books are my social life

lets get personal.

1: 6 of the songs you listen to most?

2: If you could meet anyone on this earth, who would it be?

3: Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 23, give me line 17.

4: What do you think about most?

5: What does your latest text message from someone else say?

6: Do you sleep with or without clothes on?

7: What’s your strangest talent?

8: Girls… (finish the sentence); Boys… (finish the sentence)

9: Ever had a poem or song written about you?

10: When is the last time you played the air guitar?

11: Do you have any strange phobias?

12: Ever stuck a foreign object up your nose?

13: What’s your religion?

14: If you are outside, what are you most likely doing?

15: Do you prefer to be behind the camera or in front of it?

16: Simple but extremely complex. Favorite band?

17: What was the last lie you told?

18: Do you believe in karma?

19: What does your URL mean?

20: What is your greatest weakness; your greatest strength?

21: Who is your celebrity crush?

22: Have you ever gone skinny dipping?

23: How do you vent your anger?

24: Do you have a collection of anything?

25: Do you prefer talking on the phone or video chatting online?

26: Are you happy with the person you’ve become?

27: What’s a sound you hate; sound you love?

28: What’s your biggest “what if”?

29: Do you believe in ghosts? How about aliens?

30: Stick your right arm out; what do you touch first? Do the same with your left arm.

31: Smell the air. What do you smell?

32: What’s the worst place you have ever been to?

33: Choose: East Coast or West Coast?

34: Most attractive singer of your opposite gender?

35: To you, what is the meaning of life?

36: Define Art.

37: Do you believe in luck?

38: What’s the weather like right now?

39: What time is it?

40: Do you drive? If so, have you ever crashed?

41: What was the last book you read?

42: Do you like the smell of gasoline?

43: Do you have any nicknames?

44: What was the last film you saw?

45: What’s the worst injury you’ve ever had?

46: Have you ever caught a butterfly?

47: Do you have any obsessions right now?

48: What’s your sexual orientation?

49: Ever had a rumour spread about you?

50: Do you believe in magic?

51: Do you tend to hold grudges against people who have done you wrong?

52: What is your astrological sign?

53: Do you save money or spend it?

54: What’s the last thing you purchased?

55: Love or lust?

56: In a relationship?

57: How many relationships have you had?

58: Can you touch your nose with your tongue?

59: Where were you yesterday?

60: Is there anything pink within 10 feet of you?

61: Are you wearing socks right now?

62: What’s your favourite animal?

63: What is your secret weapon to get someone to like you?

64: Where is your best friend?

65: Give me your top 5 favourite blogs on Tumblr.

66: What is your heritage?

67: What were you doing last night at 12AM?

68: What do you think is Satan’s last name?

69: Be honest. Ever gotten yourself off?

70: Are you the kind of friend you would want to have as a friend?

71: You are walking down the street on your way to work. There is a dog drowning in the canal on the side of the street. Your boss has told you if you are late one more time you get fired. What do you do?

72: You are at the doctor’s office and she has just informed you that you have approximately one month to live. a) Do you tell anyone/everyone you are going to die? b) What do you do with your remaining days? c) Would you be afraid?

73: You can only have one of these things; trust or love.

74: What’s a song that always makes you happy when you hear it?

75: What are the last four digits in your cell phone number?

76: In your opinion, what makes a great relationship?

77: How can I win your heart?

78: Can insanity bring on more creativity?

79: What is the single best decision you have made in your life so far?

80: What size shoes do you wear?

81: What would you want to be written on your tombstone?

82: What is your favourite word?

83: Give me the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word; heart.

84: What is a saying you say a lot?

85: What’s the last song you listened to?

86: Basic question; what’s your favourite colour/colours?

87: What is your current desktop picture?

88: If you could press a button and make anyone in the world instantaneously explode, who would it be?

89: What would be a question you’d be afraid to tell the truth on?

90: One night you wake up because you heard a noise. You turn on the light to find that you are surrounded by MUMMIES. The mummies aren’t really doing anything, they’re just standing around your bed. What do you do?

