📰 weekly reporter 11.16-12.06

[zoomieyo]

📰 weekly reporter

vol 35 week of 11/16-12/06

r.e.p.o.r.t.e.r — media recap — editors recap—

— reflecting

on Friday, I texted myself this: "everyday I'm hungry for something to consume. I need to make something to feed myself...." in times where I'm not writing or creating, I find myself with this itch I can't scratch. a desire to sink into something.. I look for blogs or articles to read, for a video to watch, something to satiate that hunger for Something. I sit with it for a while, flipping idly between social media, my reading page, for anything that I can really devote and dive into... but eventually I realize it's a need to create something, to be fully engaged with my own work and inner flow state. that need to find and figure out how the pieces fit together.
I guess there's the concept of filling the well (I believe from the artists way?) and/or filling your own cup. I'm at the point now, where I need to make things, not consume things. that's what that hunger is. I think I've talked about it before in reporter?

— enjoying

within the last two weeks I went on vacation! we went on a carnival cruise out of new orleans. our itinerary was 2 sea days, celebration key, half moon cay, nassau and then 2 more sea days before we came home. my goals for the cruise were to 1. learn how to stand up paddle board and 2. stay drinking. I achieved both goals! at celebration key and half moon cay, I was able to rent a paddleboard and I only fell off the board 3 times (twice on the first day, once on the second). I was able to stand up and just kind of float along... so the next goal is to actually paddle about without losing my balance. I didn't think to go on my knees before standing up- I started seated (like in a kayak) and then went into a low squat before tentatively standing up. it was fun! when the weather gets warmer, I will try to paddleboard locally so I can get better.
I don't drink or go out a lot in regular life... so on the boat I like to indulge a bit. I start the day with mimosas at breakfast, then I day drank tropical mules (a new discovery to me!), and then moved into fufu vodka martinis starting at dinner and into the evening at the nightclub. I did a lot of shots, and had a blast dancing in the nightclub. I did not gamble this time, but made friends with some people who played a lot of blackjack. maybe in the future I'll try my hand at the blackjack tables...
I didn't get a lot of sun; I was good about putting on my sunscreen, and wore hats to cover my face. on past cruises, I've always had to deal with sunburns and they seriously ruin the cute outfits I put together. I want to plan another cruise already... I seriously love the cruise life T_T

— playing

soooooo that new sylus companion huh.... I went to use up my free pulls for his banner and got one of his cards so. now I'm suckered into unlocking his companion. it came home in my first 10 pull... why cant xavier or zayne be like that huh.....
other than that.... prepping for finals has been eating up my gaming time. I did do trivia on thursday and we won first place!!! this win was preceded by doughboy by jvb playing as one of the timer songs to which I "entered a trance that [I] couldn't be pulled out of." so my friends had a laugh at me while I sang and danced to jvb as they deliberated on whether to wager all 20 points or not. I truly!!!! did not expect to hear JVB in the wild like that, much less DOUGHBOY of all songs.

— obsessing

obsessing has been a little closer to ruminating this week. mostly finals prep and..... law school application stuff. before I left for vacation, I was looking at classes for next year and couldn't decide between two classes.. and then I got into a rabbit hole of potential concentrations and cross applying credits towards a master of science... but then I thought.. how can I also take another pottery class because I miss being in the studio.... so then it's juggling which classes on what days... so I set aside all those worries for after vacation, and now well.... its after vacation sooooo time to make some decisions.

