hey, you wanna learn about the largest amphibian in the western hemisphere? you do?
GREAT.
(no takebacks)
then without further ado, I’d like to introduce you to
found in the eastern half of the United States, the Hellbender is a giant fucking salamander. they are the largest amphibian in the western hemisphere by a wide margin, with adults clocking in at around two… feet? (that definitely says feet. jesus) long.
large enough to use as a blunt instrument
no one is really sure how these giant salamanders earned the name “Hellbender”, but it is thought that white settlers thought it was “a creature from hell who was bent on returning”, or that its wrinkly skin reminded white settlers of “the horrible tortures of the infernal regions.” (white settlers should not have been allowed to name things.)
…all right, yeah, it does sort of look like it crawled out of a Bosch painting.
these days, locals just tend to give them endearing vernacular names like: Snot Otter! Lasagna Lizard! Devil Dog! Grampus! Allegheny Alligator! aaaand for some fucking reason, Leverian Water Newt!
these poor guys just can’t catch a break.
you’re hurting his feelings
the Hellbender is found in fast water streams and rivers from New York to Missouri. they breath completely through their skin (weird, but mammals can be judgey about this so I’ll let it slide) and hide under large rocks on the streambed, where they feast on crayfish and also regular fish.
maybe also feet
they are active at night and remain in dark areas during the day. to stay hidden, they have evolved light-sensitive cells all over their bodies. that’s right, they literally turned themselves into a single giant weird eyeball. what the fuck, evolution.
this seems like a good survival strategy (sort of), but it also means that to catch one you just have to go flip a bunch of muddy rocks over.
aaaaa! my plan, foiled!
unfortunately, human activity has been decreasing their number for years, and they are now regarded as Threatened. that said, there are many programs now in place for their recovery, including extensive captive breeding and environmental repair.
hopefully in the future these amazing giant snot otters will make a recovery. we wish only good things for the lasagna lizard.
look at those eager faces! the future is yours, children
Hellbenders are literally my favourite thing you can find in a river
I walked into work today and thought the morning nurse was a different person who had been sort of dicking us around on scheduling. So I said “didn’t expect to see you here” in what was, in retrospect, a needlessly hostile tone.
Then I realized I was wrong about her identity, so I panicked and tried to cover my mistake by telling her she looked like another, third person. Then I realized that was calling her generic-looking, so I clarified that she was very distinctive-looking, just in a way that some other people are distinctive. Like, her appearance is a significant minority of the population. Then I realized that might seem insulting towards her appearance, so I clarified that by distinctive I didn’t mean unattractive, just that she was normal-looking but in a unique sort of fashion. Then I named some other people she also looked like, making sure not to say anything uncomplimentary about those people.
Have you ever seen a man eat his own feet, then keep going up his body, consuming legs and pelvis and so forth, until he actually swallows his own mouth?
Today in dumb maneuvers: I managed to bend a fingernail back while moving a pillow.
Reblog if you are an alpha woman who are unable to love, you support alpha women who are unable to love, or you just laughed really hard at the article title
“If girls say they are depressed, we owe it to them to listen. Furthermore, we can no longer afford to ignore the effect of a highly gendered culture on the mental wellbeing of girls. If we’re able to draw links between masculinity and high suicide rates in men, we can surely do the same with femininity and female despair.
If the past is another country, female adolescence is a war zone. Puberty transforms you into a walking target overnight. If you’re lucky, other girls get there before you and become your shields. Pity the girl who’s wearing a bra before she leaves primary school; already she’s ventured over the top, into a no man’s land of groping, cat calls and adult disapproval.
Girls need support in getting through this. They need coping methods. But they also need a different society, one which permits them to take up space, to express their fears and passions rather than internalise them. It should not be the role of mental health services to patch girls up and arm them to face another onslaught of patriarchal slings and arrows. There has to be a ceasefire. Girls shouldn’t have to be so brave.”
