maybe people like butterfly vomit sometimes

Angsty Bumbleby commission for @1stlieutenant-riza-hawkeye!

Hello, UK peeps - especially those of you in England. The shitty Government is trying to cut the huge NHS waiting list numbers in England not by improving secondary care resourcing, but by making it harder for patients to get a referral to consultants and other secondary care services. Except in the case of urgent referrals where cancer is suspected, GPs must now write to consultants and other secondary care providers asking for advice and guidance on the patient's care. They have always had the discretion to do this, but now it's mandatory. This means that it's likely a proportion of patients will simply be bounced back to their GPs for their care to be managed in the community, and no further investigation will be undertaken. It undermines the role of GPs as clinicians and will increase their workload at a time when they're already overworked and under-resourced. But perhaps even more worrying is that those people who already find it difficult to access timely and effective medical care - e.g. people from ethnic minority backgrounds, disabled people, women and girls, LGBTQIA+ people, people living in deprived areas - are going to have yet another obstacle put in their way.

i put them on my front door and anytime it opens they ring. that way if i think someone has broken in or i see someone who isn’t there i can think back to if the bells have rung, and if they haven’t i can assure myself it’s not real. obviously it’s not fool proof, like if you are prone to auditory hallucinations, but it has really helped me calm down in time to avoid major psychotic breaks. it’s a real lifesaver

"Now I've shot so many Nazis, Daddy will have to buy me a sable coat." (From his Wikipedia article).

Neil Munro "Bunny" Roger

June 9, 1911-April 27, 1997.

Bunny Roger killed a bunch of Nazis and then invented Capri pants.

He was expelled from Oxford for his indiscrete gayness (discrete gayness being perfectly fine at Oxford and part of the curriculum until...today probably, at least like 1992?). Then, having been sent down to London, he started his own fashion business, and his first client was Vivien Leigh.

Bunny served in WWII, killing fascists in North Africa and Italy, and often wearing a mauve scarf in the field. Roger claimed that he had gone into a battle brandishing a rolled-up copy of VOGUE and commanding: "When in doubt, powder heavily!"

Roger was known in high society for his themed soirées; Diamond, Amethyst, and Flame Balls were held to celebrate his 60th, 70th, and 80th birthdays. He wore a curious plum colored catsuit with a feathered headdress at his 70th birthday ball in 1981. At his 80th, he made his entrance in a catsuit of scarlet sequins with a cape of orange organza, greeting his guests from behind a wall of fire. His parties were covered by the newspapers, including a New Year's Eve Fetish Ball where the proper upper class mixed with young guests in rubber S/M gear.

From an obituary: "Beneath his mauve mannerisms, Bunny was stalwart, frank, dependable and undeceived; to onlookers a passing peacock, to intimates, a life enhancer and exemplary friend."

From another obituary:

And this in-memoriam piece.

1. Potatoes. Best starch and caloric yield per acre of just about any food.

2. Tomatoes. Easy to can or dry, tasty, high in nutrients.

3. Corn, beans, and squash, planted Three Sisters style. All are nutritious, and planted this way the beans put back into the soil the nitrogen the corn uses. If you plant dent or flour corn and dry beans and sun-dry the squash, all store well. 

4. Mint. It’s useful for minor aches and pains in salve, it’s good for upset stomachs, and it’s quite tasty.

5. Hot peppers. Tasty, and also useful for aches and pains.

8. Radishes. Same reason. Regrows in a few weeks. How perfect is that.

9. Strawberries. If the climate is right for it. Easy and jummy. Strawberry plants can live multiple years (though they give less fruit after the first 3 years) and create their own baby-plants in fall. So you can have more strawberry plants every year or give the plants to other zombie-apocalypse survivors.

10. Winter carrots. Your winter will be boring if you only have potatoes. Carrots are a great winter veggie. 

11. Onion and garlic. Because you really can’t cook without them, can you?

Oh, & maybe just as important is what NOT to grow or the apocalypse or just for your first DIY garden:

1. Cauliflower. Difficult. Requires a lot of work, time, space and nutrients and you’re quite likely to end up empty handed.

2. Broccoli. Same reason.

3. Olives. The trees need to be over 5 years old to produce their first olive and many more for a good harvest. That’s not much use for immediate survival.