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In honor of Pride month I want to share this comic I made about growing up queer. We live in a world that tries to cut us down, I am so glad I stayed around long enough to write stories about finding the light. If your looking for more Black, Queer, and Magical storytelling consider backing FLY on kickstarter

on survival

Trigger warning for graphic descriptions of injured and dead wildlife.

When a fireworks display occurs near a wild bird roost, the birds simultaneously explode into the night skies in utter panic, which can lead to huge numbers of deaths, usually because these birds either smash their skulls or break their necks as the result of flying into trees, fences, billboards, houses and other solid objects that they cannot see in the gloom and ensuing chaos.

Many of the startled birds who take flight fly at much higher altitudes and for much longer durations than they’re used to to escape the noise, which is energetically costly and physiologically stressful.

Small birds and bats can be knocked from the air and killed by the sonic shock. In 2010, 40 dead sparrows were discovered dead under a roost in a nature reserve after a local fireworks display. The manager of the reserve witnessed a tawny owl fluttering and convulsing on the ground after a particularly loud explosion. It died shortly after.

In Arkansas in 2010, some 5,000 red-winged blackbirds, European starlings, common grackles and brown-headed cowbirds suffered blunt-force trauma after colliding with cars, trees and buildings, an ornithologist from the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission would tell National Geographic.

In 2008, federal officials showed that seabirds in the northern California town of Gualala abandoned their nests after a fireworks show, leaving their eggs vulnerable to predators.

Each year in Austin, Texas, the Congress Bridge bats can be seen fleeing the fireworks display en masse on weather radar, and emergences from their roost diminish noticeably in the days following the Fourth.

In 2018, the Galapagos banned the sale and use of pyrotechnics. According to the BBC, conservationists said that fireworks caused elevated heart rates, trembling and anxiety in many animals. 

The threat to wildlife doesn’t stop at startling lights and sounds; fireworks also have the potential of starting wildfires, directly affecting wildlife and destroying essential habitat. Litter from firecrackers, bottle rockets and other explosives can be choking hazards for wildlife and may be toxic if ingested.

So what do you do if you want to watch fireworks responsibly? Experts say municipalities are more likely to be aware of these dangers than private consumers. Their best advice is to stick to the shows put on by professionals and local governments, which tend to follow guidelines put forth by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, among others, about animal safety.

The National Audubon Society offers similar guidelines: “Commercial fireworks are concentrated in one location, rather than in several locations at once, which is what often happens in neighborhoods. This allows birds to take off and land again in a ‘safer’ location rather than continuing to flee noises coming at them from all directions.”

⋆˚✿˖° "You don't have to be okay right now. You don't have to be anything right now."

⋆˚✿˖° "When did you last eat. And water doesn't count and neither does coffee."

⋆˚✿˖° "I've got you. You're safe. I've got you."

⋆˚✿˖° "Stop apologizing for needing things. Stop it right now."

⋆˚✿˖° "You called me at 2am and I came. That's not something I did out of obligation. I want you to understand that."

⋆˚✿˖° "Lay down. I'm not asking."

⋆˚✿˖° "You've been holding this alone for how long. How long have you been holding this alone."

⋆˚✿˖° "I'm going to sit right here. You don't have to talk. I'm just going to be here."

⋆˚✿˖° "When did taking care of yourself become something you had to earn."

⋆˚✿˖° ⟢ "You're shaking." - "I'm fine." - "You're shaking and you've been crying and you're not fine and that's okay."

⋆˚✿˖° "I'm not leaving. You can ask me to leave and I still won't. You're stuck with me tonight."

⋆˚✿˖° "Has anyone ever just — taken care of you. Without needing something back." - "..." - "That's what I thought. Come here."

⋆˚✿˖° "You scared me. I need you to know you scared me and I need you to never do that again."

⋆˚✿˖° "I heated up the leftovers. You're going to eat them. We can fight about everything else tomorrow."

⋆˚✿˖° "Stop being brave for one second. Just one second. It's just me."

⋆˚✿˖° "I noticed you weren't okay three weeks ago. I've been trying to figure out how to say something."

⋆˚✿˖° "You don't have to explain it. You don't owe me an explanation. Just tell me what you need."

⋆˚✿˖° "Nobody should have to go through that. I know you did. I'm so sorry you did."

⋆˚✿˖° "Close your eyes. I'll stay until you fall asleep. I'll be here when you wake up."

⋆˚✿˖° "You keep saying you're fine and your hands keep shaking and I need you to pick one."

