#cheap cuts

[jonnolovesfob]

NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT CHECK YOUR PHONE AND HOW PETE SAID “pre party for the apocalypse don’t forget to rsvp” AND THEN WHEN LOVE FROM THE OTHER SIDE WAS TEASED THE LYRIC WE HEARD WAS “sending my love from the other side of the apocalypse” WHY IS NO ONE TALKING ABOUT THIS????!!!!!!

#fall out boy #fob #pete wentz #patrick stump #andy hurley #joe trohman #jonno’s bs #jonno’s fob bs #cheap cuts #check your phone #love from the other side

[theabigailthorn]

Just wrapped on the new Chube lads

Took two days of filming, but it's in the can and headed to your eyeballs soon. Dead chuffed with this one: it's ambitious and creative and cool as hell

This isn't even the best outfit: there's more on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/posts/93358888?pr=true

ALSO - an old character from Season 2 of Philosophy Tube is going to be making a comeback!

#philosophytube #philosophy chube #philosophy fukin chuuube #let's goooooooooo #fun fact that's my actual apron that I just have for baking #Brian got this wild D&G leather blazer dress and I was like 'Lol I'm gonna put a cheap amazon apron over it' #Why does this pic feel like it has John Wick energy? #Wick pic #Welcome to my kitchen Mr Wick would you like ten knives for no reason? #I need no knives: I will cut you with these cheekbones #John Wick: [looks confused and Stoic] #John Wick: [defeats me easily with the paprika] #the knives were a misdirect

[dduane]

...So that was lunch. Lamb shank (that best of cheap meat cuts, except maybe for shin) braised low & slow, using this recipe from Fifteen Spatulas, for a couple of hours in the oven and then finished in the "hay box" overnight. Merely prodding it gently causes the meat to fall off the bone.

On the side: rice, chunky potatoes & carrots that were cooked in with the lamb, with some hot/sweet pepper jelly and hot and sweet pickled oranges on the side.

And now back to work. ...But wow, I love these dishes that can just be thrown together and then left to themselves to get on with things.

#recipe #lamb shank #cheap meat cuts

[gauntletqueen]

Segment in a horror game where you explore a haunted house in which people have gone missing. The music that plays here isn't like an ambient track or only a sad creepy violin, but consisting of several instruments, including soft vocals harmonizing and a slow percussion instrument of some sort, repeating roughly the same note every second. As you explore the house, no big scares happen, maybe a sudden rat or some creepy imagery scratched into a wall. You may find newspaper articles about the house, testimonies saying they've heard footsteps from inside the house. But you hear no such thing, only the music.

After a while, so slowly you might not realise at first, instruments in the track begin to fade away, until only the percussion remains with its slow, repeated thumping. You may begin to think, when isolated like this, it sounds very similar to footsteps, when-

#I dunno what'd happen afterwards #cheap jumpscare? Does t he entity walk into the room and chase you? #Does the entity walk into the room and it cuts to black then? That might be good #simple and effective #leaving the player's imagination to fill in the void #what's the entity? No idea I just had this idea :>

[spiderzlover]

These Splatfest tees are awkward💥💥

#why they look like that #EXTRA crispy ULTRA saturated MEGA stretchy #it's just funny how their faces stretch lol #one of those “design is my passion” moments #they're not TOO bad.. kinda cringe #like from those random ahh websites that put anything on shirts for cheap #splatoon 3 #splatoon #splatfest #deep cut #leyko drawz

[harbingersecho]

... and however hard I try to integrate Iʼll always remain alien

lowkey inspired by thiss

#rvb #red vs blue #locus #sam ortez #rvb locus #samuel ortez #mine #*23 #art #i kinda cant stop staring at their short hair locus... the slight grayish hairs... wrow #i barely even recognize my version as locus tbh lol. he's like a stranger 2 me... maybe thats what he feels like too after cutting it. #i had to give him shitty long broom hair just to check that it looks like locs and like. it does. that's him officer! wh #also i suddenly thought of that 'there comes a time when u look in the mirror + realize what u see is all u'll be. and then u accept it. #or you kys. or you stop looking in mirrors' quote (paraphrased lol) so i had to repaint the eyes completely. it doesn't even matter. o woe #anyway. do u think short hair locus would have like silky hair or would it be sticking up? im partial to both #(felix's sticks up btw and it looks stupid as shit (i would know)) u knoooww his hair smelled like cheap gel 24/7 during s14 merc episodes!

