if you read in a frog paper “specimen was released in the field immediately after capture” chances are very good that what it actually means is
“i dropped the damn frog and despite the fact that we fell all over each other no one could recapture it”
sometimes when i am sad i go read through the tags on this post, because they are 70% other biologists saying things like “AND ALSO FUCK FIELD MICE” and “THAT CRAB ALMOST BROKE MY FINGER” and I am reassured that I am not the only one who has bobbled a wood frog right into their cleavage.
plus six or seven people who just….can’t figure out what a frog paper could possibly be. (guys it’s…a scientific paper. about frogs.)
and this one
which made me laugh despairingly because i mean
bro you don’t even know.
what is the code entomologists use for “i stepped on it, i’m so sorry, it was dark out and the specimen was very small”
“Impromptu dissection was performed under less-than-optimal lighting conditions.”
‘impromptu dissection’ is an alarming phrase in any context and i thank you for it
What’s biologist for “the little fucker BIT me and I yote it into the undergrowth on reflex”?
“Specimen was removed from the study pool due to abnormal interaction responses”
I am reblogging this 98% for the second to last comment holy shit I’m fucking choking
I’m enjoying the tags/replies discussing the proper conjugation of “to yeet.” I am in favor of the decision that the future perfect is “will have yitten.”
Expanding this, NASA has a few gems from their report language:
“Underwent unplanned rapid disassembly” – it exploded, and it wasn’t an explosion we wanted to happen
“Lithobraking maneuver” – it stopped because it hit the goddamned ground.
“Engine-rich exhaust” – the engine bell melted or evaporated, or the engine ejected itself out the back of the rocket without having a very good reason to do so.
“Fishing orbit” – the craft is in the ocean instead of space and we didn’t mean to put it there
“Thrust was observed along an undesired vector” – the engine leaked and the rocket spun off into oblivion.
“Wearing his manager hat” – a moron who shouldn’t be an engineer (a reference to the infamous quote “take off your engineer hat and put on your manager hat” in the meeting in which the Challenger was cleared for launch)
concept: a death god that is actually surprisingly supportive and on the side of the good guys, supporting actions and promoting policies that will lead to the kingdom growing and thriving instead of being destroyed, because the more the kingdom grows, the more people there are, and the more people there are the more people will eventually die, and when you’re an immortal god of death, you know there’s no need to rush. you’ll get them all in the end
i like how the responses on this post are cleanly split between “hey this is a great story idea i love it” and “this is absolutely terrifying”
writers: “hey this is a great story idea i love it!”
Hey, does anybody want to see some more of my cool rocks?
This one looks like a painting, doesn’t it? This Cool Rock is polychrome jasper. When I look at this rock, I feel like I’m standing at the bottom of a canyon in the desert, staring up at the blue sky.
That flaky texture, cranberry color, and pearlescent shine make lepidolite look like a sugarcoated dessert. Here’s something cool about lepidolite: its crystals are a little bit elastic, so they can bend without breaking, and they’ll snap back into shape when you let go! (I’ve gotta stop peeling crystals off of my specimen to play with them, or eventually I won’t have any lepidolite left…)
These little blue cubes are fluorite, which is my state mineral! Fluorite comes in so many different colors, I hope to have a collection of lots of them someday.
Wanna see some BIG CUBES? Check it out: the Most Beautiful Pyrite in the World.
This Cool Rock is called Puddingstone, and it deserves more love. It’s a conglomerate of pebbles that can be anything from jasper to granite, mixed together in a silica matrix to create these cool spots! My puddingstone has a really pretty peachy-pink matrix, with a lot of different colors inside it!
I think my last Cool Rocks post gave the impression that I don’t like amethyst, which couldn’t be further from the truth. Look at this slice of amethyst stalactite! This rock is one of my absolute favorites. That green core is made of agate, and makes the whole thing look like a flower that got suddenly turned to crystal.
Here’s another flower: a Desert Rose! This huge red rose is made of barite, but selenite can form little white roses too. Maybe I should get this barite a selenite friend?
What’s hiding inside this ordinary rock? It’s a bunch of tiny spheres of wavellite! Hi little guys! You’re looking very green today.
Slipping in an edit here: initially I had ID’d this one as turgite, but after a little more research I’m not sure that’s the case. This little handful of rainbows and glitter is just a particularly iridescent piece of hematite! How cool is it that even regular hematite can be so colorful?
What’s so special about this boring old rock, I ask, rhetorically, having never been so wrong about anything ever. This is ulexite, also known as TV rock! Take a look at what it can do.
It’s hard to capture the full effect in a photo, but we’re not just seeing through a clear piece of rock. Ulexite’s crystal structure is a natural fiber optics cable. Any image at the back surface of the rock gets projected onto the front! Science!!
This is prehnite, and there’s not much to say about its loveliness that you can’t see for yourself. A translucent green beauty.
This is the most valuable rock I own! I saved up for a long time to buy the specimen I had my eye on, always worried it would be sold before I could afford it. Lo and behold, here it is! Rutilated quartz!!! It’s an ordinary colorless quartz crystal, with amazing hair-thin veins of golden rutile shooting through it and sparkling.
But wait, there’s one more Cool Rock I must show you.
…And it’s not really a rock at all. Elegant element 83, a strange and spiraling eldritch beauty, an alien-looking crystal of pure metal, rainbow and mildly radioactive… You know her name; it’s Bismuth!
Weird and wonderful bismuth! Colorful, coiling bismuth! What a wonderful crystal to see! Metallic, magical, magnificent bismuth! What a wonderful crystal to be!
Hey, hey, stop reblogging that other rock post. Those are boring OLD rocks. These are shiny NEW rocks. Please appreciate THESE rocks now.
Girls Scouts encounter Bigfoot the most frequently. Part of their oath is to keep him a secret because he’s very kind and makes up 30% of their revenue due to his fervent love for thin mints.
As a Girl Scout leader, I am telling you that this is NOT true, and any former girl scout that says it is, should think about what they are saying and what oaths they may have sworn in the past
