Tag: commentary

thebibliosphere:

bluebladesoftime:

thebibliosphere:

seals-cats-and-random-stuff:

thebibliosphere:

only-in-movies:

thebibliosphere:

leafgirlinabox:

thebibliosphere:

leafgirlinabox:

thebibliosphere:

Word is arguing with me that “theirselves*” is not a word, but the Scottish part of my brain is refusing to give it up. I have been using that word since I was knee high to a splinter, it makes sense in my head, but I know someone would bitch about it as a grammatical error or some such if I used it in Phangs.

Which is unfortunate, cause as it would turn out, I’ve used it. A lot.

*themselves just doesn’t have the same meaning? Don’t ask I don’t know. It’s likely a colloquial thing.

I get it, you want a possessive pronoun instead of an objective one?

YES, thank you I’ve been trying to pin it down and sitting here just saying the word over and over trying to figure out why it feels right.

There is a slight semantic difference! You’ll see people claim that ‘theirself’ is technically incorrect grammar but that’s prescriptivist talk. If there’s a hole in the lexicon someone will fill it 😉

I mean it’s already there, it exists in Scottish dialect. I just know I’ll likely get schtick for putting it in a book, or some pedant will pick up on it and leave a remark about it not being “proper English”, which no, it’s not. But I feel it should be. It fills a gap, as you say. And language ought to change with the times.

Huh. I’d never realised I used theirselves until this very moment. It’s a real word dang it!

Right?! It wasn’t until it got pointed out to me and I had to run stuff through Word to fix something that I was like “what do you mean that’s not a word, it is too a bloody word!”

I also only recently discovered that “outwith” isn’t a word outside of Scotland…that might have been one of your revelations too but I can’t remember. Either way, the rest of English is missing out.

It’s fucking what now?

But…but it’s such a good word… what do people say instead? Outside? Without? … but they don’t have the same inherent meaning.

Oh well. Fuckit.

Sorry Phangs readers, but you’re about to get a crash course in learning Scots dialect. Hold onto yer bunnets.

how would someone use ‘outwith’, what’s it mean?

“Outwith the norm” or “outwith his expectations”.

Which I suppose “outside” would work, but it feels janky on my tongue to say that. I’ve always used outwith when talking about like thingy-things like experiences or perceptions, while outside is reserved for real physical things like “you’ve parked outside the line” or “he’s outside the house”, though I dare day there’s some folk use “outwith” for those too.

Huh. Those two phrases make absolute sense to me, but I suspect not in the same way they make sense to you? Especially since I’m kinda expecting a space between “out” and “with”, and my brain is insisting that the lack of it doesn’t change the meaning (and yet, it probably does).

And if “outwith the norm” means that is is not within a range that is an expected set for whatever is being spoken of, I’d probably be using “out of the norm” myself. IF I’m picking up the definition of outwith in that context correctly.

“Outwith his expectations” … I think “not among his expectations” might be the way I’d phrase it? Or “not what he expected”? (I mean, “outside his expectations” might be a technically correct phrase, but to me it sounds clunky and off.)

Which is more words and more syllables, and might not actually quite hit the same context, since I’m not actually sure I’m picking up the context correctly (which to me is more me having a bad morning with figuring shit out because I got woken up early by noise that very nearly started my day with a meltdown than any lacking in your explaination).

And probably most of the time where you’d use outwith, I’m using an entirely different phrase, and trying to figure it out is all about me trying to figure out if I have the context clues right, ‘cause that helps being able to communicate. (And context clues in words are so much easier than some other context clues, dear fuck.)

Edit: Continued to read further in posts, and context was provided! And I did miss some context clues, and that’s ok, ‘cause I began from limited context. (Then kept looking to see if there were more, ‘cause of course I’m going to see if there’s more information.)

thebibliosphere:

rabbitindisguise:

jackironsides:

rabbitindisguise:

kentrix11:

sindri42:

8thhousemoon:

tilthat:

TIL that many popular parenting practices may be linked to reduced brain development in infants. Such practices include “the use of infant formula, the isolation of infants in their own rooms or the belief that responding too quickly to a fussing baby will ‘spoil’ it.”

via reddit.com

wow……..crazy

Wait

there’s some assholes out there just letting their baby “cry it out”?

what the absolute fuck?

