#delurking

[shy-magpie]

In which I whine about the inevitable results of starting a series thats already over a hundred episodes in:

I am listening to the episodes faster than I am posting my liveblogs because I have a thing about posting too much on any one subject, so I queue the posts and try to alternate my posts with some of the great fanworks out here. This is along way of saying that I just listened to episode 69 and I miss Zolf. Grizzop is fine, but he isn’t Zolf. Everyone else is celebrating Zolf coming back in the current episodes and I’m just starting to really feel it. The first couple eps it was mostly practical concerns, them tidying up the paperwork, dealing with the loot and being me being mad that I can’t actually find a flaw in his logic.(1)

Now they are getting back to normal play and I feel so weird about it; like I am half a step away from screaming “you’re not my real healer”, slamming the door, playing loud music. There is nothing wrong with Grizzop, we get to keep Ben as a player, and on one level I am finding both of them delightful. On the other every time we hit that “Grizzop hasn’t actually had anytime or reason to bond with them” note or a silence where I would expect Zolf to say something leader-y, it hurts. You’d think the meta nature of the format would keep even my melodramatic butt from getting this worked up, especially since they put him on a bus, not killed him off, but I think that duality between what I think I should be feeling and what I feel is dragging things out. Especially because I like this fandom and am like actually scared of falling out of love with this show.

I better post this before I chicken out. This was supposed to be a quick note explaining why I might come across as angry at Bertie and Zolf even though they don’t deserve it (well Zolf doesn’t) and turned into some kind of processing /thing/

1)Zolf was having a mental health crisis for a while now, and when you become a danger to your own people, you thank Poseidon you didn’t succeed then you remove yourself from the situation. Bertie can’t leave at the same time (even if I think Zolf fired him at one point) because without Hamid around to keep an eye on him gods know what he’d do, to the quest or to anyone who got in his way. That Zolf got to leave on good terms with Sasha and Hamid was an unexpected grace. That I found out he was coming back before I got the episode where he left is some comfort.

[shy-magpie]

I have been seeing a number of posts about asking for accommodations in college floating around and noticed that many make it sound like you should treat all professors/teachers/faculty the same. In my experience, which is admittedly limited to Community College, adapting to them is the first step in getting them to adapt to you.

Find out how your teacher’s like being talked to and do it. I had some teachers who preferred being emailed and if you tried to talk in person they would ask you to “shoot them an email about that”; others if emailed would ask you to talk to them about it before/after class. Some wanted to schedule an appointment for a 10 minute chat. It took awhile for me to realize I wasn’t doing anything wrong in the initial contact and none of those was a “no”.

While some teachers insisted on at least touching bases with disability services many just needed to know:

what I needed (Be clear and have ideas they can put into action immediately.) ie: I need to be able to type rather than hand write: so I need permission bring a laptop to class, find my own seat with a plugin nearby and access to the printer for in class work that was handed in.

why I needed it (some needed more emphasis than others that I was asking because of a specific need like ADHD or a physical disability. That I wanted to keep up not get an edge over other students) ie: due to problems with my wrist muscles: I write slow enough I may not be able to finish the assignment, if I write faster it will be illegible, and it hurts.

 That I was willing to do the work and work with them. That I was willing to come up with an alternate adaptation if they had a concern about my suggestions ie: They were concerned the printer was loud so I suggested I e-mail the assignment or print during breaks rather than print it in class. One teacher asked me to write short bullet points instead of an essay then after the test time was over I gave the answer orally expanding only on what I wrote during test time. Another was convinced the laptop would distract other students so I suggested I sit in the back of the room so it would be less noticeable. Another needed me to remind them before each test and group activity what we had already agreed to.

If anyone can express this better please don’t hesitate to do your version of this post. I would love to reblog your version.

[genjyoandgojyoandhakkai]

Shout-out to the Dragon Age community here...after like 15 years of lurking I finally decided to join because finding fanworks, nice people, and just having a place to scream about ships actually IS what I wanted 🤣

[shy-magpie]

Oh hey while I’m over thinking things: I tag swear words not because I object, but because I have a hard time seeing them unless I actually search line by line. So I do the looking once; tag it; and can check my own tags before I share it on forums with swear policies or people I use a more formal tone with. Plus hey, in theory someone following me might actually not want to see swears, or be browsing at work etc. So no cost for never having to explain to my mother that some people refer to people they admire as “that mother F--er” again.

