#the services likely provided by the building

[sgiandubh]

Interesting comment from👇🏻

@starfishsea78 :I live like 20 mins drive from the address stated. Bromsgrove is a small town with nothing. The building mentioned is just a building full of offices. Why have a business in a small sleepy old town ????

Dear Just a Building Full of Offices Anon,

'Interesting comment'?

*laughs in Romanian*

I suppose the comment's author was surprised by this tidbit?

'Închisă definitiv' is Romanian for 'indefinitely closed', by the way.

Oh, honey. Y'all have zero business exposure, correct? That's ok, I am here to help.

May I remind you a simple company law rule that I reasonably guess exists also in the US of A (and many, many other countries around the world, too)?

Your company's registered office address doesn't necessarily have to be your own residence or owned real estate. You can choose to use a third party's address (usually either your accountant, your lawyer or a specialized agent/service provider), but not a PO Box, not anymore.

Check this out for conformity:

[Source: https://www.gov.uk/limited-company-formation/company-address]

The reason is, of course, a logical and understandable desire for privacy, as in separating one's home/private life from one's business/professional life. That is exactly what happened there. While I do not have an explanation for the Google 'indefinitely closed' indication, I would rather think this is some sort of freak glitch, or something. At any rate, we shall live and tell the tale, right?

[adobealmanac]

Consecration and protection of the home

During the fall and winter, often at campfires or near the fireplace, stories of the paranormal and the unexplained are shared. These stories often center around the places that are closest to us, such as a family home, a favorite campsite, or a commonly traveled dirt road. Many people are hesitant to speak of these events, however, they often feel safe or encouraged to share them over a late-night cup of hot cocoa and s'mores.

Scary stories often get me jittery, and one thing that provides me comfort is protecting the home from stirred-up spirits and negative energies. Creating the home into a refuge is vital to the spiritual health of the home overall. While there are many ways and traditions regarding protecting the home, I will share two methods that I find the most useful.

Method 1 - Salt and Pepper Protection Ritual

Begin by cleansing your home with the method of your choosing. My go-to for this method is mopping the floors with a cleaner like pine-sol as it cleanses the entirety of the floors, which is important for this method.

Then, open all of the exterior doors. Using a broom sweep outwards over all of the thresholds. As you do this, command any unwanted energies to leave by repeating "I command ALL energies that do not serve me, that do not have good intentions, and that take away from the spirit of this home to LEAVE. You are NO LONGER welcome HERE. As I sweep, you EXIT."

Once that is done, it is time to prepare your herbs and ingredients. I use table salt mixed with rosemary, ceremonial tobacco, sun-charged beer, whiskey, or gin, and whole peppercorns. If you do not have authentic ceremonial tobacco, use the alcohol in its place. I was gifted my tobacco by a dear friend and mentor of mine who comes from that practice and cultural background. If you want to use tobacco as I do, I suggest you seek out a mentor yourself to learn about the practice. Once you have these items prepared and at hand, you may move on to the next step.

Begin by going to the exterior of your home. Using your charged alcohol, begin to offer it to the earth. If you have tobacco, offer that to the earth as you were taught to. I always give thanks to the wonderful space I occupy and am a steward of, and acknowledge that this land is older than I am and that it is my elder. I complete my offering by kneeling and touching my forehead to the earth, being sure to give profound thanks.

Now, locate the four primary external corners of your home. If your space has more than four sides or is oddly shaped, form a square around the space that wholly encompasses it. This may be represented as the fence around your property, or the outside corners of your apartment building. Beginning at the northernmost corner, pour a small mound of the salt mixture into a small dish in front of the corner, and say "As this salt is placed here today, it marks the beginning of its service to this home. It will fortify, protect, and create sanctuary here. It will blow away with the wind once its protective powers are used up." Then, soak the mound of salt in the alcohol. Repeat the above steps for the remaining three corners, going to the east, then the south, and conclude to the west.

Now, enter your home. Locate every external corner of your home and place four whole peppercorns at the base of each one. Try to tuck them in as best as you can so they are unintrusive and remain mostly undisturbed. Wet each pile with your charged alcohol and ask the pepper for its protection.

