#so tiny!

[oldweb-sailormoon]

[studiipolis]

found a new way to keep myself busy

[every-kakashi]

[ricochete29]

Scientists discover the smallest Rico ever recorded to date:

[with-eyes-closed]

John, Paul and George walking the Champs-Élysées, 15 January 1964.

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

OH MY GOD TINY HOSS THANK YOU SO MUCH T_T

[partywithponies]

Just saw a coal tit outside the kitchen window!

[delicatefury]

Lap full of kittens. No knitting. No switch. No laundry in easy reach.

I am bored, I can’t move. But look at them!

How can something be so precious?!

[charsawdeath]

Monch cronch!

*dry food crunches* Ridiculously small kitten: “Myam myam myam. Njam njam njam njam njam njam njam! Myam myam myam nyam nyam myam. Mmmam. Mrrrrram. Meep!”

[yubriamakesart]

i saw the cutest pair on their way to the dumpster this morning, they looked like this:

[devildaisies]

🔥 H-O-T-T-O-G-O 🔥

[sabertoothwalrus]

accidentally drew tallmen au again

[charsawdeath]

I! NEEDED! THIS!!!

From @veggiedayz: “Blackberry has a song he wants to sing for you.” #cutepetclub [source: http://ift.tt/28SdMmN ]

[audible-smiles]

My memory of The Birdcage (1996) is always that it's more dated and more difficult to watch than it actually is. You hear "drag-themed comedy from the 90s based on a musical from the 80s based on a play from the 70s" and you brace yourself just a little, right? But the film has a strong gay perspective, so the fruity fag jokes mostly come off as warmly affectionate. There is a surprising amount of poignancy in Robin Williams' portrayal of Armand, grudgingly agreeing to his beloved son's request that he go back into the closet for an evening ("do me a favor and don't talk to me for a while"). The drag club's staff attempting to redecorate the apartment with stuff straight people might like (a taxidermy moose head, an enormous crucifix, and Playboy magazine) is extremely funny. Albert's histrionics are a point of tension because he does often come off as a stereotypically pathetic/comic figure, but towards the end of the movie he makes it very clear that he's aware of how people see him, and asserts that trying to copy a stoic masculinity he doesn't possess for the sake of social approval would be more pathetic. In the 1983 musical adaptation, they give "Albert" (Albin) the only good song in the whole show, "I Am What I Am", which Gloria Gaynor covered to the delight of gays everywhere. Apparently Nathan Lane wasn't (publicly) out yet in 1996, which is amazing because it means that at one point in this movie you're watching a gay man playing a straight man playing a gay man playing a straight man, in a movie about how it's important to be yourself, an absurdity that does seem to encapsulate the state of gay America in the 90s.

[nikkinelson1313]

[markscherz]

You might know this tiny frog.

This is Mini mum (photo by Andolalao Rakotoarison), a species I had the pleasure to name—together with a team of amazing colleagues—back in 2019.

That was the start of a fascination with the process and consequences of miniaturisation for vertebrates. How the hell does this tiny frog manage to fit all of its vital organs—more or less all the same senses and organs that we have—into a package the size of a tic-tac‽ Why and how has it evolved to be so small? And why don't we get frogs that are much smaller?

Well, I just secured 1.5 MILLION Euros (!!!) in the form of a European Research Commission Starting Grant, to answer these and other related questions in the genomes of Mini frogs and other miniaturised vertebrates.

Because it turns out, there are *lots* of miniaturised vertebrates, and they push the boundaries of how small we think it is possible for a vertebrate to be! Here is a little graphic of some of them, scaled to a BIC ballpoint pen.

The project is called GEMINI: The Genomics of Miniaturisation in Vertebrates! You can read more about it on my website here, and in the press release, here!