epicene-street-light:

hi so im recovering from a really mean depression and there are some things i learned and that i would like to tell you. 

1. you need to reappropriate your space and time. depression is lying to you and generally shrinks your living space (aka: you spend your time in bed/behind your computer/in your room…). visit and do something (even if its just scrolling down social media) in each room you have access to. expand your perception and space, you’ll breathe more easily.

2. plan depression outfits. a depression outfit is a comfy one you still can go out in. to me, it’s old ripped jeans and a turtleneck, my old work uniforms, sweaters. dressing up is one of the most important parts of managing depression. first of all, you’ll feel less like pathetic with proper clothes on (nothing worse than staying in your pj all day). secondly, and it’s a crucial point: it allows you to get out to run some errands. imagine you have to go grocery shopping or to the post office. if you’re in your unwashed pajamas you’ve been wearing for three days or more (been there done that) what you have to do is to undress, shower (if you can), and put on real, clean clothes. which is three things. depression messes wih one’s ability to start things, so it’s very likely you’ll drop your errands and just stay at home feeling like shit. but if you’re already wearing clothes, you just have to put on a coat and get out of the house. which is, trust me, 10 times easier than doing the whole dressing up thing.

3. it’s okay if you stay the whole day in bed but force yourself to get up in the morning (anytime before noon) and drink a glass of water/juice. again, depression messes up with your ability to start doing things, but if you concentrate your will to just get up and drink something before going back to bed, i promise you’ll feel less shitty and might actually end up getting up for good since you’ve been through the trouble of getting up. You’ll feel better (and also you need water!)

4. do one (1) physical, material thing that will improve your life conditions per day. aka: washing a single glass, scrubbing the mirror, etc. you’ll feel proud of yourself, and the tidiest your environment, the less shitty your brain will be. plus, again: if you manage to wash a single dish, maybe you’ll find yourself cleaning the whole kitchen without noticing. and thats a good thing. no pressure: just do one single thing. and don’t beat yourself up if you can’t, of course, but try, it’s gonna be better that way. 

5. open the window (especially at night, i personally find it very soothing) and just… breathe fresh air, looking at the horizon or closing your eyes, and breathe in and out slowly. it’s great to take fresh air. bonus if you have anxiety/ptsd, honestly. opening the windows is one of the easiest ways i know to stop a panic attack.

6. brush your teeth everyday, even if it’s the only thing you manage to do. i know every depression guide recommends it, but it’s really important. not showering for a few days is okay, you’re not gonna get sick that way. but dental hygiene is capital. not to mention you’ll feel less rotting in the inside if you’re less rotting in the outside. you can use your phone to schedule your teeth brushing of the day! really helps. 

7. think about your hobbies and force yourself to do something related to an old hobby of yours. i know it’s no fun. i know you can’t feel anything, so why bother? but really, do bother. do it and eventually as you recover it will be fun again. you haven’t lost your passion, your goals, your motivation. it’s still there, but depression is like a blanket that covers it all. forcing yourself to still act on your hobbies (especially if those are not screen-related: books, gardening, etc.) will help digging through the depression layers to expose your will to live again. trust me on this one. i really thought i was just an apathetic mess, but actually depression was just mean. i believe in you! 

and finally: hold tight and it’s gonna be okay! recovery is possible, and it’s gonna arrive sooner than you expect. energy and motivation are good things and they’re still around here waiting for you! 

feel free to add your own! you’re all gonna make it i promise.

(via msfehrwight)

blackfemalescientist:

jenniferrpovey:

egoofthedead:

thathopeyetlives:

cricketcat9:

asryakino:

lyrslair:

catalystofthesoul:

So this is just a PSA, y'all should never sign a contract until you read it. I’m talking in rl right now. I just got through reading my employee handbook/service contract and my bosses slipped in a lot of bullshit like telling me I can’t complain about my job on social media, demanding I work off the clock in the name of good service, expects me to show up on time during inclimate weather, and considered disability or religious accommodation a direct threat to the company.

These are all things I took issue with and brought to my employer for further discussion before signing the contract. Most of my coworkers signed without reading, treating it like an internet terms of service contract.

Tl;dr real life is serious shit, lawyers write contracts to protect your employer FROM YOU, read contracts before you sign them - fucking ARGUE about contracts before you sign them

Also important to note, and something my bf has repeated to me many times: a contract is a negotiation until it is signed, and YOU ARE ALLOWED TO AMEND IT. Tech companies often put some bs in there about “we own everything you make while you work for us” which broadly applied also means anything done on your own time. He always ALWAYS does write-in amendments with initial and date to state that they only own things done FOR the company, on company time, because there have been companies that enforced that bullshit when somebody had a personal side project the company decided they wanted to steal. There’s only one company that threw a fit at his attempts to amend it and he considered that a huge red flag and refused to sign, turned down the job.

