dollar tree dinners on tiktok

youtube

facebook

This year, even more than other years, the Seattle Mariners didn't have to do this. The Seattle Mariners wanted to do this.

This one is for you.

Where I live 108°F with 80% humidity with no wind is normal.

Pacific North West is dealing historic best waves 35-40°C or 95-105°F.

First of all. Don't make fun of them for bitching about the heat. Just like Texas isn't built for a freeze and our pipes burst, Pacific North West isn't built for heat and a lot of their homes don't have AC.

If you live somewhere with a high humidity like 80+ HUMIDITY IS NOT YOUR FRIEND. The "humidity makes it feel cooler" is a lie once it gets beyond a point.

If you live somewhere with a lower humidity, misters are nice to cool off outside.

Once you get over 90°F (32°C) a fan will not help you. It's just pushing around hot air. (I mean if you can't afford a small AC unit because they're expensive as hell, by all means a fan is better than nothing).

If you have pets, those portable AC units aren't safe. If your pets destroy the outtake thing, it'll leak CO2. Window units are safer.

Window AC units will let mosquitoes or other small bugs in. Sucks, but that's life.

Now is not the time to me modest. If you have to cover for religious reasons, by all means. If you don't, I've seen people wear short shorts and a swim top. It's not trashy if it keeps you from getting heat stroke.

If you do have to cover up for religious reasons, look for elephant pants or something similar. They're made with a breathable material.

Shade is better than no shade, but that shit it just diet sun after some point. Don't think shade will save you from heat stroke.

I know the "drink your water" is a fun meme now, but if you're sweating excessively you need electrolytes. Drink Gatorade, Powerade, or Pedialite PLEASE. I don't care if you're fucking sitting in one spot all day. That shit WILL save you from heat stroke.

Most importantly. RESEARCH THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HEAT STROKE AND HEAT EXHAUSTION PLEASE!

If you're diabetic and can't drink Gatorade, mix water, fruit juice, and either lite salt or pink salt

If you can afford it, cover windows with thick curtains to insulate the house

If you have tile floors, lay on them with skin to tile contact. If you don't, laying your head on cool counters works too.

If the temperature where you're at is hotter than your body temperature, don't wear heat wicking clothing. Moisture wicking is safe though.

Check your medication labels. Many make you more susceptible to sun and heat

-Room temperature water will get into your body faster. This is something I learned doing marching band in high summer in Georgia, and it saved all of our asses. Sip it, don't gulp it, especially if you're getting into the red; same goes for whatever fluid you're drinking. And just in general drink during the day.

-If you are moving from an air conditioned space to an un-air conditioned space, if at all possible try to make the shift gradual. When my dad and I were working outside and in un-ac houses a few years ago, he'd turn the air down to low in the truck about ten-fifteen minutes before we got where we were going. This way your body doesn't go from low low temps to high temps. S'bad for you.

-If you can, keep your lights off during the day. Light bulbs may not generate a lot of heat, but the difference is noticeable when it gets hot enough. I literally only turn my bedroom light on in the evening when it gets too dark.

Don't be afraid to just like... pour water on yourself if you need to. The evaporation will cool you off.

Put your hand to the cement for 15 seconds. If you can't handle the heat, it'll burn your dog's paws. Don't let them walk on it.

Dogs with flat faces are more prone to heat stroke. Don't leave them out unsupervised.

Frozen fruit is delicious in water.

Wet/Cold hat/handkerchief on your head/neck will help you stay cool.

Pickle juice is great for electrolytes! You can even make pickle juice Popsicles!

Heat exhaustion is more, "drink water and get you cooled off." Heat stroke is more "Oh my god call 911."

Image Description provided by @loveize

[Image description: an infographic showing the difference between heat exhaustion and heat stroke. The graphic is labeled "Heat Dangers: First Warning." Signs of heat exhaustion: faint or dizzy, excessive sweating, cool, pale, clammy skin, rapid, weak pulse, muscle cramps. If you think you or someone else may be experiencing heat exhaustion, get to a cool, air-conditioned place, drink water if conscious, and take a cool shower or use cold compress. Signs of heat stroke: throbbing headache, no sweating, red, hot, dry skin, rapid, strong pulse, may lose consciousness. If you think you or someone else may be experiencing heat stroke, call 911. End description]

Be safe.

I would also like to add that beyond a certain temperature, cold water can genuinely be dangerous as a shock to your system. Roofers especially are often BARRED from drinking cold water, because going from nearly 40°C heat and then drinking something ice-cold can CAUSE ACTUAL SEIZURES.

Your best bet is lukewarm or slightly cool water, combined with wrapping an ice pack in some cloth and putting it on the back of your neck or tucking it into your belt.