Once the above steps are complete, store the remaining alcohol and periodically pour it onto the peppercorns and salt to recharge them. If you see that the dishes of salt are low, refill them with the salt mixture.

Method 2 - Miraculous Soil Protection Ritual

This protection typically requires the 'holy' dirt from Chimayo. If this is inaccessible for you, you may be able to request some to be sent to you by the church. If you prefer not to I will teach you to make your own substitute.

To make a suitable substitute first you must locate some seemingly dry or infertile land such as cracked dirt from a drought. Now, look for signs of life in the dirt. Look for a small plant that is somehow defying the odds, or miraculously continuing to thrive in such harsh environments. Once you find a spot of soil with life, collect a cup full and leave the rest for the earth. Thank it by offering it water. Water the plant and tend to it; help it succeed at life. Then pray over a handful of table salt the following prayer:

Being of the earth. In the name of the ineffable God, and by the power of the tetragrammaton, be you consecrated in the service of the most high. Imbew this salt with the powers to protect this house and everything and everyone in it from all evil. Ometeo.

Once complete, wet the salt with distilled water and mix it into the cup of dirt. Allow it to thoroughly dry before use.

Once you acquire or make holy dirt, head to the front of your home with a small dish filled with the dirt. Begin to sprinkle it along the threshold of your door and ask for protection. State that no negativity may pass the sacred soil.

Then, sprinkle the dirt around the perimeter of the front facade of your house. Do not use too much. You should not be able to physically see the dirt. Then place the dirt on top of any plants near your front door. If there are none, consider planting a chile pepper bush for protection. Rosemary is another good option, along with juniper.

Now, repeat the above steps for any walls containing an external door. If there are none place the dirt at each corner. If there is another wall, do not place it at the corners, as it is not needed.

Once completed, pour a glass of water out from the inside of each external door while standing within it. As you do this say "As I pour this water it washes away all remaining evil. It may no longer reside here."

Protecting the home is a vital step to protecting those who reside within it. These methods are my two personal go-to methods for every home I inhabit, and I hope that you find use in these methods. Be sure to execute physical safety too, as that is equally if not more important than spiritual safety. Be sure to continue to regularly cleanse your home too, as you do not want negativity to fester within the home itself.

[ilikethecolorredsstuff]

ARCANE Rant

Arcane s2 ending is underwhelming because the show was slowly building up to it (the biggest disappointment of the century)

U can feel it slowly letting go of the class issues that s1 was based on ( arguably the reason why the show was appealing to begin with) foe what seems to be no reason. Cause it seemed that they could've done better with presenting the themes that were already there in the subtext of it all or atleast it was that way for s1 and the first act(s?)

By the 3rd act, it's like they make it a point to stray away from what the show is supposed to be about and maybe that's why there's a lot of distraction going on (*caughs * fan service). In the last act there's just so many loose endings and key points are missing, ones that are usually provided to the whatcher bethey offer needed insight like how jayce decided to touch the arcane or what happened with ekko and jinx when he stopped her. This is a pattern that also shows in s1 and the other acts but the avoidance of clearing things up or providing insight on character's behaviors in this case isn't to get us to think about it and interpret it on our own instead it leaves a feelibg of just accept it for now that's how thongs came to be, and it doesn't even explain it later(would've beena great move tbh).

This lack of insight makes it easier to just accept other shifts that don't actually make sense like the main shift of victor's character when he gave up on doing good for the ppl the moment jayce attacked him and honestly not only did jayce have no business doing that, victor also had no reason to change his ideology for only that. The attack harmed not only him but also the ones connected to him so it does make sense that instead of healing he decided to eliminate all danger but even then it wouldn't make sense for him to agree to forge an army and pick sides for a political war something he aims to demolish.

And then it's not even about his conquest anymore and we get a fairly easy and rushed destruction of the black flower and then back to Victor.... Victor changes his ways and they disappear leaving everyone behind to what? Move on? As if the story is about how humans weren't ready for a progress that fast andbnow they can learn from their mistakes and take their time, as if that insane leap of advancement both biological and technical isn't just a by product of an environment manufactured by classism that pressured and cornered ppl into this extreme reality.