We have government agencies providing resources for this initiative and they are now considering ongoing financial support, but it is critical that we show that this project has strong public backing.
All Donations Now Matched Until December 31st.
We have already raised $150K, half of our total goal. If our GoFundMe Campaign is successful, we can wrap up our fundraising by the end of the year and open Canada’s first Family Shelter for Abused Men and Children in 2018!
************************************************** Hello and welcome to the Canadian Centre for Men and Families. The Centre has become a place of hope and transformation for boys, men and fathers in our community who often come to us when no other support is available. And now we and they need you.
Since we opened our doors, every day we get calls from men desperately searching for a safe haven from an abusive partner. Many of these callers are fathers with children and they have no place to go.
Now imagine you and your child live each day in fear of violence, but no one believes you because you’re a man. That is the situation for thousands of fathers every year. Although it may be hard to believe, Statistics Canada data and sociological research is clear: men suffer domestic abuse at rates comparable to women, yet their access to vital support services including crisis centres and emergency counselling is almost non-existent.
The critical missing piece are domestic abuse shelters for fathers and children. Single father families are the fastest growing family form in Canada. Yet while the caregiving role of dads quickly expands, fathers who are suffering violence in the home still have no safe place where they can escape with their children.
If governments are reluctant to step up then it’s time for you and I to lead by example. That’s what an amazing team of philanthropists did when they donated $150,000 to build Toronto’s first Family Shelter for Abused Men and Children. That means we’re already half way to our goal. And now to help us get to the finish line, we have a backer who has stepped up to match your contributions – dollar for dollar – up until $50,000, only until December 31st.
This could be the game changer we’ve been waiting for, but only if we each take the initiative.
In the last few years, shelters for abused men and children have begun to pop up in small towns in places like Arkansas and Texas, but if we’re successful here we will open the first shelter for abused men and children in any metropolitan municipality in North America. If we’re successful we can be the lifeline for so many families in desperate need of help. If we’re successful the effects will be felt far beyond Toronto for we will have sparked a critical change in the conversation around gender and victimization, and that means more support for all vulnerable families.
This is is your chance to guarantee that success and to be a part of this landmark initiative.
The time has come for all of us to take a bold step. Your support is absolutely critical for us to capitalize on the foundation that has been built.
That’s why we are asking you to please make a gift at this time and to and work with us to bring the first shelter for abused men and children to Canada’s largest city. All donations receive a charity receipt, which means you could get up to 40% back in tax benefits.
We are offering a variety of rewards for different levels of contribution. Please note that you will receive all rewards both at your level and at all levels below.
Thank you so for your interest. We are eager to join forces with you on a special project that will greatly improve many lives.
BOOST THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!!! BOOST THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!!! BOOST THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!!! BOOST THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!!! BOOST THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!!! BOOST THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!!!
I love when americans do that thing of half-jokingly covering american stories as if it’s one of those far away bad countries because it feels like they’re 👌 this close to figuring out that they’re THE bad country
Protip for men: if marriage is a horrifying concept for you and you think it is an evil trap, do not buy a ring and ask a woman to marry you
I’m way over seeing radical feminist bullshit on my dash. This isn’t even social justice or a real issue.
sorry that not marrying someone you dont loathe is radical feminism i guess?
women: don’t propose or get married if u don’t like the thought of marriage
men: what kind of sjw fuckery
the other bit that this implies is:
If you like your wife, act like it. Even around your friends. Be open and honest about liking your wife, liking spending time with her, and not being resentful of the shared work of building a household. Let your buddies know you can’t hang out with them because you’d rather be home with your wife, whom you like, because she is your legit bff, even though you know your buddies are gonna mock you for it.
Stand up to your buddies. Tell them mocking isn’t cool and you don’t want them to do it anymore. Challenge the other men in your life to be better men.
That is what “don’t get married if you think marriage is an evil trap” implies to men who are married. And while it’s all completely reasonable I imagine that it’s scary as fuck when it’s just so much easier to har de har har the little woman’s such a nag, ain’t she, don’t we all hate being married so much? with other men.
