HI WELCOME TO MY LIVEJOURNAL

they live in a different dimension and can only communicate through writing on the constantly foggy windows of the house they inhabit. their name is beauremont. and they just. fucking hate humans. it’s so funny. and the best part is that they befriend someone in our dimension who works for the scp, not realizing that they’re human, and so that human is just sorta their roommate now because they’re the only one who doesn’t piss beauremont off. it’s so fucking funny.

A Nerf Maverick that was modified by some random dude to make anything it shoots instantly worse.

First time watching fireworks:

 First time being dunked into water that’s way too cold:

First time getting caught in a bubble shower:

First time driving through a dark tunnel:

First time chatting with a puppet:

First time finding a new recipe in a cooking magazine:

First time forgetting how spoons work:

First time seeing ice cream:

So, theres an interesting way that like they are actually for the most part articulating really strangely different understandings of gender between them? Like, the ‘male’ one is mostly rooted in biological changes that are hard if not impossible to change without medical intervention: the broad facial hair, the brow bone, the oversized square jaw. but the women’s one is like… long hair and blurry skin and makeup! makeup is somehow an inherent feature of womanhood or whatever

When I was six, I was hospitalized with Rocky Mountain spotted fever. At the hospital, I was encouraged to get out of bed, get dressed and spend as much time as possible in the playroom. I brought magazines and books back to my room to read and played with other kids who were up and about on the pediatric floor. There was a girl in the next room with leukemia, and we made faces and waved to each other through our shared window. The fact that I was able to play didn’t mean I wasn’t sick enough to be hospitalized. It meant that regardless of my illness, I was a child with the same needs and wants as other children.

Yet, with adults, the same concept doesn’t seem to hold true. Whenever ill people do — well, anything — it’s taken as “proof” that we’re bluffing about our condition. Many of us are confronted by complete strangers on a regular basis when we go out in public, on everything from using parking placards to requesting ADA accommodation at events. We’re challenged more by people we know, who should really know better.

After I became ill, I decided to go to my favorite theme park one day. I didn’t do much; it was a very sedentary experience. I posted a photo of myself on one of the rides on Facebook with my germ mask on backward, slept for days to recover from my adventure, and didn’t think much of it. A few days later, my Mom called me about it. A “family friend” had seen the photo and was furious about it. She’d apparently complained to several people that if I was at a theme park, I was obviously well enough to be working and was pulling some sort of scam. It had gotten back to my mother.

I promptly unfriended and blocked the person, but their actions stayed with me. For most of the next year or so, whenever I posted a photo of myself doing anything fun, I looked over my shoulder. I always made a point of describing how sick I was and how I’d needed to rest, and how tired I was afterward. I felt the need to qualify what I was doing; to verify that I was still ill, and to remind everyone that there was more to the truth than what was visible in the photo. Someone’s ignorance and unkind judgments had made me feel guilty about enjoying my life to the best of my ability and upset my mom, and that was unconscionable. (Read more at link)

Reminds me also about how rich people will go apoplectic when they see a poor person with a iPhone. Nevermind payment plans, refurbished phones, or just plain saving up for a one time cost gadget, you can’t really be poor if you have a smartphone to some minds. Doesn’t matter that most people need Internet access just to apply for most jobs these days, smartphones are for people with money! It also ignores that electronics as a cost have not risen the way basic necessities like food and water have.

For some things, I think it genuinely used to be easier. Back when corporate employment was more paternalistic, the company did a lot of the “adulting” for you. Planning a vacation? You didn’t have Travelocity, but the company did have a travel agent.

Notice how a lot of “adulting” has to be done during working hours? When you’re kind of stealing time from work to do it? How are you *supposed* to do it? I think the answer is “that’s your wife’s job.”

But isn’t this kind of hard for your wife too? Like, it’s hard to go to the bank if you’re dragging a couple of screaming kids, right?

First of all, this only works if the kids are in school most of the day. Second of all, it used to be a lot more normal to have *servants*. Third of all, you can squeeze more work out of people if they feel they *must*, and sexism is great at that.

The people of Flint are trapped by the legal system. And it is only the most high profile case out many cities with a similar problem. 

According to the CDC, in 10 percent of those drownings, the adult will actually watch the child do it, having no idea it is happening. Drowning does not look like drowning—Dr. Pia, in an article in the Coast Guard’s On Scene magazine, described the Instinctive Drowning Response like this:

“Except in rare circumstances, drowning people are physiologically unable to call out for help. The respiratory system was designed for breathing. Speech is the secondary or overlaid function. Breathing must be fulfilled before speech occurs.

Drowning people’s mouths alternately sink below and reappear above the surface of the water. The mouths of drowning people are not above the surface of the water long enough for them to exhale, inhale, and call out for help. When the drowning people’s mouths are above the surface, they exhale and inhale quickly as their mouths start to sink below the surface of the water.