At the end, nothing has changed from the beginning of s1, the counsel just added a physical chair for the undercity instead of the invisible one that silco did hold at some point.

The truth is zaun isn't even a separate nation anymore it's still the undercity who now has a representative in the counsel.

War didn't even unite the ppl in fear and grief because except for the enforcers the fighters were mostly from zaun, this is dangerous because it paints a picture where the unpriveleged lot are fighting someone else's battles while the priveleged (root cause if said battle) get to flee and only comeback when everything is settled to look all bigoted and give side eyes to the representative of the unpriveleged (im looking at u short grandma).

My point is what is the show trying to say by ignoring the core issue, leaving us in the dark abt a character's motivations, and jumping to war with spiritual robots meanwhile the counsel is full of classist cowards leading a nation they fled when shit got bloody and letting the war criminal from the uptown have a happy ever after, her crimes don't even get mentioned while jinx is told that no amount lf help she offers can undo the harm she caused. It's all intentional, the show even ends with a hidden message that heimdinger was correct from thr beginning for restricting research or at least it felt that way.

[boinkingbattlemechs]

Shadow Hawk

A multirole BattleMech developed in 2550 during the Golden Age, the Shadow Hawk is a powerful fusion of maneuverability and firepower. With a mix of long-range and short-range weapons, good maneuverability thanks to jump jets, and excellent endurance, the Shadow Hawk has long been regarded as one of the best 'Mechs in its weight class. The Shadow Hawk is equally adept whether commanding a reconnaissance company or serving as a spotter for heavy and assault lances.

Lang Industries had technically introduced the Shadow Hawk many years prior to 2550, but this version of the 'Mech suffered from a debilitating fault in its armor plating. The line was recalled and a major overhaul was accomplished in 2550 without any difficulties which solved the issue for most, but not all, Shadow Hawk models; this resumption of production therefore is regarded by many historians as the true debut of the design. For the next few centuries Lang continued to produce the Shadow Hawk for the Star League and the Great Houses until their factory was destroyed with the start of the Succession Wars. Afterwards, Earthwerks Incorporated remained the only manufacturer within the Inner Sphere to continue producing Shadow Hawks from their factory on Calloway VI, while in the Periphery Majesty Metals and Manufacturing on Dunianshire built these 'Mechs for the Magistracy of Canopus and other prospective buyers. As many of the secrets of lostech were rediscovered, Earthwerks was able to create an updated variant of the Shadow Hawk, the SHD-5M, in time for the Clan Invasion.

Starting in the summer of 3066, Vicore Industries began promoting their "Project Phoenix" to various weapons manufacturers across the Inner Sphere, promising improved versions of venerable designs like the Shadow Hawk. Earthwerks, Kallon Industries, and ComStar all expressed interest in redesigning the Shadow Hawk, however the latter two lacked appropriate facilities to build the 'Mech and so, at the suggestion of the Vicore group, contracted Odin Manufacturing on Orestes to build the components while Kallon finished the process at its factories on Nanking and Talon. The Capellan Confederation later acquired the rights to build Earthwerks' SHD-7M Shadow Hawk variant shortly before the Jihad, which they then sublicensed to Vandenberg Mechanized Industries to produce.

The Shadow Hawk carries a varied, but effective mix of weapons. Primary among them is the 80mm Armstrong J11 AC/5 mounted in the left torso along with one ton of ammo. This weapon, as well as the Holly LRM-5 launcher with one ton of reloads in the right torso, provide the Shadow Hawk with good long-range striking capabilities. When the Shadow Hawk closes to shorter ranges it can bring to bear its Holly SRM-2 launcher mounted in the head and its right-arm Martell medium laser which can generally finish off most 'Mechs of its own weight class or smaller that might have survived the mixed autocannon and LRM fire. One ton of ammunition for the SRM-2 is kept in the Shadow Hawk's center torso while 12 single heat sinks provide decent cooling. For hand-to-hand combat the Shadow Hawk features a pair of Lang manipulative hands, regarded as among the strongest models ever built prior to the fall of the Star League. The ability to grasp and carry objects greatly assists in its ability to take part in raiding missions.

