Every Time You See A Headline Like This

i love you visible brushstrokes. i love you glue warped scrapbook pages. i love you awkward poems. i love you junk journal with faded receipts. i love you poorly composed journal layout. I love you unintentionally blurry photographs. i love you asymmetrical beading. i love you curling freeform crochet. i love you fingerprints on pottery. i love you reused materials. i love you improvised instruments. i love you mistakes. i love you bravery to make it anyway. i love you creativity that hasn't been wiped clean of every drop of humanity and sanitized and commodified.

to anyone who needs a hug right now, I've imbued this post with a hug. in other words after I wrote this post I hugged my phone for 5 minutes, so that energy should cover about 5,000 people

I know reading posts that say stuff like "love yourself" isn't going to magically make you happy

I've told people online to love themselves probably hundreds of times at this point, and most of the time when I was posting that stuff, I didn't love myself, not even a little bit

but for whatever reason I kept on living, and somehow by living long enough I managed to find out how to love myself. it was not easy, and unfortunately there is no single solution for finding out how to love yourself if you haven't already

the only thing I can say is that the only way to find it is to give it time, keep on living with the desire to one day actually care about living, and eventually it will come to you, even if you really really don't think it will

and it's definitely worth it

Good News Network

Okra and Fenugreek Extracts Safely Remove Microplastics From Water in New Texas Research

The slimy strings from okra and the gel from fenugreek seeds can trap microplastics better than the slightly-toxic synthetic polymer in use.

"The substances behind the slimy strings from okra and the gel from fenugreek seeds could trap microplastics better than a commonly used synthetic polymer.

Texas researchers proposed in 2022 using these sticky natural polymers to clean up water. Now, they’ve found that okra and/or fenugreek extracts attracted and removed up to 90% of microplastics from ocean water, freshwater, and groundwater.

With funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, Rajani Srinivasan and colleagues at Tarleton State University found that the plant-based polymers from okra, fenugreek, and tamarind stick to microplastics, clumping together and sinking for easy separation from water.

In this next stage of the research, they have optimized the process for okra and fenugreek extracts and tested results in a variety of types of water.

To extract the sticky plant polymers, the team soaked sliced okra pods and blended fenugreek seeds in separate containers of water overnight. Then, researchers removed the dissolved extracts from each solution and dried them into powders.

Analyses published in the American Chemical Society journal showed that the powdered extracts contained polysaccharides, which are natural polymers. Initial tests in pure water spiked with microplastics showed that:

One gram of either powder in a quart (one liter) of water trapped microplastics the most effectively.

Dried okra and fenugreek extracts removed 67% and 93%, respectively, of the plastic in an hour.

A mixture of equal parts okra and fenugreek powder reached maximum removal efficiency (70%) within 30 minutes.

The natural polymers performed significantly better than the synthetic, commercially available polyacrylamide polymer used in wastewater treatment.

Then the researchers tested the plant extracts on real microplastic-polluted water. They collected samples from waterbodies around Texas and brought them to the lab. The plant extract removal efficiency changed depending on the original water source.

Okra worked best in ocean water (80%), fenugreek in groundwater (80-90%), and the 1:1 combination of okra and fenugreek in freshwater (77%).

The researchers hypothesize that the natural polymers had different efficiencies because each water sample had different types, sizes and shapes of microplastics.

Polyacrylamide, which is currently used to remove contaminants during wastewater treatment, has low toxicity, but its precursor acrylamide is considered toxic. Okra and fenugreek extracts could serve as biodegradable and nontoxic alternatives.

“Utilizing these plant-based extracts in water treatment will remove microplastics and other pollutants without introducing additional toxic substances to the treated water,” said Srinivasan in a media release, “thus reducing long-term health risks to the population.”

She had previously studied the use of food-grade plant extracts as non-toxic flocculants to remove textile-based pollutants from wastewater and thought, ‘Why not try microplastics?’"

-via Good News Network, May 10, 2025

#1 rule of freelancing is that you have to be dead fuckin serious about getting paid. do not assume everything is going fine and they will pay you eventually. follow up as many times as you have to until the money is in your bank account. if you catch yourself thinking, “oh, i don’t want to bother them…” kill that thought and b o t h e r them. send uber-polite, grandma-is-watching e-mails along the lines of, “Hi! Hope this note finds you well. Just wanted to check in re: the status of my payment. Do you know when the funds will be available?” every few days until you get your money. 

also if you’re freelancing for a client based in new york city they’re legally required to pay you within thirty days of receiving your invoice so put a note on your invoice that says, “Per the Freelance Isn’t Free Act, payment is due within thirty days of completion.” if they go over that deadline or they just don’t pay you at all, you can file a complaint with the city’s department of consumer affairs and have your lost wages recovered. go w/ christ brah. 

werewolves are the best because they can be about womanhood or transness or morality or self-image or any type of Otherness. alienation. being afraid of yourself. society being afraid of you. finding your true self. becoming free.

Happy Pride 2023, everyone!!! ⚔️🌈

saw a thing recently about how callin ppl “y’all” and “folks” is becoming cringe. buddy you can pry those terms of address from my cold dead hands, they’re the only thing keeping me from calling everyone “honeybee”

draw it bad and draw it weird and draw it catered only to yourself and draw it wobbly and draw it too small and draw it with the default brush and draw it without using references and draw it and leave it unfinished and draw it for the first time and draw it

Jury nullification. Pass it on.