02 July 2025 @ 02:13 am
Killer whales attempt to feed people in first-ever sightings: 'Represents altruism'

Among their own whale circles, they have long shared their prey with one another, but in a new study, recorded over the course of the last two decades, wild orcas were spotted trying to share their food with human beings.

These wild whales, on 34 occasions, across four oceans, were documented approaching humans on their own, dropping a fresh kill in front of the people, and waiting for a response.



The polite thing to do is accept it, and if you have anything suitable, swap something back. Cetaceans love the hell out of human item drops. A sturdy beach toy should go over well.  Treat this as a first-contact situation; be cautious but aware that you are dealing with a sophont of another species.

 
 
Current Mood: busy
 
 
02 July 2025 @ 02:07 am
Sinful televangelist Jimmy Swaggart has passed away

... I just kinda want to pass Lucifer a big bag of popcorn and a big shaker of Mexican spice blend.  He's gonna need it.
 
 
Current Mood: busy
 
 
 
01 July 2025 @ 10:54 pm
Today we made a smoothie with:

1 cup orange juice
1 cup Brown Cow vanilla yogurt
1 banana
1/2 cup Great Value Mixed Fruit (pineapple, sliced strawberries, mango, peaches)
1/2 cup ice

The result is slightly thick, a pale peach color, with a nice orange-tropical flavor -- almost reminds me of a dreamsicle.  It'd be good with some coconut; there's another tropical mix with that but it's not what we have at the moment.
Tags: ,
 
 
Current Mood: busy
 
 
 
 
 
02 July 2025 @ 11:25 am
Our new challenge is:

SCIENCE



As always, you can interpret the prompt literally or figuratively, in whatever way works for you.

Each work created for this challenge should be posted as a new entry to the comm. Posting starts now and continues up until the challenge ends at 4pm Pacific Time on Thursday, 10 July. No sign-up required.

Mods will tag your work with fandom and challenge. When you've posted entries to three consecutive challenges, you will earn a name tag, and we'll go back and tag all your previous entries with your name.

All kinds of fanworks in all fandoms are welcome. Please have a look at our guidelines before you play. If you have any questions or concerns, don't hesitate to contact a mod. And if you have any suggestions for future challenges, you can leave them in the comments of this post.

Also, keep an eye out for the next [community profile] ffw_social post, which will go up in the next couple of days. If you haven't joined the [community profile] ffw_social comm, it's never too late to come and check it out. (Posts are locked, which means you have to join to see them.)
 
 
02 July 2025 @ 11:21 am
Our eightieth Amnesty challenge is now closed. Here are the entries:

Je Ne Regrette Rien Challenge: Madagascar 3: wallpaper: no regrets by [personal profile] lilly_c
Background Challenge: S.W.A.T.: Fan Fiction: No Longer In The Background by [personal profile] darkjediqueen
Pink Challenge: FAKE: Fanfic: Pink Shirts by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Animal Challenge: FAKE: Fanfic: Animal by [personal profile] badly_knitted
enemies challenge: star trek voyager: wallpaper: prayin’ on my downfall by [personal profile] lilly_c
Resolutions challenge: star trek voyager: wallpaper: burned with desire by [personal profile] lilly_c
Restraints: Original Fiction: Inappropriate Use of Rune-Carved Cuffs by [personal profile] analogbasilisk
Yarn/Charity Challenges: Miss Marple: Fanfic: An Act of Charity by [personal profile] smallhobbit
Nap Challenge: FAKE: Fanfic: Different Strokes by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Trapped: due South: Fanfiction: Closeted by [personal profile] lucy_roman
Double: "Harry Potter": Fanart: Double Date by [personal profile] digthewriter
Teaching Challenge: Stargate SG-1: Fanfic: Necessary Skill by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Sign Challenge: FAKE: Fanfic: Just Married by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Nightmare: Original Fiction: The Past Lives In The Shadows by [personal profile] analogbasilisk
Dragon Challenge: Sherlock Holmes (ACD): Fanfic: A Tolerant Landlady by [personal profile] smallhobbit
Swallow: Original Fiction: A Question Older Than Time by [personal profile] analogbasilisk
Sorry Challenge: Stargate SG-1: Fanfic: Accepted by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Family Challenge: Adventure Time: Fanfiction: Families are Tricky by [personal profile] infinitum_noctem
Yellow Challenge: Stargate SG-1: Fanfic: Too Alien by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Diamonds and Pearls challenge: Law & Order: fic: strung together by [personal profile] lilly_c
The Last Word: xxxHoLiC: Fanfic: death as a perfect circle (that elusive object) by [personal profile] bluedreaming
Mischief Challenge: Stargate SG-1: Fanfic: Prank by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Spy Challenge: Spooks (MI5): Fanfic: The picture in Vogue by [personal profile] smallhobbit
Finger Challenge: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Fanfic: Battle Wounds by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Feed: Original Fiction: Melancholic, And Hungry by [personal profile] analogbasilisk
Nap: Tokyo Mew Mew OlΓ©: Fanfic: Interrupted Cat Nap by [personal profile] soullessserenity
School Challenge: Torchwood: Fanfic: Treasured by [personal profile] m_findlow
Rainbow Challenge: FAKE: Fanfic: Pride At Work by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Cave + Nightmare + Spark Challenges: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Fanfic: Flicker of a Dream by [personal profile] veronyxk84
Bounce: Original Fiction: the key to bonding is at the base by [personal profile] analogbasilisk
Influences Challenge: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Fanfic: Bad Influences by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Dragon: The Double: Dragon and Phoenix by [personal profile] teaotter
Hit the Wall Challenge: Greek Myth: Fanfic: Be Well by [personal profile] drabblewriter
Borrowed Title: Guardian: fanfic: Pages for You by [personal profile] china_shop
Dust Challenge: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Fanfic: Dusted by [personal profile] badly_knitted
Red challenge : Iron Man comics : icons : Shiny Red by [personal profile] highlander_ii