91: You accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow you with the super-power of your choice! What is that power?

92: You can re-live any point of time in your life. The time-span can only be a half-hour, though. What half-hour of your past would you like to experience again?

93: You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

94: You have the opportunity to sleep with the music-celebrity of your choice. Who would it be?

95: You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere. You have to depart right now. Where are you gonna go?

96: Do you have any relatives in jail?

97: Have you ever thrown up in the car?

98: Ever been on a plane?

99: If the whole world were listening to you right now, what would you say?

dont be afraid to ask questions: even if it is after class or per mail, always ask if you dont understand something, or if you think there might be a connection somewhere!

learn working in groups: science is not a ‘everyone for themself’ kind of thing, you will need to learn how to work in groups and work anf study with other people. trust me, you wont make undergrad anyways if you only work alone

learn python: programming is a MUST in astrophysics, and python is one of the most used (free) languages out there! if you have the funds, IDL is also good, but pricey

learn LaTeX: speaking of programming, you should also learn LaTeX. technically it is not programming, but it feels like it. basically you programm what your MS word document would look like. used for writing papers and thesis, and usually lab reports!

if you can, install Linux: find a pc you can install linux on or try a virtual machine. there are A LOT of important programs that only work on linux, and you will have to use them. learn how to use the linux terminal and the commands! linux is the most widely used system in STEM, it is important to know your way around that, even if you personally prefere something else

dont waste your money on text books: there are usually the most basic fundations that sum up everything in one book, which will be there for you for the rest of your journey, but in general, try to get those in libraries. after that, read scientific papers (all free here: https://arxiv.org/ ) where you can find review papers that talk about general topics!

maths different: waste your money on GOOD maths books, they will always be there for you

maths is THE language: speaking of maths, if you are not interested (i dont mean if you are good or bad, i am talking about interest) in maths, dont study astronomy. seriously! maths is the language you will use to describe the universe! i was not the best at maths in school, but i was always interested by it. that is what is important. you dont need to immediately get it all, but you need to have the ability to invest so much time in it, that you will understand it at one point (going back to a previous point, here it is again important to work and study in groups. you may not get linear algebra, but your friend might)

be open minded, but critical: just because something is written in a published paper does not mean it is 100% accurate. new results can lead to theories to be disproven. discuss and make up your mind with your knowledge, and learn to be critical of new findings, in an educated way, not based on what you think is ‘true’, but through assassing the method and interpreting the data yourself.

Emma Gonzalez

Malala Yousafzai

Ruby Bridges

Greta Thunberg

Mari Copeny

Autumn Peltier

Afreen Khan

Sophie Cruz

Charlottesville Black Students Union

Naomi Wadler

DAPL protestors (names not found)

Claudette Colvin was actually the first one to refuse her seat in Montgomery, Alabama to a white passenger. The movement chose to promote Rosa Parks as the figure for that form of protest because Claudette was a pregnant 15-year-old girl.

Barbara Rose Johns was a 16-year-old who organized a student strike protesting segregated schools. This strike, after gaining support of the NAACP, became a lawsuit that turned into Brown vs. The Board of Education and resulted in the desegregation of U.S schools nationally.

7th-grader Mary Beth Tinker, disturbed by the Vietnam War, decided to wear an arm band with a peace sign on it in protest. Her school suspended her. Her family filed a suit, Tinker vs. Des Moines, which reached the Supreme Court and ruled in her favor, ensuring that students and teachers maintain their right to free speech while in school.

Freddie & Truus Oversteegen were sisters who joined a Dutch resistance movement in WWII in their teens. They lured, ambushed, and assassinated Nazis and Dutch collaborators. They also blew up a railway line, transported Jewish refugees to new hiding places, and worked in an emergency hospital. 

This is Lepa Radic, a 17 year old girl who fought against the Nazis in Yugoslavia. She was executed when she refused to give the names of her Partisan comrades.

I think it’s often exaggerated to hell as I’ve seen it on tumblr. That’s not to say it doesn’t exist, though.

