Beware!

The thing about parrots is that they will fuck with you for fun. On the outside a parrot is a small flying dinosaur with bolt cutters on its face. On the inside a parrot is a toddler with a GED who you might have unwisely trapped in your house. Humans are usually the most entertaining thing in a parrot's environment (aside from other parrots).

My parrot knows all the words for his favorite foods: peanut, berry, carrot, and noodle are the most frequently requested. I often demonstrate how good he is at naming foods when I have guests over by saying, "Ripley, what is this?" And Ripley, seeing a roasted, unsalted peanut in my hand, will answer, "a peanut." He does this for many foods, multiple times a day, knowing that if he answers correctly I'll give him several of whatever he can name.

I also offer my houseguests a chance to participate, holding a treat about a foot away from Ripley and asking him what it is. Ripley is always very gentle when treats are involved. But for the past few months, when someone he doesn't know attempts this trick with him, he deliberately gets the answer wrong.

"What is this?" my friend asks Ripley as she holds out a peanut. He confidently answers, "a berry." We laugh. "No, what is it!" she tries again. "A berry." She laughs.

I hand her dried cranberry. "What's this?" she asks, holding it up. Without hesitation Ripley answers "a peanut." She holds up the peanut again. "What is it!!" "A berry," he answers. Both my friend and my parrot laugh. Apparently this joke is worth more to my bird than getting the treat.

my issue with the argument that "disliking ai art is inherently reactionary" is that it acts like pro-ai art people are somehow less reactionary on their views on art, when like the majority of defense's of ai art as like a higher form art are indistinguishable from the arguments people use to defend the art of like. hitler

GOd okay I went to my neighbor’s housewarming, and don’t get me wrong, I love parties (if everybody doesn’t give me  all of their attention all the time and tell me that i’m smart and funny and pretty I’ll DIE), but I forget how stressful it is to introduce yourself to new people when you work in a politically charged field.  The whole evening was this:

Party Guest:  So, have you lived in the area long?

[Okay, let’s think. White male, thirties, tall, muscle tee, sandals, wedding ring, but here without a partner.  I just overheard him complaining about tariffs, so he’s either left-leaning or a disillusioned republican.  Good sign, definitely not MAGA.  Ah, that’s right, he brought his daughters – ages 5 and 7, well-behaved in a crowd – and they’re wearing princess dresses… doting father with an active role in raising his kids, lets them choose their own outfits… my gut is telling me heterosexual male feminist.  That could be good or bad – statistically speaking, he believes in climate change… but that means 50/50 odds of anti-nuclear sentiment.  I need more information, but I must answer carefully.  We’re rapidly approaching the Question.]

Me: Not long!  I just moved down from Boston a few months ago –

[Ball is in his court.  Boston has been in the news lately for being an immigrant sanctuary city, but that’s mostly local news – I’ll get information based on body language.  Oh, I may have made a tactical error.  This is an opportunity for sports rivalry to come up, and I am ill-educated on the subject.  Quick, I need a counter maneuver.] 

Me: – but I actually grew up in the area.

[Good save, and a decent delaying action.  If he takes the bait, I can redirect the conversation to local childhood reminiscence.  He’s had two margaritas, and they’re starting to affect him – talking a bit too loud, and his expansive hand gestures bespeak more than typical New Jerseyan gregariousness.  That could be to my advantage… unless it makes him too bold].

Party Guest:  Coming back home for family, or is it a work thing?

[Shit, okay, he asked about work.  This could be the endgame… but he’s foolishly thrown me a lifeline.  I can’t lie, the hosts already know the real answer, but I can dissemble by playing to his fatherly conversational weak spots.]

Me:  I moved for work, but my family does live nearby, so that’s a nice perk as well.  I get to see my nephews a lot more often!  The eldest just turned five.

