Making my way

Books and quiet. Learning Korean (A2) and German (C1) | Studying Information Technologies

[spitelesss]

if you sneeze without covering your mouth on public transit then you deserve *pauses to consider my convictions regarding punitive justice* *nods head resolutely* the death penalty

[depsidase]

[stargazerbibi]

[ 27th may, 2026 • day 23/80 ]

not much studying getting done tbh :/

-> went to a book fair!! BOOKS!!

-> therapy (total: 1h00)

🎧 Hanging Out To Dry, by Florence Road

📓 Hummingbird Salamander, by Jeff Vandermeer (yessss this is the stufffffff)

[calvinandhobbescomic]

[under-the-arch]

No, Calvin was right

[distributing-direwolves]

Calvin was 100% right.

[turtletotem]

You’ll notice Miss Wormwood didn’t disagree, just gave him advice on how to handle the pain.

[maxxie-or-smth]

you've met me at a very "yeah i'm trying to work on that" time in my life

[getbreaded]

Took this afternoon to rest and touch grass.

Went to a local market, and bought this cute sticker! My mom bought me a necklace, can't wait to wear it.

Taking some notes on a book I'm reading, but it's slow going. Each topic introduces me to 10 more.

Tomorrow I'll get back to preparing the tech interview, and studying calculus. But for now, I'll play some more acnh...and that's okay.

[quasi-normalcy]

I've reached the point where cynicism is a major turn-off for me. You're not smarter than idealists, and you're not helping.

[quasi-normalcy]

Funny that the stereotypical cynic is an idealist who aged out of it. In my experience, the reverse is true. I was an extreme cynic as a teenager and then I noticed how profoundly limiting it was, and also that "cynics are cool and smart" was a message that was being constantly reinforced by corporate media for some reason.

[quasi-normalcy]

#yes! cynicism reads as very juvenile to me#and yes prev often stemming from teen pain

Yeah, like I see black-pilled people on here and my default reaction isn't "oh, these must be world-weary old warriors who've lost their faith in humanity", it's "these people are in their 20s and need a hobby"

[quasi-normalcy]

I also think that the present era has proven that authoritarian leaders don't actually want a population of wide-eyed idealists, they want a population of jaded assholes who are convinced that everyone is lying, any resistance is either a scam or doomed to failure, and nothing can ever get better.

[erbiumspectrum]

23 May 2026 🌤️

Gave my second to last presentation of the semester yesterday! As is my personal tradition, here's what I still have to accomplish before summer break starts:

one last presentation (which is almost finished)

3 finals

finishing up the specialization project (including writing a report, but I've already written most of it)

[stargazerbibi]

[ 21st may, 2026 • day 17/80 ]

would love some consistency with the notation used in this worksheet please and thank you

-> calc3 worksheet 7 (notes + exercises: 2a-b, 3, 4a-d, 5a-c, 6a-d, 7)

-> journaled

📓 Hummingbird Salamander, by Jeff Vandermeer

[stargazerbibi]

[ 20th may, 2026 • day 16/80 ]

will try to journal more often to deal with the stress. will try to not panic too much. most things can be fixed. it’s scary, but fixable.

-> therapy (total: 1h00)

📓 Hummingbird Salamander, by Jeff Vandermeer (maybe not the best book for someone trying to avoid feeling stressed lol)

[getbreaded]

Maybe a white (blue) board will help me figure these LC problems out.

I just want this semester to end, tech interviews to go away, and to finally rest and get back to sewing.

[sobcat]

[bitchesgetriches]

Hey bitches! I need help.

So I’m in college and I have no idea what I want to major in. My heart says literature but that isn’t going to make me money and college is EXPENSIVEEEEE. So I’m looking at a program called ‘interactive art and technology’. I know graphic design itself isn’t a huge moneymaker but this program combines UX UI design, game design, programming, etc with graphic design and everything. I have no idea who to talk to to make sure that this is a lucrative career. A prof I had told me that graphic design is a lucrative career but I don’t believe her cause she’s probably been out of the market for years. I wonder if my advisors will even give me a correct answer about asking for pay (I’m kinda ashamed of asking about pay myself), and I wonder who I can ask? How do I know if it’s a good industry to work in? How can I get an honest opinion of it? (Like, I know programming is a moneymaking major but since this program is arts oriented to, I wonder if it will even be lucrative?) And what do I do if it turns out it’s not a good major to be in?

