regular-lord-reckoner

[regular-lord-reckoner]

Two years since you’ve been gone. I miss you more and more every day. I love you, always.

[regular-lord-reckoner]

it has been......a day

so yesterday our dog buddy had a grand mal seizure

he was seizing all over, eyes rolling, uncontrollably drooling and going to the bathroom on himself

i was so fucking scared, i really thought he was about to die

fortunately he stopped after a couple of minutes and he wobbled around for a few more but then he was back to being himself, running around and playing with his toys

i had wanted to take him to the emergency vet but my mom talked me out of it so i called his regular vet today to see if they would take him as a walk in and fortunately they were able to squeeze him in for an appointment

he did good throughout the night and all day today he's been fine but i barely slept last night i was so upset

i guess because my head wasn't screwed on right this is where i just fucked up my day and pushed myself over the edge

i work a little longer until it gets closer to when i need to leave for his appointment, i clock out, get myself ready, go to get him ready and get him in the car but when i went to where his harness and leash are his harness wasn't there !!

so i immediately begin sweating and i'm running all over the house turning it upside down trying to find it. at one point i figured fuck it, let me at least find an old dog collar and we'll just use that, it'll be fine but for the life of me i couldn't find a single one

we have this one collar for him that makes a sound to keep him from running off into the woods and it's got a little remote with it, but i was sure they would prefer me having him on an actual leash but by that point i was running late so i just said fuck it and put that collar on him and we hopped in the car and sped off (in retrospect i guess i could have tried clipping the leash onto that collar, but it doesn't have a designated spot to clip a leash onto so it would have had to be the collar itself and it's thicker than a normal dog collar so i didn't think it would fit very well but i probably should have at least tried instead of, y'know, panicking but you live and you learn, am i right?)

i ended up getting there ten minutes late and i left him in the car with the ac running so i could run inside and just see if they maybe had a leash i could borrow for him (they did !) but unfortunately because i was late they moved on to the next patient

fortunately, however, they said i could bring him back in about an hour and they'd try again but that i needed to be there at that time and by that point i just started crying and apologizing profusely because i was so mad at myself for fucking this up when this is a serious situation and they were so nice to work me in and i just... yeah

i took my blubbering ass back to the car and decided to just run him back home real quick so he could try to use the bathroom again since he didn't go before we left (he has to be on trazadone to go to his appointments because he gets so anxious that they can't even examine him so he's been high as balls today and kept getting distracted when i took him out the first time)

he did indeed go potty this second time around and i'd finally stopped crying by that point so we hopped back in the car and headed back into town where we made it and were even early !!

they took him back and first they just kinda checked him out and it they said he looked fine, nothing was wrong with his pupils or anything like that, so that was a good sign

ultimately our game plan is that we're not going to start him on any seizure medicine just yet because they can be really hard on a dog's organs (we had a discussion about how if it gets work we might have to and while it may shorten his life it would at least give him quality of life) and we're going to see about changing his heartworm, flea and tick medicine because those can lower the threshold for seizures sometimes and basically we're just going to monitor him and see

it's been over 24 hours and he hasn't had another one, so that's also a good sign.

they gave us some rescue meds we can administer if he has another one and then we'll take him to the emergency vet right after but yeah. i really, really, really hope he never has another one. they drew some labs today so hopefully they'll find something from that. i know this sounds weird but i'm honestly hoping he maybe just got into something he shouldn't have and that's what caused this so as long as we can make sure he never gets into whatever that was again he'll be fine ? i dunno. i guess that's my attempt at wishful thinking in this situation because i really don't want to think that something worse is going on or that he might die. he may be a little shit sometimes but i love that little guy so fucking much i really can't take losing him right now (there's something to be said too about how i feel especially close to him because he spent so much time with my dad. they were best buds sharing snacks and taking naps together every day and it's like getting to still have a piece of my dad here, plus he's just a sweet boy who comes and crawls in my lap whenever i'm crying and will always lean into me whenever we sit together. i just love him, okay !!)

oh, but wait, i almost forgot the best part !!!

