Toxic Mother’s Day

When I was nine, I schemed a secret initiative I called ‘Operation Eggdrop’–breakfast in bed for my mother, planned, paid, and cooked by yours truly. It went off without a hitch–asparagus omelette, juice, and a fruit parfait. She had no idea how I pulled it off without any help and it was the best Mother’s… Read More

Historical Romance: Or, Kissing is Gross

Sweaty brows. Heaving chests. Lusty looks. Bodices testing the patience of the local seamstress. Not my bag, but I can’t blame anyone for liking what calls to them. For as far back as I can remember, Historical Fiction has been my favorite everything (movie, books, et cetera). Historical? I’m there. Not historical? What is it… Read More

A Defense of Cursive Writing

“Oh no, you write in cursive!” “What does that say?” “Can you even read that?” “I always print, who needs cursive?” “You know it’s not faster than printing, right?”   The public extols the death of cursive. News outlets like Vox tout cursive education as an example of outdated educational standards and wasteful spending. Young… Read More

Forgotten Founders

Students and fluent speakers of ASL are well acquainted with the origins of ASL–it’s as ubiquitous as George Washington and that damned apocryphal apple tree. But how often do we think of those early students who laid the foundations of Deaf culture? For the uninitiated, Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, reverend and resident of Hartford, Connecticut, met… Read More

5 Camp NaNoWriMo Stress Techniques

If you’re like me, you’ve been feeling the pinch of Camp NaNoWriMo. Yes, it’s not necessarily a 50,000 word manuscript in 30 days, and yes, it is a goal set by yourself. But is there a better way to practice writing? Setting an achievable, quantifiable goal with a hard deadline and outlining the project in… Read More

A Walk Through Salt Lake City

I’ve always been fascinated by old homes. More recently I’ve expanded this interest to how entire neighborhoods and cities evolve. Yesterday, I took a two hour walk through Salt Lake City, where I live. I was walking on a sidewalk on an overpass when I saw an old home from the 1800s, now used as… Read More