#fpop answer

[belanova]

Shadouckity 😎😎

I drew them in the scene of them Mining, and Shadoune starts whispering in french to Quackity so he gets flustered... But he's actually insulting him LOL

ask game

[tosanelysucceed]

To Sanely Succeed

What makes me qualified to tell others how to read, write, and live? 

My mother asked me a question the other day, and I gave her back her advice to "pick your battles." Was that not wise?

My last post to this blog was almost four years ago, and it was not even an original post. It was a re-post (re-blog? re-Tumblr?) from a person about feelings surrounding the 2016 presidential election results. Before that, I rarely wrote actual posts for this blog. My last real blog post was probably during the summer after high school. This blog is only in my thoughts because I was searching for old photos from high school a few weeks ago. I ran a search through Google, and the results showed this blog - "To Sanely Succeed." The font and layout were horrible. I quickly changed it so that it was a little easier on the eyes.

I labeled myself as a "success" back in high school. On paper, I was on top of the world. I was winning science and business competitions left and right, I got accepted to my dream school, and I would be an Admissions Blogger for MIT. All my hopes and dreams were coming true. But did that make me a success? And did I do it all while maintaining my sanity?

Short answer: Success is self-defined, and I did not consider myself a success at that time. I did not always wholly maintain my sanity.

My problem for as long as I can remember has been overloading my schedule. Recently at work, I started tracking my time by the minute - broken down by task location, time spent taking breaks (zero on many days), the category of the tasks, and additional details breaking down that time even further. The result: I spend much time planning my schedule. I also spend so much time editing and perfecting documents and data. That time could be more efficiently spent implementing those plans and getting additional data. If only I could learn to relax a little.

In high school, I was too overloaded. I remember the day I found out about my MIT acceptance was after I got home from Intel (now Regeneron) Science Talent Search (STS). I was so exhausted from the week and the travel. I did not sleep the night before and almost forgot that it was Pi Day, or March 14th, the day MIT announced regular admission decisions. When I saw my acceptance to MIT, I did not even go downstairs to tell my family - I walked to the balcony and shouted to my mom, "I got into MIT," and then went to sleep for over twelve hours.

All of high school was just one week after another of overloaded schedules and lack of sleep. I tried to limit my activities with the end goal of getting accepted to any college - not just MIT. I never considered myself remotely good enough for a school like MIT until I arrived in Washington DC for Intel and saw that the other students believed it a reality. A primary reason I applied was that when I visited MIT with my ambitious friend, it felt like home, and the tour guide had amazing green hair.

My attempts at limiting activities just led me to be increasingly involved in my main activities, which were my research class/projects and business club (DECA). I was mostly internally driven, but there were external factors. During my senior year, I decided not to join Varsity Tennis for the third year to focus on academic clubs and classes. I also tried to take a regular English class instead of Advanced Placement (AP) Literature, and College Chemistry instead of AP Chemistry or the fancy crazy-hard second-level AP Physics class. My research teacher - who is fantastic, but very driven to see her students excel - changed my class schedule to include AP Literature. She told me that it was considered in my Intel STS application and very important to take advanced courses. AP Literature ended up being one of my favorite classes that year, thankfully, but it also was a ton of work.

My mental health suffered. I never took the time to pause and think about where I was or what I was doing, especially when my hard work paid off, and I started getting scholarships and recognition. It helped to write my thoughts down - I think that's why this blog exists. It's a sounding board for my overloaded and overbearing life.

When I first arrived at MIT, I participated in the Freshmen Pre-Orientation Program (FPOP) called Freshman Urban Planning (FUP). It was community service-focused and an excellent opportunity to get used to the Boston area and MIT's campus before actual orientation and classes started. 

A couple of days into FUP, my grandfather passed away. He was in a hospital for a long time beforehand, and we knew it was not good. I visited a few weeks earlier, and he was on a ventilator, but I sat alone with him for five minutes and told him about MIT. 

He cried. He always wanted my mother to go to a school like MIT, and I know he was so proud that I was going there.