[awkward-teabag]

Love (cannot emphasis how much sarcasm there is in that word) that an official Canadian government response to high cellphone rates is to switch carriers.

Switch it to what? We basically have three companies since one was allowed to eat the forth (with the government saying it wasn't anti-competition and the company eating the other pinky promising they wouldn't jack rates up). Even the smaller companies have to rent infrastructure from the Big Three so there's only so much they can do if that rent costs an arm and a leg.

And that's not touching on how many "small companies" are actually just subsidiaries of the Big Three. You may save $5 but you're still with Telus/Rogers/Bell.

Or that the actual small companies tend to have shit coverage because they don't have the infrastructure available to them and are prevented from getting it. Or their traffic is throttled in favour of the Big Three's customers. Or both.

Or that they're extremely regional thus aren't an option for a huge chunk of Canada's population.

We have no true options and the government has shown time and again that they're fine with monopolies, in multiple industries, and don't care when said monopolies jack up prices to make shareholders and the c-suite more money at the expense of everyone else. At most there will be a verbal slap on the wrist and a giftcard for $25 that people have to register for, for a decade and a half of price gouging.

It's not talked a whole lot about outside the country from what I've seen and heard but Canada is a country of monopolies. A handful of companies own nearly everything, every province has a family or two that owns a hell of a lot (Nova Scotia is basically owned by one family at this point), and our government ignores it. Even the branch that is supposed to be against monopolies is fine with mergers and takeovers in most cases.

Because, you know, the company said it totally wouldn't use consumers' lack of options to increase prices.

#canada #so much of our infrastructure and critical construction such as housing #has been pawned off for decades to private companies #and i forgot to mention one (1) family owns the bridge that is a major international corridor between canada and the us #which is apparently fine even though they fought tooth and nail to stop a bridge they don't own from being built #like our housing crisis can be traced back to the government deciding to stop building public housing in the 90s #because they figured private developers would pick up the slack #affordable apartments don't bring in much money so we got decades of cheap-ass 'luxury condos' instead #and once airbnb became a thing we got entire buildings with units <300sqft #and of course when the party in charge rotates between conservatives and neolibs nothing changes and that can gets kicked down the road #and keeps getting kicked until something collapses and they see the chance to fully privatize an industry #something similar is happening to our healthcare system too #it has been left to languish for years/decades with funding freezes and cuts #and private companies are quick to jump in and get the government stamp of approval to do [thing] that the public system clearly can't do #when [thing] would absolutely be possible if it was actually funded and/or staffed #so many communities were cut off when greyhound closed up shop because there's no government inter-city transportation #we lost internet/banking/cell service/etc nation-wide because one of the big three decided to push an update to live without redundancies #and it bugged and took the entire company's network down #even the government agency that demands major companies have a backup on a different network was taken down because they ignored that #and they got a deal if they kept their backup with rogers while their main network was also rogers #so they couldn't even make an emergency statement or anything about it #half my province also lost all digital infrastructure because it's a private company and making a redundancy line would mean smaller bonuse #it's just so bad #joke all you want about how canada is nice and friendly #but you are wrong and it's hell if you actually live here #the only reason canada is seen as nice is because it's hard to not seem like the better option when the us is your neighbour #and because of decades of pr work to make canada seem friendly and nice and not at all problematic #in some countries you actually have to try to hide you're canadian because of how much we colonize and the damage we do to other countries #yes these tags have derailed from the post but ugh #i take major issue with people who insist canada is nice and has never done anything wrong

