#and this fuckin guy

[orionlancasterr]

What if the sole survivor actually sucked really bad and helped strengthen the minute men only to join the nuka world raiders bc it sounded fun the second the opportunity arose

[borealiszero]

People should make more doomed by narratives siblings relationship.

Like with lovers you can just sever it and not have it related to you ever again but with siblings how could you?

You grow up with them you raise them or they raised you you both know how unforgiving the world is to both of you? You would die for them but will hate them for doing the same and yet none of you would regret it and both of you know it. They could be the person you loath the most and miss the most cause you still remember how they sneaked a candy into your hands. You can sever the tie but you can never look away at what you've lost, at whom you've lost because fate doesn't allow you to be together, eating dinners in quiet peace, if only there's another life, another time, where i can make you another plate of pancakes i would im sorry im sorry im sorry —

[pastadoughie]

[onenicebugperday]

Giant antlion larva and adult, Palpares immensus, Myrmeleontidae

Found in southern Africa

Photos 1-2 by alexdreyer, 3-5 by hamishrobertson, 6 by frankgaude, and 7 by eugenemarais

[gatoburr0]

RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH

[oddthesungod]

calling 911 on sam riegel for emotional damage 😭😭😭😭

[atherea]

SHE HAS THE RAIL‼️‼️

[lifemod17]

the realest statement I have read all week.

this is a mood and a half.

[myheadphonesareneverloudenough]

me when i’m the audiences’ least favourite character and finally get my redemption arc only to be reduced to a stripper joke in the finale. and the woman i would give my life for disappears and i don’t spend any time looking for her, and only reference her once to make someone else happier about their life.

me when i’m a well loved character that audiences love because of my spontaneous acts of chaos and caring soul, only to be shoved aside and have my whole life ruined in the finale.

me when i’ve had so much taken away from me in my life that i had to resort to becoming the villain of my own story just to return to the people i love, only for my love interest which i fought so hard for to be left barely mentioned in the finale, and his absence doesn’t do anything to motivate my actions.

me when i spend years on self improvement before getting sucked back into my dark, self destructive ways and barely any of my so called family notices. and then my entire arc is left unnoticed and does absolutely nothing to my character development.

me when i spend my whole life trying to protect my family and have a clear set of priorities and passions, and then i throw that all away when i see a chance to get with my brother’s wife who’s physically 20 years older than i am.

me when i'm practically sacrificed because the girl i love is is the key to the end of the world, and all i do is turn into a hideous creature without any real sendoff or significant death scene.

me when i've been arguably the most significant character for the whole show just to get zero character development throughout the finale as i'm separated from the rest of the main cast.

me when i was introduced later in the show because of my vital importance to the plot, only to have my personality stripped from me so i can cheat on my fan favourite husband with his brother.

me when i'm a squid that swallows a girl and no one cares to explain why.

[eggo-tistical]

if we really being real here

[spirk-trek]

i love watching spock slowly approach jim in the background of scenes like a cat who thinks they're invisible

[inbabylontheywept]

Soviet Birds.

The secret facility that I work in has holes in the ceiling. We don't know how to get them fixed.

We tried asking the government to fix it, once. We told them that the holes in the older parts of the facility had gotten large enough to fit birds through, and that birds were getting through, and that, perhaps, a Soviet Spy could fit through as well.

After all, it is well known that Soviet Spies and pigeons are approximately the same diameter.

Our hope was that that this vague and nonsensical threat would put a little fire under Uncle Sam's feet. If the fed couldn't be bothered to give a shit about the giant gaping holes in the roof of our facility, perhaps they could be persuaded to give a shit about... Soviet Spies.

This attempt at manipulation 100% blew up in our faces.

See, the government does not need to be persuaded to give a shit about Soviet Spies. It still wakes up most nights, drenched in cold sweat, terrified and confident that a Soviet Spy is hiding in their nightstand. If it sees a rock on the ground, it flips it over, pistol drawn, ready to shoot the Soviet Spy it fully expects to slither out from underneath. Which is to say: The government is crazy. So when we dropped those two words - inflitration risk - in the repair request, they came in guns-a-blazin'.

Does that mean that they fixed the roof? Of course not. Don't be stupid. No, instead of performing basic maintenance, they installed a state of the art alarm system throughout the facility - lasers, sonar, the works - and told us to always be on the guard. Because of the roof holes.

Then they left.

So now we had an extremely good alarm system... and birds. Which have combined in incredibly obvious and predictable ways to produce an unending fountain of problems.

For Example: About once a month, someone gets called in by the local airforce dispatch because AAAAAAAAAAA a Spy is in the Rad Lab! We're all gonna die! Except every time, it's a bird. And I get why we have to check, but every time, the dispatcher is panicked and the person going out has to be like listen, listen: It's a bird. It's always a bird. It's been a bird every month for the last fifteen years. It will be a bird next month. All this stress? Bad for your heart.

Second Example: Sometimes, birds get in while we're actually working. And when it's in the morning, you know, it's a nuisance, and it stops testing (we are not going to risk irradiating a bird) but it's not an all-hands-on-deck situation because it doesn't take ten hours to get a bird out. But surprisingly often, the bird gets in riiiiight at closing time, and in that situation, everyone goes feral because nobody can leave until the alarm is set, and we cannot set the alarm while the bird is there, because the bird would immediately trigger it and then we'd have to stay another 4 hours to confirm that it was not a Soviet Bird.

