i’ve been inspired by the person who said if they got 666k notes they would practice self care. so ya know what? i’ve been in a spiral of depression for months so if this post gets 1 MILLION notes by the end of 2023, i will start taking care of myself and actually try to battle my depression and live my life. (this is never going to get 1m notes yall HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA)

CHALLENGE: ACCEPTED LET'S GET YOU THAT SELF CARE

@chocolate-guy-compilations you're popular enough

@is-the-owl-video-cute

any popular blog

@staffs-secret-blog

@firefox-official

@one-time-i-dreamt

I've always loved a good challenge

some vampire/goth icons part 6

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part 1 part 2 part 3 part 4 part 5 part 7 part 8

One of the most bizarrely cool people I’ve ever met was an oral surgeon who treated me after a ridiculous accident (that’s another story), Dr. Z.

Dr. Z. was, easily, the best and most competent doctor or dentist I’ve ever encountered – and after that accident, I encountered quite a number. He came stunningly highly recommended, had an excellent record, and the most calming bedside manner I’ve ever seen.

That last wasn’t the sweet gentle caretaking sort of manner, which some nurses have but you wouldn’t expect to see in a surgeon. No; when Dr. Z. told me that one of my broken molars was too badly damaged to save, and I (being seventeen and still moderately in shock) broke down crying, he stared at me incredulously and said, in a tone of utter bemusement, “But – I am very good.”

I stopped crying on the spot. In the last twenty-four hours or so of one doctor after another, no one had said anything that reassuring to me. He clearly just knew his own competence so well that the idea of someone being scared anyway was literally incomprehensible to him. What more could I possibly ask for?

(He was right. The procedure was very extended, because the tooth that needed to be removed was in bits, but there was zero pain at any point. And, as he promised, my teeth were so close together that they shifted to fill the gap to where there genuinely is none anymore, it’s just a little easier to floss on that side.)

But Dr. Z.’s insane competence wasn’t just limited to oral surgery.

When I met Dr. Z., he, like most doctors I’ve had, asked me if I was in college, and where, and what I was studying. When I say “math,” most doctors respond with “oh, wow, good for you” or possibly “what do you want to do with that after college?”

Dr. Z. wanted to know what kind of math.

I gave him the thirty-second layman’s summary that I give people who are foolish enough to ask that. He responded with “oh, you mean–” and the correct technical terms. I confirmed that was indeed what I meant (and keep in mind, this was upper-division college math, you don’t take this unless you’re a math major). He asked cogent follow-up questions, and there ensued ten or so minutes of what I’d call “small talk” except for how it was an intensely technical mathematical discussion.

He didn’t, as far as I can tell, have any kind of formal math background. He just … knew stuff.

I was a competitive fencer at this point in time, so when he asked if I had any questions about the surgery that would be necessary, I asked him if I’d be okay to fence while I had my jaw wired shut, or if it would interfere with breathing.

“Fencing?” he said.

“Yes,” I said, “like swordfighting,” because this is another conversation I got to have a lot. (People assume they’ve misheard you, or occasionally they think you mean building fences.)

“Which weapon?”

“Uh. Foil.”

“No, it won’t be safe,” and he went off into an explanation of why.

Turns out, he was also a serious fencer – and, when I mentioned my fencing coach, an old friend of his. (I asked my fencing coach later, and, oh yes, Dr. Z., a good friend of mine, excellent fencer.) (My coach was French. Dr. Z. was Israeli. I never saw Dr. Z. around the club or anything. I have no idea how they knew each other.)

So this was weird enough that later, when I was home, I looked Dr. Z. up on Yelp. His reviews were stellar, of course, but that wasn’t the weird thing.

The weird thing was that the reviews were full of people – professionals in lots of different fields – saying the same thing: I went to Dr. Z. for oral surgery, and he asked me about what I did, and it turned out he knew all about my field and had a competent and educated discussion with me about the obscure technical details of such-and-such.

All sorts of different fields, saying this. Lawyers. Businessmen. Musicians.

As far as I can tell, it’s not that I just happened to be pursuing the two fields he had a serious amateur interest in – he just seemed to be extremely good at literally everything.

I have no explanation for this. Possibly he sold his soul to the devil.

