Luke Peters

@BBDaybreakEU I was in the process of making the whole blog "pretty" in Word so I could print myself a shitty book of it to read offline, but it's so long I gave up. Maybe time to finish it.

This here is an absolutely fantastic travelogue which I finished reading yesterday. It's over 50,000 words but to summarise: - Belgian couple take a Toyota Landcruiser and drive across the Congo. They cover 3000km in 39 days. - It's an unbelievably hostile environment. Everyone in the country, from the police officials to village children, is trying to make money from them. With a few exceptions, most of the Congolese they encounter are utterly terrible people. - Despite this, they have a strict 'no bribes' policy, which extends to not giving any money to anyone begging for it (which is constant). This pisses everyone off. They have to persuade every policeman and official to let them through wherever they go, and they have to tell villagers that they will not pay them when they 'offer to help'. - Most of the roads are mud and almost impossible to traverse. The car is very robust but it gets knocked about a lot and faces frequent mechanical issues which somehow have to be resolved in the middle of nowhere. - Wherever they can, they seek refuge at Catholic missions in villages along the way. The clergy are some of the only people they can remotely trust. - Their presence as White people in the villages, and on road, is a complete spectacle. Hundreds of villagers crowd around their tent when they sleep. Everyone is staring at them, asking for money, and laughing when some kind of misfortune befalls them. - There are a couple of instances where they brush closely with angry villagers wielding machetes and sticks screaming about Whites and money.

@theramblingfool @ManhttanMetsFan @ThomasBiegel1 Apparently not, because here you are despite discussion earnestly arguing for blue.

@ManhttanMetsFan @ThomasBiegel1 If you're allowed to coordinate and discuss with people you know before the vote, that is a different hypothetical, and it changes the answer for a lot of people.

Every Pro-red argument: (1) Cynicism: "It's impossible for blue to win. Don't be suicidal." (2) Narcissism: "There is no downside to pressing red." (3) Changing the hypo: "Babies don't count. That'd be stupid! So there's a blender..." (4) Psychopathy: "Blue pressers deserve to die." (5) General poor analytic reasoning: "If everyone just pressed red!"

@shane1step @rng_or_no_rng I'm glad you're not my lawyer dude holy shit lol

Фанаты красной кнопки: нет, вы сами выбираете умереть, мы просто стоим в сторонке. Как они стоят в сторонке:

@frogNscorpion Love getting to tear up degraded rippy-bits of forever plastic that the weeds have happily integrated into anyways.

Landscape pro tip of the day: Landscape fabric/weed tarp is a red flag Unless you're fine with the lowest quality landscape service (some people just want a quick mow to help them manage) never do business with a landscape company that installs landscape fabric. No serious professional does anymore. This is due to them not just being counterproductive to their purpose but generally bad for overall garden health. Anyone who installs this has no idea what they're doing. The breakdown: 1. Choking: -It effectively reduces gas exchange (O2 & CO2) in the soil -Severely limits water permeating into soil creating droughts (drip line can keep plants going but now even water from the drip doesn't properly soak the bed as the surrounding soil is patched) 2. It doesn't reduce weeds, potentially makes weeding more difficult: -Any type of soil topdressing (mulch/stone) placed on it becomes a new soil layer regardless of it's placement -Mulch alone can act as a moist area to germinate -After 1 season mulch is breaking down into an even more legitimate soil layer and stone has begun catching debris and filling its spaces with soil -Roots & rhizomes from seeds caught above the tarp still grow between the fibers of the tarp whether it's the cloth-like tarp or plastic woven ribbons. -Already existing roots and rhizomes beneath the tarp will weave and work themselves through -Now the only way to fully remove weeds is by removing the tarp as opposed to simply loosening soil and raking out weeds whole 3. Appearance: -You are effectively burying trash bags -Corners and edges of tarp always work their way to the surface -It is now obvious you have buried trash bags all over your yard -Plastic breakdown leaves you with plastic ribbons and fuzz all over your yard and probably in your balls So it's: -Bad for your garden which is bad for your garden's appearance -Bad for maintenance costs -Looks like shit There is only one sensible application for weed tarp: Agriculture. Fresh tarp placed above soil effectively acts as a weed barrier and without its fibers getting clogged with sediment it still allows for moderate gas and water exchange. It looks like you're growing in a parking lot, but you're just looking for food production. However it also acts as a heat sink during heat waves and can be tough on roots & leaves. If your contractor uses this he has virtually no experience in the field to know what a nightmare it is for maintenance, no understanding of basic horticulture, no understanding of how to manage time/costs effectively in your interest.