While nine and a half tons of armor provide excellent protection, early models of the Shadow Hawk suffered from defective armor pressure plates, especially in the legs. When struck, these plates were liable to sever the myomer bundles which governed movement, rendering the 'Mech immobile. Although the mass recall of 2550 largely solved this issue, a small number of Shadow Hawks were not fixed and continued to see service in battle; on occasion this defect led to the loss of entire battles.

Three jump jets split between the center, left, and right rear torsos gives the Shadow Hawk an adequate jumping distance of 90 meters; while limited in the distance traveled, it gives the 'Mech an edge when engaged in close combat and supplements its cruising speed of 54 km/h. Perhaps the most valued component on the Shadow Hawk, as far as its pilots are concerned, is the Sparrow 300J life support system, which among the most advanced ever devised. The Sparrow can keep a pilot comfortable up to 30% longer than similar systems in other 'Mechs, and is especially important on extended missions where a more relaxed pilot is a better pilot.

(sorry, the Tumblr queue screwed up! It was supposed to post this poll last night, but decided to say that the Carrion Crow poll was posted yesterday, and ate this poll in the process. Anyway, here's some famous thing called a Shadow Hawk, I guess? /s /j)

[thatdisasterauthor]

Okay, so, very quick overview here! Emergency management has always been around in some form or fashion, but having it organized at a federal level on an ongoing basis rather than a per disaster basis tends to happen less often. Why varies from country to country.

It's also important to consider that many countries may have a federalized RESPONSE system (such as using their military to deal with the immediate effects of a disaster) but not a federalized RECOVERY system. FEMA, while they do dabble in response, is primarily focused on recovery/post-disaster aid, and pre-disaster mitigation efforts.

If you don't have a federalized recovery system, like the US pre-FEMA, usually what happens is the big disaster hits somewhere, and then whatever governing body holds the purse strings will pass some sort of legislation to provide funding to deal with that specific disaster. Rinse and repeat as each disaster happens. That's what the US used to do as well.

Then we had this interesting dovetail of massively increasing populations, those populations moving into disaster prone areas as they colonized the west, and an increase in consumerism that meant a lot more people had a lot more to lose as the 1800s faded and the 1900s began. This is when we start to see a more formalized disaster response system forming in the US.

The Army Corps of Engineers technically started in 1802, but I'm not sure off the top of my head how much specific disaster response and recovery work they did back then as compared to today. We also had some various acts and other legislation passed over the years that was meant to provide for more than this or that disaster as they happened, but it was all still smaller scale.

We had a few other major disasters over the 1800s/early 1900s that were responded to by various bits of the military, and private entities like the Red Cross, and we started seeing more legislation about stuff like building codes, mitigation of future disasters, etc.. But it was all still rather piecemeal.

Then, then we've got the founding of the Forest Service in the very early 1900s. Which, weirdly, does not get brought up in the conversation very often? But the Forest Service was founded on the idea and promise of being able to control wildfires, to control a disaster. The accuracy of that idea is a whole different discussion, but the point is it was a nation wide, federally backed push to have a standing force for handling JUST disasters. It nearly failed until the 1910 Great Burn burned 3million acres across multiple states in a couple of days, and people realized that, "hey, maybe having people who know what to do about that is good actually???"

From there we get into WWI/WWII which resulted in a lot of studies about how people behave in disasters and how governments should handle that sort of stuff. It also resulted in the creation of the Office of Civil Defense which handled stuff like evacuation prep, volunteer coordination, etc.. A precursor to FEMA as it stands now.

Next we got the Federal Disaster Act of 1950 which created permanent and general legislation regarding disaster relief, but it was heavily focused on floods specifically. In the 60s Kennedy created the Office of Emergency Preparedness to deal with natural disasters and we were dealing with all the nuclear war fears at the time. But we were still passing legislation pretty ad-hoc for specific disasters, and disasters were getting more and more common and worse and worse. The first billion dollar disaster was Hurricane Betsy in 1965.

In 1968 we see the creation of the National Flood Insurance Program, which became mandatory in the early 70s. The focus in nuclear response also shifted in the 70s to how to evacuate entire metropolitan areas. And THIS is when FEMA was founded by Carter in 1978/79. They wanted to have an way to handle things as a WHOLE rather than dozens of little pieces scattered all over the place.

