#and i have a whole semester??? to write 50 pages??

[macbcth]

.

[friend-of-wisdom]

88/100 days of productivity

Friday, August 16th 2024

Classes started on Monday, and it's a pretty chill semester when it comes to the amount of classes I'm taking. It's only three:

Philosophy of Religion

German 2

Introduction to Philosophy (yeah, it's a 1st year subject but it was the only class available this semester to complete the credits I need)

The problem with Philosophy of Religion is that it's at 7am to 9am, twice a week. It's so hard to wake up that early! I'm waking up at 6:30am but I'm not having breakfast and I'm arriving 10min late, i don't care. Otherwise I would have had to wake up at 6am and since I cannot fall asleep before midnight, it's awful. I get really tired. At least it's onlye one class in a day so right after class I can go back home and rest.

The difficult part academically is to write my thesis. I have already started it, and I counted today as a productive day because I wrote a whole page and did research on my topic. I have now a total of three pages of text, starting the fourth page now! Yes, I'm supposed to have 50 pages written in the next couple of months. Yes, I am late. But hey, progress, right? Just keep swiming, like Dory says. Fortunately I won't have much reading or homework for the other classes so I have time to write.

I have to continue reading, I kinda stopped this first week of class. But I'm gonna try my best to take back that habit.

[scentofpines]

soooo i think the interview went well?? it was kinda odd lol we went for a walk outside and he just asked me which historical period i'm most interested in and why etc. And bc I was super panicky i rambled not very eloquently lmao but at some point i said that i was also very interested in historical women's movement and he went really hard on this and even brought up internet tradwives lol

but theeen there was this "test" and it was a book for teaching kids to read that was printed in 1941 and still used in the 50s and he asked me what was weird about the book and it took me ages AAAGESSS to realize that the first two pages were missing (they were taken out very cleanly and the whole book was coming apart so it wasnt obvious if you didnt look AT THE FRIGGIN PAGE NUMBER) and i looked at the table of contents and it would have been a chapter about "our Führer Hitler" so OFC they took that out in the 50s but the book still had a lot of nazi stuff in it anways. ughh but it was so embarassing bc stuff like that i would normally notice in seconds when im not panicking but my body just loves to fuck me up.

Anyways he loved the pic i brought and he said that he doesnt know why but he really liked my application (my guess is that i combined the colours and the layout/font very nicely hehe) and it sounded like i'm very likely gonna get the job. he even started talking about how i could write a publication about this project and how i should become a professor and infiltrate the uni with feminism??? and i just thought CHILLL dudeee i'm 2nd semester i dont know SHIIITTT.

idk i'm glad it went well ofc and i know i have to get a job at some point and this seems perfect but yeeeah i'm scared af. if my body doesnt at some point stop panicking in these situations i'm completely incapable of actually working on stuff in a concentrated and thorough manner.

[homestuckdailyweekly]

Homestuck Daily - Week 4/End of Month 1 - 5/11/2024

Today marks the end of the first month of my real time Homestuck reread. If my math is correct (and that is a big if), I have 83 months of reading Homestuck left. Based on some more math, I first read Homestuck roughly 50 months ago. I don't know what point I am making with this, except for the fact that time is long and strange.

If I am being honest, I am finding it a hard time to write this update, because it feels like basically nothing happened this entire week. It probably doesn't help that I've been playing Hades 2, an extremely fun and good game, all week. So everything I have to say about this week of Homestuck is colored by an implicit "And I read this instead of playing Hades 2 in that exact moment." Hell, I could be playing Hades 2 right now, but I am writing this instead.

In case you haven't noticed, dear reader that definitely exists, I don't exactly know what I'm doing with this one here. I know, after I worked so hard on developing a strict and rewarding format these past few weeks, I'm throwing it all away to ramble here and now. The thing you need to know about me, though, is that I make terrible decisions. Always have, always will. I promise I'll get to a point, but we'll get there on my own time.

Where was I. Oh right. 50 months ago. Valentines Day 2020. That was the day I began my first Homestuck read through. My girlfriend at the time- she would break up with me a few months later for non-Homestuck related reasons- was a Homestuck fan, and had tried and failed to convince me to read the comic before. We even spent a date night playing friend sim, which I tried my best not to be confused by. Well, Valentines day came, and I decided I would finally relent to my girlfriend's recommendation, and I spent the day reading Homestuck in my college dorm room. And when I started, I did not stop. Not for a long time. You see, it was a Friday, a Friday very early in the semester, in fact. I had nothing I needed to do and 3 whole days where I did not need to treat myself as a human being. I denied myself food, water, sleep, and human dignity as I read Homestuck, all the while texting my girlfriend my reactions. I think the only time I took a break that weekend was on Saturday, to play in a Vampire the Requiem game I had recently joined. I don't know exactly how far through Homestuck I had gotten when I attended the game- but it was further than a person should be less than 24 hours after starting the webcomic.

Which brings me to my point. How quickly into my binge did I get to the parts of this comic that has now taken me a month to reach? An hour? Less than that? I don't know and am unwilling to do the work to find that out. I don't think I had gone all-in on Homestuck at this point, but I do remember being entertained by the Sylladex fuckery that was going on. I found it intriguing, this little puzzle of mechanics, the audience and John struggling against an unintuitive game mechanic that refused to make things easy. That was 50 months ago. So far on my read through, all I really feel as I get to each new gag about Sylladexes is "Oh, today is just this, huh." A part of me is sad and disappointed these gags aren't landing for me in the way they once had. A part of me is worried what else in this comic will suffer with the addition of time. But then I got to the last page of this week's updates, page 137, a loading animation for SBURB set to Sburban Jungle by Michael Guy Bowman, and that worry melts away.

