in-the-key-of-f-major

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

i really do believe that the answer to a lot of people's self hatred is not to try and reassure them that they are wonderful and okay and enough, but instead to remind them theyre a completely unremarkable regular ass person who is not the center of the universe or especially important so why would they expect themselves to be some superhuman savior. like there really is a kernel of out of control self importance at the heart of thinking youre an evil lazy piece of shit. because why would you expect you be anything but just like some guy. if you wouldnt expect the guy who works at the vape shop or your mailman or whatever to be able to do something then why would you expect yourself to? youre just some random ass person. its fine

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

I can't stress enough how much I miss StumbleUpon

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

My fellow cadets have started calling me DoREYmon because I always have candy and other items, such as a shoe brush and shoe polish

Doraemon is a character known for having lots of things in his bag

It's always fun to see the looks on their faces when they need something and I have it in my bag, and when they have the audacity to comment on the number of things I have in my bag, I remind them that they are benefitting from it and so they have no right to talk and they instantly shut up since they want my help

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

A few years ago while trying to find ways to commit suicide as painlessly as possible, I came across a PDF of Dr. Paul Quinnett's The Forever Decision. Thinking it might go into actual methods of suicide (I read an article once that actually did that and was trying to find it again) I started to read it, and I think I only got about two pages in before I was crying too much to actually see the words.

I downloaded the PDF to my hard drive and I open it again whenever I'm feeling too suicidal to do much else, but not enough to start booking a ride to the hospital. And every time without fail I only go up to a few pages before backing off and choosing to live another day just because suicide suddenly seems even more unbearable than whatever the hell upset me in the first place.

All the book really does is [I'm pulling a summary from GoodReads here as, again, I've read no more than 5 pages] "discusses the social aspects of suicide, the right to die, anger, loneliness, depression, stress, hopelessness, drug and alcohol abuse, the consequences of a suicide attempt, and how to get help."

But it also starts with the author kindly asking the reader to complete the book before going through with anything, and for some reason I'm compelled to really just try to read it all before finalizing everything. Despite not yet completing it (hopefully never will) I think I can safely say it's saved my life at least a few times now.

It's intentionally legal to copy and redistribute this book to keep it as accessible as possible, and it's very easy to find, but here's a link for it anyways.

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

oh yeah have i ever told yall of the academic war i have been an unwilling soilder in for the past two years

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

there are a lot of undiagnosed adults out there but i do think it's a shame that we've reached a point where having hobbies and interests past the age of 20 is seen as a touch of the tism. i know many older adults who suppress all their childish desires and throw out all their old toys and for what. are you scared of being 'weird' ? who give a shit.

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

it is honestly amazing how much of writing and editing is just. logistics. like... do i use a name here or a pronoun? if i move this dialogue tag to the middle of this line and break it in half, does the end of the line hit harder that way? what if i move the tag to the front? what if i remove it entirely? ...wait, whose point of view am i in; can i reasonably say this character is appalled, or must i say they look or seem or sound appalled? is this a deliberate action or a step-removed one; is her hand closing on his shoulder, or is she closing her hand on his shoulder? environment environment environment, we need to break all this dialogue up with some narration, the scene is coming untethered. what! are! they doing! with! the rest of their bodies that are not hands! fuck fuck fuck FUCK i forgot we covered this two chapters ago and now i either need to cut this whole chunk or find a reason to reprise the conversation from earlier. name or pronoun? name or pronoun? name or pronoun? move this clause around in this sentence? oh i'll add this phrase-- nope, never mind, past!me added the same phrase two lines down. okay, if i add too much environmental narration it's going to take away from this bit, but not enough and it won't feel grounded. what if i move this to its own line? where the FUCK are their hands?

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

dam…….. that website “you feel like shit” (it’s like a questionnaire / troubleshooting guide for when you feel like shit) really works………………….. im not even all the way thru it and i even half-assed a lot of the suggestions and i already feel loads better

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

You know what? Forget the discourse. This is no longer my hill to die on.

You wanna ship canonically aspec characters because “aro/ace people can still date/have sex”? Okay, then. LET’S DO IT.  I wanna see an aromantic character with an alloromantic love interest. I wanna see that confession of undying love and the moment when the aro character says they will never feel the same way—not romantically.

