"...followed by a brisk mauling."

For those of you with a better understanding/paid closer attention in school, what would be the long-term effects (two decades, thereabouts) of 95% darkness on planet Earth on flora, fauna, weather, etctera?

Climate-wise, we’d be looking at something similar to northern New England and/or the British Isles close to the Industrial Revolution. I know we’d be looking at a mass die-off of larger animals, though how far along after two decades I’m not certain. Obviously it’d be a damned sight colder, as well.

I know Rasputina’s got the song “1816, the Year Without a Summer” and Susanna Clarke’s “Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell” also goes into it in detail, but does anyone have any other sources for me? Nothing is too simplistic and hopefully nothing is too complicated, and I want large-scale effects as well as minutiae. Any help anyone can give this social science graduate is hugely appreciated!

Pretty please?

Dress code at work is changing. Finding full-length khaki pants and even skirts won’t be a problem, but:

Does anyone know where I can find plus-size, long-sleeve, modest, Oxford dress shirts or blouses?

Preferably for a price that won’t break my budget while I’m out of work because of my spine surgery?

All right. I know all of you are wicked smart. Wicked. So here’s a math problem that a friend told me about—it was extra credit on a test she just took. I can’t figure it out (go figure). Help me?

Mr. A, Mr. B, and Mr. C go on a business trip together. They rent a hotel room for $30—they each chip in $10. A few hours later, the manager of the hotel says that he should have only charged $25, since there’s a special deal going on. He sends the cashier, Mr. D, up to the room to return $5.

Mr. D figures it’ll be hard to divide $5 between 3 people. So he pockets $2, and returns 3 $1 to the guests.

Since the guests each received a dollar back, they ended up paying $9, right? Which equals $27 total. Since Mr. D pocketed $2, that brings the total to $29.

Where’s their missing dollar?

I do not think I will be fasting tomorrow. Going to be a long night, emotionally, and the migraine is once again back with avengeance. Fasting would only make it worse, and right now it’s bad enough that I’m considering another drink (though won’t have one; so easy to fall back into that trap, but even if I’m an addict for the rest of my life, I can not be a junkie anymore).
But not really okay with not fasting, even if I am able to make it up. Right in this moment, I feel so far away from Allah. I don’t want to say this. Not sure I could say it out loud. But I can’t feel faith. For the first time since I converted, for the only time since I began to feel faith, I no longer feel it. I can say the words and take part in the rituals but at this moment it is meaningless to me. I hope it is just being tired, and stressed, and in pain, and the rest of things I don’t terribly want to get into. I can’t feel you, Allah. You’ve gone nowhere, for You are everywhere. It is I who have somehow pulled away. But I don’t know how I did it, and I’m shivering-quaking-scared that when the sun rises, I won’t be able to get back to You. It’s as though suddenly You don’t exist. I never even thought that this feeling would ever happen. I never even considered how lonely it would be. All I can do is continue to pray that when I wake, this loss will be but a dream, and I will feel Your glory and grace and mercy surrounding me again, bringing me peace.
But how can I take part in Ramadan, how can I renew my closeness to Allah, when my heart is filled with so much hate? I want someone to die. I am actually wishing another human being death. And not just death but a painful one. There are plenty who would say I have my reasons, and if I still believed that revenge was a valid excuse, I’d agree. But how can I even think to approach Allah when I would wish harm on another of His creation?
I don’t know what to do. In order to get past this anger, I feel I need to feel You. But I don’t feel I am worthy of approaching you while still harboring such hatred on a fellow human being.

Let me wake in better spirits. Let me wake to Your light. Please. I need You, Allah. I need to feel Your presence enveloping me. I need the peace You have brought me. I need the strength You have graced me with. I need You.

Whenever I read what you write, it touches me on some level I can not yet feel.

You have shared parts of your life with me. Through your friendship, through your mentoring, through your writing and your works and your words.

I know somewhere that I can’t read this. I know somewhere that I’m not reading this, that I am skimming lines and time and space.

I know these names. They’re not just names. They’re faces, and people, and friends. They’re real, as you are.

I wonder at the pain involved in losing someone to suicide. I wonder if it’s the same as murder. I wonder if we’ve ever felt anything akin to each other. I wonder if that matters.