Sburban Jungle is a song that lights my imagination ablaze with visions of epic machinations. I am the kind of person who listens to music not just because I like a song, but because that song puts images in my head that I can't tear myself from exploring as fully as I can. Even back when I was a kid in highschool, I would spend my bus rides home listing to my ipod, imagining grand adventures and fantastic scenes set to whatever music I was listening to. Sburban Jungle brings me back to those days, I think. That feeling that I find so hard to describe right now is part of why I love Homestuck, I think. It is a story about 4 kids, friends, playing a game together. A game where anything can be possible. A game where music brings actions scenes of epic and mythical scale- like the kind I would think about on the bus ride home- to life. That game hasn't started yet, we are still playing a game I'd like to call "Inventory Management if the Inventory Management hated you". But we'll get there eventually.

I have read Homestuck in realtime for 1 month. I will continue this for 83 more months. There'll be many months where I read nothing, and I'll need to think up something to post during those weeks. There'll be months where I'll struggle to keep everything I want to discuss in individual coherent posts. Homestuck is a land of contrasts, and I am going to experience those contrasts in the fullness of time's length. This is a terrible idea, but those are my favorite kinds.

Now that this is written and done with, time to play some more Hades 2.

[jeannahas]

Midnight Musings - Loss and Legacy

For some context to my thoughts this particular night, I have some major memory issues. I have theories about why this might be - a particular brand of inattentive ADHD, problems in recording memories, or information not actually leaving my sensory memory to make it to short term memory, or a breakdown from short term to long term - no idea. Could be all of the above, could be none of the above.

What matters, for tonights thoughts, is the fact that I lose memories, I lose time. Anything can and will be forgotten, as I have told many friends and acquaintances. My name, my birthday, important life changing events and even people who have in the past been deeply important to my life. Just... gone. Faded away like a printed image left to soak in water. Barely discernable, a blur of muddied ink - it has affected the page, and the page has been forever changed, but the details are gone. I have even recommended songs to people and romantic partners, and then have forgotten that the song itself even EXISTED, barely being able to recall it as a familiar thing when that same person plays it back to me.

This loss is spotty, and unpredictable, and does leave some random memories crystal clear for frequent re-visiting and examination, but the experience as a whole leaves me... hollow.

This has led to a couple of compounding fears. There are diseases that run in our family ( which I have not been able to test for) which could end a life by the age of 50 - 60. Cancers, ALS, Muscular Dystrophy, etc. So, there is a fear of wasting away, of losing the activities and things I love to do most one after the other. There are few things I love as much as martial arts, writing, and drawing, and with some of those diseases, you lose what you use the most first- the activities you love most are the first to go. There is a fear of losing memory of my own life, as I have mentioned in other posts, and massive chunks fall away with time.

This has led me to one overarching motivation, which I only recently realized was important to me - the desire to leave some kind of impact, some kind of legacy, that will last longer than I do. And it feels, every time, like I have failed. I haven't stopped trying- but I have watched things that I have worked hard to build crumble the moment I have stepped away from them time and again. I repaired a piece of landscaping important to my home town, and when I drove by last summer, it was worse off than when I had begun to repair it. I tried to build a small film project with friends in college, and it fell apart after our first semester working on it. I tried to build a martial arts school in the first city my wife and I lived in, and It never got off the ground, and collapsed within days of my leaving to accept a job, my former students scattering to the four winds. For the past three years, I have been trying to build and improve a martial arts school here in the city I reside in, and at our peak, we had 84 students , a crowning acheivement, a brief moment where everything was looking up for us.

And then... everything began crumbling. One after one, our students left, as fewer and fewer people began to call us, as the recession that's settling in began to hit luxury markets like martial arts. Money began to be tight, and fewer people had extra funds to spend on martial arts. Pay cut after pay cut, rescheduling after rescheduling, and the decision came to downsize, after it was established that I would be leaving the area.

And the losses began. Each day, as we get closer to the day I am supposed to hand the studio over to the new instructor, more people leave. People I have grown close to, people who's lives I have become invested in, who I wish the best for, and have been thinking about and trying to help improve their training for the past two and a half years. Young Kids I have come to adopt as temporary family, adult friendships that have been a rare oasis in a life largely devoid of actual friends, devoid of positive interactions, teens with such talent and progress that it HURTS to watch them stop training RIGHT before that finish line of their black belt.... it keeps going, it accelerates, and it's reached apoint where I don't know If I can do anything about it.

And I watch another thing, another project I have poured my heart, soul, blood, sweat, and tears into, collapse around me like a temple colapsing in an earthquake. I begin to doubt if this effort I have labored on for the past three years will survive beyond my leaving the city, if these people who I have helped to train, who I have helped to get their black-belts, will carry on this martial arts legacy, or if my effect here will die and end with them. Am I... just going to be forgotten? Will the school last the year? Will anything I've done or taught here matter in three years anymore?

The crushing weight of the thought that nothing I have built has lasted even a decade weighs on me, drives me to claw desperately for some way to leave a memory that will outlive me, that I contemplate how to carve my name into steel, to make some piece of something that will outlast me as I have seen happen to some other items.