Zooming in and out, it seems like two problems are 1. for the small holes/long distance you'd have to hold it further than arm's reach, so need a buddy or apparatus or rock, and 2. there are zero markings to tell you which holes are which. Although Amelia Sparavigna suggests they used calipers or the concentric circles or mnemonics to figure it out. researchgate.net/publication/22…

@Oddloaf1 @bitcloud No holes whatsoever, or very small pinholes for long-distances? I'm actually asking; I haven't seen them all.

@PukeLiters @bitcloud That explanation is pretty easily debunked by the fact that the holes are different sizes on different items, and that some of them have no holes at all.

@LoveDeltaWolf @quicklewinsky @UltimoLegend Let me spell it out for you, be your own personal Grok: the information you're looking for is LITERALLY IN THE VIDEO ITSELF VERY PROMINENTLY.

@PukeLiters @quicklewinsky @UltimoLegend Ask grok bro you have the blue ticker

@wrathofgnon So your foundation for a regular house *can* just be giant fuck-off granite stones. The LLMs keep trying to dissuade me.

Details from the construction, everything looks perfect. Granite foundation from a local quarry, wood from local forests, hemp from local fields, lime from a nearby kiln.

In Bärnau, Bavaria, in 2024 a young student architect (Julius Schönberger, 23 at the time) built a series of homes using only natural materials and with techniques handed down from Romans and medieval craftsmen. The idea was to trial methods to create contemporary homes with modern comforts using local materials and skills (the majority of the necessary labor can come from completely unskilled people). Hemp, lime, clay, wood etc. Electricity has been installed, as well as a modern pellet heater rather than fireplaces, and some of the traditional roofs have been extended to provide more space for future solar panels. The design was completely informed by the materials and the local climate, as it always was before plastics and the ideology of modernism. An interesting discovery was that the building process itself generated no garbage at all. All natural insulation easily cleared modern codes and the buildings generate less waste, pollution and CO₂ than any single part of a home built with modern materials. I am looking forward to following this project to create a method to build homes for 500 years and that break the destructive teardown and rebuild business model that is currently ruining both us and nature.

@LoveDeltaWolf @quicklewinsky @UltimoLegend Literally what are you saying to me?

@PukeLiters @quicklewinsky @UltimoLegend Idk too its funny af imo

@quicklewinsky @UltimoLegend Gonna have to change your name to slowlewinsky.

@UltimoLegend Whats the guy who makes these skits name / channel?

@MZHemingway @ChristianHeiens Does seem like they're kind of just fucking with people at this point. "And then we made them set up polls across the whole state for an unconstitutional referendum! And they actually went and voted!"

@ChristianHeiens Related but a friend of mine said he almost didn't vote because he believes the fact of the referendum attempt is so brazenly fraudulent that he wants no participation in it whatsoever. But he did vote.

My mother just told me she doesn’t plan on voting in the Virginia referendum. When I asked her why, she replied that she’s “broken out of the matrix.” This is the problem we face. There’s an enormous chunk of people who should be with us, but they’re disengaged and demoralized. Millions have checked out because they believe there’s no one out there who will fight for them.

@DevonBuildHappy @BowTiedBroke Ticks are bad and mosquitoes are annoying but there has to be something inbetween getting alpha-gal syndrome and total insect holocaust.

@PukeLiters @BowTiedBroke Thats what i was afraid of

I was in the bug business for 25 yrs. Hands down this is the best device to keep bugs out of your house. I did a study with the CDC dealing with Lyme Disease outbreaks in the Northeast. We used this for large applications of wooded areas. Knocked tick populations down by 90%.

@DevonBuildHappy @BowTiedBroke It'll kill everything.

@BowTiedBroke Mosquitoes and ticks are bipolar here in north idaho, one year its demon swarms from hell for months, and others its all wasps. Being in the woods… i dont want to kill off everything else like the mantids i love to find. Will this kill all my friends too?