Now, FEMA isn't perfect. Far from it. We do still pass ad-hoc legislation per disaster all the time. (FEMA is intentionally under-funded so politicians can swoop in and save the day for their constituents whenever a disaster hits them.) But FEMA does at least provide a better central structure to focus that ad-hoc legislation around, among other things.

And once again I have said I was going to write a short post and then not done that, haha. But, to sum up: it's not that the US one day decided to switch to a central federalized system of emergency management, it's that we slowly progressed towards it over two centuries.

Someone is trying to argue with me on TikTok that FEMA was actually founded in the early 1800s (and that before that people just died in disasters because there was no help at all).

And I just. Ma'am. No. You are so far down the wrong rabbit hole you're having dinner with the Red Queen.

[sassysnowperson]

Sass Talks Books: Thank You for Listening, by Julia Whelan

Basic Plot: An audiobook narrator, who doesn't record romance books (anymore - she needed to break into the industry somehow), is given the financial opportunity of a lifetime...recording a romance book. It's a dual narration book, too, which means working with another narrator. Her recording partner quickly becomes one of the best perks of the project, warm and funny and *real* feeling, despite the fact they've never met. (They've never met, right?)

My thoughts: I really enjoyed this one. The author IS an audiobook narrator, writing a book about two audiobooks narrators, and I listed to the audiobook...narrated by the author. I thoroughly recommend that reading experience, by the way. There's a lot of little moments with the two talented voice actor characters slipping into different accents, talking about tone and inflection, and it's an absolute delight to hear the narrator delivering on the script she wrote for herself. As for the story itself, I'm not far enough into the romance world to know if this book deviates from the romance novel beats enough that it's drifted out of the category, but I can say that it was absolutely charming and enjoyable. And, that the changes made dulled the edges of the parts of romance I bounce off of the most while absolutely being a very loving send-up of the genre. The connection between the two people was very real, but it wasn't the only (or even, I would argue, the most important) relationship developing and changing in the book.

Every character felt connected in a complicated web of love and relationships with other people - it was a joy. And it was used to explore some toothy things that I normally don't get in a book this fun - grief, regret, how you deal with the losses you can't get back, how you rebuild a life. It stayed warm-hearted and kind as a book, but it didn't shy away from real fights, insecurities, and pain.

A handful of warnings to go along with that: the MC has lost an eye, and deals with ableism, and some negative self-perception. There's some diet-culture-based disordered eating for the MC's best friend (not displayed as a good thing). The MC's relationship with her dad has some brutal fights where there's emotional manipulation happening. There's also a real look at the complications of dementia - discussed below.

The protagonist's relationship with her grandmother is a key point of the story, and the grandmother is dealing with encroachment of memory loss and personality change that comes along with dementia. This part surprised me - I work with older adults in long-term care and lol, was not expecting that my professional life would be relevant to the situation. The author made a few errors with the care system in California (where our grandma is based, and where I work). But frankly, only a few, and the way the dementia progressed wasn't one of them. It was good, and heartbreaking, and one of my favorite parts.

Wow...I wrote a lot about this. Suppose that makes sense, considering it was my experience of the book itself. I expected something light and fun, and while I got it, there was depth there too that was a very welcome surprise.

[elftwink]

to preface this post i am anti-advertising i think we should explode the entire industry but it's sooo funny when you people make posts like "and they don't even work!!" like. sorry to be the bearer of bad news but yes they do. that's why we have to put up with so many despite everyone hating them and thinking its annoying. because they actually work really well and make a shit load of money

[lizzybeanbutt]

now that you mention it, yeah kabru is kind of an ibex

trying to pin it down but I don't feel confident on my grasp of kabru's characterization (depsite him being my favourite guy. you know how it is) but like. Kabru is a nicer ibex. Ibex is kabru but he's no longer asking. Ibex is a kabru but he's not afraid to let outright enemies stay on the board if he knows he'll win the overall battle. I think Kabru would make a better candidate of rightousness. I need a two way au and we're gonna send the dunmeshi cast to divine cycle space and we're throwing the kingdom crew in a last ditch dungeon crawl

@arcnoise tagging just in case

[punk-pins]

tumblr live update on mobile: it now has the option to snooze the live streams at the top of the dashboard for 30 days, but the video icon for the tumblr live tab in the middle of the footer can’t be disabled at all :/

[nellectronic]

i don’t want to do this i don’t want to do this i don’t w

[sleepdepravity]

Happy to be your filter for funny history stuff.

