Here we spot wild Bardfinn Bluesky activities.
Be valid and ping ! bardfinn for something worthwhile or create a new thread.
Bard spotting on Bluesky 12 September 2024 
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Brooke Binkowski (@brooklynmarie.bsky.social):
My neighbor apparently was sitting out on her steps when a squirrel crawled into her arms, hung out there for about half an hour, and then died. I uhhhhh
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Ever hear the German word for "Squirrel" (Eichhörnchen) be pronounced?
That's the sound I just made
Brooke Binkowski (@brooklynmarie.bsky.social):
😂😂
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Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yasharali.bsky.social):
LMAO
(@fitforpurpose.bsky.social):
What? That's correct and normal English usage.
matti ◤✠◢ ∞ (@mattssachussets.bsky.social):
yes, true, but j.k. rowling is a complete butt about usage of "their" when referring to a single person, regardless of context
we're making fun of joanne because she's just kind of a b-word
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Nothing kind about her, sorry to say
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
For years I have seen recycled the same criticism of the latter installments of the Alien story, "These characters' actions and motives make no sense"
Thus criticism could only be born from a critic who has never understood Alien, nor ever worked in the modern workplace
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
One of the narrative themes of Alien (the first movie) is that Great Men Are Not Born, They Have Greatness Thrust Upon Them (and, uh, various deconstructs and translations of that, but -)
No one in the first contact was a Hero. All of them just schlubs. All flailed in the face of the threat.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
One of them happened to survive — being a fit to this extraordinary ecological conflict, or at least, "not unfit".
The Alien narrative is one of human civilisation versus more than just /environment/, it's Man vs Theogony
Man, here, represented and embodied by industrial conglomerates
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
The story of Alien is, in every iteration, a story of how The Hero is a monstrous thing, created from the everyman by encounters with the cosmic and divine and the underworld
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
In Sumerian mythology, civilisation is founded on a number of decrees, archetypes, axioms — called "me", 𒈨
One of these is literally recorded as Heroship
Wynn Thornton (Needs-a-job arc) (@northwind.bsky.social):
BlueSky does not like that Unicode.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
There's a known issue, observed at least a year ago, of how BlueSky's presentation layer handles vertical kerning for mixed-class between Latin and Cuneiform
I suspect it is seen as a low impact, low volume corner case issue and in some way outside the scope of the presentation layer.
Wynn Thornton (Needs-a-job arc) (@northwind.bsky.social):
Oh yeah, it's definitely low-importance compared to a bunch of things. It doesn't really bother me. I mostly just found it interesting—but good to know it's a known thing, at least. Doesn't need immediate attention though; Bsky can kern in heck, it's fine.
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Alien: Prometheus is themed on that.
In a deleted bit of PIE-esque monologue from the Engineer, dovetailing with the opening scene of an Engineer drinking the black goo and dissolving to seed life on a planet, he calls the goo "the blood of our lord"
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Earlier in the film, they establish that the Engineers are genetically human.
Which makes the differences between us and them epigenetic.
That would be the goo. The goo is a me, 𒈨.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Attested in Sumerian myth are many me, 𒈨.
Two among them are (as translated to modern English)
Fear and Terror.
Gifts in proper proportions; weapons in excess. Deadly when absent, in presence of a threat.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Most of us have had coworkers, scout pack members, schoolmates who lack appropriate [fear and terror] respect for the ant mound, rattlesnake, bunsen burner, automobile, knife, etc
as no doubt most of us have done at some point, rashly, naively, in some way
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Why do these characters do stupid things?
So that you put yourself in the story. Because you do stupid things. Because they are Everymen.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
They are not Heroes. They will not survive. "Neither would you,", whispers your subconscious, "neither would you"
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Coda: in the Sumerian view of the cosmos, the closest understanding they would have to Weyland-Yutani is that of a vast City.
Cities are human constructs, made possibly by human effort, supported by the gifts of Me, 𒈨.
Cities are not a Me.
But The Destruction of Cities, is
Dawn is Turning the Frogs Gay, Needs MA (@daybreakstations.bsky.social):
Ok now please if you could make this into a full video essay because it's brilliant and true and right
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🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
I love this whole thread, although I still find dissonance in Prometheus in particular. Part of the reason Alien works so well is because the characters are not specialists, they're space truckers. In Aliens the marines are intended to be shown as not properly trained for the threat. In Prometheus--
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
The characters are all trained, specialized scientists but you have a biologist going "ooh pretty alien lemme touch" or "I'll take my helmet off in this untested atmosphere". I understand that these characters are in part metaphorical but the metaphor doesn't land as well because of the context.
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
Scott goes out of his way to show us in Prometheus that this is intended more like myth, the title alone, the many Gnostic themes, the worshipful nature of the murals in the compound. But that makes the bumbling nature of the scientists feel even more incongruent to me.
