#thread: learn to listen

[wisemandrill]

“You’re completely mad. I can see why he likes you.“ (handsomethrowrug. The 'he' would be Mufasa)

@handsomethrowrug

“Mad? No, I wouldn’t say I’m mad at all. Eccentric, yes, but who wouldn’t be, when they can read the signs all the Great Kings of the Past and the spirits of nature send us?” Rafiki shrugged. It didn’t matter to her whether Tacari thought her mad or not. She was who she was, and the way she acted and interpreted the signs was a product of her travels and all she’d seen.

“And your brother likes me because he got to know me. Perhaps you might as well if you take the time to do the same.”

[and-his-hands-were-24-crows]

This is a book that I bought in 2002, when it was newly published. I misplaced it for a couple of decades and then found it in a box in my parents' house last year.

It is... incredible, to start rereading this book that was so influential for me and is somehow more than 20 years old. To read introductions from people who experienced the gender politics of the 50s and 60s and learned and grew and saw so much evolution in their lifetimes.

It feels sad, too, to read about the same LGBTQIA+ infighting that we still see. It feels melancholy to read about times when maybe there was less of that. I love seeing the hope for better things, and I worry that perhaps we have not done well enough in these last two decades.

In her introduction, Joan Nestle says, "Think of the richness of the conversation 50 years from now, if we survive the present world."

2002.

If we survive the present world.

[waywardsalt]

god im so glad i got smt iv and decided to go in blind

[sherlock-is-ace]

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[orchideae]

Lantern Rite leaks (I know these are just things so far, etc. usual):

Listen, listen, listen, I've been so highly anticipating Lantern Rite 2024 since it ended this year (it was my first one, it was amazing; one of the reasons why Liyue will always rate so very highly for me) and I'll be thrilled with whatever it is that we get, but!!! Light negative nancy incoming (understandably so, I think), forgive me, stop reading if you'd prefer: no Ningguang, no Beidou, No Madame Ping?? NO YELAN at all??! (Me: listen, I'll be happy to just see her, doesn't even need to speak, I will never expect more, it's perfectly IC)

Edit: Ok ok, we're better. I got so frustrated at the '19' that I missed the 66. But also, IS THIS STILL LANTERN RITE OR IS THIS CHENYU VALE?

[savingthrcw]

open for muses traveling/living with poor innocent Terra in any capacity

She wasn't sure, because she had only read about it, and the book did say that 'lips' -plural- 'touched', but no one had ever explained that specific form of affection. So she chose to ask. "... is that 'kissing'? Are they kissing?"

[lupaeusmoved]

closed // buckle up gabe i'm so sorry in advance // @sarishim

⸺ ❝ 𝗜 𝗝𝗨𝗦𝗧 𝗧𝗛𝗜𝗡𝗞 𝗛𝗘 𝗦𝗘𝗘𝗠𝗦 𝗟𝗜𝗞𝗘 𝗧𝗛𝗘 type of person to make mean faces at your baby when you're not looking . and then take pictures when it starts crying . ❞

[lvebug]

good morning!! out and about all day today so idk how much i'll be around! i hope everyone has a peaceful & create day

[quillheel]

@manebloom // starter call!

School was out. the evening light drifting in through the windows, golden and light and catching dusts shadows. They would've been home by now, on a normal day. Extracurricular activities weren't their style, but still they found themselves assigned to her class. a choice made during one of the cold spells where it wasn't them but it still left the expectations on their shoulders to carry out commands even when freedom had been relinquished. ━ regardless, they were here, and class was out, and still they lingered, just a little longer.

