#I'm going to write a text book then whack them with it | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

araekniarchive · 3 years

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If you don’t mind me asking, how do you find all these quotes and images and lyrics? You do a really good job at finding ones that fit together perfectly

Oh ty! Generally, I start a web by looking at the work of other web weavers - for example, I'm currently making a web about learning to love yourself, so I whacked 'web weaving, self love' into the tumblr search. How much there is on each one varies from topic to topic, and I've recently started running into my own previous webs doing this, but it often gives me quotes and art to look into further which might well bear fruit. I also often go into the spilled ink tag, which is used for people's original poems and artwork, again with the topic of my web attached.

Next port of call is goodreads, entirely because of the quotes function; although there is a lot of crap irrelevant stuff that comes up - mostly YA novels, fake deep quotes, misattributions - it does have a pretty solid tag function that lets me go through a large catalog very fast, and half the time it'll even tell me which book something is from. If I'm particularly stumped by a topic, I'll often go to TV Tropes which often includes a wide range of examples with quotes and sources under each specific trope, which again gives me some great leads.

All the quotes I have then generally get run through a quick check that they're legit, and not misquotes or misattributions; some I will find that are attributed to the wrong person, but I'll still include them with the correct name. Other times, I can't find a source, or the sources I find aren't definitive - e.g., if the whole internet tells me that somebody called 'Michelle B' wrote a particular quote, but there is no actual original place of 'Michelle B' writing it (and to be honest, I'm not good enough to track down such a vague citation) then there's a non-zero chance that it's a misattribution that's just been repeated so many times that the original source has disappeared, but I will likely include the name anyway, just with (attrib.) next to it, as it's better to do that than slap it with 'unknown' (imo). Sources do sometimes turn up afterward, but generally if I fail to find it on my first search, I won't happen upon it afterwards.

Then, once I'm (relatively) sure who the author of something is, and where it's from, I turn to the Internet Archive. I started using it last year when I was stuck on at home, unable to go to the uni library, and writing my dissertation. It saved my life then, but even though I graduated, I have never gone back to life without it. It's a godsend, a miracle, perhaps the greatest tool you've never heard of. It lets you read books - FOR FREE - legally, as well as listen to audiobooks, look at old web domains, search metadata... it's genuinely amazing and I tell everybody about it. For the webs, I plug in the name of the book/author and 2 out of 3 times, I can find a scanned in copy of the book, which comes with a search function. As in, I can just type in a fragment of the text I'm looking for, and the archive finds exactly which page it's on for me. I then just screenshot the page, paste it onto Paint 3D, and crop it to my desired specifications. For those sources that aren't in the archive, I usually put them into google docs, put them in a nice font and screenshot again, once more turning to my good friend Paint 3D to smarten it up.

If I know of any film or TV shows that touch on the topic, or I think it would be a good addition, I generally look on YouTube for them first (and, you guessed it, screenshot and then move to Paint 3D where I add subtitles manually if they're not already included/look ugly) and if they aren't there I branch out into streaming services and, uh, other sites. That I turn my VPN on for. If I really have no idea what scenes would be relevant, I often look for those really basic, Buzzfeed or Ranker list articles for 'The Best Doomed Romances' or 'Ten Great Sisterly Relationships on Screen' - they're generally scalped from reddit, but they do have some fairly solid recommendations which I can then investigate further. I also do this with songs - there are so many lists of song rankings around - but often you can just search lyrics in Google and they’ll pop up.

There are other steps I use depending on the specific web, but these are pretty much the ones I use every time - I use TinEye and Google Image Reverse Search when I'm trying to find the name of a piece of art or the source of an image, and this often helps me source things that other people have marked as 'unknown'. It doesn't always work, but it gives results more often than not. And, of course, there are things I add that I know about from my own memory - I really should emphasize, however, that in a web of say ten different excerpts, maybe two are ones I know about beforehand. The main process of finding stuff to put in webs is simply searching in the right places, knowing how to spot a promising lead, not giving up, even if you're on like, the fifth page of the goodreads quotes tag and you feel like banging your head against the wall (the best quote is always, always on page six) and referencing as you go.

Web weaving is something I love to do because it's broadened my literary horizons so much, it makes me better at researching, and I find it super satisfying when a web is completed, but it's not something that you can only do if you have super advanced computer programs or technical knowledge or an eidetic memory - this laptop has been on the verge of death for some time, I regularly go to my fifty-nine year old mum for troubleshooting advice, and my memory is absolutely shot to shit. All you really need to do is stick at it, and it comes together.