Sorry, I know that was a lot 😅😅 hope y’all have a good day!

Not to worry, pet! We have a couple of articles on the best way to choose a college major and career:

High School Students Have No Way of Knowing What Career to Choose. Why Do We Make Them Do It Anyway? 

The Actually Helpful, Nuanced, Non-Bullshit Way to Choose a Future Career 

Your College Major May Not Prepare You for Your Job—but It Can Prepare You for Life

The tl;dr of it all is that Glassdoor.com is a great resource for comparing salaries, getting employee reviews of companies, and figuring out what it's really like in a given profession.

We also recommend requesting informational interviews from alumni who work in the field you're targeting. Good luck, sweet pea!

Did we just help you out? Say thanks by joining our Patreon!

[sword-sorceress]

As an English Major let me tell you that while not stereotypical a "Money Making" degree, literature class teach you some of the most important lessons.

How to understand what you read.

In a world that is getting more and more anti-intellectual, being able to understand information is going to be a huge leg up. You could do so much with an english degree that they dont tell you. So many places are just concerned that you have a degree.

You can use that degree as an analyst, writer, or hr. Its scary, but its not useless. Granted I became a librarian and am honor bound to hype up the humanities but my point still stands. Life is full of twists and turns and what you get your degree in doesnt need to dictate your life.

[ace-of-bass]

Helpful STEM prof (computer science) here!

Totally agree with the English major above, and adding:

You can always take classes outside your major. Maybe you do a literature degree but take a coding class. Maybe you do the art & tech major you mentioned but also do a few literature classes. You don't even have to officially minor. No one can stop you from taking classes for fun.

Also, your advisors & professors will not lie to you about pay and which fields make lots of money and which do not. They may not have the most updated information, but most of your professors (particularly the young-ish ones) will have at least a vague idea of which majors/professions lead to easy jobs and which do not. I don't know the exact starting salary for computer science/engineering, but I know my bff who majored in CE has always made a comfortable living and never had difficulty finding a job. I know my friend who did journalism was broke the entire time he was in college and had to take unpaying internships (the devil's work). I know my friend with a master's in anthropology works for a school district and is paid a medium amount but is also taking a night school coding class to open up more options. These examples aren't specific advice to you, but your younger professors will have similar examples from their friends and your older professors will have examples of students they taught who recently had to get jobs in (or outside) the field. So I would trust your professors in general, though if you get a vibe that one specifically is misinformed or untrustworthy you don't have to trust them. Just ask a different prof that you do trust or that does seem informed.

[swimmingblue]

I'd also say not to pick a major or career just because it makes a lot of $$$.

Because that way there's a good chance that you'll end with good paycheck but also be very unhappy. And that can suck ass. So it's good that you're thinking about career options where you can make good money and support yourself, but also think about what you might enjoy doing.

[onetwothreemany]

I was a linguistics and French Literature major in college (ask me about horny troubadours!) and was frustrated with myself when I got out, because I thought my degree was kind of "useless". I went on to get a master's in wildlife ecology and I now have a very successful career as a data scientist in a variety of tech industries, and you know what? I'm one of the few people at my job who can WRITE.

I can tell a story, not just with data but with words. I can write a convincing and persuasive PRD. I can draw connections between disparate parts of my job and my company and tell others about them with metaphors that make them go "aha!".

This isn't a thing I see from the folks who didn't have a good background in literature.

"Liberal arts" degrees are very good at teaching you how to connect, how to think, how to tell a story from a jumbled mass of facts. They're good at teaching you to question sources and biases and seek out context. They're good at teaching you to break down complicated things into understandable language.

And let me tell you, that is a RARE skillset in the tech world. Once you learn how to market it, you become very appealing to employers, and even more valuable as a coworker.

