CJ the Awkward

@awkwardleftycj.bsky.social

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Ballet teacher, Jesus-follower, general nerd. Love my enby spouse. Highly pretentious, but only toward people who suck. Follow me for brief rants about bad writing as I consume way more romance novels than anyone ever should. she/her

Posts Replies Media

I don't know if there are any *good* arguments in favor of monarchy, but "all heads of state are expensive" combined with "well Cromwell was a bust" have to be among the worst conceivable, right?

NY Times: is felon the new sexy?

I will never understand how a real human in the 21st century can be a monarchist.

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Just saved a friend $500 by referring her to this program; please refer to it if you get prescribed Paxlovid and get quoted a crazy price! www.paxlovid.com/paxcess?cmp=...

PAXCESS™ | PAXLOVID™ (nirmatrelvir tablets; ritonavir tablets)www.paxlovid.com The PAXCESS™ Patient Support Program may help eligible patients lower the cost of PAXLOVID™ and access savings, with or without insurance. T&Cs apply.

Ugh, I hate it when romances insert a sympathetic best friend character who’s been quietly pinning for the MC but is never going to get together with them into the story. I’m always going to want to root for that character, and it makes it harder for me to enjoy the story.

Have you ever read a book that was so good you were almost scared to read any othe the author’s other works, in case they didn’t hold up? That’s been me with the Virtues and Villains series by A. K. Caggiano, which is a MUST read if you like fantasy, like at all. +

The best Disney romance is Bernard and Bianca from The Rescuers. You know I’m right.

#WritingTip: if your blurb makes your novel sound like a romcom, I’m going to expect it to be funny, or at least fun to read. Dark romance or whatever don’t have to always be serious. Any on that note, I’m off to read something by A. K. Caggiano.

Time to take a break from mafia shit and go back to fairy tale retellings - which, if you think about it, are pretty much the same thing.

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Trans rights (bodily autonomy, freedom from harassment and assault, etc) ARE women's rights. Gender identity is nobody's damn business especially not that of the rightwing media and especially especially not that of the BBC which by this point is basically GB News but we have to subsidise it.

What are the parties saying about women's rights and gender identity?

What are the parties saying about women's rights and gender identity?www.bbc.com Party leaders have been asked about where they stand on the topic of single-sex spaces.

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Periodic reminder: What you see on social media is an algorithm-curated echo chamber. Those who shout loudest typically get amplified the most, regardless of whether they’re right. The real work takes place offline. If you’re getting stressed out by today, take a break, focus on what you can do.

Better ways to spend your time than watching the debate: what’s yours? I personally read a poorly-edited, forgettable mafia romance novel whose name I don’t even remember.

I just avoided the entire thing & played a video game. Dad watched it though & yelled through the entire thing.

Brief writing rant: if your book contains numerous grammatical and syntactic errors, but then you go out of your way to avoid ending a sentence of *dialogue* with a proposition, that actually makes me hate you more. #WritingTip

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I hope some of the most well-funded defense attorneys in the state come and stand outside the courthouse for the duration of the trial insisting that they're waiting for more information before they go in to help him.

NEW: Former Uvalde (Texas) schools police chief Pete Arredondo has been indicted on child-endangerment charges

Former school police chief indicted in Robb Elementary massacrewww.expressnews.com Pedro 'Pete' Arredondo and a former school police officer were charged with child endangerment by a Uvalde County grand jury.

#WritingTip: semicolons. Learn what they are and use them.

Humanity was a mistake.

Do you want a Terminator? Because this is how we get Terminators!

Faces made of living skin make robots smilewww.bbc.com Scientists find a way to attach living skin to robot faces for more realistic smiles and expressions.

Can I get KU to stop recommending me a book in the “continue series you’ve started” feed? Geez, you accidentally read one omegaverse story and they just will not let it go. #booksky #romancelandia

I’m reading way too many mafia romance novels lately. I blame this on the appalling lack of good pirate romance novels published these days. #romancelandia

#WritingTip: if you’re going to write a dual-POV story, actually do it. Give each character roughly equal time in the driver’s seat so we can empathize and root for both of them. Writing a book that’s 80% one character’s POV and only 20% the other’s feels like a cop-out somehow.

The annoying thing about mafia romance novels is they all have the most forgettable titles. It’s always “adjective noun” and said adjective-noun phrase is only tangentially related to the plot of the book, so when you want to reference it later you have no idea what the crap it’s called.

White Collar Monk Person of Interest, but only like the first 2 seasons Community Firefly Doctor Who STAR trek: Voyager Star Trek: TNG Recess Does David Suchet’s Poirot count?

Get to know me by 10 TV series Northern Exposure The X-Files Buffy the Vampire Slayer Hannibal What We Do In the Shadows Sports Night Alone The Bear Crazy Ex-Girlfriend The Simpsons

#WritingTip: if your romantic hero is going to whisper lines from Shakespeare into the heroine’s ear, don’t make it Romeo and Juliet. Make it Much Ado About Nothing. It’s more witty, and everyone lives at the end.

My cancellable opinion is that it’s okay to like some things which are objectively bad, like mafia romance novels or Taco Bell.

#WritingTip: after you finish a manuscript, do a ctrl+f for “there is/there was” and rewrite any sentences or clauses to leave out that phrase. Then ctrl+f for “that” because you can eliminate it a good 80% of the time and lose nothing.

So I just got a campaign mailer from some guy running for a legislative position in my district, and I'm pretty pissed about it. He's your typical "they're coming for your children!" chuds and so the front of the mailer was a big picture of some kids at a drag queen story hour at the library. +

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Donald Sutherland at occupy Vancouver. RIP to the legend.

Brief English rant: the idiom is “another think coming,” not “another thing coming” (as in, if you think A, think again). But “another think coming” also sounds ridiculous so can we just trash the phrase entirely?

Just realized I’ve known some of my online friends for 20 years, which is more than half my life. What the hell.

If you're gen x or millennial, odds are you have known some people online for *decades*. Across multiple now-dead forums, across vast gulfs of time in internet years. You've probably got a friend group that outlived multiple sites.

Romance authors really overestimate the amount of nonchalant leaning against door frames/walls/cars/etc. men do.

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Pwnallthethings

Yo dawg I heard you hate graven images so I made you a graven image of that time you said no graven images