— recommending

when I first started reporter, I wanted recommending to be similar to the link letters that casey johnston of shes a beast does. and today is the day I can finally do something similar!! (yay!)
I realized that sometimes I skim a lot of articles like game reviews, paper recommendations, video game merch highlights, health notes, science papers, and other misc things. I skim until I find whatever piqued my interest and close out of the tab. what this means is that I don't ever save them to reference in reporter... which makes me think I'm not reading (arguably I'm not, since I'm skimming) but I'm just not saving what I read. this is related to an idea I want to explore a little bit in encountering.
more recommendations: starting from nix newsletters (1) and (2); more henrik: (1), (2), (3); note to self to check out david perell (how I write podcast) and leave spotify; also cool layout on this site

— treating

my favorite meals from the cruise were the two steakhouse nights we did: a filet mignon and then a huge ribeye; the thanksgiving day meal I had: spinach and ricotta ravioli and a delicious pork tenderloin; and the spaghetti carbonara in the main dining room. drink highlights were the tropical mule and the strawberry lemon drop martini. celebration key's mingos had a frozen strawberry drink that was super yummy too.
mom and dad went to one of our favorite bakeries and got my a couple brownies this weekend too ^_^

— encountering

was thinking about earlier this week how I'm so lucky to be able to learn, and all the opportunities to learn that are around me. I skimmed all those articles earlier this week and was just inspired and awestruck about how much information I have access to, if I choose to pursue it. I always want to do so much, I feel like I don't have enough time to learn it all. which is the wrong way to think about it, see donkey.
it's been on my mind since I finished hell yeah or no and started anything you want. combined with the new year excitement of goal setting and wanting to do so much... already I have ideas for things I want to research and write about... taking the time to actually follow through on ideas...

— restoring

came back from beautiful tropical weather in the Caribbean to cold and dreary overcast weather which I think caused me to have some congestion/head cold thing. so I've been taking a lot of naps and trying to get back onto the zinc/magnesium/vitamin c supplement routine. we also took it easy on getting back into the gym this week.

🎄 18 days until christmas 🎆 25 days until new years

media recap

📚 reading: before my trip I finished hell yeah or no at the gym and followed it up by starting anything you want. those have been on pause while I was on the boat, where I finished volume one of coins of destiny which is the first danmei I ever read! I read the fan translation based on someones recommendation on twitter, so I was glad when it got an official translation. I hold liu yao sooo close to my heart bc it was my first and it was my introduction to priest's amazing work.
also did some random dives into the demon slayer and my hero academia wikis as procrastination the other night......
📺 watching: I haven't been watching much except a couple gaming lets plays....
🎵 listening: spotify wrapped and youtube wrapped will probably get a separate post as part of a year end retrospective thing I want to do but my new workout playlist is starting to come together.
also had beneath the mask-rain, instrumental stuck in my head as I started writing reporter tonight
🎮 playing: a touch of lads... thinking about getting back into playing on my switch....

📥 editors recap

writing recap first. kinda wanted to flip the structure like I have in the past, but sometimes I think reporter looks a little weird at the bottom. anyway. WOWWWWWW there's so much to catch up on!! I meant to get reporter out on the 30th but on the drive home from the cruise I pretty much ended up sleeping the whole way.... I didn't wanna publish in the middle of the week.. and was finals prep week... so. long time nooooo writing at all. also was anyone gonna correct me on the header. why did I leave "week of october [date]" for pretty much the whole month of november -_-
I'm going to challenge myself this week to get more writing out!!!!! I have some ideas I want to work on... maybe I'll do my own mini 1000.... the next isn't scheduled until january...

---

I think this has the most links of any reporter. I've gotten into the habit of texting myself things during the week: articles, ideas, writing snippets so I can remember them for reporter. with basically a 3 week backlog it's no surprise LOL.
for whatever reason, my spacebar is acting up a little and I've found that the post writing, link adding editing has been a lot of fun today. I also got the random idea to somehow include a word count in the layout.. I need to get that template base number again. I'm at 3,444 words right now. I think it's like ~650 ish in the template? reporter has just been super fun tonight :)

▸ continued on page 2

weekly reporter vol 35 | Page 1

on writing — current musings — dating and modeling — stats report — cultivation, curation, creation —

