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Max Kaehn

@mithriltabby.bsky.social

Reader. Gamer. Maine Coon Cat wrangler. Software engineer. Zen practitioner. https://www.mithriltabby.com/ “Nobody’s free until everybody’s free” — Fannie Lou Hamer

1051 Posts960 Follower758 Folgt
Max Kaehn@mithriltabby.bsky.social · 3d ago

I often note that ⅓ of the population will vote to immiserate themselves as long as they get someone to look down on, and the rest of us need to out-organize them. This brings up another thing we need to organize around: heeding observable reality.

Mel Stefaniuk@melstefaniuk.bsky.social · 3d ago

There will never be such a thing as irrefutable fact again. Our brains are fully cooked and AI is going to gradually warp our understanding of the world until no two people share a common reality. We’ll all be in dissociative states getting into fist fights over what day of the week it really is.

Iron Spike@ironspike.bsky.social · 2w ago

This shit with Taylor Farms is exactly what I’m talking about when I say you may say you “don’t do politics,“ but politics are more than happy to do you. The microbes political bribes got out the door and into your intestines don’t particularly care that you find it all beneath you.

Max Kaehn@mithriltabby.bsky.social · 4w ago

My mother started reading The Hobbit to me as a bedtime story when I was five. I was so enthused by it we went into The Fellowship of the Ring, and I got impatient waiting for bedtime and started reading ahead on my own.

Lincoln Michel@thelincoln.bsky.social · 4w ago

The big literary discourse on twitter right now is whether The Hobbit—a children’s book that won children’s lit awards and was literally written for the author’s children—is appropriate reading for children or in fact such a difficult book most adults can’t “get their head around” it.

derek guy@dieworkwear.bsky.social · last mo.

Thank you for the donation! And sorry for taking a while to get back to you. This fundraiser received so many questions that I've been working my way through everything in batches. I'm attaching my answer here with alt-text. Let me know if you can't read it. Thank you again!

Hi Max! Thank you for the kind donation! I apologize for the delay in getting back to you. This fundraiser received a ton of replies, so I've been working through all the questions in batches. I'm writing to you through this document because I think your question deserves a thoughtful response. I plan to post this with alt-text, in case it's helpful, but please let me know if it doesn't work. I can try another solution. I love all sorts of styles, especially if they can be tied to culture. Even better if they were rooted in some regional identity or practice. So naturally, I love Aloha shirts. The style, as you probably know, comes from the plaid "palaka" work shirts that field workers (often those harvesting pineapples and sugarcane) wore in the early 20th century, which were eventually made from "pareu" printed fabric that arrived in the region via Tahiti. Asian American tailors eventually developed the style we know today — a short, boxy body with short sleeves and a camp collar, typically made from crepe rayon and silk and decorated with certain motifs. These shirts were commonly bought by tourists who brought them home as souvenirs.As the mainland became increasingly enamored of Hawaiian culture and the American middle class grew during the postwar years, Aloha shirts became pseudo-status symbols because they signified that a person had time for leisure. The idea of wearing an Aloha shirt at home while serving drinks to guests from your tiki bar represented a kind of aspirational yet accessible lifestyle. Granted, many Americans didn't differentiate much between Hawaiian, Tahitian, Samoan, or Maori cultures — much of this scene was made of a mix of things that vaguely felt "tropical exotic" — but I think our current conception of the style is very rooted in this history. This, along with the fact that Aloha shirts were part of California surf culture, which gave them a youthful appeal (although those people eventually aged out, so some people associate Aloha shirts with Jimmy Buffett concerts). Hedi Slimane brought them back into fashion about 10 years ago, when he was creative director of Saint Laurent. He teamed them with skinny black jeans, lambskin double riders, and sleek jodhpur boots with Cuban heels. This helped reframe them as being youthful and cool in the modern age. I love all sorts of Aloha shirts and their "vacation style" derivatives. If someone is thinking about buying one, I think they're easier to wear in simple designs — two or three colors and with simple motifs. Although simpler designs don't have the charm of bolder options, they're easy to pair with items like raw denim jeans, olive field jackets, denim trucker jackets, black double-riders, and so on. Plus, as a friend of mine put it, "there's always a risk of looking like an '80s movie nerd or party animal in these things." If that’s a concern, I think a simpler design is a bit safer. If you're looking for one, try Two Palms, Reyn Spooner, RRL, and (my favorite) Sun Surf (available at Self Edge). Buck Mason also has a blue-white palm print this season that looks very versatile (they call it their "draped linen deuce coupe camp shirt”). Additionally, Proper Cloth can make them made-to-measure if you can't find ready-to-wear options that fit. Granted, if possible, I think the best ones are made in Hawaii, sort of like how it's not champagne unless it comes from the Champagne region of France. If the shirt was not made in Hawaii, I think it's more accurate to call the style a "vacation shirt," not necessarily an "Aloha shirt." I really want a "Duke Kahanamoku shell shirt," either in black or brown. Named after a native Hawaiian surf legend, the original version has been a collectible for decades, but it's expensive and hard to find (because it's vintage). Sun Surf has a repro version that I've always wanted to buy. I'm including a photo of my friend Peter wearing one (his is the Sun Surf version). If you're interested in this history, Dale Hope's book "The Aloha Shirt: Spirit of the Islands," published by Patagonia, is a great read. Thank you again for the donation! And more importantly, thank you for rescuing those ferals! I’m generally heartened to meet so many people who care about animals on Bluesky. A photo fo a man sitting on a motorcycle. He's wearing a black leather motorcycle jacket with a black Aloha shirt.
Max Kaehn@mithriltabby.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Given recent events, you may be wondering if you’re fully exercising the political power available to you. I’ve learned some things they didn’t cover in high school civics. 🧵

NE Ohio Regional Sewer District@neorsd.org · 5mo ago

good night, sewers. good night, streams. good night, operations and maintenance teams. good night, settling tanks. good night, stream banks. good night, engineers, scientists, crews, managers, inspectors, analysts too. a good night for us means serving with care. good night, sewers, everywhere.

overlooking a series of circular water filled tanks of a sewage treatment plant at night. lights line a long brick building on the horizon as a blue-black sky is stark behind a veil of thin puffy clouds in the distance.