there has been a petition signed by over 300,000 british people to ban donald trump from britain and because it’s so popular they’re having to seriously consider debating it in the house of commons. it’s the best news i’ve heard all week.
I’ll be honest, whenever a work of speculative fiction (fanmade or otherwise) goes out of its way to describe an intelligent species with bizarre and complicated reproductive biology, the first question that invariably pops into my head is: “How do these critters masturbate?”
what if masturbation was uniquely a human experience though
Okay, I know that you meant “what if humans are the only intelligent species that’s anatomically capable of masturbating?”, but now I’m picturing a universe where humans are the only ones that ever thought to try it.
Human masturbation specialists traveling the galaxy to offer our gift, undertaking rigorous study and enormous personal risk to teach weird-ass aliens how to rub one out.
Calculating the exact harmonic frequencies to allow ancient, vacuum-dwelling crystalline intelligences to self-stimulate.
Descending into the crushing atmospheres of gas giants in specially constructed aerostats to design sex toys for the vast, jellyfish-like super-predators that prowl the hurricane slipstreams.
Wanking is our genius. Our legacy.
That last addition is possibly my favourite thing Tumblr has ever done for the world.
buffy: do not fight buffy. the entire show is dedicated to the fact that you should not fight buffy. she will kick your ass. do NOT fight buffy.
xander: fight xander. please just fight xander. everyone is rooting for you! if you do decide to fight xander, call me. let me watch. please fight xander.
willow: what the fuck ???? why would you fight willow. willow skinned a guy alive. do NOT fight willow. i repeat, do NOT fight willow.
giles: you could fight giles i guess, but why? he’s just a kind librarian. except for his ripper days and when he suffocated ben to death, but regardless. why would you fight giles?
cordelia: cordelia will TEAR YOU APART. not physically, but socially. she willdestroy you. do not fight cordelia.
angel: you could fight angel and you’d probably lose. but this man has already been through enough. get him some coffee. hug him. don’t fight angel.
spike: please fight spike. please just take one for the team and kick spike’s ass. he would probably kill you but i bet you could beat him up enough to give him a black eye or a scratch or something. fight spike.
faith: do not fight faith unless you have a death wish
tara: why the fuck would you fight tara??? tara is a cinnamon roll. love her. protect her. don’t fight tara. if you fight tara, i will fight you.
anya: girl was a venegance demon for over a thousand years. do not fight anya.
I want to see Zeus in a tailored suit and shaggy beard, a
walking disparity of the loud, brash, post-graduate frat boy variety who can’t
pass a woman on the street without catcalls, who has more one-night stands than
he could possibly keep in his head, for whom adultery comes as naturally as the
weather he predicts on the Channel 4 News—with startlingly accuracy, and an
endless wealth of charisma.
I want to see Hera walking tall, six-inch heels and not a
wrinkle in her skirt, knowing her boyfriend is cheating, and knowing with equal
certainty that she is better, stronger, fiercer than he will ever be, a wedding
planner with an eye of steel, spotting vulnerability, slicing it open, teaching
every woman who crosses her path to value themselves over any mistake made in
the name of men and love.
I want to see Poseidon in Olympic prime, a gym rat who
skives off class to shatter backstroke records, who spends his summers
lifeguarding at the city pool, who keeps an ever-expanding aquarium in his
bedroom and coaxes all the pretty girls up to visit his fish, his charm as
impressive as the earth-rending temper he generally uses to fuel his competitive
nature.
I want to see Hades, big, hulking, quieter than his brothers
would ever think to be, who dresses in neat dark clothes, and polishes his
boots, and spends more time reading than fighting, who debates eventuality and
ethics, who stoically reminds everyone how enormous, how terrifying, how
inescapable a thing like silentinevitability can be.
I want to see Hermes in a beanie, with watercolor splashes
of tattoo crawling up his arms and holes in his Chucks, a bike messenger with
no helmet, no regard for the rules of the road, all cataclysmic laughter, lock-pick
tricks passed along to every kid who thinks to ask, thumbing through his iPhone
without a care in the world.
I want to see Athena with reading glasses pushed high on her
head, six books in her bag and a switchblade in her back pocket, her clothing
as neatly ordered as her mind is feverish, brilliance and temper clashing and
blending, doing her best to look dignified—even when her brain chemistry
rockets ahead of her well-intentioned plans.
