#minutes for related-yet-unrelated stuff. and like it takes me so long to actually be able to focus and get into what im doing

[ectonurites]

i just need to like. make everything explode forever. <3

[rigelmejo]

I don’t know if this extensive reading has helped but I FEEL like it has helped lol. When I started 小王子 how long was it taking a chapter? Just under 5 minutes per page right?

Well I know I got faster than that. Today my Internet was down so while waiting for things to restart and load and stuff I read like 5 chapters of the book. I read them out loud (just a handful of words I didn’t know how to say out loud). I was reading at slow but steady speaking speed so that’s still faster than 5 minutes a page. Ok I just timed myself to test it and I am taking 2 minutes to read a page, and I would guess 3 minutes if I slowed down to consider a bit more on the sayings/less familiar hanzi. That’s better then the 4.5-5 minutes I started at! So I must’ve picked up some words from this book. So I would say... yes a little extensive reading seems to be helping reading speed. Also! I have 16 pages to go! This story is so short. It is sweet and odd and so human though maybe that is why it’s remained loved like Alice in wonderland. (Fun fact I also read 2 chapters of Alice in wonderland in French this week and it is just as bizarre to me as when I watched the movie as a kid, But I do think in book form if I were 6-9 I would’ve related more since Alice’s POV in the story is pretty relatable... and when I was a kid and watched the movie I just did Not relate aha).

Anyway from 4.5 minutes to 2-3 is great!

What I did with graded readers/extensive reading this month, that I am hoping is why this helped:

Read graded reader (butterfly lovers, Pleco, 500 unique characters) - not hard but very satisfying to finish it and read it quickly when it used to take me 40 minutes to read a few Pleco pages of it). So that was a few thousand words comprehensible extensive reading.

Read another graded reader, chinese short stories. While I think it’s good as a study companion, a lot of very specific words which I tripped on (antique coins, being scammed). Which was fine I just think it was not the funnest reading material? It was mostly graded reader though I had to look up a couple handfuls of words.

Read a little of my 500 character Sinolingua reader (2 stories). Also read through the back of it which has all the words in the book, and the HSK 3 words included in the book - I knew all those words but it was a nice refresher. Mostly it was just nice to see how much easier these stories were to read compared to when I first got the book. (I would recommend these books as readers if you want something for adults and in short segments, the short stories are simplified prose from established authors, and the quality of storytelling can therefore be felt a bit. They feel more meaningful as short stories and therefore enjoyable if a bit basic (since they’ve been simplified). You can tell though compared to the Chinese Short Stories book above, which was probably written by a teacher/language textbook maker and not necessarily a literary writer.

Read mandarin companion journey to the center of the earth. 450 unique characters. Another easy read that felt really nice, compared to when I first read a mandarin companion book.

Started reading 小王子 on paper, so extensive reading with little word look up (I’ve looked up less than 10 words so far when reading on paper - notable words I looked up because it frustrated me I didn’t know them: 悲伤，惊奇，惊讶，匆匆，逐渐，观察，测试 a lot of these because I know I’ve seen these Hanzi before I just never remember specifically like 惊讶 惊奇 what the difference is or guan pronunciation 观察 or 测 I tend to forget when it’s not in 测试). I started reading it because it’s supposed to have around 2000 unique words (so not too many), and be pretty easy reading level (so a bit easier than 活着 which is the novel Chinese learners often get recommended). Basically, this was the extensive reading book choice step up from graded readers - it’s got a bit over 1000 unique hanzi, not an overwhelming amount of unique words, but it is not a graded reader so if it goes well I could jump to other stuff of similar or slightly less “ease” while still having it feel this “easy” to read (and hopefully take days to read instead of months).

Started reading 笑猫日记之会唱歌的猫 in Pleco, so clicking words I didn’t know (though this one only had a word or two a page unknown). I saw it recommended on a Chinese learners form as easy reading material after graded readers, and I agree! It’s very easy to read! I could understand it without clicking words but it is nice to understand fully since it’s convenient, and look up the pronunciation etc. I read 8 chapters so far. I also listened to a few chapters after reading, but idk if it helped at all.

15 ish chapters into 小王子 I found it online and reread 4 chapters with a click dictionary for unknown words. It was nice just clarifying the word pronunciations and fuzzy bits, also the online translation was different so seeing the difference on how they decided to word it (mostly just seeing synonyms used instead or different sayings for certain parts). I listened to a couple chapters audio afterwards, idk if it helped.

Unrelated, but I did listen read to 5 chapters of 默读 mainly following the Chinese text so, idk if that would’ve helped my overall reading at all (I want to say no but I did notice in general much more general gist comprehension of lines in MoDu then last time I read a couple months ago - although listening to the audio and being able to glance at the English for unknown words of course also makes things much more comprehensible that’s why listen reading method is the structure it is ahh).

Listened to some audio for 小王子 during work because I happened to find it, for chapters 1-4. Just playing in the background. I looked at the text while listening to one to match pronunciation to some words, since the chapter was like 5 minutes long in listening. Again interesting to see their word choice since It was yet another translation (I think I like my print books translation best).

Back to reading print 小王子 today and I think the audio beforehand did help me with being able to pronounce more of what I’m reading. Read like 4 chapters in one short break, another 3 chapters just now. While I don’t know how well the reading speed will translate to reading harder stuff like guardian (which was oddly also taking me 5 minutes a page? Why is that my default speed?), my reading speed doing extensive reading on “stuff mostly easy” to me has increased noticeably. (Fun fact when I read English technical text like psychology and physics books and educational etc I think my reading speed is it’s like 10-20 pages an hour... I do not read non fiction very fast).

So anyway, my goal with extensive reading easy material this month was to see if I could push UP what my starting base level “easy” material is.

What I used to do is practice with an “easier text” (which was still pretty hard for me tbh) and then once it got bearable (took 30-40 minutes to read instead of an hour), I’d switch to a harder material that took me 1-1.5 hours to read. Then when I’d burn out, I’d go back to that “easier” text until it got easier at 20-30 minutes to read. Then I might pick a harder base reading text (usually what used to be the hard one that would now take 30-40 minutes to read), and find something even harder. Lately that has been 寒舍 as my “easier” text, taking 20-30 minutes a full chapter (2 mini chapters), and 天涯客 as my harder text at 30-40ish minutes a chapter. And yes, at this point I could pick something harder but they’re both hard enough I was just sticking to them. You might notice none of these were actually easy for me though, my actual base easy materials were still graded readers, and manhua. So I want to push that upward until there’s some “easier” material below 寒舍 that I can be built up to and read easily Without a dictionary aid. So I can have a solid base that’s reliable. Hanshe is an “easier” practice material but it’s not necessarily something I can read extensively with ease. But if I keep pushing up the difficulty of what I can extensively read, bit by bit, I will eventually Get it to hanshe (or a little below it realistically but still firmly in regular-webnovel-exist at the reading level). I will not get faster at reading these hard things unless my base level of reading is both higher and already a reasonable speed. (I’m guessing anyway??).

Well happy to say this plan is working. I guess the advice articles I read were right somewhat. I knew graded readers could drag you from 0 beginner to some reading ability, since It’s what I originally did with Chinese (and even French sort of). But I was very quick about it because I’m impatient and easily bored by too-easy things apparently lol. I read 1 mandarin companion graded reader (the 300 word Sherlock Holmes one), a couple chapters of 2 other graded readers, then started on a random webnovel (the bl 他们的故事 which somehow thankfully is on the easier end for novels) and looked a lot of words up to get through. But I did not think to try to “match my reading level and increase gradually” in regular novels, even tho if it works for graded readers it probably works for regular stuff!

And in school in our native languages, that’s why our elementary schools had libraries, and we read books for our age group and the chapter books we read were much easier than what we read as teens or what adults read! I remember bunnicula and cat wings those were not hard but they were chapter stories. Then I remember Dracula and hg wells and mark Twain in high school and how they felt a bit Hard despite me being one of those kids rated at college reading level in 3rd grade. Now as a kid? I had the same tendencies I do now, so I’m not surprised I always jump in the deep end and Try to read hard stuff (and it must help since it’s part of why I got good at reading my native language, and definitely has helped my chinese and french). I would be like 7 and pick up a mitchner novel of My dad’s (is that the author of stuff like Alaska etc?) and I’d read a couple pages and feel drained trying to follow it and give up. Or the huge The Witching Hour by Anne Rice, or HG Wells History of the world, or the biography of benjamin Franklin, I never finished any of these or had any idea what they were about I just got curious and opened up a couple pages every now and then. Yet somehow that must’ve been part of why my reading level so early on was considered “good”? I’m guessing.

But I wasn’t actually good at reading in the sense of doing it often or fast until my dad started reading to me at like age 8-9 I think it was Harry Potter which at the time worked out since the books got harder each time, and also my dad reads out loud slow just like he tutors slow lol so eventually I read myself so he’d stop boring me (I love him and loved the bonding time I’m sure but truly i just apparently always liked jumping in the deep end). Eventually his strategy Im guessing to get me to read slightly harder stuff each time worked, because by books 4-5 I read each in 2 days. He was so impressed because before that I couldn’t read long books and not fast, and that’s when he thought I got good at reading. Looking back lol it’s actually so funny? How much work he had to do to get me to read and how what ended up working I still sort of do now. He started me on Hop on Pop as a kid as my first book cause One Fish Two Fish bored me and I thought jumping on a dad was funny, and he did that just to do something to get me to pick up a book lol. Then he got me that digital book toy they had back then where you had a real book but it was in a digital holder and if you clicked words with the pen it read them out loud. Literally how I learn Chinese now... he really got me digital equivalent to graded readers back then ToT. And just like as a kid I still pick up stuff way beyond my level and just read a couple pages at random. It’s just. Kind of funny to me how much I didn’t really change that much after all ToT

BACK ON THE TOPIC OF APRIL PROGRESS lol ok. I listened to Guardian ep 1 today just in the background so no subs etc and I was Floored by how much I completely understood. I’ve been listening to SpoonFed chinese again (15 audios listened to this month), but I’m floored if it made a difference?! Since I was mostly listening in the background not focusing and missing some stuff. Idk if it made a difference, or listening reading method just that 1.5 hours I did this month or what. Or if my listening skills have been this decent I just don’t test them since I usually watch shows with hard Chinese subs (and read the subs), or watch shows with English subs. So like. Anyway mejo back in what was it august 2019 when I started studying? Would be so happy. Back when I started watching guardian and only knew ni hao and xie xie and zai jian.