Drowning people cannot wave for help. Nature instinctively forces them to extend their arms laterally and press down on the water’s surface. Pressing down on the surface of the water permits drowning people to leverage their bodies so they can lift their mouths out of the water to breathe.

Throughout the Instinctive Drowning Response, drowning people cannot voluntarily control their arm movements. Physiologically, drowning people who are struggling on the surface of the water cannot stop drowning and perform voluntary movements such as waving for help, moving toward a rescuer, or reaching out for a piece of rescue equipment.

From beginning to end of the Instinctive Drowning Response people’s bodies remain upright in the water, with no evidence of a supporting kick. Unless rescued by a trained lifeguard, these drowning people can only struggle on the surface of the water from 20 to 60 seconds before submersion occurs.”

This doesn’t mean that a person that is yelling for help and thrashing isn’t in real trouble—they are experiencing aquatic distress. Not always present before the Instinctive Drowning Response, aquatic distress doesn’t last long—but unlike true drowning, these victims can still assist in their own rescue. They can grab lifelines, throw rings, etc.

Look for these other signs of drowning when persons are in the water:

Head low in the water, mouth at water level

Head tilted back with mouth open

Eyes glassy and empty, unable to focus

Eyes closed

Hair over forehead or eyes

Not using legs—vertical

Hyperventilating or gasping

Trying to swim in a particular direction but not making headway

Trying to roll over on the back

Appear to be climbing an invisible ladder

So if a crew member falls overboard and everything looks OK—don’t be too sure. Sometimes the most common indication that someone is drowning is that they don’t look like they’re drowning. They may just look like they are treading water and looking up at the deck. One way to be sure? Ask them, “Are you all right?” If they can answer at all—they probably are. If they return a blank stare, you may have less than 30 seconds to get to them. And parents—children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, you get to them and find out why.

Source/article: [x]

I’ve been a lifeguard for 6 years now and of all the saves I’ve done, maybe two or three had people drowning in the stereotypical thrashing style. And even those, like the save I made last weekend, it was exactly like OP describes where the person’s head is going in and out of the water but it isn’t long enough to get any air. Mostly you recognize drowning by the look on someone’s face. If someone looks wide eyed and terrified or confused, chances are they’re drowning. That look of “oh shit” is pretty easily recognizable. And even if you can’t tell for sure: GO AFTER THEM ANYWAY. I’ve done “saves” where a kid was pretending to drown and I mistook it for real drowning, but that’s preferable to a kid ACTUALLY drowning.

Also please remember that even strong swimmers can drown if they have a medical emergency, get cramps, or get too tired. If your friend knows how to swim but they’re acting funny get them to land. And even if someone can respond when you ask them if they need help, if they say they do need help? GO HELP THEM.

However . If the victim is a stranger, I can’t recommend trying to get them. Lifeguards literally train to escape “attacks,” because people who are drowning can freak the fuck out and grab you and make YOU drown as well. If you do go in after someone, take hold of them from the back and talk to them the whole time. IF YOU ARE GRABBED: duck down into the water as low as you can get. The person is panicking and won’t want to go under water and should release you. Shove up at their hands and push them away from you as you duck under. Don’t die trying to save someone else.

She got distracted for maybe 45 seconds. I dove, found a surprising undertow, and started drowning.

It was exactly as described here - in fact, this description was vivid enough to dislodge the memory. I distinctly remember trying and failing to move my limbs, or stop gasping long enough to say something. It was panic on a level I’d never felt before, and literally the only things I could move on my own were my eyes.

I finally managed to wrench a single inhuman noise from my throat somehow just as I went under for the last time. Total elapsed time from finding the undertow, maybe 30 seconds.

I remember thinking I was going to die. And then being pulled up into the world again, everything too bright and loud, my chest burning and heaving, spewing water.

Lost a billion. Another billion in debt.

As a sniper I was not usually the victim of a traumatic event, but the perpetrator of violence and death. My actions in combat would have been more acceptable to me if I could cloak myself in the belief that the whole mission was for a greater good. Instead, I watched as the purpose of the mission slowly unraveled.

…As a sniper I was not usually the victim of a traumatic event, but the perpetrator of violence and death. My actions in combat would have been more acceptable to me if I could cloak myself in the belief that the whole mission was for a greater good. Instead, I watched as the purpose of the mission slowly unraveled.

I served in Iraq from 2004 to 2005. During that time, we started to realize there were no weapons of mass destruction, the 9/11 commission report determined that Iraq was not involved in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, false sovereignty was given to Iraq by Paul Bremer, the atrocities at Abu Ghraib were exposed, and the Battle of Fallujah was waged.