I want to see Apollo splattered with acrylics, board shorts
and Monster headphones and a beautiful classic car, busking on street corners,
not because he has no choice, but because the sunlight catching on a
sticker-patterned acoustic is summer incarnate, because music is blood, because
the act of creation is the ultimate in sublime.
I want to see Artemis in ripped jeans and haphazard topknot,
star of the soccer team, the track team, the archery team, who rides a
motorcycle, and keeps a tribe of girls around her at all times, and does not
care for men, for expectation, for anything but volunteer hours down at the
local animal shelter and falling asleep under the stars.
I want to see Aphrodite in sundress and scarf, homemade
jewelry and lavish amounts of bright red lipstick, who is excellent at public
speaking, at theater auditions, at soothing bruised egos and sparking epic
fights, who kisses as easily as she breathes and scrawls poetry onto bathroom
stalls.
I want to see Ares all but living in the boxing ring, cutoff
shirts and sweats, red-faced under a crew cut as he punches, punches, punches
until the noise in his head dims, a warrior with no war, all crude jokes and
blind fury, totally incapable of understanding what it is to sit, think, plan
before running screaming into the fray.
I want to see Demeter with the best garden you’ve seen in
your life, with a lawn care business she runs out of her garage, a teenage
prodigy grown into a joint-custody single mother, who teaches her carefree
daughter all she knows while scaring off the hopeful neighborhood boys with the
pet python draped across her shoulders.
I want to see Dionysus with a joint in one hand and a bottle
of wine in the other, baggy hoodies and three-week-old jeans, who brews his own
beer in his basement and greets all visitors with a fresh pack of Oreos and
half-stoned theories of the universe, of birth and death and partying mid-week,
because why not, man?
I want to see Hephaestus with a workshop taking up the
majority of his house, whose kitchen is overrun with blowtorches, whose bathrooms
are home to all manner of hodge-podge invention, who walks with a cane and
forgets his laundry for weeks at a time, and strings together the most
beautiful steampunk costumes at any convention at the drop of a hat.
I want to see wood nymphs fighting against climate change,
waving their signs and pushing for scientific progress. I want to see epic
heroes sitting down to Magic: The Gathering tournaments, poker brawls, Call of
Duty all-nighters with beer and snapbacks. I want to see Medusa working a women’s
shelter, want to see Achilles training for deployment, want to see Prometheus
serving endless community service stints for what he calls providing necessary welfare with stolen goods.
Give me modern mythology. I could play for hours in that
sandbox.
A push? It’s a wall. Pushing on a wall won’t do anything.
I’m sure your door will open once you’ve found the right key.
Walls don’t have locks…
Although maybe you should call a locksmith just to make sure everything is, you know, okay.
Nothing you are saying makes any sense. It’s a WALL.
Maybe yours is actually a pull door. And it’s okay, you know, if your door opens the other way. I’m sure you’ll feel better once you admit it to yourself.
Do you not understand what a wall is?
Did your fingers get caught in the door when you were younger? Because you shouldn’t let a trauma like that stop you from opening your door now.
No my fingers did not get caught when I was younger because IT’S A WALL AND NOT A DOOR.
You know, I don’t mind helping you with your door ;)
… I’m just going to go over here now…with my wall… yeah….
my kinda boyfriend person took me to build a bear today for my birthday and he chose a sound to put in it and like he wouldn’t let me know what sound it was and he said I couldn’t listen until we got in the car so I was kinda worried bc I thought it was going to be super vulgar or sappy and gross or whatever but we leave build a bear and I press my bear’s hand and it just makes this super loud velociraptor sound.
I am writing to you because it has gotten just that bad. I have found myself telling too many people about the advice given to me years ago by the late composer Herbert Brun, a German Jew who fled Germany at the age of 15: “be sure that your passport is in order.” It’s not enough to laugh at Donald Trump anymore. The rhetoric about Muslims has gotten so nasty, and is everywhere, on every channel, every newsfeed. It is clearly fueling daily events of targeted violence, vandalism, vigilante harassment, discrimination. I want you to know that it has gotten bad enough that my family and I talk about what to keep on hand if we need to leave quickly, and where we should go, maybe if the election goes the wrong way, or if folks get stirred up enough to be dangerous before the election. When things seem less scary, we talk about a five or a ten year plan to go somewhere where cops don’t carry guns and hate speech isn’t allowed on network television. And if you don’t already know this about me, I want you to know that I was born in this country. I have lived my whole life in this country. I have spent my entire adult life working to help the poor, the disabled and the dispossessed access the legal system in this country. And I want you to know that I am devoutly and proudly Muslim.