Also I can’t even remember now if I did extensive reading guardian (after reading the English translation), this month too or just last month. But I’m sure that helped and I should test general reading sometime of a priest novel. Like.. literally what kicked off the “I should extensive read more” this month is me Desperately wanting to kick up my reading speed after the horrific 25 page guardian chapter I read that took like 1.5 hours.

[jessicajonesrp]

An Awkward favor (reposted, since I screwed up response in last one)

It's been about a week since Jessica told Luke that she was pregnant and they were going to be parents. It was news that Luke was excited to hear even tho it scares the hell out of both him and Jessica they were still quite happy. However his wife's unrelenting hatred of doctors is a REAL PAIN IN THE ASS!

It came down to either she bit the bullet and see a doctor or Luke did something that was completely uncomfortable for all involved. It took a day or two for him to get up the nerve to make the call, funny the man can let a grenade explode in his face but calling her made him hesitant.

After finally making the call a meeting time was set..a neutral spot in a Manhattan coffee shop. Luke debated taking Jessica with him, I mean this was basically walking off a cliff for him because who knows what his firecracker of a wife will do but this is for the sake of their baby so he really didn't have a choice.

They arrived about 20 minutes early and found a table towards the back. It wasn't long until a woman walked up to them and sat down, she wore a short jacket to cover up her dark blue scrubs, the meeting time apparently coincided with her next shift. Luke stood up, pulling out a chair for her, smiling at the woman to cover up the awkward feelings he had seeing her again.

"Hey Claire, thanks for coming." 

Claire eyes him for a second before smiling and addresses Jessica holding out her hand. "You're Jessica Jones? Hi I'm Claire it's nice to meet you." 

Luke thrown a little when she ignores him but not so much that he doesn't notice the wedding ring on her finger.

"You're married..Congratulations I'm happy for you."

j

Jessica had always thought that she was the one with mental issues in their marriage. Apparently she was wrong, and Luke had hidden depths of crazy of his own. Because what kind of guy thought his ex wanted to be the baby doctor person- whatever, she wasn't an expert on pregnancy related terminology yet- of his current wife? Or that she, said wife, would be comfortable with the idea of a woman her husband assumedly slept with looking at her naked?

The only reason she even agreed to a meeting with Claire to see if the woman didn't laugh in both their faces, which was no less than Jessica expected, was because Luke trusted her. And for Jessica, that said a lot. She was very skittish with any touch from anyone not within her tiny circle of trusted ones, doctors included. Even pre Kilgrave- after all, it was doctors who made her and Phillip what they were. But if Luke trusted someone, she in turn trusted him, which was more than could be said for a random stranger.

Besides, this was not an ordinary baby or pregnancy. If she had to see a doctor, it had to be one with superhuman experience.

"Yeah, hi," Jessica nodded stiffly, giving Claire a brief glance over and wondering if the woman was doing the same towards her. She shook her hand as quickly as was minimally polite and as was her way, got to it.

"You probably wonder why the hell your ex would ask you to come meet his wife when she isn't obviously about to die, so lets get to that so you can turn us down and go. Right, I'm pregnant, and I hate doctors, because of many reasons, and he says I have to go to some doctor. And he says he trusts you, and I trust him, but obviously with you being ex and me being current you're going to say no. So, sorry for wasting your time."

She starts to back away, ready to leave since she assumes she just had the whole conversation for everyone.

Claire looks at Jessica bewildered. "Excuse me, first of all you don't know me..At all! Second I'm a medical professional so if someone needed my help I have to help them third ain't nobody thinking about yo man or dying to see you naked. Now how about you asked me what you wanted to ask me and let me decide on rather or not I'll do Boo for your skinny ass!" With that she turns to Luke and begins cussing at him in what is probably the dirtiest Spanish on the planet.

Luke holding up his hands in his defense says the equivalent of Yes yes, I'm sorry, but please we need your help back to her in Spanish and smiles at her, 

Claire tries to bring herself to cuss more but sighs before turning back to Jessica. "Look.." sighing again "You need someone that knows how to monitor you and your bady.. And I have experience dealing with you kind of people..So look Luke's a jackass but..Damn that's all I got he's a jackass, so let me help you."

Turning back to Luke. "I don't do this stuff for free anymore, this won't be cheap because some of the stuff we'll need is expensive..But Mr. Big Time that shouldn't be a problem for you."

 Luke nods yes. "Whatever you need I'll take care of it..But this is absolutely on the down low Claire..So not even your husband can know about this." He looks at Jessica concerned "Guess it comes to you Jessica, what do you want to do..If not the hospital or Claire, something else?"

"We'll do whatever you want." Claire moves closer and smiles again "This is some awkward shit but I can do this..Hell I've done harder with less than what your husband just agreed to buy and not be cheap about it either." Giving Luke the side eye 

"Its gonna be ok.. I'm off Sunday, I'll come by the club and take a look at you." 

Luke interrupts her "Actually we have a place in Harlem, it's nice I'll text you the address." 

Claire gives Jessica one more look of assurance.

Jessica turned back to face Claire, taken aback by her attitude. This was the first time she had met someone who was actually more verbally feisty than she herself, and for a second she just stared at her, a little stunned by her response. She was still processing that the woman had more than just dished back at what Jessica had laid out at her, and was in the middle of turning over in her mind how Claire had figured out she was squeamish about her seeing her naked while simultaneously calling her skinny, before the Spanish flurry of exchanges started.

"That's fine, anyway I have to get to the hospital to start my shift, so see you Sunday?" She looks at Jessica waiting for an answer.

Jessica, who knows about as many Spanish words as might be uttered in a Taco Bell commercial, outright stares when Luke starts responding back to her in Spanish in return. She had no idea that he knew Spanish, let alone enough to be able to understand the rapid, angry-sounding spew of words that Claire had just flung at him.  Her taut shoulders ease up a little as she watches, and she slowly starts to smirk.

“Damn, Luke. I’m starting to see a pattern, you really like women that say it how they see it, huh.”

When they finally start speaking English again and Claire addresses her directly, Jessica stiffens, not liking her calling Luke a jackass, but she can get why she would feel that way, considering the position he’s putting her in as his ex.

“So…wait, you’ll actually do this? Even though you sounded like you wanted to take his head off a second ago?”

When Claire continued to assure her, she shifts nervously, playing with the sleeve of her jacket.

“What stuff do you need? The expensive stuff you’re talking about. And, uh, what do you need to do to me, exactly?”

She hesitates, hating as usual to have to actually verbalize any kind of feelings-related, vulnerability-involved things, but if this woman is going to be her doctor, it’s more than likely going to be a necessity, so she makes herself spit it out.

“It’s not really the you being ex thing that trips me out, okay.” She took a breath, then ground out, “ I have PTSD. I don’t always do great with people touching me. And the last few encounters I’ve had with doctors have been the doctors that made me what I am, and the doctor that made my rapist who he was. Who also happened to be his father, and trying to save his life, but that’s a whole different story. I’m not trying to be an asshole, I just…..it isn’t anything personal.”

She looked towards Claire, but not directly at her as she finally answered. “If you’re willing, I guess I’ll try. I want the baby to be okay. Just…you have to tell me what you’re doing, and why, and stuff.”

[iatheia]

EDA reviews part 2 - books 10-18

Previous part here

10) Legacy of the Daleks - A very enjoyable read, even though it doesn’t mesh well with Big Finish continuity. I have a few headcanons on how to rectify that, though... The meeting between the Eight and Delgado’s Master left me grinning ear to ear, the way Eight was posturing, wholly aware of the way the Master ticks. I’m not sure I liked Susan quite as much, though - nor was she that fundamental to the story, spending most of the time off screen, but being somewhat unlikeable when she was there. Her final confrontation with the Master was a bit much... Similarly, it was hard to accept Master not recognizing her. That said, the rest of it was a fun romp, and Eight’s thoughts towards the end were particularly poignant, 9/10

11) Dreamstone Moon - Starting right off the bat with an author self insert, and have him being both the source of the conflict and the one to ultimately save the day, kind of - it’s a bold choice.... It’s been said before, but Doctor’s companions really should unionize huh? Eight’s in particular. It really is quite striking that the situation with Sam is pretty much the exact same one as it will be with Charlie - thinking that the Doctor is dead, abandoned, alone, without any network of support. And I’m finally about to have context for that post, so, cheers, I guess. That said, Sam and the Doctor are very much representative of the “quit telling everyone I’m dead - sometimes I can still hear his voice” meme. I’ve lost count how many times Sam decided that the Doctor’s dead within five minutes of seeing him very much alive. (Ok, no, I jest, but it’s a good book, throughly enjoyable from the beginning to end, 10/10)

12) Seeing I - I, uh, really struggle to follow Sam’s logic in the beginning here. I don’t really understand how she ended up in the place she did, after the last novel. Because, she wasn’t alone, she wasn’t abandoned, she was in a company of people, who, uh, cared about her might be putting it a bit too strongly, but who at least could vouch for her. So this disconnect is a bit odd. And, as good as this novel is, as good as the character work in here is, I have a slight disconnect with the rest of it, too. There is too big of a gulf with where the story begun and where it ended - there are too many things going on, too many plots introduced and then unceremoniously dropped. It’s like... Revolution of the Daleks inside of Kerblam, with Nightmare in Silver thrown in with half a dozen other themes from other episodes. When you have the doctor in the machine and the psychologist guy go from primary antagonists to the supporting cast we’re supposed to root for, there is something mildly dissatisfying about it, thematically speaking. Overall, the story in its entirety is less than a sum of its parts. Breaking it into pieces, though, there is a lot of exciting stuff there. 9/10

