fireweed
@fireweed@lemmy.world
- Comment on LPT: Follow #bloomscrolling on Mastodon for a good time. 4 days ago:
Top-of-my-head identification attempt, approximately left to right, top to bottom:
rhododendron, iris, milkweed(??), mushroom (???), trillium (?), can’t tell too obscured, narcissus(?), no idea, columbine, too obscured, no idea, random forest shot
- Comment on Cardinals most likely to be the pope 4 days ago:
Bothered me too so I went and looked it up.
Northern cardinal range:
Stupid meme made me go learn something.
- Comment on Know when you are appreciated 1 week ago:
Live in the US? Have a yard or balcony where you can grow plants? Then you should check out the Xerxes Society’s plant lists for recommendations re: plants to support pollinators in your area.
- Comment on Religions have some of the wackiest rules 1 week ago:
I can’t tell if you’re being humorous here, but historically babies were baptized shortly after birth out of fear that anyone who died without being baptized would be unable to get into heaven.
In the middle ages* in Europe, baptism was usually scheduled a few days after birth, and often the historical record includes baptism dates and death dates for individuals, so historians estimate birth dates to be a few days prior to the baptism date. Babies that died pre-baptism were thought to go to purgatory instead of heaven, and considering the high infant mortality rate pre-modern medicine, there was a bit of a rush to get your offspring baptized pronto to save their itty bitty souls. Generally this is no longer believed, at least not by most mainstream Protestant sects, and many Christians nowadays opt to wait until their children are old enough to “appreciate” the event more.
*Not sure exactly when, and maybe this was mostly a Catholic thing? Again, this is not my area of expertise.
- Comment on Religions have some of the wackiest rules 1 week ago:
I don’t know if I’d call it “easy” reading, but this is a well-regarded college textbook that’s popular in “Christianity 101” religion classes (so at least it’s entry-level and doesn’t assume prior knowledge on the topic):
bartehrman.com/the-new-testament-a-historical-int…
For something much lighter, Extra Credits did a video series on early Christian schisms that mentions the circumcision debate:
youtube.com/watch?v=E1ZZeCDGHJE&list=PLhyKYa0YJ_5…
I’m far from a religious scholar (just someone who enjoys history from time to time), so I’d be curious if other folks have additional recommendations.
- Comment on Religions have some of the wackiest rules 1 week ago:
Actually there was a huge debate among early Christians whether circumcision was still required because Jesus never spoke on the issue (or if he did, there was no verifiable record of it).
To crudely summarize:
The earliest Christians were primarily Jews, so they were already circumcized as required by Judaism so it was a non-issue. However unlike Judaism where you’re almost always born into the religion, Christianity actively encourages adult conversion, so as more non-Jews (e.g. Greeks) began to identify as Christians, the circumcision issue became a conundrum. Some felt Christianity was a branch of Judaism and as such Jewish practices like circumcision were still required, whereas others objected because they saw Christianity as a new approach to Judaism, or even as a separate religion altogether (circumcision specifically was hotly debated due to such issues as adult circumcision being more, shall we say, unappealing than infant circumcision, plus getting circumcized would “out” non-Jews in nude spaces like bath houses, which was at best awkward and at worst deadly).
The earliest followers of Jesus thought Jesus was going to return in their lifetimes, so these types of issues were not discussed (or at least not resolved) by the original founders and proselytizers (researchers have determined the Gospels weren’t even composed until well after everyone involved was dead), but as generations passed it became clear that the Second Coming actually may not happen anytime soon, so practical issues of “how to establish a new religion (is it even a new religion or just a Jewish sect???)” turned into gigantic internal debates for the community. That’s what much of the New Testament is: letters back and forth trying to interpret the words of Jesus to resolve doctrinal conflict. In other words, the New Testament is basically four different versions of the story of Jesus (Mark, Matthew and Luke which were based on Mark and a lost “Gospel X”, and John), followed by a curated back-and-forth commentary section debating issues of the day such as circumcision and women’s role in the church, and controversially capped off by the (theorized) hallucinations of a hermit tripping balls off donated moldy bread.
The history of the New Testament (how it was written and later compiled, early texts that were lost or discarded, and all the doctrinal conflicts that boiled over into variously incidents of geopolitical chaos) is fascinating and seriously worth exploring.
