a grey cat checking out my pink and green roller skates.

today i wrote 6000 words (very few of which probably made any sense) and then taught the neighbourhood cat about roller skates

supporting local businesses (my library's coffee machine)

do i want to study english at oxford? good question… (jk i love my degree but finals are indeed killing me)

A bookmark aimed at 17-year-olds that asks, “Do you want to study English at Oxford?”

silver linings: the more i am destroyed by exam stress, the funnier this bookmark becomes for me

372 pages into a book that’s over 1,000 pages long, you are at liberty, you have read an entire book worth of book and whatever comes next is a galactic void of radical freedom

(can’t believe this is my final time going through this bizarre and agonising ritual before finishing my degree wtf)

every time i need to move accom i procrastinate by scrolling through all my tiktok reposts and making myself really sad about enjoltaire… like guyssss they died holding handssss

i do love micromobility, but i hate how often i think i see someone skateboarding, only to get closer and see they're just on an e-scooter, which is way less fun and cool :(

currently rereading Fantomina, which is somehow even more unhinged than i'd remembered it being

and when i say “socks”, i really mean “nearly every single item of clothing i own bc it’s been so long since i’ve had time to just mindlessly sew all day”

revision is affecting my wellbeing so intensely that i’m currently daydreaming about all the socks i’ll have time to darn when exams are over 💭🧦🪡😌

I just registered AND YOU SHOULD TOO!! Excited to be talking about my diss research on Thomas Bakewell (and Robert Bloomfield and Robert Burns)

Just checked and this is real - Scottish Labour’s manifesto refers to trans people using slurs and commits to a policy of explicit segregation in public life

flapjack, a tabby cat with the same grumpy face as biscuit, standing in a tree and staring at me with very wide eyes.

flapjack sitting on a bench on a sunny day where i am working on my laptop.

flapjack in my bedroom, lying on my tiny sofa, which is covered in a yellow blanket, 2 cat cushions, and 2 cat cuddly toys.

flapjack fast asleep, stretched out super long on my rug.

there are actually two college cats and i love both of them dearly, but biscuit is much more attached to me than flapjack. biscuit will follow me around anywhere; flapjack will just about tolerate my presence.

biscuit, a fluffy ginger cat, sitting in a patch of grass, struggling to stay awake.

biscuit in the college library, looking up at the shelves of books.

biscuit lying on the floor outside whilst i read johnson’s lives of the poets.

biscuit lying on my lap whilst i read don juan.

as excited as i am for my exams to be over, i can’t believe i only have a couple months left with my bff, biscuit (the college cat) 😢😢😢

(just to reassure my devoted bluesky followers... i am indeed maintaining a work-life balance, mostly by binge-reading everything alison bechdel has ever written)

last night i skated to devotions upon emergent occasions by john donne… hashtag the grind never stops

recently realised that i can exercise without taking a break from revision if i just listen to an audiobook… i am sure corrupting my hobbies with work will have no negative consequences for my mental health

Fluffy grey cat sitting on a chair. He is vastly too big.

Either this is a very small chair, or we have a problem

Day 3 of 3 at the BPM tying up loose ends

Famously the Bell Poems only sold 2 copies in their first year BUT I didn’t realise Charlotte ‘with characteristic boldness’* ordered 1000 copies to be printed, when it’d be more usual to print 250 & eg Matthew Arnold was restricted to 500

* G D Hargreaves

going to the library to spend 5 hours drinking their £1 coffee (and maybe doing some revision whilst i’m there)

currently studying using the lesbian pomodoro method, where i do an hour of flashcards and then read a couple pages of dykes to watch out for 👍

the sequel to this: currently at a cafe and was just approached by a lovely elderly man who said “how wonderful. you’re a green woman and i’m a green man (although i’m not wearing any green right now). i can’t wait for the day women rule the world. men have fucked it up.”

i think the term "ai slop" is brilliant, but i do worry that it has contaminated the beauty of the term "vegan slop", which has been my favourite food group since i was 14 years old

WE NEED YOU!

Would you like to write an article for the BARS Blog? We've got some ideas for April below! If you'd like to write a blog on one of these subjects, please do get in touch!

Alternatively, if you'd like to pitch your own idea, don't be afraid to drop us a message!!

was at the gay bar the other night and someone came up to me, complimented me on how much green i was wearing, and asked when i was diagnosed with autism

if i was one year older!! </3

Fully-funded three-year PhD Scholarship: Living with Print in the Eighteenth Century

Based at @sydney.edu.au (with Nicola Parsons) and @glasgow.ac.uk (with me), working with collections in Australia and Scotland.

Deadline April 21st - please circulate!

www.gla.ac.uk/scholarships...

Photo of a white and light ginger, medium haired, tabby kitten, looking down at a miniature typewriter and raising one paw as if about to smack it. He’s standing on brown carpeting in a living room setting.

Suddenly feeling terrible that I’ve never given my cats a tiny typewriter. Photo from my collection, 1966.

A reminder that the deadline for Expressions of Interest in hosting BARS 2028 is coming up - if you're potentially interested, but have questions or concerns, please feel free to drop me an email. It's a big responsibility, but a very rewarding one, and crucial for the health of the Association.