13) Placebo Effect - Controversial opinion time - I don’t care for Ark in Space. I think it’s a pretty forgettable episode. So any time I encounter any reference to the wirrrn, my reaction is “wait, who?”. And even though I like Leisure Hive well enough, I dare you to find anyone who has been clamoring for the return of Foamasi. This rather made me immediately apprehensive, straight from the preface. In general, there was too much continuity. Stacy & Ssard, really? How deep do you need to be to appreciate their appearance? They are so utterly unnecessary, too, they disappear less than a quarter of the way into the novel, they aren’t even there for set up, they are there for a set up of a set up. If you are actually a person who knew who they were, and wanted to see more of them, I can’t imagine this being all that satisfying. It’s a rather abrupt transition from the previous ark. I dare even say, aggressive, to the degree you have Sam going from “she is afraid to be even in the same room with him, lest she kills him with her soaked through panties” to “she is absolutely delighted when he imparts onto her his grandfatherly wisdom”. Then again, any time either Eight or Sam opened their mouth, I didn’t see Eight or Sam. I saw Four and Sarah Jane. It’s not well written, either. It’s very clunky. The dialogues in particular are obnoxious. Stacy’s and Sam’s conversation, and later on dogmatic discussion between Sam and the priests gave me full on psychic damage. I mostly skimmed beyond that, can’t say there was much to catch the eye. 2/10

14) Vanderdeken's Children - This book is aiming to be a masterpiece, but it’ll just have to settle for being good enough. It does have some interesting twists and turns in here, even though most of them are pretty predictable and expected from the set up. The last couple of chapters, the ending overall, are quite decent (even though all the ebook versions I was able to find cut off the last couple of pages, argh!), but the middle is very middling, with mostly uninspiring secondary characters that are ever so slowly being positioned on the chess board. 7/10

15) The Scarlet Empress - Where to begin... It’s a series of mostly unrelated short stories in a trench coat pretending to be a novel. It’s set up in a middle of a road trip, unrelated not just to each other, but also the measly bit of plot that was given to us? I found it’s quite difficult to engage with the story overall, or follow it, really. It tries to be more character driven than plot driven, which is an admirable aim, and some of the character stuff they have in here is nice, except... Outside of may be bits of chapter 1, I couldn’t really hear Doctor’s voice - any version of him, let alone Eight. Sam fares a bit better, but, at the end of the day... It doesn’t really feel like Doctor Who story. The pacing is completely off, as is the structure, and it was quite nonsensical and whimsical, more akin to Alice in Wonderland than Doctor Who. Not bad in and of itself, just, hard for me to appreciate as a part of this marathon. A note on Iris. I haven’t yet listened to her stand-alone adventures, but I generally enjoy whenever she shows up in Big Finish. Here, though, she was rather lacking Katy Manning’s charm and personality. And, I feel, if you didn’t have any existing fondness for the character before, this novel isn’t going to give you much to care about her. Except, *checks notes*, this was one of her first major outings? Not really a good start. Oh, and prior to this she was in a few short stories, by the same writer. Well, that checks out. 6/10

16) The Janus Conjunction - I really liked this one. Not much to say beyond it, but, very well written, very easy read, practically in a single breath. Excellent characterization for both Doctor and Sam, just a right degree of joyful, determined, adventurous, death defying, mad, delirious, and codependent, almost moreso than any other I’ve read so far. Rather dark, though, I can feel it resonating in the pit of my stomach, and it gets inside your head. 10/10

17) Beltempest - What did the Doctor do to deserve this character assassination??? It’s not without redeeming bits (looks like “I’m not a man” quote comes from here, big yay), but, in large part, is barely a pale shadow of a character I like. Especially in the beginning - he think that Sam might have died and he is ok with this??? After the Dreamstone Moon??? And he is incredibly obnoxious? And Sam was barely herself, even before being... uh, possessed? for plot related reasons. I can’t describe how much disconnect I have with the protagonists here, or with any characters in the rest of the book, for that matter, and how much the dialogue made me roll my eyes. And, ah, the technobabble. I generally try not to overthink the physics of most things in fiction, because, as a certified space scientist, otherwise I’d be here all day, but there comes a point where it crosses the line. After everything else, to read the words “newly born main sequence star” with my own two eyes is just too much. I’m a good person, I do not deserve this nonsense... The first half of the book left me rather put off. The second part left me feeling absolutely flat. No emotions, either positive or negative. And, uh, there was a post going around on tumblr along the lines of “the worst you can do to the character is having them mention a certain food, because the fandom will turn it into an obsession” - it’s rather the same here with Eight and books & classical music. I am rather starting to loose count of the number of times they are trying to emulate the scene with the ending of the movie, where he is lounging about and reading, or specifically mentioning Pucchini. To be fair, it’s not just this novel, but it definitely starting to take me out of it. 5/10

18) The Face-Eater - I’m generally a bit wary of cold opens in the books, because some tend to ramble a bit, with the characters I don’t already know and love, so it’s often is a chore to muster enthusiasm to care about them. This one, though, despite all that, starts very effectively, in a way that made me immediately sit up straight. Very snappish, in a style of noir novels. Too bad it doesn’t quite sustain that energy throughout it. The plot is... interesting, I guess. Characterization is decent, for the most part - although some moments, especially early on gave me a pause, it more than makes up for it in other places. 7/10

Overall impressions so far: Much better than the first set of 9, which often were too deeply rooted in nostalgia to try to offer anything unique. And, I guess, with more writers having a chance to read each others works, the characterization is a bit more consistent (not for every writer, mind, but, in general). How long does it take for them to write a novel of this length, I wonder? A book a month is a rather grueling pace for the series - how far in advance do they start? How many other books come out during that time? 

Sam in particular incrementally found her footing (though, there is a bit of a lag from novel to novel). Instead of imagining literally any other companion, there were certain novels that really helped me to grasp her character. Though, hmm... being Doctor’s companion is not a safe job by any stretch of imagination, but this girl has really been through a wringer. I’m rather struggling to think of any other companion that has been put through so much (non-lethal) battering. There comes a point when one just wants to just to let her have some good time. And, uh, there was a horrible thought that occurred to me, and went to look up how she will depart the TARDIS in the end, and... well, I have a feeling that sometime afterwards I will not like what will happen.

Also, there is this trend of separating her and the Doctor, for a prolonged period of time, them having no idea where to find each other, without any contact, just, stumbling onto one another eventually. It’s a way for writers to have them cover more narrative ground, and you certainly don’t want them attached by the hip, but when they spend less than 20 pages a book in each other’s company, that’s, uh... not a trend I particularly care for.

Well, onto the next batch where we meet Fitz, and say good bye to Sam.

Next part here

[lesbeet]

long post ahead

ive been thinking nonstop about the possibility of me having adhd since my sister and her boyfriend brought it up to me last week (i’m FINALLY seeing my therapist today so we can talk about it) and i’ve been doing a lot of research and i found the howtoadhd channel on youtube

and literally the number of times in the past 2 hours alone that i’ve teared up or started legitimately crying because of how much i relate to things that these videos are saying is ridiculous, like some of them are word-for-word things i’ve said that i had NO inkling of an idea could be related to adhd

like this one video of this guy who was diagnosed at 43 and said that prior to his diagnosis he had just accepted that he would feel dissatisfied for his whole life, that he would never feel content, i’ve been saying that for YEARS and just was resigned to it and chalked it up solely to my depression

and just like. having been able to do well in school as a kid but constantly being told that i’m “not living up to [my] potential” and now that i’m in my early 20s and my intelligence can’t compensate for like....not being able to regulate my emotions and not being able to organize my life and not being able to motivate myself to do things, which is supposedly why a number of people get diagnosed around this time, because metrics for success are different in adulthood (you can’t just take a test and rely on being smart to compensate for all the other problems), and i was always just. thinking that i fucked up and wasted my life through laziness or whatever the case may be

i’ve always considered myself to be “crafty” and “resourceful” in the sense that i may not go about doing things in the typical way but i can almost always find a way to accomplish what i need accomplished, even if it’s unconventional -- apparently that’s common with adhd too! like i’ll say “oh i couldn’t figure out how to do [x] so i did [y and z]” and someone will be like “why didn’t you just do [thing everyone else does]” and usually i either couldn’t figure out how, or it didn’t occur to me, and my way was weird and unconventional, but it worked for me!

and then of course i’m just recognizing all these signs that have always been there that i either didn’t notice or attributed to other things -- i’ve been trying to observe the way my attention functions this week and literally i space out and miss things SO much more often than i ever realized, like i miss so much information because i’ve drifted off. or i get really stuck on things in conversations and even after everyone else has moved on i have this urge to bring it back so i can say that last thing i’ve been rehearsing over and over for the past 5 minutes so i didn’t forget it, and now it’s in my head and everyone is talking about something else and it’s SO inconsequential but i have to forcibly drag myself away from whatever the thing is (yesterday my sister and her friend and i were talking about early 2000′s fashion and i wanted to make a comment about wearing ugly scarves as belts and they saw a dog and moved on to talking about cute things our dogs have done and i just couldn’t stop thinking about the scarves as belts thing for like 10 minutes until i just had to sigh and be like...well i can’t bring that up again now)

when i was younger i would rush through tests so i could go back to whatever book i was reading and i just thought it was a silly quirk like “oh i just like to read lol” but i realized i still do similar things -- if i’m reading a book or watching a show or working on something, THAT is what i’m doing. anything else, whether it’s work or sleep or eating or hanging out with a friend or fulfilling any sort of responsibility? that’s a break from the thing i’m doing. if i’m reading a book, even if it’s the 3rd time i’m rereading harry potter for the year, for example, then in my head, i’m reading harry potter. i have to go to work all day but then i can read harry potter. all i’m doing is thinking about reading harry potter. i rush through my responsibilities so i can go BACK to reading harry potter, because that’s what i’m doing and anything else is just taking a break from reading harry potter. (you see how this can negatively affect the accomplishment/fulfillment of important tasks and responsibilities)

and my sister has pointed out things that i didn’t really notice, like she said it’s really difficult to hold a conversation with me when i’m excited about something because i can’t calm down enough to let the other person talk. and i’ve always known that i tend to finish peoples’ sentences for them during conversations, which i always thought was a way of showing that i’m listening! but ive realized it’s actually that, if i already know what you’re going to say, and you’re saying it too slowly, i get impatient and i need to blurt out the rest for you so we can move on and i can say my next thing before i forget it

and like obviously all people experience some symptoms some of the time, daydreaming isn’t exclusive to adhd, neither is walking into a room and forgetting what you’re doing there. but this week as i’ve been paying attention, i notice i do it CONSTANTLY. the other night i opened up my phone before bed because i remembered i hadn’t set my alarm, so i picked it up from where i place it for the night (i was about to go to sleep). 15 minutes later i put my phone back down and decided to turn in for the night again, and then realized i still had never turned the alarm on because i got distracted and did other stuff. and things like that happen with almost comical regularity, now that i know to look for it.