It's a peculiar agony of the soul. Hoping someone else will remember your life because you are not sure that you can - hoping that what you did mattered enough to someone for them to hold onto what you taught them when you are gone, that they will build on it. Leaving feels like a funeral, made worse by the fact that I don't know If I will be able to make something of myself where I am going, even though I have multiple plans to try to do just that. I know what I want to do - I know mostly how to do it, but the risk of failing again - the knowledge that what I will try to build next could fail before it even gets off the ground, is daunting.

Naturally, I am moving forward. I am stubborn, and I haven't given up yet. I will try agian, and again, and again, to do good, to leave wherever I am better than I found it, even if that effect doesn't last for long. Existential dread aside, I will keep trying, however I can.

Hopefully it matters to someone.

[gwen-tolios]

I posted 1,052 times in 2022

That's 42 more posts than 2021!

284 posts created (27%)

768 posts reblogged (73%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@asknotbug

@tumbleaboutit

@merlinsbed

@spiritofcamelot

@gwen-tolios

I tagged 891 of my posts in 2022

Only 15% of my posts had no tags

#0 - 60 posts

#instagram - 233 posts

#ifttt - 139 posts

#short story - 59 posts

#original fiction - 50 posts

#america - 49 posts

#writing - 46 posts

#gwen writes - 35 posts

#flash fiction - 35 posts

#writeblr - 29 posts

Longest Tag: 101 characters

#damn just to check i tried using my middle initial and my city and still i'm not in the google search

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Books Where The Ace Character Has A Relationship

There needs to be more of these. Some of us do want relationships!

All these books have canon ace characters - word on the page vs headcanons fyi.

1) Let's Talk About Love by Claire Kann. This book gets a lot of buzz, as it should, for its portrayal of a black ace girl navigating a relationship. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31625039-let-s-talk-about-love

2) Chameleon Moon by RoAnna Sylver, and the other stories about Parole. This has a poly relationship with an ace character and a whole lot of other rep. It reads like a blockbuster action movie, if that's your thing. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31938167-chameleon-moon

3) Thaw by Elyse Springer. Featuring a relationship between a model and a librarian, I love how this is such a standard romance novel. All the beats are there - it's just got an ace woman in it ^_^ https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32673586-thaw

4) The Spy with the Red Balloon by Katherine Locke. Wolf is demisexual (hello ace brethren) and his romance is his B-plot. This is completely okay because trying to sabotage Hitler takes priority. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38650956-the-spy-with-the-red-balloon

5) Returning to You by Gwen Tolios. That rare partnership between an ace and aro character (neither of whom are aro ace), full of pining, family drama, and going from friends to lovers. As aces do. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/60497147-returning-to-you

6) Three Stupid Weddings by Ann Gallagher. Fake dating, friends to lovers, but make it gay and ace? Yes. You need this. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41074778-three-stupid-weddings

7) His Quiet Agent by Ada Maria Soto. This is a classic ace romance, released way back in 2017, that reads like the gentle sickfic in the hurt/comfort tag on Ao3. Nurse your ace coworker back to health, and now you're a couple. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35238838-his-quiet-agent?ref=nav_sb_ss_1_9

8) Making Love by Aidan Wayne. This features an aro and a ace character realizing they're falling for each other in a world of cupids and succubi. Suuuper fluffy. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/33120447-making-love?ref=nav_sb_ss_1_26

9) Enchanted Soles edited by Sasha Miller. This is a queer anthology featuring stories about shoes, but the last story called Hallowed Veil is the gold star. It features TWO ace characters, one in a relationship, and highlights the spectrum of desires. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30075296-enchanted-soles

10) How to Be Ace: A Memoir Of Growing Up Asexual by Rebecca Burgess. Non-fiction graphic novel about growing up ace, including dating troubles. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54403237-how-to-be-ace

12 notes - Posted June 28, 2022

#4

Undine's Child

Her watermark was creeping down her legs. Each day, another scale. She slathered lotion on, hoping to prevent the itch as it replaced skin. She showered daily, seeking the soothing sense of water.

Her dad had warned her. Going to college so far from saltwater might be a problem, but she'd dismissed it. Surely, she could spend a semester away from the ocean.

And she had, her first year. And her second. But her first scales had started showing up before Thanksgiving this year, hidden only by jeans to be washed away when she went home for Christmas. Now, April was around the corner, she had a month left of classes, and her scales would soon peak out of her workout capris.

They always started on the back of her thighs, hard to see, hard to scratch. Better than her hips, where waistbands would chafe, or other more obvious places. There was a lot of space on her thighs, and they were easy to hide, but they'd hit the back of her knees this morning and they'd continue down the back of her legs.

Spraying saltwater on them hadn't worked. Nor soaking in a salt bath. She needed the ocean, her legs needed the relief of her dad's home, but she needed to pass her classes. Needed her degree.

Give me five weeks, she prayed. Five weeks to hide what I am.

And then the summer to figure out how to deal with them for all of next year.

29 notes - Posted February 2, 2022

#3

Accouncing Tomorrow and Beyond

Hey Tumblr!

I'm releasing my own short story collections! I have two planned, but the first, collecting all my contemporary and science fiction stories, will be out Feb 16th!

Stories include:

🌈 realizing you're gay for a dead friend so you might have brought her back as ghost?

