Thoughts From the Windowsill

plantyhamchuk:

Minnesota cities can no longer mandate turf grass lawns - Minnesota Reformer

Minnesota cities can no longer ban pollinator-friendly native landscaping, thanks to a provision in a state government finance bill that too

Minnesota Reformer

“Minnesota cities can no longer ban pollinator-friendly native landscaping, thanks to a provision in a state government finance bill that took effect in July.

Concern over declining populations of bees and other pollinators has sparked interest in native plant landscaping in recent years, with many homeowners opting to tear out their turf grass lawns in favor of more diverse plantings. But those efforts occasionally run afoul of local ordinances that either require grass lawns or mandate that plants be kept below a certain height.

…

And in 2020, the city of Falcon Heights banned all front yard gardens after a resident attempted to plant vegetables.

The new language requires cities to allow homeowners to install and maintain a “managed natural landscape,” which it defines as “a planned, intentional, and maintained planting of native or nonnative grasses, wildflowers, forbs, ferns, shrubs, or trees.” 

The law explicitly states that “turf-grass lawns left unattended” are excluded from the definition of a “managed natural landscape,” which means mowing-averse homeowners will not be able to simply let their grass grow and declare it a natural garden.

But the legislation doesn’t say anything about homeowners’ associations, according to Julie Liew of the League of Minnesota Cities, so HOAs can still mandate the use of turf grass lawns. The Community Associations Institute, a trade group for HOAs and similar organizations, estimates there are more than 7,500 such organizations in Minnesota overseeing about 1.5 million residents.

Traditional turf grass lawns are effectively biological deserts. They’re devoid of the diversity of plant life that’s needed to support healthy native pollinator populations, and frequent mowing ensures that local plant life never gains a foothold. 

Native plantings “can offer the kind of habitat and nutrients to sustain thousands of insect species, and many of those in turn will be the food for birds and amphibians,” as St. Paul beekeeper and entomologist Margot Monson wrote in support of the new law.”

thievesandbeggars:

only-tiktoks:

20dollarlolita:

There’s a regular at the fabric superstore. She’s at least 80 years old, and she just got back into sewing after giving it up for 40 years. We’ll call her Irma.

I love Irma.

Irma is constantly surprised by the newfangled sewing gadgets our store sells. Today she bought some extra-fine glass-head pins and a magnetic pincushion. As I’m ringing her purchases up, she tells me very seriously, “did you know, if you’re careful, you can sew RIGHT OVER those pins? You don’t need to take them out!”

I told her that I liked that you can’t accidentally melt the head of the glass pins with your iron, and she nodded. “They used to all be like that, but times changed.”

I love old sewing machines and asked what kind of machine she has, and she goes, “Oh, it’s an old Singer Featherweight that my husband bought me when we were first married. It’s probably not worth anything anymore, but the thing sews fine. Have you seen the ones those girls over there–” indicating the sewing machine sub-store in my location “–have? Those things go in every direction and the needle always comes to the top when you stop sewing! Imagine how handy that is!”

I mention that I used to sew on my grandmother’s Featherweight but now there’s a intra-family war about who owns Grandma’s Featherweight and so no one gets to use it. It’s genuinely the best portable straight-stitch machine I’ve ever used.

I warn her to never let anyone tell her that Featherweight isn’t worth something. “I know, I miss my husband and it’s always going to have a place in my heart, just like your grandma’s.”

“I mean, Irma, there’s that, but they’re also worth a really notable amount of money. The Singer Featherweight is really financially valuable. I almost never see them for sale around here for less than about $400, and that’s in bad condition.”

“It’s a good thing my husband’s dead, honey, because if you told him that he managed to buy a sewing machine that’s worth more in 2021 than he bought it for in 1950, well, he’d be so smug that I just wouldn’t be able to tolerate driving home with him.”

cleoselene:

In economics we divide the population into income quintiles – top 20%, bottom 20%, etc

The Biden Economy has been very, very good to the bottom 20% – I know because I am in that quintile and under the Biden Presidency I have seen multiple SNAP increases, the best COLA adjustments for Social Security in four decades, Medicare now pays my utilities, and because I’m part of the Affordable Connectivity Program, they can now never turn off my internet even if I can’t afford to pay the bill.