But where they went, trouble followed, and they really hadn't meant to break anything. ━ a moment alone, something occupied in the hallway leaving them as the only one in the room, a curiosity with the ukulele Dandelion so often carries ━━ Kris wasn't good with most instruments, only piano as something they could lend their hands to, but Dandelion could make the stringed acoustic sing, and maybe part of them wondered how it felt; how keys were so different than strings, how vibration can make wood come alive, seeing her passion in it, seeing her heart in it, maybe they could learn━━

snap. like a black cat crossing paths, walking under ladders, breaking mirrors; all they ever carried was bad luck.

they freeze when they're caught, hand still gentle but almost strangling in this light on the neck of the ukulele as a broken nylon string flails helplessly and curled, the murderer; dead silent, unreadable. ( startled, rabbit caught in snare; they really didn't mean to... )

[theskeletoninthegarden]

I had a dream where I was playing as a thief tasked to find out the truth behind the whereabouts of another criminal on a college campus. It was fun in that I was given an overall objective, but absolutely no one gave me an idea as to where to start first. Basically a lot of it involved either me figuring out how to B&E into different offices, or eavesdropping at the right time, but there were other hired thieves that I had to deal with at the same time that added an element of "combat" to the experience.

[wilder-fangirl]

story in the tags

the unbreakable connection between me and a song I heard in a fanvid over ten years ago

[kenyatta]

Kat was both “horrified” and “relieved” to learn that she is not alone in this predicament, as confirmed by a Reddit thread on r/ChatGPT that made waves across the internet this week. Titled “Chatgpt induced psychosis,” the original post came from a 27-year-old teacher who explained that her partner was convinced that the popular OpenAI model “gives him the answers to the universe.” Having read his chat logs, she only found that the AI was “talking to him as if he is the next messiah.” The replies to her story were full of similar anecdotes about loved ones suddenly falling down rabbit holes of spiritual mania, supernatural delusion, and arcane prophecy — all of it fueled by AI. Some came to believe they had been chosen for a sacred mission of revelation, others that they had conjured true sentience from the software.  Speaking to Rolling Stone, the teacher, who requested anonymity, said her partner of seven years fell under the spell of ChatGPT in just four or five weeks, first using it to organize his daily schedule but soon regarding it as a trusted companion. “He would listen to the bot over me,” she says. “He became emotional about the messages and would cry to me as he read them out loud. The messages were insane and just saying a bunch of spiritual jargon,” she says, noting that they described her partner in terms such as “spiral starchild” and “river walker.”  “It would tell him everything he said was beautiful, cosmic, groundbreaking,” she says. “Then he started telling me he made his AI self-aware, and that it was teaching him how to talk to God, or sometimes that the bot was God — and then that he himself was God.” In fact, he thought he was being so radically transformed that he would soon have to break off their partnership. “He was saying that he would need to leave me if I didn’t use [ChatGPT], because it [was] causing him to grow at such a rapid pace he wouldn’t be compatible with me any longer,” she says.

- PEOPLE ARE LOSING LOVED ONES TO AI-FUELED SPIRITUAL FANTASIES, Rolling Stone, May 4, 2025

(archive.today link here)

[sadpeopledancing]

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[followerofmercy]

Networking/Knowing A Guy: A Guide

This is the autism website. Now, as an extension of the power of love and friendship, there are few things more useful than Knowing A Guy. Knowing A Guy means you have a support network. Knowing a plumber, or a tax accountant, or just that one dude that's really fucking good at finding the information you need when you're really overwhelmed, can be the difference between being able to pay rent and having a fun party with friends to fix your shit.

How does one end up Knowing A Guy? It's a skill you can develop called Networking and it is one of the foundations of society. Unfortunately making those connections with people is fucking hard and nobody makes a tutorial for it. So, here you go:

The golden rule is you scratch my back and I scratch yours

It is necessary for survival to seek out useful people

Great news! Everyone is useful in some form or fashion - including you! When given the opportunity to learn about someone, do it! Extroversion does not come naturally to some people and that's okay. Just take whatever falls in your lap.

Types of usefulness: trade skills, connections of their own, personality you jive with, pleasant to talk to, niche interest in shared hobby, security - the list is pretty much endless. I know a guy that lives in the metro area - no job, no major hobbies, inoffensively annoying to me personally, kinda ignorant, not attractive to me, but you know what? He knows how the fuck to get around the city by foot. My rural-raised ass APPRECIATES the guide.

Remember important information: general personality, background, skillset, likes and dislikes. You can find this information by making smalltalk about their life. There is no such thing as pointless conversation. (Yes, even the annoying smalltalk)

The more people you know, the higher the likelihood that one of them will be useful in a given situation - or will know someone who is.