[shy-magpie]

While hardly surprising given all the free floating stress on offer, I just realized I am near full ADHD “Help I’ve fallen and I can’t shut up” mode. Mostly Dreamwidth, discord, and various drafts folders, I think but half of this mode is not realizing I’m doing it until I’m confronted with a wall of text and realize every other participant’s responses are so much shorter.

Not sure to what degree I might just go with it, what with my stimulant not being good for either my sleep patterns (already shot to hell for the same reasons) and anxiety (which is both worse and a heck of a lot better than usual because everyone is posting things to help with anxiety and I’m finally better enough to realize that it isn’t taking away from anyone else if I use those resources). Also I need to learn to find a balance between reblogs only and OMG I didn’t mean to type that much so I may as well see if I can learn to edit rather than write and run.

So TL;DR consider this your final warning that I might not be staying at home yet, the up tick in my posting will probably be more than if I was.

[shy-magpie]

Hey so I don’t know if anyone has noticed but I have been experimenting with posting based around themed days; instead of my more random queue of the past. I am also posting about 6 posts a day 3 hours apart. I am also probably overthinking this. If any of my followers have any feedback it would be appreciated. More posts a day? less? did you prefer the mix of topics to the focus? Should I announce the theme of the day?

[shy-magpie]

In Praise of an Ugly BuJo

Long post but I wanted to spread the good new of ugly bullet journals to others struggling with organization. I have ADHD and heard that using a planner can really help with the executive dysfunction. I tried using a regular planner with preprinted pages but I felt bad whenever I didn't use it or when I used a page for working out an idea instead of using it "right". I heard of Bullet Journals didn’t realize it would work for me since all the ones I saw online were the really pretty scrapbook ones. The thing is a bullet journal can be pretty much anything you want it to be-the point of the format is flexibility.

My "baby BuJo" or "notebook of doom" is a lined composition book. My daily pages go from from to back I left a few pages blank for a Table of Contents. Anything else goes in starting from the back cover in and I just put it in the TOC so I can find it again.I don't worry about pretty, as long as I know what I mean.

On the daily pages write down everything I have to do and everything I don't have to do but will do anyway in a stream of consiousness. If I know I am going to take 30min to goof off on tumblr or play a game then I can schedule it in so I am less tempted to do it when I need to be doing something else. Then I check yesterdays page to see if there is anything I forgot to do yesterday I need to do or anything I marked TBD (To Be Dealt With later). Once I have the list turn it into a schedule by putting in the things with fixed times (like work); then the things that have to be done before or after those fixed events (like getting read for work tasks all have to be done before /x time/);Any tasks remaining get filled in the remaining time or marked TBD.

One of the big reasons my baby BuJo works for me is that I don't have spend money on it. The idea is /less stress/ not feeling guilty because you spent $$$ then forgot to use it for a week. I use a $1 composition book whatever pen I have near me and ruler for when I feel fancy about laying out a page.

The next biggest reason this method helps is it helps me let go of the idea that I need to stick with any one method. With blank lined paper I can copy any page layout I like. I rarely use the same page layout for more than a week. Sometimes its depends on how much I have to do, or how much is fixed times vs long projects, sometimes I saw a cute studyblr and copied the layout.

So please don’t do like I did for so long and write yourself off as “one of those people who can’t get their life together”. Grab a notebook, skip a few pages and start figuring out what needs to be done today.

[murder-husband]

[text] Come upstairs.

Ambient lighting arranged, perfect comfort in the cocoon of a light quilt and a Joni Mitchell record playing. Louis settles deeper into the couch, drawing his knees up.

The phone vibrates loudly, drilling noise against the table as it shivers with the force.

 [text] Upstairs? What’s the matter?  [text] You said we were leaving hours ago. [text] Is it a wardrobe malfunction?