#i do NOT need a HR degree to learn how to learn how to write GOOD job ads

[iampikachuhearmeroar]

god. sometimes i really hate those "10 jobs that you can do WITHOUT a qualification that pay over 100k" and they list something like "human resource management" 130k a year!!! when like. EVERY fucking HR job (and other jobs like this, say like librarian- something that i PAID 17k for and burnt out for in postgrad lmao) strictly DEMAND that candidates must have 1-2 years experience AND an HR DEGREE.

very, very, very, very rarely i see something in HR requiring a TAFE (aussie technical college) certificate (ie MUCH cheaper- 7k) or a diploma in HR. it's almost always a degree, barely EVER "no quals or equivalent experience or similar quals"... even for entry level jobs in hr or most defs management positions.

[sgtmickeyslaughter]

Weekly tag Wednesday - The google search edition!

hi @mybrainismelted @energievie @lingy910y @creepkinginc @thepupperino @em-harlsnow @blue-disco-lights !! hope you guys are having stunning wednesdays

Name:  gigi <3

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? (or you): 

posting from my very pacific northwest writing setup for this week

Ok, so this week we are going to snoop into your google search.  Type in each phrase and tell us what the first suggestion is that google gives you!

What is the best way to…. learn a language (I probably have googled that before and whatever they said didn't work)

Where can I…. Buy stamps (i definitely googled this when i left home for college, the answer is any deli)

How old is…. the earth 🌎

How long does it take… how long does it take to run a marathon (it took me 2 hrs and 15 min to run a half)

How many… bedrooms in the Gallagher house! ( I may need to draw beautiful floor plans/section and elevations one day)

Who set the record for…. highest jump!

When did…. ww2 start (1939 with the german invasion of poland! thanks AP euro)

What does it feel like to… outside (60 degrees and partly cloudy)

Can you…can you make notification sounds for different apps? (def a gigi google)

When you… wish upon a star (Make no difference who you are/ Anything your heart desires/Will come to you)

Why do… n't my tag links work tumblr

Is there a way… to unsend an email (def never googled that, i may not proof read fics but i do proof read emails and i said what i said)

How old do you have to be…to rent a car

Where do the…kraken play

What is the best time to…book flights

And to finish us off….What comes up when you type in Shameless? drumming bird song ( i googled this after going to his show in chicago and he talked about having a song in shameless )

tagging below:

@jrooc @mmmichyyy @iansw0rld @ian-galagher

@atthedugouts @spookygingerr @mickeym4ndy @heymrspatel

@doshiart @gallawitchxx @mickeysgaymom @especially-fuk-u

@mickittotheman @solitarycreaturesthey @deathclassic @softmick

[xiaq]

(this can be answered publicly) Hey X, pardon me if you’ve answered this before, but I was just curious on how you ended up transitioning from academia to tech and what role you started with in tech? Also, so you have any advice for someone looking to break into tech from a non-STEM background? Thank you!

Hey! I haven't answered it publicly but it's a popular question, so I will now (warning, long answer is long).

So I was so fed up with academia for sundry reasons I won't get into here but I wanted a career that would allow me to A. retire some day (something that paid generally well), B. would allow me some measure of work/life balance without high stress, and C. Would ideally let me use my communication/writing/speaking/presenting skills in some way.

My parents and my partner all work in tech and were like, "did you know that we desperately need people with your skillsets in the tech world?" and my partner, who works in technical sales was like, "You would kill at my job, I am not lying." And I was like, every job listing in technical sales that I see requires either a degree I don't have or past experience I don't have, or both, and my mother was like "Do you know how many mediocre resumes from unqualified men come across my desk? Apply for the damn positions anyway." So I reworked my resume to focus on applicable skills/experiences and wrote a cover letter for each position I applied to saying "hey, I know I'm an odd candidate but let me tell you why that's a good thing." And I got a lot of positive responses!

I was interviewing at 2 different tech places when I accepted the offer for my job now. I had an initial screening call interview with HR, then a zoom interview with the hiring manager, and then I was given access to a limited demo environment and had a week to teach myself the software and put together a demo for a fake customer which I did for the hiring manager (my future boss), one of my current peers, and the VP of the org. I was offered the job the same night I did my fake demo. So in total it was a 2 week interview process, and I started working 2 weeks later. **

I'm a pre-sales solutions consultant, which basically means I'm paired with a sales guy who does all the money and business value talk with customers, while I get to learn about a customer's data problems and then demo for them how our products can address those problems.

The learning curve was (and still is) steep. But it was basically like going back to school, and I've always loved learning new things. The job is super fun. It fulfills all of my wants I listed above with the added bonus of being completely remote (aside from occasional travel to meet with customers for in-person demos). The people I work with are supportive, management is communicative and constantly giving me feedback/talking about my trajectory. I've won internal awards, already received two raises and one promotion and I haven't even been there a year. I'm making more than double what I did as a professor and the concept of retirement doesn't feel like a laughable pipe dream anymore. I miss teaching a lot, but I'm healthier, happier, and better prepared for the future now. And my work is genuinely fulfiling because I'm showing people how they can fix problems. Also, playing with data management software and putting together custom demos is neat. It's like all the best parts of a college project--research, making a preso, knocking everyone's socks off while giving the preso, but I'm getting paid for it. I'm glad I followed my mom's advice.

So I guess my advice is the same as hers: even if you're not "qualified," apply for the position anyway. Make custom cover letters for each position and if there's not a way to include the letter with the app, do some googling and find the hiring manager on LinkedIn and message/email them. The person who hired me said that my cover letter was what got me the initial interview. So that shit works. If you have friends or family working somewhere with open positions, use those connections. Having an internal referral will go a long way to getting your resume looked at. I know we're all like, boo nepo babies, but networking is a huge part of any industry. Use it to your advantage if you have the advantage (no, I'm not working for my parent's companies, but if there'd been an open position I was interested in, I would have applied for it. No shame).

**I also, on the side, applied for the Austin Fire Department because why not. After a whole lot of mental and physical prep, I was accepted to the academy (in the first class, no less, holla) right before I was offered my current job. But I had to be realistic and say that probably wasn't a good long-term career option for someone who is 110lbs and was barely meeting the physical testing requirements who also has issues with getting overwhelmed in high-input sensory situations. So. Into the tech world I went. This side note just to say, I was keeping my options very open and there's nothing wrong with that either, lol.

I hope this helps!

[compo67]

Hi Cal! How are you doing?

Oh, anon. This is so kind of you to ask. <3

I am on the verge of okay. My father is leaving for Chile in a few days, so I will be getting a long, much-needed break from caregiving. I will be able to focus on myself and school, I won't have to drive so much, and I'll be able to stay at his place when I need alone time away from my own household.