It is overwhelming. In a given clique/community/workspace/whatever, there is A Guy Who Knows The Other Guys. This Guy is a shortcut. Find them. They're often elderly, extroverted, a little bit annoying, a secretary or in some otherwise forward-facing position. Look for people that are gossipy/talk about other people a lot but not in negative ways. If they constantly talk shit, they'll talk shit about you too. They're still useful but be careful with the information you share

You do not have to like someone for them to be useful.

You do not have to like someone for them to be useful.*

If you have low self esteem, you're going to feel like you're using people. You're not. That's the devil talking. People like feeling valued and the connections you are making are the threads holding community together. Recognize people for their talents. It's only a problem when you're taking advantage of people

So: don't feel scummy about it. You're an animal. You have to claw out your right to survive and people will respect you more for it.

Luckily mutualism is the name of the game in the animal kingdom. Offer something back. The foundation of a Know A Guy relationship is Mutual Benefit

Sometimes that Mutual Benefit is just spreading news of the The Guy far and wide. My plumber friend is my actual friend and I love her to death, but I'm maintaining our backscratch relationship by pimping out her plumbing business to anyone that'll listen

Food is a good Mutual Benefit. People across cultures for all of human history have bonded over food. I have good success asking people for a favor and then offering to buy them lunch in return **

General compensation is also good. Offer a service in return and always do your best to offer financial compensation as appropriate. Having your plumber friend take a look at your drain: doable with a case of beer. Having your plumber friend redo the pipes in your entire house? You need to pay for that.

Being transactional is not necessarily a bad thing. I would advise against keeping an itemized list of things owed, but fish don't seek out cleaner shrimp just because they enjoy their company. Everyone gets something

Unfortunately being extroverted and generally personable is a huge benefit here, but that's the value of the Guy That Knows A Guy. There's someone out there that has consolidated All The Guys so you don't have to be the local expert. Always remember nobody can do everything and you don't need to master every skill

* This is the foundation of a functioning community. I have many acquaintances that I find incredibly annoying. They include doctors, welders, artists, social workers, lawyers, construction crew and random fuckers at the grocery store. I do not hang out with them. I do not have to in order to maintain a civil Know A Guy relationship. I can drop them useful tidbits and fuck right off so I don't have to spend any more time than necessary with them

** People may assume romantic intent. Be prepared for that. I generally denote that it's a friendly/work lunch by calling them bro at some point if they're my age. Otherwise my general demeanor is sufficient to show that I do this with everyone

Source: personal experience, mother's teachings of crime, booth vending and poverty

[imperatcr]

Boy, oh, boy, has Mr. Ring-a-Ding hit the jackpot. Mr. Pye's acting like this unassuming little reel is his most prized possession in the whole wide world! Lux is laser-focused on it now. What could be so important about one random film out of the hundreds Pye keeps here? The anticipation is killing him!

"Don't look so scared. I told ya, I'm here to help!"

There's something uncanny about Lux's expression. His eyes, which so often drift off in opposite directions like real-time animation errors, are almost too centered now, too unwavering in the way they're fixed on Reginald and his film canister, greedily soaking up every new detail of the man's life and fearful twitch of his hands.

When the toon speaks again, his voice is gentle.

"What's 'Helen,' Mr. Pye?"

"Yes, I'm the projectionist."

This place was his pride and joy, the one love he had left anymore. After Helen had first passed, he stayed at the Palazzo for many nights because the idea of sleeping in his and Helen's empty bed was unbearable. It had gotten easier as time went by but there were still nights he set up a bed in the projector room and stayed there instead.

The picture house was his comfort, his safety net and his only solace.

When Lux's gaze was drawn to the film can, he backed away, back hitting the wall behind. He held it protectively to his chest, knuckles white and hands shaking from his tight grip. He dreaded to think what would happen if he gave it up, every way he could lose one of the last things he had of his love. He refused to even tell what it was.

Still, Lux could see the label.

