Fangirling the day away

Im not sure whether I will have to go through one (its a weird situation) but the prospect is giving me immense dread and it would be my first. No clue how to prepare myself :(

Some breakups you'll shrug off, some will always ache, less and less with time but never zero. The worst ones are breakups with friends. Pride is a worse teacher than humility. Sometimes deep love and affection can wind up becoming really bitter enmity and it'll be confusing how the same person could mean opposite things to you at different times in your life. Falling in love and wanting to spend the rest of your life with someone changes you forever. It changes you even more if they leave you, and even more if it happens to you more than once. But change can't be avoided and you can't control other people. Some of your mistakes will be forgiven, but some never will be and you'll have to live with being the villain in someone else's story. Sometimes you won't make any mistakes but things still won't work out, and you'll have to live with the unfairness of that too. Making the same mistakes again and again and learning slowly to be better is part of being a person. Everyone else is trying their best, just like you. But the absolute best breakup advice I ever got was this:

Here it is again. You might want to save it just in case an accident like that happens again

The Ottolenghi - it is vital that you use 1g of this very expensive ingredient. It comes from a 500g bag with a one-week shelf life.

The time machine - 15-minute recipe! First, leave to marinate overnight...

The dishwasher - one-pot recipe! Now decant your ingredients and wipe out your pot. And again. And again. And again.

The optimist - cook the onions until caramelised (2 minutes).

The kindergarten teacher - get one nommable little tree of broccoli and bosh that into boiling water. Delish!

The brand names only - ingredients: Ritz crackers, Philadelphia cheese, Cool Whip, orange Jell-o...

The 1950s palate - use one (1) clove of garlic and a small pinch of chili flakes (omit if preferred).

"That is queerphobia. That is bigotry. No matter how well-informed or well-intentioned it might have been. And so, I do damn them for that. I don't really care what their intentions were. I still don't. I care about my freedom and the freedom of people like me.

"Let God judge them on their intentions and the contents of their hearts. I judge them on the contents of the coroner's reports."

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.

Cool, so you want natural fiber costumes with no/nuanced corset slander, people wearing colors, historical hairstyles, people wearing hats or headcoverings and long sleeves outside during the day, no potatoes or pumpkins in pre-columbian Europe, actors with textured skin and wrinkles, minimal makeup, consulting HEMA groups and weapons scholars for all the weapons and fight scenes, a good soundtrack that includes traditional instruments?

The only other thing is that not all USB-C cables are created equally. The form factor is standardized, the insides are not, some shitty, cheap, cables are only rated for data not power, or for low power needs. You can search for charging cable to make sure you get one intended for power transfer.

my mom is in fact aware that dandelions exist. she temporarily forgot the name and there was some miscommunication.

the truth is actually weirder

she’s aware dandelions look like this

she is familiar with this flower. she knows the name of this flower. she declines to believe, however, that these are also dandelions

she does not believe these are the same plant. I tried to explain, and she thought I was either misinformed or lying. so I asked her what exactly did she think the yellow ones were called?

gosh I enjoy this website