A white person wearing a kimono won’t singlehandedly kill the Japanese population, and is in fact often seen (with good reason) to be respectful. A lot of Japanese people like foreigners wearing their clothing - they’ll give them as gifts, help them put them on and be delighted that someone is embracing this little part of their culture.

You know what’s cultural appropriation? Taking something of historical or religious significance and making fun of it or outright desecrating it (looking at YOU, j-law in hawaii), simplifying something to an outright offensive portrayal of what it actually is instead of looking into the significance of it (see: geisha, who have slowly become to be associated with ‘comfort women’ or courtesans because of how ‘exotic’ they were perceived to be), racism (wearing a sombrero hat is all in good fun, but when it accompanies blackface / racist remarks, stereotypes + accents, not so much ), and lumping cultures with a common signifier (native american reservations, asian countries, african countries) and heavily misattributing things to them based on assumptions and rumors, which are often racist, especially things that might be practiced or be more common than your average American state, but absolutely do not represent them in any way and sometimes aren’t even a cultural thing at all. (China and eating dog; Indians being scam callers and/or inherently misogynistic, etc)

There is no reason for culture not to be shared and embraced in a respectful way – even ignorant, if the person is willing to listen and learn – and there is nothing inherently wrong, in my opinion, if culture just happens to be a tourist attraction, sometimes. Take pictures to your delight, so long as you’re not banned from doing so. Do yoga and find inner peace or whatever. Participate in tradition and be amazed, amused, poke a little fun because culture is bound to be different from what you’re used to and it’s not always considered good, it’s not always awe-inspiring, sometimes it’ll be a little silly and you’re not obligated to fully immerse yourself into appreciating it - sometimes you just experience it and move on with your life. 

I also want to make a quick note on the term “cultural appropriation” itself: It is not by definition a bad thing.

Cultural appropriation is, simply, doing something that is common to another culture but not your own. Human beings have been appropriating each others’ cultures since one Neanderthal looked over at what another Neanderthal was doing and said, “Nifty.”

A Swede learning to cook stir-fry is cultural appropriation. A Korean eating pizza is cultural appropriation. An American wearing a kimono to a festival in Japan is cultural appropriation. But that’s fine! There’s nothing wrong with sharing ways of doing things, there’s nothing wrong with participating, especially when the sharing of knowledge/methodology improves people’s lives!

What isn’t fine is, as OP said, being disrespectful. Treating sacred objects as decoration is not okay. Misusing terminology is not okay. Forcing a group into a debt to you specifically to the point where they have to make and sell you cultural objects for a pittance, and then turning around and selling those objects to tourists and making bank is not okay.

What also isn’t fine is seeing a picture of someone whom you assume to be white wearing a sari and bitching her out because you don’t know that she’s half American and half Indian and that’s her fucking sari. What isn’t fine is seeing an American at a festival in Japan and bitching him out because you don’t know that his Japanese friends dressed him up for the festival because Western clothes would be totally out of place. What isn’t fine is speaking over minorities as you try to “defend” them from what you deem to be bad behaviour when your judgement is based in your own ethnocentrism.

having enough sleep and a fixed sleeping and waking time ( at least on the weekdays)

starting my day with gratitude (things to be grateful for: being alive, having a body, a mind, a soul, health, family, friends, food and water, safety, a roof over your head, your education, your job, your free time... seriously there is so much to be grateful for) and praying for my family’s wellbeing

any type of movement - it can be as light or as intense as you’d like it to be: stretch in bed, hop on your yoga mat, go for a walk, go to the gym...

showering = instant rebirth

diligently doing your skincare routine

nourishing your body. no counting calories/ no restricting. feeding your body all the nutrients it needs to function

making a to-do list in the morning

journaling at night

reading before bed

doing a monthly habit tracker

having enough time to get ready in the morning and not rushing

checking in with your loved ones weekly

listening to podcasts - especially motivational and uplifting ones

learning something new everyday - never underestimate the power of those 4- 8 minutes educational videos on youtube

doing yoga

<transcript below>

"One of the most prevalent obstacles in our ability to heal and self-actualise is when our productivity is tied to our worthiness."