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
The truckers in Alien are more by the book and cautious than the scientists in Prometheus. Ripley and Ash have multiple conversations about scientific quarantine and the consequences of breaking it. I don't get why most of the characters in Prometheus act like cowboys, it breaks the flow for me.
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
And I do think Prometheus undercuts itself by having the scientists be so cavalier because it diminishes David's presence as a trickster when multiple other characters are so reckless that they're creating chaos even without David's influence.
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
I know I'm now way off course from your original point, I don't meant to derail things. I just think Prometheus is SO close to being great but the ways it's not great really pull the rug out from under the project.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
In Prometheus, the scientists are more science-entrepreneurs who get bankrolled by a (very self-motivated) venture capitalist
They're like Twister's tornado chasers
The storytelling didn't spend enough to establish that. That they're not Pure Science. And it does jar the narrative.
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
Ahhh well that does make a LOT more sense. Weyland makes perfect sense in the movie, but it absolutely should have been more clear that this was less of a rigorous scientific investigation and more like a very expensive episode of Ghost Hunters in space.
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
Guess I need to rewatch all the Alien movies now!
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
I started thinking about this, this morning, because the parallels of monstrosity between Trump & Weyland were demanding to be written about, & this was my way of putting that off by preambling it
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🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
By the way, are there any articles online that expand on these ideas in regards to Alien specifically? I'm a sucker for this stuff.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
I should keep a bibliography aha
🏳️⚧️Isabelle, Estrogen Absorber🏳️🌈 (@dumpsterblizzard.bsky.social):
Yes! I'd devour this stuff
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This is one of the worst posts I have EVER seen. Delete it.
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
For years I have seen recycled the same criticism of the latter installments of the Alien story, "These characters' actions and motives make no sense"
Thus criticism could only be born from a critic who has never understood Alien, nor ever worked in the modern workplace
Will "Looking for a job" Smith (@willsmith.fun):
I think the last decade has changed my expectation of the kind of people who would blindly follow an oligarch on a quest to find god, from "they'd probably hire smart ones" to "only numpties would sign up for this". Prometheus works better under the latter than the former.
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Mine is
Got PO'd at anthropogenic climate change deniers
➡️
PO'd neoNazis, MAGA, and transphobes so badly I might have to flee the United States as a political refugee
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
AGW deniers are closely, intimately wound up with Intelligent Design Proponents(ists), down to the same people running the think tanks & lobbying firms. Also, the same people doing the Heritage Foundation, Project 2025, the Manhattan Institute, etc.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christo...
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
If Trump is elected, theocratic fundamentalist Christian fascism — complete with outlawing biology, archaeology, paleontology, climate science, and "soft" sciences, along with gender-non-conformity — will be the law of the land.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
The people running the AGW denial subreddits circa 2013 also happened to be running / recruiting for the whole spectrum of conservative fascist social movements, including open hate groups.
I kicked until they lost. That made them angry.
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Oh no
I like Voltage and Livewire
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Cancelled™️
Ash Higgins (@ashhiggins.bsky.social):
Mango Heat - People Who Want Real Change.
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Kiraculous the Cyborg🏳️⚧️ (@kiraculous.net):
if you want to be a girl, you can just find a witch deep in the woods, she'll give you a prescription for estradiol and spiro
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
"… But, Doctor, …"
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rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
me: huh, why did my speed and accuracy of the spam review just drop like a freaking rock and I suddenly have to spend 30 seconds on each decision instead of having it be as the page loads?
also me: checks creation time of the accounts around the rough spot at which I lost it
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
If you guessed "the deep brain learning stopped being accurate right as a bunch of new legitimate accounts started coming in with entirely different username styles, profile patterns, etc, that were developed on another site that's now shutting down", award yourself a prize
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
the deep brain learning is seriously fricking weird
Glenn White (@justicar.xyz):
Saaaaaaame.
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
I remain absolutely fascinated by what our brains can do without us noticing
Glenn White (@justicar.xyz):
I am equally fascinated that there ARE patterns that vary by geography or culture that CAN be interpreted.
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
I once looked at a blank account whose username was a verb in the past tense and my brain went "oh, that's a spammer" and then stopped and blinked because my brain helpfully offered up "...and if it had been in the present tense, it would have been a roleplayer"
Tai @ Xenosaga era (@taihen.bsky.social):
every time i check "i am a rping account" on dw i mentally go "hi rah!"
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
❤️
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
there are people who actually put "hello spam checking person!" in their bio and it always makes me giggle
Ken Burnside (@kenburnside.bsky.social):
So if I put a picture of a cat next to "Hi spam checking person, thank you for doing what you're doing, has a cat pic" on an account request...I'd brighten your day by a noticeable amount?
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
laughing
For years, every user ban I handed out on Reddit used a macro that included, in tiny script in the upper right table cell, "cat", a hyperlink to a pic of a siamese.
