via https://t.me/russian_cat_meme

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(Photos taken by Petra Parker, who coincidentally also transitioned)

good lord there's a lot of vasectomy joke gifts that don't know the difference between a vasectomy and an orchiectomy.

orchi is removing of one or both testicles. a vasectomy cuts or seals the vas deferens so there's no sperm in your semen. You still have testicles, you still have testosterone, there's just no sperm in your ejaculate to make babbies with.

they're very different operations!

One might even say there's a vas deferens between the two

KSENIA DANIELA KHARLAMOVA as Svetlana Vetrova in HEATED RIVALRY (2025)

Svetlana + outfits

if i can just keep being insane 4 a second. im a little obsessed with the use of food in heated rivalry. there's a phrase someone once brought to my attention - "there's nothing but bread and salt between us" - it's an arabic saying originally i think, and it speaks to the kind of deep emotional, cultural significance of food; food as a form of love and care, of family. and i keep thinking about the tuna melt in episode four and how ilya's first attempt at being vulnerable is him offering to feed shane. and shane fully understands the weight of that meal, that action - "you want to make me a tuna melt?" - if not consciously than instinctually. and then in episode five, when ilya is on the phone delivering the famous russian monologue talking about how used and empty he feels, he says specifically - "I make sure the food is good". and then we get the cottage, shane immediately asking if he's hungry, letting him know he got groceries, cooking for him the whole time. and then the scene at his parents' house, where ilya is shovelling that pasta down. so eager to be fed. to be full. to be part of this family. when they're leaving he says "thank you for the pasta" and LIKE. listen, i know that all of this is just incidental script stuff. but there's something about it that gets me for some reason. this idea that love is not big and flashy and in your face. that it exists in these little corners of our lives. and like yes, yes, scott and kip kissing after winning the cup was a spectacle and it was fun. but there is something so beautiful about the quiet softness of the cottage. like hi, hello, i know i cannot take your pain away, but i can cook you dinner. there is nothing but bread and salt between us.

I truly hate to tell you all this, but the reason needle sizes are numbered that way (smaller numbers = bigger needles) is BECAUSE SOME ASSHOLE HAD A 1-INCH DIAMETER CYLINDER AND LABELED HIS NEEDLES' SIZES BY HOW MANY NEEDLES HE COULD SHOVE IN THERE.

Like, 24 24-gauge needles can fit in a 1-inch cylinder. 18 18-gauge needles can fit in a 1-inch cylinder. Wrong and horrible. The worst possible way to measure a needle. Good night.

this is how shotgun shells are made apparently

and then needles got made that way too

Wires as well

That is so unnecessarily imprecise.

It’s not actually that imprecise from a low-tech perspective though? How else are you going to measure the difference between a 6 vs a 9 gauge needle without some highly precise measuring equipment? This is cheap and replicable, and isn’t it easier to make a big cylinder to match a specific diameter?

I'd measure the diameter of the mold used to make the needle and label the molded needles accordingly but however people want to do it is fine I guess

Stacking circles inside circles doesn't measure things all that precisely. To give a super exaggerated example, a 1-guage needle via this method could be 1 inch diameter, .51 inch diamater, or anything in between. You can nearly double the size of a needle at that scale and still have the same gauge.

Obviously most needles are smaller than that and the margin of error is thus smaller, but it's still so unnecessarily imprecise when you can just measure the diameter of the molds and use that as your standard. If you want to measure them at home by chucking them in a ring you still can. But the measurement standard should be diameter-based.

It seems weirdly imprecise because it's not true. I don't know where this rumor comes from, but that's not how needle sizes came about. As I understand it, they come from wire gauge sizes, where you make a wire thinner and thinner by repeatedly pulling it through smaller and smaller holes in a draw plate:

ALT

They're numbered in order from largest to smallest because you do them sequentially, making the wire slightly thinner each time, and the gauge # is just the number of holes you pull it through.

Notably, in every gauge system I'm aware of, the size-0 wire or needle is still much, much less than an inch across, because it's a wire or a needle, not a piece of rebar.

My best guess about the "number of wires/needles that fit in a 1in cylinder" things is that someone who was confused about gauge numbers had a 1" hole, noticed that they could shove a little more than 20 24-gauge wires in it, jumped to the conclusion that this must be how it was defined, and started confidently telling everyone that this was true.

Do you want me to use historical knitting knowledge to make this a little bit worse

I must know how historical knitting information can be anything but a benefit.

And now I'm thinking about the Terrible Knitters of Mold or whatever it was, the women who hand-knit REALLY fast using knitting sheaths.

Right! so this post is about sewing needles, where gauge/diameter are slightly less important than in other types of needle, such as medical needles or knitting needles. There's of reasonable amount of wiggle room in crafting a sewing needle, a very ancient technology that can really be made any old way (it doesn't even need to have an eye - it can just be a poky thorn or animal quill that pokes thread through holes.) And the technological innovation of the metal sewing needle being made from drawn wire and the points ground on a grindstone is supported because we know that's how they did it and because that's the easiest way to to make long thin pieces of metal, so needle size mapping to wire size (and a higher number being number of draws through a plate) makes sense.

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When I say that Ratthi is a dork and a golden retriever, I in no way mean that he's dumb. Ratthi is not a himbo. That's actually the opposite of his character. He's a doctor, he's a scientist, he's a biologist. When we meet him, he's on a research mission so difficult and intense that PresAux is forced to hire a secunit to even go on the mission. He bonds with SecUnit nearly as fast as Mensah but that mostly proves he's also got incredible EQ. He picks up on and tells Gurathin in book ONE that MB isn't being an asshole, it's shy. Ratthi quickly becomes one of MB's best friends because he so easily picks up and adjusts to it's nonverbal cues. He balances a lot of romantic and platonic relationships with seeming ease. He's the human commenting on ART and MB's emotional states in NE.

The man is incredibly smart and competent and his enthusiasm and curiosity does not make him less so.