i’ve known i have executive dysfunction issues for a long time so i won’t go into those, but like we’ve known i have problems with directions and organization and spatial processing and knowing how to complete tasks for a long time

the rejection-sensitive dysphoria is something i didn’t really realize was part of adhd, but it makes SO much sense. i think it’s part of why i thought i had bpd for a while, because a lot of the symptoms were similar and i knew i was dealing with something more than just depression and anxiety but didn’t know what, and a lot of the symptoms i experienced also seemed to fit the bpd diagnosis even if my actual behavior and personality didn’t seem to

there are so many more things i’ve noticed this week and thought about differently but i literally can’t remember what they are lmao i think i’m gonna try to write stuff down so i don’t forget to tell my therapist today but like. 

so many of these things i didn’t realize had anything to do with adhd, like emotional dysregulation, i’ve always known i have horrible mood swings and trouble regulating my emotions, i’ve always noticed a lot of these different symptoms but it never occurred to me that they could all be part of the same thing??

like i haven’t been tested or diagnosed yet and i’m worried i’m getting carried away but the only time i’ve ever felt this sort of relief was a few months ago when realizing my dad is a narcissist. like the feeling of “oh my god, i knew this was something i experienced but i didn’t think i could attribute it to anything” and “oh my god, this is word for word something i say all the time, i didn’t realize it was part of a pattern”

and it genuinely made me cry! hearing people talk about things that describe me that i never would have guessed might have to do with adhd, finding something that seems to encompass a very broad range of symptoms that i previously thought were unrelated or results of a myriad of things (and obviously they all play off of one another but that’s a whole separate issue)

but it would explain so much of my behavior and challenges -- why i struggle with finishing up a task or project once the big, complicated part is done; why i get super obsessed with something and then once it wears off i never mention or think about it again; why i’ve always needed my mom’s help to clean my closet or pack for a trip, even though i felt like i was way too old to need help with that; why people constantly are like “i know you heard me say this because you said ‘ok’” about things i genuinely have no recollection of

but i just can’t stop thinking about that guy talking about how he was just resigned to thinking he would never been satisfied or content with his life because that is something i have been feeling and saying FOREVER, for years ive just been like “everything is so hard, the idea of spending the rest of my life struggling to get up in the morning and going to work every day, dealing with all my responsibilities, i feel like i’m exhausted and underwater just thinking about it, i’m never going to feel fulfilled or satisfied, it’s always just going to be slogging through my responsibilities and it’s never going to end” and apparently that’s....a normal thing, and i just thought it was depression and maybe part of it is, but maybe the reason i struggle so much with those every day things is because my brain is wired differently?

and maybe i’ve fucked up because at this point i think i’ll be really disappointed if i don’t get the diagnosis because i’m not really sure what else could explain these issues, it certainly makes sense and i feel like it fits and i feel relieved just thinking about having that answer, and it certainly negatively impacts almost every aspect (if not every aspect) of my life. so like if i don’t get diagnosed idk what i’m gonna do and i probably fucked up by spending the last week obsessing over it lol

but like....the relief i feel every time i read or hear or see someone with adhd say “i experience [x]” and i’m like holy shit??? me too???? and it just. feels like maybe there’s an explanation for all this horrible dissatisfaction and unhappiness i thought i was going to be stuck with for the rest of my life, and there are other people who experience these things and there are things that can be done, medication and therapy and strategies and...my whole life doesn’t NEED to feel like a challenge, maybe it’s not an indisputable fact that i’m just going to have to live with forever.

if you read this far and you have adhd (especially if you were diagnosed after childhood) i would love to hear your thoughts on this, obviously i didn’t list every single symptom and experience and i know there are more but these are all i could think of at the moment, if i seem like i’m way off base obviously please let me know

[crystalelemental]

FE Fates Replay - Part 2

“A big focus for Fates was beefing up the storyline, which most agreed didn’t really go anywhere in Awakening. While Awakening was an excellent game to play, I can’t tell you what happened.”

Listen, I’m sincere about wanting to replay Fates with a bit more of an open mind, and a desire to come to appreciate more of the cast and viewing it as its own entity.  But this interview is the one thing I cannot possibly set aside.  Because when you get right down to it?  They drew the comparison themselves.  They wanted us to think “Oh yeah, Awakening sure had a pretty weak story, so making a complex story everyone can enjoy is our goal in Fates!”  They made the comparison themselves, and were so cock-sure that they were convinced Fates was going to blow Awakening’s story out of the water.  So no matter how much I look over Fates on its own merits, I can’t get away from drawing the connections.  And neither should you.  So whenever events like today’s chapters occur, I want you to make that connection.  Think about the moments in Awakening that were designed to evoke similar feelings.  Think about Emmeryn sacrificing herself to stop a war waged by a despot.  Think about Lucina finally getting to meet her father for the first time in her life, and the moment they share.  Think of how much emotional impact Awakening had, and compare it to this.  Because we can never forget: they thought for sure they did a better job.

Chapter 4 begins to introduce us to the Hoshidan side.  The worse side, if you ask me.  Rinkah and Kaze are solid characters in their own right, but the rest feel lacking.  Ryoma is fine and serious, but he doesn’t really do anything to demonstrate the compassion that Xander has.  He mostly just does the thing all the Hoshidans do, and calls all of Nohr a bunch of scum.  Hinoka is fine, and seems to genuinely care about Corrin, so she’s probably the best of the four so far.  Sakura didn’t do anything too interesting either, and is mostly just there to be the shy younger sister.  Takumi...look, we’ll get to him.

Chapter 4 is focused on showing you what the war is like for the Hoshidans.  The Nohrians seemed to be on the offensive, while Hoshido seems to be trying to manage against weird creatures called Faceless that the Nohrians create to bypass their Passivity Barrier.  See, Hoshido has a barrier created by their mother, which makes anyone passing into it unwilling to fight.  A bit contrived, but fine, I’ll just accept that at face value and move on.  The Faceless, as entities that are without will or purpose, are unaffected by the magic, and are thus the preferred method of attack.  The Faceless, unfortunately, are also without direction, and attack randomly across villages and harm innocents, which Corrin is none too fond of.  The chapter itself is a rescue mission, going to help Sakura and Hinoka, but honestly?  They...kinda had it under control.  If Sakura were able to figure out the concept of “moving away from the bad man,” they wouldn’t even need our help.  Hinoka had that well under control.  Anyway, you get the reunion with them, and everyone in this kingdom refers to you as family and does seem to care, but there’s a lot of emphasis on you being blood related here.  It’s a large focus of who your “proper” family is, and I feel like the appeal to that concept is important for your decision.  Again, more on that later.

Azura’s introduction is nice.  You’re pretty fast friends.  Mikoto attempts to have Corrin sit on the throne of Hoshido to hopefully get her memories back, and again we’re just very focused on getting memories back and proving that they’re the real blood relatives.  It’s honestly about all they focus on.  They’re definitely glad to have Corrin back, I just wish we could move off of it.

Which almost makes Takumi being such an unrelenting prick refreshing.  I’ll admit, I remembered disliking Takumi right away because he was a jerk, but I had forgotten how much of a jerk.  Look, I get it.  Corrin showing up and being the assumed favored child is frustrating for him.  That’s fine.  I was ready for him to be an ass to Corrin.  What I didn’t expect is him being an asshole to Azura, who’s lived with them peacefully for as long as Corrin’s been gone.  Seriously, what is this guy’s damage?  He’s the perfect representation of Hoshido as a whole, I think.  Like I mentioned in part 1 of this replay, every time the Hoshidans reference Nohr, it’s usually with “scum” or “filth” inserted in.  They’re so trained to utterly despise their opponents, to the point Takumi tells someone who’s been living with him as a sister for what is apparently the better portion of a decade that she hasn’t earned the right to say his name.  Seriously, fuck you, Takumi.

Chapter 5.  Here’s where the intro text becomes relevant.  Mikoto has decided to announce for everyone that her long-lost daughter, who was kidnapped by Garon, has returned home.  But oh no!  There was a surprise plot, and this weird magic man used your obvious evil sword to explode the barrier!  Shards of the sword go flying toward you, and Mikoto blocks them with her body, sacrificing her life to protect you!  Corrin is so distraught that she becomes a full-on dragon, in what is honestly a pretty cool transformation scene.  Ryoma rushes in to fight this hooded figure, and the rest of you fight your way to support him.

Pause.  Show of hands, how many of you actually felt something about Mikoto dying?  Because...I sure didn’t.  We’ve known her a grand total of like 10 minutes, and she’s already dead.  The only thing she did was announce that she’s your real mom, try to get your memories back, and die.  This entire sequence is incredibly lacking in any form of emotional impact, which is funny, because they wanted to make a good story with Fates, better than Awakening even!  And yet...Emmeryn’s death, which was designed to evoke similar feelings of loss, hit way harder.  Because we spent time around her.  We got a feeling for how she acts and engages with others, in a way that isn’t just Azura saying she’d like to stay in Hoshido because Mikoto is a peaceful ruler.  Nothing substantial is shown to us through Mikoto’s actions, and despite being your birth mother, Corrin’s memories aren’t back yet.  She has stated time and again that she doesn’t really feel anything about Mikoto, yet when she dies it’s like the biggest tragedy in the world.  Don’t get me wrong, Mikoto sacrificing herself for Corrin is a pretty selfless move that would definitely have upset Corrin, but why is this the event that makes her dragon out and not Gunter’s death?  Gunter has been with her the whole time, and Hans came out of nowhere on what was said to be a peaceful mission and kicked her kindly uncle into the bottomless pit.  Sure, she got some dragon power in that moment, but given the history and connection she must’ve shared with Gunter throughout her life, you’d think that would hit harder than the death of the mother she never knew.