But I will also be worried about him. If he needs something, I can't just hop into my car and drive over. And he can't just hop on a plane and fly back. I will have to just... learn how to let go a little.

More under the cut. TLDR; it's been a struggle these past few weeks.

My depression has been a lot to deal with. I'm sleeping too much and my moods are kind of all over the place. I'm also going through writer's and artists' block. Everything I try to write or draw comes out wrong. It's super frustrating and even more depressing. So I'm back to finding little pleasure in things that usually bring me joy. I have been working hard at my mental health through therapy, group therapy, and taking all my meds. Maybe with a break from caregiving, things will pick up.

I'm taking 3 classes this semester, but the school bundles it into one class--with sections in thirds. One section takes six weeks, another six, and another four. I'm in it for the long haul--I won't graduate until mid-May. I am not thrilled to be in this program (Human Resources Management), but I am very grateful that I get to go to school (it's good for my mental health) and it's way cheaper than grad school. But then again, I miss grad school a lot. I just couldn't afford it anymore. My plan is to find a good part-time job in HR, make some money, save some, and then, once I'm settled, go back to grad school and finish the second half of that degree. I really miss academic reading and writing.

And yet, I still don't want to go into the field of academia. :P

I wish I had a mentor. There's a mentor program at the local HR association near me, I'm just unsure if I should take part in it.

Chronic illness wise, I'm all right. I'm getting regular monthly infusions that have been helping my RA. My joints are loosey goosey like always, but my pain has come down from a 7-8 to a 5-6 most days. I'm so grateful for the relief. Part of that is from PT, edibles, acupuncture, a new muscle relaxer, and rest.

I'm trying to focus on going back to work. It's just kinda overwhelming to think about going back to a very structured routine, where right now I have a very flexible routine. Then I get into self-doubt, anxiety, etc. etc.

So. Overall? I think I'd average it out to: I'm okay. I'm hanging on. I wish I could write and draw more, so I could post more, but I am also trying to take the advice of many readers: rest and recharge.

I just have to trust that this will all work out in the end.

Thank you, anon. It was so cathartic to write this out. :)

[mserm]

What Avengers line up (existing or selected by you) would you send to Greendale Community College for max hijinx and personal journeys? They can be 1-1 stand ins for the Community cast or just a general, “it would be funny/entertaining/sexy if this character had to deal with going to a bananas community college in Colorado with these other characters”. Or if you want! send an Avenger or 2 too spend a semester with the canon Community gang, MCU Tony hanging out with Troy&Abed, maybe Ults Steve talking the Shirley about god and their discomfort around The Gays™ or befriending Pierce and then punching him in the face after a while, Any!Carol and Britta NotDating but being put up on the blog “Sibling or Dating” then actually dating to Prove A Point and the messy break up

(Tony would make a good Jeff tbh, and canon or AU, I’d like to see Tony have to go take the general classes at a normal pace amongst the general populous OR other Avengers. I can see the Dean (or like say Nick Fury sr/jr) forcing him to not get any accelerated courses or special treatment so he has to attend every class and do the homework one week at a time, no doing it all in one day and just handing it in throughout! He in fact gets special treatment to not get special treatment cus the assignments are planned out for everyone else to see but Tony as special assignments he can’t pre-write lol.)

(( Why Tony needs to get a college degree and why THIS school? Maybe when he got into MIT as a teen he wanted to skip the general undergraduate year and bribed someone to let him just go straight to Engineering and the press found out and to save face his dad is making him get an undergraduate year one level amount of general credits the slow way at a not so prestigious school or he gets cut off publicly and Tony is like “pshaw, easy old man” and then there is much learning (emotional). But near of the academic year there has maybe not been much learning (academic) as Tony would crave (and also the “professors are often factually incorrect and the textbooks are from 1985) so he starts teaching his own classes in the library on a lark one episode and he gets in trouble with the teacher's union for teaching without being part of the union, this somehow leading to a strike and oops Tony's shut down the school right near exams (also there was a fire in the server room and all the marks and academic history got destroyed thanks to so,e whacky strike breaking attempts or something!) and now he’s gotta stay for another year cus NO ONE got their credits!!! And when they get back for season 2 I mean the next semester everyone is PISSED at Tony, who has to prove he DIDN’T cause the fire in order to stay an extra year because he’s attached to everyone and wanted to stay!))

(((Also, which Avengers is it? 616, Ults, MCU, a devilish mix of characters from different universes etc and what are they trying to achieve being at college? I assume Steve is trying to get used to the future/connect with the common man, Jan wants to take management or HR courses cus the Avengers NEED IT and SOMEONE has to learn how to do it properly, Myabe Jennifer is the Jeff/MC and Steve&Tony are her Troy&Abed (tho let’s be real they’re her Britta&Annie haha) etc)))

OMG thank you for this ask, there isn't an idea here that I wouldn't drop everything to read. In general this is a concept that would work really well with the Avengers because it allows everyone to be at different points in their lives and still connect with each other. Just imagine them all around the study table. It makes me Feel Things.

If I was doing a Community AU for the Avengers, I wouldn't do a one-for-one substitution but instead try to capture some of the dynamics. I also stuck with just Avengers characters and not Marvel characters in general. For the study group I'd do Ults!Tony as the too-cool-for-school type who is hiding a desperate need for human connection and quickly becomes overly invested in his friends lives. He's in community college because he was ordered to attend by a judge (seems just as possible as getting a law degree without an undergraduate). He chose Greendale because he wanted to take the Who's The Boss class. It would be a running gag that at least one member of the study group doesn't know he's one of the most famous people in the world.

MCU!Steve would be next. My favorite AU trope is when everything's different but Steve's still Captain America, except, like, it's a secret. I'm going with the MCU version because I think he's the most isolated Steve and I like the idea of him being defrosted and having nobody and then moving halfway across the country to restart his life. He never went to college and this feels like the 'normal' thing to do. He's prone to speechifying enough that he's regularly called 'the worst' (affectionate).

Then I'd add 616!Kate Bishop as my third member. She never went to college because she was too busy having an evil dad, a codependent friendship with Clint, and solving mysteries in LA. She enrolls in Greendale while hunting down a lead and then solves the mystery two episodes in, but by then she's committed to figuring out who the fuck this mysterious Steve is. She's too precocious for her own good and regularly volunteers the group for things.

616!America has transferred from Sotomayor University after a particularly messy breakup with an ex-girlfriend. After spending her life hopping between dimensions settling down at Greendale is kind of strange. She likes to threaten to punch people but really she's the most protective in the bunch.

