Since once in a blue moon I actually discover a decent rule for adulting, and since I know I have followers a few years younger than me who are just entering the workforce, I want to tell you about a very important phrase.
“I won’t be available.”
Imagine you’re at work and your boss asks you to come in on Saturday. Saturday is usually your day off–coming in Saturdays is not an obligation to keep your job. Maybe you were going to watch a movie with a friend, or maybe you were just going to lie in bed and eat ice cream for eight hours, but either way you really, really don’t want to give up your day off.
If you consider yourself a millennial you’ve probably been raised to believe you need to justify not being constantly at work. And if you’re a gen-Z kid you’re likely getting the same toxic messages that we did. So in a situation like that, you might be inclined to do one of three things:
- Tell your boss you’d rather not give up your day off. Cave when they pressure you to come in anyway, since you’re not doing anything important.
- Tell your boss you’d rather not give up your day off. Over-apologize and worry that you looked bad/unprofessional.
- Lie and say you’ve got a doctor’s appointment or some other activity that feels like an adequate justification for not working.
The fact is, it doesn’t matter to your boss whether you’re having open heart surgery or watching anime in your underwear on Saturday. The only thing that affects them is the fact that you won’t be at work. So telling them why you won’t be at work only gives them reason to try and pressure you to come in anyway.
If you say “I won’t be available,” giving no further information, you’d be surprised how often that’s enough. Be polite and sympathetic in your tone, maybe even say “sorry, but I won’t be available.” But don’t make an excuse. If your boss is a professional individual, they’ll accept that as a ‘no’ and try to find someone else.
But bosses aren’t always professional. Sometimes they’re whiny little tyrants. So, what if they pressure you further? The answer is–politely and sympathetically give them no further information.
“Are you sure you’re not available?” “Sorry, but yes.”
“Why won’t you be available?” “I have a prior commitment.” (Which you do, even if it’s only to yourself.)
“What’s your prior commitment?” “Sorry, but that’s kind of personal.”
“Can you reschedule it?” “I’m afraid not. Maybe someone else can come in?”
If you don’t give them anything to work with, they can’t pressure you into going beyond your obligations as an employee. And when they realize that, they’ll also realize they have to find someone else to come in and move on.
IMPORTANT!! PLEASE READ!!
Just like with many other parts of life, learn to say ‘no’ to people. You are important. Don’t kill yourself for another person, esp. if they are your boss.
the question of whether modern internet humor is dadaist is fascinating because sure on a surface level, it absolutely resembles dadaist art of the 1920′s but my question is…………..is it art?
the original dada movement emerged specifically to interact with that question, of whether an incoherent collage, or a gold-plated toilet seat, or poetry pulled out of a hat should be considered art
but internet humor? it exists solely for us to entertain one another. it doesn’t give a shit about what art is or isn’t, and comments like “this belongs in a museum” or “where’s her oscar” always come after the fact, and, more importantly, are made specifically to add entertainment value
so my take for today is that internet humor isn’t neo-dada, or post-dada, or even “e-dada” or “#dada”; as a mass movement concerned more with community participation than performance to an audience and wholly unconcerned with questions about higher meaning…………….this is folk dada
FOLK DADA
i don’t think i’ve made a post about this yet, but i find it fascinating how MHA is kinda the story of a next gen shonen story, only the audience has never seen the previous generation.
All Might was the protagonist of his story, and now he’s reaching his limit and needs to retire. the story focus is on the new generation surpassing the old, and learning from their mistakes. All Might doesn’t want Izuku to experience the same pain he did, by losing his master. instead, he’s focusing on helping Izuku become the next Symbol of Peace.
Izuku is learning that self-sacrifice isn’t the end all, be all for heroes. that you can’t just wreck your body to save someone else, because sooner or later it’ll catch up with you.
Endeavor is what would happen if a shonen rivalry continued on into adulthood without ever resolving itself. he’s the logical conclusion of an unresolved rivalry of someone who couldn’t take being left behind. Bakugou’s development is in direct contrast to Endeavor’s, because Bakugou is learning and growing and slowly letting go of his spite and frustration and need to be number one all the time, unlike Endeavor
Toshinori made himself the Symbol of Peace, and as a result he was the only thing keeping society on it’s feet. once he fell, so did everything keeping the villains at bay. the new generation are all going to learn from this and become more symbols, holding up the peace together instead of just relying on one person.
the next generation is all about Teamwork, not just working as individuals.