In that context, “don’t get married if you think marriage is an evil trap” is kindof a radical statement.
The number of guys I work with who are engaged who started pulling the “uh oh, life over soon, har har” shit that I have completely shut down with a simple “well if you don’t want to get married, then don’t”…*sigh* And they’re just like, hem, haw, welllll if I don’t then she might not stay with meee, which I respond to with “well, sounds like you need to have a pretty serious and honest conversation with your fiancee about your feelings then” and then the *panic!* look…When you remove that easy “hah hah ball-and-chain” narrative, watch the reaction. Some of them (to a female friend) will mumblingly admit that they love their fiancee and are excited to be married. Others…all you get is fear.
That’s the disservice we do men by refusing to teach boys how to explore their emotional needs. It hurts everyone. I watched three male friends walk into marriages I can tell they weren’t ready for and didn’t want, just because it was expected and they had no tools for emotional self-examination. Two of those marriages are (shockingly) in crisis, a couple years later. One has kids involved now. It’s more than a little heartbreaking. The marriages I see that are working? Are the guys with the emotional maturity to talk to their wives and who don’t care if everyone knows they’re in love with them.
SERIOUSLY.
My friend is getting married this summer and when I congratulated her fiance on their engagement he said to me “Yeah well you know, women. This is what they want so you have to bite the bullet.” and my other friend’s husband who was sitting next to him laughed and agreed. If this is how you feel, don’t get married. Don’t propose. Just…. Don’t. Do it. Any of it.
Straight people think that doing things you really don’t want to do – like marriage and having kids – is normal cos they’re still stuck in a fucking 19th century mindset.
It’s why I know my best friend got a good one, he’s open about how much he loves her and he’s excited to be getting married and regularly contributes ideas and has his own input, it’s nice to see
It filters through as well. Even being gay, a lot of my straight friends don’t understand why I spend so much time with my husband. Because I love him? Because I enjoy his company? Because he’s my best friend? I can’t count the amount of straight people that have told me that they think it’s “weird” that my husband and I spend so much quality time together. The only person who understood was my mom, whose response was: “If you love someone and genuinely enjoy their company, why WOULDN’T you want to spend your free time with them?!”
How can anyone look at their impending marriage and think ‘oh no, it’s all over now’ like???? I’ve only felt so close to so many people in my life, but those small few were like?? I’d wake up in the morning excited to be awake just to look forward to SEEING them. I’d catch myself with this stupid idiot grin in broad daylight just THINKING ABOUT BEING AROUND THEM. I’d sleep easy with them in my head, shitty days became perfect once I spoke to them. THAT’s how I imagine feeling again someday. I think about feeling that way for someone again and it’s like the whole future opens up. Marriage is finding your best friend in the whole wide world and wanting to have a sleepover every single day, and to agree to it and then go around groaning like your freedom is being stolen is a HUGE disrespect. If you have the freedom to share your life with anyone you like and you throw it around like baggage you really can’t expect it to grow, can you? You gotta care about yourself a little more than that I think
All of this.
Not to mention this mentality makes it’s way TO THE DAY OF THE WEDDING. How many weddings have we seen with something like this:
Like what kind of toxic mentality do you have to have to say this as the bride is about to walk down the aisle and marry someone who it’s now suggested doesn’t even want to be there?? How is this cute? How is this supposedly charming? This is supposed to be the person you love and want to be with! And not to mention that you send this down the aisle with a small child (the ring bearer or the flower girls)…I have a special loathing for things like this.
Holy shit I didn’t know that was even a thing.
This reminds me of a study I read about years ago with statistics on happiness/stability in relationships of people of various genders/orientations, and straight people were at the very bottom. (And lesbians were at the top! Not a huge surprise, given that women are generally more inclined to communicate and work out emotions and issues.)
Urocyon's Jaunts 2.0 
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