[antisisyphus]

i keep thinking back to a quote by some architect who was arguing that the most sustainable architecture is the architecture that doesnt get torn down bc we will be (hopefully) constantly finding newer, cheaper, more efficient, ways of being "sustainable" so trying to make the most sustainable building is a moot point. in 5 years it will be outdated & if all it has going for it is "was once a very sustainable building but isnt anymore" well. that isnt much. the point was that the architect was saying that classical/romantic architecture (often considered very beautiful & worth saving which i could get into but that a whole other thing) is sustainable bc of its beauty. bc of the value we put on it. bc we dont want to erase or tear down things we find beautiful or important. i dont really have an end thought but im just musing on the importance of beauty & how aesthetic value can extend itself into material value & also how beauty (infinite) is hoarded by the rich as if it is a finite source. inch resting

#i feel like this could be a thesis but i dont know enough about anuthing to make it more than a post #the whole othr thing i could get into is how classical/romantic architecre is often held up as the most beautiful style #which is very eurocentric. #but also delegitimizes other reasons for wanting to keep a building around #ie historical importance #im just thinking about the endless capitalistic cycle of creating mass produced soulless buildings #from the catalogue homes from the 50s to the white box condos of now #where they get made & sold as New and Modern and Cutting Edge #and then in a few years (when they arent new or modern or cutting edge no one likes them so they get redone/torn down #and often those renos are ALSO souless and just fit more New and Modern and Cutting Edge appliances/architecture #this creates a lack of conse4rvation of “ugly/cheap/poor” buildings which is. again a whole other thing #also what im saying isnt new. and can be applied to many other aspects of capitalism/comsumerism #anyways

[marzipanandminutiae]

also someone on that post of McMansion getting renovated into a different McMansion was like "people who love old things don't realize that a lot of it was just cheap mass-produced stuff like the furniture and household goods they hate today!!!!"

and like. okay. there are articles on how cheap mass-produced stuff has gotten worse in just the last ten years. is it really that hard to believe that it was vastly better-made 100+ years ago?

also that should make MORE of an impact, I think, than simply assuming it's all the same as exquisite artist-crafted furniture in mansions. even the equivalent of Wish.com housewares in the 19th century were often 100X more durable than what we have today

(and no, that doesn't mean Western Society BetterTM or anything else the marble statue PFPs spout. forms of mass production happened in many societies, from cheap ceramics made in China and Japan for export to copies of ancient grave goods made in Egypt and the Mediterranean during archaeological revival crazes)

I have been living in Working or Middle-Class People's Apartments c. 1910-1920 for the past ten years. one of them was just rendered uninhabitable by fire, but a surprising number of the walls and doors were still standing. I firmly believe you could run a tank into those radiators and not damage them. things WERE often better-made in Ye Olden Times, and it doesn't make one ignorant or a Trad to say so

#history #their 'cheap throwaway perfume transportation vials' intended only to get a liquid from the store to your dressing-table bottle #are now valuable antiques #like. this shouldn't lead you to assume modern society is Morally Degenerate #it should lead you to demand better treatment and pay for workers and better materials to make our things #and the subsequent pay cuts for CEOs to make that happen #taxes on the wealthy were higher in the 1920s just saying

[shrikeseams]

I'm supposed to be cleaning house, but all I want to do is turn cigar boxes into lil shelves for my perfume collection. 😔

#San shoots the breeze #This is the project that tipped me over into buying a (cheap knock-off) dremel #My cuts are extremely wobbly but I am having a good time #Also cigar boxes are cedar so the sawdust smells nice

[anipgarden]

Cheaply Starting Seeds

This is my fourth post in a series I’ll be making on how to increase biodiversity on a budget! I’m not an expert--just an enthusiast--but I hope something you find here helps! 

Having a high-quality seed-starting setup can feel like an ultimate but distant dream. An entire shelf--an entire room, even, filled with grow lights and plant trays in the optimal setup to make tons of plants? Tons of garden tools, each with a diverse and dedicated purpose? That’s just not an option for some of us. But that doesn’t mean we can’t get started at a low cost!

Seed Starting Set-Ups

Speaking from a somewhat biased Floridian perspective, I’ve had great success starting seeds outside! My usual set-up is on a rarely-used outdoor patio table that’s moved to a sunny spot in the yard, but I’ve even grown seeds in solo cups on sidewalks, or directly in the ground, with great results! 