And for the love of god if you have to go outside, wear BIG FLOPPY UGLY HATS as well as sunscreen. (Good Sunscreen. 60SPF minimum.) Sunburns retain heat and are Fucking Miserable on top of giving you cancer. Bad ones dry out your skin and can cause infections when you’re still sweating a lot and it gets into blisters.

Heat Stress is cumulative. If you are out trying to do the same thing Monday to Friday, something that you could manage on Monday is probably going to knock you flat on your ass on Friday if you don’t pace yourself.

I'm at a Guide Dog center here in Australia. This is a legend, a tactile and Braille map of the bathroom, right outside the door.

We zoom back out while she continues, with large hand gestures,

Do you want to know what the hardest part of my day is, as a blind person? 'Cause it's probably not what you expect. It's not the fact that I can't drive, though it's not ideal. It is the fact that public bathrooms are all designed differently. Do you know how stressful it is, when I have to pee in public on my own? My boyfriend leaves me at the door of the women's room, and I have to walk into the great unknown. Is there going to be a line? Where in line am I supposed to stand? When I find the toilet - well, first off, when I'm with my guide dog I need the accessible stall, so I have to feel my way to the big stall. Then, when I get there, hopefully it's open. If not, I stand. I wait. I get in. I have to find where is the toilet paper? Where is the toilet? I have to hope to God it's clean 'cause I can't see it. Then I have to find the flusher - is it a pull, is it automatic - who knows? Then I have to find my way to the sinks. Where is the soap? Where is the dryer?

She turns back to tap excitedly on the sign.

Hello! We have found the solution.

She starts telling us what the sign says as her fingers skim over it.

So, up here it says 'female and ambulatory toilet map', and then it tells me 'A-T' means it's the 'ambulatory', which means it's the larger accessible stall. 'T' means 'toilet'. Um, down here we have, like, 'D' means 'dryer'.

She moves down to the map, showing us the location of the three stalls along the back wall.

So then I go here, and I know that this stall would be the one that my guide dog and I would use - 'cause it's the 'A-T', the bigger stall. Next to it, the two ones to the right are both normal sized toilets.

She goes back to the top left corner of the map to follow the left wall towards the front of the room. Halfway, she gets to,

Down here we have 'D', so this means it's the dryer for drying my hands.

She continues down, and at the front of the room takes turns tapping two squares for 'B', and one between them for 'S'.

We have 'S' and 'B', which means I now know: if I'm at the sinks, the soap is in between the two basins.

We zoom back out, but then she remembers something, so we go back to look at the opening at the bottom right of the map.

I want this! ... Ooh! And I know, look, here I walk in the door, so I immediately orient myself: toilets are right in front, I would go far left. Right next to the door is gonna be my sinks.

We zoom back out so she can finish,

Like, this, this is a game changer! This is a game changer. I want these everywhere. This is my plea. My next campaign. How to make toileting more accessible to everyone.

in aotearoa, june isn’t our pride, it’s theirs. martha p johnson and sylvia rivera are their historical figures, not ours. the phrase that “you owe your rights to Black trans women” is true there, but here we owe our rights to (mostly) Māori historical figures. i have the freedoms i do because of the legacy of an entirely different set of people operating in an entirely different context at entirely different times.

But because of american cultural imperialism, most queer people in Aotearoa don’t even know our own queer history. Carmen Rupe, Ngahuia Te Awekotuku, the Dorian Society, Gillian Laundon, Georgina Beyer, and the Wolfenden Association are some of our queer history. We should know their names! we should know what they did for us! but because of the power of the american imperial machine, we don’t.

our national pride month should be july, the month that the Homosexual Law Reform Act passed in 1989. our two largest cities hold their pride festivals in february and march, respectively. american queer history has very little (or nothing, depending on who you ask) to do with our queer history. anecdotally, from my own queries, queer youth in aotearoa know more about american queer history than our own.

if you’re in so called Australia go look up the experiences and stories of brotherboys and sistergirls (and those terms if you haven’t heard them to start).

“Kunghah: Sistergirls and brotherboys unite to strengthen spirits” (Article from 2016 by the ABC. Contains photos of Aboriginal people and I don’t know if any have since died.)

Video interview of brotherboys Kai (18) and Dean (50) (2014)

if I were to share only one specific story I’d like it to be of Dr George Duncan, who’s hate crime murder in 1972 lead to South Australia being the first state to decriminalise homosexuality.

(content warning for both articles of homophobic language, violence, hate crime and murders.)

SBS article on Dr Duncan

some highlights:

(on A Complete Unknown:)