Anyway, following the map itself, Azura trying to calm the raging Corrin, and eventually succeeds, though it takes some effort and Corrin almost kills her in the process.  Everyone else moves on from their mom being dead surprisingly fast, mostly marveling at Corrin’s dragon form, while Takumi has an understandable tantrum and snaps at Corrin and Azura that they should fuck off.  Honestly, earlier dickitude aside, I can actually see where he’s coming from on this one.  Again, it made sense he was mean to Corrin.  How does he know you’re really his sister?  He feels nothing for you the same way Corrin felt nothing for Mikoto, and that makes some sense.  So when your arrival meant that Mikoto died, I can get why he’d be pissed.  And in this moment, at least, I can understand why he’d snap at Azura too.  He’s lashing out at everyone, and is clearly grief-stricken.  So fine, that’s cool.  He’s still an asshole, though.

Chapter 6 ramps up as the Nohrians enter Hoshidan territory after the fall of the barrier, and prepare to make one last push to conquer the kingdom and put an end to the war for good.  Both sides reach out to Corrin, asking her which family she chooses to side with.  That decision...will be made next installment.  Which basically means in a few hours, probably.  I’m in a good headspace to want to keep playing, so I’ll probably do that, but need to take care of some other stuff first.  Which side will I pick?!  Oh man, it’s such a mystery!

[peacefulheartfarm]

What is a Freemartin Heifer?

What is a freemartin heifer? That’s today’s topic. It is related to one of our cows having twins. Stay tuned for those details. In other news, “is that a skunk?” That’s what I thought yesterday when I was walking out to get the cows. You never know what you are going to run into on the homestead. And the dogwood trees are in bloom what a treat. It’s different for us out here in the country. Driving along the highway, there are lots of dogwood trees in everybody’s yard. These are well-trimmed and very round trees. They are quite lovely. The dogwood trees here on the homestead are sprinkled through the woods. It looks like it is snowing in patches everywhere. I love this time of year.

I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much. What would I do without You? I have no idea. I’m so glad you are here. I’m so excited to share with you are the various stuff going on at the farm this week. There is a lot of it.

Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates

This time of year, everything is kicked into high gear. It seems like one thing is happening right on top of another. And when you have the odd thing pop up – like your windshield getting a ding by a flying rock on the highway that quickly expanded to a lengthy crack requiring a windshield replacement, it makes it that much busier. To top off that cute little story, you never question how much it is going to cost for those great auto-driving gadgets if something breaks. The windshield has a camera right behind the rear-view mirror that required recalibration after the glass was replaced. That lovely service cost one and half times the cost of the windshield replacement itself.

A day later I find out that the automatic headlight features are no longer working. I have to make a second trip to town for some codes to get cleared out. That fixed the problem but it took another three hours out of my day. Do you guys have days like that? You have so much to do and you end up doing something completely unrelated to anything on your “to-do” list. I still have a pending “to-do” regarding that windshield replacement. In Virginia, every county has an annual inspection that requires a sticker to be displayed on the windshield. Yup! You guessed it. That little feature didn’t survive the procedure. I got it back in pieces with an apology and a reminder that I would need to get that inspection sticker replaced. When am I going to get that done? Geesh. It has been one of those weeks. On to the homestead happenings in and around these minor annoyances.

Gardens and Orchard

The strawberries are doing really well. I can’t wait for them to start blooming. Speaking of blooming, the blueberries are busting out all over. Keep the second week of June in mind. That’s likely when we will have blueberries available at the farmer’s markets. I’ll be making lots of blueberry jam again this year. At least I hope I will be.

If you’ve been around the podcast a while, you might remember that we have had some trouble with racoons in the past. These are really cute creatures and I’m willing to share a little of our abundance with them. However, when they start eating the entire crop of blueberries, that’s where I draw the line. We put up an electric fence two years ago. It worked beautifully. In fact, it worked so well that we didn’t even have it working last year and we still got all the berries. I guess the experience the previous year was so “shocking” that these little guys decided not to even try last year. I wonder if that caution will hold up for another year. Naw, let’s not test it. That electric fence needs to be reinstated in the coming weeks to ensure that we are successful in harvesting our wonderful blueberries.

The blackberries are growing lots of leaves but have not started blooming quite yet. It is a wonderful time of year when the blackberries bloom. A related plant, the wild rose, also blooms about the same time. Between these two plants, the fragrance in the air is heavenly. The goats have cleared out most of the wild rose and wild blackberries so we may have to rely solely on the domestic blackberries for our perfumed air this season. We shall see.

The green peas are jumping up out of the ground. Scott built a wonderful trellis for these lovelies. We have two 70-ft long beds with six rows of peas in each that are coming up. Peas love the cool weather. It’s a good thing they do. The temps are going to drop into the low 30’s tonight. But I expect the peas to be fine. There might be a very light frost, but we should be okay with that.

The early blooming fruit trees are done and will be setting fruit at this point. That is a greater concern. If it gets too cold, the cherries, peaches, and plums could lose their fruit. I was looking at the peach trees yesterday and I didn’t see any small fruit. Perhaps it will be all right. We shall see.

What was I doing out in the orchard yesterday? I was chasing a small quail.

Quail

While I was testing the automatic waterers, one of the younger girls slipped by me and jumped to the ground. I chased her and chased her and chased her. She got into the orchard and the grass is about 8 inches tall in there. I saw exactly where she landed but when I got there, she was gone. I walked outward in a spiral, expanding larger and larger, but I never saw her. I guess she’s gone for good. Sigh! I hope she has a great life out there on her own. Hopefully, she will be able to fend for herself. It’s hard to tell though. She has always had her food presented in an easily consumable form with no effort on her part. Out there on her own, she will need to scratch around a lot to find bugs and worms and such. Quail are very carnivorous and require lots and lots of protein. I wish her the best. Who knows? She may turn up in a day or so and I will be able to catch her. We had that experience a couple of years ago. Scott lost two hens that time and we eventually caught both of them and returned them to their cages. So, there is hope.

The rest of the quail are doing very, very well. Twice a year Scott gives the quail hutches a thorough cleaning. He finished that job just as the new babies went out into the grow out cages. They are doing really well. We have 36 of them at this time. Figuring out how to work the automatic waterers is always a challenge, but they mastered it in no time.

Just this morning 72 more eggs went into the incubator. The second cycle of baby quail has started.

Sheep and Lambs

We are done with the lambing season. The last ewe delivered twins a few days ago. Girls!! Yay!! They are doing very well. We ended up with three girls and three boys. Six healthy lambs. Susie Q is still getting her bottle twice a day, but she has been turned loose with the rest of the sheep and lambs. I’m thinking she doesn’t like this very much, but she is getting used to it. Because she was so attached to Scott and myself and literally never left our side, it was important for her to start spending her time with other animals. After all, she isn’t a human and she needs to make friends with the other animals.

It seems to be going well. I always feel sorry for these lambs that have no mother caring for them. But they seem to do very well in spite of their orphan status in the flock. Lambert is our flock ram. He was a bottle-baby last year. Look how far he has been elevated in status. I’ll probably keep Susie Q as a flock ewe also. The bottle babies are somewhat like pets. Not exactly, but definitely more special than the others.

Cows and Calves

Violet is the only animal we have left who has yet to deliver. She is not due until the first week of June. It’s always a relief when we make it through this delicate time for all of our female creatures. Scott briefly talked about having a second set of lambs in the fall. I am not in favor of this as it is quite stressful for me when our ladies are nearly term. I’d rather keep it to just a couple of months in the spring. My nerves need a rest for the remainder of the year.

Butter produced a very big surprise for us. If you haven’t seen and heard Scott’s video on our Facebook page, you have to get over there and find it. It was posted on Thursday, April 15th. He is filming the results of him helping Butter deliver this cute little girl when all of a sudden, he sees another set of hooves. Here’s a link to that post. It’s hilarious. Watch to the end.

The twin calves are really cute. However, there is a problem when twins are one boy and one girl. The heifer calf, the girl, is most likely what is called a “freemartin���. That’s the topic that I want to dive into with more detail.

Butter’s Surprise

I had Butter pegged for delivery in late May, not mid-April. I’m not sure how I got so far off on those calculations. I think I was planning ahead on my spreadsheet, estimating where the dates would fall with various scenarios and neglected to put the dates back to their original settings. About three or four days before she gave birth, it became obvious that my calculations were off. Her udder swelled up and she was just huge. And it was the day before she gave birth that I had the very strong thought that she might have twins. She was really huge. It really is hard to tell though. When they fill their belly up with hay and grass, it can get really big even when they are not pregnant. Add pregnancy and they all look really huge just before they give birth. I just had that very strong thought and then she did, in fact, have twins.

There is no problem when the twins are both girls or both boys. But when one is a boy and the other a girl, there are definite issues. Nothing like they will die or anything like that. No, they will be quite healthy. It’s the freemartin phenomenon to which I am referring. What? You don’t know what that means? Neither did I.

We had actually purchased a calf that was a likely freemartin heifer when we purchased our first milk cows, Claire and Buttercup. We purchased Beta because the price was right and we wanted one additional cow strictly for beef. So, what is a freemartin heifer anyway? Here is the low-down.

Freemartin Heifer

The term freemartin refers to an infertile female mammal with masculinized behavior and non-functioning ovaries. The animal originates as a female with the double X chromosome, but during gestation acquires the male, XY chromosome. This can only happen with a male/female twin gestation. As I said, as long as there are two girls or two boys, there is no problem. This occurs in all cattle species that have been studied, and it can also happen occasionally in other mammals including sheep, goats and pigs. We have never seen this in our sheep and they deliver mixed male/female twins all the time. So, I have to think it is quite rare in sheep. Sheep and goats deliver twins and even triplets all the time. However, natural twins in cows only happens about .5% of the time. About one in every 200 births. A large cattle herd of 200 or more cows would see twins regularly in any given calving season.

