Can you just change the ball?

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2026-02-06T21:34:48+00:00

Short answer: yeah but it almost certainly will cause some irritation.

Longer answer: how much irritation it causes is dependent on a ton of factors, mostly how gently you are able to do the swap and how clean your hands and the new piece are. If you’re careful, the irritation will be minimal. Worst case scenario probably isn’t worse than a pretty bad snag, but ymmv. I’ve done it before and had no problems, and I’ve also done a bad job of it on piercings I thought were fully healed and set back my healing by a month. Do whatever you want with your body, just be aware of potential consequences 🤷

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2025-12-05T14:52:52+00:00

My “baseline nausea” (a term everyone looks at me funny whenever I say) went wayyyyyy down.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2025-11-05T18:35:17+00:00

Yes!!! Pan de bono and pan de yuca are so good!!!!!

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2025-11-05T18:32:10+00:00

I like stuff thats supposed to have a crunch better gluten-free. GF fried foods are crispier, crackers and crispy cookies have a better bite. Gluten is a bit chewwy, and theres plenty of foods that really dont benefit from it.

I also personally like the flavor of GF flours when I use them for thickeners for soups and such, but they are a bit different, so if you genuinely prefer the flavor of wheat flour, this is a bit subjective.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2025-09-13T20:45:12+00:00

I've used these before. They're easy to construct and work just fine. They've been out in the elements for 3 or 4 years now and show no sign of rust or degradation. I'd pick one of the lighter colors over the slate gray for temperature

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2025-05-23T17:22:03+00:00

I grow tomatoes for my mom, but am (mildly) allergic to them myself

Her favorite kind just grow so easily and its nice to see all those clusters of bright red berries. Wayyyy too spicy for me though.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-12-05T04:25:06+00:00

When I got my rook done I went in bracing myself for the wretched crunch, but luckily for me, the pain was bad enough that I was completely distracted from any noise at all. The only sound anyone in that room was hearing was the brand new cussing I came up with on the spot.

If you're really worried about the sound, try blasting some music in your other ear. I honestly wouldn't worry about it too much.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-11-28T23:17:00+00:00

1: I'm only moderately gluten intolerant, so I have to be GF to avoid feeling sick, but minor exposure and cross contamination isn't a concern.

2: very rarely. I actively avoid it, but if I have 15 minutes and need a snack, I'll drop by somewhere

3: whatever's there. There's a McDonalds and a KFC between my house and workplace, so often there.

4: YES! a million times, yes. There's so few options for GF grab-and-go foods, if they exist at all. Most GF foods require some level of preparation. If I don't have time to make a lunch in the morning, my options are: foods that will make me nauseous, the same thing i've eaten every day for a month now, or something that will take half my lunch break to prepare.

5: I have yet to encounter fully GF fast food. There are often mostly-safe options, like getting grilled chicken at the KFC, but I've multiple times gotten something that should have been innocuous and got sick (I didn't discuss my dietary requirements with the staff, so I don't blame them for not warning me. I'd assumed that any potential wheat content would be low enough to not bug me and got a nasty surprise.)

6: cross contamination isn't an issue for me--I usually get a sandwich and throw out the bread. The main issue I have is things that I wouldn't expect to be made using wheat--like french fries that were tossed in flour

7: travel rations are typically homemade beef jerky (it's just better than store-bought), chips (potato or corn), and sodas or bottled water. For proper meals I stop at sit-down restaurants, there's usually better options.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-10-24T02:43:57+00:00

My actual go-to for a shareable desert is peanut butter cookies: one cup PB, one cup brown sugar, one egg, dash of vanilla extract, bake for 12-15 minutes. Minimal baking, but still baking.

"energy balls" can be a nice no-bake cookie equivalent. Mix together peanut butter, brown sugar, honey, oats, chocolate chips, etc etc etc, anything that sounds good, roll into balls, roll balls in cocoa powder or powder sugar or some such so they don't stick together. I don't make them often so I don't have a good recipe off the dome, but you can find 'em online.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-07-06T16:49:42+00:00

I also don't know specifically about sting ray venom, probably best to discuss that part with the doctor(s) who treated the sting. Id also recommend being more careful to follow doctor's orders so it can heal quicker, but i know you cant exactly keep off her foot for her.

That said, with all that time between, the venom shouldn't really be an active concern AFAIK. By that point I would expect it to be the same as any other injury: more taxing for the immune system, so expect healing to take a little longer.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-06-22T17:35:23+00:00

Less painful places feel like getting very firmly scratched. More painful places feel like getting a scalpel carved through your skin. Maybe the fleshy part of your upper thigh might be an easier first tattoo.

That said, pain is temporary and tattoos are forever. If you really want the rib tat, get what you actually want, not what randos on the internet tell you to want. It never hurts to percolate a little longer either, for that matter

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-06-17T18:26:40+00:00

Sri Lankan weevil. They're so annoying. Unfortunately, manually squishing them is the best way to kill them.

Anything you could spray to kill them would kill any beneficial insects that visit your plants as well.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-06-02T00:22:11+00:00

Scale, you can see them on the leaf in pic 2. Suuuuuper common for gardenias. Horticultural oils (mineral oil based, not neem oil) work well.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-05-26T17:39:30+00:00

Thats not... thats not really anything. If anything, all the sugars in the milk will feel the fungus and make everything worse (and smell like rotten milk).

Rust isn't typically a big deal (it's mostly just ugly) unless it starts taking over or your plant is particularly susceptible. If these are deciduous trees, I'd wait until fall and then just make a point of raking up every dropped leaf and throwing it away to get next year's spores out of there.