He did a damn good job on my surgery.

#op your oral surgeon is an immortal

Some god is slumming it on Earth with maxed-out stats helping people and his dive bar of choice is oral surgery.

Looked at the old vampire angst trope & went nah imma make the world a better place with all the time I’ve got

My therapist asked me to create something “motivating” so I made these.

lol.

I really love these, and I reblog them every single time. Some of you don’t realize how easy it’s to forget to do some of those stuff or how hard they can be some days.

intro to lit theory

these are about 2/3 of the readings for my intro to lit theory course, if you’ve ever wondered what one studies on such courses, the links lead to free pdfs  

Devonian memories in the river

SCARECROW [x]

Hand on the Key

When they arrived at Privet Drive, they all stood at the door for a few moments, momentum lost, before Harry shrugged and stepped forward to ring the doorbell.

As soon as Petunia saw them through the peephole, she backed away, but they could follow her shadow through the frosted glass panels beside the door, and anyway Hermione was out of patience by then, and didn’t even look around to check if the coast was clear before whipping out her wand and performing a brisk Alohomora.

Petunia did try to stop them, drawing herself up to her full height and summoning as much poison into her voice as she could, but Ginny just laughed and elbowed past her, Luna dancing behind, and Neville had his fingers in the hanging basket beside the door—All clear, he said gravely, as though there might have been something brutal and awful lurking among the pansies—and Hermione, who bore a long grudge, said unsympathetically, “Oh, do shut up” to Petunia as she ran some diagnostic charms over the lintel of the front door. Ron hovered behind her, glaring, wand out.

Dean and Seamus were just there to bump the numbers up, really, and they were already preoccupied by the little yappy dog that was running around in the side passage, behind an unnecessarily fussy metal gate, so it was only Draco who noticed that Harry wasn’t moving.

It was just that Petunia was still there, that was all, standing in the doorway, ribs straining with her rage, the rattle of her outraged breaths keeping Harry at a distance. He remembered how angry she could get.

“Don’t you dare come in here,” she said, pointing at Harry, hand upraised, and he couldn’t help it; he flinched. Draco was behind him suddenly, a solid heat at his back, and then Harry felt his steadying hand at the base of Harry’s spine.

“Move,” Draco said to Petunia, “or I’ll make you regret it.”

He was still good at that, being impossibly posh and commanding, Harry thought dimly, looking up at Petunia from the front step. She was so tall. And then she stepped to the side, leaning back against the wall as though she was very tired, and Draco steered Harry past her so fast that it was over before he even had to think about it, and he could breathe again.

Ginny was sitting on the kitchen counter, swinging her legs and eating some of the good biscuits out of the biscuit barrel. With every beat of her heels against the cereal cabinet, she left a dusty smear. Petunia’s not going to like that, Harry thought. Through the window he could see Dean and Seamus in the back garden. The dog was on its back on the grass, four legs in the air, wriggling with delight as they rubbed its fluffy tummy. Through the open window, Harry could hear the distant hum of a lawnmower. The air felt heavy with summer.

“You’d better not have eaten all the good ones, you rotter,” Draco told Ginny, and stalked across the kitchen to her. She hugged the biscuit barrel to her chest, and before Draco managed to wrestle it away from her, she dug out a green-wrapped Viscount and chucked it to Harry over Draco’s head. He muttered something to her and she laughed out a spray of crumbs, and then Draco picked out a piece of shortbread and came back to stand with Harry.

“You can have this one, if you like,” Harry told him, holding out the Viscount. The foil was stretched out and shiny from his smoothing thumb. He could feel the chocolate inside softening under his touch.

“You have it,” Draco said, stuffing half the shortbread into his mouth. “This one is fine.” His voice was muffled by biscuit, but his eyes were still sharp when he looked at Harry. He swallowed hard, and then said, “You’re allowed to have it, Harry.”

Executive Dysfunction Tip: Stop in the Middle!

So you just finished a chapter of your work in progress. Congrats! Seems like a good place to stop, right? 

But wait! Before you go take that much-needed break, do this: Write three sentences of the next chapter. That’s it. Three sentences. Now you’re done.

It will be much, much easier for you to come back to it when you feel like you’re already in the middle. You just got rid of the most difficult part of doing anything: Starting.