I am writing this in response to a non Muslim friend’s question about what she can do. Because there is much that can be done in solidarity:
If you see a Muslim or someone who might be identified as Muslim being harassed, stop, say something, intervene, call for help.
If you ride public transportation, sit next to the hijabi woman and say asalam ‘alaykum (That means ‘peace to you.’). Don’t worry about mispronouncing it; she won’t care. Just say “peace” if you like. She’ll smile; smile back. If you feel like it, start a conversation. If you don’t, sit there and make sure no one harasses her.
If you have a Muslim work colleague, check in. Tell them that the news is horrifying and you want them to know you’re there for them.
If you have neighbors who are Muslim, keep an eye out for them. If you’re walking your kids home from the bus stop, invite their kids to walk with you.
Talk to your kids. They’re picking up on the anti-Muslim message. Make sure they know how you feel and talk to them about what they can do when they see bullying or hear hate speech at school.
Call out hate speech when you hear it—if it incites hatred or violence against a specified group, call it out: in your living room, at work, with friends, in public. It is most important that you do this among folks who may not know a Muslim.
Set up a “learn about Islam” forum at your book club, school, congregation, dinner club. Call your state CAIR organization, interfaith group or local mosque and see if there is someone who has speaking experience and could come and answer questions about Islam and American Muslims for your group. They won’t be offended. They will want the opportunity to do something to dispel the nastiness.
Write Op Eds and articles saying how deplorable the anti-Muslim rhetoric has gotten and voice your support for Muslim Americans in whatever way you can.
Call your state and local representatives, let them know that you are concerned about hate speech against your Muslim friends and neighbors in politics and the media, that it is unacceptable and you want them to call it out whenever they hear it, on your behalf.
Out yourself as someone who won’t stand for Islamophobia, or will stand with Muslims—there is an awful lot of hate filling the airways, and there are an awful lot of people with access to the media and/or authority stirring the pot about Muslims. Please help fill that space with support instead. Post, write, use your profile picture or blog to voice your support.
Ask me anything. Really. Engage the Muslims in your life. Make sure you really feel comfortable standing for and with your Muslim friends, neighbors, coworkers.
I can tell you that in addition to the very real threat to their civil and human rights that Muslims are facing, we are dealing with a tremendous amount of anxiety. While we, many of us, rely on our faith to stay strong, we are human. This is not an easy time. What you do will mean everything to the Muslim Americans around you. Thank you for reading and bless you in your efforts. Share freely.
I have a thought about ‘kill your darlings.’ There seems to be a general notion out there in the ether that the phrase means, ‘Hunt down every sentence or image you really love and cut it down like a pernicious weed.’ That, my dears, is bullshit.
In my opinion, what it really means is, ‘If you’re rewriting a whole scene just so that a paragraph or conversation you’re in love with will work, and it still kind of doesn’t, maybe it doesn’t really belong in this story and you should print it out and put it in a lovely, decorative folder labelled DARLINGS to read on those days when you hate every sentence you’re writing.’
HERE ARE THE STEPS: 1 - TAKE YOUR OLDEST FANDOM you know the one, that first thing you made art or wrote fic for, where you made all those really weird over the top OCs because you didn’t know any better 2 - TAKE YOUR NEWEST FANDOM yeah, that thing that you love and can’t stop thinking about right now 3- SMASH THEM TOGETHER like freakin’ conceptual play-doh 4 - MAKE SOMETHIN’ OUT OF IT make fic! art! a song! whatever!
HERE ARE THE RULES:
1- HAVE FUN WITH IT 2- THERE ARE NO RULES THIS IS CROSSOVER TOWN AND WE’VE STOPPED THE CAR IS GONE YOUR ROOM IS BOOKED AT THE OLD-TIMEY NERD MOTEL IT’S TIME TO DO SOMETHING STUPID
In every generation there is a chosen one. She alone will stand against the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness. She is the Slayer.