[ailurinae]

I remain of the opinion that tumblr live would be basically fine, if when you looked at it you only saw tumblr users, not people from other parts of that live video provider.

Of course, it is also hard to sell people on using a system that seems to have no users... but probably easier than selling a system that seems to have these users to tumblr users.

(also they need to finish making the TOS and privacy policy fully adapted for tumblr and make it more clear what the privacy terms are... I think many of the complaints about that are not actually real issues, but look like they are do to the generic policy)

genuinely feel like im being pranked rn

[umbralwaves]

I truly wish my boss wasn't a masterclass in white supremacy, but here I am.

[thirst2]

The number of times I see a (presumably) grassroots software or application come out that claims to solve a major point of erasure or negligence by corporations regarding marginalized people so I message them to immediately ask whether their tech. is open-source and…always No.

[bijoumikhawal]

Funds for Haiti and Haitian Americans

A Haitian American woman with long Covid and her daughter with cancer have both been struggling to raise funds that would help them during their illnesses. Both of them live in the Midwest, which is where a lot of the most recent fear mongering has been centered.

COJEHA is a Haitian organization that provides financial support for youth, teaches agricultural skills, helps ensure children attend school, and teaches other soft life skills. They're working on building a farm with fish and vegetable crops where teaching occurs, which will also increase local access to fresh food.

P4H Global is the organization that has been working on building the canal connected to the Massacre River, another agricultural project. They have also been working to support education in Haiti, with both teachers and students.

The Haitian Community Center in Springfield, Ohio. Springfield's food bank, community health center, and a local Catholic organization that provides aid are also accepting donations.

Richard Pierrin is a journalist who has had to flee Haiti and is trying to get a visa that will allow him to work, and that doesn't end after 3 months.

Marc Henry and his family have been dealing with food insecurity for months, and are trying to get funds so they can eat, as well as supplies like livestock and fishing equipment so they can sustain themselves even after the fundraiser is done. They're close to their goal.

An elderly couple's home was damaged multiple times over the last few years and they are trying to raise funds to finish construction. They are also very close to their goal.

A fundraiser for children in Jacmel to provide food, water, and clothes.

A fund for several families to secure plane tickets out of the country

OTRAH is an organization that helps trans Haitians and wants to expand their services to combat HIV. They don't have a gofundme, instead donations are discussed over email.

There is also this thread of Haitian gofundmes which updates fairly regularly

This document explaining the leadup to where we are now also names some organizations that could use financial support

[wormsdyke]

[ID: a collection of various creatures that are all small and round and cute, including the autism/tbh creature and the puffles from club penguin.]

if you put aside the fact that at least 2 of these Creatures appear to have fur, my first thought is that top left, middle left, and bottom right would be members of the phylum mollusca and class cephalopoda. molluscs notably have a mantle and mantle cavity, which resembles the kinda wide round body shapes of all these Creatures and would support my feeling that they would sound hollow if bonked on the head.

top left and bottom right resemble squid to me, with their defined head and tentacles - admittedly fewer than most squids, but taxonomy is never a perfect system. tell me this guy’s big round eyes don’t resemble those of the Autism Creature!

[ID: a photo of a light tan squid.]

the puffles on middle left remind me of cuttlefish! though they’re more spherical than your average cuttlefish, their wide array of colors and personalities harkens to the cuttlefish’s ability to manipulate their chromatophore cells to change their color and pattern. like this vibrant fellow!

[ID: a photo of a brightly multicolored cuttlefish.]

i would classify top right, middle right, and bottom left as tardigrades, or water bears. my reasoning is a little less scientific here but i believe still accurate. they are simply little guys. tiny chunky little creatures. microscopic, even. like a tardigrade, i just want to keep them in my pocket as a friend. this guy is a Creature for sure

[ID: a grayscale photo of a tardigrade.]

Taxonomically, how do we define this genre of Creature?