captious-solarian

[captious-solarian]

As it is Passover again, it is time for the annual debate as to whether the frog plague, which thanks to a quirk in the Hebrew, is written as a plague of frog, singular, rather than the plural, plague of frogs, was in fact, as generally imagined, a plague of many frogs, or instead a singular giant Kaiju frog. This is an ancient and venerable argument that actually goes back to the Talmud because this is what the Jewish people are. If we can't argue for fun about this sort of thing, what are we even doing.

In that spirit, I would like to submit a third possibility, which is that in fact it was one perfectly normal sized frog, who was absolutely acing Untitled Frog Game: Ancient Egypt Edition. One particularly obnoxious frog, who through sheer hard work, managed to plague all of Egypt.

[captious-solarian]

i think they should change it to "behindutva" where its all about loving big behinds like sir mixalot

#endorsed

[captious-solarian]

I found this sentence Ciceronianly hard to parse, and I'm surprised nobody else seems to have had that problem (or the arrogance to pipe up).

Tumblr doesn't allow nested lists so I can't readably show the parse, but I think this is the intended meaning:

A "two state solution" may be bad in 3 ways. First, it might settle on terms that no Palestinian leadership with any popular legitimacy would reasonably accept. Second, it might immediately meet with expansionist betrayal by Israel. Third, it might immediately meet with massive armed resistance from Palestinians, because said Palestinians correctly anticipate such a betrayal. I kind of suspect that any "two state solution" that avoids those 3 problems would fail to respect Israel's "right to exist". How so, you ask? It would require international supervision so strict as to be tantamount to foreign occupation and regime change. (This clearly fails to respect Israel's "right to exist".) Or, barring such supervision, it would require a quasi miraculous transformation in Israeli society and political culture — a transformation sweeping enough render its past self virtually unrecognisable.

Am I reading that correctly? I spent a while staring at palestinians correctly anticipating such a betrayal would fail to respect israels "right to exist" and wondering why betrayal by Israel would fail to respect Israel's own right to exist…

@sentence-arborist, if you want a big one?

I kind of suspect that any "two state solution" to neither settle on terms no palestinian leadership with any popular legitimacy would reasonably accept nor immediately meet with either expansionist betrayal by israel or massive armed resistance from palestinians correctly anticipating such a betrayal would fail to respect israels "right to exist" in that it would require international supervision so strict as to be tantamount to foreign occupation and regime change, or barring that a quasi miraculous transformation in israeli society and political culture sweeping enough render its past self virtually unrecognisable

#words #palestine cw #war cw

[captious-solarian]

I think "kinda funny" is what almost all Strine shoots for, so mission accomplished! You will be assimilated.

The maoists on here are working really hard to turn what has to be the corniest american demonym—"yankee"—into a slur

[captious-solarian]

Where do you stand on "seppo"?

The maoists on here are working really hard to turn what has to be the corniest american demonym—"yankee"—into a slur

#words

[captious-solarian]

Yeah I don't wanna understate the difficulty of flirting while ugly, it definitely affects how well the recipient takes it. I'm speaking more to the other points.

Being sweet, being charming, being goofy, being witty, being eccentric, being flirty, and being helpful are all usually predicated on being attractive. When you’re ugly, often such gestures are instead interpreted as menacing.

#ugly pride

[captious-solarian]

User is not authorized to perform: iam:GoogleSomethingRealQuick on resource: OkYeahThisIsFunny because no identity-based policy allows the iam:GoogleSomethingRealQuick action.

Oktja: the giant pig in charge of 3rd party SSO

#Okja (2017) #web #puns cw

[captious-solarian]

Hang on I gotta google something real quick

Oktja: the giant pig in charge of 3rd party SSO

#puns cw

[captious-solarian]

That doesn't match my experience at all.

Being goofy and eccentric is easier when you're ugly. Think of comic relief characters: they're almost all ugly. I try to be funny as a person, and I lean heavily into my funny looks for that. This is very compatible with witty wisecracks.

I don't see how helpfulness has to do with looks at all: people can tell whether you're helping them or not, there's a lot less interpretation going on! Sure "need help carrying those groceries?" can come off as intimidating if you're tall and look strong and lower-class, but that's quickly papered over, and is mostly unrelated to beauty.

All this makes it easy to be sweet and charming like a child or a little old lady, but of course hard to be sweet and charming in a fuckable way. Even then, I find it rare that flirting attempts are seen as threatening, as opposed to just awkward and unpleasant.