Our unwritten policy was "if they mention the cat, they get unbanned"
Fewer than a dozen people ever mentioned the cat
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
That's amazing
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
It was a Green M&M's clause test. Slotted right after "ban appeals", so if they viewed the cat, they were at least inquisitive enough to have read the ban appeal docs
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
That's amazing!
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Ken Burnside (@kenburnside.bsky.social):
#ProofOfCat is the only reliable form of internet identification.
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
The cat in question
www.reddit.com/media?url=ht...
rahaeli (@rahaeli.bsky.social):
oh gosh what an absolute beauty. that is a cat who remembers when cats were worshipped as gods, that's for sure
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Praying Trump gets elected so you get sent to some kind of concentration camp
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Dr. Damien P. Williams: Like TSCC s03 John Connor, But Better (@wolvendamien.bsky.social):
walks in dragging a chair to the front of the room extremely noisily
sits down pulling out a pack of unfiltered lucky strikes
lights 3 cigarettes & takes a huge drag
puts elbows on knees & grinds the heels of my hands into my eyes, exhaling smoke through my nose
looks up
What the frick.
Dr. Damien P. Williams: Like TSCC s03 John Connor, But Better (@wolvendamien.bsky.social):
I'm gonna ask you this seriously, and I want you to really think about your answer:
What the frick is wrong with all of you, and what is it going to take for you to fricking learn?
Steen Comer (@mediapathic.bsky.social):
I know the question's not directed at me, but I can hazard a guess at the second answer. "Losing enough money."
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Sadly, we never hear of the "Someone we paid a modest salary to steer us clear of expensive liability foresaw this as a misstep" stories, only the "Without accepting responsibility, we have settled the class action for [BIGNUM]" stories
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Ada 🏳️⚧️🏳️🌈 (she/her) (@shitposting.tubaterry.me):
Applicable to most uses of this entire AI genre, but especially right now
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
A big ol' goose-egg, gang
RI Smith (@rismith.bsky.social):
Look's like someone got in the comments
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bea p (@spatulatrix.bsky.social):
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
2007 flashbacks OH GOD I I.T. MANAGED AN ENTIRE NONPROFIT THAT USED THESE FOR EVERY WORKSTATION
We averaged 1.3 motherboard replacements for every seat in one year b/c their warranty replacements were hitting the back of the bathtub curve real quick
Concepts of a Wraithe (@wraithe.bsky.social):
Ohhhh fuk. Yeah I remember troubleshooting an iMac G5 for DAYS and only after the client basically said "just take it, I'm buying a new machine" did we find out about that whole thing.
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
18 U.S.C. § 2339B
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Must sleeeeeeeep
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
"The other side" — Donald J Trump, referring to Congress as "the other side" with respect to the January 6 2021 storming of the Capitol
His side — Anti-Government / Anti-Authority Violent Extremists
The other side — the American people
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Surely some revelation is at hand …
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
I transitioned for the pretty pewter fairy necklace I left behind at a renaissance faire, age 10
the perfumed toy charm I found at school, aged 8
the gorgeous dress I found at a flea market age 20
The dream of flying, age 6
The wind in my hair
The grass in my toes as I kick off the earth
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
When the universe gave me a whole leather flight jacket, cut for a woman's frame, should that have been enough
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
When the universe gave me not one, not two, but three friends at uni who transitioned, should that have been enough
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
An antidote for the GOP meme poisoning
Gogol Bordello
Immigraniada
...Monkeybones (@monkeybones.bsky.social):
Seeing them live were two of the best shows I've ever seen. The entire venue was hopping.
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LeAnne (@ennael.bsky.social):
Report and block this Nazi shithead, please
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Reported & listed
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Today I have Sarah McLachlan's "Out of the Shadows" looping in my head, which is a song so dark, so melancholic, so chaotic, the epitome of ecto, and not coincidentally the first song of her first studio album
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
A song of so much teenage angst, clove cigarettes, black lace and patchoulli that becomes a vortex of selfloathing, dark roast coffee, used bookstore breakrooms and flickering, 30-year-old fluorescent tubes dim beyond belief, all flesh pallid and veined, an unlife of winter solstice's afternoon
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Even the sunlight picks out only verdigris and the henna flash of a curled lock hung upon the gate by a lover so recently passed away
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
An entire album that would have been at home gracing a screenplay of Interview with the Vampire
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
This entire album could have been an October Project album, that is how ecto
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Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Russia.
📌
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🏳️⚧️ Josie (from "GALIS" by Philip K. Frick) 🪗 (@josie.zone):
Dear god
Ms. Penny Oaken (@skywitches.net):
Pegged. Perfectly pegged
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Granny panties and a dress. Granny panties and a dress.
6 foot 4 and a mugshot. 6 foot 4 and a mugshot.
Child abuse and no job. Child abuse and no job.
Living in mama's sunroom. Living in mama's sunroom.
Giant pale hands and lipstick. Giant pale hands and lipstick.
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