Some seeds grow best when they go through a cold period before germinating, while other seeds aren’t affected much by it and just wait for warm weather. As such, a viable option is to sow your seeds in late fall, let winter roll by, and wait until the seeds sprout on their own come spring! I would try and mark off where you planted said seeds, so you don’t lose track of them and accidentally dig them up.

Alternatively, if you want to get started while it's cold outside, a popular option I've seen is to grow in milk jugs! There's a lot of different ways to do it--everyone has their preference--but if you're already drinking things like milk or juice or sweet tea, and you're going to get jugs at some point in time--why not use them for gardening?

An easy way to clear up a section of lawn to create open gardening space is by using a sheet mulching or lasagna gardening method (though I like to call it the Cardboard Snuff-Out). Place cardboard or newspaper down in fall/winter to mark out where you want to garden. Layer compostable materials like grass clippings and wood chips on top of it, or potting soil/bagged compost. It’ll decompose over Winter into an organically rich bed that’ll have killed the grass and weeds underneath it. You don’t have to break out any tools and sweat over it come spring, and the cardboard itself will slowly decompose as well!

Though it's often recommended to plant things directly into the ground to decrease watering needs and increase nutritional independence, there’s plenty of reasons you may not be able to. Whether you’re renting, living in a place without a yard, or even just can’t or don’t want to break ground in a yard, you can still help biodiversity by growing in pots. Some plants have rather extensive root systems and aren’t well suited for pots, but there are still plenty of options available for plants that’ll boost biodiversity, be beautiful to look at, and grow just fine in pots! A recommendation is to get a larger pot, if you’re able, as it’ll hold onto more water and need watering less often. Not only are potted plants great for providing food for insects, but they can be shelter for other creatures too--there’s been a good few times I’ve moved a pot and found a frog or toad living underneath it.

If you don’t have room for pots on the ground, you could consider using hanging pots or window boxes! These can be great and easily-maintained options to provide food and habitat for insects and birds in an urban living situation like apartments or townhouses, but they can also be a fun way to add even more habitat to an already-robust home garden. You can even make an entire mini habitat in a window box or pot! I can personally say I’ve seen tons of pollinators visit my yearly hanging basket garden that consists of about five to seven plants, and I’ve always loved the idea of having a window box for blooms right out my window. Just make sure that it’s safe--make sure they’re securely fixed, and that whatever they’re hanging from can handle their weight when they’re freshly watered and loaded with plants. 

If you want to start indoors, you don’t necessarily need grow lights or heat mats (though it will make things a bit easier.) I’ve successfully grown milkweed, peppers, tomatoes, zucchinis, and even sprouted lemon seeds in college dorm rooms, and kept tomato and pepper plants in a dorm room on a sunny windowsill. For the most part, you need a nice and sunny window, some kind of container, and a source of heat (in my case, I used anything from a space heater to the warmth of my laptop running nearby. If you don’t have any sunny windows, or enough windowsill space to start plants on, its possible to obtain cheaper grow lights. One year, my mom bought me some gooseneck grow lights that could clip onto things for cheap off of Amazon. (Fair warning, though, they did light up my entire room in purple. I lived alone that year (covid year, my roomies bailed), so it was fine, but it was kind of trippy,)

Another year, when I was in an apartment on my own, I bought a grow light modeled like a normal light bulb from the lightbulb aisle in Lowe’s and put it in my desk lamp. Growing seeds indoors can make them grow fast and leggy, so it’ll help if you can keep a desk fan on them so they focus on growing strong instead of tall and fast.

If you’re fortunate enough to have a friend with a nice set up, you could see if they’re willing to let you borrow some of their space to start your own plants as well! My set-up in college was by no means High Class, but I was still more than willing to start seeds for my friends who asked!

Containers for Seed Starting

So now that we’ve talked starting seeds indoors and out, we need to address what to start them in. It’s important that whatever you’re using has drainage holes, and be large enough to support your plant (starting something like milkweed or a squash in a tiny little pot won’t yield great results). Fortunately, there are options here!