Toshinori lost his place as a hero after he went after All for One in revenge those 6 years ago. he lost sight of his heroism in order to avenge Nana. that’s the moment he fell. that’s why he can no longer be a hero anymore, because of the injuries he sustained from that fight.
Nana gave up her child and cut herself off from her family because she couldn’t take the pain of it anymore. she likely kept herself emotionally distant from Toshinori because of this, during their short time together, and Toshinori is doing the complete opposite of what she did; Toshinori is getting close to Izuku and they’re both emotionally supporting each other.
there’s so much about Toshi’s life that we don’t know about, and it’s his life that would’ve been the star of the previous generation. how he was quirkless, how he wanted to become a hero, and a symbol who could stop crime, how he met Nana and earned her trust and gained her powers, how he lost her and trained under Gran Torino, how Endeavor met him and sparked that rivalry, how he eventually became All Might and how his reputation alone nearly stopped crime (something no hero in any previous generation was able to do).
his whole life could be told in it’s own series, but we, the audience, aren’t privy to that information. we just know the bare bones, and occasionally we find out more as the story goes on. little hints of what happened before. but that’s all in the past–it’s all about helping the next generation grow now. All Might was a legend in his own time, but he’s old and injured and has to retire from hero work. instead, he’s helping a new generation of heroes grow; he’s helping Izuku become the next Symbol of Peace in his place.
the story of MHA is a next generation story without the previous generation being shown, and i think that’s fascinating.
Encounter: 1990s-equivalent-of-clockwork scorpion; tail injects a venom that prevents the victim from connecting to the Internet for 2d8 hours
i have 2 stop acting like warrior cats is a Super Serious series worth analyzing way too much goofy shit happens in it for me to get serious about it anymore. after a 15 pound cat lifted a fucking beech tree with his back i should have known that warriors was going bonkers
other nutty things that happens in warriors that make me stop taking it seriously sometimes [a lot of the time]:
- adult cat gets scooped up by an owl and then dropped midair, dies, and is resurrected by star cat gods
- normal domestic cat with no super strength powers explicitly stated [lionblazes only power was that he couldnt be beaten in battle] lifts up a fucking tree
- cats can die twice apparently? die and go to cat heaven/cat hell and then their ghost can be killed again
- badgers are huge and are hellbent on killing cats
- DOGS ALWAYS WANT TO KILL THE CAT CHARACTERS
- A CAT LIFTED A TREE ON HIS BACK
- cats have gigantic battles in the middle of fields but for some reason no human ever stumbles upon it wondering what the hell is going on
me: h
30-40 year old male writer who is still bitter that he wasn’t a chick magnet sex god in high school: And there she was. The most beautiful girl at Washington High School. I’m completely in love with her. But she’s dating that brainless dumb jock Chadley Bradson.
rocky horror is the worst and is also transmisogynistic can we please finally get over this shit movie
ok but like the writer is transgender nonbinary and the language used in the play was the preferred language by trans people of that time can we not deny parts of our history because we’ve evolved since then thanks
So fucking much this.
PS, youth of today: you’ll be saying the same damn thing about art from this time before too long, for good or for ill. Terminology will, in fact, change. Definitions will, in fact, shift. It always does, they always do.
PPS, it is pretty much impossible to overstate how life-alteringly important this movie was to kids who didn’t conform to standard expectations of gender and sexuality, back in the day. Especially when back in the day was the mid-to-late 1980s, when the only queers you saw on TV were neutered AIDS tragedies, Bowie was playing straight, and even Elton John was married to a woman, and midnight showing of RHPS were pretty much the only place that felt like home. It was mental life raft for a lot of people.
I was one of them.
#the queer youth of today has forgotten all its history and is spitting on its ancestors and i hate it (via @gaythreats)
beautifully phrased
Solfege Navigator 