[That should do it.  My nephews are about the same age as his kids, which will build a rapport and redirect the conversation back to himself.  It should be easy to get him talking about his daughters.  Unless… oh no.  He’s two drinks in on a Sunday night and working on a third in front of his children, while his wife stays home.  She wakes up earlier than him, potentially much earlier.  He’s been talking about the economy a lot.  Damn, recently laid off?  He’s going to focus on work.]

Party Guest: That’s awesome.  What sort of job?

[The brilliant bastard.  He’s good, he’s very good.  Truly a worthy opponent.  Pierced right through every single gambit and went straight to the Question. Have I met my match? Will I finally be humbled?  It’s do or die.]

Me:  I’m an engineer at an energy company.

[Alea iacta est.]

Party Guest:  Energy?

[Last chance.  He's intelligent and fiendishly clever, but hope against hope that he’s more well-read in Aristotle than Rutherford.  This should dead-end him]

Me:  Nuclear, kind of. Fusion, not fission.

Party Guest:  Oh, that sounds cool.

Me:  Mhm.  So, how do you know Bill and Stephanie?

Party Guest:  I was in film school with Bill.  Have you seen his documentary?

[Ha. Another victory, all the sweeter for having been hard-fought. Time for a celebratory cornichon, maybe some crackers]

Part 3: Combining shapes, braids, and textures! And utilizing parts and fros!

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Coperni Fall 2025 Ready-To-Wear

Viviano Fall 2025 Ready-To-Wear

Real Science II: The Cookening

What I've been pondering for the past couple of years. It's a lot so I put it under a cut because I'm sure not everybody wants a wall of text.

The problems with the current standards of corn snake feeding:

One big barrier for budding snake keepers, particularly those living with parents or roommates, is the aspect of feeding live or frozen/thaw whole prey. Though someone may be fine having butchered meat in their freezer or refrigerator, there is a "squick" factor when the meat in question is a whole mouse with eyes and fur and a face. I would like to be able to recommend a viable alternative to whole prey to those who are uncomfortable offering it, and an alternative to frozen prey to those for whom the issue is keeping dead mice in the freezer next to the ice cream.

Frozen/thawed prey presents a potential food safety hazard if the prey is not properly handled. Prey that is not completely thawed before being fed can result in spoilage in a snake's stomach and may cause regurgitation or death of the snake. Prey items that have been thawed during transport and re-frozen may begin to break down and spoil, which could result in illness for the snake that is later fed this prey. I would like to be able to suggest a safer means of feeding pet snakes, with less risk of spoilage or foodborne illness.

Whole prey with intact gut microbiota may begin to putrefy more rapidly than butchered meats or cooked food. Snakes who hesitate to eat thawed prey for more than an hour or so may inadvertently make themselves sick, necessitating monitoring by keepers and increased food waste. I would like to be able to suggest an alternative food for picky or finicky eaters that is less likely to be tossed in the garbage if it's not consumed within 30 minutes.

Corn snakes in the wild eat a huge variety of prey including other reptiles, amphibians, small rodents, and birds. Corn snakes in captivity are limited to available prey in an appropriate size range, which for baby snakes usually means baby mice exclusively. This is not nutritionally ideal. I would like to be able to explore means of offering larger prey in a smaller package, in order to diversify prey types and ensure balanced nutrition for small snakes.

Keeping snakes has, until very recently, been largely a niche interest and those who keep snakes are still considered "weird" or "subversive" when corn snakes are truly an ideal low-low-maintenance family pet. I believe the "squick factor" associated with the feeding of snakes is a contributing factor in their continued marginalization. I would like to help make snake keeping more accessible and approachable to "everyday" people.

The rationale:

Domestic cats, an obligate carnivore that have evolved to eat raw whole prey, have transitioned very easily and rapidly to cooked prepared foods. Other reptiles such as blue-tongued skinks are frequently fed cooked prepared foods with no ill effect.

