if the individuals are biologically dissimilar enough. The solution there is easy: the System has access to all of the Omnitrix's data, including that on all of its millions of species. The toxin would be composed such that it cam effect all organic matter (from the mammal types, insectoids, and the walking plants in the show) to the inorganic (the tetramands and so on).

Next question, how exactly would the System design this beast of a toxin? Its programming disallows it to take life unless there is a significant risk to its data or programming. The scientists and those studying the captured -ens (in an attempt to better arm against Eon's forces) would absolutely be targeted, but where would the line be drawn and how would it be discerned?

Individuals working with those who've crossed the line (becoming a recognized risk) would be targeted. Would the System design the toxin to divvy further into microbials so as to keep track of who engages with who, observe patterns of proximity and map biosignatures? In order to do that, wouldn’t the toxin need to weasel its way to silently observe while being spread within unsuspecting hosts?

Hm….

…..

..