Julia Wester, PhD

done!

I reflexively reached for the mental red pen reading it that’s for sure

Gd right

I saw a suggestion elsewhere here to carry a marker to cover this crap up where you can’t easily remove it. Going to start. Maybe some good stickers too in the purse, just in case.

Went to the curry fest in Miami tonight. In a bathroom stall someone had drawn a hate symbol. I managed to get it out w/ soap. But outside ppl were trying food from all over the world, laughing & dancing together. I believe one of these will win & it’s not the one hiding in the toilet like a bitch.

Friends, the November 11-13 field research experience is full, but due to popular demand we’ve opened a second one November 20-22!

And you can also take just the online course without the field part, for course credit, CPE credit, or just for fun!

www.centerforwildlifestudies.org/courses/p/bi...

Conservation can really work.

Donate to Support a Pregnant Asylum-Seeking Mom in Central Kentucky, organized by Lauren Cagle Hi, I’m Cagle! I’m fundraising for an asylum-seeking mother… Lauren Cagle needs your support for Support a Pregnant Asylum-Seeking Mom in Central Kentucky

Y'all, I'm asking for your help with a GoFundMe I'm sponsoring.

Along with other members of my local community, I'm fundraising to support a pregnant asylum-seeking Mom and her family here in central Kentucky.

Every dollar helps, as does every share. Thank you thank you!

gofund.me/afcd1f1a

With everything going on in the world, it can be hard to remember to make time to just be a person. Joyfully learning about something new is such a fundamental part of that.

I try to encourage the undergrads in the program I run to just try stuff. The way we structure financial aid makes this tough for some and almost all of them think they are behind their peers which can really sap the joy out of the learning and exploration.

With everything going on in the world, it can be hard to remember to make time to just be a person. Joyfully learning about something new is such a fundamental part of that.

I try to encourage the undergrads in the program I run to just try stuff. The way we structure financial aid makes this tough for some and almost all of them think they are behind their peers which can really sap the joy out of the learning and exploration.

I tried to take one random/art-y class a semester when I was in undergrad and dance therapy was super fun. I also took an honors non traditional sculpture class where I made an egg-looking chair (you sat inside).

maybe I *should* get tiktok

two most talented people in TV whose careers never really took off

Just gave. Please consider helping if you can. Right now is an incredibly important time. Right now.

Okay, but, hear me out… what if new notebook AND a nice new pen?

Dudes rock

Ah yes, a classic that one

Sigh, Florida’s got enough troubles.

I try to build my Spanish vocab by reading ebooks en español, and the ability to look up and highlight words I’m learning is great but it does ruin my reflexes in this way even faster

I once caught myself “clicking” on a word in a paperback to look it up and had to hang my head in shame

Come to visit and we can go together!!

“What do you get for the man who has everything?” A large enough pile of linear algebra to drive him literally insane, I guess

WHAT FUCKIN IRB AUTHORIZED ALL THIS

I **am** overdue for my next tattoo 🤷

We see these in Miami all the time and I still don’t know what they’re called but my friends and I call it “chair-a-sailing”. I always feel like they are about to crash into a bridge or something.

Paper ACCEPTED- in time for me to mention that it's been accepted when I present on it at my conference next week.
Shiffman, D.S. and @drjuliawester.bsky.social (2025). "Scientists no longer Twitter professionally useful, and have switched to Bluesky." Integrative and Comparative Biology. 🧪 #SciComm

The academic’s mid-summer crisis is a mid-life crisis in miniature:

You realize summer is half gone, & not only that: you see that the longest & least burdened days came early, & they are well past. You compare all you thought you’d do against the days remaining & grieve for what never will be

They loved their country not for what it was, but for the hope of what it could yet become. Believed in it not for the government it had, but the government they hoped would replace it. A nation great not because it was the strongest power of the age, but openly standing against that power