Did I Daydream This, Or Was There A Website For Writers With Like. A Ridiculous Quantity Of Descriptive

Achievements of 2021 (both academic and non-academic)

I'm still very much on break (basically just eating, sleeping, reading and swimming, it's delightful), but I want to sum up this year. It's been a fucking rollercoaster of a year and I still can't believe like half of the things that happened, both good and bad. Nevertheless, I want to focus on the positive ones to kickstart the new year in the most uplifting manner I'm able to pull off. Which is not very optimistic nor uplifting, but I can be at least not full of doom, haha.

I want to do this chronologically, just because I tend to forget the good stuff that happened more than two months ago.

Let's wrap this up!

Academic Achievements of 2021

presented at my first international conference (February)

prepped two PhD dissertation projects (April) and successfully defended them during the PhD programs interview (June)

wrote my diploma thesis while cooperating with the best mentor ever (January till June)

got accepted to two PhD programs and currently doing both of them! (June)

co-written three papers over the summer - two already published, one under a promising peer review (June-September)

defended my thesis and passed my state exams with straight As, meaning I got my master's degree! (September)

wrote a book chapter that got accepted (November)

Non-Academic Achievements of 2021

quit the job I hated (January)

got rid off so much stuff I didn't need (mostly July, August)

read 130 books, yaaay

stopped saying yes to meetings with acquaintances just because I felt like I should see them (big one!)

found a functioning skincare routine (September)

started swimming again (and loving it) (September)

A lot of this year has been mostly about surviving, to be honest. I was battling a lot of anxiety and depression, I was extremely stressed at times and couldn't sleep. Swimming and taking proper days off helps, close friends help. I'm gonna do a post with some goals for 2022, so I won't spoil here that, haha.

It was a good year after all.

Take care!

M.

How to Handle Having TOO MUCH To Do

So let’s say you’re in the same boat I am (this is a running theme, have you noticed?) and you’ve just got, like, SO MUCH STUFF that HAS to get done YESTERDAY or you will DIE (or fail/get fired/mope). Everything needs to be done yesterday, you’re sick, and for whatever reason you are focusing on the least important stuff first. What to do!

Take a deep breath, because this is a boot camp in prioritization.

Make a 3 by 4 grid. Make it pretty big. The line above your top row goes like this: Due YESTERDAY - due TOMORROW - due LATER. Along the side, write: Takes 5 min - Takes 30 min - Takes hours - Takes DAYS.

Divide ALL your tasks into one of these squares, based on how much work you still have to do. A thank you note for a present you received two weeks ago? That takes 5 minutes and was due YESTERDAY. Put it in that square. A five page paper that’s due tomorrow? That takes an hour/hours, place it appropriately. Tomorrow’s speech you just need to rehearse? Half an hour, due TOMORROW. Do the same for ALL of your tasks

Your priority goes like this:

5 minutes due YESTERDAY

5 minutes due TOMORROW

Half-hour due YESTERDAY

Half-hour due TOMORROW

Hours due YESTERDAY

Hours due TOMORROW

5 minutes due LATER

Half-hour due LATER

Hours due LATER

DAYS due YESTERDAY

DAYS due TOMORROW

DAYS due LATER

At this point you just go down the list in each section. If something feels especially urgent, for whatever reason - a certain professor is hounding you, you’re especially worried about that speech, whatever - you can bump that up to the top of the entire list. However, going through the list like this is what I find most efficient.

Some people do like to save the 5 minute tasks for kind of a break between longer-running tasks. If that’s what you want to try, go for it! You’re the one studying here.

So that’s how to prioritize. Now, how to actually do shit? That’s where the 20/10 method comes in. It’s simple: do stuff like a stuff-doing FIEND for 20 minutes, then take a ten minute break and do whatever you want. Repeat ad infinitum. It’s how I’ve gotten through my to do list, concussed and everything.

You’ve got this. Get a drink and start - we can do our stuff together!

Here it is folks:

My definitive ranking of my least favorite bodies of water! These are ranked from least to most scary (1/10 is okay, 10/10 gives me nightmares). I’m sorry this post is long, I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about this.

The Great Blue Hole, Belize

I’ve been here! I have snorkeled over this thing! It is terrifying! The water around the hole is so shallow you can’t even swim over the coral without bumping it, and then there’s a little slope down, and then it just fucking drops off into the abyss! When you’re over the hole the water temperature drops like 10 degrees and it’s midnight blue even when you’re right by the surface. Anyway. The Great Blue Hole is a massive underwater cave, and its roughly 410 feet deep. Overall, it’s a relatively safe area to swim. It’s a popular tourist attraction and recreational divers can even go down and explore some of the caves. People do die at the Blue Hole, but it is generally from a lack of diving experience rather than anything sinister going on down in the depths. My rating for this one is 1/10 because I’ve been here and although it’s kinda freaky it’s really not that bad.