If you’re looking to buy pots, Dollar Tree will sell some small plastic pots for cheap in the spring! They’re kind of thin, and won’t last forever, but they’re great for a few uses and don’t cost a lot of money. Something that’s a bit more pricey but are longer-lasting, in my experience, are the Burpee SuperSeed trays. They come in different sizes, but I’m fond of the 16-cell trays--they have silicone bottoms and are made of a nice solid plastic with a tray to hold water, so they hold up for a long time and are easy to clean and reuse!

Burpee seed tray, my beloved.

What’s better than a cheap pot? Free ones, and there’s plenty of options there! I’ve seen people use toilet paper or paper towel rolls as pots by folding the bottoms in and have it work well for them! I think this method would work best if you had some kind of tray to keep them moist, because mine dried out fast last time I tried this method. I’ve also seen people make pots out of newspaper with a few different methods, and the people who use this method love it--apparently, the roots pass through the paper easier and it decomposes faster when buried, so you can just transplant the whole pot and avoid any kind of transplanting shock. If you don’t have any newspaper on hand, you can likely ask your friends or neighbors! 

I’ve gotten lots of mileage from reusing old containers by poking a few holes in the bottom with knives or scissors--just be careful while you’re doing it! I, personally, am more likely to use an already-used solo cup for it--they’re a nice size, so they hold a good amount of soil and moisture and give the seedling a good amount of root space. I tend to write the plant information on the side of the cup in sharpie marker, or on an index card in pen. I’ve also heard of people making use of egg cartons, fruit containers, yogurt cups, milk cartons, soda bottles--the more you start thinking about what you could easily poke a hole in, the more options start coming around!

This photo may be from 2018, but I'll still regularly reuse cups like this! They're also great for cuttings!

As you start planning to move your seedlings into the ground and preparing planting sites, you’ll likely need a few tools to do it! How do you get these? You may be able to borrow some tools from a neighbor! As long as you make sure to return them in good condition, depending on how friendly your neighbors are, they might be totally fine with you borrowing their tools for awhile. If you don’t want to take that route, there may be a tool library you can borrow from, or a mutual aid group that can loan you tools for awhile. Either way, borrowing tools is cheaper than buying them--though, if you do have to buy tools, cheap hand-tools from Walmart or the dollar store work just fine. They’ll even last a good while if they’re taken care of when not in use! I've even seen places like Ross sell some tools and pots in spring!

Spotted in a Walmart gardening section by the registers, 2023.

Of course, your mileage may vary with these. I genuinely cannot think of the last time my house got a newspaper, and as I've mentioned I don't have to worry about snow. Similarly, maybe you don't use plastic cups when you can help it, or don't have a particular affinity for eggs and yogurt. Maybe there isn't a tool library in your area--I sure don't know if there is in mine--but it could still be worth poking around and asking a neighbor!

That's the end of this post! My next post is gonna be about ways to support your plants for cheap--we're gonna be talking compost, mulch, and trellises. Until then, I hope this advice was helpful! Feel free to reply with any questions, your success stories, or anything you think I may have forgotten to add in!

#biodiversity #solarpunk #gardening #outdoor gardening #growing from seed #budget gardening #cheap gardening #indoor gardening #ani rambles #out of queue #the biodiversity saga #I can make a post later about how I prepare solo cups for being used as pots if yall want #I've found its safest to just use a nice pair of scissors and keep the cup upside-down on the table while I cut into the bottom #and when i say 'take care of the tools when not in use' i mean 'dont be me and leave a cheap shovel from dollar tree out in the rain' #it had a wooden handle and it basically just like. rotted. fell apart in my hand when I picked it up #generally keeping tools in the garage will also help them not rust as fast too #but if you're gonna leave them outside at least put them in shade #the number of times i have lost feeling in my hands because i picked up a hoe that was laying in the sun and fuckin SCALED my palms #its not fun. dont do it. maybe its a Floridian problem but still #if you read all these tags. uh. shovel emoji. idk. sorry dude.

