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Weekly Open Thread with Crows in Snow

tigtog

This week our Open Thread hosts are these delightful corvids playing in the snow in Russia. Please natter/chatter/vent/rant on anything* you like over this weekend and throughout the week.

So, what have you been up to? What would you rather be up to? What’s been awesome/awful?
Reading? Watching? Making? Meeting?
What has [insert awesome inspiration/fave fansquee/guilty pleasure/dastardly ne’er-do-well/threat to all civilised life on the planet du jour] been up to?

* Netiquette footnotes:
* There is no off-topic on the Weekly Open Thread, but consider whether your comment would be on-topic on any recent thread and thus better belongs there.
* If your comment touches on topics known to generally result in thread-jacking, you will be expected to take the discussion to #spillover instead of overshadowing the social/circuit-breaking aspects of this thread.

56 thoughts on Weekly Open Thread with Crows in Snow

  1. I just had finals week and I’m honestly not very pleased with the work I turned in. I didn’t manage my time well and eventually just ran out.

    I’m set up for dangerous semester–four classes, two outside my department, and TA for a class that’s also outside my department (but not my skill area). I don’t know if I can make it, but I can try, I suppose.

    1. As someone who’s also just had a frustrating finals week, I am sorry to hear that! My time management always gets away from me.

      This semester, I actually have a week-long extension on a paper because of earlier illness, and I’m struggling to focus enough to manage this last week on the back of an intense semester.

      Best of luck for all your classes/TA-ing next semester 🙂

    2. I feel you. This is my first semester of PhD work. I had three seminar papers that I turned in today. One I thought was excellent. Another, good enough, I guess.. Still another, disappointingly mediocre. Really counting on that whole “Grad school A concept to kick in.”

    3. I feel you. I had a one-page paper due I could have finished in about fifteen minutes if I had just sat down and done it, but I procrastinated all day and ended up finishing it at five in the morning and getting no sleep. Ugh.

    4. I’m sorry to hear that, karak. My finals were shitty as well. In particular, I’m pretty sure I got an F on my vector calculus final. And I’ve most likely failed the class. I did okay on my Java final, but I’m really kicking myself in the teeth for having horrible grades in a math class – I used to actually be good at math.

      1. I’m finishing up my last class next week, and I’m so relieved. This class in particular was for professional development in my current position and I’m on the barest edge of getting an A – it’s comforting to know that I don’t need to get an A in this course to protect my degree’s GPA since this class is outside of that program.

        Grade reports are in for my competed courses already – I have a 4.0! I’ve now held that grade for a year. I’m enrolled in junior college atm while I earn a transfer degree – I’m currently meeting all requirements for guaranteed admission to my top school!

        I’m so glad it’s almost over for a few weeks – even when I enjoy the subject, sixteen-week courses bore me to tears.

        I send any wanted Jedi hugs to Ally, Karak, SophiaBlue, jrovkford, and anna_k as well as lurking students. It’s almost over, if only for a few weeks! All we can do is push forward.
        Reading about the challenges of other students has been tremendously helpful for me.

      2. CN: CSA

        So. Word down the grapevine that my habitual abuser, my father, isn’t taking care of his multiple serious health issues and will likely be dead in the next year or two. This news is good because (imo) the world will be improved with his untimely (he’s in his fifties) demise and… hmm. I think that him being gone forever means that, for me, it’ll finally be over. It’s been hard to admit that him being unable to walk or drive doesn’t change that I’m still so irrationally afraid of him. I don’t like thinking of him suffering.. I don’t take pleasure in the pain of others, even people that have done heinous shit.. but I can’t wait for the phone call. To know that he’s gone and that there is zero chance that he, personally, can hurt anyone ever again.

        2. Kerandria… this is very late, I know, but all the hugs if you want ’em. I can’t imagine how you feel, but I just wanted to say that you’re not irrational for feeling that way, even if the feeling itself is irrational; that’s how fear works.

      3. Hey, just because you might fail vector calculus doesn’t mean you’re no longer good at math. It just means that you needed more time to learn it, or you needed to learn it at a different time, etc. I really battled my way through math classes, and one thing that helped me was going as slow as I possibly could. Just because those classes try to cram too much information into too short a time period doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong with you, and there’s no shame taking a class again. We all learn at our own pace. Good luck!

  2. [Content note: dysphoria]

    It seems that I’ve learned how to get a stereotypical butch-girl-with-short-hair look. Granted, I won’t be truly happy until I have a very femme physical appearance and voice – my hair and my facial appearance still make me feel dysphoric, and I have way more body hair than I’m comfortable with. But it’s still nice to look at my face in the mirror and see that I’m actually losing my very masculine facial appearance.

