A Gaggle of Fandoms

[Q: Why did you decide to do this experiment?

A: Snake behavior has been generally neglected as a field of research, especially in Brazil. And most studies don’t examine what factors make them want to bite. If you study malaria, you can research the parasite that causes the disease—but if you don’t study the mosquito that carries it, you will never solve the problem. Up until now, the popular wisdom was that the jararaca would only attack if you touched it or stepped on it. But that was not what we found.

Q: Why did you need to be the victim?

A: The best way to do this research is to put snakes and a human together. In this case, the human was me. We put the snakes inside a ring on the floor of our lab until they got used to it, then I stepped in wearing special protective boots. I stepped close to the snake and also lightly on top of it. I didn’t put my whole weight on my foot, so I did not hurt the snakes. I tested 116 animals and stepped 30 times on every animal, totaling 40,480 steps.]

"After they overheard that ICE was at the courthouse to arrest someone, they improperly accessed court databases to determine who was not born in the United States," a DOJ detention filing says. "They then snuck every suspected illegal alien who was at the courthouse out a back door, where ICE, who was waiting in the parking lot for their target to leave the building, could not see them."

On Monday, from 1:30 PM to 1:37 PM, several residents have volunteered to host a brief tutorial in the laundry room for anyone interested in learning more about proper use of the equipment.

That is a leviathan passing beneath the ice of my peaceful fishing hut if ever I saw one.

The passive-aggressive nature of declaring it will take only seven minutes, but precisely seven minutes, for people to actually learn how to use the laundry room is amazing (I'm figuring five minutes to present and two minutes for questions).

1. Good laundry room etiquette: when you put your laundry in the washer, set a timer for the length of the wash cycle. It's good manners to move your laundry from washer to dryer within 15 minutes of the wash cycle ending. Don't be anxious though. It's not truly rude until you delay more than 30-60 minutes. This depends on how many machines there are -- the fewer machines, the better it is to remove the laundry sooner.

1a. Rather than sort by color, sort by type -- undies and soft shirts in one pot, trousers and heavy shirts in another. Most clothes are colorfast these days so washing the type rather then the color is more important.

2. When putting your laundry in the dryer, check the lint trap. This is a space between the inner area and outer area of the dryer at the bottom of it. Sometimes it's a tray you have to pull out and sometimes it's just a gap that looks like it's covered in felt. If it looks "felt-y", scrape it out with your fingertips and toss the felt. If you're feeling confused, Google "dryer lint trap" and look at photos, this will help.

3. If the lint trap is empty, awesome! When you take your clothes out after they're dry, check the lower front of the dryer and remove any felt or wool you see.

4. Some hot tips: if you can avoid it, don't machine-dry "delicates" (bras, some tank tops, flimsy shirts) or t-shirts that are 100% cotton. It's not that vital, don't get nuts about it, just be aware. Hang dry that stuff on hangers if you can. Don't use fabric softener, it's expensive nonsense. Also don't do the "deep clean" shit you see on tiktok, that's also nonsense.

99% of all laundry can be machine washed and dried these days. Don't freak out if you put something in the drier that shouldn't be. One cycle won't ruin things, most of the time.

The way I explain it to my patients is that our neurons don’t regenerate. They make connections with each other and that’s it. If you don’t use your brain, they make fewer connections and, if one of them dies, you’re gonna miss it, because that was the only one that knew how to do X. Now, if each one of them has many, many connections, you won’t notice the difference when one of them dies. The others pick up the slack.

As of 2024, 45% of dementia risk factors are modifiable. Relevant to this conversation, 5% for less education and 5% for social isolation.

We absolutely are going to see the reflection of this, but it’s gonna take decades and it’ll be too late. So, for the love of your brain, pretend that it’s a muscle and make it work. People complain about “when am I ever gonna use this maths formula in my life?” You’re not. You’re teaching your brain to think logically. Those sinapses will be there for when you need to figure out your week’s schedule. English classes taught me how to interpret data and how to convey it in this text so it’s clear and you understand what I’m saying, not because I needed to justify why the curtain is blue.

Make your brain know how to do different things. Logic games, puzzles, taking care of a garden even if small, planning a church’s event or birthday, learn a new instrument, learn a few words in another language, look at a calendar every day, do some manual labor if possible. Do not, I repeat, do not let your brain get rid of sinapses by letting AI do everything. Your brain uses 20% of your body’s energy — do you really think it’s going to maintain connexions that aren’t in use?

Most cases of Alzheimer’s are sporadic, meaning no family history. Family history of a first-degree relative with Alzheimer’s starting before they were 80yo increases your risk in 2-3x on average.