#and now I'm in my 30s about to start a PhD

[max1461]

Thought for a moment in the 2010s that we were entering a new serious era (e.g. 1920s, 30s, 40s), but it seems that we're instead in an increasingly tacky era (50s, 60s, 70s). Like look at the change in YouTube. Well you all are textheads you don't do video, I know that. But like. In 2017 there was ContraPoints. Agree or disagree with her opinions, what she was doing was conceptually and aesthetically serious. Even her early, low-production-value stuff. She was talking about incels and other internet shit, but the internet is part of the real world, that's fine. In fact that's what gave me hope for another serious era, people were finally talking about internet stuff the way 1920s German intellectuals or whatever talked about the cultural trends of their day. Maybe because Contra has half a philosophy PhD and was explicitly influenced by those German intellectuals.

Another example from a totally disjoint cultural niche was Digi a.k.a. Trixie a.k.a. Ygg Studios or whatever they go by now. Drunk, smelly, and unkempt—yes. Or at least so went the persona. Talking seriously about anime—also yes. When they claimed they were the only good anime reviewer on the internet it made a lot of people mad. But they were right!

There were thinkers, we had thinkers. My generation, or roughly my generation, had thinkers. To be clear, when I include Contra here I'm not including all of her ilk, I'm not including the leftist-theory-regurgitators and so on. But Contra herself was a thinker! Digi was a thinker! We had thinkers.

But that era is over now, on YouTube at least. I go on there and it's all algorithmic drivel. I look for anime content and as I've explained it's all about #hype and #epic and how the new season of whatever #hits different and other empty meaningless bullshit. No analysis, no thought, fundementally unserious bullshit. Tacky! It's tacky! The the YouTube thumbnail O-face is fucking 70s-ass fake wood paneling tacky bullshit!

MrBeast. I've never seen a MrBeast video but I hate him for what he represents. I used to watch this channel called Wranglerstar, he made videos about different types of axes and forest fire fighting equipment and various other stuff. "Modern homesteading" I believe was the tagline. And it was always evident that he was a far-right guy but who gives a shit, his videos where good. Serious videos about interesting topics, that a fucking normal guy might watch. Well around 2020 he basically started flooding his channel with covid conspiracy bullshit and "the Chinese are going to attack us any day!" bullshit and other unserious crap. And I had to stop watching. How could I find any of that compelling? It's vapid nonsense.

And I don't know if it's a shift in the algorithm or people becoming more savvy to the algorithm or what, but all of YouTube is like this now. Vapid clickbait empty meaningless bullshit for another tacky commercialized bullshit era.

And you know, I felt like it might just be localized to YouTube for a while, but I started to look around, and it just feels like everything is like this. Backsliding to the tacky times. God I hate tackiness. I hate unseriousness. I'm having a little meltdown. At least SMW kaizo hacks are having a renaissance. People are doing serious shit in that space, serious shit that is also not anachronistic, you know, it's kept up with the modern world. It addresses modern concerns (fun to play hard Mario). But it's serious. People are serious. One of the few serious things happening in my orbit.

Even in science it feels like people aren't serious anymore. You know, standard Sabine Hossenfelder complaint about particle physics. But I don't really know enough about that to say. Get the vibe that biology is still serious these days.

To be clear, everything I'm saying here is pure vibes. I'm just saying shit. I'm just saying shit that I feel. But I'll be deeply disappointed if I have to live my youth in another tacky era, god damn it. Even the 80s seem like they were better than this.

#navel gazing #insane-type complaining sorry

[studentbyday]

day 08 // 100dop++

src: study with merve

so i thought the door to a career in academia was closed to me after my first year bc i felt like there was no way in hell i could swing it, even if i wanted to (and while i had glamourized the academic life in high school, i was so burnt out after first year i could not stand the sound of the word "academia" or anything remotely related to it). but a few people close to me, including @zzzzzestforlife (and i usually trust her judgment of my preferences 😅), suggested i look out for a career in academia bc "i like studying and learning". ...now that i think of it, there is a bit of truth in that (but do i really only complain about studying like someone who likes it would??? 😅🤓) and i feel i have changed a bit since first year...maybe with more years to grow, i might feel like academia is a real career option for me... for now, it gives me motivation to study (and a reason to research phd's again 😅). it's a late start again today... 🙈

👩🏻‍🎓 study stats (30/10): 🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅

journal ✅

physio ✅

psyc ch 1/2 from last sem ✅ (i finally read it all but have to finish notes on the last 2 sections 😑)

finish pharmacology section 1/5 ✅

psyc ch 2/2 from last sem (ugh. psych has *got* to be the first thing i do tmr or i will fall even further behind bc while i can study it when tired, motivation/will-power to finish it is low when i'm tired.)

write down all due dates (looks like this is happening on the weekend bc i wanna sleep early tonight!)

try to test out of unit 5 (integrated math 1...idc about the mastery points sm as the feeling of familiarity. once i get that feeling, i move on, even if i don't max out on the mastery points) ✅ (i did it! 😊)

#studyblr #studyspo #study aesthetic #100dop #stem academia #stemblr #100 days of productivity #100 days of studying #100 days of self discipline #bioblr #scienceblr #mathblr #academia aesthetic #light academia #classic academia #light academia aesthetic #dark academia #dark academia aesthetic #in a state of excited overwhelm...but more excited than overwhelmed rn which is good #heyfrithams #heydilli #mittonstudies #diaryofastemstudent #astudentslifebuoy #becoming that girl #study motivation #chaotic academia #chaotic academia aesthetic #digital diary #uniblr

[catboybiologist]

Random actual vent that is probably more venty than my usual random little things, but occasionally I have to step back and think how asinine the salary system for PhD students can sound to people outside of academia. I really just want to like... lay it on the table, because it really is fucking dumb and I occasionally want validation that its fucking dumb.