  3. So, any other Queen B. fans around on feministe? 🙂 Currently listening to/watching the entire album on repeat.

    Also, overlaying a WOC’s definition of feminism (Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, specifically) on the track that loads of white women called out as an example BeyoncĂ©’s apparent horrendous anti-feminism (Bow Down), despite her self-identifying as a feminist, is just so, so delicious.

    1. I wouldn’t call myself a huge fan of BeyoncĂ©, but I’ve really enjoyed the videos I’ve seen so far, especially “Flawless.”

      Also, you know she has star power when she can drop an album without any buildup or fanfare and still make the internet go wild.

  4. Mostly I’ve been a lurker in the past, but I’ve commented on a couple of these open threads before, but anyway…
    I just want to heartily recommend for any fantasy/sf lovers out there any book by N.K. Jemisin. I’m a pretty big fantasy/sf person and I just discovered her books a couple of months ago, but wow. She only has 5 out (2 series) but the worlds she’s created are just amazing. I’m a voracious reader and am always looking for new authors, so I wanted to send out this recommendation for anyone else whose looking for new books to read : )
    Also, whoever illustrated her books did an awesome job – the covers are what drew me in to the books in the first place.

    2. Seconded! And I’ll add that she has main characters who are women of colour, which is a nice change from all the white men who tend to populate fantasy books.

      1. Yes, that was one thing I liked about her books, in addition to the fact that she’s created fantasy worlds unlike anything in our reality, which I really admire in an author because I can’t even imagine all the work it is to create you own universe(s). (I differentiate between this type of fantasy/sf where the nations etc are totally unrecognizable to us and fantasy/sf like books by Guy Gavriel Key (whose books I love) where it’s fantasy but you can pretty easily tell what countries/time points he’s drawing inspiration from.)

      2. Oh, and the author herself I think is a WOC (going from the pic on the book jacket) which is still relatively rare in fantasy/sf I think.

  5. I’ve had mindworms gnawing at my memory bits all week. I was trying to think of a story for a couple of days, then when I found the title (Scanners Live in Vain) I got sucked in to another hunt that brought me past some other things I hadn’t thought of in a while. Now though, I’m stuck.

    There’s a series of books about siblings with powers that travel through time/space to a desert where they meet this mutant hyena critter. My cold read words for the books are “dust,” a male name starting with “P,” I’m getting a “Paul” or “Peter,” and at least three kids, one of which is a girl. Anyone have clue?

    1. Sounds a bit like The Story of the Amulet, by E. Nesbit, featuring four siblings (two girls and two boys). One of the characters is a sand (or dust) creature named the Psammead, and the plot centers around time travel. The book has a detailed Wikipedia entry.

  6. I’m back to work as of Monday and kinda sorta looking forward it. I miss my coworkers. Going to miss having all this free time, though.

    1. Oh, and I have been off work for six weeks and have not seen a dime of my employment insurance sick benefits, and probably won’t now. So a hearty fuck you to Service Canada in all of it’s useless, incompetent glory.

      1. Oh, and I have been off work for six weeks and have not seen a dime of my employment insurance sick benefits, and probably won’t now. So a hearty fuck you to Service Canada in all of it’s useless, incompetent glory.

        My friend had that same attitude towards the State of New Jersey, but she had her mind change when she received unpaid unemployment for 8 weeks a month after she had a new job and had replenished her savings she had to dip into. I just received a tax refund for 2012, which I also assumed I would never get.

        I am not assuring you you will get your check in any way or fashion, and fully acknowledge your situation sucks at the moment. However, it is pretty fucking awesome receiving a check that you had written off in your head, so I’ve got my fingers crossed (would say a prayer if I wasn’t agnostic) for you.

      2. Andie, perhaps you have already tried this, but if not I had good results when I spoke to Service Canada’s office of Client Satisfaction for my very late maternity benefits. With all the cuts and layoffs their service levels are really suffering. Maybe they’ll be able to help you with your sick benefits – 1‑866‑506‑6806.

  7. Does it bother anyone when someone says positive things about a race/religion/sexuality because they assume you are a member of that group? (i.e. you haven’t mentioned you’re part of the group.)

    It bothers me even more when they get it right, because I think “oh great this person took one look at me and decided I was a Jew.” Whereas if I feel like the person thinks I’m gay (this happens a lot when a dude bro type sees my apartment which is always neat as a pin and is largely decorated by my wife, and all of a sudden they’ll say something like’my cousin’s gay and he’s such a great guy’) it’s still prejudice and clearly ridiculous, but I’m actually proud of the way my wife decorated, which is why I keep it so neat (I keep my studio much more casual,) and my ego takes over.

