Abacus Wizard

Abacus Wizard

@abacuswizard.bsky.social

• teachin’ math and physics • playin’ folk music and board games • readin’ sff novels and old comic strips

219 followers43 following5.6K posts

PROMETHEUS AND THE EAGLE The slow flap of enormous wings drew nearer to the cliff. “Morning, Prometheus,” said the giant eagle as it landed. “Morning, Eagle,” said the titan chained to the rock. “How’s life treating you these days?” asked the eagle. …

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… “Well, no, not exactly as such,” mumbled the eagle. “They named the big pillar after your uncle Saturn, and the overall program after your cousin’s kid Apollo.” “Oh,” said Prometheus. “Did they at least name the lander after me?” …

PROMETHEUS AND THE EAGLE The slow flap of enormous wings drew nearer to the cliff. “Morning, Prometheus,” said the giant eagle as it landed. “Morning, Eagle,” said the titan chained to the rock. “How’s life treating you these days?” asked the eagle. …

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… “Yeah, that—well, the mortals managed to build some sort of ship powered by fire, and it took them all the way to the moon! Big flying metal pillar sort of thing, carrying a little lander on top.” …

… “That’s fantastic!” exclaimed Prometheus. “I always knew they’d achieve great things with the stuff someday. Do… do they still remember me, and what I did for them? Did they name the ship after me or anything like that?“ …

PROMETHEUS AND THE EAGLE The slow flap of enormous wings drew nearer to the cliff. “Morning, Prometheus,” said the giant eagle as it landed. “Morning, Eagle,” said the titan chained to the rock. “How’s life treating you these days?” asked the eagle. …

… “Oh, can’t complain,” replied Prometheus, ”except of course for being chained to this rock for thousands of years, and a giant eagle pecking my liver out every morning.” The eagle looked a bit embarrassed. “Nothing personal,” it muttered; “just doing my job.” …

… “I know… doesn’t make it any more pleasant for me, though. Say, how’s the mortal world doing these days?” At this the eagle perked up. “Oh! You remember that ‘fire’ stuff you gave them?” “Well, yes; it’s the reason we’re both here, really.” …

(during intermission at a production of Macbeth) “Remind me which one is Macduff?” “He’s the one who gets ahead at the end.” “I don’t get it.” “You will.”

The most important thing I’ve learned from history: People move around. Always have, always will. It’s an important part of who we are. And those who seek to artificially restrict it are denying us our humanity.

LOWρUFO 🇺🇦🇵🇸🌍@lowrhoufo.bsky.social

Freedom of movement is the most fundamental human right; everything else is built on top of it. The 20th century was a campaign to smother that freedom and we should not let it win

If you sent this image through a time machine to 2007 and showed it to the people who were first passing around “I Can Has Cheezburger” they wouldn’t have believed it possible. Lolcat technology has come so far in these last two decades. Who can say what memes will come in years yet unseen?

Democracy in landscaping.

Andy Kingdon 🔶️@andygeology.bsky.social

I think it was University of Sussex where they deliberately didn't put in any paths when it opened. Just grassed the site, waited until the routes people used became stripped of grass, then tarmaced those. Because people will always take direct routes.

Christopher Lee was already a big fan of The Last Unicorn when he got the role voicing King Haggard in the movie, and brought in his own well-loved copy of the book, with Haggard’s dialogue highlighted, when he arrived at the studio.

Amy "Thunderjam" Chase@amythunderjam.bsky.social

We all know the "Viggo broke his toe" story but what's another movie fact you're personally compelled to bring up every time without prompting? For me, it's the fact that Robin Tunney is wearing a wig in The Craft because of having just shaved her head to save her job filming Empire Records.