This also works for:

Happy productivity!

we are already living in the cyberpunk future and i know this because within a span of 3 days we went from this tweet:

to thousands of people making phony images and replying to them with their passionate desire to have them as a tshirt to overload the bots with nonsense and junk and send out warnings to shoppers like this:

and now we even have people replying to pictures of baby yoda with “i want this on a tshirt” knowing how ravenous disney is being with copyright in hopes to get the stores taken down altogether

i dont know what it is about stuff like this and the whole turn mei into a symbol of hk protesters thing but, its really reassuring for some reason

And the next step…

There is so much awesome in this post… Like, using freaking DISNEY to attack illegal art resellers… that is Next Level Chaotic Good right there

My brain, having a meltdown like a toddler: I just can’t do it! I don’t want to !! I can’t!!

Me, parenting my tired toddler brain: Take a deep breath, it’s going to be ok. We don’t have to do everything today that’s overwhelming you. Let’s pick the most important thing to work on, ok? What’s the smallest step we can do to work towards that?

My toddler brain, wiping away tears: Um, I think we should…open up the important spreadsheet and look at the first row.

Me, parenting my tired toddler brain: Great! Let’s do that, and then we can have a popsicle, ok?

My toddler brain: *nods through drying tears, upset, but cooperative*

pride month celebration week ♡ day seven: free day BISEXUALITY IN MUSIC

i can tell i’m sleep deprived bc i just made myself cry about tutankhamun and i have, like, negative interest in the kid

have now made the rest of the discord cry about this little boy who had multi-coloured ducks sewn onto a tunic that he loved so much he wore it to a Very Important Event because he was EIGHT and have you SEEN my DUCKS

sorry no i’m not done i’m gonna make you all cry some more i’m bringing you down with me

there was once a little boy.

he is born disabled. his body hurts, and he can’t walk properly the way the other children do. he doesn’t understand why. he’s a little boy. but he plays with wooden boats and pulls toys on a string.

somebody makes him a tunic. they sew ducks onto it in red and green and yellow and blue. the bright colours of a child.

the little boy is eight years old, and he’s going to be king now. there’s a big ceremony about it. he doesn’t really fully understand what’s going on, because he’s eight, but he wears the tunic with the brightly coloured ducks for the occasion because he loves it. look at his ducks! aren’t they great?

he is a child. the adults around him manipulate and coax him to gain more power for themselves. he still plays with toys.

as a teenager, not yet an adult, he fathers children. they do not survive. he’s not even old enough to have full agency in his job and is still being manipulated, but he had babies and they died.

he does not make it to his twenties. at eighteen or nineteen years old he dies, and is buried. his babies, so tiny, are buried with him.

and so is his tunic with the little ducks that he loved so much he kept it long after it no longer fit.

there was once a little boy.

yeah i think that like. especially with historical figures in your mind people who were kings and queens or important nobles were adults. even if you know how old they were it doesn’t really click. it doesn’t seem real

but then you get something like a little tunic with brightly coloured ducks on it and it hits you like a fucking truck that this really was a little kid and no matter how far removed you are a little kid is still a little kid. their brains didn’t develop any quicker back then. he was just as developed/mature mentally as any 8 year old now. he had cartoonish animals on his clothes and he played with toy boats and probably terrorised the local cat population.

tutankhamun was a child and he didn’t make it to adulthood because he was unfortunate enough to be a very important child

his dad died when he was 8. he saw his own babies die when he was still just a boy himself.

but he had brightly coloured little ducks on his favourite shirt, and he kept it.

and he did not just keep the duckie shirt either

tutankhamun had a little pair of sandals with ducks on them. he had earrings decorated with ducks. he kept those, and other items of childhood clothing. some toys. keepsakes. things he loved, and treasured. he kept them all in a little wooden chest. the chest… was carved with ducks.

and that little duck chest, filled with things he kept from his childhood, was buried with him. maybe he was keeping them for the little babies who did not make it. maybe they just reminded him of good days and fun times.

but he was a little boy who thought ducks were just the best

WITH PLEASURE

(greyscale makes it hard but the duck head is on the right above the toe strap. always takes me a while to find it too)

*looks at sherlock* it’s very smoll