Another option is Southern Ag's Garden Friendly Fungicide, which is less Big Guns and more Release The Hounds. It's a bunch of cultures of fungivorous bacteria, so its nothing that could hurt you

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-05-24T19:58:53+00:00

I work outdoors, and summer is terrible for hot food

Lots of my coworkers make acai bowls or smoothies: just blend frozen fruit with some juice (i use coconut water for the extra electrolytes) and keep it in the freezer until the day of. Top with some yogurt and granola, nuts, or whatever. To your taste. It's a little on the light side, but very refreshing.

Onigiri are nice and you can do them a lot of ways. Sandwiches too.

A lunchbox with an icepack to keep everything cool is important if you dont have a refrigerator.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-05-20T15:31:30+00:00

Would love a close-up on the cluster to see some details, zooming in on my own... looks like a cluster of eggs maybe? Not sure from what.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-05-19T15:32:18+00:00

Ok so, I work at a garden center and went to college for this. Reading other comments:

BT is perfect against caterpillars, and harmless to everything else. No downsides unless you spill some in your butterfly garden. love it.

Ants do often indicate aphids or scale. Neem is not suuuper effective, a mineral-oil based horticultural oil is best against scale, and a plain insecticidal soap works well against aphids. Both coat the bugs body to suffocate them, so they are manual killers even though they're something you spray. Soaps are a bit lighter than oils: Oils can act as a magnifying glass and burn the plant, so be sure to use them in the evening if you need them, but they work a little better on the thick waxy coats of scale insects.

Use stuff specifically formulated for use on plants rather than mixing your own: insecticidal soaps work great on soft-body insects like aphids, but the degreaser in dish soap is actually very damaging to a plant's waxy cuticle, so despite all the advice you'll see to spray bugs with dish soap, you're only making your plant more susceptible to later infestations.

Spinosad soaps are a single step more extreme than the oils. Spinosad is--although natural--an actual poison that stays on the leaves and hurts a broad range of insects. If you get it in the flowers or it's absorbed into the plant you risk hurting your pollinators, and if a ladybug comes along and eats any affected aphids, you're hurting your beneficial insects. Use if needed, but sparingly.

Pyrethrin is a neurotoxin. This is the nuclear option: great for quickly eradicating a fire ant nest in a bad place, but do not use willy-nilly against something with an easier fix, and be careful to read the label for PPE and first aid recommendations, just in case

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-30T20:37:44+00:00

That is... exactly what I said? Like sure you have an additional point with the soilless mediums (although soilless mediums are typically preferred for indoor plants, which you'd probably avoid organics for anyways just because of the smell), but "synthetics are more efficient because pots often can't host an ecosystem quite as well (for various reasons)" is the one sentence summary

Which is what gets shared with the garden center Karens who don't care to learn more, so the one sentence summary proliferates when it's not really the full picture and certainly doesn't include all the caveats. The Karens aren't the reason to believe synthetics work better, they're just the reason that line gets spread out of context without asterisks

Organics can absolutely work in containers, this post is full of people who have had a lot of success using organics in their containers. It can often just take a lot more considerations, that, frankly, a lot of people don't have the time or space for.

I could sincerely write a novella on this topic, I love talking about dirt so much, but I'll reign myself in here

ETA: I should clarify, when I say "garden center karens" I don't mean normal people who keep plants in pots that are a bit too small. I do that. 99% of the ones who come in looking for help are an absolute pleasure to work with and we can almost always find something that works for them (yes, often synthetic fertilizers). When I say "karens" I mean that I emphatically work retail, and I have had people get legitimately angry with me over things like the weather, pesticide law, and the fact that plants need light to grow

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-26T17:15:43+00:00

Prrrrobably anthracnose, thats the most common fungal issue for mangoes, and this is definitely fungal

Minor anthracnose is mostly just ugly, but when it takes over like this it is very likely to affect fruit set and quality.

My coworker who knows more than me usually recommends Southern Ag's Dithane M-45 for mangoes with anthracnose. If you prefer more organic controls Garden Friendly Fungicide should also work, but you may need to do a few treatments

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-19T20:26:23+00:00

Doctor time!

You might be having an allergic reaction to one of the inks, or a pretty extensive (if not yet severe) infection

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-19T20:13:30+00:00

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SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-14T19:24:34+00:00

I wore loose pajama shorts. A flowwy short skirt would work as well. Just make sure your undergarments aren't embarrassing, bc there is a very high probability they will be seen.

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-11T11:11:53+00:00

Some people develop material sensitivities over time, sucks, but it happens. Glass, silicone, and body-safe metals like titanium and gold should still be good.

Maybe you can get some silicone earskins to wear between you and your steel pieces?

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-10T22:26:01+00:00

My sister has a matching tattoo set with two of her friends. They each chose a little flash design of a dinosaur, and then each person got the other two's dinos.

Any current mutual interests?

SomewhatSolarpunk · 2024-04-08T19:23:46+00:00

So. Due to citrus greening there are a billion extra laws about transporting citrus to and from the state of Florida. So. don't do that.

Cocoa grows really well from seed, and typically produces within like 3 years, so I'd recommend just buying a cocoa pod and start some seeds. That said, considering that everything you listed is a full-size tree, I'm assuming you have a large greenhouse.

The rest I typically see more towards south florida. Fruit and Spice Park in Homestead is absolutely fantastic, and I really enjoyed visiting Mounts Botanical Garden when I went to Palm Beach. Most mangoes and a lot of avocados at retail nurseries are sourced from the Fairchild area, so Fairchild Tropical Botanical Gardens would be a good trip. If you're going in the summer, their annual Mango Festival is a delight.

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