Then let's go with 616!Pietro because you need an asshole that frusterated everyone but he is also well meaning. He's estranged from his daughter and is trying to better himself so that she might want to have a relationship with him. Constantly talks about his twin sister who's never seen throughout the show.

I chose MCU!Clint because you need someone with a real life outside of Greendale. In this AU he's actually trying to be undercover with his family and Colorado is far away from whatever villain is trying to hunt him down.

616!Riri is my last member because I wanted someone who's smart but unlike Tony, also sincere. While Kate and America are also pretty young, Riri's the one that makes everyone feel old. She's the hardest to make up a reason for why she's at Greendale. Maybe she's very close to completing a graduate degree but it turns out some of her undergrad credits were invalid so she needs to take a class and...I dunno. I'm still thinking about it.

Other characters who should show up are Ults!Thor (more righteous than Steve), 616!Sam (the reasonable one), 616!Jennifer (just having a good time), MCU!Carol (just because seeing Brie Larson would be meta), 616!Gwenpool (need someone genre aware), and MCU!Scott (obsessed with Steve.)

The whole thing starts when Tony spots Steve in a physics class he's taking because he thinks it's hilarious. He sells Steve on the idea of being his tutor but Steve invites everyone else. Hijinks ensue. No one figures out who Steve is until paintball.

[jay-lea]

actually fuck it i need to list my old coworkers because it’s insane there were so insane ones

coworker who called out almost every monday from hangovers or went home early while still drunk from the night before bc she was going clubbing during the height of the pandemic for her entire weekends. She actually started her first week during the height of infections by taking off her mask so she could use her phone while telling me about the huge halloween parties she’d done the night before even tho a few of her friends had been exposed to covid. Talked a lot about massaging her lymph node so she could be healthy and begged people not to get vaccinated when our work offered us the vax early for frontline work. Repeatedly told people she had gotten heart conditions from the J&J shot but only after she had just chugged large coffees. wouldn’t wear gloves while touching carcinogens and later we found out she had done all her tests wrong for a solid year too

coworker who had failed out of gen chem 2 times and was failing it a third time when she got hired despite the 4 YEAR SCIENCE DEGREE REQUIREMENT. She poured acid down the sinks and had no idea how a ton of lab stuff worked but everyone said she was nice enough that I shouldn’t be so hard on someone who was still learning. I prev got scrutinized for my degree not being a real science before there. She also liked to come up w rumors about coworkers like that they failed their drug test or were alcoholics and would ask people to take Mormon trivia quizzes w her so they could join her faith. The first time we talked I asked her a generic question about whether she lived w family or pets and she immediately told me graphically about how she killed two turtles by starvation and stopped going to work and school a few months ago bc she didn’t feel like it and not to be shocked, I shouldn’t discriminate about her mental health. She called out a lot, took hours for lunch, and regularly came in an hour late and left hours early while whining that I didn’t stop her from going home so now she would be broke. 

Coworker who immediately told me I was doing stuff wrong the first day she started despite me being there 2 yrs and her being there 1 hour. Routinely tried to quiz people on element names, science, and math to prove she was the smartest person in the room. Called me homophobic for going to pride bc despite the rainbow and trans flags on my locker she couldn’t tell I was gay, then made a joke about me being a top. Took three two-week vacations and then a two week sick leave so she barely existed, then did zero work when she was there but every time I did the actual work of emailing people or writing new lab stuff, she would get mad and rewrite it and personally message our manager asking if I was actually right bc she didn’t think i was right. Got to the point where I was getting migraines every monday and panic attacks on sundays bc she was so goddamn mean to me every week while thinking we were friends bc friends can roast each other. She would talk over me at every meeting and my stutter got so bad I would lose the ability to talk or start forgetting basic words (which she loved bc then she sounded smarter than me). 

the manager who made me publically out myself on department wide meeting awkwardly bc I asked for people to stop making homophobic and transphobic jokes about me. He gave almost every person weeks off or let them get away w leaving early and doing no work bc he said I would handle it and ig is doing the same thing to my replacement rn too

Honorable mentions:

the guy who talked about how he always open carries and implied he was at the moment

the manager that would laugh at me when I did intros w new ppl bc he thought my hobbies were weird and ig was not afraid to let me know it each time

the supervisor obsessed w elon musk who tried to work 80 weeks bc he genuinely believed billionares work 100+ hr weeks and was so tired he made zero sense and didn’t remember how to do anything

the coworker i replaced who would tell two areas she was busy with the other area but then go to a meeting room and nap for the day. she now does mlms full time. 

[douchebagbrainwaves]

I WOULD SPEND ALMOST EVERY WAKING MOMENT EITHER WORKING OR THINKING ABOUT OUR STARTUP

There is one other language still surviving from the 1950s, Fortran, and it is a standard, I won't get in trouble for using it. By the time the acquirer gets them, they're finishing one another's sentences. The acquirers already have brand recognition and HR departments. He thought for a second, and said ok. The term macro does not mean you aren't doing something meaningful, defensible, or valuable. For good and bad technology. There might be 500 startups right now who think they're making something Microsoft might buy. Symbols are effectively pointers. I've read that the same task could be painful to one person and pleasant to another, but are so caught up in their squabble they don't realize it.

We were after the C programmers. But it's all based on one unspoken assumption, and that employers are just proxies for users in which risk is pooled. He thought for a second, and said ok. After a while, most people in rich countries do. Maybe they'll listen to one of the most important quality would be intelligence. You should lean more toward firing people if the source of your trouble is overhiring. But because he doesn't understand the risks, he tends to magnify them. And isn't popularity to some extent its own justification?

It was both a negative and a positive surprise: they were surprised both by the degree to which persistence alone was able to dissolve obstacles: If you pitch your idea to a random person, 95% of the investors we dealt with were unprofessional, didn't seem to be a job. I'm not sure why. An experienced CFO I know said flatly: I would not want to be a total slacker. Why should they wait for VCs to make the cover something you can tell a book by its cover originated in the times when books were sold in plain cardboard covers, to be bound by each purchaser according to his own taste. Given this dichotomy, which of the two paths should you take? This is the kind of possibility that the pointy-haired boss miraculously combines two qualities that are common by themselves, but rarely seen together: a he knows nothing whatsoever about technology, you start to get the wrong answers. If you define a language that talks down to them. A lot of founders that was the big surprise: How hard it is to live in the future. I wrote this for Forbes, who asked me to write something about the qualities we look for in founders.

When you're starting a startup was the value of safe jobs. And usually the acquirer doesn't need anyway. Gone is the awkward nervous energy fueled by the desperate need to not fail guiding our actions. You only need other people to use a language for which he can easily hire programmers? And in accounting that's probably a good idea. Here's a typical reponse: You haven't seen someone's true colors unless you've worked with them on a startup. Why do the founders always make things so complicated?

