absentcoder

[absentcoder]

When Everything Everywhere All at Once said “The only thing I do know is that we have to be kind. Please, be kind, especially when we don’t know what’s going on" 

When the Good Place said “Why choose to be good every day when there is no guaranteed reward now or in the afterlife… I argue that we choose to be good because of our bonds with other people and our innate desire to treat them with dignity. Simply put, we are not in this alone.” 

When Jean-Paul Sartre said ”‘Hell is other people’ is only one side of the coin. The other side, which no one seems to mention, is also ‘Heaven is each other’. Hell is separateness, uncommunicability, self-centeredness, lust for power, for riches, for fame. Heaven on the other hand is very simple, and very hard: caring about your fellow beings.“

[absentcoder]

I counter with

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“Can I help you?” A voice asked me after I had exhausted my throat, and I found myself forced to down the last of my water.

I had been walking through this forest for days in circles, using my backpack as a pillow and jumping at the slightest sound all the while. It was nothing I wasn’t used to, having become familiar with the sights, sounds, and smells - oh heavens the smells - of the city streets that raised me.

I had to force myself to bite back a response, almost choking on my water as I weighed my words carefully. I wasn’t certain that this was one of the fae I needed. For all I knew, he was just another human in a search party for someone unrelated.

“I don’t know either,” I eventually offered. “There’s a lot of things that need “help”, but how many of those things are lost causes?” I asked rhetorically, biting back a bitter scoff as I looked at my calloused left palm, worn down from repeated injury.

Their response was swift. “I don’t know if you’re a lost cause, but you certainly seem simply lost,” they joked. “Come with me and we can get you sorted out,” they offered.

“Where do you want to take me?” I offered.

“You’ll find out if you follow,” they countered.

“Yeah, no,” I spat back. “I’m not intent on getting any treatment or whatever,” I explained, “I don’t want to be rescued, I want to vanish. This forest is where the fey live, isn’t it? They can have my name. I’m not doing anything meaningful with it any time soon,” I scoffed.

I shot them a look for a moment as what I said caught up to me. Days of fatigue, years of being beaten down, and only then did I realize this stranger may have finally been my salvation.

With little hesitation, I ran after them, barking my name after them. After days of doing so, it had ceased to sound like a coherent word, it had turned to noise. A meaningless sound that I made in the hopes that it would deprive me of everything that weighed me down.

I don’t know how long we ran, walked, how long I chased them for. All I knew was that eventually I had stumbled face-down into the dirt, and pulled myself up to find a clearing of sorts, where an older figure was staring down at me with some mixture of disapproval and understanding.

“So this is the one who offered his name freely?”

“Yes, my liege.” Seems that scout was standing behind me.

He shook his head. “Stand upright, mortal.”

With some amount of trepidation, I did so, in no position to be disrespectful.

“I am impressed. Impressed that you would hear of the stories around us and actively seek us out, but confused why you would do everything you were told to not do,” he explained.

I shook my head. “Sir, I remember the fables well. Anything you would do to me, is better than what my own home has done.”

He looked confused for a moment before he appeared to be deep in thought. Eventually he looked at the scout behind me, and a few seconds later he shuddered.

“I am inclined to believe you. Your name has been given to me, and, if I may, I see it fit to return it to you.”

“Please don’t,” I countered. “I could never take such a burden on again. The life that name will lead is set in stone, and it’s better to just let it die.”

“Would you truly resign yourself to such?”

“He was in our forest for three material world days, sire,” the scout interjected. “He had sufficient time to weigh his decision, I believe this is what he wants.”

The king shook his head. “Your name is of no value to us in this state. I understand you believe we find misfortune humorous, but your name is far too damaged to be of any such use. Your sorrow runs much too deep.”

Unable to cry at this point from dehydration, that was the last thing I remember before falling backwards from fatigue and disbelief in equal measure, looking up at the scout for a moment before my world went black.

_________________

They looked at the mortal at their feet for a moment before looking up at each other in confusion.

“Such a strange human to throw himself at our mercy like this. I believe they have a word for those who flee from lands that treat them poorly in search of better opportunity,” the king noted as he directed another of his subjects to pick up the human.

