sunlightandtealeaves

[sunlightandtealeaves]

As , the United States, potentially heads into another forever war I can only think of this quote.

[sunlightandtealeaves]

I know that some British people take umbrage at Americans calling the Great British Bake Off relaxing, but it's just because GBBO is such a different kind of stressful from American baking shows.

American baking shows will be called something like "Cupcake Knife Fight", there's horror movie lighting everywhere and dramatic stings every 5 seconds. All of the contestants are shit talking each other and fist fighting over the one single deep fryer provided by production. It will show the judges all whispering to each other at their super villain table overlooking the whole kitchen, and one will be like, "Oh my god. Everyone look at Brenda right now. She's straight tanking it." And it will cut to Brenda, who is running around covered in flour and crying and also bleeding for some reason. Then you get a clip from an interview with one of the contestants, and they're like, "I really need to win this. Without this award money, I'm gonna need to close my restaurant, sell my dad, and live out of my car. AGAIN." Then the giant digital doomsday clock overhead lets out a horrid klaxon, the judges tell half of them that their cupcakes taste disgusting, and one of them gets eliminated and sent to walk down the dramatically-lit shame hallway never to be seen again.

Meanwhile GBBO is in a lovely, brightly colored tent, there are delightful and friendly hosts/jesters there to keep everyone entertained, and all of the B Roll is of like... a bumblebee going into a flower, or a lamb running in a field. And yes, there will be moments where someone will mess up their timing or something, and they'll be looking at their bake through the oven door like, "oh gosh I don't think this will rise in time!" Then they stand up to find Paul Hollywood directly behind them ominously. His creepy whitewalker eyes will glow white, and he'll say something like "the 12th of June. 2035. Drowning." And his eyes will go back to normal and he'll walk away. Then the baker gives a playful grimace to the camera and says "that didnt sound great, did it?". Cut to a sweet looking older woman sipping tea on a stool and she says "oo I do hope that Prue enjoys the taste of my sugary, sticky baps!". Then, at the end, someone gets a gold star for doing good, and the loser of the episode gets in the middle of a giant group hug. You see all of them at the end of the series at a giant carnival with their families and the post credits informs you that all of the contestants have become a Partridge Family-style traveling band and stayed friends forever.

[sunlightandtealeaves]

why are teen girls this hysterically funny for no reason

[sunlightandtealeaves]

[sunlightandtealeaves]

[sunlightandtealeaves]

The other night husband and I were watching a documentary about the yeti where they were doing DNA analysis of samples of supposed yeti fur, and every one of them came back as bears.

Anyway, the next night we watched a thing about some pig man who is supposed to live in Vermont. People said it had claws and a pig nose but walked upright like a man. Now, I happen to know that sideshows used to shave bears and present them as pig men. So every piece of evidence they gave of this monster sounds to me like a bear with mange.

So now the running joke in our house is that everything is bears. Aliens? Bears. Loch Ness monster? Bear. Every cryptozoological mystery is just a very crafty bear.

Bears. They’re everywhere. Be wary. Anyone or anything could be a bear.

[sunlightandtealeaves]

these are KILLING me

[sunlightandtealeaves]

the hours between 8-11pm should be reusable. optional mini time loop you can rewind and start over if you had more tasks to do or another book to read or the first three hours hanging out w your friend weren’t enough

[sunlightandtealeaves]

I'm very fond of this video

[sunlightandtealeaves]

At the lake and the fog is rolling. (Haha, I thought the first video didn’t go through so tried this one. Now they’re both up with the same caption.)

[sunlightandtealeaves]

I’m really tired of seeing people broken up into labels of absolutes.

People are not just “good” or “bad”.

People are not a list of labels. 

People are complex, situations are complex.

I know, that makes it a lot harder when you want to just write off everything someone’s ever done as bad – but that’s not how people actually are, and it would do everyone good to stop pretending they are.

I am tired of hearing about the fear people have in putting themselves out there. And it is a scary thing! Putting yourself out there means subjecting yourself to people who want a really good reason to tear you down, who will jump at the first chance to feel “good” by labeling someone else as “bad”.

I reject this. I reject the idea that there should be fear in speaking up and talking about experiences and trying to reach an understanding of a situation.

I’m unhappy to see people spitefully urging others to cut off ties with their friends under the guise of “well, that person’s just inherently bad, so if you talk to them you’re bad too.” That is fucked up. You definitely have the right to let the friend know you don’t want to hear about whoever troubles you, but you do not at all have the right to decide who their friends should be. This includes guilt trips.

Anyway, just try to be more aware of others. Everyone else is a person like you. They might not have the same experiences as you. They might not understand how their words are harmful, or how what they’re doing is wrong. They certainly won’t if you never tell them.

Most people are trying to be good, but they’re going to mess it up sometimes. Try to keep that in mind. Even when people do really fucked up shit, sometimes they are trying to do good. “The road to hell is paved with good intentions” and all that.

Nothing gets solved, no growth happens when you put people into a box from which you’ll never let them escape.

Yes, you absolutely must be careful about people who have tendencies and patterns that are harmful to you. Sometimes people try to overcome those patterns and they fail, and you have to distance yourself from them: that is the sad reality of life. Sometimes though, they can overcome it. But they certainly won’t if the first thing you do is write them off after a fuck up. 

Be sincere. Use your best judgment.

[sunlightandtealeaves]

By Japanese landscape photographer うさだだぬき ⛩ usadanu.eth@usalica

[sunlightandtealeaves]

Hybrid fuchsia.

Mie, Japan.

[sunlightandtealeaves]

“light yagami is a misogynist” I say into the mic.

the crowd boos. I begin to walk off in shame, when a voice speaks and commands silence from the room.

“she’s right… surprising, for a woman”, they say. i look for the owner of the voice. there in the 5th row stands light yagami.

[sunlightandtealeaves]