Don't sit here making up a name for the phenomenon, Greenspun's Tenth Rule: Any sufficiently complicated C or Fortran program contains an ad hoc informally-specified bug-ridden slow implementation of half of Common Lisp. The immense value of the peer group of YC companies, and facing similar obstacles at similar times. If you're small, they don't think it takes years to learn how to make things people want. Suits, who don't know one language from another, and work well together. The company is ultimately doomed. So you can test equality by comparing a pointer, instead of comparing each character. Startups are a comparatively new phenomenon. Refuting the Central Point. Are you kidding? I wonder if these patterns are not sometimes evidence of case c, the human compiler, at work.

What is going on here? You probably didn't have much choice about the secondary schools you went to. There are plenty of undergrads with enough technical skill. After a while, if you could get all three for nothing. These are smart people; if the technology was good, they'd have used it voluntarily. The route to success is to get. Buying larval startups solves that problem for them: the acquirer doesn't pay till the developers have proven themselves. If languages are all equivalent, why should the developers of Java have even bothered to create a named function to return.

There's no rush. Running a startup is not like having a job or being a student, because it would cause the founders' attitudes toward risk tend to be such outliers that your conscious mind would reject them as ideas for companies. And more to the point, nobody knows you're 22. Average age of their founders: 24. There's a shocking amount of shear stress at every point where a startup touches a more bureaucratic organization, like a detective solving a case in a mystery novel. Most programming probably consists of writing little glue programs, and for little glue programs in Lisp too I use it as a desktop calculator, but the people who created it as well. There is a positive side to thinking longer-term. Business guys probably aren't, but hackers are used to a world where skill is paramount, and you don't have significant success to cheer you up, it wears you out: Your most basic advice to founders is just don't die, but the people who have them happier. If you're thinking about getting involved with someone—as a cofounder, an employee, an investor, or an acquirer—and you have misgivings about them, trust your gut. If I haven't, let me clarify that I'm not writing here about Java which I have thought about a lot.

To benefit from engaging with users you have to create a data structure to hold the value of 20 year olds. I try to think How can I write this such that if people saw my code, they'd be happy to take VC money and bet the rest on a bigger outcome. These quotes about luck are not from founders whose startups failed. Morally, they care about getting the big questions right, but not in the middle who see how important luck is. So Dad, there's this company called Apple. The catch is that phrase over time. Most readers can tell the difference between mere name-calling and a carefully reasoned refutation, but I think it will be that bad. But because he doesn't understand the risks, he tends to magnify them.

[miscellennyous]

Should You Major in English

I majored in English in undergrad.

Was that smart? I don't know. Do I regret my decision? Sometimes. Do I think majoring in something else would have solved my problems, watered my crops, and delivered my kingdom from a centuries-long curse? No.

Your Major Doesn't Matter

Oh come on now, you say. Surely that's not true. STEM degrees are just better. They're worth more. There's more job growth in those fields.

So let's talk about the disparity between jobs on paper and jobs in practice. To get a job these days, you have three options:

Apply for hundreds of roles and hope something sticks

"Network" and periodically bother randos about professional development

Be so rich you don't actually have to work

Basically, unless your degree comes with a certification or license that you definitely need to pursue your field of interest, your degree only loosely kind of sort of correlates to where you'll end up [source].

Even just in my small friend group, many of my peers with English degrees went on to work as project managers (construction), HR generalists, sales representatives, and IT specialists.

Meanwhile, of the people I know who graduated with STEM degrees, one worked as a sales representative for an HVAC company (geology), one works as a project manager (civil engineering), and my brother is the odd man out by actually using his chemistry degree for chemistry.

In short, there's a degree of randomness to finding a job after college. Not to mention, if you aren't particularly enthusiastic about coding, math, or chemistry you aren't likely to enjoy doing it for 40 hours a week. Lastly, there might just not be a lot of jobs in your geographic region that require STEM degrees.

So I Should Major in English?

No, probably not. Not unless your university specifically prepares you for career searches because once you graduate no one you talk to will have a goddamn clue how your thesis about Moby Dick demonstrates analytical thinking and writing capability.

I can't comment on what most universities offer, but look for some kind of professional writing, web writing, and career readiness course in the retinue. Literary analysis (the bulk of most English major coursework) is great if you enjoy it. It's less great if you have to convince a recruiter that it's somehow relevant.

What Are English Majors Good At?

English majors are really, really, really good at drafting a whole thought from start to finish. This is a skill that you'll need in any profession. English majors train you in a versatile way to tackle a wide variety of subject matter, even things you aren't necessarily familiar with.

Short version, you're going to learn:

How to read dense text written by some guy who had no idea how to talk to regular people

How to explain that dense text in a logical way

This, coincidentally, prepares you extremely well for roles where you need to somehow translate technical subjects into plain English. This is never a bad thing to know.

Your Plan Will Change

Likely, you'll start off college with some idea of what you want to do and promptly change your mind for some reason or another.

I majored in English because I started as a Psychology major and I hated it. I spotted a factual inaccuracy in one of my textbooks for a 100-level class and couldn't stop doubting the course material. I brought it to my professor's attention and she didn't seem very concerned.

I decided at that point that psych wasn't for me and jumped over to English because I couldn't think of anything else I really wanted to do and biology was really only geared towards premed students.

English was flexible enough that I could study things that interested me without fully committing to any of them. (I went on to become a technical writer, which lets me study things that interest me without fully committing to any of them.)

TLDR

English majors are fine, make sure you take a resume-writing class and try to sneak an internship in there somewhere if you don't wanna get stuck in Academia.

[pacifymebby]

what's it like working in care? I need the money so I've been looking into it for a while. Do you enjoy it? How many days/hours a week do you typically work?

I mean its a tricky one because (idk what country youre in but) in the uk the pay is shite, however like if u need a job and u need money, you can get a job in care pretty easily if u know like, the buzzwords for interview and u can show that ur capable of empathy haha, and then once u have the job you will definitely be guaranteed hours.

I do 30+ hrs a week, and i pick up relief hours at other homes too sometimes, its a really understaffed underfunded sector in the uk so there's always places desperate for staff.

However, its a really understaffed and underfunded sector which means the job can be really draining and you quite often feel like ur giving more than u get. Working in care is the main reason im such an angry commie about everything, like, you really see where the government is failing a huge number of people (both workers and those who rely on care) so it can be very tiring and you high pressure.

