It's 2am and I'm working on a story. I decided to watch my phone clock because I've never seen exactly what happens at 2am when we go back in time. I don't know what I expected--maybe a little celebratory confetti animation on my phone. But no, it just jumped from 1:59am to 1am. And that was that.

I just don't understand. With all that money, why oh why and how could anyone be so selfish? I live in stupidly expensive Southern California and am considered lower middle class--I'm 100% in for doing my part to help pull others up in the world through taxes. The mindset of the 1% is mind boggling!

BOO! The place where I buy my favorite conditioner will no longer be carrying it. YAY! There were two on the 'Last Chance Shelf' so I bought them for half off. BOO! There's a mosquito buzzing around my home. YAY! I'm drinking yummy tea. BOO! Another story rejection today. *cries* YAY! Bedtime soon.

For the love of all that is holy and unholy, where TF did the idea come from that em dashes = "oh hai, I see you used chatGPT to write your story." I love em dashes and use them often. I've never used AI to write any of my stories or to even generate ideas. When I die, bury me under the em dashes.

My new Halloween night light is so cute, that I just want to pull a chair into the bathroom, sit in the dark for several hours, and watch it flicker!

Sigh. Canvas is back up. My mini vacation is officially over.

Had planned to get a bunch of grading done today but Canvas has been down since midnight bcuz of the Amazon AWS outage I started to dust to make good use of my "downtime", but that didn't last very long as I was overcome by the sleepies Currently taking a do-nothing mini vacation in my desk chair.

Dear Lit Mags, I love that there is a Lit Submission Calls feed here on Blue Sky (so convenient!), but there are so many calls that don't show up there. Did you know that if you use the #submissionscall hashtag, your post will show up on that feed? Love, someone who visits that feed frequently.

For those of you who write and submit prose poetry, could you point me to your favorite lit mags where you've submitted your poems? I generally don't write #poetry (more of a #flashFiction writer), but I have a prose poem that's appx 150 words that I'd like to get out there in the world. Thank you!

Just registered! #writingCommunity #flashFiction

Excellent stories! Give it a read! #writingCommunity #flashFiction

This short story by Anna Hundert, "Queen of Calvary", is so damn good. So many poetic-like lines woven throughout. I wish there was enough time in the world that I could become this kind of writer. Sigh. Give it a read! #writingCommunity www.menace-mag.com/queen-of-cal...

As you get older, there aren't as many "first times" as there are when you're young. But last night, I had four firsts... first time walking the Hollywood Walk of Fame, first time eating at the Shake Shack, first time going to the Pantages Theater, and first time seeing Les Misérables. Fun night!

You know what to do. So do it! Good luck! #writingCommunity #flashfiction

In the various @nycmidnight.bsky.social challenges I've competed in, I've gotten my fav genres (comedy, fairy tale, historical, romcom) 1x each, and my least fav…horror 3x & thriller 3x. Am I cursed?! Will that stop me from registering for the Dec. 5th 250-word challenge? Nah! nycmidnight.com/250

This is an important one to read!

The tide is high but I'm holdin' on...

FvCK iyeece

I hate AI so much! I hate that artists & writers have had their work stolen. I hate that AI uses far too much energy & water. I hate that students use it to cheat. And now teachers use it to grade WTF?! Why oh why isn't AI reserved for complex issues like disease diagnosis/cures or climate change??

Sometimes I look at my students' assignments and I think "Are you purposely trying to do everything BUT what I asked for???" Weary teacher here. Twelve more years until I can retire. Twelve!! 😖

Dragonflies are supposed to be good luck and new beginnings! One landed on my daughter's shoe just a few days before her audition for Annie... and she got the lead so... 🤷🤩

Girl power!

It's 1:45am PST. Anxiety sucks.

A student emailed asking for an add code for a late start class I'm teaching. At the end of his email he wrote "Thank you, and be careful" Uh. Be careful of what? Are the ducks organizing? Did my dish sponge develop opinions? The rapture? Lizard people? Did my avocado grow teeth? *paranoid now*

Welp...

Truth!!