⋆˚✿˖° "I made your tea the way you like it." - "You remembered." - "I remember everything about you."

⋆˚✿˖° "You were there for me when I had nothing. Did you really think I wasn't going to show up for you."

My nephew is very allergic to eggs, peanuts, tree nuts, and sesame. Last year my sister discovered all hot dogs and hamburger buns now contain sesame. Not "may contain", but listed in the ingredients. This year basically every brand of sliced bread also now contains sesame, making it very difficult to find bread items he can eat.

They're just adding it to their products, so they can just list it as an ingredient and not bother with worrying about cross contamination. And they aren't even bothering with telling anyone. Capitalism is going to kill us all.

"Which brings us back to Kellogg’s. Back in 2016, the company found a way around the added burden and expense of complying with the FSMA: they simply began adding trace amounts of peanut flour to their cracker products. Doing so allowed them to list peanuts as an ingredient of the product, freeing them from having to prevent cross-contact.

With a heavy heart, I come to you all with the news announced by close friends of Cat Frazier that she had passed away on Monday, June 29.

She had been running @animatedtext since 2012, with her impact on the internet SHAPING tumblr. If you have a years long history on this site, you’ve seen her art.

She ran a venue in Oakland called Oakland Secret, a punk venue where I’d vend at regularly as an artist. She made a safe space for queer artists, artists of color, and local furs too. I am forever grateful for her work both in the Bay Area creative scene and online, and am forever changed by the totality of her impact.

I’ll be linking some articles from the 2010’s about her impact online: The Fader | Action | Jezebel | ObviouslySocial

I invite you to take a visit through her archive, and if you have a long history with this site like I do, it’s like walking down memory lane.

The Lion King universe is convoluted and not meant to be thought about that this much. lol

Edge 's strategy is contingent on the universe we have set up. Once you start universe hopping to other lion media, it doesn't click. This is why when people try to do MP alternate universes or human alternate universes, it falls apart. Sorry that we don't find it to be a very compelling thought experiment.

As for your opinions on Scar, it's certainly a wild take and in line with "the trains ran on time" historical revisionism. People have been analyzing this movie for 30 years and have finally arrived to a conclusion on a movie that doesn't exist. Scar was a lazy and ineffective leader. As dictators tend to be. Mufasa teaching Simba the Circle of Life wasn't meant to be this pretentious, empty moment that didn't mean anything. It concerns the very balance of their universe that allows this shared community to survive.

Also, it was never mentioned that a drought just randomly happened. As Nala confirmed, Scar allowed the hyenas to overrun the Pride Lands. They overate and the balance that Mufasa outlined to Simba was disrupted and Scar neither cared nor knew about resource management to handle a huge clan of hyenas vs. the usual deal of a small pride of lions. This also led to prey animals fleeing for better pastures. Scar knew about this, Shenzi was pretty blunt about the situation and he dismissed it as it being the problem of the lionesses. He purely wanted the title of King without the real responsibilities that come with it.

And while it's true that the lionesses are not shown to be visibly starving (presumably because this is a G-rated movie), Sarabi does tell Scar that his refusal to let them leave Pride Rock would be akin to him handing out a death sentence.

#nobody asked but heres Nuta's story: shes the best friend of the fantasy world's Chosen One

#and shes been in love with him since childhood but he doesnt see her that way. anyway he sets off to join some tournament as the underdog

#while Nuta is left in their little village as an apprentice necromancer. in this world necromancy is just a specialised skill

#sure it can be used for evil but mostly its a mundane and regulated profession. like how pharmacists are just Good drug dealers lol

#Anyway Nuta is failing her apprenticeship bc she cant summon humans

#only animals. and thats not very useful when necromancy is a mostly admin profession. their job is to summon dead people to-

#-resolve things like land disputes or last wills or suspicious deaths. sometimes to gain knowledge from a dead professional etc

#but Nuta is INCREDIBLE at summoning animals. not only can she summon multiple spirits at once she can ALSO re-animate their corpses

#which is a very advanced skill. but bc it's only animals her mentor is convinced shes just not applying herself to REAL necro (humans)

#anyway circling back to that tournament: its happening bc prophecy dictates that an immortal evil will descend upon the land

#specifically that the imprisoned demon king will escape his magical underground prison and reign terror on the land

#so the tournament is supposed to identify the prophecised Chosen One who will stop him

#so back to Nuta: one day in the village tremors rack the earth. the sky turns red. her mentor realises that the demon king has escaped