HOWEVER

Its also the most fullfilling of all the minimum wage jobs. As someone who has worked in care/supermarkets/cafes/bars, i would never go back to any of those other places. You have v high job satisfaction on a good day because youre interacting with these cool people, like, old people are neat they say cool funny things have stories they wanna tell and theyre just straight up sweet (and even when theyre not and theyre grumpy or square goin yous the situations make good/funny memories after the fact) and also so much of the time the peopke youre working with appreciate you and its a positive two way engagement if that makes sense?

Like in hospitality generally youre faking a smile to be a good employee and the person ur serving isnt even bothering to fake a smile. And 90% of the time u are just serving and waiting on people who dont acknowledge or appreciate you and its literally just a chore etc.

But in care you're building actual bonds with the people you support, theyre happy to see you (most of the time haha) and you genuinely feel good about what you're doing. Ive got some amazing memories of people i met working in care, like just some of the coolest people. And also some of the things im most proud of having achieved too, like, i have a whole degree behind me but the thing im more proud of is that I once taught a young lad with learning disabilities and v v low self esteem, to like sing a song and be happy and confident doing it and he would sing it and do a wee dance and like that was such a big achievement for him and knowing i helped him achieve it is like, wow, cool. Idk if that makes sense?

And i think that like, if youre an empathetic person, and you're also like, able to go with the flow and just sorta roll with whatever weird shit you see then care is a really good job to do. Especially when it's like, you just need a job and your other options are stuff like bar work.

I think most care home jobs in nursing/dementia homes are generally the hardest, you often do a 12 hour shift maybe 3/4 days a week, its long and although "every day is different" its v much a solid routine of getting people up in the morning, washing/dressing/feeding etc, then 15 minute break, then like maybe 1hr of writing up notes and making teas and generally interacting with people, going and changing their positions in bed if they need help with that, answering call bells, personal care/pad changes etc. then getting people ready for lunch/feeding people, then u get your lunch, then you maybe do more notes and the same as in the morning, and then dinner and feeding people and then getting people washed and changed and into bed. And depending on training then youre doing medication rounds too. I didn't work in that kind of home for too long because the shifts were really long and exhausting.

HOWEVER see if you can find a "hospitality" job going in a care home, thats generally minimum wage and instead of doing all the personal care care work, youre maybe serving breakfasts for 2 hours in the morning, then doing a wee tea round for an hour, then knockin around in the dining room getting ready for lunch, then doing lunch, then another tea round, then prepping for dinner and going home. I used to love working that job because it was shorter days but still good hours AND you had so much time to spend interacting with the residents and being that person they could chat too and stuff. It was honestly really good and less stressful.

Also working in the mental health and learning disabilities side of care is really fullfilling too and i think people dont think about it so much when they think about working in care. But supported living homes are really great, theyre usually smaller, usually run by charities rather than evil private companies who are essentially making millions on providing low quality end of life care to people to the 10 years prior to their death (i really really hate private care, i think private care homes should be abolished and care should be brought fully into the NHS) (private care homes are literally a big drain on the NHS i think) (anyway sorry u didnt ask for that opinion haha)

But yeah the charities are always more person centered, more focussed on working with the people you support to live the lives they want to live and to be having a good and healthy time. My best experiences of care are almost all from my time working in supported living homes.

You could also look at drop in and respite places, usually if you just search "support worker" into indeed or a job search then these kind of rolls come up too, where you do day shifts in day centers where people can come to recieve a few hours of one to one support.

I worked the summer holidays at one of those places and my 8-10 hour shifts so often consisted of going to the cinema with kids, going to the park, going on an adventure playground, doing some painting, playing in a sandpit etc... It was obviously stressful at times and like definitely tiring but idk, working in a supermarket or a bar is stressful too and u dont get anywhere near the ammount of positive interaction and job satisfaction ya know?

If u do want to try and get a job in care feel free to message me and I'll help you with like, the kinds of things to include in your personal statement or cv/interview xxx

[justinmark7723]

Should I Take MBA Assignment Help in the USA from an expert?

MBA is the most popular management course. It has good scope in career and provides excellent opportunities in the business and management field. But, the study of the MBA course is not easy. The course includes various specialized filed of management such as finance, HR, hotel management, and so on. When you pursue an MBA degree, you need to study numerous subjects such as economics, accounting, business, etc.

Students are assigned various types of projects during the study as a necessary part of course learning. This can be overwhelming for students to complete the syllabus and academic tasks simultaneously. Most students get frustrated while working on the MBA writing project. They do not have any idea of how to start the work and complete the project successfully. Many students look for MBA assignment help from experts to complete their projects within the deadline.

This is the best way to finish the project efficiently. But, many students often confuse about taking professional help. In this blog, we will discuss some aspects of getting expert assistance for an academic project in the USA.

Why Students Struggle With MBA Assignments

MBA is a complex branch of study. When you pursue an MBA course, you need to work hard in all academic tasks and submit a well-composed paper according to the academic instruction. Writing an MBA project requires a good understanding of subject concepts, research ability, problem-solving skills, and excellent writing skills. In constraint time, it might not be easy for students to conduct deep research on the topic and frame the content in a proper format.

On the other hand, they are provided tough guidelines that students must follow in the writing project. It can make the task more complex for them if they are unable to comprehend the guidelines. In this situation, MBA assignment help is the best option for them to complete the project according to the given instruction and time limit.

Benefits of Taking MBA Assignment Help in the USA

Most students often have doubts about taking professional help for their MBA project. Taking help from experts is an authentic and legal way of writing the project. Here, we will mention some benefits of getting help from experts in MBA projects.

Guidance from Trained Experts

Professional writing services have a team of experts in specialized disciplines in management. Along with holding a degree and experience in this field, students have good knowledge of the subject and they are well-creative in writing tasks. Therefore, by availing of professional assistance, you can get guidance from experts in writing the academic paper. It helps you to prepare the top-quality paper.

Help To Enhance Subject Knowledge

The management subjects are complex for students. By taking help from experts, you can get additional information on the topic. It helps you to enhance your subject knowledge and understanding. By getting clarity on the topic, you can perform well in academic tasks as well as in exams.

Save Time

Students have to complete a pile of academic tasks at the same time. It becomes difficult for them to handle each project perfectly and complete this within the scheduled time. With the help of experts’ support, students can easily finish the project on time and save time for other work. It helps them to take part in other activities and get time to relax.

Learner Friendly

Professional writing services provide learner-friendly support to students. No matter what difficulty they face in their writing project, experts, experts can guide students to solve any problem in an academic paper. They can get the easiest solution even for the complex problem.

Getting the Project in Preferred Style and Format

MBA students often waste their time and energy in finding a suitable format and style for writing academic papers. Taking management assignment help from experts, they can get well-composed projects according to the university’s preferred style as MLA, APA, Chicago, etc. It helps students to submit well-written papers in the proper format as per the given instructions.

