Hgskl. This is such a delightful mental image. I’m absolutely living for the skeleton. I need someone to draw that for me.
I’m already sketching the R2D2 thing @thebibliosphere so I may as well do the skeleton flag.
A hero emerges.
Alrighty then. *rolls up sleeves* @thebibliosphere you seem like the kind of person who would prefer grapefruit spoons, if only because they too have teeth.
Also sparkly bones, because I just got more metallic acrylic reasons.
Lemme know if anything else comes to mind, k?
[image description: a skull and half a rib cage drawn on watercolor paper /end ID]
Oye @thebibliosphere and @kori-monster-the-ascendite! Y’all are gonna get your flag, but I need maybe an occasional poke? ^^’ Brain is foggy, and I don’t wanna forget to finish.
My protection spells are always running, I even put them in my FAQ so people could always find it.
But here is your reminder:
[An image depicting the tree of life symbol made from rose
quartz, surrounded by a double circle of protective stones with an angel
at the top, flanked by two candles][Source Post]
This is the curse breaker, no harm can come to pass from reading negative posts, no ill intent will reach you or your loved ones, you are safe,
your loved ones are safe, and you are free to never reblog or worry about negative posts
ever again because they are powerless.
They are words without meaning, and you are free of them.
In case you need something else to do that feels more
tangible and real, here is an old Scottish curse breaker I learned as a
child and have used my whole life both for myself and others:
Take your thumb and index finger on both hands and lock them together.
Imagine it represents the negative energies that have latched onto you,
then break the link by pulling them apart, like so.
[An image of my hands performing the previously described action]
And remember, there is no curse powerful enough that you cannot break it with defiance and a refusal to accept it. You are in control. And you always will be.
[The same as above but this time much larger, surrounded by a
lot more candles because sometimes you need to add a little more light
into the darkness.]
Oh it’s times like this I miss not having all my certifications on hand, cause this romance book blogger has got enough actual certified science and licensed know how to fill a fairly substantial wall.
Just from what I have handy atm, Robert Tisserand is one of the worlds leading experts on aromatherapy, and he talks extensively about the safe (and unsafe) uses of essential oils, including medical interactions with drugs, and how the base compounds react with basic physiology and the environment.
I’ve taken the liberty of screen shotting the summary on the known effects of essential oils on the olfactory system, and highlighted parts which are relevant to you having breathing issues:
So basically even though it can help some people feel relief with correct use, if you are triggered by scents or suffer from breathing problems, the use of essential oils should be done with extreme caution. And shoving menthol directly under the nose is not even remotely in the same vicinity as using caution.
Essential oils should be used in a well ventilated space and applied to safe spots to the body, away from mucous membranes. Directly under the nose, on the skin, is not one of those safe spots, though I know plenty of people who will tell me they do it all the time and they’re just “fine”. (Nb: if you’re one of those people that’s your choice, but don’t inflict it on anyone else, especially children or people with allergies)
If it’s a diluted mixture (which those rollerball things tend to be) your chances of skin damage are reduced, but you’re still at risk from developing a sensitivity, or from personal irritation due to existing sensitivities.
Also here’s what Poison Control has to say about it:
Some nasal inhalers contain menthol. The menthol makes us feel as though we are breathing easier, but it does not actually help with congestion. In fact, it appears that more inflammation develops.
There’s also an article in the Canadian Respiratory Journal to back this up, which breaks down how menthol works to soothe breathing difficulties with some actual science and figures if you’re interested:
Nasal resistance before testing was similar on both occasions. No differences were found in respiratory frequency (mean ± SEM) (menthol 17.0±1.1 cmH2O/L/s; sham 16.9±0.9 cmH2O/L/s), minute ventilation (menthol 7.7±0.5 cmH2O/L/s; sham 7.9±0.5 cmH2O/L/s) or total inspiratory time/total breath time (menthol 0.4±0.1 cmH2O/L/s; sham 0.4±0.1 cmH2O/L/s). The upper airway resistance was similar during menthol (3.47±0.32 cmH2O/L/s) and sham (3.27±0.28 cmH2O/L/s) (P=0.33) inhalation.
CONCLUSION:
Inhalation of menthol does not alter upper airway resistance in awake human subjects.
Basically, the tl;dr version: menthol doesn’t increase your ability to breathe, it merely cools things down, providing relief from the symptoms of inflammation, while not actually increasing your airflow capacity.
So shoving menthol under your nose, isn’t going to actually help your breathing problems to resolve long term. If anything it may trigger them into being worse if you are sensitive to fragrances, or suffering from some form of inflammation which may be worsened by the use of volatile oils, which is another name for essential oils. Sounds a lot less friendly than “essential” though, doesn’t it.
Anyway, I hope these are useful to you. Good luck with avoiding the rollerball.