so, i didn't realize they were gonna need a urine sample and because i'd already taken him out before we got there they obviously weren't able to get one from him while he was there so they sent me home with a little kit to collect it and bring it back myself sometime within the next few weeks so i'm like okay sure thing

i'm thinking this is going to be easy peasy, he'll have to pee by the time we get back home and i'll just collect it right away, hop back in the car and for the third fucking time today darken the doors of my local vet's office to sling some dog piss their way before scooting back home to FINALLY get some work done (ended up being clocked out for 4 hours of my 10 hour shift today... i made up two of them and we'll squeeze the other two in....later) but so okay, sweet

and sure enough, we get home and the boy has to pee so i slide the little plastic tray thingy under him (he looked at me like "what the fuck ?!") and for a brief, shining moment something that day was actually going right, it was filling up, there was plenty of urine for me to syringe out into the little test tube, this nightmare was finally coming to a close and...oh my god he kicked the fucking plastic tray over and dumped most of the piss out into the grass

i tried to pick it back up but most if it had spilled out at that point. and y'know how sometimes you reach that level of done where you just can't even react anymore, you just go full robot mode ? yeah that was me after that, just squatting there beside my car where i set the plastic tray down so i could try in vain to get enough of the leftover urine into one of the little holes so i could hopefully fill the syringe up to where it needed to be but it just wasn't enough so after about ten minutes of me doing that in utter silence i just said fuck it, we'll try this again tomorrow and we went inside (*griffin mcelroy voice*) and you knoOoOoOw i got piss all over my hands in the process, because shit just wasn't bad-e-fucking-enough !!)

anyway, after that things have pretty much been calm. buddy's been good, so that's really the most important thing (i did scare the shit out of him by accident, though because while he's on that medicine he acts like he barely knows who i am so he just kept looking at me and was all skittish and of course, of course !! right when he was trying to eat his food i was right next to him in the fridge putting his food container up and a plastic bag with an onion in it fell out of one of the side shelves so i picked it up, GENTLY placed it back on the shelf and naturally the entire thing had to collapse, sending a bunch of jars slamming to the floor and having buddy think i was over here throwing shit at him (he literally went back to my mom's bedroom door like he wanted to go back to his bed, his safe space, and i had to pet on him a while before he trusted me enough to come finish his food, it broke my heart)

all of that being said, i'm going to go to bed now and hopefully tomorrow is a better day and even more hopefully than that this will be a one time thing the poor little guy had to go through and he'll be fine

hugs your pets tight tonight, thanks for listening to my day from hell <3

[regular-lord-reckoner]

miss you big time, big sis 💚

[regular-lord-reckoner]

GREAT song, by the way !!

[regular-lord-reckoner]

i've got one more day left of my time off from work and i......really wish i could have a whole extra week at this point lol

it hasn't been a bad week, necessarily, but it's just been...a lot

for starters, i didn't really get a lot of time to recover from my niece's birthday party/ensuing mental breakdown over all the coursework i have to do before sliding right into another work week so by the time i did finally get to my first day off, which was last friday, i had really been looking forward to having that day to try to reset somewhat but one of my aunts had actually come up from florida to visit with my grandmother and while i thought she wasn't going to come see us until saturday she decided to come over on friday !!

so, literally as i was out trying to do my friday errands i had to cut that short to get back home because my mom was also out running errands and wouldn't be done until after my aunt got there so i just decided to go to the grocery store on monday instead and booked it back home so i could have about an hour of peace and quiet before she got there (i love my aunt and she'll tell you this, too but she talks a mile a minute and never stops talking so i knew i needed to charge up a little before we started that up)

she actually didn't stay too long, she got up super early on sunday to drive back so i'm glad i took the time over the weekend to visit with her, especially because i don't see her that much, but in the back of my head i was kind of panicking because i had so much stuff to do for school and that ended up being two days i didn't get anything done and then sunday i decided to take as both a holiday and day to finally reset my brain so pretty much the entire weekend i didn't get shit done for my school work

oh, and to add to why i was so worn out, my other aunt and her partner who also used to live in florida have now moved up here to be closer to us which is nice and i missed seeing them as well, but they also enjoy a good yap session and even though it wasn't that long ago that both aunts were feuding they've seemed to have put their differences aside and have made up for the time being, so actually on saturday they came over to join my mom, my other aunt and me for an early celebration for my mom's birthday

monday i did finally get around to going to the grocery store and also finally managed to get some school work done, but not as much as i would have liked because i was still pretty exhausted by that point and i had class later that day so there was that

same thing by tuesday which was actually my mom's birthday so while i did manage to squeeze a little school work in i wanted to make sure to spend some time with her as well and my aunt and her partner joined us for her official birthday dinner so i didn't get as much done then either

