baratron | Entries tagged with cephalopod

Issues:
xoJane: Fat kids and formerly fat kids are at significant risk of eating disorders, yet are more likely to go undiagnosed and untreated. Something that I only really thought about based on the experience of a friend, but it should seem obvious once you think about it.

Slate.com: How would American media report on the Government shutdown if it were happening in another country?. A bit out-of-date now, but certainly interesting.

Society's New Rules (According to the Internet)

Adorable:
Not Always Romantic: Three is a Crowd, but also Allowed. The last line just makes it.

Amusement:
The 50 Most Perfectly Timed Photos Ever.

IKEA or Death? Does that shouty Scandinavian name belong to an IKEA product or a death metal band?

Knitted nautilidae!

Snakes Wearing Tiny Hats.

Pet snake playing Pokemon X/Y.

NASA finds Cookie Monster on surface of Mercury. Awesome :)

Parody of anti-gay pamphlets offers detailed, behind-the-scenes view of how liars misuse real citations. Very interesting, and Relevant To Our Interests.

~~Sexist bastard~~James Watson on The Double Helix and his changing view of Rosalind Franklin. I still want to spit at him, but I suppose he comes across as slightly less objectionable when all the evidence is considered. Bah.

More than you maybe needed to know about the echidna. Warning: Contains echidna penis. Once seen, can never be un-seen!

Protein art. This is also Relevant to My Interests.

OMG, baby octopodes! *hyperventilates with Teh Cute!*

Current Mood: sore

You know what I've been really missing since people started spinning off to other types of social media? Awesome links that people found. I only have a couple of people left on my friends list who post cool links, and it tends to be one or two at a time rather than massive linkspams. I miss them!

I myself am terrible at getting round to posting linkspams (indeed, I usually have 20 or more tabs open waiting until I have spoons to write coherent English), but here are some of the links that have been sitting around waiting:

Science Links:
Photos: Bear researcher Lynn Rogers keeps making tracks. This is the guy who's been on a couple of BBC TV programmes, and whose bear research I follow every day. Lovely photos of Ursus americanus. Bears!

So, we all know that people who think that people who think that cilantro is pleasantly astringent are normal, and people who think it tastes soapy are normal, and people who like it because it tastes soapy are complete weirdos. And we've known for a while that whether it tastes pleasantly bitter or soapy to you is because of genetics. Here are the actual genetics.

Carnivores pick meats over sweets. Apparently, lots of carnivores can't actually taste sweet things. I presume that bears are not among them.

Awesome animations. Unfortunately, the version of The Cambrian Sea shown here does not include the Opabinia. (

stellarwind's favourite prehistoric creature).

otterylexa informs me that 8th-12th October are Cephalopod Awareness Days. All hail our future overlords!

Ada Lovelace Day is on Tuesday 16th October. Rather tempted to go to this event in London, anyone interested?

Cute Things:
Liz Climo's Tumblr. Adorable drawings of bears, bunnies, dinosaurs, foxes, and more.

Queer Things:
Illustrated Kinsey Scale. NOT SAFE FOR WORK. Now I want someone to do a female version, please. And a bi version with all genders of people.

Disability Links:
Found by accident: Sign language that African Americans use is different from that of whites. Very interesting.

Linked from that, and on a similar note: Gallaudet University’s new dorm designed with deaf students in mind. Will be generally interesting to anyone who cares about access issues.

How Things Work When Your Lover Is Also Your Caregiver. This is great.

Current Mood: okay

Found completely by accident today on Etsy.com: OCTOPUS tattoo thigh high stockings / nylons.

Somehow, I don't think I can be bothered with the shaving or waxing that would be necessary to wear those; but I will link to them anyway, in case someone who does remove their leg hair would like to get some. The only problem I can see is that they are "one size", which as we all know means they won't fit anyone properly. Though apparently they also make tights with this design in S/M, L/XL and XXL, in a variety of base skin tones.

Current Mood: okay

Killing myself laughing at the Merriam-Webster "Ask the Editor" feature on the plural of octopus (which I would link to, if I could find a way to do so). Apparently, if you say "octopuses" you are correct; if you say "octopi" you are sorta correct, but have no grounds for telling the people who say "octopuses" that they're wrong; and if you say "octopodes" (which the girl has pronounced most unlike the classical Greek that I was taught at school), you have to "be prepared to deliver this spiel at a moment's notice and in a British accent". Funnily enough, those are both things I specialise in... ;)

Current Mood: amused

Some links that I've had open for ages, plus one that is brand-new.

Mr Potato Head makes octopus pal. From the BBC News site a year ago. I posted about octopuses putting together Mr Potato Heads before here.