His death was my breaking point. My mother and grandmother told me not to go to the funeral because it was during my MIT orientation, and my grandfather would not want me to miss it. I knew they were right, but I still feel bad about it. 

I fell apart and started acting out during one of the FUP activities the day after my grandfather passed. I told one of the counselors what happened, and she told me I could take time off from the program.

I mention mental health in my posts here and on the MIT blogs and around the internet. Still, it is a sore subject for association with a professional career. Most people hide behind anonymity. They try to keep things lighthearted, as I always have.

Unpolished drafts and posts filled these pages in the past. I shared my favorite music and would post things about being a firefighter like it was the coolest thing in the world. I talked about Imposter Syndrome but not about the environmental factors amplifying it, and I often did not talk about it at all.

I'm Rachel - I am sane enough. I have a cat. I'm not going to over polish this draft. This is a rough, unplanned post, and that is okay.

Spontaneity can be a good thing. Perhaps embracing it a little more will help me succeed further in work and life. Maybe it will help me sanely succeed.

[thisnerdsadventures]

starting college

random things i hope to relay upon ye younguns starting school in the next few days:

random thing i was thinking about for high school, the thing i regret most (outside the not taking time to learn waht i want/spending so much time stressing over the SAT/other things like that) is not taking AP Stats. In college, i now realize how important stats is and how applicable it is to literally every single science endeavor. Learn basic stats pls

for college/eh heh mit is starting orientation in a few days isnt it

rooms w/o AC can be hot. i just want you to think about that for a few minutes. my room in mcc is generally around 78 degrees at night with a fan, so adjust accordingly~

take the swim test early. if you put it off, it will take a lot of activation energy later in the semester or year to do it on a random day when you are much more likely to be hosed. take it during orientation or FPOP week when people there are also much more used to confused freshmen

talk to people as much as you can. make small talk, or find people with similar interests and capitalize. introduce yourself to people you meet but dont feel bad about going to events by yourself! a great place to start would be your orientation group. these are people you will see for a few hours every day of this week, so might as well try to befriend some of them (note, if you’re going to parties across the river and that sort of thing, you might want to go with a friend, someone you think you would trust) but also dont feel like the group you venture out with is the group you are going to stay with forever and ever. lots of these people, more than likely, you will never see again after REX/orientation and that’s completely normal!

don’t stress about exams like the math diagnostic or ASE’s. honestly, people will have differing opinions on this, but i personally say if youre gonna go for ASE’s, don’t go for more than two. if you try to go for more than two, it’s possible you’ll get really stretched thin and not prep well for any of them. (of course, if you’ve taken college level courses and no i dont mean AP’s bc most high schools do not teach AP courses up to college level, esp here, i mean legit college level courses or done olympiads and all that, then yes, you will probably ace the ASE so disregard). but for real, you should enjoy orientation week and not stress too much because you’ll get enough of that during the year. also absolutely definitely do not go around bragging about the number you’re taking/passing, the other colleges you were choosing among, or anything like that. you’re all in the same place now, and its up to you to work together to survive the next four years.

GIR’s; take them your first semester on P/NR. this will help you meet other freshmen and form study/friend groups and also since these classes are geared towards freshmen, help you ease into the workload/life at school. Before buying textbooks, see if your dorm has a library where books are or upperclassmen willing to sell. Check out BookEx from APO or free and for sale on facebook. You should also consider if your class actually uses the textbook or if there’s a pdf online (for example, out of all the GIR’s i dont think i used a single textbook i paid for bc 8.02 was all online course notes, 5.11x i didnt use the book, 7.01x i used the pdf. i didnt take 18.02 idk anything about that class) I would cap at taking three technicals max and then definitely trying to take your CI-H/HW during the fall semester. of course, these are just my recs, go by what your advisor says.

treat REX seriously! FYRE is a really great place to find your community, which is very important here. Dorms including mcc this year have FYRE! within your living group, there may be lotteries or floor rushes that you should treat seriously too, so spend some time getting to know the dorms and floors of the school

do you see something on the rex schedule that looks absolutely crazy and trolly? do it

call home at some point - your parents/guardians/family left you on campus for the first time in your entire life probably and its a big step for them as much as it is for you. call them to tell them you’re ok, and even if you don’t miss them that much yet, they might miss you a lot already.