wednesday i got a little more done but had class again so a good portion of the week has been "hey, i have like one or two things i gotta do today but they're later in the day so theoretically i should have plenty of time to do other stuff before then and yet......i don't feel like i can do much of anything else". still, i did manage to squeeze in some work and as the week has bled into the weekend i've progressively gotten more and more done

as of right now i've got all of my reading done for both classes for the upcoming week (yipee !) and i've got a draft of the discussion board post i need to make before monday's class but i'm still working on the wording of it so whenever i figure that out i'll toss it up there and we'll be good to go on that (my other two discussion board posts don't have to be done until the start of the following monday's class so i've got plenty of time on that)

i've also got the first few discussion posts for my other class done and it looks like maybe the rest of the work for this week isn't going to be quite as heavy so i'm going to try my best to get it done with whatever time i have left after work monday, tuesday and wednesday before class (thank god it's a 9 pm class)

my biggest focus, however, has been on an essay i had to write for one of my classes and then getting into the real meat and potatoes of the big project i'm stressing about big time

the essay i got done today i need to just go over and make a few revisions here and there but i'm pretty happy with it and it was pretty simple since it's a reflective essay on our beliefs and goals as librarians so i think i did alright with it (usually writing is my strong suite so finger crossed that's still true lol)

this fucking project, however..............my god the way it's taken up most of this fucking day for me

first of all, this project is just...so unbelievably big it really boggles my mind how i'm supposed to do it in about 2 months time

it's a reference scenario where we each choose a prompt about a person who's trying to find some information about a given subject and we get to decide what the subject will be and have to come up with a research question based off this prompt and then collect resources to answer the information need so like...that sounds interesting, that sounds doable, right?

except there are so many moving parts to this fucking thing every time i look at the requirements i feel like my brain starts leaking out of my ears

first we have to obviously describe our scenario, that makes sense, but we also have to give a few paragraphs to describing who our imagined user is so we come up with this whole background and give as much detail as possible and then we have to describe in a few more paragraphs what exactly the information need is (even though that was...kinda already described in the first part)

the second part (which is actually later in the format of the project; the first part was A&B but for some reason we skip over to part E) is something called librarian opinion and i've already fucked this one up and didn't turn in my draft (it's only two points, but fucking still) because !! even though i reached out to my local library weeks ago i never heard anything back from anyone and as the date for this assignment being due was drawing closer i decided to branch out and touch base with all five locations of another nearby library to see if anyone there could help and didn't hear back from anyone there either !!! (well, actually one guy did get back with me but it went to my spam folder and even though i'd been checking that just in case i didn't see it in time)

essentially what this portion of the assignment is is connected to yet another part of the project which is the librarian interview and again for some reason these two parts are split up, but the librarian opinion is supposed to be i guess a summation of the insights you'll glean from the interview portion about how this librarian approaches their work and reference work in general ?? i guess ??

everything about this portion of the project just has me like !!!! because even though i've tried i just...couldn't get this part done in time (again i think part of it had to do with me thinking, "oh, that part comes later, i have time" only to realize "oh shit, that's actually due soon !!" and then it dawned on me, "hey, it's been several days now and nobody's getting back to me...") i think there's something in there about how the librarian interview portion will be set up in slides we'll be presenting to the class or some shit ?? (i know i should know this and i'll probably have to end up getting clarification about this part in class or through email at some point but we'll cross that bridge when we finally get this goddamn interview done)

in any case, i reached out to my professor both as per my advisor's recommendation to let her know i'm kinda struggling with all of this and to also let her know why i wouldn't be turning in my draft for the librarian opinion part and so she was really nice about it and offered to connect me with a librarian she knows so i've finally got my interview scheduled for this upcoming week and should at the very least be able to turn in that draft on time so thank fuck for that. i was a little :/ though because in regards to me struggling in class my professor offered to post reminders about upcoming due dates, like.....yeah, i appreciate it and i did thank her for that but also it's just not really that helpful. a big part of why i just wanted to quit in the first place is because i knew there wouldn't be any actual accommodations possible, it's one of those things where either you're able to do it or you're not and so that's that confirmed, i guess

aaaaaaaanyway, the actual meat and potatoes is the part i worked on today and the next draft that's due. all told we have to find fifteen different sources for our hypothetical library user so they can get the answers they're looking for and for this draft in particular we only had to find the first three, but when i tell you this shit took me several hours (most of my goddamn day) i am not joking or being hyperbolic in the slightest

