AAAAAAAAAAAAAA

During one semester of PE in high school I got put in a section called Team Sports. This was significantly better than a regular unit because the athletic kids were able to play and I largely got to sit and watch.

Months were devoted to what they called Pickle Ball but I’ve since learned was basically ping pong with larger than average paddles. The paddles had been through the absolute wringer, all padding had been rubbed and torn off by a relentless stream of bored adolescents like myself.

This presented me with a unique opportunity. I had a pencil, nominally used to keep score. I had a blank wooden panel. And I had large stretches of time sitting on the sidelines.

Every day I’d pick a blank paddle. I’d doodle little animals, bizarre monstrosities, and a bunch that were just a huge eye in the middle with the words “Big Brother is Watching”. What can I say; I was reading 1984 at the time.

When we finally finished with the paddles and moved on to badminton I completely forgot my dozens of illustrations.

It wasn’t until several years later that it got brought up again. I was hanging out with a friend and their younger sibling. We were listening to them lament their high school experience of the day. “But I won the Pegasus paddle, so that was cool.”

“Wait- what?”

“Yeah, most of them are just Big Brother, so they’re not exciting, but there’s only one Pegasus so we fight over it. Last week I had an elephant I really liked though.”

“You guys fight over the paddles with art on them…?”

“Yeah!”

My friend turned to me and asked, “Didn’t you make all those drawings?”

Their sibling lit up, “You made them?!”

I sat in silence as the complexity of the world and the waves we leave behind as we move through it washed over me. I contemplated how intertwined I was with the rest of existence to create such a beautiful moment.

I had made art on a whim out of boredom and it had an effect on someone else’s day, someone who through random happenstance years later was telling me about it all unknowing.

Their sibling was delighted when I drew them another pegasus on the spot and announced that they’d be the talk of PE now that they’d uncovered the mystery artist.

Roman descriptions of Celtic warriors are so horny it’s hilarious they’re like “They think they’re impressive, fighting naked where you can see every wound on their exquisite well-formed bodies, their pale slender necks encased in gold. They are so fierce in battle, these stupid superstitious barbarian fucks. They are a proud people, all tall and well built and, did I mention, fighting naked?” you want to fuck them so bad it makes you look stupid. The dick out battle method was definitely working.

Wait while we’re all being unhinged about, like, stew. We all obsessed over the Joy of Cooking as children right. Right

The Joy of Cooking is a cookbook written by a committee of midcentury American goofballs who weren’t sure if your life circumstances were going to call for cooking woodchuck, wedding cake, or both at the same time. But the one thing they could arm you with? Unshakeable confidence and a wine pairing. Absolutely demented manual for living, 100% recommend imprinting on it as a child.

YES our first stop will be the Backpacking menu. We find it incidentally next to THE weirdest vintage things to do with bacon. Hello, bacon and rice custard. Why are you, somehow, a small act of violence in our day. We then see the actual menu with its genuinely extremely useful information including “welcome extra munch items.”

Referencing here also, useful information about building fires, which leads you to the Ritual Psychic Incantation of Massachusetts to determine what setting an open fire is on. This spell is to be performed nonverbally. and Mississippi will also do if you are a coward. Do NOT use anything except a US state!!!! Memorise this fact diligently as you may need it later

finally what other menus do we have, you ask? Normal ones of course

Lots of people asking “is this the one with the squirrel/rabbit diagrams” of COURSE it is that one

“Does it really have woodchuck”

Yes of course. Take one (1) woodchuck

Shout out to @arthurwilde for pointing out this is the one with the recipe for opossum that starts by first keeping the opossum as a lil pet.

File that under recipes you don’t need to make tiktokers try

@tartsandcrafts OH MY GOD

I have a vintage copy with the squirrel diagrams but fun fact: The Joy of Cooking is about 900-1000 pages. In braille, it is 30 volumes long. Volumes.

Oh NO! And this is a book with so many references and cross references that it’s almost unusable as-is!

Forgot to come back with a shot from my work. These are braille volumes of the Joy of Cooking

I am so excited by this, thank you so much for sharing!

In storage I have the Windows CD-ROM of Joy of Cooking. If anyone knows how to extract the database files in a usable way that might be helpful

Also, this is the original cover image

Note: there is no cooking referenced in this image. The joy is in smacking things. A water-dragon is there but we’re not exactly aiming for it and it looks friendly. This is because Irma knew we’d be out here, fighting for our lives, every day. The actual recipes are indeed less important than knowledge and confidence. The water-dragon, which represents Cooking, is awed by the carnality and joy of the Chatelaine. She is sainted for this; her handbag is absurd, and represents keeping it silly. Thus endeth the lesson

‘Nother idea: Dunkleosteus at Dunkin’ Donuts.

Dunkleosteus at the Dunkin’ Donuts

Dunklin’ Donuts…

Do you ever start bullshitting a paper, and then look over it halfway through and think, ’…Wait a minute, I could be onto something here.’

this is the definition of college.

