Marie Becker

Gee maybe if he knew more about art history—or consulted with a human who did—his comparisons wouldn’t have been so shallow and unconvincing.

If the NYT told the story of the homeless teenager exploited by Matt Gaetz with even half as much empathy as it tells the story of Olivia Nuzzi, it would be in danger of committing journalism.

Just exhaustedly went through several student papers explaining the “bigger words” and “explanations” from their ChatGPT prompts didn’t actually answer any of the questions I asked in the prompt

Hitting the point in the term where I fear I've been sweet, understanding Miss Nelson for too long and need to bring some Viola Swamp energy to drag us all to the finish line.

(iykyk)

All the time—I feel like I’ve basically ruined my life trying to both work and take care of myself and succeeding at neither

The People Want To Read: On Massive Budget Cuts Proposed in Chicago If passed, Chicago Public Library will lose half their budget for acquiring new books and materials.

The People Want to Read: on the massive budget cuts proposed for Chicago Public Library. What's at stake and what you can do, whether or not you live in Chicago.

buttondown.com/wellsourced/...

I’m obsessed with them

" I thought I knew what it meant to love Chicago—to feel something settle inside of me when I saw her skyline from the expressway, or her lights from the window of an airplane, after crossing the cloud line. I thought I knew what it meant to love her brick and steel towers, her annoying street preachers, her chorus of accents and the poetry of her activists, the grit of her workers, awaiting buses and trains in icy air, her guerrilla gardens, bookshops, bucket boys, and crashing winter waves becoming shelves of ice—so many corners that feel like home, even though you’ll never live there. I know this place. I love this place, and I thought I knew how much, until you made me love it more." - Kelly Hayes

I poured everything I had into this one. "I see you gathering, hundreds at a time, to learn, to keep watch, and bare your teeth. I see you running toward danger, together, and loving each other more fiercely than you ever knew you could." organizingmythoughts.org/in-chicago-w...

What a dashing gentlecat!

YouTube video by Mary Chapin Carpenter - Topic On with the Song

This Mary Chapin Carpenter song about it also always gives me too many feels www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIVx...

A slightly lumpy pumpkin, side one of a reversible crochet piece. Pattern by Beaver Meadow Crochet.

Ah, that awkward phase: the pumpkin half inside out, with a black shape emerging. Black shape has white on the edges and a spot of green; is it an eldritch horror?? Pattern by Beaver Meadow Crochet.

Tada! It’s Shadow the Frankenkitty! The reverse of the pumpkin, a cartoony black kitty with huge green eyes, four paws with white embroidered claws, and a little white nose. She’s fine. Pattern by Beaver Meadow Crochet. (But the crooked orange stitching being visible is all me, lol)

A little crocheted cauldron I more or less improvised. Cauldron is grey with a rim; the “potion” is bright green bobble stitching.

Three crocheted pottedplants, from left to right: a purple-petaled flower with a bloodshot eyeball in the center (pattern by Tatyana Pogosova/@mrs.crowlet); a plant with three thick green stems each ending in an eyeball still “budding” and lateral tendrils (pattern by Dasha House); a striped potted plant consisting of five purple curved “monster finger” like fronds (also Dasha House). Fwiw I made some tweaks to the patterns for structural/supply reasons

Three crocheted skulls (two in cream and one bright white) each with exposed “brains.” One brain is lavender, one is a grayish green and one is half bright green and half purple. Pattern by Svitlana Hurova/@fayni_toys

The bright white skull from the previous pic with the “brains” unfolded to reveal they are granny-square-ish coasters, with a skull in the center and ruffled edges that roll up to make the brains. Pattern by Svitlana Hurova/@fayni_toys

Another skull from the previous photo. Showing the lavender edged “brain” coasters unfolded. Pattern by Svitlana Hurova/@fayni_toys

Posting my month of creepy #crochet! Pattern credits in the alt text

That paw has PLANS

My boss keeps sending us pedagogy and classroom management tips beginning with “so I asked ChatGPT.” I hate it.

Honestly, I don’t feel like I can even expect the institutions I teach at supporting me in treating this as a concern, considering the utter lack of interest in any conversation about GenAI other than how to include it as a job skill. I did get a memo about telling them not to eat in class, though

This is how I feel as a teacher and too many of my colleagues tell me I have to get over it

Living your best life?

And the added insult when they claim this is actually teaching us to self-advocate and be proactive.

Inspiring!

The one thing that gives me a little hope is when I explained this to my “writing with sources” students—an “underprepared,” marginalized non-elite population—as one of the reasons I do not incorporate genAI “skills” in their class—they got it.

I just left my old job as a writing specialist at a university for a lot of reasons, including what felt to me an uncritical approach to AI, but one of the things I know made an actual difference was when I sent individual, personal texts to students to check in.

Also, as someone who dealt with both physical and mental health issues in college and grad school, this would have made me feel creeped out and judged, not cared for.

I've worked on a heavily "data-driven" campus and a) surveillance is not the same as care, b) students can tell the difference between genuine reach-outs by a person and a bot and c) students are already inundated with so much noise this will just train them to ignore more.

Turn off AI. Pick up a crayon. Google Gemini offers “a new way to bring your imagination to life.” Adobe Firefly promises “The ultimate creative AI solution.” And Craiyon invites you to “Create AI Art.” Don't believe the tech hype.

Harold and the Purple Crayon is a manifesto for human creativity disguised as a children's book. I wrote about it.
blog.oup.com/2025/10/turn...

I quit a masters program because—after explicitly telling me there was no requirement to use GenAI tools—they kept insisting this was “democratization” and shutting down any conversation I raised about that word.

Approved!

They were human props in fascist propaganda. The state of Illinois should play no role in these theatrics, and we certainly shouldn't prosecute protesters who did nothing wrong. Let ICE spin its own BS cover story. We don't have to lend them IL courts for that.

ICE unleashed tear gas on the street in Chicago’s Logan Square today and I tried to find meaning among the fog and my own anger about, well, everything. dansinker.com/posts/202…

The Block Club Chicago newsroom continues to report on today’s federal immigration activity across Chicago.

If you have footage of agent activity you filmed, please reach out via this website:
blockclubchi.co/3IIYou4

Same for me.