0x56e - Legs

boop

Something that literally changed my life was working with a friend on a coding thing. He was helping me create an auto rig script and was trying to explain something to me but his words were just turning into static in my brain. I was tired and confused and there was so many new concepts happening.

I could feel myself working toward a crying meltdown and was getting preemptively ashamed of what was about to happen when he said, “Hey, are you someone who benefits from breaks?”

It broke me.

Did I benefit from breaks? I didn’t know. I’d never taken them.

When a problem frustrated or upset me I just gritted my teeth and plowed through the emotional distress because eventually if you batter and flail at something long enough you figure it out. So what if you get bruised on the way.

I viscerally remembered in that moment being forced to sit at the table late into the night with my dad screaming at me, trying to understand math. I remembered taking that with me into adulthood and having breakdowns every week trying to understand coding. I could have taken a break? Would it help? I didn’t know! I’d never taken one!

“Yes,” I told him. We paused our call. I ate lunch. I focused on other stuff for half an hour. I came back in a significantly better state of mind, and the thing he’d been trying to explain had been gently cooking in the back of my head and seemed easier to understand.

Now when I find myself gritting my teeth at problems I can hear his gentle voice asking if I benefit from breaks. Yes, dear god, yes why did I never get taught breaks? Why was the only way I knew to keep suffering until something worked?

I was relating to this same friend recently my roadtrip to the redwoods with my wife. “We stopped every hour or so to get out and stretch our legs and switch drivers. It was really nice. When I was a kid we’d just drive twelve hours straight and not stop for anything, just gas. We’d eat in the car and power through.”

He gave a wry smile, immediately connecting the mindset of my parents on a road trip to what they’d instilled in me about brute forcing through discomfort. “Do you benefit from breaks?” he echoed, drawing my attention to it, making me smile with the same sad acknowledgement.

Take breaks. You’re allowed. You don’t have to slam into problems over and over and over, let yourself rest. It will get easier. Take. Breaks.

guys it goes higher than MAX……..

2014-05-07

SELF-DECAPITATING BEHAVIOR SEEN IN SEA SLUGS

​The body they leave behind dies.

Autotomy, the voluntary shedding of a body part, is fairly widespread in the animal kingdom, and is generally followed by the regeneration of shed terminal body parts, but now, two japan researches have found a extrem case of autotomy in photosynthetic sea slugs.

Under lab conditions, two species of Elysia sea slugs - know by their capacity to use chloroplasts from algal food into their cells to utilise for photosynthesis- were infected with parasites, after that, sea slugs self-decapitated, suggesting they do it to get rid of parasites.

According to researchers, the head, separated from body and organs, moves on its own immediately after the separation (as the GIF shown). Within days, the wound at the back of the head is closed, while the head feeds on algaes. At the first week the head starte the body regeneration, and by the third week, regeneration is completed.

- Head and the body of Elysia cf. marginata, a day after autotomy. The shed body is much heavier (>80% of the total weight) than the head. Photo by Sayaka Mitoh.

Researchers Believe the slugs may use the photosynthetic ability of chloroplasts they incorporate from the algae in their diet, a proccess called kleptoplasty, to survive long enough for regeneration.

These findings in sea slugs represent a new type of autotomy in which animals with complex body plans shed most of their body.

Reference (Open Access): Mitoh and Yusa. 2021. Extreme autotomy and regeneration of the whole body in photosynthetic sea slugs. Current Biology.

Gif: Movement of Elysia cf. marginata  after induced autotomy.

hitting and smacking you moodboard

ya'll who's up for group meowing

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guys it goes higher than MAX……..

guys it goes higher than MAX……..