With the male/female twin calf set, they not only share the uterus but they also share the placental membranes. That’s where the problem arises. The joining of the placental membranes occurs at about the fortieth day of gestation. After that happens, the fluids of the two fetuses can easily mix. There is an exchange of blood and antigens that carry unique characteristics of bulls and heifers. In the end, both will have some characteristics of the other sex.

The male is only affected by reduced fertility. In the female, over 90% of them are completely infertile. That makes her a freemartin. One who is genetically female but has characteristics of a male. Ovaries generally do not develop correctly and are small. There can be other structural anomalies as well. In the end, freemartinism cannot be prevented. And it really is rare. Even with any set of twins, there is a 50%-50% chance of same sex calves. If I do the math correctly, that means that 1 in 200 births would produce twins and at least half of the time, those twins would be fine – twins of the same sex.

Anyway, that’s the story of our twin calves. They are cute beyond measure, but likely we have two steers. I don’t know about the Hansel. Oh, I forgot to mention we call them Hansel and Gretel. So, I don’t know if Hansel will make a decent bull or not. But we can be pretty sure that Gretel will never produce a calf. What do you think we should do with these two calves?  We currently are bottle feeding both of them. They could be sold as bottle babies. We could raise them as steers. We could try to breed Gretel when she is old enough. We could raise Hansel as a bull. He is 50% registered Normande and 50% registered Jersey. If he is fertile, he would make a fine bull for somebody.

Let us know what you think.

Final Thoughts

That’s it for this podcast. It’s a great time of the year here on the homestead. I’m so glad to be nearly finished with birthing. As I mentioned it is quite stressful for me. I just never know what to expect. We have beautiful lambs and beautiful calves. We are truly blessed. The joy of watching all of the plants and animals grow will fill our lives for the next several months.

I hope you all are having a wonderful spring season as well.

If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. If you like this content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast.

Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace.

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Check out this episode!

[rhetoricandlogic]

I feel that this post by @uncloudedandsage didn’t get the attention it should have ... because a.) Scott Lynch everybody - look at him and b.) he has some really interesting things to say, so here’s the complete thing:

First of all and unrelated to the rest of my questions, but congratulations on getting married and moving. Thank you! Moving was the bigger problem.

How’s everything going these days? Everything seems to be going pretty well, except for… I’m constantly at science fiction conventions when I should really be working on my next book.

Getting the obligatory question that no one wants to answer out of the way then, how is the book coming along? Everything with my fourth book, The Thorn of Emberlain, is coming along really well. I’m only being slightly facetious when I’m saying that I should be at home working on it [laughs] rather than here in Sweden and Finland traveling between conventions, but some of these things are unavoidable; as strange as it seems to look at this as a professional commitment, I suppose it really is.

My wife and I will have an uninterrupted 2 month period after we go home, during which I basically hope to get the book turned in, and then we can begin setting a firmer schedule for its publication. For the most part I’m very pleased with it. I’m pretty sure that I can fix the stuff that I’m not pleased about in the next 8 weeks or so.

Great! Now for example, George R.R. Martin and Patrick Rothfuss get a whole lot of crap from people about being late with their novels... [sighs] They do, yes, it’s kind of ridiculous sometimes. Pat gets a tremendous amount of vituperation, online in particular. I mean, George gets it, but George is also kind of above it. George doesn’t really give a shit; George is big enough to not give a shit, and Pat is still, relatively speaking, a little bit closer to his readers and does not quite have a Scrooge McDuck money-bin to dive into just yet. I mean, he doesn’t do badly for himself, but Pat gets, I think, the most vicious of all the online comments, and I just don’t understand it. We are human beings, we are human artists, we produce at the rate we produce, and telling us that you really want our work, but that you fucking hate us and that we should nail ourselves to our desks and produce until it’s finished… it doesn’t make any sense. You can’t have both. "You’re a lazy bastard! Now give me that thing that I really want that’s beautiful, that only you do!" [laughter]

Do you feel like you get a piece of that crap pie, or have you been avoiding it? I’ve just begun; it’s just started in the last, let’s say 2 months especially, because there was a lot of stuff that I wanted to be able to talk about, a lot of developments not just related to my books but to various other things, which have to stay under badge for the time being. As it turns out, I have not been able to talk about any of them at all. And that, for a change, is not entirely my fault. So it’s just one of the ways in which the wheels of publishing and the industry just grind very slowly. What I expected to be a gigantic series of announcements has actually been a long, stupid summer of silence. Possibly we can fix that soon-ish, but still…

It’s one of those things where my wife and I both discovered, as we’ve become more involved in our careers, that the travel and publicity aspect of it is very valuable and it’s wonderful to meet readers. It’s good to get out of the house and take vacations, meet editors and agents and so forth in other countries, but no work gets done while we’re doing this. A little bit here and there, and a lot of research, a lot of useful stuff, but no actual production of the next book. So I’m looking forward to finally nailing that son of a bitch.

In that vein, is there anything that you wish people knew about writing that people clearly don’t understand? Inherent in producing anything, basically - and very few people realize, or think about it - is that something you consume in hours or minutes takes months or years for someone to actually make. A 20-page comic book or a portion of a graphic novel... it takes a writer and an artist a month to make. It takes you 20 minutes to read it. So as far as you’re concerned, it’s 20 minutes of emotional investment.

With regard to writing itself, how long would you say your compositing period is before you even actually start writing? That phase where you’re just thinking things through. For The Thorn of Emberlain, it’s different because this is the book that I set out to write originally back in about 2000-2001, so I’ve had 15-odd years to think about this one, and that’s not usual.

Ordinarily, I would say that the lead I process to any given novel - which usually involves the writing of the previous novel - is a year or two, and ideally the writing of it would be a year or two. That’s how it went with my first two novels, but things have been a little more difficult since. I would like to get back to that point where the actual writing of a novel is a 6-8 month affair, rather than a long, drawn-out, anxiety-filled 4-year process.

Again, if someone’s going to read it, it’s going to take them 8-12 hours, and it took me 4 years to make it. The discrepancy in the emotional involvement, I think some people just don’t think about it.

Related to what you just said there, I’ve read that the seven book series was meant to have the first three as the introduction to the world and characters, with the four later books being the actual starting-point of the story. Is that true? Yeah, that’s still pretty true. I was originally dead set on starting the story with what will be book 4 in the sequence, The Thorn of Emberlain, and I realized about two chapters into trying to write it that I did not feel that I knew the characters involved well enough. It just did not feel right. So I went back and essentially wrote three prequels to it. That cheapens the other novels, you know, in memory - that’s not entirely what I mean to do to them - but I wondered how my readers could feel involved in a setting and these characters if I myself did not feel sufficiently involved in them.

So yes, there will be a major structural difference in the first half of the sequence and the second half, in that the first half was location change, location change, location change, and the second half will be a lot more anchored in place. We will see some new locations, but we’re always going to be returning to Emberlain and the Kingdom of the Seven Marrows, as returning scene settings.

Is there anything you’re allowed or willing to tell us about The Thorn of Emberlain and what to expect, such as who we might be reading about, or is it still very hush-hush? [ed: for those who want to avoid any and all story spoilers, skip down to the next question] It’s not entirely hush-hush. I can reaffirm stuff I’ve already said and try hard not to spoil anything. It does follow about 6 months after the end of The Republic of Thieves. It picks up on the northwest coast of the continent Locke lives on, in the city-state of Emberlain. It does focus on the actual civil war in the Kingdom of the Seven Marrows.

Every book has had a thematic shift and a plot shift. The first book was essentially the revenge tale, the second book was a heist novel, the third book was politics and romance, and this book is war. Locke and Jean will engage in a scheme that brings them into direct contact with an unfolding civil war and their efforts to profit from it are going to complicate their lives forever.

We’re also going to meet a new cast of recurring characters, who are going to be in total political opposition to everything Locke and Jean want to accomplish, and that is Anton Strata and his family. He’s a teenager who finds himself essentially fighting in a suddenly very vicious portion of the civil war to stay alive, let alone claim his eventual succession to the throne.

Locke and Jean, in previous books, have used the rumored threat of a civil war in the Kingdom of the Seven Marrows to make money as part of a scam, and now it’s actually happened and it’s going to severely fuck the world up, pardon my French.

So it is the biggest of the Gentleman Bastards sequence thus far in terms of scale. We’re going to see actual battles. There’s a lot of stuff that we’ve not previously seen and it’s going to be the biggest challenge and the most complicated infiltration scheme that Locke has ever run.

I’m looking very forward to reading it! Republic of Thieves ended in a very unexpected way, both for the readers and for the characters. The series feels like it took a complete turn into a different direction from there. Can you talk a bit about those endings, and did they shock you or did you already know the books were building up to that? For the most part I knew. I work from a very elaborate and anal-retentive plan. I graph everything out, draw little lines to a lot of preliminary work - I’m an outliner. Everything was proceeding firmly according to plan, although there was one gigantic twist at the end of the third book, and those who have read it will know what happens in the last scene and who returns from a previous novel. Originally that was not going to happen. Originally we were never going to see that person again. Once that scene sort of popped into my head, once I saw what they were doing, I couldn’t un-see it. I just had to. So the story has taken one significant shift and that would be it. Everything else is still basically exactly where it was.

You’ve already mentioned that you plot your stories out a lot beforehand. Do you let much of anything just happen as you go? I’m fascinated by that notion - it seems so romantic to me - but I have a lot of difficulty with actually doing so. Although, typically… what I’ve often said before is that I write a strict plan, I get about 30-40% of the way into the work, but by the time I’ve spent that much time with the characters, I’ve gotten to know them a little better. It’s not that they take over; I don’t believe in that sort of anthropomorphisation - I think that’s a little bit precious - but you’ve spent more time with them and angles and opportunities that may not have been previously obvious suddenly become obvious, because you have a better mental model of what the characters might do. They might take paths that you did not previously conceive of as possible. You can still get to the ending point you wanted, but the path becomes a little more meandering. So that’s about as far as I go toward just getting lost in my own story.