Never. EVER. Sign shit without reading it. Also: if your prospective employer won’t let you take the thing home to read before you sign it and says you need to sign it then and there THAT IS A RED FLAG. The job I had that turned out to be abusive as shit was like that. Every other job I’ve been able to bring the contract home to my parents to have a more experienced set of eyes on it. It’s also common practice in some fields to have one’s attorney look over it before signing. So never let them tell you that you can’t look over it with someone else. That’s a fat load of shit. For “lower level” jobs they may not accept amendments to the contract but if they won’t even give you the proper time to read it over, they’re trying to pull some bullshit on you and you’re going to regret it if you sign. Even if there’s nothing bad in what you signed it’s an example of how they are going to treat you while you’re there. Take it to heart and run like fucking hell.

Please also tell your coworkers. Inform others. Tell everyone. Please, for the lovee of everything TELL PEOPLE THEY ARE ALLOWED TO DO THESE THINGS.

Companies BANK on the fact you’re not going to read it. Then they slip in shit like ‘you can’t talk about your wages’ because they want you to keep quiet, so thy can pay that guy six bucks, and pay the guy over there fifteen and pay you eight. They want you to accept it all blindly. PLEASE DON’T STAY BLIND.

Yes, I’ve lost out on jobs because I wanted to read it and they didn’t want me to. Or they wanted m to resign and I said no to to the things they added that I pointed out were unfair and borderline illegal. 

Read shit. Tell everyone else to read shit. BE INFORMED. 

Absolutely 100% good advice ☝🏼☝🏼☝🏼

Never ever ever sign shit without reading and re-reading it! Take it home, show it to someone more experienced, if you can, show it to a lawyer. A contract is supposed to work for both sides. A company in Toronto tried to make me sign a contract with clause that in event of me leaving the job I will not work in a similar position anywhere in Ontario. Yeah, right, not enforceable in court, dudes, you can’t prevent me from making a living. Read the shit and don’t let them intimidate you. 

The last thing - with stuff being unenforceable by law - is also important! It’s important not to be overawed by the power of the company or other entity.

Also, some liability disclaimers are paper thin once lawyers become involved.

Hell, Target pulls the ‘we own everything you make‘ bull on seasonal workers.  It’s very common.

And companies will sue for breach of contract over it.

This also goes for freelance contracts.

I once had a company slide into their NDA, before we had even discussed compensation, that anything I wrote that was “similar” to what I’d be working on for them belonged to them. It was so broadly worded, that anything I wrote with a contemporary setting would belong to these people…including the web serial I was writing and publishing at the time. Full rights.

I told them I could not sign it as stands and attempted to open negotiations.

I never heard from them again. I strongly feel I dodged a bullet.

Never, ever sign a non-compete clause unless it is extremely narrow. “Don’t take our stuff and sell it” is fine.

“We own everything you make” is not fine.

I also had a temp employer try to do a milder version, which was “Anything you write during your commute.” Uh, right. You going to pay me for my commute time then. I refused to sign and did not get the job.

Unless you are literally at the “Can’t pay my rent/food bill” point? It is better not to get the job or gig than to be locked into an aggressive non-compete.

With the legally-required disclaimer that I’m not a lawyer, watch for these in publication contracts and NDAs:

Overly broad non-competes. “Please don’t self publish a book the same month we’re releasing your book” is fine and only good manners. “You aren’t allowed to self publish for the life of this contract” is a red flag.

On the same note, overly broad first refusal clauses. Don’t sign with a publisher who insists that they have to have first refusal on every single book you write for the length of the contract. Often they will sit on your books for months, even if they don’t publish that genre. However, it is always polite to give first refusal on sequels and other books set in the same world.

Life of copyright clauses. For the love of little puppies and kittens: Never. Sign. A. Life. Of. Copyright. Contract. (Work for hire is obviously a different situation. I’m talking for original work here). Contracts should have a specified term in years, after which your rights automatically revert if you don’t renegotiate. Automatically. You shouldn’t have to request them.

Signing over rights the publisher doesn’t intend to exercise. Don’t sign over audio rights unless the publisher has a solid record of producing audio books (if they do  have a solid record of it then do give them audio rights and make them pay the production costs). Don’t sign over movie rights to a book publisher! Yes, I have seen this. The publisher was Curiosity Quill. They have since imploded. If a publisher is e-only ask about splitting off the print rights.

