#reading hygiene?

[saddest-girl-in-the-whole-world]

Since it'll be a while longer until alecto releases (take your time tamsyn) I think we should try to avoid the usual insanity that befells a starved fandom by doing something unheard of: Reading another book. So uh.

What books would you recommend to your fellow locked tomb fans to help with the urges until we get alecto?

[femmefatalevibe]

Femme Fatale Guide: Best Sleep Hygiene Habits & Tips For Better Sleep

Daytime Habits:

Stop drinking caffeine at least 8 hours before you want to go to sleep

Move daily: A 30-minute walk or a short pilates video is enough if that's all you can manage

Get some fresh air/natural light and/or supplement with vitamin D

Ensure you're getting adequate magnesium and vitamin B12 in your regular diet or through supplements

Nighttime Habits:

Tuck your phone in at its "bedtime": Leave your phone in the charger across the room. Out of sight, out of mind.

Have a physical book beside your bed to start reading at a certain time. Around 30-60 minutes before you actually want to go to bed. Find a book that puts you in a calm mood. A book that's too engaging will be counterproductive.

Have some "sleepytime" tea around 30 minutes before bed (Chamomile tea is a great choice. I love the Yogi Soothing Caramel Bedtime tea).

Limit the lights on for an hour or so before you want to go to bed. Only keep the light on near your bed if possible. Keep your curtains closed if necessary.

Practice deep breathing in bed: You can do a full 5-10 sleep meditation or just do a few sets of belly breaths (one hand on your chest and the other on your diaphragm or upper stomach)

Use meditation or a self-pleasure practice to relax enough to fall asleep.

To get on a proper sleep routine & fight insomnia:

Allow yourself one day to be exhausted, so you go to sleep "on time" and give yourself enough time to get (at least) around 6 hours of sleep. This helps your body "reset," at least for a few days.

When you close your eyes, picture one of your favorite memories and re-experience it without allowing other thoughts to enter your brain. This helps calm your mind, so you more easily drift off to sleep (I've been doing this for around 15-18 years and it's golden)

Have a journal or notebook with a pen by your bed: This allows you to write anything down that you forgot about or need to do, sudden inspiration that arises before you fall asleep, or a place to write out your feelings to help relax before going to sleep. It's better than having your phone and gives you no excuse to go pull it out.

Have a bottle of water by your bed, so you can have a few sips if you can't sleep from being (even a little) dehydrated.

[pollenallergie]

i need more people to write benedict bridgerton x reader fics. i simply do not have the time to do it myself, but, goddamn, do i fucking love reading them.

[batsplat]

breaking a blog policy of non-engagement with active discourse unless explicitly asked about it,, below the cut,, I intend this to be a one-off thing, look away

seen some snarking about this article on the race dot com about where marc fits into the current title fight, and specifically this paragraph:

because ofc it's some kind of grievous sin to equate the current two title contenders with the two title contenders in 2015, one of whomst was well past his prime and the other who in many ways had a deeply untidy season. the argument might be that the current spec ducati has a bike advantage over marc, which. you'll never guess how the 2015 yamaha measured up against the 2015 honda. and yeah, it sure is embarrassing how the current title contenders chuck away bucket loads of points through sheer stupidity. after all, when racing in the wet in misano, it's unforgivable to pit at the wrong time and emerge with only one point - why not simply crash and emerge from that weekend with zero points instead? imagine finishing second behind marc in those conditions, when you could instead swap bikes far too late and finish a lowly fifth

it's worth putting that paragraph in context of what the piece was actually saying:

all of this is categorically true. it doesn't mean marc might not still win this year's championship if both jorge and pecco make enough mistakes, but quite obviously those two are closer to the 2015 title contenders than 2017. in the former, marc could not bank on a consistent pace advantage, in the latter he could; this feels like quite a straightforward point to be making. dovi's phillip island stinker did kill his championship momentum - and given the sheer consistency of performances jorge and pecco have put in when it comes to their pace, it would be very surprising to see an equivalent from those two. don't even get me started on whatever the fuck maverick vinales was doing that year after like,, the first five races, which lack of a dominant bike is quite frankly not enough to excuse. the rest of the article assesses marc's chances entirely fairly, essentially expanding on the argument that you just wouldn't expect that kind of consistent performance edge that he would need to overturn the points deficit. (I personally think marc is a little more likely to be a title threat than the author of the article does, though I also don't fundamentally disagree with anything specific being said; mainly I just feel vibes-wise that sprint races have made title fights insanely volatile.) he could still win - but in terms of how he compares to the opposition, there is no argument whatsoever to be made that this is not closer to 2015 than 2017. even if you believe this is only due to bike difference, in which case I think you are possibly giving 2017 dovi and vinales a little too much credit, the points raised in the article still stand up to scrutiny