once you find a source you then have to give its citation, include a picture of the source and describe the search process to find said source. pretty simple, nothing too crazy

but then there's this chart you have to fill out for each one (also god in heaven the amount of time it took me to figure out how to get my hands on a copy of this chart that i could just copy and paste into word; i was thiiiiis close to just trying to recreate it my damn self but that would have taken me so much longer) and this chart has you list out the keywords you're using as well as alternative search terms that might be helpful and what operators you use to string them together (so AND, OR or NOT) and then underneath that you have to describe your search strategies, then describe how you went about your search (so y'know...search process.....), then talk about why you chose the reference you did and then describe what limitations that source may have.

okay, still not too bad, right? a little repetitive in some parts, but nothing crazy

but then !!!

you also have to describe two additional resources that you found in your search process that you discarded and then explain why you did so. so in other words....for each of these fifteen sources there will be an additional two sources to have to account for (although not document as thoroughly, thank fuck, but still.......)

and just when you think it's over, you better buckle up because the fun just keeps going !!

the next section involves evaluating your source and there's this long list of criteria you can use to evaluate with but you have to choose at least five (and three of them are always on there) and so for the chosen source you have to explain it from the perspective of its authority, audience, accessibility, format, objectivity, limitations, etc., etc.

and finally, last but not least, you have to describe how and why this source meets your user's information need by referencing specific parts about the source and connecting it to the scenario (also tbh i'm sure that's the part i did the worst on for each of these but especially considering our first source is a book.......dude, i'm not reading an entire book just so i can tell you specifically what's in it and how that relates to the information some made up person is looking for; i based what i said off the chapter titles and if that's not good enough then fuck me i guess)

so yeah, that's basically the heart of the project, but there's also a few more parts to it that i also can barely wrap my head around but there's something called an executive summary bit where i guess we'll answer the user's information query to the best of our ability (i already know that's gonna be a landmine for mine because we've already covered how librarians cannot give medical advice and my scenario is one where someone's seeking medical information so...yay) but there's also a portfolio markup which i think is where we'll use a bunch of documents we've gone over so far in class and have to reference a lot of that information to the actual reference scenario (i would explain it better but my brain.....she's tired) and then finally there's a reflection piece which is...well, a reflection and that i think is the whole project

so like....am i crazy for thinking that's just kind of a lot for a project you get barely two months to complete? in addition to having 60-80 pages to read every week as well as several 20 minute long lecture videos to watch and ~ten discussion board posts (some of which are after prompts that are like "spend some time going over these ten different definitions of the same concept (each one will be ten pages long) and then decide which one most aligns with your values and explain why and then also create your own definition) ??

it just kinda feels like a lot and again i keep thinking about the fact that my advisor mentioned something about how this class when it's taught in person is almost a month longer so.......why hasn't this been curated to be about a month's less amount of content ? or has it and it's still just...this much ?

i dunno.

i get that grad school is supposed to be hard, it's supposed to challenge you, it's supposed to get you on that ~higher level thinking shit, but i feel like it gets to a fucking point, y'know ??

i feel like this project is something i could definitely do if i had more time to do it and i get what it's trying to teach me, but the stress of trying to get it done before the timer runs out is kinda robbing me of that and honestly it just feels like i'm throwing spaghetti at the walls and hoping it'll stick

and of course on top of it all i'm just....still really tired and worn out mentally. i know my life isn't as busy as it often feels, but from my perspective it's like nothing ever stops and every moment of the day there's just...something for me to do or some new piece of information is being handed to me and i'm drowning in stimuli but every time i try to take a break i just....can't

i dunno. i keep telling myself i just gotta get through this term and see how this all plays out but it feels like it's going to be a painful and frantically hurried rush to that finish line and i can't help but keep thinking that i wish i'd never set out to do this in the first place or at least had gone about it differently (i.e. volunteered at the library first for a while just to get established and make connections, plus really see what the job is like up close and then maybe tried to become a librarian assistant or something like that). i really don't know why in god's name i decided to just shoot for the big guns right out the gate but here we are !!

