#much less at the workplace

[gydima]

One of Con's cuntiest scenes, from one of his angriest, bitterest, IDGAF characters - thus one of my absolute favorites. I would've watched a whole series about Ian.

[toughtink]

i went and signed up for a busuu acct and omggg it IS like duolingo sorta before it went all ai bullshit! they even facilitate interactions with native speakers! i just wish it gave me more choices on what to do next. it's more comparable to duolingo's "waterfall" aka forced linear path than the old duolingo version of giving you options on what to build up next. so far it also seems to have less repetition, which got annoying with duo but is honestly very good for memorization, so it probably needs to be supplemented with flashcards like anki.

i'm gonna learn spanish (again sorta)!! i'm gonna do it!

[vivalamusaine]

Knowing you're going to quit a job before you've handed in the notice is the best feeling in the world. Yeah sure boss ill sign onto this insane project with unrealistic timelines with no pushback at all because it's not going to be my problem at the end of the week

[pieofdeath]

Ok so like I have not been paying as much attention leading up to this event as I should've been considering I follow 1k+ blogs and I'm stupid. HOWEVER. this has made me feel like I'm drunk/pos. what's happening. I love it here.

[lucabyte]

making posts about headcanons that have basically no textual backing makes me itchy but someday i should probably elaborate on my opinion that "mirabelle being aroace is the one thing keeping her oblivious to the fact that the dormont house of change is the religious coven equivalent to fleetwood mac"

[girderednerve]

i have once more Read a Book !

the book was jim morris' cancer factory: industrial chemicals, corporate deception, & the hidden deaths of american workers. this book! is very good! it is primarily about the bladder cancer outbreak associated with the goodyear plant in niagara falls, new york, & which was caused by a chemical called orthotoluedine. goodyear itself is shielded by new york's workers' comp law from any real liability for these exposures & occupational illnesses; instead, a lot of the information that morris relies on comes from suits against dupont, which manufactured the orthotoluedine that goodyear used, & despite clear internal awareness of its carcinogenicity, did not inform its clients, who then failed to protect their workers. fuck dupont! morris also points out that goodyear manufactured polyvinyl chloride (PVC) at that plant, and, along with other PVC manufacturers, colluded to hide the cancer-causing effects of vinyl chloride, a primary ingredient in PVC & the chemical spilled in east palestine, ohio in 2023. the book also discusses other chemical threats to american workers, including, and this was exciting for me personally, silica; it mentions the hawks nest tunnel disaster (widely forgotten now despite being influential in the 30s, and, by some measures, the deadliest industrial disaster in US history) & spends some time on the outbreak of severe silicosis among southern california countertop fabricators, associated with high-silica 'engineered stone' or 'quartz' countertops. i shrieked about that, the coverage is really good although the treatment of hawks nest was very brief & neglected the racial dynamic at play (the workers exposed to silica at hawks nest were primarily migrant black workers from the deep south).

cancer factory spends a lot of time on the regulatory apparatus in place to respond to chemical threats in the workplace, & thoroughly lays out how inadequate they are. OSHA is responsible for setting exposure standards for workplace chemicals, but they have standards for only a tiny fraction—less than one percent!—of chemicals used in american industry, and issue standards extremely slowly. the two major issues it faces, outside of its pathetically tiny budget, are 1) the standard for demonstrating harm for workers is higher than it is for the general public, a problem substantially worsened during the reagan administration but not created by it, and 2) OSHA is obliged to regulate each individual chemical separately, rather than by functional groups, which, if you know anything at all about organic chemistry, is nonsensical on its face. morris spends a good amount of time on the tenure of eula bingham as the head of OSHA during the carter administration; she was the first woman to head the organization & made a lot of reasonable reforms (a cotton dust standard for textile workers!), but could not get a general chemical standard, allowing OSHA to regulate chemicals in blocks instead of individually, through, & then of course much of her good work was undone by reagan appointees.

the part of the book that made me most uncomfortable was morris' attempt to include birth defects in his analysis. i don't especially love the term 'birth defect'—it feels cruel & seems to me to openly devalue disabled people's lives, no?—but i did appreciate attention to women's experiences in the workplace, and i think workplace chemical exposure is an underdiscussed part of reproductive justice. cancer factory mentions women lead workers who were forced to undergo tubal ligations to retain their employment, supposedly because lead is a teratogen. morris points at workers in silicon valley's electronics industry; workers, most of them women, who made those early transistors were exposed to horrifying amounts of lead, benzene, and dangerous solvents, often with disabling effects for their children.

morris points out again & again that we only know that there was an outbreak of bladder cancer & that it should be associated with o-toluedine because the goodyear plant workers were organized with the oil, chemical, & atomic workers (OCAW; now part of united steelworkers), and the union pursued NIOSH investigation and advocated for improved safety and monitoring for employees, present & former. even so, 78 workers got bladder cancer, 3 died of angiosarcoma, and goodyear workers' families experienced bladder cancer and miscarriage as a result of secondary exposure. i kept thinking about unorganized workers in the deep south, cancer alley in louisiana, miners & refinery workers; we don't have meaningful safety enforcement or monitoring for many of these workers. we simply do not know how many of them have been sickened & killed by their employers. there is no political will among people with power to count & prevent these deaths. labor protections for workers are better under the biden administration than the trump administration, but biden's last proposed budget leaves OSHA with a functional budget cut after inflation, and there is no federal heat safety standard for indoor workers. the best we get is marginal improvement, & workers die. i know you know! but it's too big to hold all the same.

anyway it's a good book, it's wide-ranging & interested in a lot of experiences of work in america, & morris presents an intimate (sometimes painfully so!) portrait of workers who were harmed by goodyear & dupont. would recommend

[disdaidal]

So, I met my nurse today and she said I'm finally getting scheduled for the ADHD testing on Dec 18th—after all these years. Albeit she said that it may not change a thing, but it's good to test it anyway.

