why couldn’t i get a useful type of autism instead i got “obsessed with the dc metro” autism
It’s not our fault. It’s just. It’s the DC Metro. It’s a very good mass transit system and the vibes are also immaculate. The stations are the peak of like…caring brutalism. They’re so practical but the intent is obvious. High vaulted ceilings of unpainted concrete like cathedrals where people worship by moving along. They honor this place by leaving it. Those little cutouts in the concrete. A human being designed those places for other human beings with care. Yet they’re so clearly not to be lived in. You are not supposed to be here. You are right where you need to be. You’re always a stranger in those stations. You’re always right at home in them.
Anon, ten years ago gay people couldn’t get married in large parts of the US. AIDS was an almost certain death sentence when I was in high school. I was looking at job boards the other day and found a part time gas station job that had health insurance as a benefit, which NEVER would have happened 15 years ago. When I was a kid, hitting your child was extremely normalized in the US and my parents were the weird ones for not doing it. There is a vaccine for chicken pox. I didn’t meet anyone who had transitioned until my 20s because it was so uncommon to transition in the aughts, and now there are some states that protect your right to have gender affirming care provided by your health insurance. It’s not all states, but it’s better than the number of states that had it in 2010, which was zero. THERE ARE TENANTS UNIONS NOW. WE HAVE A VACCINE AGAINST CERVICAL CANCER.
And all of that has been the work of a lot of individuals and organizations and research teams and activists.
Do you know how bugfuck insane the words “Unionized Starbucks” would have sounded to someone in 2005? Baristas getting union-mandated breaks could have been a throwaway joke in part of the Scary Movie franchise as something ridiculous.
RALPH NADER WAS AGITATING FOR A FIFTEEN DOLLAR MINIMUM WAGE IN 2004 AND SHIT IS MOVING SLOWLY BUT MY STATE HAS A TWENTY DOLLAR MINIMUM WAGE FOR FAST FOOD WORKERS. WHEN I STARTED HIGH SCHOOL THE ONLY OPTION FOR AN ABORTION AFTER 7 WEEKS WAS SURGICAL AND NOW THERE’S A PILL.
FUCKING. ELECTRIC CARS. SO GODDAMNED MANY PEOPLE HAVE SOLAR PANELS ON THEIR HOUSES OR IN THEIR PARKING LOTS.
WE DON’T HAVE SMOG DAYS IN LOS ANGELES ANYMORE UNLESS THERE’S A FIRE AND IT’S BECAUSE OF CARB STANDARDS.
LITERALLY MILLIONS OF FUCKING PEOPLE TURNED OUT TO PROTEST POLICE BRUTALITY IN 2020 AND YOU CAN SAY “NOTHING HAPPENED” ALL YOU WANT BUT THE WAY PEOPLE TALK ABOUT IT NOW IS FUCKING DIFFERENT THAN THEY DID AFTER RODNEY KING AND NOW PEOPLE WILL STOP AND WATCH OUT FOR EACH OTHER INSTEAD OF GOING ‘NOT MY BUSINESS’
THERE IS A MALARIA VACCINE THAT HAS BEEN GIVEN TO OVER A MILLION CHILDREN IN JUST THE LAST FIVE YEARS SINCE IT WAS APPROVED FOR USE OUTSIDE OF TRIALS
Something that struck me the other night as truly incredible—I grew up during the height of the AIDS crisis in the ’80s and ’90s. I remember around 1990 or so was when people really started working to bring HIV/AIDS and the search for a cure into public view and begin the really, really long work of destigmatizing it, even a little bit. The homophobic terror people had of even being NEAR someone who had the so-called “gay disease,” I really cannot understate this. A diagnosis was considered an absolute death sentence.
The other night I was watching whatever random thing on YouTube, and I got yet more of the constant ads that irritate the fuck out of me. But this one was for an HIV maintenance medication. It was a long ad, probably 60 seconds, and so help me, I watched the whole thing. It talked about this drug (forgive me, I can’t remember the name) that would let you live a happy and fulfilling life (while mentioning that of course safe sex is important). And it showed queer couples, straight couples (to break the stereotype), people who looked single and happy, different races and genders and presentations and body sizes, going out to lunch or cuddling on a couch or going out for a date, whatever it was the scene was implying. Bright colors, soothing optimistic music and voiceover, physical affection including kissing—you couldn’t even tell who among the actor couples was or wasn’t portraying an HIV patient. It blew my fucking mind to just see a whole minute of this between ads for Pizza Hut and car insurance. I’m not even sure anyone would have shown a gay couple kissing, full stop, on TV in 1990. And this ad was just out here like, if you’ve contracted this illness, there’s help for it, and you can live a good happy life among your loved ones. But also, you deserve to have that happiness, out in the open, and there will be people who love you, unafraid. Even if, and especially if, you’re gay. This is a world where this is possible. Like I’m honestly tearing up right now. I could not have imagined this in 1990. I could not.