@IterIntellectus @Publix did Greenwise "BPA-free" cans substitute it with BPS/BPF?

> be plastic company > put BPA in baby bottles > endocrine-disrupting chemical > replace BPA with BPS > put "BPA free!" on the label > BPS turns out to be worse > shrinks testes and breaks sperm in male offspring > mfw

@zephzoid Rao's was without a doubt the best jar sauce on the shelf. I knew Campbell's was going to gut it.

This is one of the most disappointing rabbit holes we have ever seen with our food… Rao’s was one of the most beloved clean ingredient staples in every health conscious consumers kitchen. Then they were bought out by Campbell’s in 2024… In 2025 Campbell’s also bought 49% of La Regina, who produces Rao’s tomato‑based sauces. The ingredients stayed the same on the back. But customers are now claiming Rao’s is now more watery, tangier, more acidic, less tomato‑forward, and sometimes “cheap store brand” quality. Loyal customers say the sauce tastes worse, look more orange, have more chunks, or taste more heavily spiced and bitter. Then people flipped over the jar… ”Olive Oil” not “Extra Virgin.” This means they’re likely using a more processed, lower‑grade olive oil (or a blend) rather than a cold‑pressed EVOO. It’s also not organic, meaning the inputs are undoubtedly conventionally farmed. Campbell’s says the ingredient list hasn’t changed… Consumers point out the ratios could be different. The sourcing quality could be worse. Whatever it is, many believe something is up. We’ve seen a long-time pattern of healthy brands achieving the velocity to be acquired from a Big Food company and then just not being the same as it used to be. Shop local, buy independent, support your farmers.

@reddit_lies There are only 2,331 people on death row?

Reddit trolley problem:

@giveashitnature People know. You think they don't know? They just don't like bugs.

If you have a bug zapper up, it's time to take it down. A University of Delaware study analyzed nearly 14,000 insects killed by bug zappers over a single summer. Mosquitoes accounted for 0.22% of them. Less than one quarter of one percent. The other 99.78%? Moths, beetles, midges, fireflies, and other beneficial insects doing exactly what your yard needs them to do. Here's why it's even worse than it sounds: mosquitoes don't find you by light. They find you by carbon dioxide, body heat, and skin chemistry. Your bug zapper is completely invisible to them. Meanwhile it's running all night massacring the pollination night shift. Moths are among the most important nocturnal pollinators alive, and they're flying straight into your zapper because they navigate by light. Bug zappers kill over 70 billion insects annually in the US. Harvard Medical School's Zika page specifically warns against them, noting they may actually increase mosquito populations by eliminating the beneficial insects that prey on mosquitoes. What actually works: eliminate standing water within 100 feet of where you spend time outside. That's your best bet. It's time to break up with the bug zapper.

@jpopelish @jess_ann_pin @texmed @DallasCMS That actually is what she specifically signed up for. This was elective cosmetic surgery.

I consented only to “excision of redundant labia” when I was barely 18, a virgin, and still in high school. I was told “no risks to sexual function,” which I also read online everywhere I looked. My OB/GYN, later made president of @texmed and @DallasCMS, completely amputated my labia minora, amputated my frenulum, and cut into clitoral body skin without my consent, which denervated the glans of my clitoris. This happened because clitoral/vulvar anatomy was censored from medical school and OB/GYN education. The standard of care was to do surgeries they were never trained to do on anatomy they didn’t know. Thats why I’ve been an activist. 22 years later, this is FYI STILL HAPPENING FOR THE SAME REASONS. Though I’ve changed 20 major medical textbooks, 2 anatomy apps, etc., this isn’t enough to get surgeons educated. Last I checked, OB/GYNs still aren’t required to know clitoral anatomy. Textbooks define the frenulum as part of the labia minora and do not recognize its function. Tbh I was so focused on getting the course of the dorsal clitoral nerves added that I didn’t focus on the innervation of the frenulum (posterior labial nerve). This is recognized in 0 OB/GYN resources. ☠️ The white lines show where my doctor cut me basically.

@wasphyxiation Here's Tangier, right in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay. It's sinking.

I'm fascinated by islands. You can sometimes find islands that you've never heard of by going on Google Maps and panning around. Here are some islands I've found