If it's meant to be, it's up to me

this is from "research as a leisure activity" by celine nguyen, publs. on stubstack in 2024. it's a very good read

#the reason that lab safety regulations are the way they are is because literally all chemists are like this #as in 100% of them #no exceptions (via @prokopetz)

stop. analyse that text through the lens of its author's intentions and original historical context. okay now take the author out back and kill them dead and analyse that text as though it were published by your mutual yesterday and is in direct conversation with the contemporary discourse that's most relevant to your life. okay now pick your favorite angle of interpretation and come up with the strongest possible argument against it. now imagine that the text is your best friend and that it means you well and that you naturally give it every benefit of the doubt because you're on its side and you want the best for it. now imagine that the text wants you dead and it'll eat you if you don't eat it first. now pretend that you found this text locked away in a cave with no evidence of when or where it came from and you have to divine its meaning solely through its internal coherence and nothing else. okay now address the elephant in the room aspect of the text you've been ignoring because you find it boring or confusing or uncomfortable and become the number one expert on it. now spend forty minutes assigning all the characters dnd classes with at least three sentences of reasoning each. okay now do the cha cha slide.

Lovely to see we have spaces where you can gain access to so much literature!

the belief i have in my ability to carry any amount of stuff home if i am equipped with my backpack and two reusable totes is hubristic to a degree that the achaeans fighting at troy could only have dreamed of

you want me to get high? the thing that killed icarus?

i love the phrase "cruel and unusual." not only is what you're doing mean but it's also quite frankly fucking bizarre

I literally applied for access to a chinese digital repository of Zhou era pottery artifacts to make this.

do you think two pennies is still enough for the ferryman or has inflation driven up the fare

if he makes me use an app I am simply not crossing the river Styx.