You will swim for decades, and suddenly you will look up and see islands that you never would have dreamed of.
SHORT ANSWER: IDK, HE JUST IS. I JUST LOVE HIM SO MUCH.
MEDIUM ANSWER: LET’S GO BACK IN TIME. It’s October 2012. I’m in a pretty dire situation, ficwise, because all the people I usually rely on for recs are just TEEN WOLF as far as the eye can see. I know for a fact that there is quality 1D fic out there by an author I love if I am willing to cross that line. I FIGHT IT FOR A LONG TIME, ANON, BUT THERE IS SO MUCH BAD STEREK AND I JUST WANT AN AU THAT ISN’T GOING TO DISAPPOINT ME. And so I read Better With You, and it’s every bit as good as I was expecting, and Liam’s the POV character. Even though at this point I know so little about 1D that I can’t even identify Liam in a photo and I’m under the impression that Liam/Louis is the dominant fandom pairing [this was a disappointment when I realized there wasn’t as much fic for them as I was expecting, but by now I’ve seen enough of 1D tinhats to be relieved], he’s still effectively my entry point into this whole neverending emotional disaster, so the boring answer is that I SAW HIM FIRST and I imprinted on him like a baby duck and/or a Twilight werewolf. [It’s definitely a lot closer to whatever fucked up thing is happening to Twilight werewolves than it is to baby ducks, I’m gonna be honest.] I resisted for a long time, but there was no stopping it.
LONG AND COMPLETELY UNHINGED ANSWER: I REALLY JUST LOVE THE SHIT OUT OF LIAM PAYNE, and I will never be able to articulate any kind of WHY because it’s not like any of this is rational.
yeah if humans tried to smell space just like that, we’d die, no doubt about it
but the smell of space lingers on spacewalk suits, and docking hatches when astronauts open them!
apparently, space itself smells like burning hot metal, or a hot barbeque grill with a slight hint of spent gasoline. The moon, apparently, smells like a gun after its been shot!
The coolest thing about it all is that the smell is actually what are left of dying stars- it’s literally the smell of stardust, and the particles smell like that because they’re so rich in hydrocarbons- something so very essential to life, and speculated by a lot of astronomers and astrobiologists and such to be the very thing life on earth started from!
another neat fact is that no two solar systems smell the same- ours smells like that because our solar system in particular is extremely rich in carbon, and other solar systems and places in the universe will have extremely different smells depending on what elements are most abundant in their system!
We are makings of a great forging and in the space between the celestial bodies, the scent of bright embers persists even in the dark.
dear diary . i no longer want to go to space because today i was informed that it smells like the interstate
left: the Nebra sky disc, circa 1600 BCE, showing the Moon, Sun, and stars in gold on copper - the oldest depiction of the cosmos in the world
right: the Webb Space Telescope, July 2022, revealing thousands of baby galaxies forming in the early days of the universe - humankind’s deepest look into the sky
GOOD EVENING, children, and a very MERRY NUGGETMAS to you all! What’s that? You don’t know what “the hell” NUGGETMAS is? Well, gather round, honey, cuz daddy will tell you.
MANY SLEEPS AGO, in a mystikal place called NEW ZEALAND, otherwise known as EARTH’S HOBBIT HOLE, a spritely young man with an ass that jiggled like a bowl full of jelly cuz jam don’t shake, ASCENDED into the heavens. LOUIS TOMLINSON sat atop his ROYAL BALCONY and looked at us, his loyal , frothing SUBJECTS and felt in his tender heart that he must somehow TOUCH US in our own shriveled excuses for blood-pumpers. But of course, we know now that it would be impossible for LOUIS TOMLINSON to come down to the ground and speak directly to us, for the sound of his voice would shatter us into millions of sprinkles, or we would be overcome by our complete adoration of him that we would tear him limb from limb until he was also millions of sprinkles. It would be dangerous to be close, for us and for him.