Snakes were fed cooked food in a 2007 study on the energy expended during digestion, and it was determined that consumption of cooked meat does offer an energetic benefit over raw meat. This study was looking specifically at metabolism of a single meal over a short time frame, however, and was not focused on long-term growth. Additionally, the snakes in question were Burmese pythons and they were being fed beef. :/

Offering a cooked diet reduces the concern of spoilage. Prepared food could be refrigerated rather than frozen and kept safely for days rather than hours.

Prey could potentially be cooked and sealed in convenient packaging (similar to fish fillet kitty treat packets) which could even be shelf-stable, reducing the need for keeping dead mice in the freezer and making the task of feeding snakes more palatable for a wide range of potential keepers.

Neonate corn snakes who initially resist eating may be enticed to eat a pinky mouse that has been dipped, whole or just the head, in boiling water. This is an established method of encouraging eating, and used by many snake breeders. It is possible that snakes may find cooked mice more palatable than raw or live.

Cooking meals opens the door to providing a wider range of prey in the form of sausages or ground homogenized meat. These sausages already exist in raw form (Reptilinks!), but they do not currently incorporate rodent prey species and are, as with frodents, subject to the hazards of shipping frozen raw meats. It may be worth noting that grinding meat has an additional reduction of digestion cost (higher net energy) versus intact whole prey.

The hypothesis:

I hypothesize that cooked prey will be more readily accepted by baby corn snakes as well as easier and faster to digest, resulting in higher growth rates and more robust young snakes than those fed raw prey.

The concerns:

Since we have already established that digesting cooked food results in increased net energy, I am a little worried that feeding the same prey sizes on the same cadence as raw diets will actually cause a weight gain trend towards obesity. This is something I will be watching for when I take monthly comparison photos.

I am also a bit curious about how trace vitamins and enzymes will be affected by a cooked diet. I already offer probiotic, calcium, and vitamin supplements to all of my snakes, though, so these differences will likely be mitigated and not explored in this particular study.

I am slightly concerned about what happens when the study concludes, if it is successful. Will I be able to transition these snakes back to raw food? Maybe I could offer two smaller prey items, one cooked and one raw, during the transition period. Will I even want to switch them back if the cooked food results in better growth? How practical is it to continue offering cooked food through adulthood? It's something I am considering, depending on growth trajectories. Can I offer occasional cooked prey but maybe not always? Does cooked food have reproductive implications? This experiment is likely to invite more questions.

Thinking forward:

Depending on the outcome of this experiment, I may begin to explore grinding meat as well as cooking it and incorporating other prey types in a Reptilinks-style sausage with a rodent meat base.

This is one of the more ambitious pieces I've done for a bit, and I did it on an absurd deadline, but my trans dragon back patch is done! The project ended up taking 130 hours of working time to finish, using two strands of cotton floss for both fills and outlines. The base pattern was from my own collection and was originally from 1936.

was talking to my mom about how white people ignore the contributions of poc to academia and I found myself saying the words "I bet those idiots think Louis Pasteur was the first to discover germ theory"

which admittedly sounded pretentious as fuck but I'm just so angry that so few people know about the academic advancements during the golden age of Islam.

Islamic doctors were washing their hands and equipment when Europeans were still shoving dirty ass hands into bullet wounds. ancient Indians were describing tiny organisms worsening illness that could travel from person to person before Greece and Rome even started theorizing that some illnesses could be transmitted

also, not related to germ theory, but during the golden age of Islam, they developed an early version of surgery on the cornea. as in the fucking eye. and they were successful

and what have white people contributed exactly?

please go research the golden age of Islamic academia. so many of us wouldn't be alive today if not for their discoveries

people ask sometimes how I can be proud to be Muslim. this is just one of many reasons

some sources to get you started:

PubMed Central (PMC)

Arabic Medicine in Literature

Google Books

A History of Medicine: Byzantine and Islamic medicine

but keep in mind, it wasn't just science and medicine! we contributed to literature and philosophy and mathematics and political theory and more!

maybe show us some damn respect

Women's pocket watch in Art Deco style to be opened,

Gruen Watch Manufacturing Company, Biel, Switzerland, around 1920

Dorotheum