I consider you one of the top worldbuilders, or at least I love your world- Oh yeah! [laughter]

…what do you like best and worst about creating new worlds, and what do you think is the base requirement for a world to feel organic and real? I obviously love doing it. The difficulty is… there are two major points of difficulty. First off, giving yourself permission not to tell every damn thing. It’s a very difficult skill to acquire. It takes years to basically decide, how much can I get away with? The real question in worldbuilding is not how much can I dump on the page, but how much can I get away with not actually telling people? Because the alternative is to get this inelegant info-dumpy writing style, in which everyone who is meeting everyone else is taking extra time in their dialogue to explain what they’re doing.

“As an author, I find that doing these interviews, which my publisher helps arrange with newspapers, which you guys work for...”

“As you know, Bob, yes, we are in a room on a planet, which is orbiting the sun.” [laughter]

Like I was saying on a panel earlier, people repeat things. They tell each other the same stories over and over. They use the same tidbits in interviews over and over, wink wink, nudge nudge. We don’t constantly explain, “The chair you’re sitting in was made from wood and plastic, and these things blah, blah, blah,” unless you’re a fucking crazy person. Okay, maybe there are some crazy people out there that do that sort of thing, but it’s not symptomatic of mental health. But that’s what you end up with in a lot of stories, when characters inelegantly - with the best of intentions - explain the world to people who already live in it. There’s a really fine art to providing just enough clues for the reader to get the point without overwhelming the story and the people inside it. That’s what I really enjoy.

The other thing is the realization that everything is worldbuilding. Worldbuilding has this negative connotation as sort of this homework that you have to do beforehand. Like, “If you want to enjoy this book, first here’s the glossary and then here’s the map and then let’s tell you this, and here’s the backstory about who killed such-and-such and who fucked such-and-such and who wanted to kill such-and-such and who wanted to fuck such-and-such, all the way back to the first such-and-such 3 billion years ago.” [laughter]

Everything in a story is worldbuilding in the same way that everything about us is worldbuilding. Every piece of technology we are carrying, every piece of clothing we’re wearing, the passports in our pockets, the contents of our wallets, that weird thing that you’ve got on that strap around your neck and what it does [ed: he is referring to the photographer's camera] and why you’re carrying it and why we’re in this building, the languages on the signs… all of these things are clues as to where we come from, where we are, etc. And so it is with the fictional characters on the page. What they wear, what they eat, what they drink, what they value, what they want, this is all worldbuilding and it goes on until the last page of the story. It’s not all just, “Here’s the map and here’s your 50 pages of fucking background research. Memorize this so you can have fun with the story.” There are ways to make it more elegant and more intrinsic to the story, and I do this because it is more satisfying as a writer. You’ve got to be enjoying yourself while you’re doing this, otherwise you’re just doing hack work.

Have you ever read Gardens of the Moon by Steven Eriksen? Yes, I’ve read the first of the Malazan books, but I have not [yet] continued the series.

I’m in the same boat, and I’ve noticed that he almost does the exact opposite of what you’ve said: he under-explains everything. You read his book and you think, “Who are they and what are those and where are they and what’s going on?” Yet, it still works. Yeah, those books have a really high period of… the learning curve to get into them is not gentle.

Most people seem to quit at some point during that first book, but everyone I’ve heard, who has read beyond, says it’s worth it, but you just have to chew through that first confusing book. They are brilliantly intricate, but it is very daunting to get into. In some ways, the ideal is to sync the reader… the old aphorism about slowly boiling a frog about upping the temperature one degree at a time. Eventually you want to boil your reader, you just don’t want to do it at the beginning of the book.

Exactly. Now, I’ve read that you were heavily influenced by the Final Fantasy game series, or at least Final Fantasy VI... Oh my God, yes! Final Fantasy, which I played on the Nintendo Entertainment System, and Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy VI, and Final Fantasy VII, and Chrono Trigger… basically all the major Japanese RPGs that would’ve been available in translation in the United States from about 1988-1995 are more or less chewed, swallowed, and digested into my background, yes.

We’re running out of time, so I’ll just ask one last question now: who are some of your favorite authors, or what are some of your favorite books at this moment in time? Well, I’m always a perpetual nut about Dune by Frank Herbert. I’ve read everything that Frank ever published and I’m late to the party because he died when I was 8, unfortunately, but I was a teenage Frank Herbert obsessive and I’ve never lost a reverence for his work; even the naive and silly stuff is great.

I am a big Margaret Atwood appreciator. She was really important to me when I was a teenager. Matthew Woodring Stover is the guy that… I described him as basically the closest thing I had to a mentor. He’s a criminally underappreciated, brilliant science fiction and fantasy writer. Barbara Hambly - another severely underappreciated fantasy and science fiction writer - did a lot of stuff back in the 80s and has sadly sort of faded from the public eye, and that’s not fair at all.

Jack Vance, C.J. Cherryh, and Poul Anderson… I came to Anderson’s work relatively later in my life, about 10 years ago or so, but everything I’ve read by him has been wonderful and directly formative on a lot of my own work.

C.L. Moore, a female science fiction writer in the 40s and 50s; Leigh Brackett, another groundbreaking planetary romance/sword and sorcery writer from the 40s; Fritz Leiber, who is one of my literary heroes… an absolutely brilliant, funny, whimsical, long-lived man with a very long career [laughs]. I wish I could emulate that part too!

Robert E. Howard - the author of the Conan stories - had a really unmatched passion for the stuff that he really cared about, and that really burns through in the Conan stories.

My wife’s work, Elizabeth Bear. I’ll be nepotistic. We liked each other’s work before we started dating, so thank God for that. We both agree that we would not be in a relationship if we couldn’t stand each other’s work [laughter]. It would be miserable and awkward.

I think that’s a good start.

That’s a very long list! Thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us! My pleasure!

[thezolblade]

Fanfic ask game~ C, F, G, and V. If that's not too much :')

Okay let’s try these for some of the fandoms we have in common, though not all apply to each letter.

C: What member do you identify with most?

- FF7

I was going to say that I don’t particularly identify with any of the cast, beyond feeling for them as the story plays out. But then I remembered, omg Shera. It was obvious from the start that she did her job and saved Cid’s life, but he gaslighted her for not telling him what he wanted to hear, and only realised that she was right after bullying her for years? Wtf Cid, go die in a fire if that’s what you really want. It left me thinking “…And…? Will Shera be okay? Will she finally leave and get on with her life?”

I don’t care what Cid named after her in AC, I want to know if she recovered her self-esteem & career & personal life. If you have a techy skill, and people who don’t know better try to undermine you, that can be such a tough situation to handle… Years of it would be horrifying.

- Revolutionary Girl Utena

Anthy most of all, I think. Not the drama and trauma at the end, but the solitude she maintains when it’s not yet clear why. The show did a good job of showing that school can be hell for a lot of people, for all kinds of reasons. And damn, it was painful seeing Anthy spending so much time alone, offering everyone a false smile, avoiding the crowds because they really weren’t going to do her any favours. It got frustrating in the early episodes, seeing Utena push her into things when she’d said she didn’t want to about as clearly as she was ever going to. And it was pretty gratifying to see Utena apologising for that at the end.

I mean it was also relatableto see Utena trying to do the right thing, and getting frustrated at the world when it was never easy. I’m still impressed that they managed to demonstrate so much emotional realism in the conclusion, at least as far as you can extrapolate reality for magical near-immortals or whatever they are. With the show being heavily metaphorical, and ending with everyone trying to take the same journey in the movie, it seems like Anthy’s struggles were meant to have universal elements - showing how you can self-sabotage by hurting others, and hurt yourself by telling others what they want to hear. How you need to be able to imagine better options before you can walk away.

- Golden Sun

Uh, Alex, somehow. He’s an embarrassing mess, he makes so many bad decisions which are all ‘wft are you doing?’, and Dark Dawn got into near-wallbanger territory where I was disgusted with both him and the game, bc the gratuitous damage seemed pointless and inconsistent from a gameplay perspective, and so far across the line from a characterisation perspective that it’s really hard to see why Kraden was programmed to say that Alex may have been 'helping in his own way’ or something like that. But in the first two games, at least, there was some complexity to his attitude. (And bits like that of the 3rd one indicated that the canon may still have been trying for nuance, only pretty poorly executed. #.# )

Still, gotta admit by now that judging from the amount of meta and fic I keep writing from his pov, something about his thought process is relatableenough that you can see why he’d think what he thinks, even if he’s wrong. When he actually provides factual information, it tends to be correct. He uses relatively inarguable facts to try to influence people, and the trolling is kinda unrelated. The manipulation isn’t emotional “Leave or I’ll be disappointed in you for picking this fight” - it’s attempted-impartial “Don’t pick this fight because your opponent(s) are too strong / your parents won’t be released unless you keep your side of the deal with those people.” Plus a side of “Lol you think I’m trash don’t you?”, demonstrating that he’s not trying to use a personal connection as leverage bc he’s burning those bridges, and still somehow expecting people to listen. ’I’m not on your side! But you should take my advice!’ Embarrassing mess…

And yet the others sometimes come across as relatively young and distracted by comparison, making assumptions about the world that he wouldn’t, and arguing over petty details. What is the point of panicking over things you can’t change?

F: Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

Oh I like so much dialogue, tough choice. Uh well this probably isn’t the best scene, the oldest oldfic is still a messy WIP and I can tell it’d need a lot of work to match the newer stuff, and even to get it finished as what I originally envisioned I need to schedule a whole lot of time to work on it. But I want to, because I still love it, and since I haven’t managed to communicate the whole story yet to its readers, it feels like a self-indulgent choice. I’m pretty attached to the parts where Alex and Isaac get incredibly annoyed at each other, making the situation worse even while trying to work together, though they can’t each recognize genuine effort in the other - for a variety of reasons by this point.

“I… am sick of receiving derogatory communications from the aether, the last one wasn’t nearly as offensive, it wasn’t even real, - ”

“Wait, it’s… What?” Isaac was having trouble making sense of this. “Have you been getting obscene messages from the gods?”

“Can’t you go five minutes without bringing the gods into this?” Alex snapped, looking down again, seizing the chance to change the subject. “We are the ones with infinite potential!”