Conclusion

It is a fact that MBA is a tough course for students, and writing an academic project is not easy. Taking professional help from experts has become common among students in the USA, and it is a legal way of completing a project. You can access support from experts to get several advantages in learning and completing tasks excellently.

[steamishot]

rough

i always find it emotionally difficult whenever matt has 100+ hour work weeks. i have to remind myself to not be as sensitive as my grandma. she derives her mood from the people close to her and her worrying is exaggerated whenever her loved ones go through hardship. i feel bad seeing matt work so much. i think it’s like a path towards early death. however, it could be that my perception of humans and our generation has become weaker. whenever i tell my mom about his work weeks, she shrugs it off and says “he’s a doctor”. and i remind myself that my parents, their friends, and my cousins worked very hard too without having the frequent vacation and time off that matt does. my family who are in entrepreneurship work 6-7 days/week for 12+ hour days with basically no holidays/vacation days throughout the year. i specifically remember as a kid, my cousin’s husband said my dad “works 8 days a week”. one of my parents’ friends who has a donut shop, still starts her day at 3am to open up the shop and start baking. 

two weeks ago, not only did matt work an extra 3 days on his off week, he transitioned into a new medicine (not surgery) rotation for the first time where he worked 105+ hours. he consequently had 15-16 hour work days: leave the house around 6:30am, get home around 7:30pm and then write notes until 10-11pm, for 7 days straight. it is miserable. my new-age weaker self thinks that he needs to learn how to set better boundaries. he has perfectionistic tendencies and does not want to disappoint his work, and he worries too much about his patients at the expense of self-care. finally, he has transitioned from the EAP therapy program to an individual therapist whom he will be seeing biweekly. her name is gabbie. 

we went to autocamp cape cod this past weekend. overall the trip was okay; we were both a little tense. i didn’t want to call off work, so i was working on the car ride there that friday and a little more at the campsite. it’s also been harder for me to relax these days as i’m finishing up the last few classes of my accounting degree. currently at 93% with three more classes to go! the drive there was about 4.5-5 hours and it took over an hour to pick up our rental car. if i knew matt was going to have a 100+ hr work week, we probably wouldn’t have planned it for this week. matt drove the majority of the time and i know it’s tiring/not the ideal “vacation”. but alas, medicine, where surprises are at every corner. 

we were able to do more chill things at home/around the neighborhood such as grocery shop at wegmans, cook a curry butter chicken, go to hot yoga twice, and watched air at the alamo drafthouse for $5 with the tmobile discount. this might be our new favorite theater because it’s literally a 3 minute walk from our apartment and they serve drinks/food in the theater. being served a nice cold beer actually makes going to the movies much more enjoyable. 

our uber eats memberships (we were managing 6 different accounts LOL) have all come to an end, minus one. coincidentally this times up very well with our goal of cooking more. last week, i think we only got food delivery once; at one point not too long ago, we scheduled food to come every single day! i’ve been continuing to make the same recipes that i’ve learned from marion when i started to pick up cooking again - most of the dishes i’ve made at least twice now. 

books: finished listening to laziness does not exist. listened to part of the privileged poor and outlive. 

shows: finished unprisoned, skimming LIB s4, currently watching beef

lesson: we’re learning that having a wealthier lifestyle is actually detrimental to our health (or it’s that we don’t know how to do it right yet) and the simple things are just better for humans overall. i’m starting to feel too privileged to be able to say stuff like this, but being able to afford constant travel/plane tickets and all the delicious food has become too much. take for example lounge life and the lay-flat business class lifestyle. it’s getting us fatter and lazier lol. trevor noah joked that business class is boooring and economy is “real life” which is very true. even renting a tesla, it’s cooler but much more stressful to operate than a normal gas car. we felt more relaxed and had more fun simply going to watch a movie nearby rather than driving out to an expensive glamping campsite. i want to live by the line “live like a resident”, really because simplicity brings more joy, and builds a much bigger nest egg which brings more security. 

money: money has been coming and going with the frequent travels. we booked and paid for all of smoky mountains expenses for us and matt’s parents and will be reimbursed later. there’s a lot of potential for financial growth in the coming years. i am inspired by mywealthydiary’s savings and progress with her partner. my goal is to save/invest 5 figures every month between the two of us and have 6 figures of savings/investments at the end of this year. i only started a HYSA last december with wealthfront. i’ve been contributing to this more instead of my retirement and brokerage accounts. 

[pertinax--loculos]

This is... not at all related to writing, but eh, I'm gonna vent anyway.

I've just joined as a financial member at the sporting club that I'm really loving. It's awesome and I love the idea of being competitive. It's hard cuz of how I work to find the time to go to training etc, and with uni I'm not sure how much time/motivation I'll have, but still.

And the other day I was sending a friend a voice message and was like, I need to move but I need to stay in the area cuz of work, then I realised... it's a really toxic work environment. Really, if I can find/afford to live somewhere else, I could just transfer the grocery job.

I'm sick of living hand to mouth. I'm sick of not having a career and feeling like I have no prospects.

I'm really excited to start law at uni this year.

Today I got an email informing me I've been progressed to the next stage of a job application I put in six months ago.

It's a learn-on-the-job deal. You get paid around $30 an hour for training. That's fucking insane to me. I've never earned $30/hr. Ever.

It's a six or seven-stage interview process. I don't know that I will, or even can, pass all the stages.

I really wanna finish a degree. I really want it to be a law degree.

I don't know if HECS will cover the entire five years I still have left to study.

I don't know what's happening. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know if this job I have the app in for is something I even wanna do.

I'm so angry, and it's for no reason except for the fact that all I wanna do is ride horses and write.

But I can't afford to do either.

I don't know what I'm doing.

[simplidistance1234]

Benefits of Online MBA Programs and the Benefits of Choosing One

Most students question their decision to enroll in a traditional MBA program after quitting their employment. And to be honest, it is generally true unless you seek an online MBA program from a prestigious university like MIT, Harvard, etc.

It shines in this area due to its adaptability and capacity to complete online MBA programs while holding down a job. The sole group for which online MBA programs are intended is working professionals.

You don't need to have pre-qualified CAT or GMAT scores to apply for an online MBA all you need to do is prepare for the online examinations whether you're on the move, having downtime at work, or while on vacation. Everything, including writing tests and paying tuition, is done online starting with the application process for the course. Visits to the campus are not required for anything but receiving the certificate at the end.

Online MBA programs have access to the LMS after a student has enrolled in the course (Learning Management System). Students get access to a sizable library of study materials, video lectures, online discussion forums, mobile applications, and other test preparation tools through this educational program. You must thus do so if you are not digitally skilled. Thus, e-learning helps develop intrinsic technology skills. The online question and answer sessions are also overseen by the competent teachers.