Note that this is all coming from a traditional lab sciences, in the US perspective. Also, I'm really fucking ADHD and have a really, really shitty brain for bureacracy, so this is a rant and isn't really intended to be informative and might be wrong in places, its just me word vomiting.

Let's start with something straight off the bat- grad school isn't really school. It's work that creates value for the university, and you happen to take one or two courses on the side that the university has determined will make you better at that work (your mileage may vary). It's an entry level job, essentially. You create value for the university in one of two ways- you either contribute to research that gets them grant money, or you teach undergrads that pay tuition. We'll get back to how that affects you later, but first lets talk about something else: what the university claims they pay you vs what you actually get paid.

On paper, my income is approximately 3 times as much as my actual, take home income. There's two reasons for this. The first is that I am technically charged tuition by the central university, which is then immediately paid off by the source of my income. In official job titles, that's technically included in what you're getting paid, although most universities don't even bother advertising that. The other confounding factor is that you're literally always considered part time. The exact % time varies depending on your exact schedule, and of course your university, but its actually weirdly consistent even between universities. Technically, the work you do on your thesis isn't "work", and the university doesn't technically pay you to do it. Even though the work you do on your thesis literally generates revenue for the university in the form of grant overhead. But we'll get to that. If you're a researcher for a given appointment term, you're expected to also do research activities that are unconnected to your thesis- which is ridiculous, because there's no lab in existence where the work isn't all interconnected in some way.

Half time appointments are common, but lots of different percentages exist.

So, if you ever see a figure that says that a grad student position is paid at about $80k a year, that's whats going on. The highest take-home income I have EVER heard of in the US for PhD students is $54k, at Stanford neuroscience. I think its a bit higher now, but that at least gets you a ballpark. Most STEM PhD students on the high cost of living coasts are paid 30-40k ish, and in cheaper areas you can expect to take 5k off of that. These are for degrees that usually make six figures on the job market.

And then there's the other convoluted problem- the source of the funding. This is where the academia salary model really has a unique brand.

Basically, when you're a PhD student, you're not working one job for the full 5-7 years. You're constantly flipping between job titles within the university, and who exactly is paying you changes as a result.

The most basic distinction is researcher vs teaching assistant. TA is easy- you work "part time" (but oh my god those workloads are not part time sometimes [although the class I'm TAing now is very chill so its w/e][fuck you molecular genetics at my master's uni tho]), and the department you're teaching for pays for your tuition and your salary as a result.

Researcher is a bit weirder. Basically, each lab is conducted as its own independent financial unit, managed by a Principle Investigator (PI, or to any grad student, the professor/boss/research advisor/liege/monarch/authority of the lab). The PI is constantly writing lab wide grants to supply the core funding of the lab, including the salary of the grad students. Grants can be pretty general, but there are also very specific ones that check in how the money is being spent. These include training grants/fellowships/tbh the name is arbitrary for a lot of these. Those are grants that are written to supply the salary of a specific grad student.

Couple things to note- the university charges the PI in a lot of ways on this. Notably:

They charge tuition on every grad student, as mentioned previously, which under a researcher appointment is paid from the PI to the university.

They charge overhead on grants- basically, they take money out of every grant the PI gets.

If the previous two sources aren't enough, oftentimes universities will pay rent on the amount of building space a lab takes up (although this is very inconsistent between universities)

Researcher appointments are considered favorable to teaching appointments, because they mean you can spend more of your time on your thesis. But, its dependent on whether your PI has the funding to pay you all that, which is a big if. So, every quarter or semester or year or however much your university decides to renegotiate it, you essentially switch jobs, in a way. Obviously its a lot more simple and streamlined than actually switching jobs, but your title, responsibility, source of income, and sometimes your actual pay changes constantly.

And to anyone who has been through a PhD, you're nodding along like this is all the basic stuff, because all this is so NORMAL. Like this is all the normal system, and this is the bare basics of it as well. And it's weird that it's normal, right? Like, most of my career has been tied to academia, so I don't have a fantastic benchmark for this, but this isn't how it works outside of academia like... at all.

Over the course of late last year and bleeding into this year, multiple graduate student unions have had strikes or negotiations regarding pay scale, but its been a very difficult situation for the average grad student to untangle because of how weird the source of pay is. Because technically, even though you functionally work a single, salaried job with slightly changing obligations, what's happening behind the scenes is that you're essentially hopping between jobs every couple of months. In an ideal system, those jobs always have the same pay, but that's increasingly becoming not the case. Sometimes that means getting paid more overall, sometimes slightly less. Union negotiations have made this pay slightly higher overall, but its still a mess of a system.

And obviously, there's paperwork associated with so many of these steps.

So in my last post, when I said "getting a grant", that was what I was referring to- applying for training grants that will guarantee that I don't have to teach extra or get extra money from my PI for the time I'm here. I'd love to get more teaching experience, but ofc I want to do it when I want to, not when I have to. I'm applying for multiple training grants over the next couple of months that will hopefully fund my salary specifically, and hopefully I'll get at least one of them. And tbh, I don't even care that much about teaching, I more want them because it'll dramatically simplify all this for me.

I love what I do to death, but untangling this shit is what gives me imposter syndrome more than anything. I think my arrogant streak shows when I can genuinely say that I've never felt imposter syndrome based on my scientific knowledge. I have felt it over two things- my motivation/productivity (which is a different rant entirely), and the fact that I am really, really bad at untangling the level of bureaucracy required to just... exist here. Just give me my fucking paycheck and let me do my science, and tell me when you want me to teach.

#vent post #like an actual one lol

[johaerys-writes]

I love disasters!AU so so so sooooo much. It added ten more years to my life expectancy. I wish to see your writings forever, if possible.

Anyway, I have a question! How old are Patroclus and Achilles in 2024, roughly? I assumed they'd be in their late 30s or early 40s by now, and wanted to make sure.

