Just a little Mus

Meanwhile this was what various medical professionals in that reddit thread had to say about it.

"The substances behind the slimy strings from okra and the gel from fenugreek seeds could trap microplastics better than a commonly used synthetic polymer.

Texas researchers proposed in 2022 using these sticky natural polymers to clean up water. Now, they’ve found that okra and/or fenugreek extracts attracted and removed up to 90% of microplastics from ocean water, freshwater, and groundwater.

With funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, Rajani Srinivasan and colleagues at Tarleton State University found that the plant-based polymers from okra, fenugreek, and tamarind stick to microplastics, clumping together and sinking for easy separation from water.

In this next stage of the research, they have optimized the process for okra and fenugreek extracts and tested results in a variety of types of water.

To extract the sticky plant polymers, the team soaked sliced okra pods and blended fenugreek seeds in separate containers of water overnight. Then, researchers removed the dissolved extracts from each solution and dried them into powders.

Analyses published in the American Chemical Society journal showed that the powdered extracts contained polysaccharides, which are natural polymers. Initial tests in pure water spiked with microplastics showed that:

One gram of either powder in a quart (one liter) of water trapped microplastics the most effectively.

Dried okra and fenugreek extracts removed 67% and 93%, respectively, of the plastic in an hour.

A mixture of equal parts okra and fenugreek powder reached maximum removal efficiency (70%) within 30 minutes.

The natural polymers performed significantly better than the synthetic, commercially available polyacrylamide polymer used in wastewater treatment.

Then the researchers tested the plant extracts on real microplastic-polluted water. They collected samples from waterbodies around Texas and brought them to the lab. The plant extract removal efficiency changed depending on the original water source.

Okra worked best in ocean water (80%), fenugreek in groundwater (80-90%), and the 1:1 combination of okra and fenugreek in freshwater (77%).

The researchers hypothesize that the natural polymers had different efficiencies because each water sample had different types, sizes and shapes of microplastics.

Polyacrylamide, which is currently used to remove contaminants during wastewater treatment, has low toxicity, but its precursor acrylamide is considered toxic. Okra and fenugreek extracts could serve as biodegradable and nontoxic alternatives.

“Utilizing these plant-based extracts in water treatment will remove microplastics and other pollutants without introducing additional toxic substances to the treated water,” said Srinivasan in a media release, “thus reducing long-term health risks to the population.”

She had previously studied the use of food-grade plant extracts as non-toxic flocculants to remove textile-based pollutants from wastewater and thought, ‘Why not try microplastics?’"

we are still here, and furious. you are still here, and that matters. you can still do and make and be something important. i promise. stay alive. it matters, and you matter. i know it is easy to succumb to anxiety and exhaustion and defeat.

communities can start with tiny ideas. google "dnd meeting near me" or whatever your interest might be. google "volunteering near me." google "support groups near me." start journalling. start a discord. start a book club.

www.tumblr.com##.B6Xr2 www.tumblr.com##.zytrC._y4kh for the y2k stuff

www.tumblr.com##.TRX6J.CxLjL.qjTo7.IMvK3.q8kZB for the frogs button the rest here all remove things like tumblr live (no more seven day limit!), the suggested stuff that interrupts posts (like the buttons you can click on, etc), and removes the multiple dashboard options at the top so you can have just your dash of people you follow: www.tumblr.com##.KDoiW.rR_oZ www.tumblr.com##.T4ddP www.tumblr.com##.RAEnv www.tumblr.com##.EvhBA.T0bbH www.tumblr.com##.TQmoN www.tumblr.com##.MJvwO.kDCXR www.tumblr.com##.wl0Ka

vs

Riusuke Fukahori creates incredible depth in his artworks by painting a layer at a time onto acrylic resin, until a 3-dimensional image is formed, sort of like how 3D printers work. via awesomer

he l

he literally paints it

in three dimensions

into the basin

he

literally

paints it in three dimensions

he

l iterally

*During House assigning*

Professor McGonnagal: Wednesday Addams.

Wednesday *begins to get up*

Sorting hat: Yeah no, no, sit back down kid. You’re Slytheren. I have never been more sure of anything in my existence.

*Later at Slytheren dorm*

Draco: Well look, if it isn’t Potter’s little Mudblood sister, listen up you little...

Wednesday: *Shoots Malfoy a glare which instantly silences him.* You will listen to me and listen carefully. I do not like repeating myself. Harry is off limits. In fact, everyone in Gryffondor is off limits, that goes for the rest of you. If you cause ANY trouble for my adopted brother, you will answer directly to me. Is this understood?

Draco:...Yes mum.

*Later in potions class*

Snape: Potter, you were two seconds late, twenty points from Gryffondor.

Wednesday: *Picks up beaker and smashes it on the floor.* Professor Snape. I have wilfully destroyed school property. I believe that is a twenty point deduction from Slytheren house.

Snape: Did you? Well I didn’t see it so.

Wednesday: *Gets up, walks to the front of the class, looking Snape in the eye the entire time, smashes another beaker on the ground right in front of him.* Twenty. Points. From Slytheren.

