I'm the bravest version of myself I've ever been.

Clocking in for #noexcusenovember @m0tiv8me

Morning no looking at phone-- ✓

Meditation--✓

25 minutes of abs & arms-- ✓. Here's a video of me trying to do 2:50 seconds of plank, struggling and ultimately failing. But, I almossst had it. This workout was sluggish in general. It's evident to me that I'm real good at doing the easier things--the things i like, such as walking 'til my feet ache--but putting in work with weights is so hard for me because it is much, much harder. trying to train the resistance out of myself. or something. my form during a lot of this is not the best. i tried tho hehe.

6 mile hike--✓. Or just about. I clocked in at about 5.7 miles, but I'm ganna count it.

I wore my new pjay top that I'm obsessed with on my walk. So cozy.

Cutest thing I saw was an adorable man tryna walk his dog, insisting we go this way! we go this way! But Dog decided no, bub, we are going THIS way and led him in the opposite direction. who's walking who, I asked.

Found a gorgeous swing that does NOT squeak when you use it. Had a friggen blast on it.

Home to my heating pad (which I'm sharing with the cats, of course); a gorgeous salad with ground turkey meat and some pickles on the side; christmas lights; a late cup of coffee & nada, which is a fun and gorgeously filmed show: a real ode to cooking and food, which I have been thinking about a lot lately.

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Ex-husband is coming tomorrow to say his goodbye's to Oli, and to grab the few items remaining of his that I did not throw away. An act of grace and humility on both ends. I hope we can spend some good and healthy time together, and maybe talk a bit more about anything else that needs saying.

Never imagined I'd ever see him again. This year continues to be my teacher. This year continues to instruct.

saying “visual style" because, for example, if you would swap your current wardrobe for an identical, ethically made counterpart, there would be no visible change

to prevent any further tragedies

i miss them a little if im gonna be honest

I felt the need to share here as well—

Say no to AI art. Please read before commenting. Fan art is cute, putting my art into a parasite machine, without my consent, and throwing up horrifying monsters back at me is not.

We are not fighting technology in this AI fight. We are fighting for ethics. How do I say this clearer? Our stuff gets stolen all the time, we get it, but it is not an excuse to normalize the current conditions of AI art.

These datasets have >>EXACT<< copies of artists’ works and these parasites just profit off the work of others with zero repercussion. No one cares how “careful” you are with your text prompts when the data can still output blatant copies of artists’ work without their permission. And people will do this unknowingly since these programs are so highly accessible now. There are even independent datasets that take from just a handful of artists, that don’t share what artists’ works they use, and create blatant copies of existing work. There’s even private medical records being leaked. Why do you think music is still hard to just fully recreate with AI in comparison? It’s because organizations like the RIAA protect music artists. Visual artists just want similar protection. So, wonderfully for us, Concept Art Association has started working towards the steps of protecting artists and making this an ethical practice. I highly suggest if you care about art, please support. Link to their gofundme here. One small step at a time will make living as an artist today less jarring. Artists will not just sit and cope while we continue to get walked on. For those who apparently do not get it, it is about CONSENT. Again, the datasets contain EXACT copies of artist work without our permission. Even if you use it “correctly” there’s still a chance it’s going to create blatant rip offs. This fight is about not letting these techbros take and take and take for profit just because they can while ignoring the possible harm and consequences of it. This is just ol’ fashioned imperialist behavior with a new hat and WE SEE IT. Thanks for reading!!! Much love!

Here’s the link again to support the gofundme.

dr malpractice and his boy best friend

cupid depression edition

Boundless compassion for all living beings is the surest and most certain guarantee of pure moral conduct, and needs no casuistry. Whoever is filled with it will assuredly injure no one, do harm to no one, encroach on no man's rights; he will rather have regard for every one, forgive every one, help every one as far as he can, and all his actions will bear the stamp of justice and loving-kindness.

Arthur Schopenhauer, On the Basis of Morality

jon at the top of the wall, looking out into the night: oh gods. honour and duty against love. but what of free folk? are they not people too? do I not a duty to them, even if it goes against my duty as a watchman? may the gods strike me down for what I do. And what of my siblings? Do I not have a duty to them? But, aye, it is love that drives me away from my Honour™, and so may the gods strike me down for ever wanting what is not rightfully mine (having a family)

Everyone Else at the Wall: god i can't wait to eat this boar.

my therapist said,

"It's easy to be alone. You don't have to be vulnerable."

In the crystalline knowledge of you.

#noexcusenovember update @m0tiv8me: today was successful. I woke early & did not lay in bed scrolling. Instead, I took coffee & a blanket to the couch, read some poems and a bit of the doing nothing book I'm reading. Meditated with my crystals & sound bowl (which Oli loves & always comes laying near me to hear). Got a bunch of grading done & finally crossed off following up on a student's incomplete by working on her submissions, too.

Got my six miles in. Did three different trails: one easy, one difficult, and one that I walked as the sun had set (see also: hiking in the woods, in the mf dark). Wasn't a huge fan of the hiking in the dark piece, but was determined to get my miles in. & in the end it was all gorgeous: autumn colors, smells, the sunset spilling across the expanse of earth just beyond the ridge. I'm so glad I went.

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Oli's breathing is becoming more labored. It's become apparent that a month left with him, per the vet, might not even be possible. It's time to sit with the difficult decision of when to let him go.

In some ways, #noexcusenovember is a way for me to dissociate and distract myself. In some ways, having these goals has already, in the last few days, encouraged me to think beyond my grief.

God I wish more fics would include Andrew’s weird ass eating habits.