And do you have any hcs about them in their 20s, 30s and 40s that you don't mind sharing? Like, are they still together? I goddamn hope they are. What do they do for a living? What are their relationships with their parents and friends? Any hc would be sooo welcome! Have a nice day!

First of all, I love you for sending this ask dear anon 🫶 Any opportunity to talk about my favourite boys adds ten years to my lifespan LOL don't mind if I do

So the age question is kind of tricky because you're a walking disaster and yet- isn't set during a specific time period. Like the Phthia years have a 90s vibe, and the Athens years have a late 90s-early/00s vibe, but I never really had a specific year in mind. It's just vibes mostly lol. But like, assuming we start in the 90s, then I think in 2024 they'd be late 30s, early 40s. And of COURSE they're together, haha. I honestly don't see these two separating at all in that AU, not even as a joke. They're each other’s ride or die and I'm not saying it's exactly healthy (oops 🤣🫣), but I highlyyyy doubt either Achilles or Pat would even consider the possibility of taking a break.

As far as jobs and studies go, Achilles finishes his Architecture major in Athens, then probably does an internship in an architectural firm while Patroclus works part time as an usher in a small theatre and also as a theatre production assistant whenever the opportunity arises, helping making props and procuring materials and generally just running errands for the crew and the director lol. Then they move abroad for Achilles to do a masters degree (in their mid/late 20s?), I was thinking probably Italy, and Patroclus of course follows him. After a bunch of coaxing and convincing, Patroclus accepts Peleus' offer to pay for his studies as well, so the two of them spend a couple really lovely years just studying and travelling Italy and seeing all the sights and eating ALL the food and gelatto etc, and generally having the best of times. And then eventually they come back to Athens where Achilles opens up his own architectural firm (with daddy's help ofc), and Patroclus does his PhD in dramaturgy and starts teaching shortly after (hot professor Pat PLS 😩🤲)

As for the relationship with their parents and friends: they both have a really good relationship with Peleus, better than they did when they were younger. Turns out now that they're older Peleus is great for taking them to expensive restaurants and teaching them about wine and stuff, or taking them on boatrides (with his divorce mini yacht LMAO). Thetis is also in Athens and Achilles does see her often, most times on his own, sometimes with Patroclus. Pat and Thetis are not besties by any means but they get along for the most part. But I still don't think Pat ever truly warms up to her tbh, and Achilles doesn’t push it.

They still often go to Phthia for the holidays so they see Ajax & co, Menelaus and Agamemnon both stayed in Phthia as well so they see them too. Odysseus returns from time to time but they lose contact with him after several years. Dio and Briseis do actually get back together after college for a couple of years, but it just doesn't work out unfortunately, much to Diomedes' disappointment 😅

So yes Achilles and Pat are definitely together by the time they're 40, definitely living together, definitely have amassed an army of dogs at this point haha. Like shortly after the main fic ends they get another dog, and by the time Laika sadly passes away, they already have at least a couple more. And it just snow balls from there. Eventually they move into a bigger place with a yard somewhere in the northern suburbs of Athens, and they just have their cosy little life with their dogs and their vast collection of books, and it's just really really nice for them :')

#listen i just want them to be happy and well #they've been through so much they deserve all that slow love and healing and growth #just growing old together 🥹 and still being sappy idiots #i love them i love them #i'm not crying you're crying #patrochilles #disasters au

[rattusn0rvegicus]

Honestly I'm finally starting to make genuine connections and form relationships within my community and it's insane. I'm so far from the isolated, paranoid person I was as a young(er) adult. I can't believe I used to be someone who was usually too terrified to even leave their bedroom to go to the bathroom or eat. How many nights I spent curled up, alone, with my back to the wall, suicidal, feeling like I was being watched by a million unseen eyes, and thinking it would never get any better.

It's all been so gradual, too. It took me four years to get my AA and I almost got kicked out of school due to failing grades twice. And then I finally got my AA. And then I got into a long distance relationship. And then I moved to the Midwest, and aside from my bf and his friends, was still very isolated - but not alone. And then I worked a few jobs and always felt like such an odd one out with my coworkers. Never socialized behind that, but always longed for it. A couple years later, I started volunteering. Started going to a trans support group and met a few folks there. Then started working on my BS last year.

Now I'm meeting this amazing, incredible group of coworkers and everyone is so passionate about what we're doing. I've never had a job so in alignment with my values, a job that so deeply inspires me to improve. I've never felt this way, not at school, not at work, ever. I've had tiny tastes and glances of it in piecemeal events.

I'll finish my BS sometime between 28 and 30. And that's okay. (the idea that I'd even have a chance to make it to that age was so foreign to me for most of my life) I'm not like a lot of friends and people I know who are already in grad school or working on their PhDs or graduated already. I had a different lot in life and that's okay. I'm meeting so many people with a similar story.

And we can build each other up.

#I'm just feeling kind of emotional about all this #Maybe I should journal about it sjdjsgg #Well I kind of just did. LMAO #personal

[actualalligator]

This ended up a much longer thing than expected, but I just needed to get it all out. Life woes under cut.

Sometimes, being asexual feels a little like a deal breaker. Being asexual as a lesbian felt even more so because so much of what I experienced trying to date women online was hypersexual, and I felt so out of place. Now I'm genderfluid/queer/something I'm still trying to figure out and potentially willing to date men, but not really willing to date anybody who isn't kinky because I'm in my thirties and I'm tired of trying to tell myself that I can live without it. What little sexual desire I do experience is so intrinsically tied to my kinks that I can not separate them. And that all kinda feels like a deal breaker, too.