Snape:..... Alright then twenty points from Slytheren.

Wednesday: *Returns to seat, still glaring at Snape*

Snape: Now before we get on with classes I have the results of last weeks pop quiz, fairly expected stuff, Mr. Weasley you did adequate, but your penmanship was atrocious which is...

Wednesday *Grabs another beaker and holds it up with a look on her face that says ‘I can keep this up as long as you can old man’*

Snape:....Something you should work on in the future.

*Later*

Draco: Can’t you just expel her professor?

Snape: Well I could in theory, but considering her muggle father keeps somehow sneaking in here I think whether she has permission to be here or not is rather Academic. Besides, I’m not crossing her after what she did to Umbridge.

Gomez: well that makes him family, we must invite him over.

Harry: but father, everyone says he's trying to kill me.

Gomez: oh, of course, how thoughtless of me. Lurch, put away the swords for guests and sharpen up the good swords we use for special occasions! A relative visiting is one thing, but a murderous relative needs to be celebrated.

Mortitia with man eating plants

Pugsley with explosives

Wednesday just keeps pulling bigger and bigger weapons out of those tiny pockets on her dress. She has a wand but never uses it!

I mean I don’t know that I agree with him entirely on his analysis of Jareth’s villainy, but he is right that Jareth is - on the most basic level - most definitely preying on a teenage girl, and that he has very obvious sexual desire for her. 

However, if we take up the very valid interpretation that the whole adventure is a dream or a fantasy (and moreover her way of working through her feelings about her mother’s death, her father’s remarriage, and her departure from childhood), it’s also clear that Jareth represents a lot of Sarah’s anxiety about sexuality. She has recently gone through puberty. We are also told that she doesn’t date, and where is she on a weekend evening? Playing dress-up/pretend in the park by herself.* 

Then Jareth shows up with his seductive voice and his extremely tight pants and begins making overtures. Moreover, we need to remember the overall context that he was played by David Bowie in 1986, a time when David Bowie’s face was almost definitely plastered over many a teen girl’s bedroom wall. He was, at the time, an absolute beacon of male sexuality for many girls and women. 

Moreover, despite his creepy actions, I would argue that Jareth is still very obviously presented within the female gaze. He is lithe and elegant, he’s royalty, he’s magical, his clothes are tailored to show off his body in an erotic-but-not-too-erotic way, he’s self-controlled up until the point that he throws aside his dignity to beg her for love (Mr Darcy vibes, anyone?), his idea of a hot date is a fairy-tale ball and he even magics her a dress that every young preteen/teen girl dreams of, and on top of that, he’s shown being cute with kids! That is 100% female gaze material right there.

So basically, you have a story of an isolated girl who is clinging to her own childhood in order to maintain a sense of normalcy as her life falls apart, but who is also being faced with the unavoidable changes that come with adolescence - including sexuality. At the start of the film, we are shown that she is threatened by her step-mother assuming the role of her father’s wife and sexual partner. She is saddled with the very proof of that sexuality - her baby step-brother - who she obviously resents, partially because he is the embodiment of her step-mother’s entrance into the family, and perhaps partially because he is a symbol of something that very frequently comes along with adult womanhood (fertility and babies). 

So she fantasises/dreams of a world where everything is confusing, with no clear answers, and life is unfair. In other words, adulthood. She also fantasises/dreams of a man who absolutely drips with a teenage girl’s version of eroticism, but who is also threatening and frightening at the same time - because guess what? Those desires and feelings can be very frightening and confusing when they first show up! And they can feel extremely demanding, too - just like Jareth. 

Anyway, all that said, I disagree with @prokopetz that Jareth symbolises predatory male sexuality, because it is very clear that he was written to simultaneously represent young girls’ desires and anxieties about the unfamiliar world of sex and adulthood. And for young teen girls like myself who watched that movie…yeah, it damn well worked. There’s a reason a lot of us remember that movie fondly, and why it continues to fuel a lot of fantasies today. I would also disagree that he is the villain. He’s an antagonist, surely, but the real villain is Sarah’s own uncertainty and fear.

Of course, obviously, if you want to take a literalist interpretation of the story, then yeah, Jareth is a predatory villain, but I would argue that a literalist interpretation is missing the point of the film entirely. And I’m not surprised that radfems are missing that point by a country mile.

–

He's only 6 to 7 weeks old and nearly 2 pounds.

“Is it that obvious? It was a hell of a time.”

“I feel you, sis. Here, I have something that’ll fix you right up…. I must have just missed you, where did you end up? Not on campus for sure.”

“What? No, there’s never anything going on here. The railway yard is the current hotspot.”

“Oh damn, yeah that makes a lot more sense, I saw the lights from downtown.”

“You did? I’ll have to tone it down next time I guess.”

Yes, it’s true that, amongst themselves, adult housecats generally only vocalise to communicate with kittens, but the particular set of vocalisations that adult cats use to communicate with humans is distinct from, and largely non-overlapping with, the set of vocalisations that they use to communicate with kittens.

Your average adult housecat has anywhere from twenty to fifty distinct vocalisations that are basically only used to communicate with humans.