it is perhaps inevitable that people will deify the greats of the past - even more so if they dislike the top riders of the present and feel that they are undeserving of their current success. it does, however, seem to come along with a skewed understanding of the actual greats in question, of where they were strong and where they faltered. valentino and lorenzo had two title fights, both of which were error-strewn affairs and hardly their best seasons. sprints have helped further distort perceptions of how error-prone these current riders really are, because at the end of the day neither martin nor pecco are on course for a radically different error rate than the title contenders in 2009. lorenzo lost his head in jerez when he was the pre-race favourite and ended up crashing trying to overcompensate for his surprisingly poor pace, valentino had an absolute howler at le mans that makes misano this year from martin look like a paragon of good decision-making and composure under pressure, jorge practically handed the championship to valentino with back-to-back dnf's at donington and brno, valentino incidentally also crashed at donington and got extremely lucky to have a bike that was still rideable to fifth, then proceeded to just chuck it for absolutely no reason at indy with a mistake that was so obviously stupid and needless he showed up to misano with a donkey helmet. valentino followed up misano with a poor fourth in estoril because he got lost with the set-up that weekend - and buddy, if you think the gp24 bike advantage is bad, let me tell you a story about how yamaha/ducati/honda were doing back in the day compared to the field. fourth might as well have been last. (I don't love single manufacturer domination either, but let's not pretend like the gaps between bikes aren't way, way, way smaller than they were in '09.) then jorge, with momentum and opportunity on his side, gets so spooked by valentino's pace in practise he bins it on the very first lap of phillip island, essentially ending the championship fight then and there. neither of them deliver a particularly dignified performance in sepang. during this title fight, there were three instances of crashing out of the lead and one from a very close second. jorge martin and pecco bagnaia eat your hearts out

and 2015? the season that was actually being referenced in the championship? valentino was only in that championship fight due to his relentless consistency, a handful of starring performances and an ability to not completely fuck it when a few rain drops started falling. his pace was flat-out not good enough to be a title contender - if anything, on raw pace he was more competitive for a big chunk of 2016 than he had been the year before. he was qualifying abysmally in an era where the gaps between bikes were considerably larger, reflecting a far poorer performance than equivalent grid positions would nowadays, and certainly would have nothing to counter the consistency in qualifying the two title contenders this year have demonstrated. jorge had to work hard to come as close to losing that championship as he did, going through a bizarre and borderline embarrassing set of helmet visor issues early on in the season that he should never have allowed to happen. he was peak metronome that year, able to dominate and win from the front but otherwise rife with limitations, repeatedly performing poorly when he was put ever so slightly off-balance. in many ways, he got very lucky to not be penalised more for his horrendous silverstone performance. he was also helped by the gap between the factory yamahas and hondas to the field being so large, because otherwise some of his inconsistency would have cost him a hell of a lot more. both of their seasons had laughably obvious flaws that just about managed to offset each other's enough to make a title decider possible - but if you ever so slightly change the formula, if the qualifying format had still been different or the bike disparities larger or smaller or any of that, it would have probably tipped it quite strongly one way or the other. a battle of the titans it was not

none of this is to say that valentino or jorge are shit riders, or that marc is a fraud for letting himself be so thoroughly beaten by them in 2015 on what was ultimately still a competitive bike. at a certain point, however, you are comparing the current athletes with versions of the past greats who quite frankly did not exist 90% of the time. if you are sufficiently motivated, you can come up with pretty decent slander for anyone. it is also presenting an idealised version of the sport in the past that, again, did not exist. while the gp24's advantage over the field is substantial, if we are talking in terms of raw lap times, it is substantially less so than the gap the top few factory teams had in the past. the aliens did not dominate from 2007 to 2015 to the extent that they did because they were just so brilliant - they were performing at a high level, yes, but also nobody else really stood a chance. as hard as it may be to accept, when you have riders who so consistently have a pace advantage as pecco and martin do, including over the fellow riders on the same machinery, it is possible they may simply be doing an actual good job. and the more pecco adds to his resume, the more difficult it will become to not consider him in the same tier of rider as at least some of the aliens. yes, I am talking about lorenzo here - a man who incidentally did not convincingly pass the 'only good with one manufacturer' test that's already being dangled in front of pecco. if we really want to go into the weeds, it's worth pointing out that pecco's luck has also not been particularly fantastic this year, from mechanical gremlins at the le mans sprint to being wiped out by binder at the jerez sprint to the qualifying position at aragon working against him and losing out quite severely in what are at worst 60:40 racing incidents twice this season - sometimes, you do get punished a lot for relatively minor missteps. so yeah, if you want to compare the current trio of title contenders with anyone, then 2015 feels as good a place as any. sometimes the greats of the past did suck, idk what to tell you. they would be a hell of a lot more boring if they hadn't

[tntduopolls]

Does c!quackity ever force c!wilbur to take showers or does he take them on his own?

