If You See This On Your Dashboard, Reblog This, NO MATTER WHAT And All Your Dreams And Wishes Will Come

"Close the sky over Ukraine! Close from the bombs, from war aircrafts, from all these terrorists. Make a humanitarian zone! We are human. It is your humanitarian duty to protect people. And you are able to do it! If you don't do it, if you don't even provide us with planes so that we could protect ourselves - it means that you also want us slowly murdered" - President Zelensky to the Western political leaders, right after Ukrainian city Vinnytsia was hit by eight rockets.

March 6th, 14:24 Ukrainian time (12:24 GMT).

Why in the word would you need a license just to braid hair?

My family needs help after my dad's hospitalisation

My dad recently had to go to hospital for a procedure due to debilitating arthritis in his neck

His company, however, decided not to pay his sick leave

He was off work for 2 weeks leading up to the procedure, and was supposed to be off another 3 weeks following

Because of them refusing to pay him, he was forced to go back to work only 1 week after, against the hospital's instructions

His union is fighting it, but until then, he's lost almost an entire month of wages

We were already living paycheck to paycheck, and we don't know how we're going to make ends meet this month

I know times are tough for everyone, but if you could spare even a little, I would be so so grateful

Here is a link to my PayPal

Even if you can't donate, just reblogging would be much appreciated

Thank you

💀🐴SKELTON PAINTED HORSES🐴💀

Half of all US food produce is thrown away, new research suggests

The demand for ‘perfect’ fruit and veg means much is discarded, damaging the climate and leaving people hungry

Americans throw away almost as much food as they eat because of a “cult of perfection”, deepening hunger and poverty, and inflicting a heavy toll on the environment. By one government tally, about 60m tonnes of produce worth about $160bn (£119bn), is wasted by retailers and consumers every year - one third of all foodstuffs. 

But that is just a “downstream” measure. In more than two dozen interviews, farmers, packers, wholesalers, truckers, food academics and campaigners described the waste that occurs “upstream”: scarred vegetables regularly abandoned in the field to save the expense and labour involved in harvest. Or left to rot in a warehouse because of minor blemishes that do not necessarily affect freshness or quality. 

When added to the retail waste, it takes the amount of food lost close to half of all produce grown, experts say.

Retail giants argue that they are operating in consumers’ best interests, according to food experts. “A lot of the waste is happening further up the food chain and often on behalf of consumers, based on the perception of what those consumers want,” said Roni Neff, the director of the food system environmental sustainability and public health programme at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future in Baltimore.

“Fruit and vegetables are often culled out because they think nobody would buy them,” she said.

But Roger Gordon, who founded the Food Cowboy startup to rescue and re-route rejected produce, believes that the waste is built into the economics of food production. Fresh produce accounts for 15% of supermarket profits, he argued.

“If you and I reduced fresh produce waste by 50% like [the US agriculture secretary] Vilsack wants us to do, then supermarkets would go from [a] 1.5% profit margin to 0.7%,” he said. “And if we were to lose 50% of consumer waste, then we would lose about $250bn in economic activity that would go away.”

The farmers and truckers interviewed said they had seen their produce rejected on flimsy grounds, but decided against challenging the ruling with the US department of agriculture’s dispute mechanism for fear of being boycotted by powerful supermarket giants. They also asked that their names not be used.

“I can tell you for a fact that I have delivered products to supermarkets that was [sic] absolutely gorgeous and because their sales were slow, the last two days they didn’t take my product and they sent it back to me,” said the owner of a mid-size east coast trucking company.

“They will dig through 50 cases to find one bad head of lettuce and say: ‘I am not taking your lettuce when that lettuce would pass a USDA inspection.’ But as the farmer told you, there is nothing you can do, because if you use the Paca [Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act of 1930] on them, they are never going to buy from you again. “Are you going to jeopardise $5m in sales over an $8,000 load?”

Massive food waste is based into capitalist agriculture. If the vast majority of the food produced in America’s farms was brought to market, it would drive prices down rapidly, threatening the profits of retailers. Less than 1% of this surplus food ever reaches the mouths of the hungry. 

There was an interesting thread on Bluesky dissecting Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett's relationship

TL:DR - It seems like Gaiman has been exaggerating the level of closeness between them for YEARS

Me too! George tries to steal my pen,steal my paper,steal the drawing/writing off the paper....😁

This is what i have to put up with.

Alfred Schnittke - Story of an unknown actor, op. 125

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To the tune of Intoxicated Under the Shadow of Flowers

The Double Ninth Festival

Light mists and heavy clouds, melancholy the long dreay day, In the golden cencer the burning incense is dying away. It is again time for the lovely Double-Nith Festival; The coolness of midnight penetrates my screen of sheer silk and chills my pillow of jade. After drinking wine at twilight under the chrysanthemum hedge, My sleeves are perfumed by the faint fragrance of the plants. Oh, I cannot say it is not enchanting, Only, when the west wind stirs the curtain, I see that I am more gracile than the yellow flowers.

 Li Qingzhao

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A remarkable female poet of the Song Dynasty (960-1279), Li Qingzhao (1084-1155) made great achievements in prose as well as poetry, but most of all in the field of lyrics. Born into a literary family in present-day Jinan of Shandong Province, she established herself early as a major talent. In 1101 she married Zhao Mingcheng, who shared her artistic and academic interests. The style of Li Qingzhao’s lyrics changed sharply after she fled to the south after the invasion of the Kin Kingdom in north China. Before she went south, her lyrics mainly recounted the lives of girls and women in their boudoirs. For example, Like a Dream and Complaint of the Prince describes the airy life of cheer the poetess enjoyed at home. Tipsy in the Flower’s Shadow expresses a girl’s loneliness and longing for love, as also expressed in the Flute on Phoenix Terrace, and A Twig of Plum Blossoms. After fleeing south, she endured great hardships in life and the style of her lyric poetry turned deep and pithy. Buddhist Dancers Charm of a Maiden Singer and Slow, Slow Song explore the author’s feelings about life in exile. Joy of Eternal Union is one of the classic Li Qingzhao’s lyric poems composed in the south, presenting a scene during the Lantern Festival in which the poet, avoiding the company of friends, meditates on the bitterness consigned her by the war. In this lyric poem, Li Qingzhao rises above self-pity and expresses her fears for the whole nation. In Pride of Fishermen, the poet not only spilled out the distress caused by homelessness but also expressed a strong desire for an unfettered freedom. Li Qingzhao’s lyrics are woven with a “delicate restraint” in the following ways: first, merging intense passion with literary images, creating an artistic conception in which feelings and scenery are well blended; second, using simple but original language, which in Li Qingzhao’s lyrics is very natural and expressive. Not many literary quotations sprinkle her lyrics but with much spoken language and common sayings, Li Qingzhao’s lyrics have the beauty of music and are easy to recite. Bio and photos via:  absolutechinatours.com and cctv.com