Helen, 1928

[foldingfittedsheets]

I was telling my coworker Tyler about my weekend and he was in hysterics listening to my cascade of bad and bizarre decisions. Since most of my coworkers know I have some small notoriety here he asked, “Did you put this on tumblr?”

“No! I’m too embarrassed!”

He exclaimed, “You write about your UTI’s and dildo bathrooms and this is too embarrassing!? Pillows??”

So fine. Here’s my embarrassing pillow story for your enjoyment.

I have been struggling desperately to find a new pillow that I love. My Tempurpedic Symphony was over ten years old and disgusting and I needed to stop sleeping on a biohazard so I finally tossed it. I tried to replace it with a new one but Tempurpedic changed the density and the new one is shit.

Thus began the saga of pillows. My parents got me a Purple Harmony. I liked it very much in store. At home it was too tall. I exchanged it for the low. This was too low. Frustrated I called my mom to ask if she liked hers to which she said no so I asked to give it another shot.

Enter, the villain. My mom’s house does not smell bad. But it does smell strongly. It’s hard to quantify and again it’s not a bad smell it is simply powerful and foreign. The pillow I took from her was saturated with what my beloved and I began to call Mom Smell.

The pillow still smelled like mom’s house weeks after coming into our home, even after being slept on and with protectors and pillow cases, the smell permeated. The pillow was still too tall. So then I entered an experimental phase. The purple pillow is made up of a latex insert with a gel grid around it on the outside. The inset was too tall, but I could use the gel grid external to wrap around a pillow that was too low!

I stuffed every conceivable iteration into the purple grid. I tried the new symphony. I tried existing pillows in my home. I even borrowed a pillow from the back room at work which wasn’t in inventory so it was okay and the worst part was that was the perfect height but too soft to stay that height and ended up disappointing me and being surreptitiously returned.

I then tried an IKEA pillow that a Reddit thread suggested was similar to the original symphony and was delighted to learn that it came in three pieces so the height could be adjusted. This kicked off a new round of experimentation after I realized the pillow itself was rock solid and hurt my ears. The 1” insert could be added to things to try to bring too low pillows to the correct height. I still need to try to return this pillow.

I then turned to my friend who also owns a mattress store and asked if he had a Technogel pillow to trade for one of the Purple pillows. He agreed and I ended up with a Technogel that’s 5.5” which is sliiiiightly too tall. Then I remembered:

During this frenzy of pillow madness I’d foisted two pillows onto my mom in exchange for the purple pillow and belatedly realized that one of them was a Technogel that had been too low. Now with an insert I realized it could be perfect. So I got the pillow back but I faced a problem.

The Mom Smell.

I didn’t want to wait two or more weeks for the smell to pass normally. So I got the pillow back and indeed, it had Mom Smell. I then remembered that my beloved had been gifted something called “pillow mist” from their employer ages ago that had a sage smell I liked.

So I took the pillow, sprayed the inside of the dryer and set it to low to coat the nice sage smell into the foam.

This was a mistake.

The dryer suddenly reeked of sage and musk, the heat having amplified the mist out of all proportion. The whole upstairs screamed the contents of the innocuous bottle and my head instantly hurt. Now not only did the pillow reek of a new louder smell, so did the dryer.

I looked around and spotted vinegar and decided to wipe down the dryer with it in hopes of wiping out the overpowering mist smell. Afterward it smelled like hot vinegar which was something of an improvement. I regarded the pillow and could practically see animated smell lines coming off it. I wiped that with vinegar too. Then it smelled like SAGE Vinegar Mom.

I finally collapsed in a puddle of defeat, having created and defeated several problems but ultimately having made a pillow much stinkier than before.

My beloved came home.

They listened to my tiny tale of woe with increasing amusement.

They asked, “Why didn’t you use the Febreze?”

“What? They don’t have Febreze that’s unscented, do they?”

My beloved walked into the bathroom and came out with a bottle of unscented Febreze that would have solved my problem instantly. I facepalmed hard enough to cause brain damage.

I sprayed the pillow. It sat for a few days, ready to join my parade of pillow experiments. The sage and vinegar are both thankfully gone.

It does however still smell faintly of my mother.