We’re giving Yucan Tu a little boost of love today!

…………………………………

Sometimes education isn’t enough.  Sometimes you can study and study and try and try, and never quite cross the last bridge between where you are and your heart’s desire.

Sometimes you need to tell the perfect little lie to get there.

Once upon a time there was a small god of goldfinches named Yucan who wanted nothing more in the world than to be a god of toucans, to manifest himself as a big, beautiful, tropical bird that people would stop to ooo and ahh over when they saw it in the trees, something impressive.  It was a good thing to be a god of songbirds.  There weren’t as many of them as there had been before cats became quite so popular as house pets, and the ones remaining needed all the divine intervention they could get their wings on.  He appreciated their attention and their worship, but he wanted, so very badly, to be more than his nature was allowing him to be.

So he hatched, over the course of several slow decades, a plan, and one night, with no warning whatsoever, his faithful woke and found him gone.  He had abandoned his divine duties, flown the coop, left the nest, and no one could find a single feather left behind!  All the little birdies were distraught…but not for very long, as little birdies have short memories, and there were other gods of songbirds around to serve.  If it wasn’t quite the same, well, nothing ever is, not even following the same god from one day to another.  They adjusted.  They adapted.

And far away, a very small god with a very big dream put his plans into action. He donned a false face, he told everyone who met him that he was the god of endangered tropical birds, and if no one had ever seen him before, well, some of those birds were very endangered.  Deforestation and poaching, don’cha know?  So many dangers to evade.  So many fledglings to protect.  So he lied, and lied, and pretended, and did his best to live up to his own lies.  He protected those who came to him, he spread his wings over the nests of species unknown to science, and he tried, and he lied, and he tried.

Until one day, the mask would not come off when he went to go to nest.  One day, he noticed that his wingspan was greater, and he no longer heard the prayers of songbirds, but of the birds he had claimed…and of more than them. Of frightened high school drama students and would-be figure skaters, of novice computer programmers and new-made lawyers.

They had their own lies to tell.

And Yucan Tu would be with them every step along the way, singing goldfinch songs in their ears and spreading his wings to defend them from the risks of their own actions.

He is a god of falsehood, yes, but also of sincerity, and of effort.

…………………………………

Artist Lee Moyer (The Doom That Came to Atlantic City, Starstruck) and author Seanan McGuire (Middlegame, Every Heart a Doorway) have joined forces to bring you icons and stories of the small deities who manage our modern world, from the God of Social Distancing to the God of Finding a Parking Space.

Join in each week on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for a guide to the many tiny divinities:

Tumblr: https://smallgodseries.tumblr.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/smallgodseries

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/smallgodseries/

Case in point, look at all these different things that are dragons:

White unicorns are overrepresented in media, but unicorns can be any color. Winged unicorns are not as popular but are just as qualified. Look at this powerful, oxlike winged unicorn from the Apadana in Iran next to its fellow winged unicorn Twilight Sparkle.

Unicorns do generally seem to be ungulates. Which raises the question: is any one-horned ungulate a unicorn? How about a rhinoceros? Some rhinos have a single horn. The scientific name of the Indian rhinoceros is even Rhinoceros unicornis. Since unicorn literally just means “one horn,” I think a rhinoceros with a single horn is definitely a unicorn, and therefore the extinct elasmotherium is a unicorn.

Qilin (麒麟) may or may not be ungulates but they are often considered unicorns despite being very scaly. And since term “unicorn” does literally just mean “one horn” … why stop there ……. if unicorns can be scaly, huge, and extinct, is centrosaurus a unicorn? I think centrosaurus can be a unicorn if it wants to be a unicorn. It may not have hooves, but some qilin don’t have hooves, either.

Fuck it, you know what? Unicorn.

The trouble is that the Emperor is completely unaware of all of this, and believes the party’s domain to be a grimy, desperately impoverished backwater – a misconception both the party and the populace actively foster as the keystone of an elaborate scheme to weasel out of various feudal obligations they’d otherwise be expected to fulfill.

Or, in plainer terms, it’s a happy shiny romantic fantasy kingdom masquerading as a shitdark low-fantasy hellhole in order to evade taxes.

The campaign’s adventures revolve around coordinating a series of increasingly elaborate measures to maintain the deception, ranging from setting up reverse Potemkin villages for Imperial tax collectors, to concealing the presence of a visiting dragon who doesn’t really understand the need for all the secrecy and keeps unwittingly fucking up the party’s efforts to keep them hidden, to repelling a neighbouring realm’s army without giving away that their defences are much more capable than they have any right to be.

once again, tax evasion appears

Every game designer has their niche. Fantasy tax evasion happens to be one of mine!

ASMR: It is the year 12,000. You have strayed far from your family’s encampment while foraging for nutrients, and you stumble upon a peculiar structure in the wilderness. It is overgrown with strange, stunted plants, and as you approach, a hologram is activated. The ghostly image of an ancient votary of the atomic priesthood appears before you and delivers a pre-recorded message in a language that is at once alien to you, and strangely familiar... you have stumbled across one of the Great Old Ones nuclear waste disposal sites, from before the world moved on...