dont feel obligated to rush into an internship/urop you don’t want to do. do something you’re interested in and if you have any questions, ask someone! pester everyone until you get answers

good luck!!!! freshman year is a very exciting time and you guys should try to have some fun in the middle of all the class stuff. go out into the city and experience the local culture and meet different people. feel free to hit my inbox any time during the year, drink water, eat food, get enough sleep, learn a lot :)

[layaltheblogger2019]

What is your current obsession?

It’s summer in Boston!! Summer!! Sun!! Beaches!! Happiness!! Exploration!! Random road closures*!! Outdoors!! Fireworks!! NO PSETS!! Events!!

So, this is my first summer NOT with my family in Florida and my first summer in Boston. I will say that although I arrived at MIT last year at the end of August for an FPOP (Freshman Pre-Orientation Program), it is not in any way comparable to spending a full summer here. And even though I spent nine months taking classes over freshman year, the warmth and sun of the summer is nothing like the freezing, sun-less, soul-sucking days of winter. You might be asking, ‘Layal, what are you doing in Boston over the summer? Are you taking classes at MIT or something? Why don’t you have an internship or go abroad, yada yada—’ Well to answer your many questions, I chose to be here! (Also MIT doesn’t offer classes in the summer so that we can all actually get a life ;P )

What exactly do I do? I am here as a Residential Facilitator for the Interphase EDGE Program and a UROP in the Media Lab, Personal Robots group. And what does all of that mean? The Interphase EDGE Program is a summer program for incoming MIT students to help ease their transition into freshman fall. As an RFA, I am responsible for overseeing a ‘cluster’ of three first-years/freshmen/frosh, teaching a workshop/recitation section, of which I teach chemistry, and being present as a guide and resource to help the seventy Interphase scholars. This is probably the most fun job you can get in the summer (though I might be a little biased). With it, I get the satisfaction of being a mentor to the incoming freshmen, the experience of being a TA for a class, and if that already wasn’t cool enough, as bonuses I get breakfast, dinner, and a single in Maseeh with a partial river view! There’s nothing I dislike about this job, and the people I interact with make it worth every moment (and there’s really nothing like being in a single, which I could probably write another entire blog post about). And my UROP is a UROP, which doesn’t explain much. I guess it might not be as good of an explanation as I first thought since any time I do any random craftwork/work not on my computer, my friends ask me if I’m working on my UROP. I mean, sometimes yeah, I am ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

In actuality, the work I do for my UROP surrounds the idea of designing social robots for older adults. I had started working on this UROP in the spring, designing icons that would be used for the interactive part of the study. This summer, I worked on analyzing transcripts from interviews done by my supervisor with respect to her long-term study and designing tools that could be used to make the interactive part of the study low-cost and portable. As it stands, the icons are stored and used on a very expensive HP Sprout which, from experience, is heavy and very hard to transport to the participants. It has been really interesting hearing older adults’ opinions on technology, their life needs, and the idea of social robots catered to them. The UROP allows me to think creatively to complete assigned tasks, and that is my favorite part of the job.

All of this background is here just to set the tone of my summer, a general what have I been up to sort of thing. What I really want to talk about is my new obsession.

Since getting to Boston last year, I have loved exploring the city, or rather, walking across Harvard Bridge as an excuse not to do psets. I have lived in suburbia my entire life, and as tiresome as some aspects of Boston can be, I have fallen in love with the city. Since nowadays I have much more free time than I do during the academic year, I am OBSESSED with exploring more of Boston. The city comes to life over the summer, with a host of events, food, and fun. Here is a list of some of the fun things Boston has to offer that I’ve done in the past two months:

1.      Travel to New York City!

Okay, this isn’t exactly Boston, but its location is ideal for a day trip to NYC. A friend of mine is doing an internship there, and so we joined her for 24 hours of fun in the Big Apple. A car rental and five hours later, we were exploring the city. We had bagels for breakfast, roamed around Central Park, had food cart food (big yum), walked along the High Line, stared in awe at the Oculus, and wandered through Times Square. New York City is also accessible by train and by bus, and whatever way you get there, it’s a trip I highly recommend! Though again, I might be biased because there is just something about NYC that makes me fall in love with it every single time I visit.

