"It's Giving Me The Death Giggles"

A scribbley little comic about the second time Raf invited Magritte to crash at his place; yogurt and overfamiliarity on a Saturday morning.

Thinkin' abt how, after this [and the first time Raf invited Margie to stay at his place], Margie just fuckin'...disappears for two weeks. Doesn't text, doesn't call, not even to confirm thursday night jam session, doesn't show up for thursday night jam session. And Raf has no idea what happened and literally no way to find out. She's just gone. And, especially after Thursday comes and goes, thinking about it just really kinda stresses him out because like...what happened? He kinda wants to think she just fucked off and didn't care enough abt him or his time or w/e to tell him she was outtie. Because at least then he could feel kinda righteously mad abt it. He'd prefer that over what he actually feels, which is an opressive dark cloud of major concern that smth bad happened to her. Miserable, disempowering anxiety.

Anyways, the following Wednesday or Thursday, Vic comes back into the studio after lunch all like "there's a homeless chick on the sidewalk really bangin' out the tunes on a toy piano, lol." And faster than Vic can say "toy piano", Raf is out the door to see her. And lo' behold, she's there! Stinky and greasy, but not dead!!

And she's there specifically waiting for him to step out for a lunch break or smthing because she really wanted to let him know that she wasn't mad at him nor meant to disappear or anything, it's just that, "Life kinda got crazy and I sold my phone thinking I could borrow another one from a friend, but then I couldn't and also I haven't really been able to, like, shower because [[vague guesture]] and I was hoping I could get my shit together before poppin' in on you like this but I kept putting things off because other things and I needed to tell you!!! We're still cool!!! We're still cool...right?"

And Raf's just like "...you sold ur phone? Like...the little...what was it, a nokia?" And Margie's just like, "Yah." And Raf's impulse is to ask why?? What happened??? What is happening???? But he also extremely does not want to reciprocate answering those kinds of prying questions, so instead he's just like. "Okay. You're okay..?"

And Margie's like, "YEAH. I'M OKAY. I SHOULD GO THO. Don't wanna get u fired it's like...2 pm or smth. Jobs!"

Raf scrambles to get her to no fuck off ("they not gonna...fire me."), inviting her into the studio--which she is vehemently like "No!! I can't have stinky be the first impression I leave on your cool music people!!" so he elects instead to drive her back to his place where she can finally force herself to wash her clothes and take a shower ("gonna stink up your car tho." "I mean, I smoke weed in there, ur really not gonna make it any worse.")

He's actually able to get her to spend a few days at his place this time, until she gets her hands on another shitty, cheap, flip phone. (It's still 2008, after all). And then she's gone again, but keeps well in touch.

Raf never actually learns abt why Margie vanished for 2 weeks, nor why she had to pawn a bunch of her stuff including her phone(???) nor...anything regarding that time, tbh. Nowdays, Margie would certainly tell him all abt it if he asked, regardless of any lingering embarassment/shame over the recollection. But I think they've both forgotten about it.

You get a Neon Goby

There's nothing left for him. His daughter. He wasn't her father, either. She loves him. She'll survive. She's young. I don't want you to die. Don't kill him. Let him live. Let him live. Don't kill him.

The aim of the project was to travel 270 km / 168 miles between Helsinki and Turku in Finland, and to highlight the possibility of horse travel in modern society. Since then they've took to promoting horseback efforts in urban landscapes with several European collaborators and artists.

Yli-Vakkuri and collaborators first spent eight months practicing riding to become safely self-sufficient in saddle, and bought a Finnhorse gelding Toivottu Poika ('Awaited Son'). The route followed, as closely as possible, the old coastal royal country road of the premodern era, Kuninkaantie/Suuri Rantatie, and took 9 days.

Toivottu Poika is a very average example of his breed, standing at some 155 cm / 15.1 hh tall. The Finnhorse is a relative of for example the North-Norwegian Lyngshest breed, the Icelandic horse, the Swedish Gotlandsruss pony and the Estonian landrace horse and Tori horse breed. It is a mid-sized light draught and trotter, a sensibly realistic mediaeval country travel horse equivalent.

For more hardcore short-term treks, looking into competitive endurance riding can be helpful. Mongol Derby might be one of the most intense races, as it recreates the Chinggis Khan era postal system of swapping horses continuously over a 1000 km / 620 mile route.

By only including skilled endurance riders, keeping up a constant fast speed and swapping horses every 40 km / 25 mil, the Mongol Derby route only takes 10 days even though it's several times the length of the Trans-Horse project. This is the speed of highly organised imperial messengers with the supporting cultural infrastructure, professional marathon runners where Yli-Vakkuri and Toivottu poika were leisure hikers.

the last i checked, the map of roads stretches from Calais, France to Moscow, Russia west to east and from Košice, Slovakia to Tornio, Finland south to north. it doesn't cover all of Europe, for example Sweden and Norway are empty at the moment, but it is quite extensive and still being worked on! in addition to showing the old roads, you can calculate the distance and travel time from one city to another, and there are a lot of options:

and that's not all! here's a description from the site itself (emphasis mine):

"Viabundus is a freely accessible online street map of late medieval and early modern northern Europe (1350-1650). Originally conceived as the digitisation of Friedrich Bruns and Hugo Weczerka's Hansische Handelsstraßen (1962) atlas of land roads in the Hanseatic area, the Viabundus map moves beyond that. It includes among others: a database with information about settlements, towns, tolls, staple markets and other information relevant for the pre-modern traveller; a route calculator; a calendar of fairs; and additional land routes as well as water ways."

What began as a grassroots passion for hiking among the people of Baysour has evolved into one of Lebanon’s leading examples of community-based conservation, thanks to the partnership between the Society for the Protection of Nature in Lebanon (SPNL), Baysour Hiking Group, and the local community. Through the Hima approach, SPNL helped transform local enthusiasm for nature into a long-term…

Please listen to this baby tapir CHEEP and maybe all your sorrows will go away for a precious moment 🩷🩷🩷