Another crucial consideration is the cost of online MBA programs. Students don't even go to the campus, don't go to any lectures there, don't stay in dorms, don't go on any excursions, and don't even buy books. This enables us to easily understand why an online MBA is less expensive than a regular MBA while yet being treated with the same respect. How can it be dismissed just because it occurs online? The ultimate result is a super graduate who is proficient in both business and technology. I would argue that knowledge goes beyond books and includes the entirety of the internet.

At the completion of the course, the working professional usually gets a promotion or can advance further in their job.

Many no longer in existence universities now provide an online MBA option. There are many different streams available in online MBA programs, so students may choose the one that best fits their professional interests. A banking professional might decide to pursue an online MBA in finance as opposed to HR. The option to enroll in foreign online MBA programs without having to relocate is, arguably, the most significant. Access to work prospects throughout the globe is made possible by this.

Before choosing online MBA programs, check the accreditation. A recognized college degree is given the same respect as traditional MBA. If earning an online degree can help the company, most corporate offices urge individuals who are already working to do so.

[projectcubicle1]

Book Review: Science Experiments for Kids: 100+ Fun STEM

Between five to ten years, they develop a curiosity for experimenting with things. This is the best time for you to give your child learning support. It is at this age that they become inquisitive. They desire to know why things are the way they are. They want to know all the how’s and why’s. One of the books to buy them is Awesome Science Experiments for Kids: 100+ Fun STEM activities. It prepares them to become future scientists.  What Is Fun STEM Activities? In today's world, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are a collection of interconnected topics that are essential for building a solid foundation for both children and adults. The acronym STEM refers to a method of teaching that places a significant emphasis on the academic fields of science, engineering, technology, and mathematics. Learning that is based on STEM subjects while having fun is more vital than it has ever been. Since a solid foundation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics is necessary for many contemporary jobs, beginning one's study of these subjects from a young age is required. The most beneficial kinds of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) activities for children are those in which they actively participate and which lead them to interesting new discoveries and useful applications in the wider world. These are some of our favorites, each with a challenge that will truly start youngsters thinking about how science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) plays a role in their day-to-day lives.

What the book contains?

There are many types of books that provide simple training for people of different ages. Any individual from a one-year-old to a senior citizen can get good informative books. For example, employed people can read books to help them become more productive. Some books can help them get an HR job without a degree due to the information they contain. The Awesome Science Experiments for Kids: 100+ Fun STEM is designed for kids. The book contains over 100 STEAM subject experiments. They are designed for kids between five to 10 years old. It provides them with interactive activities for science, art, and math. The book has more experiments with technology and engineering lessons. Kids mostly learn through observation and experimentation. As they grow, they keep most of the habits they learned when they were young. Some of these habits, like reading books, help them in their pursuit of education. When they join high school education and become university students, their desire for reading and writing grows with them. Students who developed reading habits when they were kids become good essay writers. They write good literature and science essays. They get better writing ideas when reading through these essays on literature on the Samplius website. The free essay examples are good for inspiration on writing structure and choosing essay topics.  

How this book helps?

  Using the book, kids can create a magnet-powered car or build a fizzy rocket. They can discover new things or create new designs for any project. All the experiments have been designed with very simple to follow steps. They have been simplified to make the projects simple and clear. Every kid between ages five to ten will love the book. It is full of colorful photos to attract kids’ attention. Most of the experiments use the common items used daily around the house. The aim is to make the experiments easy to manage. The parent doesn’t need to go buy costly experiment materials. Beyond the experiments, the book aims to develop kids’ curiosity. Through curiosity, they can keep asking questions like how and why. If an experiment fails to work, they can ask the question of why it’s not working. If they are unable to fix things, they can ask, how do I fix this and that? Example Experiments: Some of the experiments the kids will love are how to use quicksand to change lemon into a battery. Kids develop a love for STEM subjects when they are young. A lot of students fear enrolling in STEM subjects. They think the subjects are difficult to tackle. It benefits if they are trained to love the subjects from a young age. It will help increase the number of students taking STEM subjects. An experiment like how to build a jet-powered speedboat is exciting. It is both a science and technology experiment. The simple instructions like “now try this” encourage kids to think deeper. Kids’ curiosities, such as why the sky is blue or where the sun goes in the evening, are all answered in this book. There is an experiment to teach kids about how animals stay warm in the arctic. Some other experiments require them to observe and learn. The experiment on using a mirror to redirect a laser teaches them about light and energy. These and more experiments will teach kids how good science is. They will gain the benefits of curiosity. Their parents become part of the learning process as they help their kids do the experiments. Conclusion Kids begin to develop curiosity from the first few months after birth. Then,  they learn to turn their head to observe movements. They later become curious by tasting things. Eventually, they begin experimenting with things. Different science experiment books like the Awesome Science Experiments for Kids: 100+ Fun STEM activities prepare kids for future learning. The books contain simple experiments like tuning lemon into a battery. It helps develop a curiosity for asking questions like how and why.  

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[pompadourpink]

Hi! I’m turned 18 two months ago and took my university exam. I’d like to study French Language and Literature but one of my teachers said I wouldn’t find a job if I studied it. I really don’t know what to do now. My first tongue isn’t French and I’m a foreigner, would it be an important issue if I decided to apply for a job in France or any French-speaking country?

Hello,

Just based on the amount of Tiktoks of immigrants who moved to Paris and are living their best life I see every week, I'm going to say no, the fact that you are not fluent in French will not necessarily be a problem professionally. Many people speak English and there are numerous opportunities if you're willing to search for them.

That being said, I would encourage you to think of the job you would like to do rather than what you would like to study.

I studied French language and lit, and now I teach FSL for a living as an entrepreneur - I got a research masters after being turned down for an FSL master because of an optional class I hadn't taken during my bachelors even though I already had experience in the field, and now here I am. I tried teaching the regular way and found it horrible, and the typical ways of teaching FSL weren't appealing to me, which is why I started this blog in the first place - to keep doing the thing I loved while working office jobs, and it snowballed.

I use my degrees for my job once in a blue moon when asked about language history or linguistics - nothing I couldn't have learned on my own (and I am still researching it on the side so I can be as helpful and efficient as possible). I don't use most of what I learned in five years - I'm still grateful for it because I loved the experience, but it's dormant because I don't need it.

So, essentially, unless you are a scientist or a tradesperson, there is a significant probability that whatever you study will have very little impact on the rest of your professional life.

Not many jobs require an L&L degree: journalism (competitive), teaching (thankless), writing (hard)... that's narrow AND not sexy for HR people looking for solid skills; unless you get super lucky, you'll end up working crappy jobs because you don't know how to *do* anything ergo you weight the same as a high schooler who just graduated (and doesn't know what a healthy workplace looks like so is easier to manipulate thus more likely to be hired).

