#further research needed?

[brianbrianbrain]

ID. Black and white photo of a shepherd knitting on stilts, front and center view. Behind him, sheep can be seen grazing among the grass and trees. Cursory reverse image search: a shepherd in the Landes département, 1905. Cited source leads to broken link; have not tracked further yet. End ID.

ID. Black and white photo of a person knitting on stilts, side and center view. A dog stands by their feet, body angled towards the camera and looking to the right. The bottom of the image is labelled Libourne – Henry Guillier, rue Fonneuve. (3509) Vieux Berger Landais Tricotant Des Bas. In purple cursive: meilles remerciements. There is a stamp in the bottom left corner. Cursory reverse image search: a shepherd in Pays de Buch, part of the Landes forest. Website is French; have not tracked further yet. End ID.

every time i see trad gender roles people being weird about fibercraft i wanna tell them

-medieval and early modern knitting guilds were full of men learning and perfecting fancy knitting techniques to impress rich clients

-in cold, wet climates like the scottish highlands knitting was done by the whole family, in fact it was the perfect activity to do while a man was out on a fishing boat or in the pasture with his sheep and cattle

-men who were away from women for a long time had to know how to knit and sew at least well enough to mend their own clothes. soldiers knitted. sailors knitted. cowboys and frontiersmen knitted. vikings probably knitted (actually they would have been doing a kind of proto knitting called nalbinding, but that's beside the point). all those guys the far right love to treat as ultra masculine heroes were sitting around their barracks and campfires at night darning their socks and knitting themselves little hats

[tossawary]

I just know in my heart of hearts that in "Star Trek" at one point, there was some moral panic somewhere on Vulcan (among the uppity sorts) because Human culture was "infecting" the local youth with their overly emotional, destructive, unproductive, frivolous, and uneducational ways.

And what was actually happening was that a bunch of Vulcan kids got really into 23rd-century "Minecraft" or something.

Small Vulcan child @ another Vulcan child: (in a tone that sounds flat to Humans but angry as hell to Vulcans) "You have compromised the optimization of my fortress. I am having an emotional urge to blow up your house... in Minecraft."

[alexandria-alexis]

Max’ fixations on certain men that go by the initials CL and DR needs to be studied. What is it about the Australian that made Max, a literal grown ass man, tuck his hair behind his ear and bend forward laughing like a teenage girl in a Netflix chic-flick? And what is it about the Monegasque that has Max quick to remind everyone that he knows everything about him faster than anybody else in the room does?

[orykorioart]

[Image description: Illustrated comic of journal entries from Kodira. Each comic panel is separated by a line of text from the journal.

Text: July 8th, 2021.

Image: Kodira and Hand of Guidance on a small motorboat.

Text: I accompanied (blank) Guidance to her research today. (Redacted square indicates that Kodira perhaps wrote another name before revising.)

Image: Close up of a thick notebook. Written on it are “Research of The Merfolk”, scrawled underneath is labeled “Devo la Main”.

Text: It was her biweekly meeting with Devo. “It’s an important one, so I wanted you to come.” She had said.

Image: Kodira sees Devo, who is greeting her excitedly.

Text: I’ve only gotten to meet Devo twice before, but from what I’ve heard,

Image: A pile of research papers, detailing merfolk’s tails.

Text: We owe a lot of what we know about the merfolk to him.

Image: Devo gesturing for the boat to follow him towards a distant island.

Text: When we met with Devo further out at sea, he had gestured us to follow him towards a hidden cave.

Image: Devo introduces Amber to Kodira and Guidance inside the dark cave, slightly illuminated by magical glowing particles.

Text: There, he introduced us to his companion, another Merfolk from his reef by the name of Amber Gris.

Image: Amber and Kodira shook hands. Guidance is off to the side, waving to Amber and Devo with her hands.

Text: She was a Sharkfin. Best of her kind, she proclaimed.

Image: Duo panels, with Amber mischievously grinning up at Kodira, and Kodira looking down at her, smiling amusedly.

Text: I can’t be quite sure if that’s true, but with the glint in her amber eyes, and that dangerous toothy smile… I think I believe her.

Image: This panel is textured like a notebook, indicating that we are actually seeing Kodira’s notes. Featured prominently is a messy full-body drawing of Amber swimming.

Text, shown to be handwitten: Amber Gris might not be the first merfolk I’ve ever seen, but to me, she is perhaps the most beautiful mesmerizing intriguing, scientifically speaking. (The words beautiful and mesmerizing are scratched off).