- Comment on Velvet Spider 3 weeks ago:
For the curious, the original text says “cute” in Japanese (the infamous “kawaii”)
- Comment on cha-cha-changes 4 weeks ago:
c/SocialScienceMemes
(Does this exist? It deserves to exist, if for no other reason than to encourage heated debates over where psychology memes should go)
- Comment on I'm leaving the US for good, anything I should do before I leave? 5 weeks ago:
Again, depending on where in the world you are, you may not have the equipment nor access to ingredients necessary to make these properly. You might be able to approximate, but it won’t be as good, which is the entire point of my comment.
American pizza requires a pizza oven or regular oven with a steel/stone (or dish for Detroit-style pizza), specific types of cheese, and depending on your preference, specific toppings; these may not be available abroad. In some countries, ovens are not considered standard kitchen equipment; good luck making decent pizza on the stovetop.
Similarly, really good BBQ requires special equipment that even most American homes don’t have, and requires a good deal of outdoor space (otherwise you risk smoking out yourself/your neighbors).
Mexican food is more flexible in terms of equipment, but ingredients may be hard to source (especially spices).
For ice cream you might struggle to find the right add-in ingredients depending on what flavor you’re trying to make, but again, the biggest issue is equipment. You can make ice cream at home without an ice cream maker, but it seems like more hassle than it’s worth and still requires some equipment and decent freezer space (fwiw I’ve never done it before; maybe it’s easier than it sounds).
- Comment on I'm leaving the US for good, anything I should do before I leave? 5 weeks ago:
American style pizza
frozen broccoli
You have exactly ten seconds to get the fuck out of my comment section
- Comment on I'm leaving the US for good, anything I should do before I leave? 1 month ago:
Obviously this is entirely dependent on where you’re moving to, but I struggled to find the following when living abroad:
- good (American-style) pizza
- good Mexican food
- good BBQ
- certain ice cream flavors (like cherries jubilee/cherry garcia)
- wide open spaces completely devoid of people
- large-group events of a boisterous and goofy nature
- certain types of museums/educational facilities (such as good zoos/wildlife rehab open to the public and interactive science museums)
- Comment on Taking huge cock is therapeutic 1 month ago:
Original tweet quote translation:
“After inserting the giant butt plug, the [strained back/slipped disk] pain disappeared”
- Comment on Does it make sense to buy a lifetime supply of honey? 2 months ago:
Haven’t seen this mentioned yet so:
The honey may not expire, but the container you store it in could. I’d be very concerned about plastic disintegrating and/or leeching into the honey. Glass would be better for that, but it’s also really heavy compared to plastic, so you’d need more, smaller containers instead of one giant tub.
- Comment on I hate this image because idiots will see it, not understand what its showing, and make up some crazy shit based on it. 2 months ago:
Log was absolutely a part of my American high school math curriculum, and while it may not make its way to everyone, many if not most Americans were exposed to it in school. But people have terrible memories when it comes to what they leaned in school, doubly so regarding math, quadruply so regarding higher-level math. Regardless of their level of educational exposure to math concepts, I certainly don’t expect the average American adult to be able to reliably do any math they learned outside of elementary school, myself included, because after a few decades of not practicing, not even thinking about those concepts, that knowledge is almost certainly gone or at least covered in a very heavy mat of mental cobwebs.
- Comment on I feel my life is empty. Is there any way to stop this? 2 months ago:
Cruises are an environmental nightmare; we really should not be promoting them for any reason.
- Comment on I'm tired boss 2 months ago:
Me trying to raise kids
Well there’s your first problem
- Comment on Has any country actually _solved_ the housing crisis? 4 months ago:
Japan is an outlier for numerous reasons, the biggest of which is that housing value there decreases over time (without going into the causes, the result is a feedback loop where housing isn’t built to last, so it depreciates like other semi-short-lived products, such as cars). This isn’t something the government planned, it came about naturally. So I wouldn’t say they’ve “solved” housing so much as their situation has made it a non-issue.
