It's fairly mild this time, at least so far, but I seem to have caught a cold or something, which I can't say I'm particularly pleased about. For some reason I've also been ravenously hungry these past couple days, so maybe that has to do with being sick.

I've been listening to this on repeat:

"56k (song made entirely from dial-up modem sound)" by RAC.

My dad called my name and asked if I was playing a song and how long it was. I said I just had it repeating and he was like "okay, well it's kind of annoying." Guess he doesn't like my beep boop music.

I attended a Mickaboo basic bird care class today, as the first step to potentially adopting some birds. The place it was held at had pigeons/doves and bunnies for adoption, and now I'm thinking about what it would be like to have pigeons as pets. I like pigeons, but they're not as cute as budgies. On the other hand, they are less work apparently, and are more cuddly. I mentioned thinking of adopting a bunny to my friend Henry, and he gave me a load of info on bunny care because he has a bunny. While I wasn't really looking for a ton of advice on the subject, it was helpful stuff to know if I ever do decide to get a bunny.

---

Lately I've been thinking about weakness and strength and what cultivates and contributes to each of those qualities. Overall I've been feeling good about myself and my life in general recently, minus a couple things, but I have felt a bit restless. It feels like I've been getting too many vague compliments and not enough (constructive) criticisms, I guess. I want to improve, but I'm in a place where I feel like external feedback would help me out, and I'm not getting enough information in that regard. It's all well and fine for people to say "just keep doing what you're doing," but that doesn't really give me anything new to work on.

Too many compliments starts to create an expectation of praise, and I don't like feeling like I need that. Praise is nice, but I don't want to feel antsy in its absence.

School is going well so far, and I'm having a much better time here than I was at school last year. There are some things I'm still worried about though, such as being pushed to treat people too delicately. I don't want to encourage weakness in other people by implying that I don't think they can handle stuff through my behavior towards them. Not saying that I think everybody should just buck up and deal with bad situations, but like... I generally believe that people are pretty capable of getting through tough times, and I want them to believe that about themselves too. I'm concerned that an overly careful PC culture could undermine people's sense of their own resilience. This hasn't been a problem so far, but I'm wary of it happening.

Sorry, you do not have permission to comment.

If you are a member, try logging in again or accessing this page here.