It’s a baby. It can’t fix its own problems. And it does, indeed, have problems they don’t just cry for no reason. Best case scenario you’re leaving a kid terrified and alone during its most formative years, more likely you’re risking serious health problems or even death by letting it sit in its own filth or starve or whatever because you can’t be bothered to take care of your fucking kid.

If you’re not willing to respond to a plea for help from somebody who is absolutely defenseless, you should not be anywhere near an infant. Put it up for adoption, hire a nanny, whatever, just don’t force them to rely on you for anything.

Oh yeah, that comes from this mentality people that have no idea of how to be oarents fall.

The “I’m not their slave and I won’t let them order me around” kind of mentality.

It’s really really dumb

Worse- these types of parents believe that their children requesting any kind of support, or expressing emotional responses, is a sign of manipulation. They’re a fucking infant. They can’t manipulate the colorful blocks yet, nevermind a whole human person.

Letting babies “cry it out” used to be common parenting advice, specifically meant to help babies sleep through the night better. My mum was advised to do it, but I remember her saying that she really struggled with it (I’m not sure if she ever wound up following it).

It’s not just bad parents who have terrible practices. First-time parents in particular can be prone to following bad advice through fear, particularly if the advice comes from authority figures.

Oh yeah, totally. I was pointing out the logical flaw of assuming that kids crying was for anything that wasn’t immediately necessary (even if that immediate necessity is “attention”) and kids crying is “bad” and “manipulative” and should be “trained out.” A lot of abusive parenting in general is obscured by ignorance, especially of power structures. For example: telling young boys not to cry, not helping them do things and letting them get hurt needlessly.

I was a baby with a lot of health problems (surprise!) who cried a lot, and the health provider that used to come to our house (a midwife I think) to see how my mother was doing, once told her to put me in the garage to let me cry myself out to “show the baby you won’t be dictated to”.

My mother never followed through with that particular suggestion, but the one time she let me “cry myself out” alone through the night on the advice of the midwife, she opened the nursery door to find me floppy and unresponsive. I was rushed to the hospital where I stayed for some weeks due to a viral infection that ravaged my immune system. After that my mother never let one of us “cry it out” ever again, despite the fact that doctors, nurses and midwives told her to do it again with my much sicker and disabled younger brother.

So yea, it’s ingrained in the system, particularly with older people who were raised by people who were also raised by people who believed that too much affection would “spoil moral character”. And it is some bullshit.

Also just to add, if you are feeding formula to your baby? Thank you for taking care of your child and making sure they get food. Breastfeeding while beneficial for some reasons, is not the only correct way to take care of baby, and people need to stop shaming parents for not breastfeeding. That shit is hard for some people, it can hurt and cause infections and the pressure they get put under to persevere with it to the point of drawing blood is horrible.

If I weren’t fed formula as a baby, I would have starved, because mom could not produce enough milk. Ditto both my brothers. So fuck the idea that formula is universally a bad thing.

lynati:

xenosaurus:

xenosaurus:

Story concept of the day: a mad scientist has been turning the residents of their neighborhood into monsters… on request. The government tries to investigate and discovers the locals treat this as a body mod on par with a tattoo or piercing.

the comments on this post immediately confirm the premise that people would do this

I’d do it.

I can haz wings! And fire!

divineninee:

wolfhero28:

thespectacularspider-girl:

excessively-english-jd:

djn-001-kunai-man:

excessively-english-little-b:

valentineart89:

whoreablejewess:

babyanimalgifs:

I didn’t know cheetahs meow I’ve always thought they roar my whole life has been a lie

Ok but the other one is purring so hard

If I ever don’t reblog this assume I’m dead

Fun fact: technically, because of its inability to roar and its ability to purr, the cheetah is not a ‘big cat’ (or Great Cat) – they are still classified as Lesser Cats.

Also you haven’t heard anything until you hear them cheep.

YOU CANNOT JUST SAY THAT AND NOT PROVIDE A VIDEO

I HAVE REALISED MY MISTAKE AND SHALL RECTIFY IT:

Cheeps.