Also, congratulations to [personal profile] bluedreaming, who earned a name tag.

\o/ \o/ \o/

Thank you to everyone who participated! You're now free to post your entries to your journal or wherever else you'd like. If you're archiving on AO3, you can add your work to our fan_flashworks collection there.

New challenge coming right up.
 
 
 
01 July 2025 @ 04:23 pm
July is Disability Pride Month.

These are some of my characters with disabilities. Series with disabled main characters include Clay of Life, the Draft Dawgs thread in Arts and Crafts America, Daughters of the Apocalypse, Frankenstein's Family, Monster House, The Moon Door, P.I.E., and Walking the Beat. Polychrome Heroics has a bunch, but they are scattered around various threads; some are ordinary disabilities while others relate to superpowers. You can ask for more disabled characters in any relevant prompt call. Today's Poetry Fishbowl theme is "Weaponized Incompetence and Malicious Compliance."

Read more... )
 
 
Current Mood: busy
 
 
01 July 2025 @ 02:55 pm
There are over twenty mer-marvelous icons entered this time. Thank you very much to all the participants!
Voter Guide
Anyone is welcome to vote.
Please choose FOUR (4) icons for the main placements and one each for the categories Best Color (Coloring), Best Image Crop & Best Composition.
Please, don't vote for your own icons or ask others to vote for your icons.
Please try to vote for the best quality icons, not only the subjects, fandoms or makers.

Important:
Please vote for a different icon for each of the categories (Color, Crop, Composition).
There is a checkbox & text answer combo poll.
Voting will be open for one week.
Thank you for voting.

Vote Here πŸ—³οΈ.... )
 
 
Current Mood: 🀩 amazed
 
 
Title: Shiny Red
Fandom: Iron Man / Marvel comics
Rating: PG
Content notes: None apply
Summary: icons of Tony Stark / Iron Man - armor, bath towels, even shirts for racquetball - all red


Shiny Red )
 
 
 
01 July 2025 @ 02:48 pm
Sunshine Revival Challenge #1: Light

Journaling Prompt: Light up your journal with activity this month. Talk about your goals for July or for the second half of 2025.

Creative Prompt: Shine a light on your own creativity. Create anything you want (an image, an icon, a story, a poem, or a craft) and share it with your community.. Post your answer to today’s challenge in your own space and leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so
.

Sunshine-Revival-Carnival-1.png

Read more... )
 
 
Current Mood: accomplished
 
 
This is today's freebie. It was inspired by a prompt from [personal profile] torc87. It also fills the "I tried being reasonable. I didn't like it." square in my 7-1-25 card for the Western Bingo fest. This poem belongs to the series One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis.

Read more... )
 
 
Current Mood: busy
 
 
01 July 2025 @ 02:47 pm
Welcome to [community profile] spookybang. Where we cross over characters from different supernatural, paranormal and horror fandoms for the sheer joy of it. Author Sign ups are now for July 2025 til August 10th 2025. Other sign ups go much later.


 
 
01 July 2025 @ 01:24 pm
Today is mostly sunny and warm, nicer than it has been recently.

I fed the birds.  I've seen a mixed flock of sparrows and house finches, plus a pair of cardinals that flew away when I went outside.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 7/1/25 -- I refilled the hopper feeder.