End Description]

[obstinatecondolement]

There is an aphorism in science that all models are wrong, but some are useful. The general idea is that a simplified representation of something much more complex may not perfectly replicate every element of the real thing, or account for every single factor that would affect it under real world conditions, but a good simplification potentially can approximate something more complex enough to get broadly accurate* insights that are useful.

In my opinion, specific sexualities and genders (all of them, fwiw), and the even the concept of being cis or trans, are best thought of as useful models for certain amorphous clusters of experiences and feelings, rather than as things that have concrete, inflexible definitions that map perfectly onto every single person who uses that model of identity as a shorthand. Dictionary definitions of what gay means/what a woman is/etc., are all assuming spherical cows in a vacuum to make the maths easier, and you look like an idiot if you think that cows really are spherical and are not affected by atmospheric pressure in any way (or indeed that they could survive vacuum conditions) and then go around harassing cows on this basis.

A person's internal sense of self is more important than your belief in a model. Fuck off and let me get back to chewing cud.

[silvery-bluish]

34 w/ arisone :) for the whump prompt

prompts from here

trips. falls. catfiend fight fallout spills out of my arms.

Contents: 34 - "You promised not to leave." In the immediate aftermath of that one time Ricardo tried to solo the Catastrofiend.

Wordcount: 852

Relationships: Chargestep, ft Arsinoe. But this is TECHNICALLY in the limbo of them having kissed but not talked about it for like a year.

Warnings: Blood? Gore implied, but I don't go too hard on the descriptions of it.

There's blood on their hands. It's not something they think they'll ever get used to, something they can't stand the thought of getting used to, bright red. Like spilled paint. Never getting used to the feeling of holding someone's organs into their body, of pleading with deities they don't even believe in, anyone who will listen, that help will get there faster.

"D'd you see me?" Ricardo asks, and they almost laugh, because only he'd be worried about if they saw him fighting some…thing. Terrorbeast, creature, monster, they don't understand the Catastrofiend and it frightens them. Slick, sticky mind.

"Yeah I saw you," they say, and he grins at them, slumped in the alleyway. There's red in his teeth. "Stick with me, okay? That was impressive, but that was dumb, Ricardo, you--" almost died, but they aren't sure if it's an almost, because this is bad. Sentinel in their ear, telling them it's just a couple more minutes. To hold on.

"Nowhere else I'd rather stick," Ricardo says, and then, "You hurt your hand?"

You're not supposed to get blood in someone's open wound, but it'd mostly cauterized, and they were clean last time they got their blood checked. "I'm fine," they say, "I'm not the one who decided to fight the Catastrofiend one-on-one, Ricardo, what the fuck."

"Wasn't one on one," he's stubborn, brow furrowing. Eyes fighting to focus on them. Blood loss. Not… good. "I knew you were working on something."

"I wasn't going to leave you," they say, almost offended. You don't leave a teammate behind. Even if he's doing something practically suicidal.

"Promise?" Lucidity back, for a moment, and they nod. How can they do anything else?

"Yeah," they say, and they mean it. Had meant it before, but they're freer now. They get to choose when they leave a situation. And they won't leave a teammate behind again.

He smiles, and leans against them. Fuck, it's bad if someone goes unconscious, if they lose too much blood? Grasp for remembered percentages-- most people can lose fourteen percent of their blood without many adverse side effects. Past that… most people don't survive losing forty percent. So. Somewhere between fifteen and forty percent, and that's all they've got. His heart beats a fevered pitch against them, they can feel his pulse because they've basically got their hands in his guts.

They still can't feel past the static to get a better bead on him, even now. Is he going unconscious, or just going quiet?

"Hey," they say, jostling him slightly. "Ricardo?"

"Hmm," he just hums against them. "Stay with me?"

"I said I would. You stay with me. Don't you dare die on me, Ricardo Ortega."

"Yeah, trying not to."

Prying words out of him is slow, and it's all they can do to keep themself from panicking. But if they panic, they can't help him. So they shut it down, shove it in a box they'll deal with later. Not now.

Eventually, hands pry him out of their arms, their hands out of his stomach. They almost punch one of them, too, almost bite, vicious clawing until they realize these people are here to help, dressed in their EMT uniforms. Maybe it really had only been a couple of minutes.

It felt longer.

They get Ricardo up on a stretcher, real gauze and real professionals saying panicked, half-comprehended things to each other in low tones as Arsinoe watches. Blood bag hooked up to his arm nearly as soon as they get Arsinoe clear. Ricardo blinks slow at them, and that's all that matters.