🐈 being so bored as the go-to geneticist for show cats you decide to break the law

🍺 a girl getting back at her alcoholic father by vandlizing all the bars

🦸‍♂️ a gay superhero faking his death because he doesn't want to fight his enemy anymore

🏒 a girl surviving as the sole girl on the HS hockey team due to spite

🤖 an android realizing logical fallacies can impact artificial intelligence as hard as it hits humans

🦜cosplaying as pirates during a hot air balloon race and doing things you really, really shouldn't

AND MANY MORE.

Kindle only so far, but more is on the way! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09RWB711C

29 notes - Posted February 11, 2022

#2

Aro Books For Aro Week

It's Aro week! I've read more ace books than aro books, but I did want to share a few.

1) Common Bonds. This is an anthology where each story features an aro characters - how cool is that? https://bookshop.org/books/common-bonds-a-speculative-aromantic-anthology/9781775312970

2) A Promise Broken by S.L. Dove Cooper. This is the first aro rep book that I read, so I'll always remember it just for that, but it's also a lovely tale about grief. I will say it's a very active read - the reader has to put together a few clues about the story because the narrator is mostly an unreliable child. https://dovelynnwriter.com/books/a-promise-broken/

3) Making Love by Aidan Wayne, though the aro rep is small. It's noteworthy cuz Leeta comes from a society that is typically aro and she's an exception, falling for an ace cupid. This book is just the fluffiest. https://www.amazon.com/Making-Love-Aidan-Wayne-ebook/dp/B01MRA15MR

4) The Dragon of Ynys by Minerva Cerridwen. This is a cozy, low-stakes fantasy with an (older!) aro-ace knight on a quest to find a missing person. Queer rep all around. https://bookshop.org/books/the-dragon-of-ynys/9781945009686

5) Tarnished are the Star by Rossie Thor. This book got a lot of support from the ace community, but the character is actually aroace - both! If you like steampunk, but want it in space, this is for you. https://bookshop.org/books/tarnished-are-the-stars/9781338312270

6) The Lady's Guide to Petticoats and Piracy by Mackenzi Lee. Felicity is aro/ace and is far my fav rep I've read. You know right away she'd rather pursue science than marriage & then whoops! She's tangled with pirates. While it's the second in a series, they're world series so there's no need to read book 1 to understand this one. (I think this one is better anyway.) https://bookshop.org/books/the-lady-s-guide-to-petticoats-and-piracy/9780062795335

7) Hazel's Theory of Evolution by Lisa Jenn Bigelow. This one is another aro/ace MC, but it's so casually queer w/ other identities and disabled rep. I love it. Noteworthy for being an MG read and contemporary. All other books on this list are SFF and either adult or YA. https://bookshop.org/books/hazel-s-theory-of-evolution/9780062791177

8) In the Ravenous Dark by A.M. Strickland. I devoured this book last year, but know it's an *upper* YA dark fantasy with a lot of necromancy and violence. Aro/ace side character, but also poly rep. Did want to call out there are spicy scenes in this book! It may not be for every aro-ace reader. https://bookshop.org/books/in-the-ravenous-dark/9781250776600

9) Returning to You by Gwen Tolios. Aka me! This is releasing in June and is a contemporary romance between two women, both of whom are bi, where one is ace and one is aro. https://www.amazon.com/Returning-You-Gwen-Tolios-ebook/dp/B0B4FDYNP6/

454 notes - Posted February 22, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

10 Ace Books For Ace Week

As an ace author and reader, I'm all for more examples of rep to read and authors to support. Below are just a few of my favs, but I have a larger list here: Gwen's Ace Book Recs and you're always welcome to hit me up for recs!

----

1) The Lady's Guide to Petticoats and Piracy by Mackenzi Lee. Felicity is aro/ace and I love how up in your face her aceness is. A true integral part of the character. You know right away she'd rather pursue science than marriage & then whoops! She's tangled with pirates. While it's the second in a series, they're world series so there's no need to read book 1 to understand this one. (I think this one is better anyway.) https://bookshop.org/books/the-lady-s-guide-to-petticoats-and-piracy/9780062795335

2) Common Bonds. While actually an anthology with an aro focus, there's also ace rep and I love how varied this collection is. So many aro and ace stories all bundled up neatly is still such a dream. https://bookshop.org/books/common-bonds-a-speculative-aromantic-anthology/9781775312970

3) Making Love by Aidan Wayne. Thinking about this, it might be the first book I've read where the ace character wasn't also aro. It's about an ace cupid trying to help someone find love, and missing a fair amount of cues. It's a fluff dream. https://www.amazon.com/Making-Love-Aidan-Wayne-ebook/dp/B01MRA15MR

4) Returning to You by Gwen Tolios. A friends-to-lovers romance between two women, both of whom are bi, where one is ace and one is aro. Be prepared for a fair amount of family drama from both sides (including fake dating!) https://www.amazon.com/Returning-You-Gwen-Tolios-ebook/dp/B0B4FDYNP6/

5) How to Be Ace by Rebeca Burgess. Memoir graphic novel full of experiences that I could relate to that's good to share with local aces or allos. My local ace community has 100% passed around a copy of this. https://bookshop.org/a/55449/9781787752153

6) Tarnished are the Stars by Rossie Thor. This book got a lot of support from the ace community, it's own voices and has quite a bit of queer rep. If you like steampunk, but want it in space, this is for you. https://bookshop.org/books/tarnished-are-the-stars/9781338312270

