“how do you just know this” is a question I get asked a lot, because I tend to be someone who can contribute unusual facts or insight on whatever topic a casual conversation turns to, and I never know how to answer because “I pay attention” sounds rude and isn’t super actionable. but that is really it, I just take an active interest when I encounter something curious or unusual.
like recently one of my friends linked me a funny paragraph from a very badly written erotic novel. it was so bad that I thought “I wonder if this is real”, so we looked up the book it was from and learned it was a vintage horny housewife type story by someone who wrote a lot of shitty cheap porn back in the 80s, all of which now seems to be completely out of print.
in the course of googling the author, I discovered that one of their works had been cited in a 2004 court case over a prisoner’s right to keep erotic novels in his personal library after the prison confiscated them. a bit more googling turned up the case details in a legal database. the guy had received the books by mail and kept them, among others, in his cell. the prison seized them, citing a policy against prisoners having pornography. his lawyers argued that 1. erotic novels are distinct from pornography because they have artistic and expressive content beyond the depiction of sex acts, and 2. since he received them by mail they are therefore protected under his constitutional right to freely access non-disruptive information from outside the prison. I don’t know if he got his books back, but he won his case.
then we googled the defendant and found out he was in prison for helping a woman to drug and murder his boss (who she lived with), mutilate the body with acid and dump him in a ravine.
anyway my point is, take an interest. that’s how you learn weird stuff.
Minimal symptoms and minimal pain doesn’t mean overwork yourself to make up “lost time”.
[Image description: The Simpsons “Don’t make me tap the sign” meme. The sign reads: “Don’t overdo it on asymptomatic days!” in all capital letters. End ID.]
Plaintext: Yes I’m looking at you!! Knock it off and take it easy!
In the future, children will think our ways are strange. “Why do old people always grow so much milkweed in their gardens?” they’ll say. “Why do old people always write down when the first bees and butterflies show up? Why do old people hate lawn grass so much? Why do old people like to sit outside and watch bees?”
We will try to explain to them that when we were young, most people’s yards were almost entirely short grass with barely any flowers at all, and it was so commonplace to spray poisons to kill insects and weeds that it was feared monarch butterflies and American bumblebees would soon go extinct. We will show them pictures of sidewalks, shops, and houses surrounded by empty grass without any flowers or vegetables and they will stare at them like we stared at pictures of grimy children working in coal mines
We will be feeding our grandchildren strawberries and raspberries we grew in our gardens, dragging them along to the farmers’ markets for tomatoes and eggs and goats milk and pickles and pecans and salsa and sunflower seed butter and jars of honey, as they complain and drag their feet because Gramma always stands around talking to people for like an HOUR
and we will say “When I was YOUR age, fruits and vegetables came from a supermarket and they were bred to get shipped 1000 miles in a truck and sit on shelves for weeks, and they tasted so sour and watery it was like eating paper compared to these ones. It wasn’t even legal in some places to grow your own food”
and they will roll their eyes like yeah yeah just because everything was miserable in the 20s doesn’t mean I have to have a smile on my face standing in the hot sun while you listen to that one guy talk about his bees FOREVER
But they will go, because there might be baby goats.
ALT
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