AND SO, LOUIS TOMLINSON, AKA CHICK NUGGLE, AKA CHICKENTA NAUS, AKA OLD SAINT CHICK, AKA FATHER NUGGETMAS, reached into his magical sack. Like all the way in there, like his full arm. He was elbow deep in that sack, SO IT IS SAID. He wrapped his tiny, furious fists around HANDFULS of DELICIOUS NUGGETS, and he TOSSED THEM over his the railing of his HEAVENLY BALCONY. LOUIS TOMLINSON gave of his only NUGGETS so that we may LIVE.
It is unclear whether or not people hated the first NUGGETMAS or if they loved it. What is known is that now NUGGETMAS is celebrated each year by millions across the globe. EVERY YEAR on NUGGETMAS, NUGGETS rain from the heavens as if from the HANDS of LOUIS TOMLINSON himself. We all open our PALMS to the sky, tilt our HEADS back, stick out our TONGUES, and wait for NUGGETS to fill our BODIES and SPIRITS. A chicken nugget may catch in your EYELASH and you will NEVER feel more LOVELY and FREE. You may gather the NUGGETS into a NUGGETBALL and have a spirited NUGGETBALL FIGHT with your TROUBLEMAKER FRIENDS who have only given you more CONFIDENCE to be YOURSELF. BUILD a SLED out of WHATEVER BALCONY YOU CAN FIND and SLIDE down a NUGGET HILL, NUGGETS spraying in your face on the BITTERSWEET WIND. Join FAMILY, FRIENDS, CHOSEN FAMILY, or NO ONE in decorating the NUGGETMAS NUGGET with NUGGETS. BUILD a NUGGETMAN out of the dirty, damaged nuggets dusting the ground. GIVE the NUGGETMAN a CHICHI pipe and a NUNU nose and TWO EYES MADE OUT OF NUGGETS. Legend has it that if you place a HALF-EATEN BURGER that has been SMASHED on top of a CAR atop the head of your NUGGETMAN, he will come to life. GATHER ROUND the BALCONY and toss NUGGETS from it while singing NUGGET CAROLS, like CLASSICS such as “TOSS THE NUGGETS”:
THROW THE NUGGETS OFF THE BALCONY NANANANANA-NA-NA-NA-NA ‘TIS THE CHICHI TO BE NUNU NANANANANA-NA-NA-NA-NA TOSS WE NOW OUR CHICKEN NUGGETS NA-NA-NA-NA-NA-NA-NA-NA-NA
Or a rousing rendition of “NUGGETMAS WONDERLAND”:
AT THE PEOPLE WE CAN TOSS SOME NUGGETS AND EAT THEM UP WHEN THEY HIT THE GROUND WE’LL BEG LOUIS TO DUMP THEM DOWN IN BUCKETS CHICKEN NUGGETS CHICKEN NUGGETS CHICKEN NUGGETS
Now, there are SOME out there who have lost the NUGGETMAS SPIRIT. They say NUGGETMAS is nothing but a commercial holiday to rally behind a FALSE IDOL and to get us to go out and buy 62 INCH NUGGETS or NUGGET PHONES or DIAMOND NUGGETS. SOME PEOPLE even say that LOUIS TOMLINSON is not real because there are MALL LOUIS TOMLINSONS with FAKE MULLETS and NO ASSES going around half-heartedly sprinkling nuggets on the floor. Now, it’s true: LOUIS TOMLINSON cannot be everywhere at once, so sometimes he has to use HELPERS. But he sees you, and he knows you, and he is all real.
NUGGETMAS, much like the pointy-toothed, bemulleted lost boy who founded it, is about being SPONTANEOUS. It is about CREATING MISCHIEF. And most importantly, it is about SHOWING PEOPLE that you CARE ABOUT THEM in CREATIVE WAYS. NUGGETMAS is about being LOVED and LOVING in return. So get out there, buy some CHICKEN NUGGETS, and pelt someone you care about with them until they collect the nuggets in a tupperware container and keep them forever. CHERISH this holiday season with all your heart and your entire butt.
HAIL LOUIS FULL OF NUGGETS. BLESSED ART THOU AMONGST NUGGETS, AND BLESSED ARE THE NUGGETS OF THY WOMB. AMEN.