The NYC skyline from the Staten Island ferry

The 9/11 Memorial and the Oculus at the World Trade Center

2.      Watch the 4th of July fireworks (and join in on the                       other festivities)!

If you’re in Boston over the summer, you can’t miss the 4th of July. Like it is physically impossible to avoid this holiday, given that Boston is America’s birthplace. The festivities begin with a flag-raising ceremony at Boston City Hall at 9am, leading to a nice little parade that takes you to the Old State House, where the entirety of the Declaration of Independence is read from the same balcony that it was read from every year since 1776. Throughout the day there are numerous celebrations to get you in a patriotic mood. There is the famous Boston Pops concert that happens across the river on the Esplanade right before the fireworks, which I did not attend but could hear from Memorial Drive.

The fireworks are a very big deal. Large boats that will be lined with fireworks begin to show up on the river from three or four days before the fourth, Harvard bridge is shut down from 4pm the day-of so it can be ready for the show. Rooftops and tall buildings with a river view are lined with people. Since the unofficial best place to watch the fireworks is on the Cambridge side, I collected my work for the day, grabbed a blanket, and sat on a nice, grassy patch of Killian Court when the sun began to set. There were so many people on both sides of the river, an estimated half a million just on the Boston side! And the show was very much worth the wait.

Flag-raising ceremony at Boston City Hall

Minutemen marching in the 4th of July Parade to the Old State House

Fireworks!!!

3.      Go to Maria’s Pastry Shop!

I am an outlier of sorts in that I don’t like the infamous Mike’s Pastry’s cannolis. I really don’t. But I wasn’t worried because the North End has no shortage of pastry shops or cannoli options to try. I heard a lot about Maria’s Pastry Shop so one weekday morning before I had to go in for my UROP, I took an Uber with friends to eat some freshly baked goods and cannolis. And holy cannoli it was good. 10/10, will eat again.

(I have no pictures of the cannolis, I ate them immediately)

4.      Go to Revere Beach!

Walking through Boston, it doesn’t feel like the coast could be so close and accessible, but it is! Just a hop, skip, and jump away from campus is a beach you can visit for $5 roundtrip on the subway. Just take the red line, transfer to orange, and go all the way down the blue line to Wonderland: even the name of the stop expresses how nice the place is. On a really hot summer day, the water is perfectly cool, and the sand is smooth and soft. I’ve made this trip multiple times since I came to MIT, and over the summer I took a trip with a large group of Interphase scholars! It is a very accessible way to get away from campus and return to nature, at the open border between land and water.

Beach Day at Revere!

5.      Eat pie at Petsi Pies (and visit the school down the                     street)!

At the outskirts of Greater Boston is one of the most delicious pie places I’ve ever tried. I was actually introduced to the place by my UROP supervisor when we went to Cohasset to visit some study participants, and I have been enamored ever since. Peach Blackberry with Walnut Crumb. Brown Butter Pecan Pie. It tastes even better than they sound. This would have been a quick trip on the Red Line, but on the day in question, the Red Line was broken :(

After getting there, we walked towards a small park to eat, then to Harvard Square for dinner. While walking there I noticed that the Curious George store was missing from its corner (no! what a travesty!) but then I found out it was moving to Central Square (yay! it will be closer!) so that was fun. Walking through Harvard campus, I felt like I was intruding on the place or something lol. We visited Widener Library to get our complementary Harvard library cards for access to their library and shuttle system, but it was closed for the day. I will be back to Harvard sometime soon for that.