#asks and answers #the process #i know that sounds incredibly pretentious i do but i want to have a tag for posts about it so people can find them

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what-even-is-thiss · 7 years

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I just found out I have ADHD two days ago. What do I do? Can you give a run through on what to do, in general? I think I'm confusing you. Just explain how your life is with ADHD please

Oh man. I remember my diagnosis. I was not happy about it. Okay, I'll try to give some unprofessional advice. This got kind of long.There's a couple things that might happen. If your ADHD is moderate to extreme your doctor might strongly recommend you try meds. If it's mild like mine it'll be a choice. I chose not to take meds and instead use mental techniques and coping mechanisms which people with meds usually use anyways because they don't make all the symptoms go away.I'm just one guy with mild inattentive type (aka ADD) but I'll tell you about my day to day experience and a couple things my lil bro, a kid with moderate hyperactive inattentive type on meds goes through.First of all, doing stuff you don't wanna do is extremely difficult. My brother doesn't like reading and even with his meds it's hard for him to and I'm the same way with writing academic papers for stuff not in my major. Neurotypicals just don't get how hard it is. One thing I'd suggest doing when you need to do something you don't want to do is remove distractions. Get out of your room or wherever your stuff is. Clear off your dining table or clean up your sitting room or go to a local library and sit in a section full of books you don't like. Keep your phone in your bag or pocket and surround yourself with the material. Take breaks every twenty minutes. Really plan for it. When my brother needs to read he goes into our family room and the entire house goes quiet so he can read. When I need to write a paper I go to my university's library in an area I only go when I write papers. It's still really hard, but it becomes easier.Hyper focus is a blessing and a curse. That's the state you get into when you are 110% focused on one thing. The entire world is tuned out and all you see is that thing you're doing and time is even more distorted than usual. It's great when you're doing a project or homework or housework, but it can also happen when you're watching tv or attempting to get a particularly worrisome hangnail off your finger. It's easy to lose track of time and I've actually forgotten to eat meals and use the restroom or drink water if I stay in hyper focus too long. I've even forgotten to breathe for a few seconds. If you're doing something interesting set timers so you don't forget to go to work or eat. Also if you can find a way to trigger hyperfocus when you need to get something done, it can be very helpful. And try not to hit anybody when they snap you out of it. I've nearly hurt people before when they startled me out of it.You don't need to follow "normal" ways of getting things done. If you need a rigid schedule so strict it resembles military protocol then make one for yourself. If it's impossible for you to keep any kind of schedule then work with that. It's impossible for me to stick to anything other than a loose schedule while my brother needs a steady one or he gets lost. Every person with ADHD is different. I can't stick to a schedule. I can't stand consistency. I brush my teeth at different times. I exercise and study and sleep and write when I feel like it. The only steady thing in my life is when I need to go to classes during the school year and going to church at 11 am every Sunday. My brother is at the opposite end. He needs to wake up at the same time, eat around the same time, and study at the same time. If anything is thrown out of whack he feels like the world has come crashing down and sometimes it puts a damper on his entire day. He does spontaneous things, but there's a time and place for them. Certain times in the evenings and on the weekends.One of the most annoying things is something I've forgotten the term for but I'll explain it. See, the human brain has two states. Spaced out, when you're not really focusing on anything, and focused when you're focused. Normal humans space out, but not as often as people with ADHD, and they can usually successfully get back to focus mode. People with ADHD often are stuck in between these two states. They are unfocused and focused at the same time. That's when you pay attention to what you're reading and then realize you don't remember the last few pages of text you read. When you see someone is talking but all you see is moving lips. When you're trying with all your might to focus but you just can't and it's like you're stuck in limbo. It's even worse when you're with someone that won't let you fidget or stim. I go to church with my grandparents and even though my grandma knows fidgeting helps me she always insists I don't move. These days I don't listen but I used to and I would try with all my might to sit still but then my mind would go everywhere and nowhere and then remember nothing that happened during the church service. Fidgeting is the best way to cope with this particular problem but know you might annoy people around you and it's not always a perfect solution. Sometimes the split attention thing is just gonna happen.Memory is a problem. Oh my gosh. Write everything down and still forget. I'm particularly bad with names and lists. My brother and I are both bad at remembering what we're supposed to do if you give us more than one thing that needs to happen. Also dealing with people that follow linear thinking is frustrating. They need conversations to follow a logical pattern. A conversation between 2 neurotypicals goes from point A to point B to point C. A conversation between 2 people with ADHD goes from point A to point Z and back to point H and then stays linear for a while and then jumps to point 2F, which is a point any neurotypicals listening in didn't even know was a point to begin with. And then over to Hati or something. I'm getting distracted just writing this. Whatever happened to the earthquake relief there? Nobody talks about it anymore.Where was I? Oh yeah. My point is, the normals can get confused if you try to talk about everything your brain jumps to so be aware of that.Brain working way faster than anyone else's and way slower at the same time. I often see obvious things that aren't obvious to anyone else because my brain connected all the dots in a fraction of a second what it takes them minutes or hours to figure out but I also take hours or days to understand some simple concepts. This feature of the disorder is both useful and incredibly annoying. Surround yourself with patient people and be patient with them when explaining things in turn. That was long and I could say a lot more because my ADHD affects every aspect of my life and many aspects of the lives of those closest to me. However, as upset as I was when I was first diagnosed just knowing I have it has helped so much. Be patient with yourself. I know patience is hard for people like us, but it can take a while to learn to function and even longer to accept you don't need to function like you're a neurotypical. You still need to learn in your own special way how to make it, but you don't need to follow that pattern of thinking or be fixed. Medication is a great thing and can really help and if you feel you need it I'd highly recommend you try, but it doesn't "cure" you. There will still be problems and the disorder will still affect your life.I'm rambling. What a surprise. Good luck to you.

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