- Comment on Causes of Death in London (1623) 5 months ago:
Someone didn’t watch the Star Wars prequels
- Comment on Brazilian's impression of asia who has never been there (and oceania because a continent with only two countries is not a continent) 5 months ago:
“thinks the Japanese are evil” needs to be a lot bigger…
- Comment on Margot Robbie Baffled Over ‘Babylon’ Flop and ‘Still Can’t Figure Out Why People Hated It’: ‘I Wonder If in 20 Years People’ Will Be Shocked It Bombed 5 months ago:
Something tells me audiences in 1952 had slightly different tastes
- Comment on I guess at least I can opt out... 5 months ago:
Have you never heard of a “career change”?
- Comment on Evan Almighty and flushed away 5 months ago:
Certainly not the studio’s best work but far from bad
- Comment on if you workout and run, would you recommend a merino wool base or mid layer for autumn/winter? or am I going to break it? 5 months ago:
I run outdoors year-round in weather down to 20°F in a climate with high humidity. Above 40°F I wear old beat-up tshirts, a thick hoodie, and leggings-style running pants. Below 40°F I replace the T-shirt with some old REI house-brand light- or mid-weight base layers, and I toss a pair of cotton exercise pants over the running pants (I bought those years ago for less than $15) and wear a cheap woven hat and my junkiest gloves. If it’s raining I’ll replace the heavy hoodie with a water-repellant windbreaker + light weight hoodie.
In other words my running wardrobe is comprised almost entirely of my oldest, most beat-up clothes, most of which were originally just cotton or other cheap non-technical materials purchased years ago at a fast-fashion store at the mall or used from a sporting goods store. I do invest in decent socks (I highly recommend darn tough for their durability), but unless you’re braving truly cold temps, very long workouts, or cannot return indoors shortly after working out,* you really don’t need anything fancy for year-round exercise. For what it’s worth I’m also a woman and I get cold very easily.
*The main problem with cotton is that it will not keep you warm when wet, so if you like to take a long cool down walk or hang out on a park bench for thirty minutes post-workout you should go with wool or synthetic material. But as long as you’re returning to a warm indoor space before your exercise warmth dissipates, this shouldn’t be an issue.
- Comment on Why do I fart all the time when I'm trying to sleep?! 5 months ago:
Obligatory: I am not a doctor, I don’t know your life.
Jumping off the other comment suggesting a low-fodmap diet, do you have other health problems? What sounds like an extremely unbalanced diet (possibility in combination with a round of antibiotics or an episode of food poisoning) may have resulted in a condition called SIBO (small intestine bacterial overgrowth), specifically an overgrowth of methane-producing bacteria. I’d recommend getting tested.
- Comment on 🤢🤮🤢 6 months ago:
Magnolias have entered the chat
- Comment on Blood Meal 8 months ago:
There are vegan blood meal alternatives out there to resolve this exact conundrum.
But the reality is, unless your plants are being grown hydroponically in a sealed warehouse or similar, chances are real good that they are feeding on decaying animals (either directly or indirectly) whether you like it or not. They’re mostly insects and annelids and such, but still animals.
- Comment on Too many looks. 8 months ago:
Not a paleontologist, but these renditions seem shockingly consistent for a dinosaur. T-Rex for example went from full upright to balanced to covered in feathers in half this timeframe. And let’s not even talk about poor iguanodon…
- Comment on Hummingbird Feeders 8 months ago:
Feeders are okay, but the real joy comes from watching hummingbirds feed at flowers. In my experience they’re big fans of fuscias, and I’ve also seen them at fireweed.
- Comment on Gen Z is actually taking sick days, unlike their older coworkers. It’s redefining the workplace 8 months ago:
Also dependent on the state. Some states mandate minimum sick leave, others don’t. Then there’s the issue of paid vs unpaid: if you’re living paycheck to paycheck it doesn’t matter if you have all the unpaid sick leave in the world, you’re not going to use it…
- Comment on Centipedes Don't Fuck 8 months ago:
Sooo are centipedes like fruit flies and not engage in any real form of sexual selection, or is the female going around judging the fuck out of every jizz pile she encounters?
“Mmm-mm, look at that poor viscosity; a low-quality male clearly produced this. This one on the other hand: deep color, firm texture, nice and sticky… clearly produced by a male with the superior genes I want to pass along to my offspring.”