7) Hazel's Theory of Evolution by Lisa Jenn Bigelow. Aro/ace MC, but it's so casually queer w/ other identities and disabled rep. I love it. Noteworthy for being an MG read. I'm so glad to see ace rep hitting middle schoolers. https://bookshop.org/books/hazel-s-theory-of-evolution/9780062791177

8) Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire. This is the first time I saw 'asexual' in a book, and for that it will always be dear to me. This launches a great series about children who have returned from portal-fantasy adventures and the trade versions all have amazing illustrations. https://bookshop.org/a/55449/9780765385505

9) Simply an Enigma by Brittany Evans and Chelsea Lauren. I'll admit I have a love-hate relationship with this book, but it's such an accurate portrayal of the journey to identifying as ace it has a permanent place on my shelf. https://bookshop.org/a/55449/9781732464315

10) Three Stupid Weddings by Ann G. Cute, short romance about bringing a friend to weddings as your date and oh! You're now a couple by summer's end. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41070264-three-stupid-weddings

571 notes - Posted October 27, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[acertainidontknowwhat]

Dissertation: one year later.

After a year of dissertation I have somewhere between 20 and 50 good pages alongside tons of notes and several ideas that are just that, which feels like an absolute failure on my part. This process has been difficult and while I haven't been the best dissertation writer, my academic support system has been severely lacking as well. During this semester alone one of my committee members sadly passed away after a very long battle with cancer and my lead committee member resigned effective immediately without any sort of forewarning and has not been in contact since.

I settled on my topic relatively early and found it exciting in the beginning because I saw it as being novel, but I don't know anymore. I tried to move from my Petronian niche to broader themes within the Julio-Claudian period: a reassessment of Petronius as an author of an imperial critique that goes beyond Nero and is instead focused on the Augustan legacy as a whole. I don't think that it is a coincidence that Petronius (whoever that is) is writing at the same time as Lucan.* Lucan's Bellum Civile is the repetition and continuation of mourning for a new generation describing the civil war between Caesar and Pompey in visceral detail for the purpose of bringing those events into the present. The Satyrica also seem to be obsessed with the idea of repetition as an act of definition, both literary and political. While comedic, many aspects of the Satyrica revolve around issues of trauma both at the individual and societal level. I am taking Petronius more seriously (a funny idea in itself) in my dissertation and when one does so the narrative becomes filled with the presence of loss as if the characters are existing in the fallout of civil war.

A reassessment of Trimalchio is due as well, not as a caricature of Nero but as an amalgam of the figure of princeps. Moreover, a metaphorical reading of the freedmen (liberti - the emancipated ones) is far more appropriate than a literal reading of Petronius' characterization of this class of people. It has been clearly shown that Petronius' freedmen in no way reflect the lived reality of actual Roman freedmen (see Henrik Mouritsen's The Freedman in the Roman World) and thus who is being represented by Petronius? Could it be a representation of the Julio-Claudian princeps, his family, and their closest associates as liberti and thus Petronius could claim plausible deniability while writing about the emperors? Not to mention the dinner takes place inside a home that is distinctly described as having characteristics of a mausoleum, the most famous of which would be associated with the one Augustus built for the imperial family.

I got carried away. I love this project, but I feel like I should be done already and I need to stop living in the future trying to prepare for the next step when I still haven't been able to finish the most important thing in the present.

*The ongoing debate over who wrote the Satyrica and when it was written means that making claims about what the Satyrica does or does not say becomes more difficult. I have read papers and dissertations claiming that the Satyrica should be dated variously as end of the first century CE, sometime in the second century CE, and even as late as the third century CE. I know that the general consensus still seems to accept a Neronian date for the work, but it is something that is frustratingly undergoing continual reassessment.

[apricotluvr]

Alright. Let me complain about this essay for a minute before I can actually start it

[wightwulf-a]

[givemearock]

Tmr Girls Studying With You

Requested by @mockingjaykatnisshungergames

A/N: sorry this was super late I had a bunch of hw then I got sick but I woke you like! I tried to make it longer to make up for it :D

Brenda

she would probably only study the subjects she likes

like if your struggling with science she’ll pull out a whole study plan and you’ll ace your next text

‘Brenda, did you take this from the teachers office?’ ‘No these are my notes’ ‘...you write down everything the teacher says?’ ‘You don’t?’

She’s dedicated

but for the things she couldn’t be bothered studying for she has way of sneaking the answers in that she’s more than happy to share with you

‘Alright so be sure to wear a long sleeved shirt so-.’ ‘Brenda are you sure you don’t wanna just help me with math?’ ‘🤨but this is easier?’

if you ever convince her to help you study something else she’d probably end up just as confused as you

50/50 chance but you’ll probably leave having learned something

Harriet

a whole mom

she brings star stickers so whenever you get something right she can put a star next to the problem you did

‘Harriet you know I have to turn this in right?’ ‘Mhm, and they’ll know how much of a star you are’

it was supposed to be a study date where you help each other but she’d just end up helping you with your problems, claiming her stuff could wait

even if you said you didn’t need it she’d insist on helping

‘ I’m really fine, let’s do some of your work’ ‘But you’re struggling’ ‘I’ll be fine let’s focus on you-‘ ‘But you though’

the only way you’d get to help her is to finish all your work

she probably wouldn’t need much help but would definitely pretend like she did to not make you feel bad

‘Didn’t you ace Econ last year?’ ‘Yes, but I forgot everything over the summer’

