One of my favorite things to see is random people trying to interact with unfamiliar outdoor cats. Just standing there with a hand out, making kissy noises, maybe meowing at the cat while it ignores them. Mankind at its best and least dignified
if you want to interact with a cat that doesn’t know you, sit down not facing it. glance at it occasionally and make an inviting noise, but mostly just play with your phone or whatever.
the cat will almost certainly come over to check you out sooner or later. it’ll stay out of arm’s reach because it doesn’t know if you’re a jerk. offer your hand and let the cat sniff. wait. if the cat wants pettins, it will indicate that by noofing your hand, flopping on its side, or coming in close.
the cat may want to be bros but not get pettins. in that case, it will sit or lie near you but out of reach. this is friendly! the cat is saying, you’re a person in my neighborhood! hi neighbor!
of course, it’s possible that the cat is a great big cuddleslut and will come love all over you. that happens too. but if it doesn’t, that doesn’t mean it’s an unfriendly cat. be chill and let the cat choose how close to get, and you’ll find most cats are pretty friendly.
that the people who care about you aren’t, in fact, incrementally & constantly adjusting their opinion of you based on how stupid or cool your last interaction with them was….is something i actively try believing in every single day & when it works it brings my heart great peace
I feel like I should make a post about this because it’s not something that’s very well-known, and that Americans in particular may need to know about given the uncertain state of our healthcare system at the moment. I’ve wanted to write this out for a while, It’s kind of a long post, so sorry about that!
If you have an emergency and have to go to the hospital, you’ll owe the hospital a lot of money. (I got into a car wreck and broke my ankle and my arm. My hospital bill was around $20,000)
You’ll also owe the ambulance provider, if you need one. (My ambulance bill was about $800)
You may get separate bills from the anesthesiologist or surgeon. (My anesthesiologist bill was $1,700)
You may need follow-up appointments. (My orthopedic surgeon billed me for the appointments and his surgery together and it was about $1,000)
You’ve also got to pay for medical equipment you need afterward, like crutches or a walking boot. (Mine cost about $75)
Altogether, I ended up with almost $24,000 in medical debt from one car accident. That’s a really scary number for someone like me who makes $10/hr at a 12 hour a week job.
I got my debt down to $1075 by making some phone calls and submitting some paperwork.
The first thing I did was contact the hospital. They don’t make it easy to find, but many hospitals (perhaps most hospitals?) have financial assistance programs for people who can’t afford medical bills. I don’t make a lot of money, and I have bills to pay, so they were able to help me. I called the billing department and asked if they had any assistance programs for low income people who can’t pay their bills. I had to call multiple times, and I got transferred in circles by people who didn’t know what I was talking about. Finally, I got an appointment with someone in “Eligibility Services” (I don’t know what other hospitals call it, if it’s something different). I had to bring my pay stubs and copies of all of my bills. When I got to the hospital for the appointment, nobody knew what I was talking about so I had to wander a little to find where I needed to go. I spoke with the guy in Eligibility Services, and I waited for a decision on how much of the bill they would forgive. A month later, I got a call telling me it was totally forgiven.
I did the same thing for my ambulance bill and my anesthesiologist, but the process was a LOT easier. I just had to mail some paperwork and it was totally forgiven.
I didn’t bother with the medical equipment suppliers, since the bills came from separate companies and I didn’t feel like going through the process twice for $75. I was assured at the hospital that they had similar programs for debt forgiveness, so I could have probably avoided paying that too.
The only thing I couldn’t get taken care of was the surgeon/follow-up appointment cost, but they were able to put me on a no-interest payment plan.
Medical debt is scary because it’s something that can come from stuff that’s already really scary. I didn’t need the burden of $24,000 in debt on top of trying to get around on a crutch with a broken arm (it’s not easy, believe me!).. but I can’t imagine what it would be like with a bigger debt or a more severe medical emergency. I see lots of people in even worse trouble than I was in, both financially and medically. Please know that there are options for you when that GoFundMe doesn’t do enough. Even if your income is higher than mine, it’s worth a shot even for partial debt forgiveness.