I think the studyblr community especially needs to hear this. You don't have to be productive all the time, you need rest. Recovering from internalised capitalism means unpicking all the messages from family, friends, school and workplace that have reinforced the idea that you are a commodity, and that your worth is based on what you do. Your worth is inherent.

Please do your research! There is so much misinformation out there and a lot of lies.

Everyone should know the truth so please try to know as much as you can so you can spread awareness and help!

Patrick von Kalckreuth (Kiel 1898-1970 Starnberg)

1. Marie Curie (Maria Salomea Skłodowska Curie, 7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934), was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity - a term she coined. She discovered the elements polonium and radium, using techniques she invented for isolating radioactive isotopes. During World War I she developed mobile radiography units to provide X-ray services to field hospitals. She was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and the only person to win the Nobel Prize in two scientific fields. She was the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris in 1906.

"Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less."

2. Ada Lovelace (Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace, 10 December 1815 – 27 November 1852) was an English mathematician and writer, chiefly known for her work on Charles Babbage's proposed mechanical general-purpose computer, the Analytical Engine. She was the first to recognise that the machine had applications beyond pure calculation, and to have published the first algorithm intended to be carried out by such a machine. As a result, she is often regarded as one of the first computer programmers.

"Mathematical science shows what is. It is the language of unseen relations between things. But to use and apply that language, we must be able to fully appreciate, to feel, to seize the unseen, the unconscious."

3. Rosalind Franklin (Rosalind Elsie Franklin, 25 July 1920 – 16 April 1958) was an English chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose work was central to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), RNA (ribonucleic acid), viruses, coal, and graphite. Franklin is best known for her work on the X-ray diffraction images of DNA while at King's College London, particularly Photo 51, which led to the discovery of the DNA double helix for which Francis Crick, James Watson, and Maurice Wilkins shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1962.

"You look at science (or at least talk of it) as some sort of demoralising invention of man, something apart from real life, and which must be cautiously guarded and kept separate from everyday existence. But science and everyday life cannot and should not be separated. Science, for me, gives a partial explanation for life. In so far as it goes, it is based on fact, experience and experiment."

4. Grace Hopper (Grace Brewster Murray Hopper, December 9, 1906 – January 1, 1992) was an American computer scientist and United States Navy rear admiral. One of the first programmers of the Harvard Mark I computer, she was a pioneer of computer programming who invented one of the first linkers. Hopper was the first to devise the theory of machine-independent programming languages, and the FLOW-MATIC programming language she created using this theory was later extended to create COBOL, an early high-level programming language still in use today.

"The only phrase I’ve ever disliked is, 'Why, we’ve always done it that way.' I always tell young people, 'Go ahead and do it. You can always apologize later.'"

5. Hypatia of Alexandria (350–370 - 415 AD) was a Hellenistic Neoplatonist philosopher, astronomer, and mathematician, who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, then part of the Eastern Roman Empire. She was a prominent thinker of the Neoplatonic school in Alexandria where she taught philosophy and astronomy. She is known to have written a commentary on Diophantus's thirteen-volume Arithmetica, which may survive in part, having been interpolated into Diophantus's original text, and another commentary on Apollonius of Perga's treatise on conic sections, which has not survived. Many modern scholars also believe that Hypatia may have edited the surviving text of Ptolemy's Almagest, based on the title of her father Theon's commentary on Book III of the Almagest. Hypatia is known to have constructed astrolabes and hydrometers.

"Fables should be taught as fables, myths as myths, and miracles as poetic fancies. To teach superstitions as truths is a most terrible thing. The child mind accepts and believes them, and only through great pain and perhaps tragedy can he be in after years relieved of them. In fact, men will fight for a superstition quite as quickly as for a living truth—often more so, since a superstition is so intangible you cannot get at it to refute it, but truth is a point of view, and so is changeable."