Headcanon that the Ravenclaw door allows entry to those who willingly and humbly admit that they do not know the answer or that their answer is wrong, because having an open mind and awareness of the limits of your intellect is proof of wisdom.
Supplementary headcanon that there are a lot of good answers, because the door opens for good reasoning, good arguments, and the way your mind hacks away at the problem, not the actual answer itself.
Tertiary headcanon that the door will no longer open for puns, no matter how clever.
Quaternary headcanon that at least once a year, there’s an unsolveable riddle to force all the Ravenclaws to humble themselves and admit they don’t know everything.
thor is always running into little kids who are thrilled to meet him - he doesn’t really understand the concept of signing autographs, but he starts carrying asgardian toys around in his pockets to give to kids he meets (much to shield’s chagrin - how are we supposed to keep alien tech under control when the god of thunder is giving out magnetic propulsion toys to five-year-olds?)
but one day, he meets this girl who’s nine, maybe ten, and she runs up to him all misty-eyed and immediately asks him if he knows jane foster
and her mother’s embarrassed because “honey, that’s thor, aren’t you excited to see thor?” but the girl just explains that she wants to be a scientist when she grows up, and that jane foster is the astrophysicist (she pronounces the word carefully, as if she’s been practicing) who found out how the rainbow bridge worked - isn’t that so cool? she read about it in kids discover and they watched a documentary in school and dr. foster was in it and it made her think that maybe because she likes planets so much she could be a scientist, too
and thor smiles broadly and tells her that wanting to be a scientist is a noble dream, and he says “if your mother would be willing, i could introduce you”
and that’s how jane foster ends up with a tiny science geek in pigtails trailing around behind her in her lab, asking how everything works. jane can’t really comprehend the fact that a kid would want to meet her, but she likes explaining things and she looks at this girl and can’t help seeing herself. thor is just fucking delighted because to him the idea of jane being a child’s hero makes perfect sense, why wouldn’t it? she’s jane
and years later the girl grows up to be an astrophysicist or an astronaut or an aerospace engineer and she never forgets the time that dr. jane foster knelt down beside her and said, don’t let anybody stop you from chasing the stars, if that’s what you want
jane foster inspiring girls in science, y/y
I’m really glad that one of my most popular posts on this site is one that I’m genuinely happy with
If trees are so rare in the Wasteland that Nux completely doesn’t have a name for one, not even a made up name…
Toast keeps chewing on a toothpick I mean, can we just. It’s made of wood, I presume?
I mean, she’s basically chewing on the wasteland equivalent of gold.
Just.
I mean also: white cloth? In the Wasteland? White???
Miller might as well have dressed them in diamonds.
And by this I mean I want a Transporter AU or maybe a mafia AU and that I see all these family aus, but I never see addressed the fact that these girls come from wealth and they’re returning to wealth.
I was on the bus thinking about Harry Potter tonight and I remembered the part where the Dementors all show up at the Quidditch game, and I remembered how they were all looking up at Harry, and I wondered why they would all be staring at him, and then I realized that it’s because he has two souls in him.
On this note, wouldn’t that also be a reason why Harry would have had a more negative reaction than his friends (even Ginny)? He was hearing his mother’s voice as she was protecting him, which in itself was his worst memory. but the Dementors were also forcing the piece of Voldemort to relive its worst memory as well… The memory of being ripped apart by the curse that backfired. No wonder Harry passed out so often.
I literally never thought about that.
omg…
HOLY
Oh FUCKING HELL, you just made me realize that it wasn’t Harry’s memory that was his father telling Lily to take Harry and run, and it wasn’t Harry’s memory of Lily screaming.
Here I was, just eating a cup of applesauce under the 14-year-long assumption that the reason a small infant was able to remember something was because this was a fictional world of magic, but no, now this entirely reasonable and somewhat less terrifying bubble has burst and I’m never going to recapture that innocence.
“Gun rights groups are going to march with loaded weapons and then stage a fake mass shooting. Got it? Good.
The groups, Come and Take It Texas and DontComply.com, are planning a demonstration at the University of Texas in Austin to protest gun-free zones. “We’ll use fake blood,” said spokesman Matthew Short.