Interactive Build A Squid. Linked by

mactavish, very fun. My colossal squid is called Flobalob, have a look for him sometime :)

Octopuses give eight thumbs up for high-def TV. Except they don't have thumbs. Oh well.

INVISIBLE OCTOPUS IS INVISIBLE. Linked by

mactavish, who is clearly my friend in cephalopod fandom. Video of octopus protective camouflage. These creatures are amazing. I, for one, welcome our new overlords.

Current Mood: 8-legged

Eeek! Turns out 8th October was International Cephalopod Appreciation Day and I didn't know! Well, for those of you who are still in a timezone where it's the 8th... follow the link for some exciting cephalopod activities.

Richard is working late this week (2pm-11pm), so I see him for a while in the morning depending on when either of us manage to get up, but am devoid of wuzzieness in the evening. As a result I shall be watching videos like this one: "Carmensita," by Devendra Banhart, featuring Natalie Portman (linked by fellow wuzzie

epi_lj). It features a mad singing wuzzie with vast quantities of hair, including some which you don't usually get to see! And he loves an octopus! Further analysis in The Guardian.

By the way, Richard's beard is currently longer than it's ever been. He may be going for some sort of personal record.

Current Mood: blah. Just got up.

I have waaay too many tabs open. In an attempt to get rid of some, I'll post the links.

YouTube video: Shonen Knife - "Top O' The World (gay bear version)". Apparently there was a trend last year for bears to post videos of themselves miming to their favourite pop tunes. Most of the videos aren't terribly interesting (on several of them, the guy hardly moves all video, so the only evidence you have of his bearhood is the beard. Bah). This one however features dancing, belly, plushies, Engrish, strange hairstyles and lots of laughter. Recommended, if you are a fan of the hairy beardies. May be amusing even if you're not. (Totally safe for work, too, if audio's ok.)

Webtoy: The Blogadilla Swedish Furniture Name Generator. Richard is a chest of drawers, apparently. I think he should be a bed.

This is freaking hilarious. When Dogma was released, lots of Christians decided to protest against it - without actually having seen it. As a result, Kevin Smith decided to go and join the protest. A video has been unearthed.

National Geographic: Translucent Creatures. Beautiful photography featuring octopus, squid and lots more.

Weird sex: Giant squid do it deeper. Very awesome! If you like squids. Link possibly from

mactavish.

Cute & funny Pokemon animation. Probably makes more sense if you are at least in passing familiar with the Pokemon games, but it's still good. Link from Alex at Pokecharms.

The Idle RPG. Amuses and disturbs me immensely. Link from

hoopycat.

Alarming surreal art! Features copious numbers of tentacles, as well as people merged with animals in bizarre ways. I think image 4 is my favourite. Link from

slightlyfoxed via

booklectic's journal.

Robots made from fonts. Very cool if you are a font geek. Link from

j00j.

OK, we have to go to Blackpool. Apparently the Blackpool Sea Life Centre has a new exhibition called Suckers. And it features a hexapus! Photo here. I am dead of cute.

I've been wanting to go to Blackpool Pleasure Beach & ride the Pepsi Max Big One for ages, anyway. So this can be an official excuse. Anyone else want to come?

HEXAPUS!!

Current Mood: cuted

I am oddly cuted by the Flickr: Octopus on yo head photo pool which

mactavish found by accident.

I am unsurprisingly cuted by the knitted octopus which

nitoda found in the

knitting community.

But nothing, nay, nothing comes close to the sheer awesomeness of the crocheted squid scarf found by

j00j, which is unbelievably cool. I WANT ONE! In h-l-safe plant or synthetic fibres please, and perhaps bright pink & purple rather than orange... Will pay for squid!

Current Mood: bouncy

irc transcript from #soc.bi, a few minutes ago:
<Beetlebau> IA! IA! CTHULHU CITRUS FHTAGN! <astra> ?! * Beetlebau found out about Buddha's Hand. <Beetlebau> A type of citrus fruit that looks like a cross between a lemon and Cthulhu. <astra> does this exist in reality? <Beetlebau> Well, yeah! <fluffymormegil> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha%27s_hand <fluffymormegil> freaky! <Beetlebau> We found some at Jungle Jim's Sunday. Kind of regret not buying one. <astra> that really DOES look like Cthulhu!