Being sweet, being charming, being goofy, being witty, being eccentric, being flirty, and being helpful are all usually predicated on being attractive. When you’re ugly, often such gestures are instead interpreted as menacing.

#ugly pride

[captious-solarian]

Gull ID is hard and I know next to nothing about American gulls, but a few pointers:

Age is the easiest thing to notice, much easier than species: Younger birds are darker. They start out covered in splotchy dark brown, that slowly fades each year and completely disappears in breeding plumage.

The beak and legs also start out dull colours (dull pink, dark grey) and turn brighter with age (yellow, orange, bright pink).

For species, adults in breeding plumage are the easiest to tell apart. The shape of the beak is also super helpful. Size is supposed to be helpful but I can never estimate a bird's size well enough to make any use of it.

Ring-billed gulls have a fairly thin bill. In young gulls like this one, the tip is dark; as breeding adults, the bill is bright yellow with only a dark ring around it.

Your other very common gull is the herring gull. Their bill is, like, chunkier? Scarier? As a breeding adult, it's yellow with a red spot on the bottom.

Somewhat less commonly, you have the great black-backed gull. Looks like a herring gull, but with a black back.

Uncommonly, you also get the laughing gull. Super easy to recognise in breeding plumage: it has a black head. In other plumages I don't think I could tell it apart from ring-billed, but its legs and bill are fully dark, whereas young ring-billed has dull pink or yellow with a dark tip on the bill, so you can try.

You also get like a dozen rare gull species that I know 0 about, plus some terns.

There's people who can glance at a gull and give its species, age, and sex instantly. I fear those people.

Lone seagull

#birds

[captious-solarian]

Your linear friends are double-crested cormorants, your only local cormorant species.

Cormorants are really cool: To hunt, they dive and swim after prey underwater. Unlike most water birds, they're not waterproof, to aid with diving. That means they can't fly right after swimming, and they spend a lot of time T-posing to dry off their wings.

The duck is a female mallard. They are waterproof, and eat by dabbling — dunking the front of their bodies to eat plants that grow at the bottom of the water.

Thanks to Ava and Rosie for helping me with the IDs!

I should get a phone with a better camera, I can’t see birds well at this distance. Bigger phone bad for hands though…

#birds

[captious-solarian]

Ring-billed gull! You get a good few gull species in Baltimore, and this is the most common. This one isn't quite an adult yet, I'm thinking second winter.

Lone seagull

#birds

[captious-solarian]

Tragic news, I got a quote from the New Testament instead of the Bible, this is antisemitism

Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field:

New rule everyone in the us is assigned a different Bible verse to be theirs. I'm tired of everyone signing their emails off with Joshua 24:15. Some of y'all are going to have to settle for a begat to hang on your wall alongside your "live laugh love" woodcut. Sorry

#idolatry cw

[captious-solarian]

Once in each Age, a prayer is granted.

I said “god I need some ibuprofen” and I picked up a binder and a packet of advil fell out

[captious-solarian]

Then how do you explain that many people choose to be jerks in that particular way? Sure, riling people up is funny, but most people don't troll everyone they meet, so why is this specific circumstance especially trollable?

the "smooth shark" thing is actually tumblr just loving being smug bullies for no reason

[captious-solarian]

But I DON'T care about shark facts, is the thing. I mean, I'm sure I would feel even strongly about the whole matter if I did. But the particular texture of shark skin is immaterial to me. What I care about is that people who lie on purpose are evil and their blood should run out in the street if they won't repent.

Is it a lie? I don't think the speaker intends or expects anyone to believe the false statement.

Next time I say "Fine, how are you?" when I'm not fine, I will picture you jumping out of an alley, machete-first, hollering "REPENT OR PERISH, YOU CUR".

#violence cw #murder cw #death cw #i guess #black and white thinking

[captious-solarian]

I tried that, and drove myself apoplectic trying to decide what subject a book really counts as. Systems I'm happier with:

Alphabetical by author. Pros: can easily decide where a book goes and find it. Cons: kind of arbitrary.

By language / main owner of the book. Pros: can find your books without sorting through someone else's terrible tastes. Cons: I ran out of space on my bookshelf and started encroaching upon foreign territory.

Crammed wherever they'll fit. Pros: look, it's what's going to happen anyway. Cons: takes forever to find a book.

baffled by the concept of someone with at least several shelves of books sorting their personal collection by anything other than subject matter. sure if you mostly own whole series of books by the same authors it makes sense to sort them that way but if you’ve got twenty different books on ecology surely you’re not going to scatter them around alphabetically?!