🖉 on writing

interesting article on is substack still a space for writers and readers. before I started writing reporter here, I was planning to write in public pursuit which was built around the three ideas I have below: cultivation, curation, and creation... I also had potentiality which was from a weekly check in project I was doing with a former friend. I didn't end up doing anything with either of them because I got cold feet, and never hit publish on anything I wrote. the drafts are documented here on dreamwidth. I had made a couple collages for one of the entries, and I remember working on the icons so they would be memorable. you can also see the zoomieyo through-line... ultimately I'm happier here- I like the relative obscurity of using dreamwidth as opposed to writing on a larger platform like substack. when I joined substack was a little more obscure than it is now, but I overwhelmed myself by subscribing to too many blogs that I don't really care to keep up with nor donate money too. there's some I do need to subscribe to: henrik's escaping flatland, which I reference often, and a handful of others..
on thursday I was doing some journaling before trivia and wrote:

"I'm drafting goals for the new year. I have them tagged as what bucket they fall under. and I come upon(tag it as?) 'writing' (in regards to reporter) and its like. what is writing? its more than just writing. lifes work? purpose? passion? idk how to describe it."

followed by the note

"does this go in on writing or reporter body"

so clearly it goes here.. anyway. I think this is related to the ideas I talked about in encountering.. I have two or three essays I want to write.. one about the effects of caffeine, another about intentional learning... there's still that series of essays on coolness I want to write... I want to keep pushing the boundaries of my writing, keep pushing my own abilities and skills too.. I had some other direct I was gonna go with this, but I got a little caught up in the substack chatter above and I kinda forgot where I was going with the life purpose stuff.
it's probably related to drafting out goals, but I think it needs a separate post truthfully. there's like 2-4 more things I wanna reference in regards to goal setting, life direction, and such... see... more things to write! how fun!!! other interesting substacks on writing fast and writing personal essays

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💭 current musings: journal changes

the hobonichi weeks (jan start) actually is a december start but I have yet to move over... I've been watching some really interesting journaling videos, and people on instagram are posting their cover decos. ngl I'm a little jealous I'm behind (I'm not) I just haven't gotten my 2026 plan together to be able to move... I really wanna utilize my hobonichi more this year, both as an art form and a planner.... I also have the avecs, but they don't start till january GYAHHH

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👛 dating and modeling

mostly modeling for this go around. I love dressing up for the boat!! I unfortunately did not document that many outfits, but trust that they were truly beautiful. I also rocked some cute swimsuits in the surfer girl cutie style, and I bought a short sleeve wetsuit. it was on sale and SO CUTE!!!!!
other outfit highlights include the cozy girls night sweatpants and sweatshirt with fuzzy socks outfit. for trivia, I wore a black turtleneck that has some lacing on the side with my timberlands and a bunch of jewelry that everyone really loved. A. keeps telling me to go with the straight across bangs style so I need to schedule a bang trim because they're too long for me.
in future, I think I wanna make this artist date recaps and more fashion talk like today ^_^ I've decided dating is not a priority to me, but I'm open to it for the right person...

📊 stats report

— last weeks goals
☑ workout playlist
☑ homework
☑ drink more water

— 3 goals for the upcoming week
☐ finals!
☐ register for spring & law school application
☐ creatine & bcaa protocol.....
bonus! mini 1000 blogmas ?

curation
ideas revolving around documentation.... which is inherently curation in that I'm intentionally putting things into a collection... I think I need to revisit the old values and intentions I wrote a couple years ago, and the goals I wrote up this year... hmmm. blogging... vlogging? streaming? I've been itching to do something with video lately.

creation
been wanting to get back into pottery after seeing A.'s most recent haul. I love when we hang out and we get ideas for things and immediately go "I could make that" instead of buying it. I wanna make stuff!!! I miss making stuff!!!!
additionally, I want to use more kaomojis....

cultivation
"the process of trying to develop a quality or skill"
what do I want to grow or develop in the next year... I've been thinking about the many areas I want to work on... fitness, work, school, passions, writing.... hm hm. food for thought keeps bubbling up as I work on this... but where is the food for thought?
I want to cultivate some discipline and cultivate the skills to keep my room clean too -_-

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weekly reporter vol 35 | Page 2