*this can either be read as he gets a pat on the head or they fuck in the shower because those two have the sexual chemistry of Gomez and morticia adams and there is no way they are sharing a space naked without something happening im sorry I dont make the rules

[romionarry]

harry smelling ginny’s perfume or shampoo or whatever in the desire cocktail is based of him but i like that right after, he chooses to seek out ron’s gaze across the table and grin at him . something about wanting to share his joy with ron … wanting ron’s company in happiness and love land. harry kid i got my eye on you

[mellotronmkll]

I did everything right last night stopped looking at my phone at like. 9:30 played piano did light chores read a book until i was sleepy my room was the perfect temperature and what happened. Tossed and turned until literally 5 am

[a-river-of-stars]

I was reading an article about dental hygiene and

39% of 25-34-year-olds in the UK admit to brushing less than once a week, according to a survey by Hive Business.

If you are part of that 39% I implore you to speak with a medical professional because this is so dangerous for your health. This is not just about aesthetics or fresh smelling breath (although those are important too). People die from complications from infected teeth and gums. Please brush your teeth, if not twice a day as recommended then at least once a day. Do this for yourself please I am begging you.

[moneygoblin04]

I am stressed, and I am on edge, and I feel like I'm actually, legitimately reaching my limit. It's kinda funny how my mom was the one to push me there

[sanjerina]

Okay my New Year’s Resolution is to stay out of bed more (I basically live there when I’m not at work). I have this whole living room I don’t really use with streaming services I rarely employ. Because depression.

So I’m weirdly looking to watch more TV? I would also not be averse to a couple of YouTubers who demonstrate *very gentle* movement without talking about weight loss. (That last clause is Very Important).

Some of my favorite shows for reference: currently watching OFMD, Severance, Heartstopper, and The Afterparty with friends. I adored The Good Place, and had a lot of fun with Killjoys and Warrior Nun. Assume I’ve watched most of the best recent Western animation (Nimona, She-Ra, Owl House, Amphibia, Vox Machina, etc) all the way back to A:TLA.

I don’t care for most dramas or procedurals (although Miss Fisher’s Mysteries were fun). In general, I get enough real life the-world-is-an-absolute-trashfire from work. (I know The Wire and Breaking Bad are both staggeringly good; I’m not going to come home from working with traumatized teens to watch them.)

My favorite genre is Shit That Makes You Hopeful, ft. Queer Characters, Found Family, and Competent People Who Struggle With Feelings. Excellent Costuming is a pleasure. This Soundtrack Fucks is also good. :)

My to-be-watched list is pretty long, actually, and starts with Bridgerton, Derry Girls, Umbrella Academy, and Sense8, as well as many (but not all, good god) of the recent major SF/superhero universe spin-offs, and the most recent Doctors Who (I petered out somewhere during Capaldi’s run). But I feel like I’m missing something?

[femmefatalevibe]

Do you have tips to improve sleep? I take melatonin and still struggle to hit the hay?

Daytime Habits:

Stop drinking caffeine at least 8 hours before you want to go to sleep

Move daily: A 30-minute walk or a short pilates video is enough if that's all you can manage

Get some fresh air/natural light and/or supplement with vitamin D

Ensure you're getting adequate magnesium and vitamin B12 in your regular diet or through supplements

Nighttime Habits:

Tuck your phone in at its "bedtime": Leave your phone in the charger across the room. Out of sight, out of mind.

Have a physical book beside your bed to start reading at a certain time. Around 30-60 minutes before you actually want to go to bed. Find a book that puts you in a calm mood. A book that's too engaging will be counterproductive.

Have some "sleepytime" tea around 30 minutes before bed (Chamomile tea is a great choice. I love the Yogi Soothing Caramel Bedtime tea).

Limit the lights on for an hour or so before you want to go to bed. Only keep the light on near your bed if possible. Keep your curtains closed if necessary.

Practice deep breathing in bed: You can do a full 5-10 sleep meditation or just do a few sets of belly breaths (one hand on your chest and the other on your diaphragm or upper stomach)

Use meditation or a self-pleasure practice to relax enough to fall asleep.

