Empress of Mars: Undisputed @zebratron2084@awoo.space

Mom and I had a rousing conversation about how all our traditional family recipes are pronounced and spelled totally differently from their official versions. (e.g. what was "pungwai" to my grandma turned out to be, um, "pancotto" to Wikipedia . No foolin.)

You know what I really love about being Italian-American? When a redneck family gets something dead-wrong, it's "ignorant." When an Italian family does it, it's "rustic." :D

I really wish the ADHD community on Reddit would stop posting such <s>on the nose observations about my neurotype</s> pernicious lies and infamy.

@OldBrushNewPaper I've kept my sanity through these things as I age, by generalizing the rule I set after the funeral of my 90-year-old great-grandmother, who lived a fine life and died painlessly in the middle of a Catholic church service. (Which sounds like a nightmare to me, but was right up her alley.)

Keep in mind that the following is PURELY my own approach and NOT intended to be normative in any way:

If they're older than the average human life expectancy when they go, not in the middle of any major unfulfilled projects, died comfortably, and seemed to have led a pretty happy life, I don't mourn. I give them a moment of silence, a round of applause, and a "Well done. Full marks." And then I look for their successor.

Now, granted, in Rutger Hauer's place, I'm not sure he actually HAS one, nor that any such thing is possible... And losing Roy Batty has a certain poignance that is entirely unique...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_faxjRKqJ4

cw: Neue Deutsche Härte, scruffy English hippie; allergy warning: parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme

Ever since I stopped having access to cannabis, my dreams have come back with a vengeance. They're back to where they were in the Livejournal days, when I used to post regular dream diaries: epic, recurring, cathartic, and deeply weird.

Today I've been trying to nap my way through some sinusitis-induced fatigue, and I wound up dreaming about playing video games with Samuel L. Jackson. It started with us all in an enormous auditorium inside his mansion, playing off a movie theater screen, just us and 4-5 other guests.

Then the party started. Hollywood celebrities arrived. Hiphop producers arrived. Al Pacino arrived. We moved out into the main mansion, a gorgeous spawrling place Über-Victorian that was all stained glass and fine varnished wood.

They brought in a whole team of weed dealers and set up an open, traveling kief and hash bar. It was so acrid I couldn't even bring myself to try it... and you're talking to someone who's been dreaming of weed EVERY NIGHT since leaving the West Coast.

The whole party was just soaked in this alienating kind of het male power-player machismo, and I spent the whole time feeling very nerdy and out of place, keeping to the corners with the other broke-ass queer nerds who came with me.

And when I woke up, I felt so hollow about the whole thing. I thought about all the wealth and power on display and I asked myself, "Rez, is this really where you ended up by comparison? You've got none of this. You've done absolutely nothing with your life."

And I kinda gave myself an internal high-five and said, "Damn straight, Other Rez. Mission Accomplished." Whatever it was those guys had, I'm genuinely grateful I stayed way the fuck away from it, had a few fun years with my fellow shy-but-perverse nerds, and now have little besides an obscure webcomic, a subsistence job, a tiny social-media circle of gay-ass leftist weirdos, and this really cool dragon to pet. Oh, and more shrimp within walking distance than I can shake a tail at.

By cat standards, I've done AWESOME. 10/10, no notes. 🐯​

@anthracite The one in Interplay's Neuromancer was no great shakes mechanically, but I still remember crying when I had to kill the one who just wanted to play a nice game of chess because I couldn't find the right software...

@001zlnv My condolences, hun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZeciX-3wfs (cw: industrial music, implicit cookie)

I survive Barry, I survive a multistate Greyhound, I survive a week of the flu, I spend all day on delayed flights... only to die at the hands of a deranged (and really sweet) old Italian lady with a new air fryer.

The sauerkraut balls are actually real good, though. It's an Ohio thing.

@LexYeen@snouts.online @Goronic@snouts.online "You're a spooky bunny, Max." "Tee-hee!"

I can not FUCKING WAIT until an American sitcom makes a joke about the "raiding Area 51" meme, therefore bringing it to its official and merciful end.

@Phorm @JulieSqveakaroo *Fry "take my money" meme*

@hummingrain Teach the little scamp to breathe fire maybe while we await the revolution? (And pet 'em for me.) It's been working pretty well with Peggy. <3

@Phorm @JulieSqveakaroo

┏┓
┃┃╱╲ in
┃╱╱╲╲ this
╱╱╭╮╲╲house
▔▏┗┛▕▔ we
╱▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔╲
welcome all homestar references
╱╱┏┳┓╭╮┏┳┓ ╲╲
▔▏┗┻┛┃┃┗┻┛▕▔

#NoLoafing

@packbat You too, huh? I just saw an entire café damn near jump to their feet at once at a thunder strike...

@kelseyhusky *scribbles notes furiously* "Don't... use... lasers... Messy." Thank you. We'll get back to you on that. For our friend.

*dashes off*

@kelseyhusky How would huskybots open a can of food?

Asking for a friend. Martians totally know how to do that already because we are very advanced. >_>;;

@JulieSqveakaroo Dammit, Julie, I thought my optimism today was unassailable...

...but now you've made me realize how bleak and empty my life is without a Stereolab cover of "Feed The Childrens." ;___;

Anyhow, for now, the Empress is [OUT]. Y'all Terrans try not to fuck up anything else too bad for Earth tigers while I'm gone, K? We're gonna need those guys here in the future to, like, exist and stuff. Everything else is just academic for me honestly.

Her Majesty is wearied by this talk of your primitive planet's affairs, and shall take her rest now. Be good, Earthlings.

@Balinares (ideologically, OTOH... sigh... yeah, I'll admit sometimes it does feel like somebody stuffed the whole Know-Nothing Party into a glacier in 1860, and some idiot released them into the 21st century like a gang of angry thawed cavemen >___<

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Know_Nothing )