None of us can do this alone

when I was younger, I got food poisoning. I was supposed to recover from it, but I wound up with a bunch of nasty medical conditions instead. I never imagined I would become disabled from food.

so I am really glad I have been able to help spread the word every now and then about food safety and recalls, since it hopefully means a few less people going through what I have.

while I have your attention, I do not post every recall, even just for the US, so here are a few of the links I use!

recalls.gov/recent.html <- aggregate of official government recall links for the US! food, drugs, products, child safety seats, motor vehicles, and tires! (half the feeds are broken half the time, but hey, it works™! check the FDA enforcement reports for a more complete list of recalls, especially drug recalls!)

recalls for canada <- recalls for canada!

RASFF <- food recalls and safety alerts for the EU!

food safety news <- news about food safety in the US, canada, and around the world!

I was poisoned <- see where people have gotten food poisoning near you, and report your own! (worldwide!)

I’m 33 now, and I still discover a new joke every time I reread it.

*starts thunderously knocking on the doors of heaven*

In the UK, the book of the peerage is called Burke’s Peerage. Burke sounds like berk, which means a silly/annoying person. So Terry took ‘twerp’, another word for a silly or annoying person, and replaced the e with u. 

Trans silvas very simply translated into german would be über den Wald

Trans silvas -> Transsilvanien -> Überwald

The Venturi Effect is a scientific term referring to the acceleration of a liquid through a narrow tube (like a jet).

Selachii is a classification of sharks. (I discovered this when my stepson got really into sharks)

The Malleus Maleficarum is a very real, very nasty and absolutely batshit insane book from late 15th-century Germany, basically laying out the procedure for catching, torturing, and executing witches. Its title translates to The Hammer of Witches. The other titles are Pratchett's inventions.

i HATE self-censorship for a lot of reasons, but being in crisis work makes it even more frustrating. who are you censoring for? like i am being so fr, WHO are you censoring for? have you even thought it through? people who have been raped know that they have been raped. if someone attempts suicide or is grieving someone who did, saying "sewer slide" isn't going to protect them from any of the feelings. a murder victim's family isn't going to feel better bc you said "unalived" instead of murdered. if anything, it's just extremely invalidating and othering. it's saying "what happened to you is so bad that i won't even say the word," which is NOT trauma-informed care. you are not protecting survivors/victims when you self-censor. the ONLY things you protect when you self-censor are the puritanical ideologies that are being encouraged by rich fascists who want your money and obedience

“Ulysses Grant Dietz grew up in Syracuse, New York, where his Leave it to Beaver life was enlivened by his fascination with vampires, from Bela Lugosi to Barnabas Collins. He studied French at Yale (BA, 1977), and was trained to be a museum curator in the University of Delaware’s Winterthur Program in American Material Culture (MA, 1980). A decorative arts curator at the Newark Museum for thirty-seven years before he retired, Ulysses has never stopped writing for the sheer pleasure of it. Aside from books on Victorian furniture, art pottery, studio ceramics, jewelry, and the White House, Ulysses created the character of Desmond Beckwith in 1988 as his personal response to Anne Rice’s landmark novels. Alyson Books released his first novel, Desmond, in 1998. Vampire in Suburbia, the sequel, appeared in 2012. His most recent novel, Cliffhanger, was released by JMS Books in December 2020.

“Ulysses lives in suburban New Jersey with his husband of 45 years. They have two grown children, adopted in 1996.

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

"The Daleks" 10/10 Yep that's them.

"The Dalek Invasion of Earth" 8/10 Just a little marked down because the story isn't about the Invasion per se. That already happened. "The Dalek Occupation of Earth" would be more precise.

"The Chase" 9/10 It is about that but that is also a game show.

"The Daleks' Master Plan" 7/10 They're doing a bunch of stuff in this. The title implies only one plan. Need more clarification.

"Power of the Daleks" 10/10 great double meaning

"The Evil of the Daleks" 7/10 not wrong but also any Dalek story could be called this.

"Day of the Daleks" 5/10 There are at least two different days in play in this story.

"Planet of the Daleks" 3/10 That would be Skaro actually, whereas this takes place on Spiridon

"Death to the Daleks" 6/10 I like the imperative voice here but the story fails to deliver on this intention.

"Genesis of the Daleks" 10/10 That is exactly what happens.

"Destiny of the Daleks" 2/10 bears very little relation to anything going on here. Fundamentally a backward-looking story, and these sleepy ramshackle Daleks don't seem destined for much of anything, frankly.

"Resurrection of the Daleks" 2/10 Really misses the mark. There is a resurrection in this story but it's pretty unambiguously not of the Daleks. "Resurrection of Davros" would be a more accurate title. Or even better "The Resurrection of Davros by the Coward Eric Saward"

"Revelation of the Daleks" 2/10 Once again the verb in the title is fulfilled by Davros, not the Daleks! Sure hope someone got fired for that blunder!

"Remembrance of the Daleks" 4/10 Not much better I'm afraid. It is a nostalgic story so Remembrance is at least vaguely relevant, but it's not really the Daleks either being remembered or doing the remembering.

"Dalek" 10/10. Clean, simple, right on the money. That's a Dalek alright.

"Bad Wolf". 3/10 And we whiff it again. While the phrase "Bad Wolf" is indeed central to the cliffhanger reveal, it's not related to the Daleks, or to anything at all. It's a self-fulfilling tautology. The actual words are irrelevant. Could have been anything.

"The Parting of the Ways" 9/10 now this is more like it. Not only are there multiple partings of ways between multiple characters, every atom in every Dalek parts ways from every other! That's so much parting!

"Doomsday" 6/10 Again points off for vagueness. This could be about anything.

"Daleks in Manhattan" 10/10 There they are!

"Evolution of the Daleks" 8/10 doesn't succeed but that is what they're going for

"The Stolen Earth" 9/10 Yep that happens!

"Journey's End" 4/10 Come on. Literally the only person whose "Journey" Ends is Donna and that of course gets reversed. Vague and inaccurate.

"Victory of the Daleks" 5/10 sure they achieve their stayed goal in this one episode but thats pretty well undermined by the fact that nobody likes these Daleks and they get retconned out of existence within a couple years

"Asylum of the Daleks" 9/10 Straightforward. Only knocking a point off because there doesn't seem to be much mental health care going on here

"Into the Dalek" 10/10 that is what happens!

The Magician's Apprentice 4/10 We're stretching here. Name based on a one-time gag and not related to the Daleks anyway

The Witch's Familiar 6/10 this one is set up better but still isn't about Daleks

"Resolution" 7/10 A New Year's Resolution is made! But it's something the Doctor would have done anyway

"Revolution of the Daleks" 0/10 This is complete nonsense. The Daleks are cops and then the other Daleks come in to be cops to the cop Daleks. Nothing is revolutionary about this. Nothing

"Eve of the Daleks" 9/10 Yeah this one works. It's New Year's Eve and there's Daleks.

Evil of the Daleks: title clearly a reference to the Dalek Factor which is, indeed, the distilled 'evil' of the Daleks. Deserves to be bumped up.

Remembrance of the Daleks: I believe this one is actually using a more archaic sense of the word 'remembrance':

Something which serves to remember; a memento, a memorial, a souvenir, a token; a memorandum or note of something to be remembered.