For work for hire contracts, then you are signing over all the rights in the contract. (Editing contracts are always work for hire). An NDA is standard and don’t be afraid to sign one even if they’re scary, just make sure they don’t hide anything nasty in it. A standard NDA should boil down to “Please don’t share the files with anyone and please don’t talk about the project publicly without our permission.” I personally treat every project as under an NDA even if I haven’t signed one…you’ll see me talk occasionally about “This project I can’t talk about is taking up my time.” That means I’m either under an NDA or I should be if the publisher had any sense.

The “opposite” of an NDA is a required publicity clause. Be careful of these: Make sure you aren’t responsible for the results. Usually they aren’t too onerous, though. It’s more like “Would you please share the kickstarter with all of your Facebook friends.” I also had one which required me to post the release of the anthology to my blog. Usually they’re no big deal, but watch out for pressure being put on you to do a ton of marketing on a small thing like a short story. It can take you away from marketing stuff which really needs it.

Tl;dr:

Don’t sign broad non-competes. Ever. Under any circumstances.

Don’t sign away the rights to something a company can’t use/exercise.

Don’t be afraid to negotiate.

Don’t be afraid to walk away (unless, again, you would end up on the street/without health insurance/etc).

Make sure you double check the numbers. My pay is standardized by the federal government, and every year I get a cost of living adjustment, in addition to a small raise. In my latest contract, the university used old numbers, stiffing me what would have been about 2K over the year. Don’t sign contracts you haven’t read.

(via chescaleigh)

hazeldomain:

oockitty:

coldalbion:

grace-and-ace:

neddythestylish:

memelordrevan:

rosslynpaladin:

iamthethunder:

s8yrboy:

“If autism isn’t caused by environmental factors and is natural why didn’t we ever see it in the past?”

We did, except it wasn’t called autism it was called “Little Jonathan is a r*tarded halfwit who bangs his head on things and can’t speak so we’re taking him into the middle of the cold dark forest and leaving him there to die.”

Or “little Jonathan doesn’t talk but does a good job herding the sheep, contributes to the community in his own way, and is, all around, a decent guy.” That happened a lot, too, especially before the 19th century.

Or, backing up FURTHER

and lots of people think this very likely,

“Oh little Sionnat has obviously been taken by the fairies and they’ve left us a Changeling Child who knows too much, and asks strange questions, and uses words she shouldn’t know, and watches everything with her big dark eyes, clearly a Fairy Child and not a Human Like Us.”

The Myth of the Changeling child, a human baby apparently replaced at a young age by a toddler who “suddenly” acts “strange and fey” is an almost textbook depiction of autistic children.

To this day, “autism warrior mommies” talk about autism “stealing” their “sweet normal child” and have this idea of “getting their real baby back” which (in the face of modern science)  indicates how the human psyche actually does deal with finding out their kid acts unlike what they expected.

Given this evidence, and how common we now know autism actually is, the Changeling myth is almost definitely the result of people’s confusion at the development of autistic children.

Weirdly enough, that legend is now comforting to me.

I think it’s worth noting that many like me, who are diagnosed with ASD now, would probably have been seen as just a bit odd in centuries past. I’m only a little bit autistic; I can pass for neurotypical for short periods if I work really hard at it. I have a lack of talent in social situations, and I’m prone to sensory overload or you might notice me stimming.

But here’s the thing: life is louder, brighter and more intense and confusing than it has ever been. I live on the edge of London and I rarely go into the centre of town because it’s too overwhelming. If I went back in time and lived on a farm somewhere, would anyone even notice there was anything odd about me? No police sirens, no crowded streets that go on for miles and miles, no flickery electric lights. Working on a farm has a clear routine. I’d be a badass at spinning cloth or churning butter because I find endless repetition soothing rather than boring.

I’m not trying to romanticise the past because I know it was hard, dirty work with a constant risk of premature death. I don’t actually want to be a 16th century farmer! What I’m saying is that disability exists in the context of the environment. Our environment isn’t making people autistic in the sense of some chemical causing brain damage. But we have created a modern environment which is hostile to autistic people in many ways, which effectively makes us more disabled. When you make people more disabled, you start to see more people struggling, failing at school because they’re overwhelmed, freaking out at the sound of electric hand dryers and so on. And suddenly it looks like there’s millions more autistic people than existed before.

“…disability exists in the context of the environment.”

Reblog for disability commentary.

That last paragraph is absolutely important.

“How come nobody ever heard of ‘dyslexia’ until widespread literacy became a thing?”

(Source: mooniicorn, via chescaleigh)

fromchaostocosmos:

rubyvroom:

brainstatic:

Trump’s brutality wasn’t something they politely ignored, it was his whole appeal.