I spent my 20s in school. Most of my peers got married and started lives. I feel like I made choices based on failed plans and simply having no idea what else to do. I got a PhD before I turned 30, what an accomplishment everybody says, but I'm working a job I only need a masters for with this looming drop in enrollment numbers that only further fucks my already tentative job security. Did I give my twenties for some expensive education and a career that's shaky at best because high school graduation numbers are going to peak in 2025? If I had known that in 2017, would I have stayed this fucking course?

I'm tired. I'm tired of not feeling secure in my career and in basic human needs like housing. I'm tired of doing it all alone while simultaneously feeling like I'm always going to be alone because the very core of who I would be as a romantic partner feels like a deal breaker.

There's no point to this. I'm just sick and sad and stressed about existing.

#this isssssss nonsense #and I am just talking #life is a little hard right now #but all things considered it's not that bad #i have a job and a home for now #and nobody dies from being single

[tokiohotel4life7741]

Intolerably Yours

Warning: mentions of kidnapping, language and that’s all I can think of.

Debating whether or not to make a part two to this.

❤️~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~❤️

“Hey agent, we have a new case and I need you here as fast as possible!” I hear hotchner speak frantically from the other end of the phone.

“Okay, I'll be there as soon as possible, hotch,” I mutter as I hang up the phone and start getting ready.

It was around 5:30 am when I got that call from hotch saying i have to come in for a case, five in the morning. I know working at the BAU means i have to be available at all time and available i am, but it was just too early to deal with spencer reid, and i'm not saying that because of his rants and how he knows everything, no we graduated from the same colleague with the same credit we both have our phds in mathematics,chemistry, and engineering and are both incredibly intelligent. I go on annoying rants about any and every topic too and the team gets tired of having two geniuses on the team sometimes. The reason I hated Spencer is because he’s always thought he was better than me, and by always I mean since we graduated highschool at the early age of 12, he always tried to one up anything and everything I did, and I seriously despised him for that.

After two long minute of sulking i get up and obviously brush my teeth and wash my face, i put on my outfit which is black pantsuit and a pair of polished black heel, but i make sure to put a pair of running shoes in my go bag in case i have to chase the unsub. I put on some makeup which consists of concealer, blush, mascara, and some tinted lip gloss. I make sure I have my go-bag ready and I head out the door making sure to lock it. I go to my car and get in it

While driving to work I blast music to try and get the thought of having to deal with Spencer this early in the morning off my mind. I gasp as my favorite song comes on and i start singing along

We’re caught in a trap

I can’t walk out

Because i love you too much,baby

Why can’t you see

What you’re doing to me

When you don’t believe a word I say ?

We can’t go on together

With suspicious mind (suspicious mind)

And we can’t build our dreams

On suspicious minds

When the song finishes I feel more relieved. I finally pulled into the bureau parking lot, I parked and get out of my car. When I walk into the building and see no one is at their desk I walk straight to the conference room knowing that's where everyone was. I walk in the door an the first thing i hear is spencer mutter

“Look who finally decided to show up,”

Mind you I was only like two minutes and thirty seconds late.

I glare over at him annoyed by his audacity and i grunted back at him saying

“Well at least i’m not such a boring person that i show up fifty minutes early,’”

“Will you two stop,for once?” hotchner uttered annoyed

I look away embarrassed and listen to Hotchner explain the next case. A summary of the new case was, the unsub, probably a white male in his late twenties- early thirties, is kidnapping girls through the ages of 16-18 he gets close to them and bribes them with a party and alcohol and that's how he kidnaps them. When hotch started describing what the victims look like a chill ran down my spine and my breath hitched, everyone look at me when the young girls were being described, hotch said they had y/n/h/c, y/n/e/c, and were y/n/s/c and as the pictures were being showed the girls on the screen look a lot like me similar feature and all. Then Spencer gives the ‘great’ idea of using me as some kind of bait for the unsub, of course i say no but once everyone else starts agreeing saying i should go as ‘bait’ i give in and say yes

“Agent y/l/n should go undercover as a highschooler after all they do look a lot like the victim and we have enough time between now and when he’ll try to kidnap a girl again to register her into a highschool and everything,” Spencer explains

“That’s literally such a bad idea, what if i actually die,” i say worried

“Hopefully,” i hear spencer mutter under his breath loud enough for me to hear

“Fuck you, Reid,” i say loud enough for only him to hear

“Agent y/l/n you are not going to die,” Hotchner says to me

“Are you guys sure there isn’t a different, maybe better option?” I question being kinda scared by the idea of almost getting kidnapped.

“This is the best option agent Y/l/n, you look like the victims and you still look extremely young much like around the age of the victims” Hotchner responded.

As I look around I see everyone else nodding along to what Hotchner said, I sigh and come to the conclusion that if I wanted to catch the unsub this was the best option.

“Alright, I'll do it,” I breathe out after a few minutes of deciding “but I don’t think I have much choice anyways,” I mutter to myself so no one hears it, but to my demise hotch sort of hears it

“What was that,agent?” hotchner mutters to me

“Nothing, just thinking to myself out loud,” i respond

“Alright, wheels up in thirty agents,” hotchner says as we all hum in agreement

#aaron hotch hotchner #Spencer #spencer x reader #spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid smut #criminal minds

[girlweepinginstairwell]

Most of my friends either had longer than average (in my country) degrees or finished out degrees late. I also spent a year getting a master's in a field I ended up not caring about, and spent another year on another master's and yet another doing nothing (well I was studying for a different thing, which I'm still doing now alongside working part-time as a teacher), and I'll probs get another degree or master's once I land a more secure job. Even tho idk when I'll manage to land a full time position as a teacher and I have friends who won't finish studying until they are 30, and my brother couldn't even finish his bachelor's yet (at 30) because of mental illness. Another of my friends started a PhD, left it after a year and has now started a different one. I know people who got a PhD at 50, I used to be classmates with a woman starting her first degree at 27, and another getting her second at 40 smth. Anxiety doesn't listen to reason, as another anon said, but point is, you're not late to anything, and despite what most of us are lead to believe, there isn't a 'true' schedule when it comes to studying or joining the work force. Sending you lots of love and positive energy 🖤

oh my goodness, congrats on the degrees & best of luck with finding a better job for yourself! thank u also for mentioning so many of your acquaintances here… it’s always really interesting and heartening to hear about what other people have been doing with their time and it makes it clear that there really is no true schedule to follow, no single correct itinerary for life. i appreciate it a lot and please take care! 🌟