It's not even October yet, but these people already have a gigantic skeleton living on their front porch. 😍

I'm sad this will be @literaryruby.bsky.social last issue. So many amazing stories! I do hope the website will stay up for archival purposes so that the wonderful stories can continue to live on. They accept both CNF and Fiction less than 1000 words. Submit submit!! #flashFiction #writingCommunity

The "Fox News Contributor" in Mollie's bio tells me all I need to know. So basically the right wingers want to get rid of DEI, but want to put it back in place to work only in their favor. Yeah. Um. M'kay.

When I was a kid, I called it spuhgoot. Still love spuhgoot... especially with some garlic bread and caesar salad! NOM NOM!

At the college where I teach, this Fall we're required to report any known exposure or positive covid tests. Then mask for 10 days. Students aren't required to report or mask I'm all for complying, but don't know what good this will do. Students are a far larger population than faculty/admin/mgmt!

I was Googling something for the college where I teach and for whatever reason AI decided to gleefully tell me that adjuncts at said college make between $69k-$109k a year. Thanks for the laugh, but no adjunct makes that much money unless they're working themselves to death at more than one college

It's 2am and I have a bad case of the hiccups. My mom would've called them shesaucers. I miss her and her silly little quips.

I submitted! I love this lit mag so much! Take a moment to read their current home page story by @amykdebellis.bsky.social It's pretty amazing! hexliterary.com #writingCommunity #flashFiction

Nnnnnnnndddaaannnggggg!

I'm confused about the recent Transunion breach. It happened at the end of July, but we're only just hearing about it in the last week??? So tired of the f*cking breaches. Probably should have done it long ago, but I've now frozen both my and my husband's credit with all three credit bureaus.

A mystery... Several of my shirts/blouses have some light white streaks on the back and front (on the inside AND the outside) right below the neckline...kind of where the bottom of the hanger lays against the shirt. They aren't anywhere else other than as described. Hangers are standard plastic.

This morning when I took my daughter to a class, we went a very different route because of traffic. As we passed by a mansion, my sweet girl (who never cusses or says mean things) stuck her middle finger up in the air at the house. 😆 I guess we haven't said the nicest things about rich people.

And this is the truth! When your life is centered around just trying to survive, you aren't going to look (or behave) your healthiest and at your fullest potential. Fear and stress is a killer.

"I think we're at the dawn of a new era of AI-enabled communication," Riparbelli said. "And one day, I think we'll look back at reading and writing as historical artifacts, like we do with papyrus scrolls or hieroglyphs or cave paintings." Maybe I'm just too doom and gloom? I'm not okay with this.

LOL! The sellers of the prompts likely asked ChatGPT to give them a list of prompts so that they can sell them. I don't buy for one second the people selling the prompts put any of their own thought into it. Also, clearly Etsy doesn't enforce their "no prompts" policy www.etsy.com/market/ai_pr...

Back in college, I worked at the university's police dept. I was young, naive, & it really was one of the first times I realized there are bad cops in the world. Confounding to learn they take pleasure in causing pain & humiliation. Not all cops are like this. But there are far too many that are.

One of my few indulgences is a certain coffee that used to cost $11.99 per pound. Right after the tariffs hit certain countries in August, it went up to $18.99 per pound. Thanks Obama! (yes, sarcasm)

One of my BFFs just texted me: "When I was 11 or 12 & auditioned for Annie (not having any experience or help on what to do), I didn't get in. So I have to say, [referring to my daughter who got the lead], this really heals the little part of me that didn't make it" And now I may never stop crying😭

If not for the antlers, it would look like the equivalent of a perfect cat loaf!

You guys!!! You guysssssss!!! She got Annie! I screamed for like 5 minutes when we got the cast list! And I can't stop crying!

Ugh. How can I concentrate on getting my classes ready for Monday when the cast list for Annie is supposed to come out sometime today?! I keep hitting the "Refresh" button in my email. My daughter (13) is in the running for the lead role of Annie! 🎭

I read pretty much every Substack Ellie posts, and appreciate her style of bringing all the facts together on the page so that it creates a finished puzzle. So many things I only knew various pieces, and she filled in the holes. She's a great writer!

Run, Coffee, Nap

Holy cow! I almost didn't make it. Uploaded my 487-word story with 1 minute to spare! #500WordChallenge2025 What a bitch of a genre horror is!!