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I have lost count of how many demons I summoned before I finally got the sigil and incantation right. An angel appeared.

"Tell me," I demanded, "why God created humans!"

"To make art."

"Wait, what? To glorify him?"

"If you wish. But all art you make delights and surprises Him."

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"All I can give you," my godmother whispered, "is a secret name."

I don't remember that, being a newborn at the time. I didn't learn about it until I was seven, when some older kids were bullying me.

Suddenly, a dragon landed behind me.

"This," it said, "is my Hoard."

That's me.

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The New World Mall, in Bangkok, was closed in 1997 after it was found to have breached building regulations.

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Louisiana students Ne’Kiya Jackson and Calcea Johnson wowed their teachers in 2022 when they discovered a new way to prove the 2000-year-old Pythagorean theorem in response to a bonus question in a high school math contest. But that was only the beginning.

A volunteer at their former school, New Orleans’ St. Mary’s Academy, encouraged them to submit their work on the famous mathematical theory to a professional conference, and in March 2023 they became the youngest people to present at the American Mathematical Society’s Southeastern Sectional conference in Atlanta. Their appearance elicited a wave of media coverage, including a spot on “60 Minutes.” The pair also received symbolic keys to the city of New Orleans and a shout-out from Michelle Obama.

Now Jackson and Johnson, who started college last year, have notched another achievement: authoring an academic paper detailing their original proof — plus nine more. Their work published Monday in the scientific journal American Mathematical Monthly.

Bonus:

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I can't explain how much I love baguette child. I would protect them with my life.

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Mosquitoes actually are not replaceable in any ecosystem that naturally has them and that includes replacing them with any of the non biting species because these are the traits that make them so core to food webs:

Tiny

Can use every single pool of moisture to raise generations no matter how dirty and stagnant and low in oxygen

Can fly

Males get by on just sugars

Females take protein from larger animals to manufacture thousands more eggs

All these things combined allow thst ecosystem to make huge volumes of insects from conditions barren to most other macroscopic life. You might think there are other insects that seem to make huge massive swarms out of nothing but there's really nothing that hits all the same qualities *except other insects that also suck blood.*

It's the precise combo of being able to "prey" on things millions of times larger and breed in nothing but a few drops of filthy rainwater or the moisture in a rotten log. That's the most efficient combination for anything that size to multiply that rapidly where nothing else can even survive, except of course the things that can move in because they eat them :)

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daniel after being turned by armand: well at least he can't read my mind to extract my worst moments as a punishment anymore

armand, who has spent the past 50 years studying daniel like a bug: i am about to recite your top ten personal failures from memory. i've made a tier list

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Why have I never come across these BTS photos before?

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oh my god it’s laika day everyone drop what you’re doing… we honour a little dog who was sent up into space 65 years ago today. she was found as a three year old stray mongrel wandering the streets of moscow. her ability to endure hardy conditions got her chosen as the candidate for a journey she was never meant to survive. she passed away seven hours after liftoff. I hope she died dreaming of chasing rabbits up in the stars I love u laika forever and ever

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On this day in 1987 – Don't Let's Start, the first single from They Might Be Giants' first album, is released. The accompanying music video gets much exposure on MTV, giving the band their first taste of fame.

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Naomi Native as Oshun by the Tog Father.

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Awebo!

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Awebo!

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It was the day after Halloween, and the swordmaster sent all students out.

"Check every garden. If you see an unbroken pumpkin, tell the owners it must be cleaved, lest some lingering spirit possesses it."

"What damage could a possessed pumpkin do?"

"Plenty. You could be gored.