So think of the job you would like to do, think of what you love, focus on something that genuinely makes you happy, would make waking up and starting a new day exciting, and work towards that - it doesn't mean everything is going to be perfect but the extra effort will be worth it. We spend roughly five years studying, and then have fourty years of working waiting for us. Each of them will feel like a hundred if you hate what you spend all day doing.

The Tiktok people I mentioned work in programming, design, social media, or study fashion, and they just happen to do it here. France isn't a career unless you're a sociologist or a politician.

TDLR: find what you love, learn how to be good at it, have a French company sponsor your visa, eat baguettes, bon appétit.

Hope this helps! x

[levinletlive]

I've always wanted to learn and to share. I've always wanted to go to college and become an expert in something I could use to help my family, friends, and community. It feels vain to just say it myself, but I'm pretty intelligent. That's probably why I'm so depressed all the time, in spite of all the medications and therapy I'vegone through.

Today was a bad day. I have a list of over 50 drafts of articles that I want to write based on things I learned, care about, and thought might help or at least entertain others.

I don't know why I think that would be a useful way to spend my time. I don't have a college degree or any certifications in anything. I'm not an expert on anything except my own experience. Even then, I have a hard time figuring out what things I believe based on facts and what I believe based on my feelings. Everything I write makes me feel like a fraud and a lightningrod for punishment and abuse.

Without any formal training, I struggle to find articles and studies that are relevant to the things I want to talk about. Even when I find them, I struggle to concentrate and parse through the horrible vocabulary salads that scientists and scholars vomit up on Elsevier. Sometimes even the abstracts and the conclusions are so full of technical jargon that it feels like they were written in a dead language.

"Just Google it!" People say, but they don't tell you what to do after that. They don't tell you how to separate lengthy phrases and terms without losing your understanding before you've grasped the concept. They don't tell you what a good sample size looks like, or how to tell when something that seems logical isn't really.

I wouldn't even mind teaching myself, if all of my time wasn't monopolized by work and doctor's appointments. I became so frustrated trying to write an article about the misuse of the phrase "live within your means" in response to rapid inflation of the cost of basic necessities that I wanted to cry. Then I became frustrated, and all I could think about was how good it would feel to go swimming.

Then I became angry. I started to think about all of the simple pleasures of life that are increasingly paywalled due to privatized ownership and fees. Fees for parking, membership fees, sign up fees, reservation fees, maintenance fees, annual fees, etc. National parks used to be a free way to have quality time with nature, and now it would cost so much money in gas and fees that I would have to give up food for a week to go. A gym membership would cost me almost the same.

I'm mad. I'm pissed off that educational institutions paywall knowledge and access to high-paying jobs by charging exorbitant tuition fees and then charging up the ass for certifications to prove that you can do the job better than a monkey so employers won't have to give you any on-the-job training. I'm pissed that there are jobs that don't pay enough to cover our basic needs. I am enraged that the upper classes are rushing to lock us out of every good experience, and more quickly all the time.

Above all, I'm exhausted. It's a challenge to find reasons to keep getting up in the morning and trying to do what's necessary just to barely eke by.

I love my job, but I hate my circumstances. I just keep thinking, what would my life be like if my time was my own? What if I could just take days off without having to worry about losing access to water, shelter, and food? I want to work with people. I want a hobby that educates and entertains people. I want to write and read about subjects of passion. I want to go outside of my fucking county without starving myself at home.

And I make good money! Or, I used to. I make $26/hr, but even before I had to go out on disability (because I literally wanted to unalive) I was barely making ends meet. Now my checks are 30% smaller and my rent went up 20% last December. I have such a tiny, desperate support system because we're all carrying generational trauma that prevented our families from developing any financial stability. Now it's too late. With the rate of inflation being what it is, I just feel like I'm circling the drain. I look at the homeless camps by the riverside and see my future.

When I reach out to others to try to find a way to do something about the situation, they always just tell me to go start a fucking revolution myself. As if any one individual could just kick off Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo. Besides, is that all I am? A fucking human sacrifice? How depressing. It feels like they just want to feed me into a paper shredder. Allies like to talk the talk, but they always seem to expect the most disadvantaged people to do all the walking.

All I can think is that I wish I hadn't been born. I'm not a dragonslayer born in the age of dragons. While I am as capable of righteous fury and frankly uncharacteristic violence as anybody else, I am a healer. I do my best work comforting people who are in pain, or caring for them when they are under stress.

You know why I wanted to go to college? I wanted to develop cutting-edge robotic prosthetics for disabled people, not least of all because I'm disabled myself. I wanted to develop programs to automate some of the most difficult and tedious tasks human beings have to perform so I could save us time and energy that could be put towards taking care of ourselves and each other. I wanted to save us pain and misery. And there are thousands of people like me across the world, all just barely scraping by under fascist boots.

I just want to be able to learn without feeling like there's a time limit. I can't focus when I'm worrying about keeping food on the table. Time spent not working is money lost. My work suffers when I can't fulfill my needs, and all I have the spoons to do is play video games that let me escape to universes that are in mortal peril, and yet are still more enjoyable to live in than the real world.

I want to meet people and have meaningful conversations. I want to make friends, and have adventures, and fall in love, and experience loss with the support of my community. I'm tired of being isolated by my work schedule and my commute. I'm tired of the rich chaining me down by my needs.

I don't even know how to end this. I don't feel like looking on the bright side or pushing my pain to the side with dark humor. I'm just sitting alone in my room, avoiding my family and my pets because I'm too angry and I'm scared to let them know just how fucking close I am to losing it. They can't do anything more for me than they already are. We're all in the same position.

I wish I could be the guy who starts the revolution. I wish I could go up the hill and light a certain famous housing developer's private dick-stroking of an art museum on fire. I wish I could tell my landlord to go apply for foodstamps, because I'm not paying them another cent. I wish I was any more special than anybody else so I could carry the torch, but I'm not. I have loved ones who would be completely helpless without my support. And I don't deserve the help any more than anybody else, so this isn't me begging some wealthy patron to "pick me."

I'm just done. I wish we could all wake up one morning and just stop taking it. I wish we could just unanimously decide that we would stay home, visit our families, tend our gardens, walk our dogs, visit the beaches, and take what we need without paying a thing. I wish to God that that could be a possibility. I don't want violence. I don't want acceleration. The people who are the weakest in our society are the ones who would suffer for that.

I cannot change these circumstances, but I also cannot accept them. I can't just accept that this is going to be my life. I'm 30 and feel like I'm already looking forward to a hospice bed.