The problem with the poorest people being the one who benefits the most? Is that it doesn’t resonate as a media story. The media is not catering to that bottom quintile – we don’t have the expendable income their advertisers are seeking.

But if you want to elect a POTUS who is honestly helping the people who need it the most, you should be an enthusiastic Biden supporter. It won’t make splashy news headlines, you’re not even going to find MSNBC going GUESS WHAT THE POORS ARE DOING BETTER all the time because it’s really not a sexy story. But it’s a real story. A true story.

I’m just really sick of the pseudo-leftist takes that characterize Biden and the Democrats as ‘conservative’ or assertions that they don’t have policy platforms except 'we’re not the Republicans.’ Such commentary sounds intelligent but only in the way Libertarian commentary sounds intelligent: you have to not think critically at all to some to such absurd conclusions. Democrats are working within a broken system and doing the best they can. You wanna fix the system? Great, I’m onboard, but smearing the only people trying to help is not going to get you anywhere.

vorbisx:

Replacing physical buttons and controls with touchscreens also means removing accessibility features. Physical buttons can be textured or have Braille and can be located by touch and don’t need to be pressed with a bare finger. Touchscreens usually require precise taps and hand-eye coordination for the same task.

Many point-of-sale machines now are essentially just a smartphone with a card reader attached and the interface. The control layout can change at a moment’s notice and there are no physical boundaries between buttons. With a keypad-style machine, the buttons are always in the same place and can be located by touch, especially since the middle button has a raised ridge on it.

Buttons can also be located by touch without activating them, which enables a “locate then press” style of interaction which is not possible on touchscreens, where even light touches will register as presses and the buttons must be located visually rather than by touch.

When elevator or door controls are replaced by touch screens, will existing accessibility features be preserved, or will some people no longer be able to use those controls?

Who is allowed to control the physical world, and who is making that decision?

Able bodied people, don’t think you’re immune! Even you can struggle with touch screens; some of them just straight up don’t recognize my mom no matter what she does but work instantly for me when I reach over to do it for her!

plaguedocboi:

fuzzy-oooze:

alter-koker:

alter-koker:

what i don’t get is how in moby dick when ishmael goes to whale church, the sermon is about jonah and the whale. this is whaleboat church, i feel like they would have covered that one on day one. how the hell do they have enough material left on jonah to talk more about him????

what’s a whale church? is there a whale religion I’m missing out on or is this just a church that’s on a boat or something?

It’s literally a whale-themed church the inside is designed to look like a whaling ship and they have big memorials for whalers who died at sea and the pastor talks passionately about whales for an hour. Moby Dick is such a weird book that this doesn’t even register as strange as you’re reading about it but now that I’m trying to explain it it actually is pretty bizarre. Whale Church for Whale Christians.

As a participant in maritime folk music, it is important y'all understand that whalers were apparently just kinda Like That.

fishyandclintbarton:

I love this for him so much 💜

empressofsnow:

tikkunolamorgtfo:

natalieleif:

Just saw a tweet like “REAL libraries check for quality!” as some kinda gotcha at AO3?? But I’m a librarian, so… heads up that “quality checks,” AKA “weeding” or “pulling,” means looking for damaged books or ones that haven’t circulated in a few years to clear up shelf space. We don’t Quality Check for if the library books have nontoxic romance or good grammar. :U I assure you every library in your area has absolute ABOMINATIONS of bad storytelling as well as your favorite pop lit.

“ReAl LiBrArIeS cHeCk fOR qUaLiTy” LISTEN. There was a collection of poems in circulation at one of my previous libraries that had never actually been published, and we only found out about it because the author called while I was on the reference desk one day asking how the hell a book that never went to print had ended up in our online catalogue. And you think we’re monitoring content?

pwlanier:

UNIDENTIFIED ARTIST

LOUNGING SEAL

antler, 1.25 x 3.5 x 1.25 in (3.2 x 8.9 x 3.2 cm)

unsigned.

First Arts

yr-tiktok-mom: