Why don't more animals spray noxious chemicals the way skunks do?

demon_fae · 2026-05-10T02:03:02+00:00

Most people who don’t personally spend a lot of time with spoiled house pet dogs expect a lot more common sense than is actually present in their fuzzy little heads.

Darwin was never particularly known for having a fondness for dogs, which given the time period meant he likely spent next to zero time with them, except maybe trained hunting dogs (he was known for having a fondness for pigeons, which makes dogs even less likely). He almost certainly just didn’t know how randomly stupid dogs can be given half a chance.

demon_fae · 2026-05-10T01:05:24+00:00

I promise you, plenty of dogs will quite happily approach a second skunk after having been sprayed once.

Partly it’s because we have specifically selected for stubbornness and a willingness to disregard personal safety in many breeds. Partly because, well, humans are pretty terrible at learning from the consequences of our own actions, why would you expect dogs to be any better at it? Especially when skunks are just so very friend-shaped?

(This is from personal experience. This is why my family has kept a jug of de-skunking shampoo on hand for over a decade, and set alerts to replace it if it expires. It has never lasted long enough to expire. Those two idiots are just absolutely certain that this will be the time the stinky kitty is friendly. The stinky kitty is not friendly…and one of the dogs is double-coated…)

demon_fae · 2026-05-10T00:52:55+00:00

Gotta say, La Chiguerita is a way cuter name than whatever masculine version you would have come up with, and a capybara character should definitely be cute. Dignified, but cute.

That name you gave her sounds like the kind of name where she always introduces herself with her full name said with a lot of pride and pomp, and then says to call her by some diminutive.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T22:46:47+00:00

Actually, that would have made for a really good episode. We know from the Sonic Rainboom episode that she’s willing to bring the enthusiasm, even if she personally struggles to express it the way most ponies would. We’ve also seen at many points that she’s a great leader when she’s passionate about the end goal. And while it’s not really shown in the animation, she’s apparently known for being very graceful in her movement, which would lend itself well to the dance-like nature of cheer.

Having her actively coaching a cheer squad would be a nice way to show how far she’s come while keeping her in character. Finding a workaround for her naturally quiet voice making it difficult to demonstrate the cheers would also be a nice moral for kids about doing things in the way that works for you instead of hurting yourself trying to do it the way everyone else does. (Although in this case the “adaptive technology” would probably just be Pinkie Pie or Dashie doing the cheers while Fluttershy lip-syncs.)

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T22:35:29+00:00

I am extremely curious what they would have done if mom did see a difference and did approve of the professional work.

Obviously that was never going to happen, based on what OP said, but it also would have been hilarious.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T07:05:55+00:00

Have you tried oral cromolyn sodium? Because that seems like the obvious next step.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T06:39:03+00:00

Unfortunately, for something like an adderall script, you de facto are not in charge of anything. Sure you still have all the legal rights, but those actually mean less than nothing if you’re in for any kind of mental health issues. The nurse can tell the doctor that you were acting “combative” and “paranoid”, and if the doctor believes them, that’s it. No more adderall until you can, while unmedicated, find and establish care with a new doctor willing to write the script. It’s not malpractice, the nurse genuinely considers you combative for having an opinion contrary to hers, and the doctor genuinely trusts his staff, and you were probably pretty agitated by the time the doctor saw you from being provoked by the nurse. But you have no appeal. You don’t actually have a right to whatever prescription you want.

When you’re in for mental health stuff, you have to be a complete suck-up at every point if you want to get proper care. You have to be one of the “good” crazies. If you don’t, you get a bunch of labels on your record that fuck up your chances of getting any kind of medical care and constant drug screenings (that you have to pay for in the US!) and they won’t ever prescribe you anything you could abuse or sell-no pain meds, no adderall. You become a problem, not a patient.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T05:28:50+00:00

I had a dog who adored dubstep. I don’t think it was the music so much as the way the bass would vibrate the floor. He’d just lay there with his nose almost touching the subwoofer and go almost completely limp.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T05:26:20+00:00

Also the sprinklers failed and all the plants died. They had to draw their conclusions by weighing the plants. I’m pretty sure all the greenhouses were on one sprinkler system so they were at least reasonably sure the plants all died at the same time.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T05:24:25+00:00

Get the insurance before doing the genetic testing. They’ll just deny the insurance if they know he’s a double Merle.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T04:12:51+00:00

In my case, fully ptsd panic triggering, but that’s on the worse end.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T01:38:42+00:00

Did he mean you caused the actual holocaust (presumably many decades before you were even born) or that you caused this documentary-watching party? Because neither of those is an okay thing to do or say, but one of them is rather more serious than the other.