Let me reiterate: Gun rights activists are planning, a mere week after the San Bernardino shooting, to stage a fake mass shooting at a major public university campus to showcase their displeasure with the idea of gun-free zones.”—
im serious about that “stop saving things for special occasions” bit tho like. even if u aren’t in your 20s. thats for everyone. its one of the most useful things ive learned lately
stop! just stop. eat the special snack. drink the expensive hippie tea. use the incense or the bath bomb or whatever you paid way too much for because you were feeling really bad and retail therapy makes u feel alive
when we save things for special occasions/rainy days it contributes to us feeling like A.) our day to day existence is lackluster and B.) you have to be feeling a certain level of Bad, or have to reach a certain level of Socially Accepted Achievement, to enjoy things
just give yourself stuff. there are definitely sometimes reasons to withhold things from yourself - as motivation, if it’s something you consciously want to use sparingly, etc - but at least for me half the time it just turns into self-flagellation and also cool things and cool experiences and nice treats just collect dust while i wait for some fabled day when i convince myself i finally Deserve it
just fuckin give yourself stuff dude. life’s so mindblowingly short
my grandmother died having only used her china like twice in her life. during the year or so before her death, she was starting to package up and give things of hers to her kids, and gave mom the china while sighing “oh i wish i had used the china more!” and mom tried so hard to convince her to just keep it, then, and eat corny dogs off it if she wanted. she insisted she couldn’t possibly, you need a special reason to use the fine china.
when nana died, we used her fine china as our everyday dishes for years. i was 18 when she died, and never really stopped having that in the back of my head.
now, when i hear myself say “i wish i had a reason to wear/do/eat/use X!” i hear nana regretting never really using her china. and let me tell you a thing:
spaghettios taste great when eaten from fine china.
it’s strange how “i want bernie to win but i know he won’t beat hillary” has become a default saying for so many bernie supporters who don’t want to “throw their vote away”
i feel like this is only true because people keep saying it and perpetuating this self-fulfilling prophecy
also if you’re not voting for the person you want to win, you’re still literally throwing your vote away
Dudes the primaries are coming????? If you vote for Bernie at primaries he stands a good fucking chance???? Why give up before the race has even begun?????
In the course of my rewatch-all-5-seasons-of-Leverage binge over the past few months, I’ve realized that my favorite long-running gag is Eliot choosing the wrong thing to get mad about.
Sophie accuses him of sleeping around with waitresses and stewardesses? “FIRST OF ALL, THEY’RE CALLED FLIGHT ATTENDANTS”
Hardison denies stealing Eliot’s sandwich and says “you probably ate it yourself and forgot about it?” “OH, MY SANDWICH IS FORGETTABLE????“ [launches into insanely detailed cooking techniques of what, to be fair, does sound like a bonkers delicious sandwich]
Hardison announces that he’s bought a brewery in Portland where they can hide out slash take cases slash brew their own beer? Everyone else is like “why the eff did we have to move to this new town with no warning” and Eliot is LIVID that Hardison is underestimating how hard food and beer pairings are. “THE BREWPUB MENU IS THE HARDEST KIND OF MENU TO DESIGN!”
I literally never get tired of it. I could watch Christian Kane get offended at implausibly bizarre perceived insults ALL DAY.
You know what though, like, to me what’s glorious about Elliot is that, to me, he’s always choosing the RIGHT thing to get mad about.
1) ignoring the sex shaming because he’s not gonna dignify that with a response but standing up for how the women choose to identify themselves.
2) attacking the most obvious lie because it has been established that Hardison appreciates the Elliot!food (a squeeze of lemon) and how dare Hardison not only lie so obviously but also choose to call into question all of Hardison’s appreciation of what Elliot had made in the past. I mean he might as well have called Elliot himself forgettable, which is a LOW BLOW, especially for a man who recognizes and makes an attempt to remember what makes things distinct.
3) Everyone else is being upset that the team is together (in a new location) but Elliot has already accepted that the team is together. And is going to be in it, for better or worse.
In sickness and in health; and through bad beer and difficult to pair foods.
‘Til his dying day.
(But that doesn’t mean he’d not gonna have old-married-couple fights about the details.)
