header by hanaxsongs

it reminds me of reading The Decameron in college, even though The Decameron was set more or less in what was modern day for its time (unlike The Three Musketeers which is more a historical action/adventure novel). because like the stories are told within a narrative frame of these young nobles fleeing the Black Plague together, but gasp! the nobles are young men and women traveling together with no chaperon!

so there's a whole author's note from Giovanni Boccaccio explaining that you must understand, morals were loosened because everyone was more worried about dying from the plague than what the young people were doing! he's not condoning this sort of behavior! it's just that sometimes this happened because of the plague and should not be taken as a commentary on his own views!

...which sadly makes me think of how authors today are assumed to be condoning morally questionable things that happen in their books unless they pause the whole narrative to say to the reader, "I don't condone this, though"

but the POINT is

I don't actually know what my point is, I just find it very funny. maybe precisely because it's sadly relatable lol

I think what it is is that Boccaccio wrote a whole author's note, whereas Dumas keeps throwing it into the narrative but like SO briefly. it almost feels like an editor was like "alexandre please, I enjoy what you're doing here but you KNOW readers are not going to think your heroes are so heroic when they're constantly making love to married women! please, you must address this!" so Dumas would just throw in half a sentence like "remember, this was totally fine according to the morals of the time. anyway,"

I'm on chapter 14 of "Dreams of the Raven" and I'm loving it...

Over fifty years of data show a peak in PFAS (also known as "forever chemicals") content in seabird eggs in the 90s, followed by a decrease as regulations went into effect. The most recent findings show a 70% decrease of most common PFAS.

We are making genuine progress! Producers are dramatically altering how much they use PFAS and how much gets released in effluent, but also there's a lot better understanding of how to remove PFAS from the environment!

when i asked whether their autistic classmate's meltdown was dangerous or merely uncomfortable, they said, "i felt like i was in danger!"

yes you should, actually. that's life. upsetting things happen. no one should have to experience any discomfort. but we do. we get stung by bees and sunburns and headaches. we live in bodies in the world.

autistic people are human beings who have the right to exist in society, including during meltdowns. having one class of your entire semester interrupted by a singular meltdown is not anymore of an infringement upon your entitlement to education than having your class interrupted by a fire alarm or cancelled for a snow storm.

one of my peers once experienced a cardiac event 10 minutes into class. it was terrifying. it was desperately upsetting. i was contacted by the school and offered counseling because i happened to be the one who managed the situation until paramedics arrived. everyone was worried about my classmate first and foremost, and then about me. no one blamed anyone, and certainly when my classmate happily recovered and returned to school, no one thought they should be removed from the program.

The crystal maiden was found in a cave in Belize, it's completely covered in Calcite crystals. She's 1,000 years old.

What we know is we have found a cache of complaint tablets about him selling low quality copper as high quality, in a site that was probably his own residence. We know multiple people complained he was a cheat. It's entirely possible they were right. It's also entirely possible that he kept these complaint letters as records of people he would no longer do business with, because they had made accusations and threats in order to bully him into giving them free copper. That is an equally valid interpretation of the evidence.

soliloquy by an immortal cave painter.

So one year for charity different pro athletes get asked to participate in a live game based on one of those “how well do you know your partner” games but instead it’s “how well do you know your rival” and participating means you get to raise money for a charity of your choice and obviously Shane and Ilya want to promote the Irina Project so they agree and go up against other current famous rivals from other sports

And Shane and Ilya discuss ahead of time that obviously they’ll have to just play things off as they usually do, light hearted chirps back and forth and what not, “winning” is just for the show and won’t impact how much money gets made for their charity so it doesn’t matter. Except then they get there and become overtaken by the need to Win and Be the Best and they are the best. So without needing to discuss changing the plan, as soon as the questions start they lock in and decide that actually they have to demolish everyone else

The other rivals are laughing and making jokes at the questions but Shane and Ilya are deadly serious and the host starts to get a little weirded out by the fact that they actually know the answers and aren’t just saying things like “how many goals last season? Probably one less than me haha” and actually have each others stats memorized

Because the audience is loving it they go to a lightning round that’s just Shane and Ilya and it’s now the usual couple game questions and they’re still getting them right because they can make excuses for knowing later, right now is about Winning

“What is Shane’s favorite breakfast?”

“Kale protein shake with a scoop of peanut butter and a handful of blueberries.”

“Ok um, what is Ilya’s favorite breakfast?”

“Two sausage egg McMuffins with an extra slice of cheese and hashbrowns.”

“What is something on Shane’s bucket list?”

“Sleeping in one of those see through igloos under the northern lights.”

“What is something on Ilya’s bucket list?”

“That thing where you feed giraffes at a zoo.”

“Ok last one. I think we all know Shane’s answer is former paramour Rose Landry, but who do you think is the most famous person Rozanov has ever slept with is?”

*through teeth gritted so tight he is in danger of chipping one* “Probably a model. Or something.”

“… Yeah, let’s go with that.”