Current Mood: amused

Hmm, I just managed to make

maniackatie laugh on irc. I said that tomorrow I'm going to the protest outside the Burmese Embassy and then to Whole Foods while I'm in London - which she said was "Heheh, a very baratron thing to say ;)". Am I really that predictable? ;)

Some links that have nothing to do with the current situation:
Article about the FTM Transtastic Calendar from, of all places, The Sun - link from

earwigmc. The article does not use 100% perfect transsexual politics-compliant language, but is so, so positive considering its source. It really says a lot about how LGBT politics in general has come over the past 20 years - even, over the past 5 years - to have an article this positive in a tabloid newspaper. (Er, eek at the edits made to that page in References & External links. Someone with Wikipedia cred needs to revert that page, I think.)

LOLthulhu.com - link from

j00j. Like LOLcats, but with Cthulhu. I really like "OH HI - I HELP WIF UR KILLIN". Some of the others are funny but a bit too well-spelled to be true LOL, er, thulus.

Dept. of Some Things We Would Actually Like to Forget: A Children's Treasury of Terrible 9/11 Art - link from

booklectic. This page might make you laugh, or it might make you angry. Or it might do both. As the author writes, "How did such a truly awful, gut-wrenching event inspire such stupid crap?". My, er, "favourite" is the Free Medium Fries In Honor of Our Fallen Heroes - as it will really make so much difference to the families of those killed to get a free bag of chips at Burger King. *rolleyes*

Naughty Needles Burlesque - Knitted Burlesque show! Linked by

mactavish & I just had to go back through 240 Friends page entries to find that, because I know too many people who might have linked it ;D As work-safe as burlesque gets (i.e. if you work in an adult toy store, no problem, if you work in a bank, better wait 'til you're at home.) I want to see the big bad wolf's knitted tail! I'd also like to see colour photos, ah well.

Lurking at the Aquarium, Brilliant Houdinis of the Deep. OCTOPUS ARTICLE. Goes on about how wonderfully intelligent they are, and features an octopus who can put together a Mr Potato Head. Like this is news to any of you lot! I would seriously have a pet octopus if they didn't have such awfully short lifetimes :(

The Trouble With Tribbles - drawn in the style of Edward Gorey by

shaenon. Linked by

j00j. Honestly, I'm not a Star Trek fan, but it's still freaking hilarious. Possibly helps for you to be familiar with Edward Gorey, I suppose.

I've noticed that I don't have a "humour" tag. Probably because I'm not convinced that many people share my sense of humour, so I don't feel that I can label things as funny. Hmm.

I currently have 36 tabs open in Opera, which is Too Many, so have a link dump to let me clear them up :)

Web comics:
xkcd cartoon: My Profanity Usage by Cause, link from DoctorOak Alex (I think). Replace "Mario Kart" with "Zelda" and you have me ;)

Left-Handed Toons (by right-handed people): An Open Letter to Subway, linked by

booklectic. I also want to see bands called Unnecessary Dairy Overlap.

Textual Humour:
Cephalopod Surprise by Skippy, linked by

j00j. If you've wondered why people suddenly have usericons declaring "Pie Doesn't Have Tentacles!", this is the context.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, condensed by

mollyringwraith.

Videos:
I may just have to rent/watch Music & Lyrics. This video is probably the funniest 80s pop spoof I've ever seen. Linked by

rmjwell.

Livejournal entries with YouTube embedded videos by other people:
Have you ever wondered about the source of the /dance emotes in World of Warcraft?, linked by

xiphias.

Xbox 360: The Red Ring of Death, linked by

epi_lj. Hilariously funny "death metal" video. Well, hilarious if you know the context of the Red Ring of Death, anyway. Unless your Xbox 360 blew up that way.

Video of a little yellow dancing robot. WAAAANT! *dead of cute*

Actual Useful Content(!):
The Ikea Hacker, link from

okoshun. How to reassemble Ikea furniture in different configurations than Ikea was originally intending and create new and interesting works of art (or storage solutions). Awesome :)

Current Mood: amused

I have been busy uploading & tagging photos from various trips - some almost a year old.

dino Trip 7 - Modern Art in Manchester, 2006-09-22. If any Mancunians could tell me what the saxophones, Moon, bat wings & bees statue is called, or who it's by, or even what street it's on, I'd be most grateful.

Me,

alexa_robinson,

rowan_leigh,

fluffymormegil (friends-only), at BiFest, 2006-09-23. (Tell me if it's ok to make this public.)

Various "new" photos of me & Richard, from 2006-12-28 to 2007-03-12. Features naked

wuzzie-chest, if you feel you need warning of that.

dino Trip 8a - Minneapolis & the Mall of America, 2007-03-29 & 30. Features an iPod vending machine, Lego stegosaurus & giant octopus, and wedding chapel - in the Mall of America.

dino Trip 8b - Lost in New York, 2007-04-03 & 04. Features the Empire State Building, giant topiary bunny, a hideous golden statue outside the Rockefeller Center, and the Nintendo World store. And this rather nice picture of ancient & modern NYC. 95%-written post about New York just needs a quick edit & post.