Marvel in the 2010s: “these movies are a fresh start; you don’t have to read decades worth of comics to understand the characters and stories” Marvel in 2026: “here’s a list of 30 movies and tv shows you have to watch before you’re allowed to see our new movie”

Just watched ST:TNG episode “Yesterday’s Enterprise” and noticed that Christopher McDonald as Lt. Castillo looks remarkably similar to Buster Crabbe as Flash Gordon half a century earlier:

Abacus Wizard reposted

I mean, my issue is that I've felt that we've been going through a generational national trauma pretty much consistently since 2016 and thus far the electorate has stubbornly refused to agree with me.

escapedexplorer.bsky.social@escapedexplorer.bsky.social

There's a Politico (lol) piece entirely about how Republicans' hope right now is that the polls are all way off and they only get a MILD wipeout and first of all it's full of a bunch of nonsense but the best part is how it ends on this incredible bit:

Abacus Wizard reposted

Replying to @jaksays.bsky.social

Most people aren’t qualified to have zero idea what consciousness is. I, on the other hand, spent three years taking upper-division philosophy courses, so I can announce with solid authority that I have zero idea what consciousness is.

Abacus Wizard reposted

Replying to @ennui.org

joke: Trump is sitting in the presidential limo at a drive-thru, looks at the menu board, and shouts “What is this? Ronald McDonald is a woman now? McDonald’s is woke! I’m never eating here again! Have fun being banned nationwide, WokeDonald’s!” and the cashier responds “sir this is a Wendy’s”

I made this image a few months ago and mostly forgot about it but now I’m looking at it again and giggling at how *many* deliberate mistakes I included. Can you find them all?

Incredible new advances in comics technology!

Nick Sousanis@nsousanis.bsky.social

Students made their first minicomics in my intro making course - mostly standard format but this student, a first time maker(!), did something so off the charts I’m still reeling from it! & he made like 12 of them for his classmates! A paper engineering feat of flipbookery as well as killer drawing!

ooooooh this is good writing advice (Holly Black)

P H Lee 🪬@p-h-lee.bsky.social

she said "you can do anything in fiction as long as the situation afterwards is more interesting that the situation before." since then i have been keeping an eye on character death in fiction. many writers seem to think that character death "raises the stakes" but actually just makes things boring

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Zorro, then, is the story of someone from group 3 who makes the conscious choice to fight against group 1 and defend group 2, and ultimately must convince group 3 to shake off their neutrality and join his struggle.

1) a small group of tyrannical oppressors currently in power 2) a large population being unjustly oppressed 3) a small group of reasonably comfortable people who are aware of the injustices but remain neutral because it isn’t directly affecting them *yet*

Sandburg: “They have yarns Of a skyscraper so tall they had to put hinges On the two top stories so to let the moon go by, Of one corn crop in Missouri when the roots Went so deep and drew off so much water The Mississippi riverbed that year was dry, Of pancakes so thin they had only one side…”

“…Of ‘a fog so thick we shingled the barn and six feet out on the fog,’ Of Pecos Pete straddling a cyclone in Texas and riding it to the west coast where ‘it rained out under him,’ Of the man who drove a swarm of bees across the Rocky Mountains and the Desert ‘and didn’t lose a bee’…”

Abacus Wizard reposted

Replying to @onewhoknows2.bsky.social

There’s no need to say that ICE is illegal. Just say that unidentified masked gunmen attacking and kidnapping civilians is illegal (hey, wait, isn’t it already?), arrest people who do that, and if it turns out they have a license to do that, they can prove it in court after being arrested.

An idea for an engineering challenge that came to me in a dream this morning: With everything we’ve learned about aerodynamics since the Wright Brothers, what’s the best aircraft you could make now using only the materials and tools and infrastructure that would have been available to them in 1903?

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Figures Mad Max: Fury Road to El Dorado How Green Was My Valley of Gwangi Clash of the Titanic The Fox and the Hound of the Baskervilles Wild Wild North by Northwest How Stella Got Her Groove Back to the Future The Van… Helsing

Sophia_Nyx 🐰@sophianyx.bsky.social

Combine 2 Film Titles 2 make a New Film.

City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly’s Golden Voyage of Sinbad To Catch a Thief of Baghdad Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home Alone Lady Sings the Blues Brothers Independence Day of the Triffids

Watching my way through Star Trek: The Next Generation for the first time. Currently 1/3 of the way through Season 3. I know it gets better. There have been a handful of really good episodes already. But there have also been SO many characters angling for the Most Punchable Face In The Galaxy award.