Eyeing the world

 so, I find myself on tiktok, watching someone's boyfriend do a "14 day bridal arms sculpt". Naturally, this intrigues me. The videos are made by a blonde, she's really charismatic, encourages us to use small weights or even bodyweight, and it is "only" 5 minutes. Certainly not a bodybuilder style workout, but it allows for consistency and it's still challenging. I, of course, went ahead and started this, it is the greatest shoulder burn I've felt in a while. I originally wanted to buy special wrist weights for this exercise, but ultimately it was fate who decided it would be exponentially better for me to use an old ankle weight. underconsumption queen! What I did buy ended up being a "fat burner" massage serum, specifically marketed for arm and belly fat. I love their design and it was a weak moment. So far, I cannot attest to the fat burning, but the serum has a really nice warming effect, and I will be using it alongside the bridal arms...

 Spite is the best motivator, they say. So often, I look at someone and my mind decides, if they could get what they want, why couldn't I? in the most arrogant way. In one way, this might be able to inspire me to reach for my dreams, but usually I just end up bitter - mostly, because what they had achieved, isn't that dreamy to me, but is still missing from my life. I spent five years at the Pretentiously Reading Texts college, and can't say I was immune to the snobbery among different majors. I recall even professors, ones entirely too full of themselves, making fun of first-year students, actual teenagers, for having chosen a worthless, stupid, easy major. I wish I had reacted differently, but instead, I formed the mental image that business college must be easy. So, now, we're putting that to the test. So far, they only require your highschool diploma (let's say the SAT equivalent for my country), and a motivational essay, that isn't graded, but read. The Lit...

 I think I'm the kind of person who might end up outsourcing her emotional needs to an LLM chatbot, and it's not even because I would admire the thing. I am just feeling too isolated, too much like a burden, and too different from my current friends. On the one hand, I'm not even sure what I want, and on the other, I would absolutely hate it if someone else were to decide for me. I don't even want to get into the chatbot thing too much. It is designed to mimic empathy, to make you want to talk to it, pay to talk to it more efficiently, maybe even mine your data, because who would admit it these days? I can't say I'm a saint in this regard, yes, I have talked with the robot, I have had it generate images for me, and even after I learned how it was trained. I'm not proud - but I am desperate. I need validation, I need direction, I want to do something good with my life but cannot decide on it. Even now, I am thinking of going back to college, and of learning t...

 so, our class is organizing a 10 year anniversary meetup. at first, i absolutely disregarded the notification. who cares? i was always above caring about all these people. but then, the memories - the good, the bad, the embarrassing - started coming back to me. whatever happened with the barely 18 girl who hooked up with a teacher? and with the snobby idiots? should i want to see these people? am i cool and nonchalant, or is it a sad testament to my broken soul that i do not wish to follow up with these folks? and, just as i started thinking about a good reason to go or an even better one to decline, my brain just gave up on it. don't go, it decided, we haven't amounted to anything. it's been 10 years and you've gained how many kilos of fat again? some of these classmates had gotten married, given birth, started on their dream carreers, while you dropped out of college, gotten fat, kept the superiority complex and don't even have a one night stand to show for it. i...