life without happyness

And now since I officially have permission to use this photo

“That’s devil worship.”

Many sexual decisions are made out of pressure or a desire to please one's partner. Be aware of your partner's comfort zones, and that they might not feel comfortable speaking up.

but not for “the day after tomorrow”

Overmorrow = the day after tomorrow

Ereyesterday = the day before yesterday

Rhotacism (n): excessive use of the letter “R”

Lingible (adj): meant to be licked

Whipjack (n): a beggar, specifically one who is pretending to have been shipwrecked

Yerd (v): to beat with an object with a stick

Roddikin (n): the fourth stomach of a cow or a deer

Balbriggan (n): a type of fine cotton, most often used in underwear

and my personal favorite

Emma Gonzalez

Malala Yousafzai

Ruby Bridges

Greta Thunberg

Mari Copeny

Autumn Peltier

Afreen Khan

Sophie Cruz

Charlottesville Black Students Union

Naomi Wadler

DAPL protestors (names not found)

The things they like are always scorned (see: boy bands, twilight) until men decide they like them too (see: Star Trek, My Little Pony). Teenage girls get catcalled more than adult women. In many countries, young girls have fewer rights than young boys or realize that as they grow, their rights will not be equal to men’s rights. Teenage girls, typically the most intuned to social structures can hear the shifting language of change to good or bad. (See: Jewish women urging their husbands to leave Germany at the beginning of Hitlers reign because they could sense the turning tides.)

Why is it that every werewolf book is this weird testosterone fueled alpha male/female romance thing? 

Like guys. Werewolves are family groups. They are basically big ol’ dog families. Your werewolf family wouldn’t be made up of alpha males fighting each other for dominance and subjugating females. 

While the notion of the “alpha wolf” is indeed misguided, being based on observations of wolves in captivity, the dominance thing does happen. And it’s not just the adult males; adult females do it too - but it’s only a thing when wolves who aren’t related by blood end up sharing a habitat.

So consider: by some happenstance, two unrelated werewolf families end up living across the street from one another. Of course they’re not going to start brawling in the streets - they’re civilised people, after all - but that urge to show the other pack who’s boss comes out in other ways, resulting in the two clans getting, like, weirdly competitive about everything.

“Spiked silver chains on the night of the blood moon?”

“The spring bake sale, Helen. Turn it down a notch.”

“Fine. But when they taste my lemon squares you’re going to wish we’d gone with the silver chains, Jessi.”

Meanwhile, across the room.

“You know what I like doin’ Rob?”

“What’s that Bill?”

“Peeing out of doors.”

“Me too, Bill. But I thought you just married into the whole werewolf thing.”

“Oh, hi Helen. Putting up the Christmas decorations, I see?”

“Yep, this light show’ll make this our best Christmas display yet.”

“Oh great! You know the Johnsons have got lifesize singing reindeer as part of their display.”

It started as “I can’t believe Disney made a movie where Merlin tries to get a squirrel to take Arthur’s virginity” and slowly became “I can’t believe Disney’s weird bestiality subplot actually solves the two biggest problems that cause Camelot’s downfall.”

I know it’s a minor point, but I still love the notion that people are still finding ways to rewrite the story so Arthur can f*@# the squirrel.

I don’t know how she does it. I don’t know how she reads my intent so clearly.

When I walk to the kitchen to get a popsicle or thaw a slice of banana bread or warm up some mango slices, she doesn’t care. She stays on her chair and waits patiently.

But when I walk to the kitchen to scoop myself a bowl of ice cream, she’s at my heels SHRIEKING by the time I turn on the light. She knows. She’s not smelling it, she’s not hearing me say ‘ice cream’, she’s not accustomed to some predictable pattern because I rarely eat ice cream.

I got up to make myself a cup of tea, thought Tea Thoughts, and then at the last moment I filled my tea cup with ice cream instead of tea.

My cat didn’t even notice. She didn’t smell it, or pester me while I was eating, or come running and yodeling her need when I opened the freezer.

…But it only wants ice cream.

Peter: we didn’t want it to crush any buildings so we brought it out here!

expensive enough to give people a reason to buy & sell used

only used once per person = great mileage, no reason to keep it around

high quality, low wear & tear

plenty of time to shop around & compare prices

sounds a lot like the textbook industry, right? But people reselling products means lower profit for the manufacturers. The same way textbook publishers try to force students into paying top price for ‘updated’ versions, the wedding industry has built a whole culture emotionally manipulating training people from a young age not to consider buying pre-owned wedding dress, despite the obvious benefits. This is a fairly new custom (wonder why)–until relatively recently western brides simply wore whatever was their best dress, which would go on to be used for other occasions. 

We’re also encouraged to attach very personal sentimental value to these super-expensive-items-we-only-get-to-use-once, and to feel obligated to preserve them. My mom didn’t even like her wedding dress. It was the only one in their budget at the time, she was pretty bummed. But she kept it for 30 years anyway, until eventually she decided to take back the closet space.

Look, your wedding day is gonna be pretty damn special, bc it’s your wedding. Remove the idea that the objects from that day have to be preserved in the back of the closet. Take lots of pictures–they age better anyway. I promise you’ll spend a lot more time pouring over those photos than digging out a dress you don’t plan to wear.