So in order to go home, everyone's top priority is Get That Bird. And we have a system for it.

Step 1: The test stands tend to be located in rooms with 30+ foot ceilings. We can't catch birds in places like that - so we have to lure the bird into the relatively low ceilinged (8 feet only) upper offices.

We do this by turning all the lights off in the test rooms, then putting floodlights by the exits. I don't know why this works - some kind of evolutionary brain fragment shared by both Bugs and Birds - but work it does. The birds almost always follow after the lights. From there, it’s just two guys moving the floodlight and a third guy to turn off the lights.

Step 2: Everyone else has been waiting for this step. There is this long stairway up from the basement level into the offices, and in the final stage, the floodlights are brought to the base of the stairwell to bring the bird up. At the top of the steps there will be a group of tennish people, waiting for the signal. The light guys will set up the final transfer, everyone will tense, and then, swish...a bird will flit up the stairs and into the offices.

It's like watching werewolves on a full moon. Before the bird cometh, we are engineers. Nerds. Pale and skinny things, trembling under the fluorescent lights. After the bird, we are beasts. Feral, gnawing things, glowing under the orange sunrise of the 70's halogen floodlights.

And like all beasts, we cannot help but give chase.

Step 3: The were-engineers begin the hunt. The goal at the start is not really to catch the bird - just exhaust it. So the pack simply does not relent. Because the stakes are going home on time, the group is basically given free reign to go anywhere in the building. If someone's door is open, and the bird goes inside, they're going to have to deal with ten sweaty panting maniacs leaping around their office. They don't get to say that they're busy, or remark on how all this movement is a terrible distraction. They are allowed to sit in silence during the chaos, and perhaps thank the war party for chasing the bird while they sat comfortably on their ass. This has been explained several times, and it will continue to be explained until cooperation is achieved.

Anyway.

The chase can go on for quite some time. Sometimes, the bird will get tired and find a crevice to hide in, where it can then be reached through standard cornered-bird catching techniques.

Other times, it will slow down enough that someone can actually yoink it out of the air. But this will go on until someone catches the bird and triggers Step 4.

Step 4: The Finale. This is the get-the-bird-out-of-the-building stage, and it requires someone to adopt a specific role: To Become the Sacrificial Vessel of Bird Removal.

This job is both coveted and feared. It's coveted, because holding a wild bird in one's hands is a precious thing. To feel how small, and fragile, and scared it is, only to free it from the building? That is what it's like to be a benevolent God. But the cost! Oh, the cost. The entire time the Vessel is in motion, the bird will be biting the hell out of their fingers. And I cannot emphasize enough just how painful bird bites are. Their entire face is a set of needle posed pliers, and they know tricks the even the cartels haven't figured out yet. So there's always a little hubbub about who shall be The Vessel while onlookers, stranded outside The Office of Bird Capture, can only look on. Quiet arguments and pleas are heard, little fragments of fear and pride and glory trickling out of room like the silver dust left behind in a bag of well shook quarters. The sound of concensus is silence, and the argument will go on until that's all that's left. And then, from the darkness of the final office, the chosen sacrifice will step forward: Hands gently cupped, tears streaming down their face, fingers trembling from the pain of the ongoing bird chomps.

And this scene is what organizes people. Not leadership, not truly. No one can think and coordinate a crowd while their fingers are being attacked with a combination nutcracker/ear piercer. But the crowd sees the suffering of their annointed, and it is driven to do everything poossible to make the process flow. People instinctively flair out, finding the fastest path outside. Doors are held open. Paths are cleared. Someone, somehow, always knows the way forward and can describe it to the sufferer. Left, left, forward. Corner closet. Yep, there's a hall in there. Forward. Two-hundred more feet man, you're doing great. Just hold it together a little longer. You're killing it.

Then the final door swings open, and the bird flees out into what remains of daylight. And yet, even here, the deed is not yet done. I cannot explain it in words, but the crowd that helped is never content until they can see and speak on the Bird Vessel's wounds. They all have to pull the fingers back and see what was given. Estimate the price: One day to get better - No, three - No, a week! Are you blind? Do you see that blood blister? -Yeah, that's not going away anytime soon - Damn, can you believe how feisty those things are? Like wolves without teeth.

(They cannot help but touch as they go. It has always been this way. Even Thomas was not content until he felt the wounds in Christ's hands.)

Only when the last of the helpers has seen, and commented, and commended, will the engineers scatter. It is their return from the underworld that announces to the sun living surface dwellers that they too can go home. (@somerunner tolja it needed to be a post.)

[vpgoldenrod]

I’d like to share a short story I stumbled onto while reading Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman.

[onenicebugperday]

Minute seed weevils, Hadroplontus sp., Ceutorhynchinae, Curculionidae

Photos 1-3 by esant, 4 by xespok, 5-6 by bazwal, and 7 (for scale) by tomegatherion

[pinacoladamatata]

blink and you'll miss it moments around skyhold....

[zombie-jed]

“They didn’t give Afton a motive”

Did Norman Bates have a motive? Nope. Did they ever really decide why Hannibal Lecter liked to eat people? Don't think so. You see, it's a lot scarier when there's no motive, Sid.