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I was a very precocious and hyperverbal toddler and asked the “where do babies come from?” extremely young so when I was almost three I randomly slammed my fork down and demanded to know how babies get into their mommies’ bellies in the first place.

fortunately they make books for teaching your insatiably curious wannabe zoologist toddler about sexual reproduction so by the time I was in preschool I was able to explain to my classmates that bugs stuck together because they were mating and that a similar process had happened between their parents to make them and that it was all a part of the biological cycle of life and death. I would explain this even to much older children who I heard asking what mating animals and insects were doing or sharing incorrect pregnancy information.

so like you can try to shelter your kids all you want but there is a nonzero chance that a hyperverbal autistic toddler will just fucking randomly walk up to them and explain that semen can fertilize an egg cell after insertion of the penis into the vagina, creating an embryo, and that ultimately they and everyone they know are subject to mortality and will inevitably die.

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"What makes this find exceptional is not just its presence at the site, but the evidence of human alteration."

The academic paper:

Of related interest:

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Okay so I’m an elementary school art teacher right, and I have this really fun game I made a PowerPoint for to teach like, emotions and intent and looking at the whole picture to first grade.

The idea is, when we count down and change slides, kids have to mimic one thing in the painting as best they can, whether it’s animate or inanimate. If there’s nothing in the shot for them to mimic (because I threw some contemporary abstract stuff in), they have to show me how the painting makes them feel. Easy enough, gets them excited to move around and vocal about their feelings regarding art, it’s very chaotic. I can tell pretty fast who’s got the emotional maturity to mimic things in a complex way, and who’s just enough of an abstract thinker to mimic inanimate objects early on in the game...

So the first picture is this:

Napoleon Crossing the Alps. My favorite reactions are usually the kids who pretend to be the freaked-out horse, but 2 memorable occasions were the one where a student immediately scrunched up to be the rock in the foreground, and the one where a pair of girls, without any communication on their parts, decided to be Napoleon riding the horse with one as Napoleon and one as the horse. Basically one of them fully tackled the other apropos of nothing, it was hilarious

I’ll add more if y’all want or if I feel like it lol I have a bunch of stories from this one game

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Discovered that your seikret will dance with you if you do any of the dancing gestures . . . oh good heaven . . .

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Via:IG@bigskyranchess

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Gustave

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The Indianapolis Star, Indiana, July 26, 1925

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white-lined sphinx says hello

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I just had an epiphany that's probably incredibly obvious to anyone who was not raised in a hyper-individualistic culture, and I need to share it.

How many times have you seen someone not being able to do their house chores on their own experssing the idea that it's something wrong with them? How many people talk about the strategies they use that enable them to do the work- listening to music, podcasts, body doubling, etc, etc? How many times have you thought there was something wrong with YOU because you have a hard time keeping up with dishes, or laundry, or cleaning in general?

We're a social species! We're supposed to work together, not alone! You did not evolve to be put in a box all by yourself and do mundane, repetitive survival tasks every day!

(this is NOT saying that there isn't space for solo activities, or denying the existence of people who like alone time)

Up until very recently, very, very recently on the evolutionary time scale, humans would have been working TOGETHER on daily, repetitive, mundane tasks. Practically every time I see a video of some group that hasn't been colonialized or industrialized, doing some task from hunting to harvesting crops to building structures to making food and textiles, they're working together. Aside from hunting, they're either talking or signing.

We're playing music and podcasts to ourselves as a stand in for the species-appropriate enrichment activity of working with another member of our species! Everyone knows that leaving a dog home alone all day is hard on the dog and if you don't do something to help them cope, you're going to end up with a neurotic dog. Everyone* knows you can't have one goat or it'll spend all day and night screaming for love and attention. Everyone knows that it's not good for social species to be alone-

And yet for a long time American culture expected a woman to be a housewife and be home alone all day cleaning and cooking. Guess who got a reputation for having mental issues? Housewives who were left alone at home all day. Before the pioneers (which is a whole boatload of ethical issues we're not going to touch on because this is just one blog post, but whooooo boy), when were people expected to live as a single family unit and do work all by themselves all day long?

No wonder Americans have a mental health issues! We are not meant nor did we evolve to be alone!

And now, today, how many people live by themselves, or even when they do live with others, how many people EXPECT to do daily chores as a solo task, and then thing there's something wrong with them when they can't do it?

And yes, some people can- but is it good for all of them? Is it pleasant? Is it something that should be expected from everyone? Should it be expected from everyone all the time?

Is there a blindingly obvious reason why anxiety, depression, and just, general poor mental health is so prevalent in our hyper-individualistic culture?

(And before anyone comes after me pitting freedom against collective work- you can have autonomy while working with others. Also I think you'll find that not a lot of us in individualistic cultures actually feel that we have a high degree of autonomy.)

I think I'm gonna start a chores club. Or start talking to people on the phone while I do chores. My god, what have we done to ourselves?

*Everyone who has raised goats

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Daggry, acrylic painting by Adam Burke aka Nightjar

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when I say “Let me ask my husband”, one (or both) of these things is taking place:

1. I am in a loving, happy relationship where we value and respect each other’s opinion

2. I am using this as an excuse to get out of something I don’t want to do (sorry habibi)

what is not happening here: I am being oppressed

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i went to the investment account inc. company retreat and all i got was this shirt and i agree to allow vic to use my likeness from said retreat in perpetuity in exchange for (1) hot dog, this shirt and a screening of twister (1996) 2024

now available in the dropout store

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...are you crying?

Dimension 20 Cast Test Their Basic Culinary Skills

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I made him sit still for another photo