Which post is it though??? Is it crucifix nail nipples? I bet it’s crucifix nail nipples. @thebibliosphere
It’s not, actually. That hell story still thrives. It’s one of my recipes most likely.
Seriously?
Seriously. Of all my shit to get flagged the one with actual female nipples in the title didn’t get flagged. My bread recipe on the other hand, well, there’s a reason I moved it over onto patreon under free access, cause no one can bloody see the post.
The crucifix part makes it qualify as part of tumblrs ideal Christian family values
It’s depressing how right you may actually be lmao
Word is arguing with me that “theirselves*” is not a word, but the Scottish part of my brain is refusing to give it up. I have been using that word since I was knee high to a splinter, it makes sense in my head, but I know someone would bitch about it as a grammatical error or some such if I used it in Phangs.
Which is unfortunate, cause as it would turn out, I’ve used it. A lot.
*themselves just doesn’t have the same meaning? Don’t ask I don’t know. It’s likely a colloquial thing.
I get it, you want a possessive pronoun instead of an objective one?
YES, thank you I’ve been trying to pin it down and sitting here just saying the word over and over trying to figure out why it feels right.
There is a slight semantic difference! You’ll see people claim that ‘theirself’ is technically incorrect grammar but that’s prescriptivist talk. If there’s a hole in the lexicon someone will fill it 😉
I mean it’s already there, it exists in Scottish dialect. I just know I’ll likely get schtick for putting it in a book, or some pedant will pick up on it and leave a remark about it not being “proper English”, which no, it’s not. But I feel it should be. It fills a gap, as you say. And language ought to change with the times.
Huh. I’d never realised I used theirselves until this very moment. It’s a real word dang it!
Right?! It wasn’t until it got pointed out to me and I had to run stuff through Word to fix something that I was like “what do you mean that’s not a word, it is too a bloody word!”
I also only recently discovered that “outwith” isn’t a word outside of Scotland…that might have been one of your revelations too but I can’t remember. Either way, the rest of English is missing out.
It’s fucking what now?
But…but it’s such a good word… what do people say instead? Outside? Without? … but they don’t have the same inherent meaning.
Oh well. Fuckit.
Sorry Phangs readers, but you’re about to get a crash course in learning Scots dialect. Hold onto yer bunnets.
how would someone use ‘outwith’, what’s it mean?
“Outwith the norm” or “outwith his expectations”.
Which I suppose “outside” would work, but it feels janky on my tongue to say that. I’ve always used outwith when talking about like thingy-things like experiences or perceptions, while outside is reserved for real physical things like “you’ve parked outside the line” or “he’s outside the house”, though I dare day there’s some folk use “outwith” for those too.
I’m pretty sure we do have that in US English, it’s just two separate words.
“out with the old, in with the new”
Out with and outwith have very different meanings though.
“Omg look at this fucking shit, gluten free mascara, ahaha, people need to be fucking stopped.”
Yes, I’m sure the person with a wheat allergy wanting to avoid putting wheat containing things near their eyeballs is truly the reason society is failing.
Also if anyone does actually need gluten free mascara, Zuzu Luxe is one of the best I’ve been able to find. Hardly clumps and doesn’t flake off like a lot of the others. Their other products can be a little hit or miss texture wise, but the mascara is great.
I once saw a person point out that common allergens are in so many things, and it even has to do with “this facility uses it in another product but it’s still the same facility” and I stopped laughing. And then I felt bad. I was ignorant, but I didn’t think about like. My corn tortillas better not have gluten! They’re corn! And then I realized….same facility. Airborne particulates. Someone working on one line, accidentally dropping particulates in another line just by walking past.
Cause there are people who are *that* sensitive. And they deserve to be protected and have safe products.
I specifically do not take issue with people just not knowing things. Cause why the heck would anyone know things like that unless they ever had to? Why would you know wheat is a common ingredient in things like mascara or shampoo? I sure as shit didn’t till I started to piece together why my body went into meltdown every time I washed my hair.
What does get to me is how inherently shitty some people are about it. Like why is the first go to for things like this mockery? Why? I mean I know the answer is “society is inherently abelist even if people don’t realize they are doing it” but I’m still allowed to be frustrated by it. (It’s the same with infomercials. Those products are not lazy or worthless, they are designed for people with disabilities!)
And I know this seems like such an over reaction to something like someone in Walgreens being shitty over gluten free mascara haha. But it’s so much more than that.
So much of my daily life is emotional and mental labor just trying to spoon feed people how not to be unthinkingly meanall the time. And
it’s not like I can ever stop because this is my life. I am living in a
world not designed or meant to include me, so constant emotional and
mental labor is required to justify both myself and the things that make
my life easier.
And I wish people would just think with a little more kindness sometimes. That’s all.