Note: she in fact did not forget everything

Great study partner

Sonya

she definitely picked up some tips from Newt and decorated her notes like he does, just probably not as organized

like she has cute paperclips and stickers but they just go wherever she thinks they’d look nice rather than to help her memorize things

‘Sonya, why did you highlight last month's assignment just now?’ ‘Because this page had a bunch of blue stickers on it so I added a pink one’

loves explaining things but will probably get confused somewhere along the way

‘So that’s how you solve for x!’ ‘Sonya we’re solving for y’ ‘??’ ‘There’s no x in the equation’ ‘...must’ve missed that’

In the end you’ll end up on the right track

will share her stickers and highlighters so you can make notes in your books and such

also will leave notes in the margins of the notes she shares with you

like you’ll be reading about a historical event with a little ‘skim this part it’s boring!’ on the side

overall will help you get better

Teresa

very set on helping you get good grades

like neither of you are leaving until she’s confident you’re confident

also very aggressively supportive

‘Teresa it’s fine we can do something else’ ‘No! I want you to succeed’ ‘it’s really ok I just can’t get it-‘ ‘NO you will get it’

takes being your study partner very serious and will bring the notes for whatever class your struggling dating back to the beginning of the semester

is genuinely proud when you get things right

however if you ever succeed but the teacher gives you a bad grade for no reason she will confront them on your behalf

you will get good grades because of her if it’s the last thing she does

This was actually really fun and I’m gonna try to revive this acc by posting at least once a week

Have a nice day and night !! 🌸

[celestemagnoliathewriter]

Y'all. I'm super excited about putting together my syllabi for the upcoming semester. Not HP related, just saying I'm PUMPED for what I'll be teaching my students.

For any of you college students/soon-to-be uni students out there, just know that some of us (many of us) who teach you are unabashedly enthusiastic about what we do and teach.

A behind-the-scenes look at what I think about when putting together a syllabus:

What do we need to cover?

What readings are most appropriate and why?

How much reading is too much for an undergrad? (I cap it at usually 50 pages a week.)

Does this all flow/make sense?

Will this be engaging? (Especially since my classes are required classes)

Does any of it matter outside the classroom? (If no, cut it)

And then the inner monologue:

why can't I assign them whole books every week?!! (because they would riot)

it's absurd I only have x amount of minutes to teach x, y, z topics.

I wish I could teach x topic for literally the whole semester

I can't wait to see their faces when they hear about y

can't find the right reading for this - guess I'll have to write a book about it someday (not unlike fanfic, if you can't find it, you have to DIY it!)

So, in short, I'm having fun (and this is why Cariad's update will happen tomorrow please forgive me)

[baladric]

okay i have to talk about the absolutely bonkers gen eds at my thimble-sized arts conservatory. my one required humanities class involved a woman who spent the entire semester infodumping about her protracted journey to a bipolar i diagnosis (relatable, if extremely tmi) and then telling us that everything is a simulation of sex, including (but not limited to): wedding rings (phallic object goes in the yonic object), pita sandwiches (cream pies), the little scroll wheels on mice (clitoral stimulation), and the act of sticking your hand in your purse to rummage for your keys (vaginal fisting). and then she made me come to her office to ask me why i hated her, and i had to talk to my therapist about how to write non-hostile reading responses because she was getting wise to my unrepentant and bottomless disdain. for fuck’s sake, lady, jung’s entire ouevre was debunked like 50 years ago.

then i had to take a class called DIGITAL MEDIA FOR THE ARTIST, a two-semester affair in which the single professor who had ever taught it since its inception (eternally clad in adidas sandals+tube socks and an indiana jones-style hat) tried to teach us how to do things like make and maintain professional websites and ~*Network*~ while routinely misconstruing noam chomsky’s extremely obnoxious rhetoric, championing katamari damacy as being the most immaculate allegory for existential experience, and heralding second life as the true and unchallenged future of not just the internet, but of society as a whole. he is almost certainly a proponent of web 2.0 now, and i can guarantee that he has purchased at least one discount nft.

because it was 2012 and i was wildly depressed at the time, i thought it would be a good idea to do my final project for this class on homestuck as a genre- and medium-defying piece of art. this involved about 7 emails to whatpumpkin in an attempt to interview andrew hussie, which eventually resulted in one reply from the gremlin themself, whose contents i remember only insofar as i immediately concluded that i did not want to ever speak to this person again. i proceeded to bullshit my entire 12-page essay, attributing to them several statements that were much wiser than hussie deserves, because honestly nobody needs to hear anything they say, ever.

then my physics teacher said “listen, none of you are going to need to know any of this, so who wants to fuck with quantum mechanics instead of learning about springs” and all 6 of us said FUCK YES. anyway that’s how i spent six months in hot contention with a Ph.D physicist about whether time is a construct or not.

[daylighteclipsed]

when i signed up for this class i didn't know i’d have to have a hecking manuscript started beforehand 

[echodrops]

Is there anything you wish your students would do, not do, or get better at? Other than like... Making sure to read their syllabi? Just curious!

1. Please, I am begging you, read the assignment instructions. In fact, read them twice. At least. 

I’m going to tell you a secret: every (decent) professor will tell their students that there is no such thing as stupid questions and to please contact us with any question (please please please). However, the truth is, even though every (decent) professor will politely answer any question a student sends, if the assignment instructions say “Read the poem on page 345 of our textbook and answer the following close reading questions” and then I open my email and see that a student has sent me a message asking “What page is the poem on?” that is, in fact, a stupid question.