#i’m assuming you live outside of the united states based on what you’ve said here though because even one master’s degree tends to be #incredibly costly ❤️‍🩹 the idea of getting multiple sounds sooooo appealing but is less feasible here i think… waaah… #asks

[foxscarf]

17.11.23

Ey so I spontaneously moved my visit home to this weekend, and got on a train straight after work at the lab! Today looked like it was going to be a little useless, but in the end I did get some lab work done, and I'm kinda proud of fitting it all in. And now I'm off for a good weekend. 😊✨🚆

Having *just* reached a decision yesterday about my rotation project choices, I'm in tumult again today. A tiny voice in my head wonders if I should've gone to the Netherlands after all... It might just be 'grass always greener'; but I got a bit of an ouch today realising a student in my year is starting her dream PhD in Amsterdam, and a part of me worried if that would've been *my* dream PhD too... :/

Any other grad students had experiences of doubt about whether they've made the right choice? :') I'd love any advice you have. Think it'll be okay, I'm just gonna keep doing my best.

30/100 days of productivity

#studyblr #my work #phd #phd life #sigh #gradblr #100 days of productivity #phdblr #cafes #coffee #studyblr aesthetic #autumn

[bettsfic]

(Love on Display is the series name for ASE and its sequel)

okay so for this commentary i went through my ASE tag to read the asks i'd gotten about it because i can't really remember the whole process, and found this response i'd written:

you know how like when you read or watch something, you kind of look for the character you relate to most? when i was rereading the hunger games last month i was thinking, i don’t relate to a single one of you bitches. and then annie shows up like “nope nope nope i can handle exactly 0% of this bullshit” and i was just, ah there i am

looking back on my mental health issues, the irony is that i was writing about madness in a time i was actually pretty stable, despite the pandemic being in full swing. i remember writing ASE throughout summer, sitting on my grandma's porch swing and admiring her garden, going inside only when it got dark enough for the fireflies to come out. at the time, i was approaching my third year of rejections on the original fiction front; i'd been querying agents for over a year and submitting short stories, and i felt like i wasn't getting anywhere. i was also about to start a phd program, which i was apprehensive about, to say the least. i wish i'd listened to that "i have a bad feeling about this" instinct.

tbosas had just come out (to almost no attention or acclaim; even now with the film coming out in a couple weeks, the gifsets i've been reblogging don't get a lot of traffic and the tag only has 250 fics in it) and so i read it, loved it, and immediately re-read the hunger games with the new lens of snow's origin story.

the hunger games is one of the few things that i think is completely worth the hype. it's a beautifully written series and i really admire it. tbosas i thought was even better, because it felt like suzanne collins had full creative control. it's not easy writing a villain origin story and i think she really managed to thread the needle with coriolanus as a POV character who is really the antagonist of two protagonists whose POVs we don't have access to.

anyway as soon as i finished re-reading the hunger games, i went back to read the one thg fic i'd written after the film series concluded, the baker's son. it wasn't as bad as i remembered it, because 2015-16 were the years i was really starting to figure out how to write, so everything from that time in my memory is hand-wavy at best. but i remember thinking, this could have been really good if i'd just taken my time with it.

back then, i never took my time with anything. i had so many ideas that i had to churn through them in order to get to the next one. when you're just starting out writing, you haven't followed through on enough ideas to know how to sort through them properly and find the ones that have legs. so i was still learning how to control my attention.

and so ASE marked a huge change in the way i viewed my own work and the reception thereof. i was getting nowhere in publishing, i was no longer in one single fandom and so i didn't really have a community, and i finally realized the only guarantee i would ever have is my own joy. that changed everything.

i know i'll always love the hunger games, because i genuinely believe it's good. it's engaging and entertaining and meaningful. before, i'd written for canons i actually didn't like, because communities had formed around them and i was inspired by what i felt was unmet potential in canon. but i know i'll never rewatch supernatural or the 100. in fact i didn't finish either of them. with big fandoms, sure, i get more traffic and comments. but i'd stopped writing for traffic and comments. i wrote ASE because it was fun, and i knew in 10 years i'd read the hunger games again, and i would want my perfect fixit fic. and i would want it to be long, and well thought out, and something i could be proud of.

i've kept that "i'm writing for my 40 year old self" mentality for all my writing. at 40, i want to look back at what i wrote at 30 and know it was time well spent because it made me happy during a hard time in human history. it's a lot easier to make creative decisions when you're writing for an audience of your future self.

with tbosas coming out soon, i'm hoping to finish the coriojanus fic i started in 2020 (i think it's 7k?). and looking back through my ASE tag i also saw how many ideas i had for finnick POV and i could see myself fiddling around with a few of those prompts eventually.