Also people have a weird desire to catch you “lying” about an allergy? There’s a preservative used in a lot of artificial caramels that I’m allergic to, and my aunt used to get so mad because she was convinced my mom was lying about it. Once when I was a toddler she offered me a bowl of ice cream with this really smug look on her face while I ate it—a look that quickly died once I started projectile vomiting all over her brand new couch. Yup she hid the caramel in the ice cream.
Feeling miserably sick for a while aside, the look on my aunt’s face at the state of her couch was rewarding
HGSKL ALL THE TIME, PEOPLE DO THIS ALL THE TIME AND IT IS NOT OKAY
@thebibliosphere Will you ever post pictures of your house? Have you before? I’m so curious based on your descriptions but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a picture.
Only ever small things, usually when the dogs are around to be photogenic.
Claudius aka “Cloudy” by all accounts a brave and noble pup, is very good at being photogenic. Though even he has reservations about going into the basement:
Ignore the ominous glow. It’s nothing.
It’s just the sun making the hideous ocher walls glow. (I forget what I was flipping off, possibly one of the falling ceiling tiles) Fun story, the house has a giant copper earthing rod running through it, and the previous owners attached the drop down ceiling tiles to it. Via the metal frame. Yes we did find out cause I noticed sparks/flames in that far corner near the possessed microwave that likes to turn itself on and off, thanks for asking. (It is now safe.)
On the surface it’s honestly nothing all that special at a glance, it’s just 90s suburban beige with hand me down furniture. When we first moved in everything we owned actually fit in the living room:
And we still don’t have that much more furniture tbh, we’re slowly trying to replace things but between my medical bills and the house throwing up fun curve balls like “the wiring was installed by a madman” and “plumbing, how does that work”, it’s a slow process.
Actually this one is a funny story (for me), so some of you might remember when NONE of the water was draining in the house (which is separate from the story about how the plumber lost his knife in the pipes so now we have a switchblade lodged in the pipes because yes this has happened to us twice now) and ETD had to go into the basement bathroom—which the previous owner built himself so of course nothing works like it’s supposed to—and try to break the trap seal in a last ditch attempt to drain the bathtub.
Pictured: ETD about to face off with 70+ years of pipe deluge. Also yes the door is crooked, yes the walls are also crooked, and yes, the ceiling is … you know what, you get the idea.
At first we thought it wasn’t going to budge, and the trap had not only been painted shut but also maybe welded. And then from the other side of the house I heard a sound like dying whale song rattling through the pipes, a started “AUGH” and then the bathtub on the main floor drained, leaving behind the vague outline of a headless skeleton in its wake.
ETD came out of the basement looking like a B rate swamp monster, carrying a bucket I will not describe the contents of because even just thinking about it makes me feel vaguely nauseous. Also yes, this is the bathroom where I found tampons in a hole in the wall. It’s still in vast need of better renovation but at least there are no holes in the wall now. Or skeleton shapes.
We have managed to replace a few things though, like the murderous washer that liked to walk over concrete floor and pull its own plug out, which would then jettison into the sink full of water where the water drains out.
That was fun.
And the oven, which the control panel fell out of:
And ETD had to jury rig it back in place with scrap metal until we were able to afford the new oven we have right now:
The phrase “safe as houses” takes on a whole new terrifying meaning in this house, it really does.
We’ve replaced parts of the furnace several times (thanks to tumblr pulling through for us when it died in the dead of winter *cries*)—after we cleared out the tins of varnish stashed away in a hidden alcove. And we will eventually need to replace the water heater but we’ll get to that. Along with the welded shut door that goes to nowhere.
Still working on replacing the AC after it died 2 years ago though … and the
window unit we bought which fell out the window into the window well below.
This thing falling out the window sounded like a bomb going off. It echoed.
But we’re getting there!
We have managed to make some nice changes, like my office, which I’ll try and post pics of soon, and also the living room has a nice homey feel to it. Especially around Christmas time:
Which of course Legolas really helps to pulls together:
He see’s you when you’re sleeping, he knows when you’re awake.
Legolas is not just for Christmas no, oh no, he keeps on trend with the seasons.
Although I did let him keep his lights.
Fun fact, if you do happen to have a life size cardboard cutout of Orlando Bloom in your house, make sure to turn his lights off before you go to bed.
It makes things slightly less pants wettingly terrifying when you get up at 3am to get a glass of water.
But if and when we finally do start to make proper renovations—instead of just running around trying to put out fires (literal or otherwise)—I will totally be up for letting you all see, complete with before and after shots, and everything else we find in between.
We’re quite a bit away from being able to do that yet, although fingers crossed it can be soon. I’d really love to restore this house to something that is both safe and beautiful because despite all the absolute bullshit, it is a great house. It’s solidly built at its core, and it’s in a great location. It’s just been badly treated and needs a lot of love and care. And maybe I
anthropomorphize things too much, but I can relate to that. It’s home, y’know?