Lake Baikal, Russia

When I want to give myself a scare I look at the depth diagram of this lake. It’s so deep because it’s not a regular lake, it’s a Rift Valley, A massive crack in the earth’s crust where the continental plates are pulling apart. It’s over 5,000 feet deep and contains one-fifth of all freshwater on Earth. Luckily, its not any more deadly than a normal lake. It just happens to be very, very, freakishly deep. My rating for this lake is a 2/10 because I really hate looking at the depth charts but just looking at the lake itself isn’t that scary.

Jacob’s Well, Texas

This “well” is actually the opening to an underwater cave system. It’s roughly 120 feet deep, surrounded by very shallow water. This area is safe to swim in, but diving into the well can be deadly. The cave system below has false exits and narrow passages, resulting in multiple divers getting trapped and dying. My rating is a 3/10, because although I hate seeing that drop into the abyss it’s a pretty safe place to swim as long as you don’t go down into the cave (which I sure as shit won’t).

The Devil’s Kettle, Minnesota

This is an area in the Brule River where half the river just disappears. It literally falls into a hole and is never seen again. Scientists have dropped in dye, ping pong balls, and other things to try and figure out where it goes, and the things they drop in never resurface. Rating is 4/10 because Sometimes I worry I’m going to fall into it.

Flathead Lake, Montana

Everyone has probably seen this picture accompanied by a description about how this lake is actually hundreds of feet deep but just looks shallow because the water is so clear. If that were the case, this would definitely rank higher, but that claim is mostly bull. Look at the shadow of the raft. If it were hundreds of feet deep, the shadow would look like a tiny speck. Flathead lake does get very deep, but the spot the picture was taken in is fairly shallow. You can’t see the bottom in the deep parts. However, having freakishly clear water means you can see exactly where the sandy bottom drops off into blackness, so this still ranks a 5/10.

The Lower Congo River, multiple countries

Most of the Congo is a pretty normal, if large, River. In the lower section of it, however, lurks a disturbing surprise: massive underwater canyons that plunge down to 720 feet. The fish that live down there resemble cave fish, having no color, no eyes, and special sensory organs to find their way in the dark. These canyons are so sheer that they create massive rapids, wild currents and vortexes that can very easily kill you if you fall in. A solid 6/10, would not go there.

Little Crater Lake, Oregon

On first glance this lake doesn’t look too scary. It ranks this high because I really don’t like the sheer drop off and how clear it is (because it shows you exactly how deep it goes). This lake is about 100 feet across and 45 feet deep, and I strongly feel that this is too deep for such a small lake. Also, the water is freezing, and if you fall into the lake your muscles will seize up and you’ll sink and drown. I don’t like that either. 7/10.

Grand Turk 7,000 ft drop off

No. 8/10. I hate it.

Gulf of Corryvreckan, Scotland

Due to a quirk in the sea floor, there is a permanent whirlpool here. This isn’t one of those things that looks scary but actually won’t hurt you, either. It absolutely will suck you down if you get too close. Scientists threw a mannequin with a depth gauge into it and when it was recovered the gauge showed it went down to over 600 feet. If you fall into this whirlpool you will die. 9/10 because this seems like something that should only be in movies.

The Bolton Strid, England

This looks like an adorable little creek in the English countryside but it’s not. Its really not. Statistically speaking, this is the most deadly body of water in the world. It has a 100% mortality rate. There is no recorded case of anyone falling into this river and coming out alive. This is because, a little ways upstream, this isn’t a cute little creek. It’s the River Wharfe, a river approximately 30 feet wide. This river is forced through a tiny crack in the earth, essentially turning it on its side. Now, instead of being 30 feet wide and 6 feet deep, it’s 6 feet wide and 30 feet deep (estimated, because no one actually knows how deep the Strid is). The currents are deadly fast. The banks are extremely undercut and the river has created caves, tunnels and holes for things (like bodies) to get trapped in. The innocent appearance of the Strid makes this place a death trap, because people assume it’s only knee-deep and step in to never be seen again. I hate this river. I have nightmares about it. I will never go to England just because I don’t want to be in the same country as this people-swallowing stream. 10/10, I live in constant fear of this place.

Honorable mention: The Quarry, Pennsylvania

I don’t know if that’s it’s actual name. This lake gets an honorable mention not because it’s particularly deep or dangerous, but it’s where I almost drowned during a scuba diving accident.

Edit: I’ve looked up the name of the quarry, it’s called Crusty’s Quarry and is privately owned and only used for training purposes, not recreational diving.

I would like to add a category to the academia aesthetics called Realistic Acedamia and it's where you show up to class everyday in jeans+hoodie with dirt cheap coffee and reduce Serious Conversations About the Nature of the Universe to memes.

Also includes messy handwriting, a collection of ugly free pens you got from library events, and complaining incessantly about your chosen area of study

May study challenge day 23!

What type of learner are you (visual, kinetic, etc.)? How does this translate to your study methods?

I’ve never really had one particular learning type that works for me more than others - I try to study in different ways, but I guess my study style fits with a visual learning method more than others?