i'm also feeling pretty dubious about continuing this program now in any case because i know i'm going to have more projects and assignments in the future that'll require me to work with my local library and being that the response thusfar has been this lackluster i'm really not sure how that's going to pan out

then again, i'm also trying not to do that thing where i talk myself out of something (which i'm very good at, clearly) just because i'm overwhelmed and anxious. i know that this is just part of the process of change and growth and that you have to be willing to live with uncertainty and uncomfortable feelings for a while until you get there, but more and more every day i just keep thinking to myself "hey yeah, this actually isn't for me after all and i should quit once this term is over before i get any more invested"

but for right now i'm just trying to take it one day at a time and hopefully by the end of this term i'll have my answer as to whether or not i want to continue down this path. hopefully even if i do decide this isn't for me after all i can grow to not regret this decision as much and instead just take the good parts of it with me and call it a learning lesson in life or some shit but for right now it's still hard to not kick my own ass on this one

anyway.......i say all of this to say i think i'm finally at a place with all this work where i can take tomorrow, the last day of my vacation, and just...turn my brain off

i'm not going to do any coursework because my brain needs a fucking break and i need a day to just breathe before i have to jump back in to work and then class again on monday

so !!!! hopefully it's a good day. hopefully i take in as little stimuli as possible and barely have to think or speak or type or do fuck all because while it hasn't been a bad week, it has certainly not been the restful and resetting experience i hoped it would be and so i need just....one fucking day to myself and maybe if i take that i can get through the rest of this shit without losing my gd mind !! :D

(also cannot emphasize enough how overstimulated i am from how many emails i've had to send this week alone but also i guess now in pretty much every class session we're going to break out into groups or two or three and so i end up talking every time i have class which is fine but they're also night classes and usually after i've already worked a full day so when i tell you it really feels like i never get a moment of peace anymore.....i mean it !! can't even just sit quietly and learn stuff, i gotta converse and try not to sound as lost as i feel when discussing all this stuff with my classmates ! i am......not having a good time in life right now, if that wasn't obvious)

as always, if you've read all this bullshit i really appreciate it and hope you also have a restful and quiet sunday as much as you possibly can <3

[regular-lord-reckoner]

well, after giving it some more thought (and myself the ability to emotionally regulate again) i think i've decided to stick with my program after all

that's kinda the bitch of getting overstimulated is that once i hit my fucking limit i really just want to quit everything (including life) and it takes me a while to step back from that ledge, my friend

i spent a good portion of this week just...crying. and crying some more. and then when i was done with that i scheduled in some more crying

i honestly don't think i've cried that hard since my dad died, i was.....not doing well at all

i decided not to attend my monday class and allowed myself some time to back away from my coursework and i think that helped me be able to breathe a bit

i also talked to my student advisor who was really helpful

essentially if i drop my classes now while it wouldn't affect anything on my transcript i'd still have to pay for the classes so like...what the fuck, why not, y'know?

these classes will be over in june, so before i know it, and if i'm going to have to pay for them anyway then like...might as well

he told me that i actually have until the week before classes finish to withdraw without it impacting anything so if i get to that point and realize i'm not going to pass i can just drop the classes and no harm done

he also encouraged me to reach out to my professors to just let them know my situation and see if there's anything they might be able to do, so i'm going to spend some time this weekend trying to get those sent (i'm mostly struggling to think of how to word it, but i do think it would be a good idea to just have them be in the loop)

i'm also now officially on vacation from work, too and will be for a week so i should have more time to take it slow through some of this work and not feel as pressured

generally speaking, though, i think it helps that i'll no longer be pushing myself like i was before which is not to say i'm not going to try, i do still want to give it as much effort as i can muster, but i'm just not going to push myself to my breaking point over it. and i figure if i get to the end of this term i'll either see that i am capable of doing this after all and should stick with it or that it's actually not for me and then that would be the time to cut my losses and bow out

i also figure, too if i do decide to continue there's no way in hell i'm taking two classes at once ever again

yeah, it'll take me longer to finish but like...who gives a fuck, i want to still have weekends !! and time after work to relax !!

in retrospect i think if i could have just started this thing out with only one class at a time i wouldn't have gotten anywhere near as overwhelmed, but we're here now so i just have to adapt as best as i can and this whole experience within itself has been a learning lesson, so that's something !