[twoleggedmermaid]

Here to "second" what folks have already said. My degree is in Communication Studies, which was widely regarded as useless because it taught general com skills and theory, rather than technical skills for a specific career. I'm so glad I got it. Instead of feeling locked into a specific career path, I can apply the skills I learned to almost any job, and I have (verbal com for deescalation in a shelter, essay skills for grant writing and copy editing, interpersonal com to understand the organizational politics and what's being said between the lines).

If you're going to spend a lot of money on a degree, spend it on something you enjoy learning, or at least that interests you. A degree in a specific field is NOT a guarantee of a job in that field, no matter what the recruiters tell you. Spend your time, money, and energy on something you find worthwhile.

[alta-et-astra]

Software engineer here. While my computer science degree has served me well in the ten years since I graduated college, the advancements (or rather, perceived advancements) in AI are killing college grad entry level positions and the tech industry just isn't as stable as it was promised to us back when I was in college.

Now, knowing how to code is super useful, especially when the bubble pops and CEOs decide it's cheaper to pay people to code rather than burn a tree and pay OpenAI, but becoming multi disciplinary, especially in the humanities will only be more helpful not less. That said, if you're interested in coding, take at least a couple of classes in it. I think that in itself is useful foundational knowledge regardless of the degree you choose.

[2boldlyqueer]

I changed majors 5 times! And transferred to a different school halfway through my degree. I have a friend who transferred 5 times in 4 years. Even if your school requires you to declare freshman year (my first school had such packed requirements that you had to start first semester to graduate in four years), you aren't locked in! Even with 5 major changes, I absolutely could have done the degree in 4 years if I hadn't had health issues.

I'll also seconding (third?) what twoleggedmermaid said. I have a Comm degree with a concentration in PR. I haven't had a single communications or PR job, but the skills I learned have been extremely useful in every job I've had since.

One more thing you may find helpful is that many schools have a major called something like Interdisciplinary, Multidisciplinary, or Independent Studies. It's more work on the front end, but you essentially get to make your own major. Before I transferred and switched to Comms, I was developing a multidisciplinary track for Science Journalism, concentrating on environmental issues and human Ecology. I was combining courses from the human eco, journalism, and English, plus intro level stuff in most science fields. I was even able to design it in a way that would've let me get a Creative Writing minor, which is where my non-science passions lie.

Basically, even if you have to declare early, you aren't locked in. You have more time to take different classes and see what clicks. (Also, if you're really concerned about spending money on classes that won't help, consider getting an associates degree. It's 2 years and then you can transfer to a 4 year college and finish that in 2 years, because you already covered everything that's not in your major. )

[getbreaded]

I've been studying a lot more than usual, trying to catch up on calculus AND preparing a technical interview.

It's hard not to feel dumb and lacking when solving LeetCode problems tbh. It feels like the past 4 years have amounted to nothing.

But that's not true, as much as my brain wants to believe it.

[raylangivins]

(three decades into my life) sorry I wasn’t paying attention, can we start again?

[64mpg]

thinking about developing a social skill soon

[userfish]

how’s it going?

[64mpg]

[probuccalfat]

stop inventing shit to be insecure about oh my god

[probuccalfat]

like i’m actually so sick of it i’m two days from pulling my hair out and screaming in the walmart parking lot about how fake the constructs of our society are like you don’t have to do any of this shit you can have a fine and content life doing shit the way you want to do it oh my GOD you don’t need to have glass skin or have a 6 figure salary or try to find a house in the city or have a baby or try to get a promotion or whatever the hell else people told you makes for a happy life you can work at the library or pool forever if it makes you happy you can be single forever if it makes you happy have whatever the fuck kind of skin or hair or clothes you like having on your body have whatever the fuck kind of body you want this shit is MADE UP!!!!!!!!!!! YOU ARE ALLOWED TO BE HAPPY WITH WHAT YOU HAVE AND NOT CONTINUALLY STRIVE FOR MORE AND MORE!!!!!!!!!