I wanna see the asexual character with their allosexual partner. I wanna see that moment when the ace characters tries sex with their partner for the first time because they want to make them happy only to realize that they are 100% sex repulsed.

I wanna see the two demiromantics who don’t even know if what they feel is romantic attraction, but they adore each other and just want to make healthy snacks together and destroy each other at Mario Kart.

I wanna see the two aces who love sensual affection and are figuring out what they define as sexual or not.

I wanna see the romance + sex neutral aroace who happily and consensually does whatever makes their partner happy…but their partner still struggles with feeling undesired. 

Oh, babe. You thought shipping an aspec character would be just like shipping an allo character? 

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

me reading my own post for the 50th time: so true bestie

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

i suspect that a huge factor in the defense of students using gen ai (and academic dishonesty in general tbh) comes from the fundamental misunderstanding of how school works.

to simplify thousands of educator's theories into the simplest terms, there are two types of stuff you're learning in school: content and skills. content is what we often think of as the material in school- spelling, times tables, names, dates, facts, etc.- whereas skills are usually more subtle. think phonics, mental math, reading comprehension, comparing and contrasting; though students do those things often, the how usually isn't deemed as important as the what.

this leads to a disconnect that's most obvious when students ask the infamous "when will we use this in the real world?" they have- often correctly- identified content that the content is niche, outdated, or not optimized but haven't considered the skills that this class/lesson/assignment will teach.

i can think of two shining examples from when i was a kid. one was in middle school when they announced that we were now gonna be studying latin, and we all wondered why on earth they would choose latin as our foreign language. every adult promised us it'd be helpful if we went into medicine, law, or religion (ignoring that most of us didn't want to go into medicine, law, or religion), but we didn't buy that and never took it seriously. the truth was that our new principal knew that learning languages gets harder as you get older, and so building the skills of learning a language while it was easy for us was more important than which language we learned, and that's an answer twelve year old me would've actually respected.

similarly, my geometry class all hated proofs. we couldn't think of a single situation where you'd have to convince someone a triangle was a triangle and "look at it, of course it's a triangle" wouldn't be an acceptable answer. it was actually the band director who pointed out that it wasn't literally about triangles; it was about being able to prove or disprove something, anything using facts.

and so, so, so many assignments that are annoying as hell in school make more sense when you think about the skills as well as the content. "why do i have to present information about something the teacher obviously already knows about?" because research, verifying sources, summarizing, and public speaking are all really important skills. "why does this have to be a group project?" because you will have to work with other people in your life, and learning how to be a team player (and deal with people who aren't) is an essential skill. "why do we have to read these scientific articles and learn about graphs?" because if you can understand them, people can't lie to you about them.

now, of course, there's a lot we could do better- especially we as in the american school system. the reason i have an education minor but am not teaching is because of those issues. there are plenty of assignments that are busywork and teachers that are assholes and ways that the system is failing us.

but that doesn't mean you should cut off your nose to spite your face!

the ability to learn and grow and think critically is one of our most powerful tools as people. our brains are capable of incredible things! however, the same way you can't lift a car unless you consistently lift and build up to that, your brain needs to train in order to do its best.

so yeah, maybe chatgpt can write a five paragraph essay for you on the differences between thomas jefferson and alexander hamilton's governing philosophies. and maybe it won't even fuck it up! congratulations, you got away with it. but by outright refusing to use your brain and practice these skills, who have you helped? you haven't learned anything. worse, you haven't even learned how to learn.

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

“As I pondered a pronoun change, I began to think of gender less as a scale and more as a landscape. Some people are born in the mountains, while others are born by the sea. Some people are happy to live in the place they were born, while others must make a journey to reach the climate in which they can flourish and grow. Between the ocean and the mountains is a wild forest. That is where I want to make my home.” ― Maia Kobabe, Gender Queer: A Memoir (Affiliate link)

[in-the-key-of-f-major]

y'all know that whole left-brained/right-brained thing is fake right? and the "brain fully develops at age 25" thing? and the "we only use 10% of our brains" thing? yeah they're all complete horseshit please yell at anyone who says them

[in-the-key-of-f-major]