So, the internet’s been blowing up today because of this picture of a dress:
No one seems to be able to decide if it’s white and gold or black and blue. Well, okay, the resounding evidence is pointing one way, but it might not be the way you think, and that’s what’s tripping people up. Continue reading
[Content note: This post mentions struggles with self-acceptance and self-sacrificial mindsets.]
On my way out the door, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. Something about it–maybe my outfit, maybe the way my hair is doing a thing–makes me smile. Before I step out, I pull out my phone, thrust out my arm, and–selfie.
Last week, I finally got around to one of those tasks I’d been putting off and went through my cell phone photos from the last nine months. Most were quick snapshots that I freely discarded; the rest I tagged and categorized on my computer. In doing so, I confirmed what I’d been strongly suspecting: I’ve been taking a lot of selfies.
Oh, selfies, the phenomenon we love to hate. Scroll through the opinion section of any site frequented by readers over 35, and you’re guaranteed a column decrying selfies and the narcissistic, tech-addicted generation that takes them. Occasionally, when a researcher at the University of Everything’s Changing and I Don’t Like It or the What’s Wrong With the Youths Institute publishes a study confirming Millennials’ inflated egos with Science, you’ll even find selfies outside of Opinion.
“Selfies are for the selfish,” opines Kelly Iverson, senior at Kansas State. At Jezebel, Erin Gloria Ryan calls them “a cry for help,” arguing that “young women take selfies because they don’t derive their sense of worth from themselves, they rely on others to bestow their self-worth on them.” Gizmodo declares that the selfie stick–a monopod that allows you to take pictures of yourself from farther away than arm’s length–is an “enabling device that deserve[s] a permanent ban“.
In other words, smartphones and Millennials are ruining everything. Again. Pass the salt. Continue reading
“As my first act as your President, I hereby OUTLAW CANKER SORES!”
“Sir, that’s not how… anything works.”
“Wait, WHAT?”
Know what feature I’d like to see in content management systems? Tag aliases. Continue reading
I get tired of dealing with unempathetic jerks on the internet, so I make things like this.
Written in my sketchbook with my Parker Metropolitan fountain pen, then painted in Photoshop.
Want to own this image in a form you can touch with your hands and/or face? You can buy it as a print, a throw pillow, a skin for your laptop/phone/iPad, a tote bag, and more at my Society6 store. Plus, a portion of your purchase will actually support me!
I run on battery power.
There’s a well of energy inside me, and right now, it’s charging. I’m in a familiar place, doing something I enjoy. Sitting on my couch with my computer, my battery is humming contentedly as its indicator changes from a red sliver to a full green cell.
There are a handful of circumstances that act as my charging stations. Visiting my parents and sitting at their kitchen table, for instance, or relaxing in their living room. Curling up in bed with R and watching Netflix. Staying with a close friend in Portland. Making a long car ride across the state by myself. Doing things I feel good at. In all of these situations, I plug into the cozy familiarity and let it fill my battery up.
I try to keep my battery as full as possible, because it’s a mess when I go into emergency shutdown mode.
Continue reading
