foxymochakitten

Surprised that no one’s talking about linen, which is one of the most solarpunk materials I can think of.

I am also extremely pale and burn very easily, and my family has a history of skin cancer so that’s fun too! Don’t worry about UPF ratings or special sun shirts or anything like that. Your goals are, 1, keep the sun from touching your skin, and 2, stay cool so you don’t overheat during the heatwave. Linen fabric will do both.

Get yourself a long sleeve linen button-up - mine are from the thrift store to avoid buying new, but if you have to buy new then you have to. You can wear it over your normal tank top or shirt. This will keep the sun off your arms and it’ll keep you cool. Forget polyester anything. Linen fibers are long and moisture wicking due to the properties of the plant its made from and you’ll literally feel a very light cooling effect just by touching it. Even better option is to moisten your shirt with water when you’re outside, if you can, because the water evaporating + the linen fibers will keep you so unbelievably cool it’ll be like upper body air-con.

Skip shorts, even though it’s tempting to expose more skin to keep cool. Go for long linen pants, something loose and flowy if possible. As the fabric moves around while you walk, it’ll cool you even further. Lightweight cotton is also a good option.

Linen blends are okay - I’d skip linen-polyester, personally, because there is nothing that traps heat like polyester fabric (it’s just plastic), but your mileage will vary. My favorite is linen-rayon because it moves and drapes very nicely, and linen-cotton is quite nice too c:

Lastly, get yourself a wide brimmed hat to protect your scalp and face from sun, or you can wrap a lightweight scarf over your head and drape it around your neck and then just wear a lot of sunscreen on your face. Remember to reapply every two hours if you’re out in the sun. Sunscreen on your hands too. Cotton socks and cotton underwear will prevent any fungal issues (if you’re going to be in hot weather, I recommend packing an extra pair of each to switch into partway through the day). And lastly… my best trick, taught to me by my partner: scrap of linen cloth or a linen scarf soaked in water and draped around your neck. Trust me. It feels HEAVENLY. A cotton rag will also work if that’s all you’ve got!

TL;DR: dress in long layers made of linen which will keep the sun from touching your skin and naturally cool you off c:

I didn’t think about that… thank you!! I can definitely get my hands on an old cellphone.

No, but it’s not the energy use I’m talking about (though I’ll do some research on video games now, there’s always more for me to learn!) - I’m referring to the water usage. The average ChatGPT session (with multiple queries) is the equivalent of destroying roughly a bottle of water. But if we are thinking about power, data centers also run diesel powered generators when there’s a high demand for queries which spew out pollution. And then its worth considering that each data center as a whole is pretty awful, and if there were less demand for them, i.e. people not using genAI, the CEOs would be motivated to make them less shitty… every query shows them that, yeah, this IS a great idea and they should build more data centers :/

I don’t mean to like make you feel bad for making a quick tl;dr using AI, it’s just that this is pretty important to me! We all have to pick and choose our battles, but of all the things we do in our day-to-day lives that impact the environment and the world around us, typing up our own summary instead of using AI seems like a really easy option to me.

thank you for being honest about it but please remember that each and every AI query is absolutely devastating to the environment!! It’s pretty easy to just type up a quick summary (or let someone else do it) rather than do that damage

oooh very useful, thank you! I am hella broke (like rationing my SNAP money broke) but I’d quite like to get into this hobby

Unironically, reading this made me so inspired I got really emotional. An internet of the community for the community. This whole post is beautifully written <3

thanks!! :D

Genius! No need for any glue at all. I’ll give it a try and report back :D thank you!!

This is pretty cool, thanks!

Neat!! Good job!

I think you dry them before you use them, so they’ll be just like any other basket! So probably not great to get it wet etc but it won’t rot. But also I suspect if you used the stems still fresh, they probably would just dry in the shape of the basket? My partner makes baskets out of other materials like tree bark and that just dries out.

oh no

hehehe I’m guessing that didn’t work out super well for you

That sounds so cool! Do you have any posts with pictures or talking about how you did it? I learned how to make cordage once from wild materials but I don’t know much about it.

I love this idea!!

Hehe you might not work with small objects a lot! I have several little baskets, bowls and pottery pots about this size. The ones I can see right now contain my enamel pin collection, my hair accessories (bobby pins, clips, etc), my rings, and my earrings. I also have a little bowl for safety pins and another for wonder clips since I do a lot of sewing. This size could also scale up easily to hold straws, pencils, pipe cleaners, and anything else light, long, and narrow. I have previously used containers of this size to hold cool rocks and stickers too. And the writer of the post explains how you can make different shapes and sizes of basket, too, so you can upscale for your own needs!

But, as someone else said, sometimes it’s nice to just make a thing for the joy of making a thing c:

Gonna go against the grain here and give you some of the best advice I’ve received as a sewist: get your machine secondhand.

Thrift stores are a great place to look, or see if someone’s trying to get rid of a machine (talk to other sewists, we usually have extras), or even free piles on the side of the road. I got a fantastic machine from the 70s on the side of the road. You’re more likely to get an older machine if you go secondhand and older machines are more powerful, but delightfully, most secondhand machines function fine and are CHEAP. You don’t need to spend more than 100 USD on your machine. You probably don’t need to spend more than 50 USD.

Source: I patch and sew my own clothes as well as make quilts. I do not use an industrial or specialty machine.

you got this!! Become the pool guy you want to see in the world

good on you for moving away from Google!

that’s cool as hell!!

whoa this is so cool!! I didn’t realize I was surrounded by so many natural resources

seconding makeup brushes!! Fluffy ones are great for delicate things and lightweight dust but a good thin edge brush will work wonders on stuck bits (source: my sewing machine seems to inhale dog hair every chance it gets)