Check out all his majesty. 2007-06-08

Why tricycles are better than bicycles, 2007-06-09.

My birthday party, 2007-06-21. Photos edited so it looks like the plushies went to the restaurant without us :) Delicious vegan food porn from 222.

Toronto Zoo photos, all uploaded & tagged. 75%-written post about the Zoo to follow. 2007-06-29

Photos of actual humans from alt.polycon 15 and from

hoopycat &

veryfineredwine's wedding will follow. They're the ones which take the most effort, as technically I'm supposed to contact other people before putting their photos online. What I'll most likely do is upload them all friends-only & get people to say if it's ok to make them public.

Current Mood: accomplished

Also, just for your information, it is the early morning of 20th July (as my friend

stellarwind says, "latearly"), and I am reading livejournal entries from 9th July and congratulating myself on how caught-up I am. If anything time-critical is happening (e.g. if any London-based or visiting London friends want to get together in the next couple of weeks), commenting here would be a good idea.

Interesting things that people have said recently:
From

kightp in a friends-locked post on

mactavish's journal:

I tend to be in "relationships" with people *before* I date them, since I count friendship as a relationship of equal and sometimes greater value to romance.
...
I think it's different for people who put off having lives of their own until they're involved in Serious Relationships. I can remember doing that when I was very young, but the memories come with a sort of vague puzzlement at why I did things that way, and no surprise at all that it didn't work out.

Now, though, I've got this great big life full of friends and joys and obligations, and I don't think it would be fair to even consider a serious relationship with someone new until they'd been pretty well exposed to all the stuff that makes me me, and shown that they were not just OK with it, but actively attracted to it. (The same holds true in reverse: I don't think I could get serious about anyone whose nooks and crannies I hadn't already explored and found comfortable).

From

papersky: Have you ever noticed, nobody ever says books have too many heterosexual people in them?

From

skibbley: So, if we were to give everyone in the country a basic amount of money to live on from general taxation and abolish unemployment benefits and associated agencies?

From

firecat: Speak well of your body pledge & commentary. I like Stef's commentary and the amended pledge better.

Some silliness:
"Translation" of a Rammstein song. With Fraggles. By

transversecity.

The Zombie Food Pyramid. By

moosl. I want this on a t-shirt. Hell, everyone wants this on a t-shirt!

Links, that you may have seen other people posting in the last 2 weeks :P :
We Have No Comment About The Name Of This Box Of Walmart Fireworks

News: A possible squid/octopus hybrid has been found?

Earth Erotica Photography by Heather Firth. Technically work-safe photographs of... rocks, and landscapes, and trees... that look like interesting parts of people. Really rather interesting.

Current Mood: thoughtful

Your Squid Quotient = 170.75

Interpreting your results: An average Squid Quotient is around 100. A SQ of 100 means you have a normal affinity for squid. A SQ above 100 means you have an attraction or fondness for squid. Below 100 means that you should probably stay away from the deep ocean.

find out your squid quotient

Current Mood: LOL!

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Page Summary

Links of the past month (or so)
In which I read BoingBoing Science News so you don't have to
Links of the Past Month Or So
If only I wasn't a hairy-legged feminist!
The plural of octopus.
OCTOPUS!
International Cephalopod Appreciation Day
do you think you can defeat me with your rebellious beard?
links of the... current time period
in an attempt to close outstanding tabs
Hexapus!
Warning: Contains tentacles.
It has TENTACLES!
link dump - mostly humour, some news
Links: Web comics, text humour, embedded YouTube & one actual _useful_ link ;)
More photos!
Not A Life Update & Links
squid quotient

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Page generated Mar. 9th, 2026 09:46 pm

helen-louise's journal

Entries tagged with cephalopod

Links of the past month (or so)

In which I read BoingBoing Science News so you don't have to

Links of the Past Month Or So

If only I wasn't a hairy-legged feminist!

The plural of octopus.

OCTOPUS!

International Cephalopod Appreciation Day

do you think you can defeat me with your rebellious beard?

links of the... current time period

in an attempt to close outstanding tabs

Hexapus!

Warning: Contains tentacles.

It has TENTACLES!

link dump - mostly humour, some news

Links: Web comics, text humour, embedded YouTube & one actual _useful_ link ;)

More photos!

Not A Life Update & Links

squid quotient