What happened with the cannolis happened with the pies ;(

6.      Take the Commuter Rail!

There is a really awesome deal right now that I believe began around when summer started, and that is the $10 unlimited weekend commuter rail pass, valid on Saturdays and Sundays. Some trips on the commuter rail are $10 for a one-way ticket, so this is actually a very good deal. One Saturday, a large group of friends and I took the commuter rail to Manchester-by-the-Sea (yes, like from the movie) and walked over to Singing Beach, a picture-perfect beach, and the most beautiful one I have visited yet. Yes, I’m from Florida. The waves were the clearest blue, the sand, the lightest beige, and the sky was bright with the heat of the sun. The water was perfect.

We then got back on the commuter rail and spent the rest of the day in Rockport, a little seaside town made infamous by its artists, seafood, and quaint, colorful buildings. We took a stroll down Bearskin Neck, ate lobster rolls at Roy Moore’s, and tasted samples of delicious fudge from the Fudgery. All this was a mere hour-long train ride away.

On Sunday, we took the commuter rail west, all on the same $10 pass, and went to a farm to go fruit picking in Sherborn. We walked between peach trees and enjoyed the warm weather with good conversation and laughter. The day ended back in Boston, with a walk through Chinatown.

There are many more great stops on the commuter rail, including Concord, Salem, and Gloucester. I can’t wait to explore more of the commuter rail.

Motif #1 in Rockport

Rocks at Rockport (I understand the name now)

Peaches at Sunshine Farms in Sherborn

My first summer in Boston has been super fun and overall a great success, and I still have about half a month left of it to go. My next few weekends aren’t planned yet, but I can’t wait to see what’s in store!

*This actually happens way too often in the summer that it's kind of getting annoying. Boston’s commute is already a mess: from the red line derailment, the MBTA fare hike, construction and lane closures everywhere, don’t even get me started on rush hour traffic. Mass Ave is at a standstill for…a parade? A street race? Huh? I mean guess the dance party was pretty awesome. And the 4th of July fireworks. I have to admit it’s cool sometimes :P

[belanova]

ihe never spoken to you idontknwo who you are but I wa s wodneirng what i should make for dinner and stressing a little bc I have nothing but tjen one of my mutuals reblogged one of your posts and it came to me like a fit of divine inspiration so yhank you im gonna go make a quesadilla nwo pevae and love

Pevae and love anon hope you have a nice quesadilla🫡

[belanova]

Sadly I know nothing of Cali, but if you ever go to cowboy, ugly highways, and pretty flowers hell (Texas) hmu bud!!!

aw thank you! im more likely to be restricted to cali or florida (Disney park) when like visiting, but if im texas i would go to say hello TO ALL OF YOU!!!!

[belanova]

as someone who has lived in california their entire life i have a couple things to say ! (regarding your question about whether or not the usa is nice ^-^)

overall the entire state of california is nice, but imo the upper half (Monterey and above) is much nicer (it’s a bit cooler and has a lot more greenery, specifically on the coasts. as well, it has a lot more stuff to do. San Francisco has a bunch of different museums and malls, San Jose has japan town, there are bunch of beaches in Santa Cruz. Monterey hosts one of the best aquariums in the entire country. and in between there are all kinds of different state parks with sites to see!! the bay area and surrounding areas is a kind of hot spot of things to do/places to see, but the uppermost part of the state is pretty much empty)

as for the valley: it can get to be really hot, and there’s not much in it besides fields, but it’s really pretty

and honestly i’ve never really visited southern california since the drive there from where i live is ridiculously long, so i don’t have much to say about it. from what i hear it’s nice! it also has the mojave desert, which is really beautiful!!

overall i would recommend it, it’s a really nice (and big) state :DD (also if you ever go to any big cities try and find a map of the different city districts/neighborhoods on google, as you’ll want to avoid certain districts that can be especially dangerous [ex. downtown and tenderloin in san francisco])

O: thank you!