After an entire day’s lecture on determining purpose and audience in essay assignments, I recently gave my freshman students an activity that was clearly labelled “Figuring Out Who Your Audience Is.” This activity was a packet that contained the instructions for three different essays, with instructions at the top of each page that clearly stated “Read the assignment guidelines below, and determine who the target audience of this essay might be. Think about demographics--is this essay targeting older people, younger people? People of a certain ethnicity or from a specific location? Describe the intended audience of the essay.” At least five students from the class failed to read the instructions and, instead of describing the audience for each essay... They simply started trying to write three full essays. (Because yes, I definitely wanted you guys to stop in the middle of our unit on audience to write a full op-ed piece about bicycle trails...) 

Read all the instructions on the assignment, please. 

-

2. Be an active participant, not a hapless bystander.

At least a few times a semester, I have a student come to me after an assignment was due and go “I’m sorry I didn’t turn the assignment in. I didn’t know how to do _______ thing, so I didn’t want to turn it in and be wrong” or “I’m sorry I didn’t do the peer review, I couldn’t find my partner’s contact info.”

What? Every time this happens I just thousand-yard stare for a second, because honestly, in what world is not doing anything the correct response to being confused?

If you’re confused, you do need to ask your questions (yes, even if the questions seem dumb). Just doing nothing because you’re confused about something is the absolute worst response. If you don’t know how something works, don’t know how to find something your professor told you to go work on, or don’t know who your group members are for a group project, do not just passively assume the information will be given to you if you wait long enough. 

You need to be a proactive participant in your own education; if you cannot find something your professor told you to go find, you need to ask for help right away. If you don’t know who your group members are, you need to ask for help right away. If you don’t know which pages you’re supposed to be reading that week, you need to go look for that information right away, not two days after the work was due.

Likewise, I also want to specify here that even though (decent) professors will answer the really obvious questions (honestly, a student once asked me “What chapter are we supposed to take notes on for the Chapter Five Notes assignment?”), that doesn’t mean that students are excused from putting in a modicum of effort to try to find out the answers to obvious questions on their own. If you can’t find the pages for an assigned reading, check the obvious places (your LMS such as Canvas, the class syllabus, etc.) first before asking. Re-read the assignment title and instructions before sending in your questions. Check through your emails/LMS announcements for messages from the professor first. 

If you’re confused, please ask questions--but do put in a basic amount of effort to check first and see if your question has already been answered.

-

3. Learn how weighted grades and percentages work and how they will impact you. 

Most classes in college sort assignments into weighted categories. What this means is that even if two assignments are both listed at 100 points, one might actually be worth more if it is a category that is “weighted” more heavily. For example, if there are three categories in a class, one worth 50% of the final grade, and two worth 25% of the final grade, assignments in the 50% category are automatically more important and worth more to your final percentage than assignments in the 25% categories.

Understanding this is important because this is how you get away with not doing everything.

To be honest, as a literature professor, I assure you that I am fully aware that students are not going to do every single reading assigned in my class. When I was a literature student, I didn’t do all the readings either. I’m aware.

But what I do expect, as a professor, is that students think ahead and skip strategically--make sure to do all the assignments in the heavily weighted categories, and if you’re going to miss assignments, make sure they’re the smaller assignments in the lower-weighted categories, which will have less impact on your total final grade.

Often I see students fall behind and then tell me they are working hard to catch up. But what do I see as they’re trying to catch up? They turn in all the little assignments and leave the big assignments missing, which means that inevitably they still struggle to pass the class as a whole.

Pay attention to the weights of grades and assignments in your classes so that you know exactly which ones are going to affect your final grades the most, and make sure to work hardest on those.

There’s plenty more, of course, but I think that’s enough for now.

[yourfavoriteagent]

Teacher Crush pt 1

A short part one this this story! Sorry I'm really tired lol

Spencer Reid x Reader

Summery: You got the internship of your dreams with the dreamiest professor. You won't let your teacher crush get in the way of this opportunity.

CW: NONE

It just so happened that you were the luckiest girl in the world. You had opened your email with the acceptance into Dr. Spencer Reid’s internship program. You were one of three interns but you had gotten the role you’d wanted, Class Aide. You didn’t know who had gotten the research and writing positions but you didn’t care. You would get to sit in on every class and assist Dr. Reid first hand for the entire semester! You ran out of your room into the kitchen to make yourself a celebratory cup of coffee and began to work on your letter of gratitude to Dr. Reid. You would start tomorrow morning, the first class of the semester was at nine am and you wouldn’t miss it for the world. It was a behavioral science class with a focus on criminal behavior. Now, you were an English major, with a heavy interest in true crime. That’s why you had chosen this internship to apply for, you wanted to get up close and personal with someone who had faced down some of the toughest killers in the world and lived to tell the tale. Maybe you would even ask him to allow you to write up one of his stories for a class! Your head filled with these thoughts as you finished your letter and emailed it to your new professor.

Your alarm goes off at exactly 7:30 am. You had set your clothes out the night before like a child excited for a school trip, but first, you hopped in the shower to rinse off and wash your hair. Your phone was blasting music from the counter when a text message popped up on your screen.

Dr. Reid: Hello, y/n. I need you to come into class early if at all possible, at 8am if you can, sorry for the short notice. Your heart dropped, wait you were so prepared for today and now it was all out the window. You looked at the clock and saw the time, 7:38. After texting him a reassuring message back you dried off as fast as you could and threw on the black long-sleeved dress, tights, and dark green cardigan you planned out. You grabbed your makeup bag and ran a comb through your hair with just enough time to look at the clock, 7:50. You might be a little late but you grab your purse and start running.