    1. For me, it’s the other way; it bugs me when people–other Jews, mostly–don’t assume I’m Jewish, because I think I could not possibly look more Jewish if I tried. I’m always obscurely annoyed when the Lubavitchers are asking passersby whom they think are Jewish if they’re Jewish and if they’re lighting shabbat candles ignore me. Which is foolish, because I don’t want to be hassled on the street, and I don’t want to be pressured into observing when I don’t, but somehow I always feel insulted–don’t I look Jewish? Can’t you tell I’m Jewish, too? What, you think I’m a shiksa? You don’t want me to light candles for shabbat?

      Maybe they can just tell that I’m clearly a lost cause.

      1. For me, it’s the other way; it bugs me when people–other Jews, mostly–don’t assume I’m Jewish, because I think I could not possibly look more Jewish if I tried.

        I think I look pretty Jewish, but there are some people out there who just assume that one is Irish if one has my color hair.

      2. I think people generally assume that I’m Jewish, at least in New York, although when my son and I were in Berlin a couple of years ago, people seemed to think we were Germans, not Americans, let alone Jews. In fact, my son told me that when he was in Berlin and traveling around Germany by himself for a month after I went home, several people insisted, after speaking to him in German, that he must be German — or at least must have “German blood”! — and couldn’t be an American. (I don’t think people in Germany are as conscious of “Jewish appearance” — or even Jewish names — as they once were. Fortunately.)

        Do the Lubavitchers approach women in the street? Because I got asked if I was Jewish and lit candles, etc., a number of times before my transition, but don’t recall being approached since then.

        1. Do the Lubavitchers approach women in the street? Because I got asked if I was Jewish and lit candles, etc., a number of times before my transition, but don’t recall being approached since then.

          I’ve never seen them approach women either
maybe it’s down to sexism and not EG’s semitic looks or lack thereof.

      3. EG, do people assume you’re Jewish outside of New York City? I have definitely noticed that in places where there aren’t so many Jews, it doesn’t necessarily occur to people. Unless someone is dressed like a black hat Orthodox person. And I’m sure I look every bit as “Jewish” as you do, except that I don’t have curly hair — unlike a lot of people in my family, who (judging from old family photos) had stereotypically “Jewish” hair. And it wasn’t common back then for people to try to straighten it.

  8. [Content note: abuse, stress, depression, suicidal thoughts, drug abuse]

    I think I’ve buckled under all of the stress I’ve had lately; ever since my quarter ended, I’ve been doing almost nothing but smoking to the point of feeling numb. I think I failed my vector calculus class and most likely got a mediocre grade in my Java class. I used to get nearly straight A’s at community college. Now I have to be lucky to get an A even on a single exam. There’s a high chance I’ll end up being kicked out of school because of my grades.

    I know I can survive without a degree, but I still feel awful because of all of these failures. It started with the SAT, on which I got scores no higher than 1780/2400 (after an abusive 6-month period of some family members forcing me to study 16 hours every day). That really hurt because, at 16, I had dreams of getting into a school like MIT, Carnegie Mellon, or UC Berkeley. I wanted to get a PhD in linguistics, which was my favorite subject at that age. So when I got those scores, I felt like I wanted to die because I deeply disappointed myself and many family members.

    With UCSC, I have similar feelings, although I don’t feel suicidal. I just feel like a failure. I wish that I could walk up to my teachers and apologize for not being good enough, although they would probably think I’m just trying to suck up to them.

    1. I’m also worried about causing too much emotional distress when I leave my dad’s house for good. Right now my grandfather is extremely poor health, and if I leave within a period close to his death, the family will be devastated on top of being furious at me. No one should have to go through that, even if their reasons for being upset at me don’t make any sense. I’m so sick of life being in a downward spiral.

      2. Please talk all this out with a school counselor ASAP. You can develop strategies for pursuing post graduate work and at the same time address some of the painful feelings you are turning against yourself. Hang in there and good luck.

        1. Joedj, thank you for your advice, but to clarify, I’m no longer interested in going to grad school. My life aspirations are no longer tied to academic stuff. I lost hope in becoming a linguistics professor when I was 17. Now I’m only trying to get a BA in computer science at UCSC so that I can find more job opportunities. I just want to become independent and start my transition.

          I’ve been wanting to see a therapist for a long time. It’s actually free on campus. And I know that the counselors at UCSC are lovely people, given what many fellow queer and trans students have told me. But I’m going to have to find a therapist elsewhere because I’m planning to escape my dad’s place very soon, and that will require me to be far away from Santa Cruz. I’m going to take a temporary leave of absence at UCSC.

    2. Ally, please don’t underestimate how much pressure and stress — and by that I definitely include gender dysphoria, on top of all your family issues — can affect one’s ability to focus on school and work. Don’t blame yourself, and don’t assume it means that you’re no longer “good at math.”