and although i was tired as hell, i did manage to make it to my wednesday class which i'm glad for because i think it helped make some of the things i was struggling to get a grasp on a little easier to understand and my professor really does seem like she wants us to succeed and is available for help if we need it, so i feel like i can breathe a little easier

so...yeah. i hate that i got to this dramatic place with things whenever i get that overwhelmed but that's just how it is sometimes and i think in a way i tend to kind of need to just...let all of that play out and cry it out and then i can sort of reset things and go, "oh, okay, all hope isn't actually lost after all, i can do this," so there's that

anyway, i'm going to get some sleep now because it's been a long week and i'm very much relieved to finally be through it and hopefully will be able to recharge my batteries some more this upcoming week

thanks to everyone who gave me some advice and reassurance, i really appreciate it !

hope if you're reading this you have a good weekend coming up or at the very least a restful one. <3

[regular-lord-reckoner]

i think i might drop out of my masters program

i just...don't think i can do this, nor do i feel like i actually want to do this at this point

damn near every free moment i've had has been spent doing homework and working on a big project i have for one of my classes and it's just so much reading and watching videos and lectures and i know on paper that doesn't seem like a big deal and it's just part of the process so just suck it up and do it, but i don't know that i can quite honestly

i've been sitting here bawling my eyes out for the past hour because i feel so completely fucking stupid that i can't do this and why did i even try to do this in the first place, why did i tell people i was doing this, why did i get so invested?

i should have just...volunteered at the library. that's what i should have done and that would have been plenty and then too i could have really seen, "hey, is this something i would want to do as a full time job? would i be good at this?", but for some stupid fucking reason i wanted to do something that i could be proud of and thought maybe i could have an actual career and one that's rewarding and does some good at that, wouldn't that be nice?

it all sounded right on paper, it all seemed to make sense, i got into a really good program and everyone was so impressed but i've just been sitting here feeling like i'm losing my actual goddamn mind because it's just....too much and now i'm at a point where i don't know that this is even a job i would actually want anymore

i wish i'd never pursued this in the first place, i wish i'd just kept doing what i had been and never got this deep into it, never tricked myself into thinking i could because i really don't think i can and that fucking kills me

i feel so goddamn dumb that i keep sitting here trying to take in this material and it's just....not going in. and yeah, maybe if i had all the time in the world to just sit here all day long rereading and rewatching all of this stuff over and over and over again until it does finally sink in then maybe, but that's just not possible and it fucking kills me that i can't just...do it.

it's like i'm sitting here right now trying to get through the last bit of stuff i need to because i have class tomorrow and i feel like i'm just phoning all of this in and everyone else is grasping the information so well and knows what they're doing and yeah sure maybe that's just my perception, maybe they feel like they're throwing spaghetti at the wall, too but it's also like...hey, this is just the beginning, i still have over a year of this to go and if i'm already this mentally exhausted from just this is this really a path i need to try to force myself down? i don't know

i'm sure it's not helped either by the fact that i went to one of my niece's birthday parties yesterday and i love them, i love spending time with them, but it's also just.....incredibly exhausting because they demand my constant attention and i was already feeling pressured because i really needed yesterday to do some of this work, it wouldn't be so stressful if i could have had that extra day, but we spent three and a half hours driving up there and three and a half hours driving back and so that was pretty much an entire day of homework i could have been doing gone and on top of that it just...drained me

i still tried to do some when i got home but absolutely none of it was sinking in and i've been at it all day today just trying to hammer through and i'm reaching that point where even when i take short breaks to try to reset my mind it just feels like it's not working and so realistically i need a full day of just...not doing homework, but that's just not possible and so again i'm wondering like...is this actually going to be realistic?

especially if i were to get to the point of a fall semester when the holidays crop up, how in god's name am i going to have the energy for all of that and still keep up with all my work and in the process not lose my absolute fucking mind

i feel like i never have free time anymore, it's just work and school work and school and i get it, there are plenty of people who do both and raise a family and have hobbies and social lives and they pull it all off gracefully and i'm so fucking envious of that, but i don't think i can push myself to be that kind of person or in my case even a fraction of that person since my plate is much less full

i guess ultimately i'll try to get done whatever i can today and then sleep on it and maybe by tomorrow i'll have a better idea of how i'm feeling and i can reach out to one of my student advisors to see what i should do

it just sucks because i know i have a reputation of being someone who just...doesn't do things, who never really accomplishes anything and always gives up when the going gets tough and i feel like such a complete fucking loser because of it and i really wanted to be able to do something like this to prove to myself that i can accomplish things, even if they're hard but then here i crying like a fucking child because i'm so overwhelmed and exhausted from just barely getting my feet wet

so it's like...do i stay and try to force myself through this and feel miserable while doing it or do i quit and feel miserable either way?