I am about 900% sure there are people who don`the know this.
I think it’s important to realize you can miss something, but not want it back.
I have now been told by two mental health professionals in two days that under NO CIRCUMSTANCES EVER am I to practice traditional Mindfulness exercises
Apparently ‘feeling like I’m dissolving’ and also that ‘I’m rising out of my body’, and being passing-out-exhausted afterwards, are all the complete OPPOSITE of what’s meant to happen
Who knew???
But seriously – this is something that apparently happens to people who are low-key (or not so low-key) disassociating semi-constantly, and is really really not good for you. So if you’re one of those people, like me! then there are other forms of mindfulness that may be more appropriate for you – specifically touch/sensation based, rather than the guided-thinking, breath- and sensory-focusing exercises that make up traditional mindfulness programs/exercises. Talk to your local health care professional if at all possible.
But basically, if you know you have issues with disassociation, and somebody recommends a mindfulness program to you, BRING UP THE FACT THAT YOU DISASSOCIATE. Because normal mindfulness can be super bad for you. There ARE apparently mindfulness programs that can be helpful, but they have to be catered to the disassociation. So.
Please bear that in mind, everybody.
To add: mindfulness practices are also contraindicated for people who experience psychosis, paranoia, or hallucinations, and there’s debate over how safe they are for people who live with OCD.
IMPORTANT for those of us who are pagans and neuroatypical – a looot of spiritual exercise and beginner meditations are about mindfulness.
if Broadway doesn’t want bootlegs floating around then they need to get their act together and make legal recordings. you can say all you want that theater is meant to be enjoyed live, but the fact of the matter is not everybody can get to NYC to go to a Broadway show. not everybody can afford to take the time off of work and buy a plane ticket to NYC and buy a night in a hotel AND get the ticket to the show. people want to see the shows, that’s why there’s a bootleg market in the first place, but it’s unreasonable to expect that everyone has the time, money, and ability to make it out to the one place in the world to see something on Broadway, especially if it’s a limited engagement. so record that shit, slap some subtitles on it, and sell it so we can buy it legally.
Reblogging this every time I see it. Copyright is important for creators but it should not support cultural elitism. Affordability and accessibility of cultural content is key unless we want to live in a very divided society.
If Shakespeare’s Globe can record performances, Broadway can too
There’s a like, Broadway netflix now but it doesn’t have a lot of the things people MOST WANT TO SEE on it so it’s somewhat useless. Like for $15/month I want to see more than old recordings of La Cage or whatever.
Hey so I just wanted to say John Oliver on Last Week Tonight has once again gifted us a way to fight for Net Neutrality, which supports free speech online and enables us to shitpost at top speed as well as keep large corporations from stifling small internet businesses (example: Google paying to slow down all duckduckgo searches or Facebook paying to slow down all social media but it)
John Oliver has made a new tool for us to easily leave comments which are now publicly available on the FCC forums to fight back and say that we specifically want Title II oversight of ISPs (explained why this is what we want in his Last Week Tonight video here)
Then you will arrive at a forum to input your comment. You are required to put down name and address but it appears email is optional. Then you can write your comment. Here is my example comment below
Thank you and please help support Net Neutrality!
TO ALL OF MY AMERICAN FOLLOWERS, THIS IS INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT! SPREAD THIS PLEASE!
There are some misleading headlines/tweets/general phrasings going around right now about the Republican healthcare bill. It passed the house of representatives, but it is not law. Currently Obamacare is still the law of the land. There are several more hurdles this bill would have to clear in order to be signed into law, many of which are looking unlikely. The Senate has already made a statement that they will not be voting on the House bill. That doesn’t mean we can rest easy, but it does mean that your healthcare is still safe for right now if you have Obamacare. I’m really glad everyone is staying informed and reading the news, but some of these headlines are scaring people and making them think that PP is now defunded and Obamacare is gone. The House voting to defund is different from defunding passing and becoming law.
valerian house archive 