Literally I was writing a paper on Asian salt water crocodiles, like a simple about them paper for a college class, and I started noticing some inconsistencies in the scientific papers I was sourcing and I accidentally discovered that the crocodile has been misdiagnosed as least concerned on the endangered species list when they should be classified as endangered and now my professor is having me write a formal report to the international Red List to have them reclassified and all I wanted to do was write this paper on an animal I thought was cool and now I’m considered an expert on this species…

this is how it works half of esteemed biologists trip and fall into their specialty while pursuing something else. one lecturer i just went to started as a biochemist researching antibiotics and discovered that crocodiles change colors based on environment and now he has 30+ crocs in his yard for research purposes and he’s just like… “wait… i’m a chemist…”

How did so many people end up with crocodiles on accident?????

you just go into science and after a while, crocodile…

Mouse Armor by Jeff De Boer

I love his stated intention behind these projects, ‘Confuse historians’.

@petermorwood I think you would appreciate this. 🐭⚔️

Thanks for thinking of me - I do appreciate it, in both senses. :->

There are a couple of posts about Jeff de Boer on my blog, because he doesn't just make armour for mice - he does it for cats as well.

He's never tried to put a real cat inside any of his creations.

Wise man...

Hat tip @eldriwolf I LOVE this, the craftsmanship and the artist intentions too!

emboidered wall hanging

something's afoot

(platypus tootsies) @elodieunderglass

Sweet little feet! Totally normal!

onion magic

@elodieunderglass

It IS like that! Thank you!

i like being a lesbian and all, but holy shit, men are so cool. i hope all men reading this have a wonderful day.

i like being gay and all, but holy shit, women are so cool!!!! i hope all women reading this have a wonderful day as well!!!!!!!!!

[image description: the epic handshake meme. one arm is labelled gay people and the other is labelled lesbians. in the middle it says "fuck yeah bro". end id]

hey guys, quick reminder! this post is about uplifting other people!!! tags like 'ugh, but men are gross lol' or 'op has never met a man' are not welcome and will recieve an insta block! men are cool! women are cool! thank you for coming to my fucking ted talk! :-)

Amen to that.

This has been approved by your local lesbian. Although I’ve got transmasc allegations going on so maybe I’m not one to talk.

I'm bisexual. Everyone is awesome! Men are great. Women are great. Enbies are great. Whoever you are, I love you!

Jane Austen: so, you go to Mr Collins' house and Elizabeth is there alone. She welcomes you politely, but she looks---troubled.

Colonel Fitzwilliam: and of course she does, after everything I said to her-

Fitzwilliam Darcy: do I sense if she is mad at me specifically or it is just her headache?

Jane Austen: roll an Investigation Check.

This Existential Goose Lamp. Honours self-discovery and will stand with you through moments of uncertainty and wonder, brightening up your days with his unique presence. This will make a lovely Gift for your Friends and Family!

==> AVAILABLE HERE <==

i dont usually reblog ads but. but this. i. i NEED this goose

Hat tip @eldriwolf thank you so much!

Okay. Say you ask a small child to draw you a house, and they come up with something like this:

For the purposes of this analogy the child is shit at colouring in, because I only wanted to give the general idea.

So, we can all agree that the child who draws a house probably isn't trying to communicate anything in particular other than “look at this cool house I drew”, right?

Cool.

So… Why is it seemingly in the middle of nowhere, when most children live in houses with neighbours?

Why is the main body a square and the roof a solid triangle when that doesn't look like any house that has ever been built anywhere?

Why does it have a wood-burning stove with smoke actively coming out of the chimney, even though the sun indicates warm weather?

Why is the sun smiling? Why is it yellow?

Answer: because the child has seen picture books, and films, and the drawings of other children, and has on some level absorbed that this is what a house is meant to look like.

Face to face, the child almost certainly wouldn't know where to begin communicating “yellow is a colour culturally associated with happiness and warmth, and two dots accompanied by a curved line symbolically represent a smiling human face, so I have combined these attributes with the sun to convey that it is a very warm and pleasant day”.

Or “historically most houses in my country used fire for heat and cooking, and even though this is no longer the case for the majority of households, most media portrayals of houses are inspired by other, older, media portrayals and therefore include the chimney. I have chosen to follow this trend.”

Or even, “I have poor motor control because of my age, and large, 2 dimensional shapes are easier to draw than anything involving detail and perspective”.

Yet this is all information that you can pick up from detailed study of the house drawing.

Ultimately, it's not about what the writer intended. That's what the whole death of the author thing means.

If you think of literature like as a conversation, then think of all the analysis stuff that your English teacher keeps trying to get you to look at as like body language. It's the stuff that the other person doesn't even necessarily mean to communicate, but that can tell you a hell of a lot about what they mean.

Also, a poem written by a poet who got high is still a poem written by a poet.

People love to say dismissive bullshit like, "oh, that's just the drugs talking" but actually, drugs can't fucking talk! It is always the human being doing the talking regardless of how intoxicated they are. The drugs are not creating the poetry. The poet's mind is creating the poetry. A person doesn't stop being a person just because they took something.

Adding that CORN was any kind of grain!

Costumes from The Pacific Northwest Ballet's Sleeping Beauty,

Preston Singletary and Paul Tazewell

Luther DeMyer and @audreymalek as King and Queen Papillon. 📷: @angelasterlingphoto

These images are so arresting I had to go find more about them. These were designed by Paul Tazwell based on the work of production and set designer Preston Singletary.

im this and im so cute and you love me

stands up. i forgot where i put my water bottle

ough big sippie

Mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) and white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus)

@elodieunderglass baby deer

look how soft they look