i mostly just really wish i'd never tried this and i know it's the whole "well, you gotta try or else you'll never know" but this feels like such a painful failure and waste of everyone's time and resources on me when i should have known better that this was never going to work

i think i'm gonna go take a break for a little bit and then at least try to finish the stuff i need for tomorrow and worry about the rest of it later because right now i just....can't

[regular-lord-reckoner]

well, i am...finding out the hard way that i cannot, in fact, leave my homework to be done on the weekends...

i guess i should have already started before class even began, so...that's on me, but i spent pretty much all day yesterday and all day today just......reading. and writing discussion board posts. and watching little lecture videos. and reading articles. and just....so much reading

i knew one of the courses i'm taking is one of the most coursework heavy classes in the entire program, but just.......jesus fucking christ it's already so much work out the gate, so much information i'm trying to process and i already have assignments that are creeping up on me and big projects i need to be thinking about and yes i did spend a good portion of today crying and freaking out because i don't know how i'm going to do all of this but we're....gonna try, i guess !!!

the kicker? i'm STILL not done with the stuff for wendesday's class so even though i'm pretty sure week two's shit is going to open up tomorrow i'm going to have to try to finish my last few lecture slides and discussion posts before then and then hop on that before i fall behind once again

i guess if nothing else if i can make it to my week off from work i'll do my very best to get caught up to the point where i'm as far ahead as i can because i'm already struggling to figure out how i'm going to find time to do all of this every week and not lose my goddamn mind

in any case, i think i'll start by getting up an hour earlier tomorrow so i can get a jump on work and then give myself some extra time before my monday class' live session to finish up shit from last week (fortunately the monday class' work load isn't anywhere near as bad, but i still need to keep an eye on it and not fall behind on that either)

anyway, i guess we've officially begun this journey, here's to hoping i don't blow it or lose my mind trying to do it !

[regular-lord-reckoner]

i spent a good chunk of yesterday and today feeling highly stressed due to my own idiocy so let me regale you with that tale, shall i?

so, my classes are stating this week and like any good procrastinator i didn't log in to check on things until yesterday where upon entering the digital campus i realized i...only saw one of my courses being displayed ??

and me being who i am, i naturally start freaking out because what the fuck, what do you mean, where did it go, oh god oh god, this was a mistake, oh shit

anyway, that went on for a while until i calmed down enough to think, "let me just log into my email and see what's going on" because i know i tripled checked my registration and made sure both of my classes were there, so what gives?

welllllll for whatever reason, the password that was autosaved for my email (same one i'd written down in my notes app on my phone) was not working

so that kinda enhanced the panic, but i was like, "it's fine, it's fine, i'll just reset it and then we'll be fine" well......

in my frenzied state i barely registered a warning after i reset my password telling me to wait an hour before trying to log in so naturally i take my new shiny password and immediately start trying to beat down the doors of my wretched email account with it only to, ripley's believe it or not, not be able to get in !!

i'm feeling especially antsy at this point but am also like...still at work, so eventually i'm like, "ok fuck it, i'm just going to leave this alone for a few hours and come back and try again" so i did just that only to find that...nope, still didn't work !!

SO i reset the password again but this time i decide to actually follow the instructions and y'know...wait at least an hour before trying to log in, so i go back to my work and try not to think about it and after a few hours i was finally done with that (although apparently so preoccupied i forgot to clock out, lol. i put in a punch request to fix it so we're all good, but christ was i distracted apparently XD) and thankfully by that time my new, new password was finally working so...yippee !!

only...no yipee because as soon as i got in there i realized i had not one, but two fucking emails telling me that that course had been canceled and that i could try to enroll in another one before march 12th so uh....panic back in full swing !!

i did try to still enroll anyway because i could see there was a class that was still open, but every time i tried it just bumped me to another screen where i had to verify all this information i'd already verified the first time i signed up for classes so i figured the door to that was probably just shut for good and that was the page it would automatically redirect to instead and decided to just accept my fate

i'd actually gotten to a point of being like, "well, okay, this kinda throws off the timetable i had in my mind, but maybe it'll be better this way if i just take one class right now, at least to get me started because two might be too overwhelming right now anyway..." and i was slowly accepting that until about 3:30 last night when i woke up in a panic because i realized that class was actually the first one i'm supposed to take for the program so....y'know, neat !! awesome !! i love when i just....fuck everything up, i love it !!