#an enemy kingdom has freed the Demon and now advances to take over the land

#Nuta's village is evacuated but some are ordered to stay for vaeious reasons. Nutas mentor must stay to interview dead soldiers

#about enemy numbers. attack formations. munitions etc. Nuta elects to stay so her mentor wont be alone

#of course the Baddies show up to sack the village and Nuta sees the dreaded Quinnui for the first time

#he revels in the bloodshed. totally unfazed by attempts to harm him. the real commander of the Baddies is a powerful witch who freed Quinnui

#so Q is more like their weapon of mass destruction (more like ass destruction have you seen Quinnui 👀👀)

#Nuta's mentor fights valiantly by reanimating the corpses of dead villagers and soldiers to fight. which is so fucking traumatic for Nuta

#but ofc the mentor is slain. Nuta tries to take up the mantel but no matter how hard she tries she CANT summon humans!!

#Q is under orders to kill all magic users to he sees her and is like 'this one will be easy'

#Nuta flees to the wood but Q chases her down. just as hes about to kill her Nuta feels the power of the animal spirits all around her

#and swarms Q with a fleet of reanimated bears deer squirrels rats and birds

#hes not really injured but he is startled and Nuta escapes. Q is sort of laughing in disbelief bc hes never heard of an animal necromancer

#anyway thats the first act of the story but tumblr tells me im running out of tags

It's also how we know that most dinosaurs had round pupils. It's pretty common for people to depict dinosaurs with slit pupils, probably because of Jurassic Park, mostly because it looks really cool, but nope, they were round. There are very few, if any, birds with slit pupils, which is further evidence for round pupils. And most extant animals with slit pupils are on the small side. Many people think of cats having slit pupils, and they do, but it's the little ones. Lions and tigers have round pupils, because slit pupils are most useful closest to the ground and they actually sacrifice some of their visually acuity for the sake of being better at judging distances in low-light conditions, and most animals with them are ambush predators that jump out at their prey. You ever seen a video where someone throws or bounces a ball towards a cat and it bops them on the head and they seem surprised? That's why; they struggle to track where the ball is going, especially horizontally. So for anything over a certain size, slit pupils are a detriment, especially if they chase down prey.

── .✦ The doctor said she was lucky. She has not yet found a way to explain to the doctor what that word does to her now. What it costs her every time someone says it. Lucky. Like surviving was something she did to someone.

── .✦ He goes over it. Every night, every version, every small decision that split into this outcome and not another. If he'd been thirty seconds faster. If he'd said something different. If he'd just—the math never changes...

── .✦ "You made it," they keep telling her, like that's the part she's struggling with. She knows she made it. She was there. She made it and he didn't and nobody seems to understand that those two facts live in her like something at war.

── .✦ She laughs at something on TV and for three full seconds everything is normal. And then it crashes back in. The guilt of the three seconds, the guilt of the laughing, the guilt of still being someone who can laugh, and she's back under again.

── .✦ He visits the grave more than he probably should. Stands there and doesn't say anything most times. Sometimes he says it should've been me and means it completely and waits for something to argue back. But nothing does.

── .✦ "You need to stop blaming yourself," they say, and she nods, and she means to, and then she's alone again and the blame is right there where she left it, patient as anything, waiting.

── .✦ "I should've been there," he said, for the hundredth time, and she finally looked at him and said, "And then what? Then I'd be standing here saying it about you?" He didn't have an answer. He's still looking for one.

── .✦ She is so tired of being the one who made it. She is so tired of carrying the weight of a life that sometimes feels like it belongs to someone else.

── .✦ He built a whole future out of guilt. Every good thing he does now he does with her name underneath it, like a foundation, like a debt he'll never finish paying off. He doesn't know if that's honoring her or punishing himself. Maybe both. Maybe that's the same thing now.

── .✦ "Do you ever think about why you?" her therapist asks. Every day, she doesn't say. Every single day I think about why me and I never come up with an answer that doesn't make me want to disappear.

── .✦ The hardest day wasn't the funeral. The hardest day was six months later when she woke up and for one terrible, beautiful, unforgivable second--she'd forgotten.

── .✦ He's good at it now. Surviving. He's built a whole life around the skill of it. Some nights he hates himself for how good he's gotten.

I'm fascinated by how the animators for TADC handle Caine's impossible anatomy so well. There's so much to balance and they've somehow engineered a solution for his expressions to hold during speech.