To get on a proper sleep routine & fight insomnia:

Allow yourself one day to be exhausted, so you go to sleep "on time" and give yourself enough time to get (at least) around 6 hours of sleep. This helps your body "reset," at least for a few days.

When you close your eyes, picture one of your favorite memories and re-experience it without allowing other thoughts to enter your brain. This helps calm your mind, so you more easily drift off to sleep (I've been doing this for around 15-18 years and it's golden)

Have a journal or notebook with a pen by your bed: This allows you to write anything down that you forgot about or need to do, sudden inspiration that arises before you fall asleep, or a place to write out your feelings to help relax before going to sleep. It's better than having your phone and gives you no excuse to go pull it out.

Have a bottle of water by your bed, so you can have a few sips if you can't sleep from being (even a little) dehydrated.

Hope this helps xx

[schizopositivity]

Hello hello– someone on the schizophrenic-spec here– I've been struggling a lot / flogging myself for struggling with basic hygiene.

My question / ask is primarily; is this struggle.. common? I suppose is the word? Like is it something others on this spectrum deal with? And if so– why? ( Knowing the why's often helps me figure things out and work through them is all )

And additionally; a positivity post in regards to bad hygiene and not being "lesser" for it? Perhaps?

( Apologies if this is accidentally a vent btw. )

The struggle is common, and is often seen as a result of the negative symptoms of schizophrenia.

Usually it's thought to be caused by our avolition (lack of motivation to complete basic tasks like taking care of hygiene). It could also be that executive dysfunction (trouble organizing thoughts and actions, and getting distracted) is common amongst schizo-spec people. Also since depression is common in schizo-spec people that could also contribute to lack of hygiene maintenance (like not thinking you are worth it or not seeing a point in it, or again lack of motivation). And for me and my schizophrenia, I have trouble reading ques from my body when it tells me to do things, so sometimes I need to be reminded by others when to eat, brush my teeth, use the bathroom, wash my clothes, etc. Also for hygiene things like the dentist, it could be because the reasons I listed in my post about how it can be hard for schizophrenic people to go to the Dr. for treating their physical health.

It could be any of these reasons or a combination of them, either way it is very common for people on the schizo-spec to struggle with hygiene. It's okay to struggle with this and it shouldn't be seen as a flaw of the person with it. It's just another part of their disorder.

Although I do think working on improving hygiene for schizo-spec people is very important. A lot of routine hygiene is to prevent problems in the future like tooth decay, infections, fungus, and plenty of others. I'd never blame the individual for these eventual problems, but I do think it's important to be aware of the possible repercussions and if possible, work on avoiding them. Maybe by googling "how often should I _" and then setting reminders in your phone. Or doing what you can at the moment like "I don't feel like showering today but maybe I can wash my feet and face and armpits in the sink" or "I can't brush my teeth but I think I can use some mouthwash".

It's not something anyone should see as "gross" or a moral flaw, it's just another symptom in a disorder that you can't control and didn't choose. The mentality that unhygienic people are less than comes from centuries of classism, racism and ableism. It's never the judged individual's fault, it reflects more on the person with the prejudice to judge. It doesn't matter if you can't afford hygiene products, are seen as inherently unhygienic, can't maintain hygiene because of physical or mental disability, it's never your fault for being judged for it. Even if it does lead to health issues in the future, that's still not worthy of being judged. And also no one is better than you for being hygienic, that comes more from privilege than from hard work or moral righteousness.

This has been a struggle for me, especially mentally to not see myself as gross for not being able to maintain hygiene. It's been a long journey of unlearning bias, and seeing what is best for me, and not best for other people. I try to balance it out like being really proud of myself for flossing and brushing my teeth one day, yet not being mad at myself when I don't have the energy to floss and brush my teeth another day. It's just another thing I have to think about, that others might not have to.

[pallases]

love how hugo’s like courfeyrac is just like tholomyes if tholomyes didn’t FUCKING SUCK

[ai-the-broccoli]

aaghh I hate health anxiety ocd (or whatever you call it), it's literally doing nothing other than contributing to make my health worse

... wait actually, does anyone have like, tips/advice for that kind of thing? I really think I need some help with this one

[enchantrum]

unrelated to anything but I can't stand the art style of One Piece and I don't understand how anyone can look at it without being vaguely grossed out. everything and everyone looks so ugly and it weirdly messes with my synesthesia in a way where I feel like the whole cast just smells of dirty old feet gdsfj;oigdhsfj;oigrsfdj;io

[bitegore]

baru cormorant seems to me to be a series that suffers miserably for me having read machineries of empire first. unfortunately everything BC is doing strikes me as something MoE did better and more believably and with much a greater and more grounded eye for how systems, complex system interaction, and oppression like. work