A Fish In These Trying Times?

Dude hyperfixations are so annoying especially if you’re not done with the last one like what do you MEAN I have a new interest I wasn’t READY YET

Wow. I’m really fucked now aren’t I haha

CW: Politics

Oh don’t mind me just thinking about how there’s a 50/50 chance I will LOSE MY RIGHTS this November y’know no big deal

- A small boy who informed me that he was one pound. Normal people are five pounds, according to him, and sharks are ten pounds. He lost his mind when I told him that we have an animal that is five hundred pounds

- My dive buddy from yesterday’s pool session, and the gentleman that joined in on our torpedo catch game. I don’t know the additional guy’s name, but he told be good luck on my buoyancy

- The hilarious experience my mom and I had at the Barbie Malibu Cafe

- The sheer diversity in people. I’ve never seen so many different people in one place. To be fair the state I came from was extremely white and generally conservative

- That previously mentioned Thor manager that randomly gives me things. He bought me a fidget cube because I kept destroying towels. He handed me a piece of a broken microphone during a morning meeting without a single word

- A bunch of guys drawing a penis out of them walking on a snow-covered lake

- Baby softshell turtles!

- An older woman handed me a handmade frog charm while I was working. I think she was a fae

- My nametag has a price sticker on it for $0.12. I get a lot of comments on it about how I’m worth more than twelve cents. It makes me happy, even if the sticker is just a meme

Things I Like Here.

So I moved from my childhood state a few years ago and I’ve been struggling with adjusting ever since, largely because of the drastic negative change in my social life. But life is beautiful, so I wanted to make a list of things I’ve seen since moving here that I couldn’t get back home! You have to appreciate the little things in life. I’m gonna periodically add more as I see them

- “The Oven Bus” which is just a bus with a brick chimney in it. I wanna know what’s going on in there so badly

- All of the sunsets here are beautiful without fail. Don’t matter what time they happen, even if it’s at 4, it’s beautiful. There’s so many colours in them

- The sign I drive past on the way to work that says “WALTZ IS FOR MURDERING THE UNBORN.” I don’t agree with it but it’s fucking hilarious to see, because it’s in the middle of nowhere

- Related, since we live out in the country now, the pro-life religious bulletins that have the most CGI looking babies on them. Like that baby is not real. Honey

- I almost got into an accident once because there are so many dogs down a 55 MPH road that I just kept looking at the dogs

- The church that has six doors outside on their lawn that say “GOD’S DOORS ARE OPEN TO ALL”

- The church that has a progress flag on its flag post and a BLM flag flying under it. I went there once and it’s full of old people. They were so kind. I want to go back there again

- The kind lady at the Chinese takeout restaurant down the road from us who stayed when the restaurant was empty so I could pick up my order. I wanted my brother to get it but he bailed last minute

- The grocery store down the street that my family has wildly different pronunciations of. It’s within walking distance. I’ve never had that before

- The man today who accidentally bought two tickets for himself. Instead of refunding one, he wanted to give away the other one for free

- The mall Santa I see around Christmas time when he’s on his break. Just walking around. High socks and shorts with a Christmas theme, he’s great

- The little girl yesterday who told me she would get a dog and a fish. When I asked her what she would name the dog, she said “Rainbow Pup”

- The parents who use they/them to refer to me. Even though I personally don’t use those pronouns and don’t like them when they’re used in reference to me, it’s a sign of progress

- The little girl whose parents I sold an annual pass to. I’ve seen her four times. She recognizes me each time and runs to give me a hug

- The toddler who tried to hand me her half-eaten cinnamon-dusted timbit when I asked her for a high five

- The kind people at KwikTrip who never look like they don’t want to be there

- My supervisor who shrieks whenever he walks by me because that’s how I greet people so he’s started greeting me like that as well. He’s an absolute truck of a man who looks like Thor

ALAS, IVE FALLEN INTO YOUR TRAP!!

But yeah. Guitarfish are rays!!

One of the easiest ways to tell the difference between shark and ray species is gill placement. Sharks have gills on the side, rays have gills on top!

You can also look behind their eyes for the presence of spiracles. Those are what help them pull water in from above them to push water over their gills beneath them! Sawfish are species of rays, saw sharks are species of sharks!

We actually have two species of guitarfish at work (Atlantic/giant shovelnose guitarfish and bowmouth guitarfish) and they’re sooooo funny

Babe i don’t mean to be THAT GUY but bowmouth guitarfish aren’t sharks they are rays…………

I’m SO SORRY

Huzzah, you identified it for me too! >:) Thanks for the info, I quite literally had ZERO idea who that big fella was. Sometimes rays look like sharks and sharks look like rays, that’s how it goes and we adapt accordingly!

Every time I see those pro-life billboards that have a 3D rendered fetus against a purple or maroon background I think no that’s not what the inside of a womb looks like and not “wow fetuses are people too”

Adding onto this because it’s on my mind

I’ve had confused feelings about my gender for a long time. I remember when I was 8-9 ish, when my mom told me that I would Get Boobs, I cried. I literally wept in the backseat of our old mustang in the drive thru lane of the Chick-fil-A. Maybe it was because I wasn’t ready to grow up, but even now I haaaaate having breasts. I remember hoping that they would stop growing as I got older. I remember wishing my period would never come. I got it at 10

I also remember thinking about growing facial hair and getting excited. I actively try to have a more neutral voice. I cover my body because I’m ashamed of being a woman because of how terribly we’re treated in general. Maybe politics has something to do with it, but that’s a separate tangent

It’s weird though

I want breast reduction surgery, but I don’t want them gone completely

I want to go on hormones, but I don’t want to change completely

I hate having a uterus, but I don’t want it replaced, just gone

I don’t mind she/her pronouns, and I call myself a lesbian all the time, but my connection to my femininity is so severed by so much

I don’t shave my legs but I shave between them and under my arms because otherwise I’m uncomfortable with myself

I don’t consider myself non-binary or trans, but I don’t think I’m cis, either

And while labels don’t define everyone and everything and you don’t need one, I want to be able to explain what’s going on in my head and with my body image. I want to point to a flat and go “that’s how I feel and those are my people,” y’know?

Not a vent, just an observation

Hold on. Cisgender people don’t question their gender?

TUMBLR SHORTS TAB GET THE FUCK OUT!!!!!

I hate it when people who don’t take a certain medication/don’t have the same disorder you do try and police how you describe how it feels when you don’t take your medication.

I take a heightened dose of a certain medication for depression. When I forget it even for a day, I notice it. My brain physically feels like jelly and every time I move my head too fast, it feels like I’m going to fall over. I’m aware of the physical space my eyes take up. It’s awful, and that’s just if I forget it in the morning- the rest of my day ends up like that.

I tried to explain it to my mom once, describing it as “I’m experiencing what feels like withdrawal symptoms from my meds because I forgot to take it this morning, it feels terrible lmao.” And then she told me that it couldn’t be that bad, that it wasn’t withdrawal, and that I shouldn’t talk about it that way (at least, that’s what it felt like she told me). Meanwhile I’m sitting there like, I’m sorry, are you taking my medication too? Are you diagnosed and being treated the exact same way I am? No? Then how can you tell what it feels like?

It’s so diminishing to me. I’m trying to talk about the struggle and I’m silenced by the whole “it can’t be that bad” sentence like??

Again, that’s how it felt. That’s probably not what she intended, but now I don’t feel like I can ever talk about it with her again