"Random Passion"

So when you block someone using the "block" button, they're only prevented from seeing your main blog. They could still hypothetically see things you post from a side blog.

If you want to stop them from engaging with your sideblog you have to block them from that sideblog as well.

This is easily done if you scroll Tumblr with a computer, but unfortunately it can't be done on the mobile app.

However, if you don't have access to a computer, it can still be done on mobile!

Open up your phone's browser (Safari, Firefox, Chrome, etc) and navigate to http://www.tumblr.com

If the browser asks if you want to open the link in the app, say "no."

Further instructions under the cut, with screen shots!

In 2021, Swarovski (the company that makes the very sparkly crystals you see in certain jewelry, on figure-skaters' twinkliest outfits, on red carpet dresses), decided they didn't want the grubby fingers of small-time jewelers, clothing designers and costumers and crafters on their shiny beads and rhinestones anymore. They decided to limit their sales to "luxury" and couture creators, not girls who sell stuff on Etsy. The tenor of their press release on the subject was snide and insulting. Resellers (like your favorite bead shop) would no longer be allowed to carry their product; the average Jane on the street would not be able to purchase them. You could only get them if you had an authorized business agreement that bound you to very strict brand behavior. And those of us who still had good stock of the crystals would no longer be "permitted" to use the brand's name in our listings for sale.

Every bead shop and craft supply place and many, many small clothing makers--wedding shops, prom and dancing dress suppliers, the sort of salt of the Earth mom and pop time machines of shops that are the backbone of the field--scrambled to find something that could replace them. The last of the stock dwindled quickly, all of us grabbing what we could get while there was any chance of it, and then it was gone and we no longer had any access.

I was Big Pissed about it at the time. It was just so goddamn stuck-up, when wholesalers and indie jewelers had made them so much money, when some people I knew--when *I!*--had been brand-loyal for decades. But with no recourse, everyone pivoted fairly quickly, most of us to Preciosa Crystals. Those are Czech, quite sparkly, and considerably less expensive than Swarovski. The faceting method they use is different, but not worse; any differences are hardly noticeable when you're seeing them as a hundred pinpoints of light.

Well, out of nowhere, Swarovski just dropped this: https://www.harmanbeads.com/swarovski-brand-policy-update

"Effective June 1, 2026, Swarovski updated the distribution and brand usage policies introduced in 2021. Businesses may now purchase Swarovski Crystals without signing a Brand Control Agreement, and Authorized Distribution Partners may once again sell Swarovski Crystals to resellers, including bead stores and online retailers. Businesses may also use the Swarovski brand name when following Swarovski’s Proper Use Guidelines. Designers, manufacturers, artists, brands, retailers, and resellers are now eligible to purchase Swarovski Crystals through authorized distribution channels."

They want us back. A lot of the companies who could have kept a brand relationship with them also have swapped to Preciosa, over the last half-decade, in solidarity with indie creators and out of a sour awareness that it could be them, next. And it doesn't hurt that Preciosa was able to expand their line quite a bit now that everyone who wanted sparkle had no choice but to go to them.

And I'm not seeing nearly anyone who intends to return. The feeling is, "Y'all told us to fuck off! Off we fucked! And now, that's what you can do, too!" I'm seeing a lot of "How many of us did you stab in the back?" comments from the people whose money they're hoping to attract.

It's rude. You're making someone take their time to read something you couldn't bother to write. You're telling them they were so unimportant you couldn't be bothered to actually take the time to say something yourself. And frankly, you're lying about it while you're at it.

it's not a hot take to say that the mass amnesia about fiberwork is linked to the belittlement of women's work in geneal, but i do think there's a special kind of illusion that is cast by "cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the children." you hear that and think "well i cook and clean and take care of children (or i know someone who does) and i have a sense of how much work that is" and you know of course that cooking and cleaning were more laborious before modern technology, but still, you have a ballpark estimate you think, when in fact you are drastically underestimating the work load.

For one, basic cleaning (as OP also pointed out) was a tedious, unending, unautomated task. You had no running water for a lot of that time, so you had to physically gather water, heat it up over a fire (or coal oven), and add the world's harshest lye soap to do something as basic as washing dishes or mopping. If the water was cold, the soap often didn't foam well. But there were other tasks.