Ohhhhhhhh shiv’s face when she realized that she’s going to be cut out of the boy’s club AGAIN and this time with a baby she can’t even talk about with her husband without risking being seen as soft … Kerry being humiliated by Marcia and the rest of the family… shiv falling down in front of a room of snickering men… gerri being thrown out as easily as garbage… connor’s mom being talked about less like a human being and more as fodder for a pr campaign…

It seems the dash has been talking about the Lan Xichen - Nie Huaisang post-canon dynamics and it's gotten me thinking about how discussion around post-canon Lan Xichen's absolutely horrendous mental state often center around the question of "who is Lan Xichen angry at and who does he feel guilty about" which, at its worst, seperates into 2 camps where according to one side he feels guilty about not protecting jgy and hates the Nies and, on the other side he has completely flipped on jgy and despises him now while being filled with regret towards both nmj and nhs.

And I dislike both of these takes not just because it often feels like people projecting their own Blorbo opinions onto Lan Xichen which is never a fun time but also because that central question is flawed to begin with. It treats anger and guilt like opposing emotions that can't coexist or, if they do, have to compete until one wins and cancels the other out.

And that's not how that... works.

To be clear, the reason why Lan Xichen is so supremely fucked up at the end of the story is that he believes on some level he fucked over everyone in this situation. And, even more importantly, that even with hindsight he can't actually think of what he should have done instead. Every attempt to do better by one seems to involve fucking over the others even more because these people were in conflict with each other and choosing one would mean standing against another

And none of this would actually stop him from feeling angry at any of them. It's not "who is he angry at and who does he feel guilty about" it's: "he is angry at everyone and feels an immediate and bone deep guilt for daring to think badly of them."

Speaking from personal experience here, but feeling like you're not allowed to be angry at someone because you wronged them really doesn't stop the feeling, it just maks you feel like shit for feeling it. And this is all worsened by the fact that what he's in seclusion for is, at the end of the day, a moral question of what he, Lan Xichen, did wrong and every single emotion serves as further proof of the ways he's failed them.

Is he angry at Jin Guangyao, for killing his oldest friend, using Lan xichen's trust in him to do it, and then lying to him about it and countless other things for a decade when Lan Xichen thought of him as the person he trusted the most in the entire world? Yeah. That's a thing people get angry about! Except Jin Guangyao also saved his life and protected and helped him more times than he can count and never ever hurt him and can Lan Xichen say the same? No. He had to clean A-Yao's blood off Shouyue, he has to be haunted by the fact that if he just hadn't listened to Huaisang- hadn't been just like everyone else, in the end, and believed a lie about Jin Guangyao just to think the worst of him- then Jin Guangyao might still be alive.

Is he angry at Huaisang? For orchestrating the death of his best friend? For making him do it? For knowing what the real cause behind Nie Mingjue's death was and never telling him until he found out in the absolute worst way? Absolutely. But didn't Huaisang hide it from him for a reason? Wasn't it his clan's techniques and his personal faith in Jin Guangyao that cost Huaisang his brother? How dare he demand that Huaisang let him in on the secret of his brother's murderer when Lan Xichen is here wondering about how he should have protected that murderer better!

And I do even think he's angry at Nie Mingjue, sometimes I think it's pretty normal to be angry at your friend for kicking your other friend down the stairs and threatening to kill him, even when you know his mind is being poisoned. And years later the last thing he ever saw of Nie Mingjue was Nie Mingjue's thoughtless corpse coming to kill him before Jin Guangyao pushed him away and then proceeded to graphocally snap Jin Guangyao's neck in front of him. And if what he wants to do is protect Jin Guangyao, shouldn't he be mad at Mingjue? Didn't this whole mess start because Jin Guangyao was afraid Nie Mingjue was going to kill him?

Except holy shit, can you imagine? Lan Xichen feels like he personally has Nie Mingjue's blood on his hands. Your oldest friend is killed in front of you and you happily believe it's an accident for 11 years and now you think you have the right to be mad at him? You watched him get worse as he was being poisoned and attributed it to his illness and not to the techniques stolen from your library with the token you give his murderer. Does he think Nie Mingjue knew who he was in that moment and wanted to kill him? That he blamed Lan Xichen for his death? (For the record, I don't. I don't agree with most of what Lan Xichen thinks about himself, but I've been in a self-blame spiral and I know how it feels)

But what was he supposed to do then? Choose Mingjue's side and let A-Yao die? That's also unacceptable. But so is letting Jin Guangyao get away with it. Every single outcome is unacceptable. And really, if Jin Guangyao felt like he had to kill Nie Mingjue to save himself, when it was Lan Xichen who was supposed to keep the peace between them, isn't that another mark of his failure? That he couldn't protect Jin Guangyao well enough that he felt he had to do something so horrible?

But that's not an answer! He's supposed to know what he should have done different, and all he can come up with is "what you were already doing, but without failing this time" He can't pick a side because that means betrayal, but he's already tried not picking a side and it ended like this! There is no right answer, which can only leave him with the idea that he was simply doomed to hurt the people he loved from the start. No wonder the guy looks like shit when we see him post-canon. They put him in a real life trolley problem and gave him the lever as a souvenir.

i have this headcanon that annabeth is completely nonchalant in her day-to-day life. and it makes so much sense to me because this girl dedicates all of her brain power/energy toward surviving, ensuring a future as an architect, and toward living the rest of her natural life with the people she loves, that mundane things like whether or not to wear her slippers on the correct feet are pointless to her. like, to me, annabeth dips her bagels in a jar of cream cheese and bagel seasoning because fuck it. to me, annabeth steals percy's pants and throws on a hoodie because she doesn't feel like walking across the room to retrieve a bra and a shirt from her dresser. to me, annabeth uses an office chair to transport herself around her and percy's apartment because free will.