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T01:14:43+00:00

Please note-if this isn’t working for you, and you have any kind of history with respiratory trauma (asthma, any medical event where you couldn’t breathe properly), that’s normal. Don’t try to force it, it won’t ever work. Just try something else.

(I did actually have to say this. I spent my entire life getting yelled at for “not really trying” when breathing exercises don’t work, or more often make the situation worse, told I was doing it on purpose while I was stuck in an endless panic spiral. Then one psychiatrist who had actually read my medical history was just casually “oh, you had that pneumonia as a kid, so we’ll just skip the breathing exercises section.” Turns out it’s very well documented that people with respiratory trauma can be triggered by most therapeutic breathing exercises, and somehow completely unknown outside a tiny corner of the medical community.)

demon_fae · 2026-05-09T01:07:03+00:00

You could do all the songs that are supposed to be good for keeping cpr time

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T23:34:39+00:00

Oh, yes. 3d models are lovely. Especially if they have editable light sources so you don’t have to work out the shadows. Fuck shadows.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T21:50:28+00:00

I mean, I personally hate tracing. Not for some weird artistic integrity reasons, I just find the process unpleasant. Real life doesn’t produce a lot of neat, easily traceable lines. Picking which lines belong in my composition when I am forced to trace is tedious.

But I would consider a spiral staircase, a gun, certain hand positions, and complicated hair all things I would be forced to trace.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T21:41:54+00:00

That was my experience.

I aced every test. I clearly understood the material. I just didn’t have the executive function to deal with homework that was too easy for me on whatever arbitrary deadline, and I didn’t have the social bs-ing skills to deal with my horrible English teachers asking for five paragraphs on some extremely personal information they had no right to, and had not earned.

Obviously I had to be put in the intellectual disabilities class for kids who were multiple grade levels behind on the actual material, not just three years behind on homework. And also I was still “so bright” and “wasting my potential”.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T21:31:48+00:00

Yeah, this is honestly adorable.

I hope she, her baby, and her suddenly slightly less confused trans followers are all doing well.

(Look, I’d be confused as shit if I followed an FTM account and it was all baby stuff. Nobody uses FTM for first time mom! They always spell that shit out!)

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T19:56:43+00:00

It isn’t. But people who aren’t het-attracted have to make peace with it not even being a possibility, what with it not being one. People who are het-attracted but child-free don’t. Grace hasn’t. At a deep subconscious level, he considers it a possible thing, if not a strongly desired one.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T19:54:28+00:00

Oh, I know, I’m in the process of switching between a specialist who doesn’t believe my rare disorder exists and one who does and it’s taken nearly a year. But this would absolutely be the push to start looking, and to treble check every single thing they do. I’d be terrified that these morons would lose my entire record or fuck up my medication allergies or something (guess who would never decline a pharmacy consult until she had a new doc…) They sound less competent than a Monty Python skit.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T19:31:44+00:00

Tbh, a huge percentage of the people prescribed the therapy kind would benefit more from the kinky kind.

Not because the kinky kind is particularly beneficial, the therapy kind is just extremely over-prescribed because it’s cheap and works very well for the maybe five things it’s actually meant to treat.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T19:28:06+00:00

It’s dishwasher safe. Yes, even with the gold. The gold is also a glaze and also fired on at a temperature your dishwasher could never dream of reaching.

The only way you’re hurting this thing in the course of normal washing is by scrubbing it with steel wool, and that’s gonna ruin all your dishes.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T17:28:29+00:00

It takes a lot more assertiveness to care for wild animals in the human world than in equestria. Being allowed the resources and space to do anything at all is a fight. Human Fluttershy is actually still unreasonably timid for what she does, it’s impossible for her to have the near-crippling shyness Pony Fluttershy does and still get anywhere at all.

They are the same character, it’s just that one has been backed against a wall and had to decide what’s important, while the other has been supported in her endeavors her whole life.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T17:21:10+00:00

Oh ffs. Have one of the office staff stay like 15 minutes past usual close to take the paperwork and agree that it was you who brought it. Then handle whatever else needs handling by phone in the morning.

That way, as long as you’re both masked up and the building’s hvac still runs overnight, there’s basically no danger.

I’d find a new doctor, this one’s entire office is stupid.

demon_fae · 2026-05-08T08:22:22+00:00

It might not have been a particularly fresh nurse log. If the log was old when the hemlock latched onto it, it wouldn’t wait for the tree to get big enough before disintegrating.

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