In class, once, we did an exercise. We stood if a statement was true for us. When the professor said “Please stand if you are a survivor or victim of sexual assault,” I waited. I waited to see if you’d stand. You did and I did. We stood together. And from that moment on I have loved you.

I can not imagine the strength to submit something like that, to put your life out in the world in such a public way.

You use words to bring the world closer to you, to bring yourself closer to the world. I use words to build walls. To deceive, to hide. I wonder if there’s anything akin between you and I.

I want to see your face. I want to hear you laugh. I want to discuss Adrienne Rich and gender-fucking over coffee. I want to hold your hands. I want to trace the lines upon them. I wonder which parts of your hands curve around the pen, which lines contain the power of truth.

I want to meld myself into you. To know you as you let me know you through your words. I want to run my fingers across the curves of your body, to investigate those parts of you that are accepted, to understand the ways in which you rebel. I want to hold you and be held, to whisper along the lines of your neck “Yes, I know that, too.” I want to be akin to you.

I want to know if hope exists. I want to look at the world with wonder, with knowledge, with grief, in the way that you do, to make it new and real and important. I want each breath to be a beginning. I want to learn and be and do.

I want to know your strength. Can I find that in myself? Are we both of us strong?

I’m sitting on a linoleum floor, your words on the pages between my hands. There’s a knock on my door, and it opens. A friend. Going home for the night. Wanted me to know. She smiles, and I want to tell her not to leave. I want to beg her to stay with me. To share the words your words created. To have someone who knows what it’s like to be silent. To have someone who knows what it’s like to be alone. To be with someone. I want to be with someone.

And I say nothing. Because she’d stay, I say nothing. It’s not right of me to share this with her, because there’s nothing she could do. I want to know if you’ve ever known that feeling. That in the deepest part of you, that holds the grief and despair and pain, that it’s a part of you no one can help with. That it’s a part of you that only you can know.

I want to open myself up to the world. I want to be able to put my truth on paper, to have my self be bare before the world. I want to write things that are honest. I want to stop building walls.

I want to know what it’s like to be in love. I want to know what a healthy relationship is. I want to know what it’s like to wake up next to someone and be happy about it.

I want to know what’s in there, what part of me I’ve locked away. What’s hiding behind the walls. Is it akin to you?

I am 5’4”.

I am 262 lbs.

I’ve gained 12 lbs this summer. Somehow. Yes, it’s true I’ve done less moving (though sporadic trips to the pool have helped me feel better and gain some endurance back, when you weigh the pros and cons of a sip of water, because the bathroom—50 feet away—might be too far to walk, it’s hard as fuck to exercise), but I’ve done less eating, too. And the things I am eating are, by and large, much healthier for me than the crap I get at the cafeteria. Apples. Bananas. Oranges. Yogurt. Granola bars. Crackers and peanut butter. Bagels. Bread and butter.

This is the first weight I’ve gained in 5 years.

And it’s weight I can’t afford to gain. Being fat (yes, I’m fat, get over the fact that I’m using that term; it’s only self-effacing if it’s not actually true) is only making my pain worse. The heavier I am, the more stress I’m putting on my body, the more pain I’m going to feel. I’m with myself there. But when the pain’s so bad I can’t walk outside, how the fuck am I supposed to exercise? How the fuck am I supposed to lose weight? Please, tell me! Because I don’t know. I don’t know. I hate the way I look. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve got plenty of potential. Unfortunately, it’s all underneath layers upon layers of fat. And I don’t want to be a skinny stick, either. I’d be ecstatic to be a size 12 or 14—that would be perfect.

But how do I get there? Now that I’m finally emotionally healthy enough to want to be physically healthy, to get the right nutrients and enough sleep and enough exercise, how the fuck am I supposed to do it? How the hell can I lose weight when I can’t move? What am I supposed to do?

Because I don’t know. I’m at my wit’s end. The only thing I can think of is bariatric surgery, but in my heart I don’t think that’s appropriate; it’s a last-ditch effort, and if I can just get the pain under control enough to resume daily functioning, it’s an effort that won’t need to be taken.

But I don’t know what to do.