I would be all “but I never thought leopards would eat MY face!” about this, but even that’s too kind here. It’s not that Trump voters didn’t care whether other people got hurt as long as they were exempted from consequences, people voted for Trump explicitly for spite, because they wanted to hurt other people - immigrants, gays, black people. And now he’s not hurting them enough. If he was persecuting minorities more this lady would be willing to put up with the hardship, because that’s how much she hates her fellow Americans.

This is a thing I had and still grapple with after the election. Many people when talking in to news people about why they voted Trump gave their reason as they he is “a business man and will run the country like a business”, will have economic reform, and essentially get them money. 

Which if anyone knows anything about Trump knows that isn’t true and the average person isn’t going to get a penny.

But the message I was getting is that the rampant racism, his history of anti-black racism, his antisemitism, his long long history misogyny, creepy sexual behavior, his disturbing incest comments about his daughter, his racist dog whistles used all though out the campaign, his transphobia, his homophobia, and the massive support he got from white supremacists that doesn’t matter to you because of money.  

Your greed is more important the damage and pain he will cause. That I find so highly disturbing and scary.

Because I already knew American had racists and they were salivating over trump and they would be more then happy to suffer if it meant minorities would suffer fuck ton more.

I mean it is scary to see just how many racists there and to see the implosion of neo-nazis in this country, even though I knew they were already here (and shit ton of them can be found wearing the uniform of police officers though I’m sure for many americans they already knew that)

I guess I just also find terrifying how easy it was for some many people to turn to flat out say that there greed was more important the suffering of others. 

I don’t if this moral deficit, if this is because of capitalism, or if because to these voters at the end of the day they thought the only people who would suffer would LGBTQIA+ people, black people, Jewish people, immigrants, disabled people, mentally ill people, and other marginalized minorities. Or perhaps a combination of all three factors.

I mean there is nothing wrong with wanting more money and financial stability, but not when it comes with suffering of others.

America has so many massive corporations that rake is billions of dollars and there are mutli-millionaires and billionaires living here that is who the government should be taxing. That is presidential candidates should go after in their campaigns not people belonging various marginalized minority groups.   

(via chescaleigh)

delotha:

onion-souls:

cpt-langosta:

onion-souls:

snarcadegannon:

squirtlesquad-rebellion:

perkachow:

remmoran-kynvahl:

mamasam:

tonyabbot:

scary-monsters-and-davesprite:

lonelyinsomniac:

samsaranmusing:

Orbital path of asteroid near miss in 2002. Yah, that’s how close we came to nuclear winter and possible total destruction.

A visitor.

It’s like it’s trying so hard to hit us and it just can’t do it

All I can imagine is every astronomer drinking heavily from 2002-2003 like “There it goes–OH FUCK IT’S COMING BACK”

Thanks moon <3

Moon: YEET

The moon threw it away yay moon

the moon was having none  of it

Originally posted by giantmonster

The best part about this? They took a picture (read: spectrographic analysis) of the thing and found out it wasn’t an asteroid at all. It was a piece of a Saturn V rocket, discarded in space decades ago and set into an orbit around the sun. That’s right, this motherfucker spent 30 years orbiting the sun, waiting for a chance to have its revenge on the petty humans who abandoned it in the void.

So that weirdly common Star Trek trope in which one of our space probes comes back to fuck us up turned out to be true

I like to see it as it desperately wanted to be a moon

Jesus christ that was stressful to watch holy shit

(via claudiagray)

haught-cookie:

sapphicproblems:

So when I was 16 I was in a theatre class & I was partnered with this boy for a kissing scene & I didn’t like him at all but I was Totally Straight ™ he just wasn’t my type and I didn’t want my first kiss to be with him and that’s obviously why I literally threw up at the thought of having to kiss him! I mean, who doesn’t throw up at the prospect of their first kiss with a boy!
Anyways, my friend (who I def had a crush looking back on it) said she’d teach me how to stage kiss! And for a stage kiss one person cups the other’s face but puts their thumb on the other’s lips and then they “kiss” the thumb.
So she cupped my face & put her thumb on my lips & then as she went in for the “kiss”,,,, my knees actually fuckin,,,, buckled underneath me,,,, like just the thought of (stage) kissing this girl caused me to physically become light headed and fall over, but I was def straight! Only into boys obviously! Never would wanna date a girl!
And I played it off as having low blood sugar & being stressed but I’m all reality I was just gay & stupid

This is actually so cute

I’d rather be older and wiser and gayer than go back to being younger and stupider and still gay. Bless, OP <3

(via shortlifelongart)