6. Lise Meitner ( 7 November 1878 – 27 October 1968) was an Austrian-Swedish physicist who contributed to the discoveries of the element protactinium and nuclear fission. While working at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute on radioactivity, she discovered the radioactive isotope protactinium-231 in 1917. In 1938, Meitner and nephew-physicist Otto Robert Frisch discovered nuclear fission. They found that bombarding thorium with neutrons produced different isotopes. Hahn and Strassmann later in the year showed that isotopes of barium could be formed by bombardment of uranium. In late December, Meitner and Frisch worked out the phenomenon of such a splitting process. In their report in February issue of Nature in 1939, they gave it the name "fission". This principle led to the development of the first atomic bomb during World War II, and the subsequently other nuclear weapons and nuclear reactors. However, she did not share the 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for nuclear fission, which was awarded exclusively to her long-time collaborator Otto Hahn. She was praised by Albert Einstein as the "German Marie Curie".

"Science makes people reach selflessly for truth and objectivity; it teaches people to accept reality, with wonder and admiration, not to mention the deep awe and joy that the natural order of things brings to the true scientist."

7. Katherine Johnson (Creola Katherine Johnson, August 26, 1918 – February 24, 2020) was an American mathematician whose calculations of orbital mechanics as a NASA employee were critical to the success of the first and subsequent U.S. crewed spaceflights. Johnson's work included calculating trajectories, launch windows, and emergency return paths for Project Mercury spaceflights, including those for astronauts Alan Shepard, the first American in space, and John Glenn, the first American in orbit, and rendezvous paths for the Apollo Lunar Module and command module on flights to the Moon. Her calculations were also essential to the beginning of the Space Shuttle program, and she worked on plans for a mission to Mars. In 2015, President Barack Obama awarded Johnson the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

"The women did what they were told to do. They didn’t ask questions or take the task any further. I asked questions; I wanted to know why. They got used to me asking questions and being the only woman there."

8. Nettie Stevens (Nettie Maria Stevens, July 7, 1861 – May 4, 1912) was an American geneticist who discovered sex chromosomes. In 1905, soon after the rediscovery of Mendel's paper on genetics in 1900, she observed that male mealworms produced two kinds of sperm, one with a large chromosome and one with a small chromosome. When the sperm with the large chromosome fertilized eggs, they produced female offspring, and when the sperm with the small chromosome fertilized eggs, they produced male offspring. The pair of sex chromosomes that she studied later became known as the X and Y chromosomes.

9. Margaret Hamilton (Margaret Heafield Hamilton, born August 17, 1936) is an American computer scientist, systems engineer, and business owner. She was director of the Software Engineering Division of the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory, which developed on-board flight software for NASA's Apollo program. She later founded two software companies—Higher Order Software in 1976 and Hamilton Technologies in 1986, both in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Hamilton has published more than 130 papers, proceedings and reports about sixty projects and six major programs. She is one of the people credited with coining the term "software engineering". On November 22, 2016, Hamilton received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from president Barack Obama for her work leading to the development of on-board flight software for NASA's Apollo Moon missions.

"Looking back, we were the luckiest people in the world. There was no choice but to be pioneers; no time to be beginners."

10. Jocelyn Bell Burnell (Dame Susan Jocelyn Bell Burnell, 15 July 1943) is an astrophysicist from Northern Ireland who, as a postgraduate student, discovered the first radio pulsars in 1967. The discovery was recognised by the award of the 1974 Nobel Prize in Physics but, despite being the first person to discover the pulsars, she was not one of the recipients of the prize. The paper announcing the discovery of pulsars had five authors. Bell's thesis supervisor Antony Hewish was listed first, Bell second. Hewish was awarded the Nobel Prize, along with the astronomer Martin Ryle. Bell Burnell served as president of the Royal Astronomical Society from 2002 to 2004, as president of the Institute of Physics from October 2008 until October 2010, and as interim president of the Institute following the death of her successor, Marshall Stoneham, in early 2011.