The Magpie's Nest

Hi hope nobody minds but I have a head canon or at least a possible interpretation of The Magnus Archives, that I want to get down but don't want to share with people who will see it as a TMA post first & a post by me second. For starters I'm not up to date & posting in part to try to re engage with the series. TMA spoilers under the cut.

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Just put my finger on why SFF&H stories that put an emphasis on “being human” and fear of being turned into something different. What level of privilege is the writer on that they've never had their humanity doubted?
Not White? Not Christian? Not straight? not neurotypical? not able bodied? Then even if people haven't called you inhuman to your face you have read people talking about those like you like they aren't people. History is littered with examples of how many don't consider you human if you don't fit a very narrow definition and the violence that ensues.

Its little wonder so many of us latch on to tales about widening our definition of person and embracing the idea of living as a person without being human.

There is nothing to say about the state of the world that hasn't been said better by actual experts a million times already. If anyone is following me on social media for the news, they have bigger problems than my inability to get my head together enough to live blog the pandemic. So I'll try to set aside feeling like I am doing something wrong for working through other things while real stuff is going on. I know its my brain casting around for stuff it can actually do something about, even if my various issues mean "do something" often means looping on stupid shit and chewing on issues from years ago.

I think its a sign of progress that one of the things I started to use to beat myself up about is both a current issue and something I can actually work on. With everyone moving to streaming and voice chat more, I've had to face something that has never been a priority for me. I HATE the sound of my voice. No I don't mean recordings, not even professional voice actors like their voice in recordings that much. I mean as the words are coming out of my mouth I often have to work at not spending brain space on how much I hate my voice. This ends up taking up nearly as much brain space but at least leaves me "vaguely annoyed at being reminded what a fuck up I am" and not arguing with myself over self hatred. So not only do I not own a mic I'm pretty sure I broke my laptop's built in mic on purpose.

It finally clicked that:

1)its probably as much gender as anything and

2)I can change it.

There are actual resources out there, some for free in ways that don't take from anyone else, for various kinds of voice training especially as relates to gender. Hell I think I could even live with sounding about twelve when I try to be chipper as long as it wasn't a twelve year old girl.

So not sure how much I'm going to actually do about that little revelation but I let myself talk a bit lower than usual, I don't think Mom even noticed, and I actually kinda liked it as opposed to just not hating it. So while I know it might just be because any new thing feels good for a while, I think it might be worth it. Just another way my little discord makes me want to be better: doing something about hating my voice never seemed worth it, but not only want to talk with them, I want to do it with out this distracting me.

soc_puppet posted: (no subject)

Changes in Severity of Allergy and Anxiety Symptoms Are Positively Correlated in Patients with Recurrent Mood Disorders Who Are Exposed to Seasonal Peaks of Aeroallergens

well shit, that explains a few things...

via umadoshi's link list12 Tips for Traveling with Depression | Far & Wide

When you have depression, even the most innocuous narratives that you face in day-to-day life can start to feel intimidating and isolating. And this is definitely true of the way that other people talk, think and write about travel. Seeing new places, experiencing new cultures and embarking on adventures outside of your comfort zone can sound wonderful in theory, but next to impossible in practice when the simple act of getting out of bed can feel like a journey in and of itself.

My mother and I scrimp and save all year so we can travel. Its hard between my ADHD and depression and her mobility issues and PTSD; but worth it. One thing that this article talks about is surprisingly hard but makes a huge difference: figuring out what we want to do not what we think is "what one does on a vacation in wherever". Sometimes that means admitting that certain landmarks do nothing for us, I worked myself up quite a bit before admitting to her that I'd rather spend more time in Disneyland than going to see the Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. I felt uncultured, childish and like admitting it would make her ashamed of me. Turned out she was dreading trying to get around in LA proper and was happy to stick to the burbs. I really recommend reading the whole article, it has some things I hadn't considered and some things I had to learn the hard way.

Wired Magazine posted: Watching Our Weight Could Be Killing Us

Then there are the dangers of dieting. According to studies in the American Journal of Physiology–­Endocrinology and Metabolism (2014) and Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health (2016), food restriction of almost any form—famine, elimination diets, wellness diets—routinely upsets hormonal regulation, potentially setting off serious mental and physical health problems and, paradoxically, weight gain.

I neither want to sound like Dennis Miller nor go off on a rant here but: Diet culture is more dangerous than being overweight. Stressing people out to the point of getting an eating disorder is not how you help them be healthy. So many people get all their health concerns dismissed because people want to blame everything on their weight. Diet culture is bound inextricably with fat shaming and fat shaming kills. Its 2019 why is this news?
Eating a variety of foods so you get nutrients is good; me not eating gluten because I have Celiac disease and it would make me sick in the short term and kill me in the long term* is good; watching every calorie is bad; checking your weight everyday is usually bad; trying to divide food into "good healthy food" & "evil fast food" is tempting but results in a lot of bad things; Please don't food shame people; Quit fucking fat shaming people.

*Don't make me write the Celiac disease is real rant: its long and only really needs to be read by two kinds of people: those with Celiac disease who are being gaslit and people who make fun of them/slip things in peoples food they specifically asked about. We might have a sense of humor about gluten free water jokes if people didn't literally poison us because they think its funny or lie to us because letting us skip eating something they didn't check/won't let us check makes them feel bad (but lying about allergens because we won't collapse at the table doesn't, wtf?)

Note to self: Don't skip the stimulant. My ADHD riddled brain is actually singing "I don't wanna and you can't make me" as I start my paperwork.

I wanted to go off on a tangent related to my recent post concerning an article about burnout in millennials. I am not posting this as a reply there for 2 reasons: 1) I don't want to derail the basic 'this is a thing' conversation; 2)I have had most of this simmering in the back of my brain for awhile, just couldn't get it congealed into words.
One valid criticism of the article I have seen from more person, is that burnout and a lot of the factors leading to it, are not unique to millennials. I think that this is exactly why it is hitting us so hard. We don't have the hope of a way out that previous generations had because we saw what happened to them.

Boomers hoped that by playing by the rules they would have at least the stability of their parents. They started in the mailroom, kept their heads down, had 2.5 kids and a white picket fence. They also had their pensions taken away after heart attacks from over work.
Gen X said fuck that and tried going their own way. People gave them a raft of shit over putting off kids and 'real jobs' to pursue their passion and come up with a life that wasn't based around the 9-5. They got the housing crisis taking the house they sunk what little they had after the dot com bust.

Now we have a third major generation that knows deep in its bones that following the path leads to nothing good and straying from it gets you eaten by wolves. We try to bolster a 'real job'(or more likely a retail job) with pursuing our passion by monetizing our hobbies; in the hope that when the rug gets yanked out from under us we will have some form of income dependent on how many hats we can knit instead of our bosses whims.
We try to buy stability that we know can be taken at any moment. We know the big things like school loans and mortgages can leave you indebted with nothing to show for it. We are constantly told if we sacrifice our morning latte on the later of savings, we will never have to fear making rent. If we can't have the big one time things like houses and degrees, or consistent small things like a morning latte, what does that leave but intermittent splurge like avocado toast and 'treat yo self' culture?

TL;DR when presented with a no win scenario as our life plan, it is hardly surprising we are stressed.