"You hurt too?" one of the paramedic asks, a young woman with cropped short hair and Ricardo's blood on her arm, from-- probably from having to pry them off him, really. They startle, hadn't thought any of them would talk to them. Sidestep doesn't do doctors. Sidestep doesn't do paramedics, either.

"I'll be fine," they say, brushing her off. It doesn't hurt. They can deal with it later.

"We need to go. Do you want to ride in with Charge, then?" she asks, and they do, is the thing. But the idea of locking themself in a box with medical professionals, and having to explain why they won't let them touch their injured hand, or why they won't go into the hospital itself. She's worried about their hand, wants the chance to get a better look at it, and they can't.

They know the paramedics don't want to cause them harm. They know that. But they can't make themself believe it, is the thing.

He's fighting them, some, enough to get the oxygen mask they strap to his face back off. Like he can sense them faltering in the doorway of the ambulance. "You promised not to leave," not as loud as he was probably trying to make it, but he's… not in great shape.

They steel themself. "Only as far as the hospital," they say, firmly, and when they climb in, him grasping to hold their bloody hand in his is almost enough to offset the slam of the metal doors behind them.

[brekitten]

The Therapist

There's a new therapist at school.

Normally this wouldn't really bother Peter at all, since he's never gone to see a shrink in his life and doesn't ever plan on it, but there's something... off about this woman.

She seems unassuming enough at first glance. Red hair, green eyes, bright red lipstick. But there is something in her eyes, something that Peter can only describe as a predator looking at its next prey, when she looks around the school at all of the teenagers milling about. Heck, even the way she walks makes her seem as if she is a predator stalking her prey.

It could always be some kind of power move, Peter reasons. He's met people like that before, who try to intimidate everyone around them into thinking that they are superior, that they are the apex predator and anyone who dares to cross them would pay for it dearly.

But his Spidey Sense went crazy around her.

He tries to brush it off as paranoia. He'd pulled an all-nighter last night in the lab with Tony because neither of them had been able to sleep, and he hadn't been sleeping well even before that. (Funny, how it had all started the night after he first bumped into the new therapist in the halls.) So his Spidey Sense is probably out of wack because he's tired. Simple as that.

But it seems like everyone in the school is depressed. Even Ned, who can't even muster up the energy and enthusiasm to talk about Legos or Star Wars or even the weather. It worries Peter.

Because it all started when that therapist came to the school.

He can't ignore it forever, he knows that. There is only so long his Spidey Sense can tell him that she is danger danger danger before he finally listens. He has to do something to help everyone.

So he researches.

And he falls into the rabbit hole of ghosts and ectoplasm and secret government organizations and the little, unassuming town of Amity Park, Illinois.

He doesn't sleep that night.

When he comes to school the next morning, Dr. Penelope Spectra looks him dead in the eyes, and smiles.

[protagonist-art]

"Uh- I'm Arnold. Bennett. It's profoundly difficult to get your lifes works and studies accepted if your name isn't... yes, oh! Are you a fan of moths, sir?"

NEW RDR2 OC!! a reclusive, clumsy entomologist and bug collector; cooped up in his study of uniformed clutter

[0xochitlsketches0]

I’ve been absolutely OBSESSED with Cult of the Lamb recently, like seriously it’s been the only thing I’ve been thinking of.

And since I’m cringe I wanted to draw my ocs in the style. I mean what better why to celebrate a game about cults then drawings my characters who are apart if another cult in the style aldjsks

[icantalk710]

Upper body gym day today wasn't too bad 😌

[joculatrixster]

curious that at the first offical faory fort meeting when lizzie says they shouldnt kill eachother of any of them r the boogeyman, both ren and bigb both instantly agree but cleo questions it and is like "it would be NICE if we didnt target eachother first but..." meaning that of the 4 she waffled on if loyalty in a boogeyman situation is vital? and yet bigb is treated like he should have known better and that she- who implied she would get it- would never forgive him even after he apologized..? could it possibly even be he remembered her opinion on the matter when it was first brought up..? and didnt factor in how after bonding more her opinion changed..???

[exasperatedoctopus]

Dr. Mora: Don’t you miss our experiments, Odo?

Me:

[creatively-cosmic]

Meeting the Missing One.

[silvashapeshifter]

🫴

have this bat dragon drawn on Clip Studio Paint yesterday

[jessieren]

A late Saturday accessory contribution…

I hereby submit a group of sunglasses Shaun for your enjoyment

[asurrogateblog]

as a media psychology researcher 85% of my job is figuring out the most horrifically academic way to say "you idiots wouldn't last a day on tumblr"