“‘Refugee’,” the scout agreed and nodded, confused as the human was carried off.

“He will be provided with room, board and food, but kept in isolation otherwise. We shall provide him literature in his first language for recreation, carefully chosen and vetted so as to avoid him learning things that could endanger us. Until then, I will have one of our changelings work on making this name worth bearing such that he does not become lifeless. He may desire to stay here, he may desire to cease to exist. But he can do neither. I would leave a human to suffer in a misery of their own creation, normally, but this human’s hell is not of his own making. He must understand that if his best is not enough, it’s not his fault.”

The royal scout had long since left, leaving the king muttering to himself as he contemplated his human prisoner.

“How pitiful. His heart may beat, but he does not know what it means to live. And so he sought to die. That does not make him deserving of death.”

You have had an absolutely terrible life and decided to go to the fae realm and start screaming your name, hoping to be forgotten or erased. But instead, the king and queen of the fae have gained an odd interest in your existence.

[absentcoder]

Apparently boomer Democrats are having meltdowns over a gen-z progressive who is primarying an 80 year old Democrat because she "went on trans podcasts" and wore a Charizard kigurumi

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Thank you shipping package delivery side of Tumblr.

USPS employee out in the ether here

Can you help me understand how something coming from Tennessee to New York

Has to make a pitstop in Colorado?

[absentcoder]

… Let’s just say it was Icy Wind, shall we?

Frozen in fear

[absentcoder]

what if there was a woman so hot that she nearly toppled the government?

[absentcoder]

A few years ago a roommate abruptly decided to move out to live with her boyfriend, and I ended up spending half a year sharing an apartment with someone I had never met before: an Egyptian girl with very limited English.

She was confused by my appearance and asked me “boy or girl?” It took me a while to understand what she was saying, but eventually she got the point across, and I told her that I was a girl. She seemed unsatisfied, and I explained that I was transgender. Unsurprisingly, she didn’t know the word.

We ended communicating by typing our respective sentences into Google Translate. Unfortunately, whatever the Arabic word for “transgender” is, it wasn’t a word she knew either. Eventually I ended up typing in “I used to be a boy but it made me unhappy so I decided to be a girl.” She stared at it for a moment then asked “You are happy now?” I said yes, and she smiled and looked thoughtful.

A couple hours later she came up to me and said “You and me, we are sisters,” and gave me a hug. “You say you are girl, you are girl.”

[absentcoder]

I think a lot of what pro-AI people are really wanting is stuff that already exists but they don't know it's out there like

can't format a work email? templates

don't know how to write a resume? templates

writing a thank you card or a condolences card or a wedding invitation? templates templates templates

not sure how to format your citations in MLA or whatever format? citationmachine.net

summary of something you're reading for school/work? cliffnotes.com

recipe based on ingredients in your fridge? whatsintherefrigerator.com

there's a million more like, guys, we don't need AI, we never needed generative AI

[absentcoder]

Eastern American red fox (Vulpes fulva fulva) in Kentucky, USA

Photos by  Rev. Lee A. Payne, Jr. || CC BY

[absentcoder]

Santa is on strike due to global warming.  All presents this year will be delivered by Sasha the Christmas Tiger.  Milk and cookies may not be sufficient.

[absentcoder]

The tail shape and color means you’ve been drawn as Cosplay Pikachu.

I mean… are you?

Thats me!!!!!!

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HOBBES vs. TIGGER cage match TO THE DEATH say goodbye to your childhood because ONE! WILL!! DIE!!!!

[absentcoder]

Merry Consumerism!

The crimmus fox. One of those times I get to lightly display my shapeshifting by minorly changing the color of my hair and tails. ^-^

[absentcoder]

Reblog If You Would Also Not Allow Someone To Use Your Character As A Base For Their Sona.

Hii, i was wondering if i could use one of the catboys (probably Fen or Aaron) bodies as a base to design my sona.

no

[absentcoder]

Of course they let you boop yourself and have a joke for it.

Apparently you can boop yourself??? The numbers didn’t increment, but fair enough. What an amusing little interaction.

[absentcoder]

Apparently you can boop yourself??? The numbers didn’t increment, but fair enough. What an amusing little interaction.