EDIT 7/1/25 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 7/1/25 -- I watered the old picnic table and the patio plants.  Despite recent rains, things were wilting. :/

EDIT 7/1/25 -- I watered the new picnic table and septic garden.

I've seen a grackle and a robin.

I picked a 'Chocolate Sprinkles' tomato.

EDIT 7/1/25 -- I watered the telephone pole garden and seedlings in the savanna.

Fireflies are coming out.

I am done for the night. 

 
 
Current Mood: busy
 
 
01 July 2025 @ 12:28 pm
The Poetry Fishbowl is now CLOSED.  Thank you for your time and attention.  Please keep an eye on this page as I am still writing.

Starting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "Weaponized Incompetence and Malicious Compliance!" I will be checking this page periodically throughout the day. When people make suggestions, I'll pick some and weave them together into a poem ... and then another ... and so on. I'm hoping to get a lot of ideas and a lot of poems.

I'll be soliciting ideas for activists, rebels, traitors, exes, abuse survivors, refugees, runaway youth, slaves or other captives, slavers, housemates, siblings, parents, teachers, clergy, leaders, bosses, employees, superheroes, supervillains, teammates, alien or fantasy species, failure analysts, ethicists, other people who get into untenable situations, protesting, dragging your feet, breaking things, causing problems because you were told to, planning, throwing in the towel, escaping, running like someone left the gate open, adventuring, hitchhiking, quitting school, divorcing, disowning, betraying, teaching, leaving your comfort zone, discovering things, conducting experiments, observation changing experiments, troubleshooting, improvising, adapting, cleaning up messes, cooperating, bartering, taking over in an emergency, saving the day, discovering yourself, studying others, testing boundaries, coming of age, learning what you can (and can't) do, sharing, preparing for the worst, expecting the unexpected, fixing what's broke, upsetting the status quo, changing the world, accomplishing the impossible, recovering from setbacks, returning home, slave ships, slave quarters, abusive homes, trails, sailing ships, campervans or RVs, distant lands, the forest primeval, prehistory, liminal zones, schools, residential school-concentration camps, homeless shelters, hotels, churches, sharehouses, campfires, laboratories, supervillain lairs, nonhuman accommodations and adaptations, stores, starships, alien planets, magical lands, foreign dimensions, other places where the intolerable happens, unhappy relationships, crappy jobs, educational abuse, responsibility without authority is abuse, protest rallies, slavery or captivity, locks or chains, travel mishaps, sudden surprises, the buck stops here, trial and error, intercultural entanglements, asking for help and getting it, enemies to friends/lovers, interdimensional travel, lab conditions are not field conditions, superpower manifestation, the end of where your framework actually applies, ethics, innovation, problems that can't be solved by hitting, teamwork, found family, complementary strengths and weaknesses, personal growth, and poetic forms in particular.

Currently eligible bingo card(s) for donors wishing to sponsor a square:

Western Bingo Card 7-1-25

Among my more relevant series for the main theme:

Weaponized incompetence has two modes:
* One is shirking a fair share of work by pretending to be bad at it: for instance, copper-digging men who try to con women into doing all the emotional labor. (Take care to distinguish this from people who don't know how to do things because they were never taught, or people who are genuinely bad at a category of thing.)
* The other is a form of activism, and indeed, one of the leading forms of resistance in slavery: doing work slowly, sloppily, breaking tools, playing dumb, etc. It's exactly how black people got a reputation for being stupid and lazy, because their ancestors were unwilling to be exploited and fought back in subtle ways.

Malicious compliance is following an order to the letter, expecting that to cause problems. It is a form of protest most often used when pointing out a flaw or proposing a better solution would be ignored or even punished.


Among my more relevant series for the main theme:

An Army of One is developing its own neurovariant culture after rebelling against the Galactic Arms.

The Bear Tunnels introduces modern principles to people in the past, touching on slavery and rebellion.

Not Quite Kansas includes demons, who are masters of malicious compliance.

The Ocracies has a wide variety of countries crammed together, each with a totally different government. Sometimes people leave their homeland to find something they like better.

One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis follows Shaeth as he works on becoming the God of Drunks after quitting as the God of Evili.

Peculiar Obligations mixes Quakers and pirates, among other things. It's another setting where people strive against slavery.

Polychrome Heroics has ordinary humans, supernaries, blue-plate specials, superheroes, supervillains, primal and animal soups all trying to get along and figure out how to make a functional society. The supervillains are the most likely to practice weaponized incompetence and malicious compliance. Among the more relevant threads are Danso and Family, Dr. Infanta, Fortressa, Iron Horses, Shiv, and Trichromatic Attachments.

Or you can ask for something new.

Linkbacks reveal a verse of any open linkback poem.

Read more... )
 
 
Current Mood: creative