      I’ve blamed myself for most of my life for being (relatively speaking) a failure in my career, and never having achieved remotely what people in my family, teachers, etc., assumed I would from the time I was a child, especially given where I went to high school, college, and law school. Once I was in my teens, and the dysphoria started to become so much more severe — as did the stress from suppressing it — I found concentrating to be much harder. I got through college OK, but once I started law school it became a lot more difficult, especially because my mother had died right before I began and I was first ill with Crohn’s Disease a couple of years later. I am amazed sometimes that I even managed to graduate. I almost didn’t! And am amazed that I’ve managed to stay employed for most of the time since then, as mediocre as my career has been, especially compared to my former classmates.

      So please don’t make the same mistake I always have, of thinking it’s all my fault.

  9. On medication for my fibro. It’s making me crazy. Like, horrible crazy. I sincerely apologise for anything I may have said in the last few days that hurt anyone. Or for the time before that. I’m really sorry.

  10. I have so much work to do today, and have gotten nothing — nothing — done yet. Ugh.

    Instead, I’ve been wasting my time doing name searches in old German-Jewish newspapers on Google Books. I did find a small article in the Feb. 27, 1841 issue of Allgemeine Zeitung des Judenthums, mentioning my mother’s grandfather’s grandfather, Casper Auerbach — then the cantor for the Jewish community in the town of BĂŒtow in Pomerania — and praising a poem he wrote to commemmorate the return to England of the philanthropist Moses Montefiore after he met with the Ottoman Sultan and the Khedive of Egypt and successfully requested the release of the survivors among the Jews who had been imprisoned as a result of the famous Damascus blood libel of 1840. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damascus_affair .) Unfortunately, the poem itself isn’t reproduced.

    But it’s nice to know that I have at least one person in my family tree who apparently had some literary talent! As guilty as I feel for doing this instead of getting work done.

    1. Donna:

      I’m a longtime lurker, but your stress at not getting enough done hits home. I’ve waited until the last minute for a grant proposal, with no (good) reason. The ‘good’ reason is, I guess, no ‘good’ reason except my depression and angst with my job. I know you’ve mentioned related reasons in the past, and I have no good words of support. Just the idea that a random person on the internet wishes you all the best.

      1. Oh, dear. I really didn’t realize she was still alive (she was 96), although I did know that her older sister, Olivia de Havilland — now 97 — was still alive.

        1. Every so often, I fall into a google k-hole about the relationship between Joan and Olivia haha

  12. So Phil Robertson, the patriarch of the soul-sucking reality show Duck Dynasty, has roundly disgraced my beloved Southland by spewing his hateful, homophobic bile all over the storied pages of GQ. As if the hordes of unapologetically racist Tea Partiers, NRA thugs, Obama-hating bigots, Christo-fascists, and Paula Deen’s folksy down-home hate speech weren’t enough. I give up. You know, i actually grew up hunting and fishing on family farms. My mom’s family were neighbors to Andrew Jackson. Interestingly, some of my dad’s family were ejected from Georgia by that very same bastard of a president (I am NOT laying claim to any oppression here, Timmy is not oppressed in any way, shape or form). Not trying to pick any fights, just saying my roots run deep in the region. Yet the past few years I’ve felt like a pilgrim in an unholy land. Hell, there was a time not too terribly long ago when i considered myself fairly conservative. But I’d sooner join up with eco-terrorists than share a platform with Ted Cruz, Michelle Bachmann and the scum of humanity. And as I gradually learned that the Moral Majority is actually Morally Bankrupt, I likewise discovered within myself bastions of the rankest intolerance, prejudice and bigotry. Finally, I decided to cast my lot with the liberals and progressives whose ideologies were so alien to my upbringing. I chose confused-but-sincere tolerance over blind conviction. Now I know that I’d rather deal with 100 Dennis Kucinivich’s than one Sarah Palin any day of the week. I dont even know what im trying to say or if im being the least bit coherent. I guess I always thought that someday the South of my childhood could co-exist with tolerance and empathy when we all grew up. But my South has not just stopped growing, it is trying to hit 88 mph and do some time traveling. I don’t believe the Old White South ever had a soul, and it sold what remained of its conscience years ago; half to the evangelicals, half to the gun lobbies. Forgive sad Twinkles his ramblings. Tonight the South is rising to the defense of a vile homophobe, and it doesnt feel like home.

    1. Oops, mods just realized i used a vulgar term above, which is probably why the post is in moderation. Please omit that word.

    2. This is monstrous. Part of me almost feels sorry for Phil Robertson, because as mis-guided as he is I know he sincerely holds these beliefs. I am certain that this guy knows better. He’s doing exactly what George Wallace did in Georgia in the 60’s. The first time Wallace ran for the Democratic primary he did so with an endorsement from the NAACP, and lost narrowly to a KKK-backed segregationist. He vowed to not let it happen again, and re-invented himself as the infamous segregationist and bigot we know him as today. And won the governorship. To knowingly use racism as a tool to play on the ignorance and hate of a voter constituency is diabolical.

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