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Kui Buri National Park’s only female ranger shatters stereotypes | Stories | WWF

In Thailand, women like Kwan remain a rarity. But neither this nor the voices alleging that women aren’t suited for the ranger lifestyle – which comprises long working hours in spartan and sometimes dangerous conditions, away from loved ones – have prevented her from living her truth.

“I think [gender] doesn’t matter for your occupation. Any job that a man can do a woman can do also. Sometimes even better.“

RECON is a queer, crowdfunded web series dramedy about a group of queer college freshmen and their attempts to balance their personal lives and relationships – while training to be spies. Set at the mysterious, ancient Academy, the show follows Ava, a skilled hacker from the Midwest who’s finally able to come out and make friends at her new school. While she’s able to make friends quickly, everything falls apart when she finds out that her entire life is being recorded and posted online in neatly edited, five- to ten-minute episodes.

Holy crap - why, YES, Luke Cage, yes I do!

Nanny of the Maroons, as the show goes on to say, was a leader of a city of formerly-enslaved Africans in Jamaica. They regularly raided plantations to liberate others. Rumors swirled that she was royalty, but her origins are a bit unclear - the show says she was Asante, but I think that’s still uncertain?

She beat the hell out of the British for years, and was reputed to have magic powers. She fed her people with quick-growing pumpkins, made the British ill with her herbalism, and camouflaged warriors so well, British soldiers would hang their coats on them, thinking them trees. Said soldiers would then decapitate the British and vanish into the forest. She could supposedly catch bullets with her bare hands.

To this day, the site of old Nanny Town is a place where unwelcome visitors reputedly go missing. 

And yes, I cover her in my first book. 

(she’s so cool! so glad her story is suffusing its way into pop culture! she fits in perfectly with the storyline they have going in Luke Cage.) 

Madagascar, Tsingy. These knife-like limestone formations stretch over 70 meters into the air. Known as The Forest Of Knives, these razor-sharp limestone points can slice through equipment and flesh easily, which makes traversing them extremely difficult and dangerous, some climbers have been known to get through over 15 pairs of boots! It is estimated that the Tsingy has the largest underground cave system in the world and many animals live among the endless maze of disorienting corridors, humid caves, and unforgiving razors at the ground level. (Image one credit: Pierre-Yves Babelon)

What exactly is a sun eclipse? Will I be able to see it and if so when from the Netherlands?

The solar eclipse is when the moon is directly in front of the Sun and creates a shadow on the Earth. They happen about once every 18 months. I don’t believe that you’ll be able to see this eclipse from the Netherlands. I think the next one to be in Europe is in 2026. There’s one in Chillie and Argentia in 2019 and another in Antartica in 2021. 

Donations pour in for Ida B. Wells monument in Chicago, but $180K still needed

The investigative journalist and civil rights activist could be one of the first women memorialized with a public monument in Chicago

There’s a push to crowdfund an Ida B. Wells monument in Chicago. They’re around halfway there. Let’s give them a boost.

The National Gallery Acquires Its First Painting by a Woman Since 1991

The London museum's acquisition of what is believed to be a rare Artemisia Gentileschi self-portrait demands a closer look at the world the artist inhabited in 17th-century Florence.

And the painter they chose was Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1653), whose first art show wasn’t held til 1991. Famously, she painted herself as Judith, beheading her rapist (as Holofernes). She also took her rapist to court and won - in the 1600s!

I cover her in book one. Here she is, painting her famous rendition of Judith and Holofernes.

“I VIOLATE ARTICLE 27, SEC. 553-4 OF THE MARYLAND ANNOTATED CODE SAFELY, OFTEN, AND EXTREMELY WELL,” Second National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights, Washington, D.C., October 11, 1987. Photo © Exakta.

Sections 553 and 554 of Article 27 of the Maryland Code prohibited sodomy (punishable with a sentence of “not less than one year nor more than ten years”), oral sex, and “any other unnatural or perverted sexual practice with any other person.”

via @lgbt_history