[densitywell]

as someone who agrees that FCG dying permanently here is likely the most satisfying resolution to their arc, i think the belief that resurrection in general "cheapens" death, or negates its consequences, kind of... overestimates the inherent weight that character death has, as a storytelling tool. or at least reweights that impact to be placed entirely on staying dead as opposed to dying in the first place.

in more traditional storytelling, a character death is a calculated risk; that the story gains more, whether in meaning and emotion or purely practically, from a character dying than the potential that's lost with them. the possibility of ressurection, and specifically how its set up by dnd and Matt in particular, expands the available directions a story could go after a death. to a certain extent it lets you have your cake and eat it too, because not only does resurrection take time, materials, travel and making connections and upending all of your plans, but it doesn't erase the trauma the death first caused. it's not an undo button.

i find the idea that death needs to be permanent to impart a lesson especially strange wrt c3, given how largely the Hells' first encounter with Otohan continued to loom over their psyches even long after Laudna was brought back. shit, they still might not be able to shake it now that she's dead. what lesson of this second encounter requires that FCG's death be permanent? things are serious now? dying is bad? they've known that since, well. since the first time they fought Otohan. going into this battle they didn't know if resurrection was even on the table anymore.

i don't think there would've been anything gained, narratively, by Laudna permanently dying, and it would have shut the door on her arc before it really got started. FCG is a different story, with the revelations they reached before their death giving a real sense of completeness to their character development, but it's not like his story has been completely explored either. there's still more to be story to be told about FCG, and there's story to be told about bringing FCG back, as well.

and in one way or another, the consequences of their decision would still be felt, most obviously by the complications destroying their arcane core (and body) may have on their resurrection, including potentially requiring they come back in a completely different body. if he did come back he would not be the same FCG that blew himself up to save the Hells, and they would not be the same Hells who watched him do it.

#critical role #cr spoilers #bells hells #FCG #critical role spoilers #crposting #okay i think this is solid. i am done with it regardless 😴 #asides abt how Laudna's res arc is Good Story that might still be paying thematic dividends almost 60 episodes later #and how cheap and meaningless many poorly written works can make permadeath feel were cut for time #as well as pointed mentions of how much i love A Crown of Candy and further praise for what Sam's done with FCG #long post

[narvin]

listen gallifrey is a nightmare death planet I have to believe that time lords can be easily converted back into terrifying apex predators if they spend a long enough time outside. like how domesticated pigs will revert to wild ones within a few generations

#they must’ve been crazy efficient predators before setting up their domes and nutrient cubes and such #they can sit still to grab passing animals like a net casting spider without even breathing for almost an hour #two hearts and massive air reserves they can chase for as long as they like #tapetum lucidum they can hunt at night #yknow in a quiet heart when some of the guardsmen join leela to hunt with the shobogans? I’m v attached to that #I think it’s still done recreationally even if it’s seen as kind of a weird hobby #and I think a lot of gallifreyan high cuisine revolves around fresh raw meat and organ meat. there aren’t a lot of cheap cuts on gallifrey

[mandycantdecide]

currently mourning the loss of our fallen solider (buddie karaoke)

#listen i am still very excited to watch this episode #can't wait for the wedding! #but feels cheap to use it for the promo and then 'oh well it was cut sorry!!' #idk i'm just thinking things and having thoughts #buddie #911 abc

[butchshevik]

maybe this is just a me thing but I have a categorical and increasingly prejudicial opposition to the recent slew of fantasy semi-new-adult book series that for some reason are all using the "a noun of noun and noun" naming structure. like sorry but L + ratio + you will never be asoiaf + if your book was really any good you would have come up with your own uniquely stylized titular cadence instead of blatantly trying to tie yourself in with a hugely popular series that did this back in the 90s + it was cool the first time but now it just seems forced + none of you understand meter and throw in a two-syllable word so the phrase always sounds weird when spoken aloud. Do better.

#its my 2024 pet peeve #like idc if you dislike grrm but i feel like u gotta admit his titular conventions are evocative and captivating #and cheap attempts to imitate them only prove that theyre a cut above imo

[doctorwhoarchive]

wait why would they cut this

#I do think these lines could’ve been written better but #maybe if they left this in I wouldn’t have to see people comparing sam to sidney all the time #and I wouldn’t have to see people bashing sam and calling her a cheap sidney knockoff/replacement #why do they always cut some of the best moments #like yeah in hindsight it seems minor to the overall plot but it’s important for the characters #sigh #sam carpenter #gale weathers #scream