I also had a discussion with my teacher today about my problems and we went through some stuff, and I might feel a little bit more enlightened about some things, which will hopefully help me.

Still. I'm having trouble with planning some stuff at my workplace because the staff there simply doesn't have time, and my instructor is also a very busy person (plus she's fussy and impatient and a little upset/disappointed with me which is not making it any easier for me), so that is still giving me a lot of stress right now.

So, I don't know. On the other hand, one teacher says I'm doing a good job and that I shouldn't quit. Then again, this particular school and their style of teaching simply might not be the thing for me and I expressed that concern today as well. I need help getting through with some stuff and nobody has time for me, so it's obviously not good.

I also need to find another place to train soon and that workplace would have to be something where I wouldn't have to manage 15 things at the same time and well. Finding that could be a challenge, too.

But. I suppose we're going somewhere.

[glitterhoof]

i get so weak in the knees

[sarasa-cat]

Contemplating if a steam deck is a good idea. I have quite a few steam games but those require my gaming machine (which is obviously not something I can travel with … nor is it something one can enjoy on the go or while in bed, outside, etc.).

Any opinions out there on the steam deck?

Is it too bulky to easily travel with when dealing with limits on what I can bring with me?

[obstinaterixatrix]

the problem is I have This Could Be So Much More Efficient brain which means I get too enthusiastic about making things efficient which turns me into a capitalist’s dream worker which is not my heart. I’ve written like 7 training documents.

[july-19th-club]

one thing about getting sick for me is that before covid (the first time) my colds and flus and whatnot all went in a very specific pattern: i would get a sore throat for a day or two, then violently congested for three or four days, then a runny nose/drainage for three or four days after that, and finally a cough, which was my favorite part of the cold (if a person can be said to have a favorite part of a cold) because it meant it was almost over AND that the problem was largely not in my face and neck anymore. but any illness i've had since that first covid has been all over the map - either i don't get the sore throat at all, just straight into the congestion, or the sore throat happens at a different time, or longer, or worse, or i have to spit a lot because otherwise i get so nauseous from sinus drainage that i throw up, or the congestion and the runny nose happen concurrently with not just each other but ALSO the sore throat (which is what's happening right now and i hate it) and like. because it doesn't follow the pattern i spent twenty-six years of my life getting used to, i'm always freaked out. which i would be anyway because ever since i had the first covid getting sick freaks me out. and it should freak more people out if im being honest. but this is a weird one bc like. i dont know how it did that but it disrupted MY trusty sick pattern

[isfjmel-phleg]

:/

[songofwizardry]

actually should be illegal that i have to go to work and mark during the winter. i should only have to read fanfic, consume excessive amounts of coffee, complete crochet projects, and stare longingly at the sunset.

[unproduciblesmackdown]

forgot i had the thought like if anyone's leaving b/c they're so totally to nice for this business why isn't it ben (ft. tuk as a duo) the person who's always been [hey this guy doesn't fit in here! he's too nice!!] thee most, as well as actually committed the whole time to Not bullying anyone around him

if ben & tuk had just left / stayed away then (a) maybe they were so loath to possibly have an episode without ben kim, speaking of the [s1 shit] priority put on the overall season. but it's a sacrifice that could be considered for the tradeoff of "why not give that [walking away b/c you just can't accept being So Mean]" which would of course also feel much more relevant for ben being told like "yeah you'd have to do what i did to step on tuk specifically, for example" versus rian who was just turning her own [is herself actually among the Constant Workplace Bullies] on tuk 4 min prior. and (b) then i guess we could have rian just standing there in the end too like oh right who are you again? and that also would've made it all the clearer like oops she's just become a generic employee who Could blend in with victor and dollar bill b/c she's just Another bully with Another slight variation in her style of being so, but that's a matter of like: yeah you made this bed now lie in it. she stopped having a chance to be a funny little guy of a tertiary rank & file character b/c she started to be an inconsistent plot device instead, & was never given the prominence to at least truly drive plots instead of staying that [plot device who just veers off in whatever direction another, truly prominent character's plot needs] like yeah you should've picked one for this character, or if not, had her leave at the end of s5. and if not, had her leave at the end of s6. and if not, well, here we are dealing with billions having to insist she's had an arc, as well as that she hasn't Already just been yet another employee with the bullying spirit completely suited to just stick around here forever

meanwhile billions seemed to focus not on "the thing about ben, & tuk, isn't that they don't fit in b/c way too much they're among the people who try not to be awful to everyone else whenever they feel like it" but instead focused on "the thing about ben & tuk is that [sound of luke bradford crashing their fake married bank heist moment] people think they're PUSSIES!!!!!!!!!!"

[eclipsecrowned]

i. actually enjoyed it? retail is a completely different experience when i'm not chained to a till for 8 hours unable to do anything but question why i'm here.

[rotting-pond]

Soooooo looking forward to starting a job where my lunch break will go undisturbed