#ase #tbosas #bomb time

[theocddiaries]

Zero: Hey, aren't you going to say anything? You've been my fսcking moral beacon my whole life, and now... Sarah: Just to be clear, what does "moral beacon" mean to you? Zero: How on earth should I know, eh? You've taught me what's right and wrong for years now. You're like some kind of pillar. Sarah: Oh, bravo. Have you not realised that I'm stuck right here just like a pillar and haven't moved for ten years and not even taken half a step forward? Zero: That means what? Sarah: It means that I've spent five years busting my guts, first at university, then with my PhD, with everyone saying to me… "Well done. You can do anything. You're so intelligent!" "And there was only one thing I wanted to do: teach children. But instead, I've spent ten years hidden away in a warehouse in the Formello Industrial area, taking coffee to people who make toilet brushes. Ten years with no prospects at all. Zero: All right, I feel like I'm stuck in a rut too, but that doesn't necessarily mean… Sarah: Oh, you too, huh? You really think you're the same as you were ten years ago? You make comics and cartoons. Ten years ago, you were working at the airport. You might not remember, but ten years ago, I was the enthusiastic one with every door open. And that's why I took care of you. I didn't like it that you were struggling. So I went with you to take your drawings to show editors at fairs. I made you strawberry tiramisu because you were so sad and you had the taste buds of a six-year-old. "And then you found your way. And all of you found your way. You moved forward. You did things. But I didn't. I just stayed here. First I was the girl who could do anything, and then I became the girl who was doing nothing. Now I'm the poor girl who, at the end of the day, has never done anything. "There's no point pulling that face, Zero. You don't remember what it's like when you think you're doing everything well, but you close your eyes for a second, and when you open them, you realise you've thrown your life down the toilet. Always stuck on the same square without even rolling the dice. And now that it's finally my turn to get out of that square, they're closing the school, and I'm going back to the start. Does that sound fair to you? Sarah: What I'm trying to get through to you, Zero, is that if the school has to close because parents don't want their kids being so close to the refugee shelter and feel uncomfortable about leaving them there, then you have to acknowledge it, whether you like it or not. Zero: What do you mean, acknowledge it? That you have to agree with it? Sarah: It means that maybe the shelter needs to be moved somewhere else. Zero: Sarah, don't you realise that's exactly what's been happening for the past month with those 30 poor people being driven from one area to another? If someone, at some point, doesn't set the principle… Sarah: But does this principle thing only apply to me? You've all done your own shit and sorted your lives out. You've already found your place in the world. But when it comes to me, I have to lose everything and say nothing because principles are more important? Zero: Excuse me, but in my work, I've always tried to do everything right and respect the principles I set myself. Sarah: And the principle of not leaving anyone behind? All the bullshit about going at the pace of the slowest one? Do you know what my pace is? Do you want to know what it is? Zero: …Uh, what is it? Sarah: I don't have one, all right?! Because I'm tied to a pole. I'm stuck there, just watching you get smaller and further away. And you don't even turn around to look.

Zero and Sarah's discussion in the TV series "This world can't tear me down".

If you haven't watched it, do it. It's fantastic.

#this world can't tear me down #sarah #zerocalcare #zero #netflix series #immigration #speech #scriptchat #dialogue #discussion

[apocryphalia]

sorry to reappear here just to be genuine on main but I'm deep in the finals soup right now so naturally I've been having Thoughts

I've been thinking about when I was 25 and finishing my associate's degree and applying to transfer to get my bachelor's. and I knew I wanted to do grad school and I was so anxious about finishing everything as quickly as possible because I was already going to be in my 30s (the horror!) by the time I finished school and would be able to actually "start my career"

but you know what I did instead? fell in love with a new subject. started thinking about other degree programs. took way too many classes my senior year and burned myself out and decided to take a year off after undergrad to decide what I wanted to do. and then COVID happened and I decided to keep waiting and I came out as trans, and I realized actually the thing I wanted to do was still what I wanted when I was 25.

so I applied to law school. and I thought, ok, this is fine. I'll get through the next three years and then I can REALLY start living my life when I'm 34.

but friends. do you know what happened instead? I fell in love with the thing everyone made me expect to hate, that I thought was going to be just a necessary evil I had to suffer through to get out into the world and practice. to finally get started.

I've been looking at phd programs now. I've been systematically harassing all my professors about how to do what they do and I've been reading their scholarship and I've been rotating the erie doctrine in my mind like it's my new fucking blorbo

and when I first realized that oh fuck, maybe I do actually still have some interest in academia? and legal academia, of all things? I thought, well shit, now I'm not going to REALLY get started until I'm in my 40s. and I was MAD. I was mad at myself for every point in the last 31 years where a different choice might have theoretically gotten me here sooner. I was mad at the legal profession and the academy for working the way that it does and I was mad at God and the universe for making me want things and then making them hard.

but look. what have I been doing all this time if not living my life? what am I doing right now if not starting my career?

my point is. my point is I actually love getting older and learning new things about myself, even if sometimes I'm the last one to know them. and I loved the experiences I had in undergrad and I love the experiences I'm having now, and I'm accumulating a whole list of other experiences to have and things to learn that I think I'll love too. and this shit isn't some race for the finish line or a checklist of things to do in the exact right order or at the exact right age. it's just... life. and sometimes it's weird and sometimes it's hard and sometimes things don't go the way you wanted or the way you thought they were going to, and I think that's probably fine actually?

idk. I just wanted to share.

#fuck law school finals #got thrown a curveball on my civ pro exam yesterday #and had to come home and do a weed about it #but then i thought myself full circle #because i really did love that stupid class #so anyway here we are #law school #life shit #apocryphalia attempts life advice maybe? #for some reason

[tehri]

Hey. So. Are you a university student or suchlike? Are you working on your bachelor's/master's/PhD? Are you prone to procrastinating on working on those?

Here, come closer. No, I'm serious, come closer.

Look. I'm taking you back in time to before the summer break/before whatever lengthy break you are on, and I'm going to explain something to you.

No, don't try to wriggle away right now, this is important. I am holding your wrist in an iron grip, and I am not releasing you until I've said what needs to be said. Stop crying, stop begging me to bring you back to your own time, and please ask past you to stop screaming in terror about seeing your future self, because this is for the sake of both of you (and me).

Do not say that you're going to work on that project over the break.

Don't look away from me! I'm not-so-gently grabbing your chin and forcing you to make eyecontact, so stop that shifty behaviour. Do not- No, I'm serious, stop it. Do not say you're going to work on that project over the break.

