oh of course

its-teatime:

happiness

ragbag:

raynor ganan signature masala™

one of my 2012 goals is to create a raynor ganan signature masala™—a sekrit spice blend that people will want to flavor everything from their eggs to their popcorn with. to do so, i’ve been scouring the local spice markets for exotic ingredients from far off corners of the globe. i have a rudimentary concoction right now but i’ve come to a very important realisation: namely, while i know what spices i like, i have no idea how spices go together. to help me better understand the synergy among turmeric and thyme and coriander and cream of tartar, i developed this chart which breaks down established spice blends into their (sometimes) shared ingredients. and now i am one step closer to inventing the next ranch seasoning.

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on another flavor note: if you have any advice for me about what ingredients should go into the raynor ganan signature masala™, i would really really like to hear from you. perhaps you know of a rare local spice that the international flavor market overlooks. maybe you grow a special aphrodisiac mushroom in your basement and want to tell me how tasty it is. perhaps there was a fictional spice in a science fiction novel that you want me to investigate. let me know!

Visual reference!

ragbag:

theory: type specimen books were the @horse_ebooks of last century.

3liza:

lordsteeb:

“how much should we care about the social rights of bees” is basically the kind of question you would ask a disguised android to trick it into attacking you

it’s also factually incorrect, unsurprisingly.  turns out whichever idiot tumblr teen scribbled this pile of garbage took exactly zero seconds to verify any of this, which i will now do because i hate myself

1. Wing clipping is generally not practiced because clipped queens will be recognized as “damaged” by the hive and replaced with a new queen.  This is because during swarming (the activity in which the queen leaves the hive with a swarm to start a new colony) the queen is driven around the out of he hive by the workers, she in no way “leads” them.  If she is unable to leave the hive, they kill her and get a virgin queen to do it.  
   Source: http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?249047-Queen-bee-wing-clipping
    
2. Drones always die after mating.  Painfully.  They have no function other than to inseminate queens, and will die after having their penis and associated organs ripped out of their bodies when a copulating couple separates.
   Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drone_(bee)
   
   
3.  Beekeepers only replace elderly queens rarely, in order to prevent the colony from dying out completely over the winter, and this is only when the queen is not destroyed and replaced by her own workers.
   Source: http://basicbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2011/02/lesson-95-when-to-replace-your-queen-in.html
    
4. Bees are a pillar of literally every kind of agriculture, and wild bees are not sufficient to keep us fed, even if we’re all vegans.  
   Source:http://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/science/bee-importance-bees.html
    
5. Colony Collapse Disorder means beekeeping is even more important now than it used to be.  CCD’s cause is unknown but we need more bees and we need them ASAP.  
   Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_collapse_disorder
   
   
6. Waggle dance, social structure, etc. Bees rule, but that’s not a good reason to not eat honey.  The statement that bees are “social” is disingenuous at best, as colony insects function far more like individual cells in a single living organism than they do like mammals.  
   Source: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2007/07/swarms/miller-text
    
7. AND FINALLY, YOU FUCKING MORONS, If you’re concerned about eating “animal” “products” produced by insects then you should probably stop eating altogether.  The FDA allows up to an average of 75 insect fragments per 50 grams of wheat flour, and you’re shoveling that down with every bite of whole grain whatever.  See also: gut parasites, eyebrow mites, dust mites, fleas, houseflies, fruit flies etc. — all part of the Kingdom Animalia and so, by your logic, it’s not fucking vegan to pluck your eyebrows or deworm yourself.
   Source: http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/ComplianceManuals/CompliancePolicyGuidanceManual/ucm074610.htm
    
8. Eating less meat or no meat is a good dietary and environmental decision, and more people should be eating less meat.  That’s not really up for debate.  There’s just absolutely no need to fuck it up with this kind of false equivalency and transparently unresearched moralism.

(Source: wordsfromnature)

(via veerideas)

bingofuel:

Super Manatees