I'm not too worried about the heat since i experience 30°c everyday pff (89 degrees farenheit) so ive gotten pretty used to it! :D I searched up the places you mention AND HOLY SHOOT!!!

i wasn't sure of it but now i am if i ever go to the usa Im going to this part especially the aquarium that looks soo cool!!! i think ive seen santa cruz before, probably in a music video but ive seen a building similar to it in here especially the patterns in it :]

I think even if i dont go to the usa with people i like, seeing this stuff in person would make it worth it anyways!

also... What do you mean its not a meat town in san fransico!? D:

[belanova]

pissa, bagina, jizzie. i see no difference love is love.

After all these years we finally have them all

[belanova]

hola mi amigo

na weon vyse a la chucha d aki

[belanova]

Hi, I hope you're doing well. ❤️ I'm writing to you with full of hope to help me and my family. My family is in a very danger situation due to the ongoing war, and I've launched a GoFundMe campaign to save them. 😢 Could you please share my campaign post from my profile? Each share could be a lifeline for my family. 🙏 Feel free to share it in any other social media platform if you would like. Our campaign has been verified by operation olive branch, and is entry number 26 in their Master List on their spreadsheet. From the bottom of my heart I want to thank you in advance for all of your support and kindness.

This campaign is vetted!

they're really close to their goal of €100,000 with currently €64,915 in it, consider reblogging or donating to help this family!

[belanova]

PLS ALGUIEN LO LLAMO YAOI DE TOM Y JERRY AL GUAPDUO VOY A LLORAR

EL YAOI DE TOM Y JERRY

esto es un ofenso.....

Al verdadero tom y jerry yaoi literal no me importa que el guapoduo estan casados nunca sera ellos.

[belanova]

do you have any pissa fics you'd recommend! :D

Ok so

"Eres suficiente" (You are enough) its two chapters its in pov of Missa trying to parent Chayanne and making sure he grows up brave and love, but struggles with it, Philza tries to help its all around sweet | ESP

"Its two in the morning and you think you might love him" based on art Thunderbottle Made with that exact premise of Philza's pov holding on Missa as he sleeps, monologuing over how he might have a crush on His husband >w< | ENG

"Picnic day" Phil and Missa have a picnic with the kids, It goes terrible, also short and cute | ESP

Thats the end no leo tanto ao3 para qsmp lo sientuuuu

[belanova]

willy fucking rex

😭 this fandom is going to blow up

[belanova]

Hello,

Thank you dear supporters for all the help you are offering the people of Gaza 🇵🇸 in this dire time. I am a father of four tender babies who are paying much of their childhood and innocence in this unfair war. 💔 Please do whatever you can to help me save my family till the war ends.

Despite the suffering and hardships of this fierce war, your support and assistance ease us and grant us power and patience. 🙏 Your contribution keeps a whole family safe, that is why I am asking you to donate whatever you can or at least share my link so that other donors can know about my tragedy and pain. 🌟

I unfortunately don't have any money or even a credit card on me :(

But this is a VETTED fundraiser and is confirmed so if anybody whose following me has money on them!

They're really close to their goal of €49,000 with €42,995 on it (6,005 left to go), so any donation would be really helpful and if you cannot then please reblog to send to somebody who can This family really needs the help

[belanova]

PLSS READ THE COMMENTS UNDER THE VIDEO 🧎🧎

what comment am i suppose to find? this is all my faves i got

[belanova]

✨✨✨WATCH FRANKELDA'S BOOK OF SPOOKS YOU WANT TO WATCH IT SO BAD oOOoOOo✨✨✨

I ALREADY HAVE AND I LOVE IT SOOO MUCH

this is actually one of my favorite animations ever i love the stories I love frankelda so much i watch it last year for halloween

My favorite episode of it was with the boy and the gnome, i think it was the scariest of them all because the boy is literally watching somebody else LIVE HIS LIFE and frankelda, all of the episodes with her and her book giving slight hints to the audience as to what actually happened but not showing, just giving an idea

id be excited to see what her story actually is, despite her energy she just seems so sad like shes trapped there :C that made me remember the movie should be out this year and i cant wait im gonna make an effort to save up tickets for me to watch in the highest quality of screen And then spoil for everyone here cause IT COMES OUT EARLY HERE THAN THE US😈