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That's especially disconcerting because the 23-cube has 8,388,608 corners. Even if you inscribe the little red cubes in all eight million corners, your big cube will still be 99.5% empty space.

It's cause the corners get farther away from the origin! The corners of square with a side length of 2 are sqrt(2) from the center. The corners of a cube are sqrt(3) from the center, etc

So it's not the ball getting smaller, but the cube getting bigger! The ball isn't the weird one; the cube is!

"Dimensionally cursed phenomena" is such a delightful phrase to find in a Wikipedia article.

standing still just chilling but then suddenly i self destruct in a huge explosion but when the smoke clears im standing there exactly the same

You ever meet a person who you can just tell is constantly fighting against their own impulse to be kind

so I have this one colleague, right? I don’t know him super well, but we work together on shift sometimes and he’s reliable, got his shit together, efficient and timely.

And he’s polite with the public, too. Says all the right things, smiles when appropriate, patient and helpful, would never step out of line. One hundred percent follows the rules to the letter, hands-off, no abusive language, no violence. Straight and narrow all the way.

And when I first met him, I was put off about how he talks about people. I still am, honestly. It’s private and quiet and discrete, not where anyone could see or overhear, but he says things to me. “That one got hit with the ugly stick”. “He looks fuckin’ handicapped”. “Look at that crackhead”. “Maybe I’d feel bad for them if they got off their asses and got their lives together”.

It started quite a few arguments between us, but it never changed that his ACTIONS were always fair and respectful, so I let it slide as one of those things you can’t change about others and just kind of have to put up with. We work together fine, and I don’t react to it anymore, and he treats people well.

One day he said he saw me buying a coffee for a homeless guy when I was off shift.

The guy in question was someone we both knew from work was a pain in the ass, high or drunk more often than not, criminal record a mile long, with the kind of mental health issues that aren’t as sympathetic because they mostly just make him act like a violent asshole. Too ill to be prosecuted, to aggressive and unpredictable for a care aid and public housing, so he gets by stealing and shooting up and threatening anyone who tries to stop him.

He’s an unhappy soul. There are very few places he’s welcome.

But I was buying myself a drink, and he was outside, and it was cold out, and out of uniform I know it’s an 80% chance he’ll have no idea who I am or that he said he’d cut my head off last week, so I figured I’d grab him a coffee. Double-double, cause sugar helps and I’d seen him eat ice cream before so cream probably wouldn’t hurt.

I handed it to him on my way out. Told him to stay safe. He took it. Didn’t say thank-you, but I wasn’t really expecting him to anyways. I’d never spoken with him outside of an active conflict before, so I don’t even know what he’d have sounded like not-angry and mostly-sober.

But anyway, apparently my colleague saw, and he asked why the hell I’d waste the money.

I didn’t know what to tell him. It was just two dollars. I’d spent more than that on the second-hand bowl that had fallen off my dish rack and shattered the other night. And it was cold out, and the guy was probably banned from anywhere warm in town, and if he wanted something bad enough he’d probably just steal it anyways, and then it’s be someone else’s problem. But mostly, he was just the kind of guy nobody is happy to see, who was welcome nowhere, and had nowhere to go, and maybe when you’re trapped in a life like that something small and decent doesn’t come around very often.

I didn’t know what to tell him. So I just said, “I felt like it.”

He rolled his eyes a bit, but didn’t hassle me about it. I got the feeling he still thought I was being stupid or naive. He seems to think I don’t understand how he world works, or how awful and heartless people can be.

I don’t know why he thinks that. We work the same job, and we’ve shared a lot about where we’ve been. We both know how awful people can be.

But then maybe a month later he shows up for shift change. And when he does, he has this weird energy about him, like a little kid who just found their first rubik’s cube and hasn’t figured out if they like it or not.

“I pulled a you,” he said, like he was making fun of himself. I asked what he meant, what had happened.