Oh my god

I’m dead now

I turned on the sound, because I enjoy this video, and my cat’s head came up from where she was napping, she turned around, and she went looking for the other cat. And is now looking at me offended because I’m giggling at her reaction. 🙂

the-incedible-sulk:

softestvirgil:

officialjerekpeckmero:

Creative writing prof: You’re in control. You’re the puppet master. You control these characters – what they do, what they say, what they think–

Every writer I know: My characters stopped listening to me and now I’m 8272836 words in to a plot that went of the rails on page 3

Honestly though

Big mood omg 

… Where is this Creative Writing Prof? I’d rather have had that one than the one who graded me down for using fantasy elements for the short story and failed me because my prefered style of play to emulate is Shakespeare.

(Meanwhile, my characters still merrily ignore my planning, because I’m just the author, not the boss of them.)

Do you ever get, or have you ever heard of, pain that you “think” but can’t “feel”? Sometimes, I get a running monologue of “ow” and “it hurts” and get tired and weepy, but I can’t point to anywhere where it hurts. I don’t know if it’s related to my chronic inflammation, or maybe a mental illness, or if it’s even really pain. Google’s no help, so I thought I’d ask here and see if you or your followers can relate.

thebibliosphere:

So I don’t know if it’s the exact thing, but when I am too fatigued, the thought “ow that hurts” will go through my head, but if I try to pinpoint it my body will just be like, random or even numb feeling, so I’ve always thought it came from general background inflammation pain that my body was going through, but my exhaustion meant I was detaching from. Cause after a while certain things do sort of become background noise and it just becomes a feeling of numb exhaustion. And then something will spike and I’ll know that’s a very not good pain if I’m feeling it through the brain fog, and I should probably medicate and/or self care more effectively and promptly.

I know I’ve had points where I know the irritability is pain that I’m not accurately perceiving – or as I tend to put it, pain below my threshold of awareness AS pain. And it’s an irritability that has a different quality to it than what’s brought on by hormones fucking with my emotional state, or lack of food/hydration/sleep, though I’m not sure how to put that difference into words.

And I know I have chronic pain issues, and have for twenty-one years now, and also probably depression and anxiety on top of that, though at this point I can’t remember which came first. (Puberty came first. Puberty decided it was a freight train and ran me over, and than backed over me for good measure.)

cedrwydden:

antioch-actius:

charlesoberonn:

mistaballista:

charlesoberonn:

I wonder what JRR Tolkien would think if he was alive today and found out people were salivating over and sexually craving the Orcs he created.

Tolkien: Lewis, are you seeing this shit? These people want to fornicate with the animalistic allegories of evil I have created! Is there no morality left on this earth?

C.S Lewis, also revived and remembering that furries based on Aslan exist: No, none.

The master of lore that is Tolkien would do that.

Tolkien regretted not being able to humanize and redeem the orcs right up until he died so I seriously think you all should reconsider his imagined reaction to this.

Huh, I never knew…though I personally doubt that Tolkien would entirely jive with the vast majority of the fandom’s dirty headcanons.

Huh. *tilts head, and goes to write more of Dazbol and Razul*

deadcatwithaflamethrower:

situationalzodiac:

not taking constructive criticism because nothing can improve this 

*is upset because Scorpio should be All Of The Above*

*eyes the chart* The only problem I see with Libra is that… well, that whole “never stab anyone” is entirely too fucking vague, and with the rest of the categories implies that they’re too kind/gentle/moral to stab someone.

As far as I can tell from personal experience and various Libra friends, it’s not so much a lack of will or desire, but that stabbing people either means too much clean up or not enough screaming, depending on the individual who keeps acting like they would like to be set on fire.

theotherguysride:

springdday:

ommanyte:

Does anyone genuinely call their siblings sis, sister, little/big sis, bro, brother, little/big brother etc. as constantly as this appears to be portrayed in media? I’m extremely sceptical. Now, affectionally addressing them by something like “slug”, “toad”, “fool”, and “bitch”, or even dare I say it, their gotdamn name, is, from my experience, so much more natural. 

ok guys, reblog and put in the tag how you name your siblings 

My brother answers to “Hey Fuckhead!” to this day.

I actually do refer to my brothers as “little brother” and “baby brother”, including to their face, and as often as I use the shortened version of their names. I sometimes use their full first names, but fuck if I can remember the last time I actually did that.

And if I’m posting anything about them, I don’t use their names anyway, because I honestly don’t use RL names for my relatives or friends who don’t have accounts on whatever site I’m posting on. It’s something that my brain interprets as terribly improper and potentially dangerous.