Today - a photo from a chemistry experiment, reviewing English, chemistry homework, violin practice, piano practice, making chemistry notes, music homework, Latin lit revision, and my cute little productivity tracker with a flower for each day 🌷🌟

Planets i learned about via youtube while procrastinating my english essay

Planet 55 Cancri e is basically a giant diamond. like the planet is a diamond. and it would be worth $26.9 nonillion

Planet Gliese 436 b is an ice planet that is constantly on fire do to its close proximity to its parent star. the ice doesn’t melt bc the planet’s gravity is so strong it physically prevents the ice from melting

Planet HD 189733b rains sideways glass…. constantly

Planet J1407-B has planetary rings that are 200x the size of saturn. if saturn’s ring were as big as J1407-B’s we’d be able to see them with our naked eye from earth AND they would dominate our sky and look larger than a full moon

Planet Wasp-12b rotates so close to its parent star that its slowly being consumed by the it

Planet Gliese 581c is one of the candidates for a planet that can support life however it orbits a tiny dwarf star and is tidally locked so one side is constantly subject to immense sunlight while the other is constantly in darkness. there’s a small area of the planet however, that is just the right temp to support life. u just can’t step out of said area. the skies are red and the plants would have be a black color instead of a green bc they would use infrared light for photosynthesis. (a message was actually sent to the planet in 2008 in hopes that there’s life on the planet but the message wont reach the planet until 2029).

Planet GJ 1214b is a water planet nicknamed “water world” is has no land at all and the water is so deep it goes down miles all the way to the planet’s core.

Planet Wasp-17b is the largest planet discovered thus far. its so large its existence contradicts our understanding of how planets are formed. and it has a retrograde orbit, so it orbits in the opposite direction of its parent star.

Planet HD 188753 has 3 suns you should have triple shadows and there would be almost daily eclipses. and no matter which direction u face on the planet u would always see a sunset

Planet HD106906b is the loneliest planet discovered thus far. its known as “super jupiter” bc its 11x bigger than jupiter. it orbits its parent star at a distance of 60 billion miles (which is v strange) hence why its the loneliest planet.

Planet Tres 2b is the darkest planet known. it reflects less than 1% of light (it reflects less light than coal and black acrylic paint). the tiny part of the planet that does reflect light is red making the planet glow a dim red.

very specific types of physicists

emeritus: a well-meaning retired professor who still frequents the department. occasionally seen jogging up and down the halls of the lab. it’s how he gets his daily exercise. his field of research is obsolete and he spends most of his days making art based on physics equations. asks all of the female undergrads if they plan to teach high school physics.

star child: no one will measure up to this alumnus. they started research in high school, graduated from undergrad a year early with a few papers already under their belt, and finished their phd (at a very prestigious university) in two years. they visit occasionally to present their research and talk to the undergrad physics students. very down to earth and kind. undergrads, grad students, and professors alike are in awe.

father figure: this prof’s lectures are full of dad jokes, metaphors comparing the behaviors of particles with sugared-up three-year-olds, and digressions about something that’s more fun to talk about than the subject matter. says “i’m not angry, just disappointed” when the class does poorly on an exam. when you go to his office hours there is almost always a child or two underneath his desk or drawing on his whiteboard (the bottom third of which is always covered in stick figures and scribbles). intensely watched the construction from his office window as a new laboratory was being built.

academic rival: you were friends over the summer when you were both doing research but they became distant. small talk always turns into bickering about the importance of your respective research when you run into each other getting coffee in the common room. begrudgingly you admit to yourself, they’re really good at what they do. thank god you don’t belong to the same research group.

harsh but kind: brilliant researcher with high expectations of their students. will offer and make you tea as they grade your problem sets (with commentary) in front of you. after your semester in their class, you buy a bag of loose-leaf jasmine green tea because they got you hooked on it.

the politician: buddies with some higher-ups in university admin and the heads of other colleges. your peers derail class by bringing up current events. has a fixation on swords and genealogy. a bit of an anglophile. you took apart a transistor radio with them once. will make formal complaints to the math department on your behalf.

melancholy teaching professor: very cynical from a career in academia but here to have fun. one of the friendliest faces in the department. organizes the students and faculty to do outreach and lugs physics demos all around the tri-county area. talks to the undergrads like they are people. always kind of sad, it makes you wish you could fix all of the ills of academia for them.

September 1, 2020 - physics studies.

It's September already! August was a tough month for me and I'm so excited to welcome the better days ahead <33 ☁️ September, please be nice 💫

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧ Keep on working hard and take care of yourself friends ♡

🎶 Dynamite - BTS

literally though if you feel like your life is slipping through your fingers and every day goes too fast… try doing hard things, not just taking the easy route, like reading and making art and exercising and cooking a meal from scratch and journaling, doing these things without distraction, without being absorbed on a screen… the time will stretch and you’ll be reminded that life is long and beautiful if you make it so.