He said he’d seen a guy, a different guy, another person on the street when we both saw all the time. “I went to grab lunch and he was there,” he said. “And you know, he’s got no money, he’s homeless, but he never causes trouble, never steals, doesn’t show up drunk. So I figured, what the hell, and I covered his bill.”

He wasn’t looking at me as he said it, just staring off with an odd energy. If it wasn’t so subtle I’d call it excitement, like little-kid excitement, but it was almost nothing. “I told ‘em not to say it was me. Didn’t wanna have to talk to him. Thought it’d be weird.”

It was totally out of left-field. Completely against the image he projected of polite distance, judgemental side comments.

I asked him, “feels good, huh?”

He shrugged, but it seemed like he was still thinking about it.

He still says unkind and hurtful things about people, though. But the other day he said something about how he didn’t care about people, didn’t care when the news said folks were dying of the flu, didn’t get upset over strangers like that.

I said, “But it’s sad, isn’t it?”, and he shook his head. “You can’t care about everyone. That would be exhausting.” And I think that’s when I figured it out.

We both do the same work. We’ve both come from similar places. And yet the way we feel about others is different.

This is a guess, but I don’t think he’s a cruel or unkind person at heart. A guess, but I suspect that after seeing so much stupid, senseless cruelty… Je cares about people, but caring hurts. Caring means you can be let down, disappointed, fucked over. Caring about everyone means suffering when they suffer, and that’s a lot of pain for one person to handle. And I suspect that maybe when he says cruel things, when he says he doesn’t care, it’s because he’s scared of his own empathy. That if he truly let himself love everyone, he couldn’t survive the hurt of it.

Which is purer, in a way, than my own sort of caring. My caring, I think, is much more selfish.

I’ve been hurt too. I’ve seen bad things, too. And when I closed myself off like that, I became a cold and bitter person, and the colder and more bitter you are, the colder and more bitter others are back, until all you can see is the worst in everything and almost nothing can drag you out of the pit you’ve dug yourself into.

I think he’s cold because he’s afraid of love. I think he knows that loving others makes you vulnerable regardless of your actions, so he does what he can to dislike people before he becomes attached.

I think I love because if I didn’t, I’d hate. I’d hate everybody. I’d hate people I care about.

I think I need to love everybody, care about everybody, at least a little tiny bit, because if any single person was unworthy then anyone could be unworthy, and how on earth would I know?

The man I bought coffee for didn’t bother us that day. Didn’t bother us for a few weeks. I try not to hope the two things are related.

Another guy I knew from the street got clean. Got a house. Was going back to school, before he fell off the wagon. He’s on the street again, now. Seeing him back out there hurts. It probably wouldn’t hurt if I didn’t give a shit, if I wasn’t kind of excited for him, if I wasn’t still kind of hoping he’d get clean again.

He has no idea who I am, though. We only met once, maybe four years ago now.

I’m still hoping I’ll see him around town again soon, standing upright without the black stains on his fingers, smiling like he was when he came by with his social worker.

I think most people have the impulse to care. I think the choices they make don’t reflect their capacity for love so much as they indicate what scares us more- pain and power and how we let it in.

We have shift change again twenty minutes.

I’m not sure what else to say.

Would you rather be stabbed in the back, or buried alive?

Bonus top icons posted in 2022: BOOKS, or “Oops, (almost) all Twilight”

i actually think its incredibly funny that people can just log on to the internet and get in a fight with a guy in another country. what a privileged time we live in. you used to have to go to war to do that

i'm such a hater man lucas came on screen in 5x02 and i booed

best r/shittyfoodporn post ever. this thing is like a son to me

grown adult caught thinking about her tween hyperfixation

and longing to live in the universe where catherine hardwicke directed eclipse and rachelle lefevre still played victoria

Volturi home

Because I studied landscape architecture for a while I was curious how many floors the Volturi home could be, considering it’s built underneath the current Volterra city and was started being built in the Etruscan era. Unfortunately I did not have access anymore to arcgis so everything is based on free access maps, articles and pictures of the city. That I went there last may helped too.

