Pride and Pen

If you want to be the kind of person who would do something, then just do it, and you'll be that kind of person. There are no pure personality archetypes for you to fall into, they're an illusion that your brain constructs out of partial datasets and media prerogatives. Let the radical unknowability of the Other set you free.

Buying a car

English added by me :)

learning that people want you in their lives is a skill you can develop if it does not come naturally

it feels fake but your friends miss you sometimes

the reason you've been hanging out with your closest friends fairly regularly for the past 12+ years is because you have fun together

people who don't like you that much will not stay in your life for over a decade asking to hang out and inviting you to things and texting you

when susan sontag wrote “I must change my life so that I can live it, not wait for it”

To whom it may concern:

I hope your era of "disappointed, but not surprised" will soon come to a close, and for it to be replaced with a long span of "surprised, but not disappointed."

heartbreaking:

girl has sooooooo many ambitions and ideas for projects but can only get 1.5 basic tasks done per day

I'm built different. like incorrectly i think

“And I don’t think anybody should feel bad if they get diagnosed with a mental illness, ’cause it’s just information about you that helps you to know how to take better care of yourself.

“Being bipolar, there’s nothing wrong with it. Being bipolar is like not knowing how to swim. It might be embarrassing to tell people, and it might be hard to take you certain places. But they have arm floaties. And if you just take your arm floaties, you can go wherever the hell you want.

“And I know some of you are like, ‘But Taylor, what if people judge me for taking arm floaties?’ Well, those people don’t care if you live or die, so maybe who cares? Maybe fuck those people a little. I don’t know.”

Taylor Tomlinson, Look At You (2022)

When I am emperor, I will make everyone who refers to women’s leg hair removal as “basic hygiene” fight to the death in my coliseum.

finally it will be understood that I am doing it not for hygiene but for slut reasons

sluts are welcome in my empire, be they hairy or smooth

Confused, but cautiously willing to welcome these slippery people into my empire so long as I can put down some plastic drop clothes over the couches before they sit down, and provided they do not become evangelical or moralizing about their thigh slime. (Why stop at thighs? Why not emulate the valiant eel and opt for a full mucusoid coat?)

This probably refers to people whose thighs touch and chafe when they’re wearing shorts or skirts

Aww, and here I was planning an imperial holiday called Slime Fest, with mandatory public slimings.

Very well, anti-chafing measures are permissible. I want my subjects to be comfortable (when they are not fighting to the death obviously).

your highness can we still have slime fest?

*imperial majesty thx

Imperial majesty, can we still have the slime fest?

hmmmmmm

no I’m too sad that the eel people don’t exist and I shall declare an Imperial Day of Sulking instead

all are welcome

The imperial Majesty Sulking

for three hours each day we will open the doors of the palace to the public so that my subjects may view their emperor sulking about the eel people from the royal observation chamber

there will be hors d'oeuvre

The pastoralist fantasy of "modern life is too stressful so I should move to a remote area and do hard labor" is so funny

I have a theory about that.

I think that what people want, when they talk about a pastoralist fantasy is actually an anti-capitalistic fantasy: i noticed, even from my experience, that most people don't mind phisical labour if it gives them results: actual, tangible, results.

Once my boss asked me to copy every article from a website and paste them in the new one. It took me roughly four hours for three days to do and my soul was slowly leaving my body. It was easy work, i mean who wouldnt want to earn money to just click here and click there, rinse and repeat? But it was boring, ripetitive and basically useless.

But when I take some time and clean my house, i sweat, i am tired but... satisfied. I see in front of me the result of my hard labour and I am happy, or at least i don't think i wasted my time.

So the fantasy of working hard but at least getting something out of it is appealing: why do people work in kitchens? Or bakeries and wake up at dawn to make bread? Or any hard job like that? I knew a guy that had the possibility of having every job he wanted, but he opened a bar and couldnt be happier.

This is my idea, i'm not a student in sociology or anything but I hope i made a point.

I have two degrees, and my previous job was the marketing department head for an international biotech company. I was well-paid, but dreaded work every morning. The endless cycle of low-grade manipulation and feeling like “making money for someone else to pocket, HELPING no one else” felt miserable.

I left and now work at a garden center. I haul around plants and educate people about them, so they can make informed choices. I help people, and seeing the plants grow under my care is wonderful. My soul is flourishing, my heart is at peace. My coworkers are all honest (as far as I can tell), and there’s no push for upselling or pushing people to buy stuff if it’s not very suited for their landscape.

Even if my wallet is a lot lighter these days, so too are my worries!

I worked IT in a city and fuck. People try to controll your every second. Faster! More efficient! You took a second too long to type that. You drove 56 kmh but could have gone 58 without getting caught. I messaged you a minute ago but you didn't reply so I walked to your cubicle to ask you. Also let's have an efficiency meeting. You are too slow. That's your feedback. How long will that task take? Can we somehow shorten that?

And all for what? To manipulate the user to buy product. Not to improve the website mind you. Whenever I suggested: hey, our website is not useable for the visually impaired/people with motor problems. I got back an: we don't care they're too small of a market value

So can you really blame me for fantasizing about a life where I can just plant flowers and vegetables and walk everywhere without the need of manipulating people and mikromanage my every second

my current job is managing a plasma cutting machine, so i have to spend a lot of time dragging big chunks of iron on and off conveyor belts and i end up sore and filthy at the end of every shift, and usually a bit scratched up.

but it’s third shift and there’s no supervision whatsoever, so while the machine is running, i can type on my phone. i’ve written most of a novel so far with my thumbs, covered in grease and iron dust. and i also produced a lot of construction materials for bridges, dams, warehouses, and skyscrapers.

i really like my job.

This is Marx's theory of alienation.

When people are removed from the tangible results of their labor, they become distressed and dissatisfied - and this is the result of capitalist profit-focused processes.

via indiarosecrawford

Frog Paints a Water Lily Pond 🪷🎨🐸

𝑓ₒᵣ ⲕᵢ𝑛𝑔 ₐ𝑛𝑑 𝑐ₒ𝑡𝑡ₐ𝑔ₑ

i will defend to the grave that literary analysis IS enjoyable and a valid hobby but it's amazing how a hyperfixation on The Character will have you writing essays for fun

an essay can be a playlist or a fanfic where they get railed btw. the definition is flexible.

i do genuinely need to go on some sort of quest this year or i’m going to become evil for real

personally i think you should be able to afford a place to live with a part-time job

dare i even say that, with how much technology has advanced in america, the 40 hour work week shouldn't be as commonplace and you should still get full-time employment benefits when you're working less than that actually

Kitty!... long leg kitty!.. uh, creechur?... OUPPY