had to just sorta scroll around on my phone for about an hour before i could get back to sleep because i needed to distract myself from the bad feelings of my utter fuck up BUT this story does have a happy ending !!

you see i also just so happened to have a meeting with one of my student advisors today just so we could check in before classes start and so i told him about my fuck up and he was like, "oh, you should still be able to enroll !"

as it turned out that screen it kept redirecting me to is something that's going to pop up every time i try to enroll in classes and he said there was a part at the bottom of the page to check off that i'd verified everything (it already says verified next to each tab after i visit it, but there's a whole extra button to press and in my defense...it was worded kinda weird to where it said something like "is all of this information correct ?" but the checkbox said no with no other option and yet when i clicked it it turned to yes and then finally let me back into the enrollment thing instead of into an editing feature like i just assumed it would so.....there's that; i love when things are needlessly unintuitive, it's my favorite !!)

so yeah, after figuring that out i am now indeed enrolled in both classes once more and fortunately that one doesn't start until monday so i have some time to go over any materials i need to look over and complete any assignments before class starts

my other class actually starts tomorrow so i've already looked over my stuff and posted on the discussion board (just a little "hey, here's me and my pronouns what classes i'm taking" thing) and so i think i'm finally ready to do this damn thing !!

it's just kinda funny because i was already nervous enough as is about all of this, but it's nice to know that my own stupidity will always be there to make sure that an already stressful situation can be somehow even more stressful !! (also i know i'm not actually an idiot, i'm just ribbing on myself for making a silly mistake, this is all in good fun)

hopefully everything from here on out will be smooth sailing and as nervous as i am to wade into uncertain waters i'm also still pretty excited

i mean, yeah, i think i picked probably the absolute worst fucking time i possibly could have to decide to become a librarian and there may not be any sort of career in it for me when i get done, but it still feels like the right thing to do so i'm going to follow that impulse until i hit an actual brick wall, i guess

in the mean time, i've been visiting my local library more and have been checking out some books from there and the last time i was there i asked if there was anything i could do to support them with everything going on right now and the person i spoke to gave me an application to become a volunteer so i turned that in on saturday and am now just anxiously awaiting to see if i get approved because i figure it nothing else let me try to do some good now and also go ahead and get as much experience as i can because working alongside the library is eventually going to be part of this program, so the sooner i start the better

there's a large part of me that's just kicking my own ass for not having done all of this sooner, but i recognize that i can't go back to the past and change things so i'm just going to continue on this path and see where it takes me while hoping for the best !

anyway, i hope if you've read this far you've enjoyed this somewhat amusing tale and let this be a reminder to check your dang email !!! (i also haven't been checking one of my personal emails and didn't realize my antivirus software was about to upgrade to the tune of almost $50 that nearly overdrew my account so....i really need to do better about staying on top of these stupid little electronic pieces of mail....)

i also hope if you're reading this that your week is free from as much stress as possible and that you get a good piece of news soon !

i'm gonna go to bed now because i've slept like shit that past few nights and my class is from 9 pm to 11 pm so i'm gonna need all the rest i can get. see ya !! <3

[regular-lord-reckoner]

very hard to do

7 colors 40 frames

[regular-lord-reckoner]

[regular-lord-reckoner]

my familys cats are outdoors now, I can't do anything about it, and i was looking up whether putting bells on them would help keep them from killing birds, and amidst the articles and studies that were like "yeah putting a bell on the cat could reduce their prey catching ability by 30-40%" there were a bunch of articles like "RAAAH bells do nothing bells don't work the ONLY thing that will work is keeping your cat indoors ONLY"

So much for harm reduction huh

[regular-lord-reckoner]

golden horizons -

my shop | kofi wallpaper

[regular-lord-reckoner]

Someone not responding to you right away does not mean that you’re not important to them. I know it can be hard, but other people are allowed to be busy, or even just not have the energy to respond to you. This doesn’t mean they don’t care about you.

[regular-lord-reckoner]

[regular-lord-reckoner]

how u doing

im not thinking about it

[regular-lord-reckoner]

Shoutout to the toxic yuri going on in House where a patient let her girlfriend give her part of her liver despite the fact that she was planning to leave her because "she got bored of her," and the girlfriend knew the patient was planning to leave her but gave her the liver anyway so that she'd be trapped in the relationship out of guilt