I know, it seems real logical, it seems perfect. You have a lot of time on your hands, you know you can get it done. There's just so much time, you know? So much time to put into this, to really get some work done, to really make progress.

Don't you see? You have already failed.

You claim you have gotten a lot of work done? How fortunate that I have your computer right here, I can just check the file and compare to your past self's file. Oh, wow, do you see that?

You have written 500 words. Over the course of 3 months. When you were convinced that you were going to finish the entire theoretical background for this project over the break.

I'm not-so-gently grabbing your collar with both hands to shake you now. Do you see what you have done?

You had so much time, so your brain told you that there's no need to panic. You have one week until courses start up again, you're going to have to see your tutor again soon. And you aren't done with even half of what you said you would do over the break. You aren't done with even 30% of it. No, not even 25%, don't you try to argue with me.

You procrastinated. You fool, you believed you had the self-discipline and control to do this. But you regularly leave essays and other works until you have very literally one week or less to get them done. You already failed.

I am dragging you back to your own time now and plunking you down in your chair in front of your computer, and I am telling you in a voice shaking with barely held back fury at my own fucking stupidity and naivety that no greater fool exists in this world. I am telling you - myself - that not doing anything for 3 months and then panicking and writing 500 words before getting a headache from having to word things in an academic manner is the Way Of Fools.

You are shyly mumbling about how you finished a really big project in a week by panic-writing, and I must laugh. Oh, I must give air to this hysterical laugh bubbling up inside me, this laugh of despair and of understanding. It is not the same. You know that it is not the same.

Do not say that you are going to work on your bachelor's/master's/PhD over the break and that you are going to get so much work done. Do not make any promises whatsoever about how much work will get done, for we both know that you are a pathological liar when it comes to your self-discipline and your ability to convince your brain that you absolutely do have to get this work done until it is already time to panic.

Do not do this to yourself.

#University #Student #College #Procrastination #no seriously don't fucking do this to yourself #i am sitting here swearing at myself because this is exactly what I did #In my defense - things really did happen over the break that were out of my control #BUT #I was the idiot who said 'I'm going to do this much over the break' #just don't do this #you know it's a bad idea #this is not aimed at anyone else than myself #I am berating myself and not anyone else

[goldrushreads]

Introduction and a Quick Hi

Hi!

I'm a PhD student who destresses by reading books. I usually read very widely- I love literary fiction, romance, essays and science writing, and nonfiction. If there's a little bit of queer joy in it, I will be reading it.

When I was about 22 years old, I discovered BookTube, and I realized it's possible to read over 50 books a year. I made a lofty goal of reaching 1000 books before I turned 30. I started keeping track. At 20-21, I had read about 12 books, which I tracked on my then blog. At 21-22, I had read 36. And then the flood gates opened. Now I'm 29 and in 2023, I'd read 135 books! In February of 2024, I finished my goal of reading 1000 books before I turned 30!!! I think that's my greatest accomplishment in life, haha.

I read a lot of audiobooks, and I walk a lot (that's the only exercise I often get). I often get books from Libby and NetGalley. Sometimes I buy hardcovers, but it's a rarity these days. My childhood 'library' is intact in my parents' house in Bombay.

When I'm not at work or reading, I listen to Taylor Swift, get called fruity by every algorithm there is, read personal essays on the internet, watch silly comfort movies, or re-watch one of my 10 comfort shows.

Currently, I'm reading 4 books simultaneously- it's not going very well, to be honest.

#gradblr #phd #grad school #phd life #bookblr #new blog #new to this #about myself #first post #taylor swift #queer

[newt-and-salamander]

Okay, time to go and overshare online because that's a very healthy coping mechanism and also impeccable internet safety.

Soooo, I had this job as a student assistant for 2.5 years. I worked for a professor (lets call him Mr. J.) and we got along quite well and I am very sure I carried out my tasks very efficiently and well. He repeatedly told me so.

Last year in January I received an offer as a student assistant for a different project (with Mrs. S), and also a different Professor (Mrs. Y) asked me if I would be interested to be her PhD student after I finished my degree. I was overjoyed because I was extremely interested in Mrs. Y's work and had meant to ask her myself but couldn't muster the courage. As Mrs. S worked in the same field, it was clear I would take her job as well.

So I talked to Mr. J and told him I would take a second job and I would need to lower my work load with him from 40 h/month to 30. He was ... not happy. I remember him literally saying "If Y wants to throw her hat into the ring, who am I to stop her", and in what I considered to be honest career advice, he told me not to go into her field as it was not very promising for a university career atm.

Fast-forward to June: It became clear to me that I wouldn't be able to work 60 h/month while writing my Master thesis starting in September, so I went to Mr J. and told him I would need to quit in autumn. It made sense, because the project I worked on with S was very much adjacent to the topic I chose for my thesis. Again, J was not overjoyed to hear this and told me it was "hard to find good people", but I took that as a compliment.

I finished all my tasks in time and I spent several hours in September showing my successor how to take over from me.

I then wrote a long email to J, thanking him for the 2.5 years we had worked together and everything he had taught me - because it was true, he had been a good boss and I had learned a lot and I knew he had made sure to give me interesting tasks. He had even sent me to a work trip to Paris to do some research in some archives there. I appreciated that a lot and I told him (and I had told him before), and wroteI regretted that I had to leave the job, but that I had had a great time. I also asked him if he could write me a employer's reference as it was pretty much my first proper job.

I didn't expect a bouquet of flowers or anything, but I thought he might write back with something like "thanks for your work, good luck with your thesis". All I got back then was a one liner saying he would write the reference.

I already had the feeling back then that he was sulking, but I brushed the thought away as him being very busy. I met him once on the corridor since then, where he very obviously had no time for me. And today I got the employer's reference, 3 months after I had asked him to write one.