7:58, you reach the front of the lecture offices. Jesus, you ran faster than you thought. Looking in your phone camera you flatten the frizz in your hair and push the large doors open. You were greeted with a hall of offices each one bearing a nameplate with the respective professor. Most of the lights were off, but one stuck out a bit down the hall. The light was shining through the open door and there was music playing, you recognized it faintly, was it Clair De Lune? You weren’t one hundred percent sure but you walked down the hall to that door and peeked inside. There, sitting at his large oak desk was Dr. Spencer Reid, at this point you had only seen him on book covers or newspaper articles, he was taller in real life, his hair was fluffier than you had expected, and you noticed he was wearing a dark green sweater vest under his coat, just like your cardigan. “Knock knock,” you say and gently rap on the door. He looks up from his papers and smiles. “You must be y/n! It’s so nice to finally meet you, although I feel like I already know you from the essay you sent in.” He chuckled and stood up out of his chair to reach for your hand. You took it and shook it firmly. You had to make a good impression today, you really wanted him to hire you again next semester. “It’s a pleasure to meet you,” You say, he grins back at you, you hadn’t noticed how handsome he was until now, and when you say handsome, you mean it. His soft brown eyes meeting yours made you feel like you’d explode. But, you had to focus, “So, it looks like we’re matching today.” You laughed. He looked down at his sweater and back at yours. “I guess so!” He smiled again, it was contagious. He then explained a few of your duties as a teacher’s aide, but you already knew because of how diligently you had read the email you received. You took letter notes, compiled research, and graded assignments and essays. He would be doing all of this as well, you’d be doing it together. The thought of doing anything with Dr. Reid made your heart skip a beat. By 9:15 he had given you all the materials you’d need for the class and cleared off space on his desk for you to sit. “No need for them to bring a whole new desk in here, I don’t mind sharing.” He smirked and set the collection books he was holding onto the filing cabinet next to him. This man was trying to kill you you had decided, your heart was skipping so many beats it may have stopped beating altogether. Your et your bag down on the floor and plopped yourself into the chair he pulled up for you. You were sitting right across from him as he went back to work reading some textbook. You couldn’t see which one but you could see the pages flying. He was turning a page at least every 10 seconds. You must’ve been staring because he said, “I read fast,” and let out a little laugh. You laughed with him and kept your eyes on your keyboard for the next half hour, you couldn’t let this little teacher crush get in the way of this internship.

[theinquisitxor]

End of the Year Reading Tag

I wanted to do an end of the year book tag, so I found these questions, and went with it!

Did you reach your reading goal for the year (if you had one)?

oh yeah, I always set my goal to 50, but know that I will almost get to 100. This year I am at 92, which is about my average. Considering that I feel like I didn't nearly read as much as I normally do, I am happy with that number.

What are your top 3 books you read this year?

(not including rereads) My number 1 book this year was no doubt Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik. My next ones are probably The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson and Jade War by Fonda Lee. Three fantasy books, but all wildly different from each other!

What's a book that you didn't expect to enjoy quite so much going in?

East of Eden by John Steinbeck. I was not expecting to find a book so beautiful and a story I was so invested in. I also had to read a lot of naturalist/nature writing for one of my classes in the fall semester, and I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed those books.

Were there any books that didn't live up to your expectations?

Of course. The Binding by Bridget Collins, For the Wolf by Hannah Whitten, The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides, Cibola Burn (Expanse #4) by James SA Corey, to name a few.

Did you reread any old faves? If so, which one was your favourite?

Yes, I did a lot of rereads. I listened to The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater on audiobook, and oh my the audiobook was a wonderful experience. It made me think about and interact with the characters and story in a whole new way. I actually listened to it a second time through, it was that good.

I also did a reread of all the Grisha books by Leigh Bardugo which was enjoyable.

Did you dnf any books?

I did not. It is rare for me to dnf a book (I only really consider it a dnf it I got more than 50 pages in) and I usually at least skim the ending. However, some of my least favorite books of the year include: Blood and Honey by Shelby Mahurin, Lore by Alexandra Bracken, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain, The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner, and Cibola Burn by James SA Corey.

Did you read any books outside your usual preferred genre(s)?

Yes, especially for school. I read a lot of naturalist writing which was different for me. It's a genre I've always enjoyed, but I read a lot more of it this year.

What was your predominant format this year?

Physical books, with roughly 81/92 being physical format. I read 11 audiobooks however, which is more than I ever have in a year. I listened to most of the Wheel of Time on audio, which was much better than trying to read the physical copies.

What's the longest book you read this year?

The Stand by Stephen King at 1,440 pages

What are your top 3 anticipated 2022 releases?

House of Sky and Breath by Sarah J Maas, Bravely by Maggie Stiefvater, and The Book of Night by Holly Black.

What books from your tbr did you not get to this year, but are excited to read in 2022?

Jade Legacy by Fonda Lee, without a doubt. My barns and noble didn't have it in stock when I went the other day, but as soon as they do, I'm reading it. I also just bought Elatose by Darcie Little Badger and The Library: A Fragile History by Andrew Pettegree and Arthur der Weduwen

If anyone else wants to do this tag, go ahead! If you do, tag me so I see it!