panda

So we're all gonna let the new Harry Potter show die on the vine, right? No hatewatching. No thinkpieces. No videos about how bad it is. Deprive it of oxygen and let it wither away unremarked-upon and unprofitable; make HBO lose their entire investment and prove to the corporate entertainment sphere that the entire IP is poison. And spend that time doing something that brings you joy instead.

there is no greater joy on this earth than Making Lists, Categorizing, & Sorting

oh do I have the game for you

oh my god, if you are the kind of person who gets sucked into logic puzzles, do not click that link if you have to do anything/go to sleep in the next couple hours

Placing misogyny as an inherent trait of men/masculinity is just another form of "boys will be boys" btw. You cannot ever meaningfully hold misogynists accountable if you treat it as an inherent trait of their identify and not bigotry they are willfully perpetuating.

at some point in your life you will be boiling fruit, water, sugar, and lemon juice in a pot to make a syrup or jam. the instructions will tell you to simmer for a certain amt of time. your timer will go off and you will look at the pot and go, "hm, this doesn't look thick enough. maybe i'll let it go for another 10 minutes." this is the devil speaking. it's only so liquid right now because it is at boiling point. it will thicken when it cools down. learn from the follies of my youth and do not let this happen to you

at some point in your life you will be making a sauce or a stew in which you need to add cornstarch to thicken it. and you will prepare a slurry of starch in cold water and think "this looks like way too little starch to thicken this amount of liquid." this is the devil speaking. cornstarch instantly polymerizes at 95°C and if you add too much it will turn into an impossibly thick goop.

at some point in your life you will be making some sort of cream based dessert that requires gelatin to thicken it. and you will soak some gelatin sheets in water and think "this is too few gelatin sheets for this amount of cream." this is the devil speaking. it will thicken in the fridge and if you add too much you will end up with milk jelly

at some point in your life you will be baking cookies. you will take the sheet out after twelve minutes as the recipe instructs and the cookies will still be glistening and soft. "these don't seem cooked enough," you will think to yourself, "i should place them back into the oven until their edges are nice and golden." this is the devil talking. this is how you get dry, overdone cookies. the cookies will continue to bake on the warm sheet for several more minutes and then harden up after sitting on a rack for a while. trust the process. trust the process.

Cooking is such a leap of faith, even if you've made that exact thing before.

At some point in your life, you will be making the perfect chicken noodle soup and you'll go to add the frozen egg noodles. You will add half the bag and stir and think, "that doesnt look like enough noodles." That's the devil talking because you always forget how much the noodles absorb and the leftover bowls of soup will resemble casserole if you add more noodles. You add more noodles anyway. Fuck the devil.

Similarly good is not stored in the uterus nor the she/her pronouns nor the estrogen.