“Yes… but…”

“And you are the one capable of taking the rest…” It was only after Alex added this that Isaac realised he’d meant the two of them, not humanity in general. For a moment, he’d thought they were of the same opinion there.

“But is it… really…?” Isaac gestured at the paper, wondering how its message could be so irrelevant to Sheba’s fate. If it wasn’t about Sheba, what use was it?

“If you do not intend to believe anything you hear from me, why tell me to speak?”

“No, it’s… uh, don’t worry. I’ll take your word for it, for now.” Isaac smiled, realizing that 'don’t worry’ was slightly inadequate even as he said it. “We have to make sure it comes into existence the way it’s supposed to. First things first. We’d better head upstairs and tell the others the plan.”

“Bring them to me.” Alex could see that Isaac didn’t understand why he would request this. Shouldn’t it be obvious? Why would he want to go back to them, to approach them entirely on their terms? “Whoever would be involved, bring them here.”

“If it happened upstairs, you should probably try it there.”

“Do you think I still need higher ground?” Alex asked quietly, his voice barely audible over the noise of the water behind him - boiling water flowing from the cold tap.

G: Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order?

Often from start to finish in as few sessions as possible, though if it’s long enough to take more than a few days, I end up jotting down dialogue notes, and then trying to put the notes in order, which gets more fiddly the more there are. The multichapter longfic get big chunks written out of sequence, which sometimes makes it easier to fill in the gaps by joining the dots, and sometimes leaves me blocked on how to tackle the parts in between.

V: If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose?

Not sure I could choose anything; other people’s stories are their ideas, and I generally want to hear more from the authors because they’re not the kind of stories I’d have intuitively come up with. Reading fic does tend to spark plotbunnies, but more those that place a headcanon in its own verse showing how else it could play out - different characterisation even if I’m adopting a headcanon I like. Back when I read more fic, I used to get the urge to play with the more macguffiny plot elements of things too, but never got to the point where I had a divergent fan-fan-fic that I could have asked the author about as far as I remember.

[canaryatlaw]

alright, I’m pretty tired so let’s get this post going. I’m not really in the best of moods, mostly to do with my upcoming trip to New York for spring break, and mainly that it’s coming so soon, being that I’m flying out Thursday morning. Idk what to do with all of these feelings. I think most of it has to do with me stressing out over jobs, with the NYC interview coming up Friday morning and I’m just feeling very unsure about all of it. If I get offered the job, which I think there’s a fair likelihood will happen at this point (I mean, I made it to the second interview, so that’s gotta count for something, and I know I’m about as qualified as one can be for an entry level position) I’m gonna feel like I need to accept it,  because it is pretty much the only application I have going on that is *actually* what I want to do, and not just somewhat related to it. but now I just don’t know if I want to end up in New York because I don’t want to be lonely. It might be the best job offer, but if I end up cooped up in an apartment alone and miserable, what’s the point? Especially when the other option I have, staying here, is no longer going to be that way for me, it hasn’t been since the start of the year and I’ve been having so much fucking fun. should I sacrifice a better job offer for a more fulfilling overall quality of life? (or Jess can just move to New York with me and solve all my problems) That’s assuming I even get a job offer in Chicago, I’ve applied to tons of places and it’s all been radio silence so far, though I know a lot of them just haven’t gotten to that point yet so it doesn’t mean I’ve already been rejected from all of them. And some of them I think I’d be really good with, special education or domestic violence, both things I’m fairly qualified to do, it’s just not exactly what I was aiming for. I mean, it’s not like I don’t know what I want to do. I very much know what I want to do- I just don’t really have many options on being able to do it because the office I spent a year interning in is in a hiring freeze and has 3 semesters worth of impeccable performance reviews for me sitting in a file somewhere that will never be read (and trust me, they’re gold, I have no doubt that I would be offered a job there if the freeze gets lifted). So yeah, this is more of me not knowing what the hell to do. I looked up when the late registration for the Illinois bar exam ends, and it’s April 1st, so by the end of the month I’ll hopefully know what my final decision is going to be, because if it’s still in flux I’d have to risk putting one thousand fucking dollars down for a test that I’m not sure I’ll actually be taken, and that’s a load of bullshit. I will say though, it makes me happy that of all the New York options, the one that’s panning out for me is the one that’s totally unrelated to anyone my dad or my brother knows, it’s one where I’m being evaluated on my own merit, not by what my last name is, and getting the position because I worked my ass off to get here and I truly deserve it, not as a result of some nepotism. my dad will never understand this, because he thinks he worked his whole life so he could give us a leg up, and my brother was more than willing to take it, but I’m not my brother and I never will be, I didn’t follow him to law school, I decided on going long before he did. I want my achievements to be my own. I’m already aware of just how much privilege I’ve had getting here, how fortunate I’ve been to have parents who are incredibly anti-student loan and willing to help make that happen (although a lot of that was possible because I got rather large scholarships that significantly cut down the price tag). I get that, and I want this to be something that I at least do on my own merit, even if I was very much assisted in getting there, I want it to be about my skills and my abilities, not some misguided nepotism disguised as “connections” and “who you know” (which my dad has been telling me is what matters literally since I was a very small child). I know he’s never going to get that, but that’s okay. I will be pleased to know that I got this job because of my own work, not his. Anyway. I should probably get around to actually talking about my day now. Woke up at 10:55, got ready and took the 11:20 bus to the DV courthouse, then just caught the train as it was about to leave, so pretty much the opposite of what happened last week lol, and of course now I ended up getting to the courthouse early, because apparently my only options are early or late, on time just not being possible (oh well). Got checked in, then sat with my laptop open, hiding my phone behind it reading the case I need to read for civil rights tomorrow, because the clerks go all power hungry and don’t want anyone using cell phones inside the area, even though I have explicit permission to do so as a volunteer, but it’s just not worth getting into a fight over, so I disguised it with my laptop so they couldn’t see (they don’t have wifi so I couldn’t just bring the case up on my laptop, or I would’ve just done that. I waited probably a little under an hour before getting on a case, paired with one of the newer volunteers as has been the case lately, and was assigned to do the affidavit, as the other volunteer hadn’t done the paperwork yet (the affidavit is harder, but learning the paperwork is complex and I sometimes still goof it up despite this being my third year working here). Client was a very nice woman who was filing against the father of her child, who had apparently stalked her back to Chicago from Florida, though it was unique in a couple ways, one of them being that there was a DCFS case going on in Florida based on domestic violence allegations (which is a whole other subject that I will not get started on because I’ll never shut up) where their daughter was actually removed and placed with her sister, but she regained custody, and said the father’s rights had been terminated, but based on some of the other things she was saying about his contact with their daughter being allowed made me somewhat suspicious that that might not actually be the case, nothing malicious on her end at all, I’ve just seen many parents get tripped up and confused with the process and just misunderstand what’s going on because it is very complex. so there was some interesting stuff there, there had only been text and voicemail threats since the last DV incident in 2013 (which was rather horrific so I won’t go into it, but it definitely endangered the child as well), so that kind of hurts the argument that it is in fact an emergency, but he had been sending death threats, and the court does not take those lightly of course. But we didn’t end up getting to find out what the court would say because the client ended up having to go because her ride had to leave, and she was going to return tomorrow morning to finish up and go to court. so we ended up being released around 3:30, which was nice. I took the blue line to the bus stop, and just missed the bus, it was at the stop down on the street as I got off the train, and by the time I got there it was gone. I wasn’t too pissed though because I had kinda been wanting to get an ice cream from the donut shop right there, so I did that and waited for the next bus, which came in about 12 minutes. So that was enjoyable at least, but the bus ride felt incredibly slow, and I didn’t get home until 4:50 or so. After i got home Jess came over pretty soon afterwards, and I started cooking. I was trying a new recipe, a garlic parmesan chicken lasagna bake, so that required a bit of prep. As I detailed last week I was using the rotisserie chicken with the hope that it would flavor it better, as has been my ongoing battle with trying to cook chicken in a way that’s not absolutely terrible for you and still somehow tastes appetizing, which I haven’t been terribly successful with so far. It took a while to assemble, but then it was in the oven and was ready just before The Flash started. The Flash episode was probably one of the better ones of this season, though that’s really not saying much because this season has been not great so far. It was a decent enough episode though, I enjoyed Jesse being back, and the format of the episode was interesting, even if their scientific explanations were somewhat hard to follow. Black Lightning was pretty solid, I totally adore Anissa and her desire to protect her neighborhood and fight back, and I would like to think that if I had her powers I would feel the same way. Gamby is obviously being super shady so that’s gonna be a plot that deserves exploring. Poor Lynn though, first she had to go through this with Jefferson and now with Anissa, while I do think they should go be saving people, I can definitely empathize with Lynn’s pain not knowing if her loved ones will safely return to her. The whole last scene with the Lady Eve ambush was pretty crazy, definitely can’t say it was what I was expecting, and it looks like Tobias will end up being the big bad this season after all, I had been hearing some speculation that it was ultimately going to be Lady Eve and Tobias was just a underling. So we’ll have to see where it goes from there. After the episode Jess headed home because she was tired from staying up last night and of course has to get up early for her *real* job. So I started season 2 of Game of Thrones, which I will admit was somewhat hard to follow. I get there’s obviously a power struggle going on with different people wanting to claim the throne as their own, but I’m somewhat lost as to who Stannis is and how he plays into all of this. I feel so bad for Sansa basically being held captive, and I have to continue talking about my love for Arya and how she’s such a little badass that escaped the fucking king as a tiny child. And I’m still not sure how Daenerys plays into all of this, I mean I know her father was the king who got overthrown by the king who just died, but idk what she’s trying to do now with her dothraki army and baby dragons (though I look forward to seeing what happens with them once they grow up). After that finished I didn’t want to start a new one since they’re rather long, so I hung out for a little while longer before starting to get ready for bed, including cleaning the rest of the kitchen because my roommate cleaned it really well over the weekend and I don’t want to mess it up when I’m just going to leave in two days anyway. And yeah, did all that good stuff and now I’m here. Got PT in the morning and then my two classes. Again, kind of tired, and it’s 12:45 am now, so I’m going to take that as sufficient reason to retire to sleep. Goodnight babes. Stay awesome.