It was a generic text about the university, then a list of my tasks which I provided and then 2 paragraphs, of which the first one said also the very generic things about my work behaviour, including 2 typos, and the whole second paragraph was dedicated to how I quit the job because I got another attractive offer and how he regrettet to let me go.

And ... I get it. These things are always very gerenic and maybe I'm reading too much into it. But tbh reading this, I feel very bad, because I think the only effort he put into it was to make sure I knew he was not happy about me leaving, and also this sounds like I left on a whim, while I told him 4 months prior. I am also very disappointed because he never once said thank you or good bye to me, and - as a person who is generally not very sure of herself - I think this letter understates my actual performance. All the time I thought I was overinterpreting his behaviour, but now I think it's safe to say that he's offended. And I don't understand why. I was only his student assistant. I think I did my job very reliably, but at the end of the day it still was scanning books for his seminars and going to archives to take photos of documents for him. I did not betray him in any personal way. I don't see why he would react in such a way. (And I can't stop thinking about the "throwing the hat into the ring" comment. If he felt I should in any way be more loyal (???) to him and IF he had maybe thought of offering me a PhD position, he could have done it then and there. I can't read his thoughts. I am suffering from impostor syndrom anyway, I don't think anyone would willingly want to take me on for a doctorate.)

Anyway, I'm confused and hurt and I wrote him an email asking very nicely to correct the typos. Let's see if that takes him 3 more months.

#also I have covid rn so maybe i'm a bit too emotional #and I just realised by working more than 10 h/week i might have tapped into my time for the cursed Wissenschaftszeitvertragsgesetz #and nobody told me #but let's not jump to conclusions i'm upset enough #and I can't stop wondering if I ACTUALLY did something wrong #rant #nobody will read this i hope #back to my master thesis #personal thoughts #uni

[saltygilmores]

Thoughts While Watching Gilmore Girls-Season 2, Episode 12, Part 2 ("Richard In Stars Hollow")

Part 1 and all other episodes here

"You built me a car?" "I built you a car." Version 2.0:

Yes it has already been established that a car has been built.

Sorry Lorelai, he's not gonna build you a plane for you to fuck him in. #SexPlane

Let's see how Lorelai takes this completely factual observation.

If your grandfather had pulled out your father wouldn't exist and I wouldn't be here listening to "you built me a car" again and having to hear about Lorelai's Sex With Dean Plane. What does your father and grandfather being good with cars have to do with anything? How does that make you a mechanic? Where's that motorcycle you supposedly had in season 1? Why is your scarf so ugly? I bet that coat you're wearing smells. That haircut is so stupid. It's that time again! Time for "Dean proceeds to get a very snippy attitude with an adult and Lorelai doesn't care because he's not Jess and she wants to fuck him on their Sex Plane."

You're a certified Butthead, that's all you are.

Gotta love Lorelai jeopardizing her daughter's life by letting her drive some death trap built by a 17 year old butthead with zero automotive experience because "it's a nice thing he did." It's not a fucking ceramic mug he made for her in a pottery class, it's a car. He built her a car (did you catch that yet?) Lorelai just gets more and more insufferable and we're only at the halfway mark of season 2. It will continue to go downhill from here. *straps in* Isn't this the car that Jess totals in Teach Me Tonight? That's the only good thing to come out of that wretched episode.

Rory, you gotta stop with that sad puppy face, you're breaking my heart. If he's so fucking good at bulding cars why didn't he do that for a living after high school instead of just being a career butthead? Why didn't he go to automotive school or something and keep himself busy and do something to contribute to society instead of trapping poor Lindsay into making his meatloaf? (#JusticeForLindsay) Why is his face so god damn punchable? I hate everything about you, sir. I wish you would perish. Truly. He claims Gypsy inspected the car (I think this is the first time she's mentioned on the show?) but literally 30 seconds ago Richard asked him "have you even driven it past a mechanic?" and he said no, but now all of a sudden all of these people have inspected the car. Butthead continues to snip at, make sarcastic comments to, and raise his voice at Richard. Rory and Lorelai just stand there. I'm not convinced Butthead can even read no less build a complicated piece of machinery. Richard and Dean mosey on over to Gypsy's in their respective cawrs so Butthead can prove to Richard that his Death Trap is safe. Gypsy inspects Dean's Metal Box of Death and declares there is absolutely nothing wrong with Dean's handiwork. He did a perfect job. We are to believe this 17 year old butthead who had to fake knowing how to read to impress Rory and is not in the automotive trade made aboslutely zero mistakes building a car from a scratch. Mmmkay.

Really? Great! That was the plan all along.

...should have pulled out. We learn a little more about Butthead's family history besides the fact that his father's pullout game is weak. His father has a shop where he sells and installs stereos. His mother transcribes medical records. And that was your peek into the exciting World of Butthead.

While it feels like every breath and eye blink exchanged between R&J has had a PHd thesis written about it at some point, there are some scenes that nobody seems to care about, like this one? It got to a point that I never saw it on Twitter and Instagram and between viewings of the show I would start to think I must have imagined it. Why, I don't know. Because it's cute as heck and it's one his more clever pranks. Certainly better than the chalk outline.

You gotta love Jess putting dirty movies into G-rated movie boxes. Unlike the chalk outline prank, he did it purely to get back at the people who had screwed Rory over. My sweet baby.

How utterly depressing that this is not even a joke anymore and a completely true statement in the year 2023.

No. No bye. You stay right here. *holds him hostage* Let's enjoy a few screen shots of pure unadulterated joy.

HE'SS JUST A BABY.

PURE JOY.

#gilmore girls #lorelai gilmore #rory gilmore #jess mariano #literati #denise rewatches gilmore girls #gilmore girls season 2 #richard in stars hollow #joyyyyy #milo ventimiglia