The map

There would be three entrances and because of the sewers, the first floor would start at least 3 or 4 metres deep. The soil is mostly clay but the hill is made out of sand and calcarenites. Structures in clay tend to fall apart, so I kind of believe the volturi structure would almost only exist in the sand section. Which is btw still around 75 metres thick... lots of possibilities. I added the necropolis as well because that is where the Etruscans buried their dead. There are also tunnels and tombs there, so why wouldn't the kings have built a tunnel there? If you want to know how Etruscan structures look like underground: I found a website that has pictures. This is where our beloved volturi vampires live.. maybe they structured it a bit more over the centuries. Adding libraries and training grounds with a bit of fantasy. Here is a website that shows how the acropolis looked like if you are interested.

The entrances:

And then I was also looking for good spots for the entries of their home. The palazzo is a tourist spot, a town hall and has no basement, not quite ideal! Here are my suggestions:

Not the main entry but a way for the Volturi lower guards to leave the main area and guard the city easily. A restaurant showcased an archeological site underneath their floor. It’s supposed to be an old path and entry to a house from the Etruscan era. What if several houses are owned by the volturi that have such entries? Guards could easily leave the underground area to guard the city. Most houses had basement floors that were clearly unused. Of course there can’t be too many or they would have a risk with so many entries.

There is an archaeological site on the hill where the remains lie of the acropolis. Many parts were closed off because, according to the information there, you could fall down several metres deep. It’s deep and they cannot explore it because of the vulnerability of the rocks. What if one of these are an official entry for guard duties? They simply need to jump or climb and open it. At night there are no humans around and there aren’t street lamps around either. (Ignore my shoes lol)

Just outside of the walls I found a war monument. It’s a bit of a quiet spot with a beautiful view, you can see a lot of the area there. There is a sewer underneath those tiles and it seems to go pretty deep. I was thinking this could be a modern entry for an older tunnel they had built. And this would be the official known entry for other covens to visit the Volturi. Just like in the books, they would have to walk through a sewer, or climb down a tunnel inside the sewer. Bonus: it’s big enough for Felix to enter :)

Other important notes:

In the books and the movies the throne room is built in the tower. That is impossible if you would use Volterra as how it’s really built. Instead, the throne room would be ancient and deep underground. Etruscan writings on the walls and definitely Etruscan structures. In that case; Bella, Edward and Alice would be led into a secluded area where no light or air would ever come. Aka, Bella wouldn’t be able to breathe there and die before she would even get close to arriving there. Cough, cough, dusty kings.

Same goes for the queens. There is no tower big enough to have a room. You could have them live in one of the houses but I would say the kings keep them in a secluded room somewhere deep underground… poor women.

As for Heidi’s tour: I have found abandoned buildings in the Volterra area. It is technically possible for a tunnel to be built leading towards the city. Several archeologists in articles have explained that the Etruscans were constantly building tunnels of which most are not yet found. Realistically, I would say they have a space built underground just outside the city, leading a tunnel towards that. The humans get eaten there and their bodies are disposed of or destroyed at the abandoned building. No accid needed! In the modern times I would think Heidi has them killed in the abandoned building, has guards put their blood in pretty jars and bottles and then delivers those to every guard and the kings. With so much surveillance and technology nowadays she maybe even just orders blood or they own blood banks..

Additional

There is so much information available about the Etruscans and their structures. I bought books and I haven't read everything yet. Most of the knowledge is gone so there is so much we don't know. Several articles have stated that there are structures beneath the city of Volterra we will never find or get access to! It is super interesting. I haven't even talked about the amfi theatre… If someone wants to add their thoughts or knowledge, please do!

Used sources

love the library. there's no risk. you can take out a book and go "wow this sucks" and just give it back. and when you do that you're still making the library's Number Go Up so you'll be able to roll the dice on even more books. all for the low low price of free/you already paid for it with your tax money so you might as well use it

It’s funny that songs from the 1930s-1950s get registered as creepy because they’re old. Do you think horror movies made in 2095 will set their credits to Closer by the Chainsmokers