Brewing beer and wine (required, because water was often unsafe to drink, so even kids drank watered-down wine and beer), making the harsh lye soap, dipping candles, weaving baskets, making unguents and other home healthcare remedies (because that was all most of them had), and if course, textiles - mending clothing, sewing clothing, crocheting, knitting, weaving, spinning, washing wool or other textile materials prior to making them into thread.

If it was a farm, they (daily) helped with the livestock and crops. Come harvest time, or butchering time, everyone on the farm, from kids to elders, pitched in however could.

Women often had to do the final processing of the raw materials of the farm, as well, aside from large cuts of meat. Leather-tanning, wool-washing, grain sifting, food-canning/preserving, sinew-drying (sinews are used to this day for binding things into place, fiber content, and leather-working), hoof-rendering (or preserving, if they were being sold to glue makers), etc.

Often, multiple families worked a farm, and most families were multigenerational. So grandma(s) would watch the children that were too young to help, while knitting or crocheting. Grandpa(s) would whittle bone and wood into useful things - knife handles, chair braces, etc. So the mothers could all do the things mentioned above, but often one would specialize in soap, another in weaving, another in spinning, etc. So they did have the luxury, often, of simply trading amongst the farm group, or the local village, for some things. They could even gather together to socialize while plying their craft - a "stitch and bitch," as it were. Until the industrial revolution, this was fairly common. Even in larger city centers, women usually socialized while doing their specialty chores, even if they were specialties that used the products of the farming communities.

But when the industrial revolution happened, multigenerational households started becoming less common. Husbands and wives wouldn't live with their parents, or take their ailing parents in. They had their own homes, and the husband would work in a factory and the women would do the same chores as before, only now they were more isolated. If they were lucky they had one grandparent to mind the children while they did the above things.

The spirit of Diogenes is alive and well

But it's not a chair. It's a bar stool.

This, however, are all chairs:

Each one is missing at least one component of the chair definition above.

✦ ✦ ✦ The Kiss

I don't live in a walkable city.

I live in a mid-sized Texas town that only realizes that there are people who don't drive when TXDoT gives them money for active transportation infrastructure.

People constantly tell me that you just cannot walk or ride a bike in this city. It's impossible!

I do it anyway, because I firmly believe that solarpunk is a useless aesthetic if you aren't living it as best you can. We don't need technology to solve our problems we need will.

Also I do volunteer work on the political side of the local animal shelter and so I find myself at city hall several times a year and there's no bike rack.

Or rather there wasn't a bike rack.

I complained to someone, politely, informing them that I am doing this volunteer work and I don't have any safe place to lock my bike and that locking it to a handrail is inconvenient for everyone and also hideous.

A few months later a single staple-style bike rack was installed at city hall. It's not much, but I got sent a photo of someone else who got to use it before I did, clearly there was a need, if small.

Then I turned my gaze to the local grocery store, which had a bike rack, but the bike rack was terrible. It was too short for modern tire sizes, it was placed too close to the wall so one side was useless, and it was generally pretty cramped.

It took some time, but an advocate friend told me to contact the property owner instead of banging my head against the wall contacting HEB itself, and so I sent another polite complaint with a photo, explaining why it wasn't a very good bike rack and it would be really cool if we had a different one with better placement.

And about two months later, we have new staple-style racks at the grocery store, properly placed for maximum parking.

It's not a new bike lane. It's not a removal of parking minimums. It's not infill development or an active transportation advisory board.

They're just bike racks.

But that's the beauty of it. I, a person with an email address, some basic "how to be firm but polite while making an argument" skills, and a willingness to work out who to contact, fixed two problems for the local community. Trust me, I have had people wait on me to unlock my bike so they could have the "good spot." I was not the only person annoyed at the old rack.

It can be done. You're not powerless. Solarpunk doesn't have to be a wishful aesthetic.

Technology will not save us.

Frederick Carter (1883–1967), “The Dragon of the Alchemists”

engraved on wood by W.M. Quick, 1936