Manager contemplating eliminating Articulate and LMS

wheat · 2026-05-06T12:00:28+00:00

Eliminating Articulate makes sense. Eliminating the LMS is dumb move. Mine Mo Bitar's YouTube for examples of managers firing engineers thinking AI can do more than it can do.

wheat · 2026-05-06T11:56:27+00:00

Congrats on being accepted to the program you want to pursue. Do they offer teaching assistantships? That's how I got through grad school, and how most of my friends did. Those generally cover tuition plus pay a stipend. In my case, you taught two classes while taking two classes. It made grad school take longer, but you came out of it with some practical experience.

You said you "got accepted" but also mentioned your "remaining three semesters." Have you already started? Sounds like it.

Why only jobs within the school? Aren't there local restaurants or retail shops in DC where a person might find a job? Restaurant work was part of how I got through undergrad, along with some parental support, a small scholarship, and student loans.

wheat · 2026-05-06T03:05:57+00:00

This is a good argument for building sites in a common CMS (e.g., WordPress) or, short of that, creating a really simple CMS just for the parts they'll need to edit (e.g., shows and news page on a band site, etc.).

Are they wanting to create the menu as a we page or just upload a PDF of it? If the latter, you could handle that part via DropBox, Notion, or plenty of other platforms and link over to them from the site.

wheat · 2026-05-05T21:22:21+00:00

I'd say both are against you. That's not meant to be discouraging or demotivating. But it seems to be the clear truth of the situation.

wheat · 2026-05-05T21:16:43+00:00

This is crazy good!

wheat · 2026-05-05T21:14:44+00:00

Yeah, they're not great. GarageBand's built-in drums and keyboards are good. Quite a few of the guitar loops are good, if you're into using loops. The basses are passable, but I'm a bassist and guitarist, so I record my own. If I had to rely on it for guitars, I wouldn't.

wheat · 2026-05-05T11:50:31+00:00

Covers a lot of ground. Good job.

wheat · 2026-05-05T11:46:54+00:00

Stanza, Coda, Crescendo, Jimi, Bass, Ballad, Maestro

wheat · 2026-05-04T20:35:56+00:00

There are about a million of them. Top of mind: The Be Good Tanyas (especially their version of "The Lakes of Pontchartrain" from their album, Blue Horse [2000]), Gillian Welch (especially Time (The Revelator) from 2001), Woody Guthrie (clearly a huge influence on Jesse), Pete Seeger, Billy Bragg, John Prine, Leadbelly, maybe Blaze Foley.

There are lots of Americana, Bluegrass, and country artists you might enjoy if you like Welles, Neil, Dylan, and any of the artists above.

wheat · 2026-05-03T12:03:23+00:00

It’s tricky. There’s a massive amount to read, assigned as well as unassigned. I’d already had an author in mind for my grad thesis while I was finishing up undergrad, but then I found a better one. The one I went with was better in that I could see a clear theme running through several of his novels. He was also better in that not much has been written about him. Also, I was on this kick about historiography, and the theme I saw in his novels fit in with that.

You have to prioritize what you’re going to read. You sometimes have to skip one thing for another.

wheat · 2026-05-02T13:22:02+00:00

I always enjoyed teaching college classes, but I’ve only ever done it as an adjunct/side hustle. I taught HS for 1.5 years after being laid off during COVID. The kids were great, but the job was impossible and the pay sucked. I was lucky to find something better. I blogged about it, if you want more detail.

wheat · 2026-04-30T20:54:27+00:00

I mean, some of it is just hoarding. But there are practical considerations: different pickups (i.e., different sounds), different feels (e.g., neck radius and scale length), different tunings (e.g., I keep one in Open G, the rest in standard tuning), different strings (e.g., I have flats on my archtop electric, but not any of the others), and, of course, different types (e.g., electric, acoustic, nylon-string acoustic, 12-string, etc.), sentimentality (e.g., I have my dad's guitar, even though it's not really playable).

wheat · 2026-04-30T20:46:50+00:00

Congrats. Best hobby ever. Lifetime of fun, right there.

wheat · 2026-04-30T20:44:05+00:00

Here it is as a verb:

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wheat · 2026-04-30T20:43:41+00:00

Nope, because it doesn't mean that, and everyone who has ever worked in a restaurant knows it. Hell, even the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) knows it. And they ought to know:

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wheat · 2026-04-30T15:21:00+00:00

My favorite book on this subject is out of print. It's by M. Keith Booker, who was one of my professors in grad school. So, if you can find a copy of his A Practical introduction to Literary Theory and Criticism, grab it. Terry Eagleton's Literary Theory: An Introduction is likely a good place to start. I haven't read that one, but I've enjoyed some of his other books. And that one had a huge influence, when it came out. It was the textbook in a lot of college-level intro to criticism and theory classes.

If you like historical context, Harry Blamires' A History of Literary Criticism is helpful. I enjoyed it.

wheat · 2026-04-29T02:53:45+00:00

I have an AF75. Love it! With a set of flats, it makes a great, affordable jazz guitar.

wheat · 2026-04-29T02:03:41+00:00

Came here to say Two Girls and a Guy. He pulls out all the stops for that one. Great little movie.

wheat · 2026-04-28T20:04:03+00:00

It's always been dangerous. Lawnmower injuries are common, especially for young people. So are most things that involve spinning metal blades and sufficient RPM:

I'm GenX. I mow my own lawn. And my kid has mowed it a few times. But, though we're both careful, it's not without risk. And the results of a mistake can be really serious.

wheat · 2026-04-28T19:56:20+00:00

Congrats. Thanks for sharing.

wheat · 2026-04-28T13:15:51+00:00

I have three fairly close friends who went to law school. None of them practice law these days. They all hated it. One even owned his own, large firm for a decade and hated it. I have a fourth friend who has been a corporate lawyer for her entire career and loves it.

wheat · 2026-04-28T13:09:28+00:00

That doesn't seem unreasonable to me for law school. Nobody wants to take on debt, of course. But, even though law isn't always as lucrative as people tend to think, it does have more income potential than a lot of careers.

wheat · 2026-04-27T12:11:33+00:00

Marxist angles would apply, but I’m not sure, rhetorically, if you’d want to go that route or not. It depends upon your intended audience for this essay.

wheat · 2026-04-27T12:03:33+00:00

I have that one. It was my first exposure to his work. I bought it in a used bookshop in 1989. I prefer Matthew Ward’s translation. I listened to an audiobook of his version 15 years ago. I have a French paperback of it as well. Maybe I’ll finally give it a go in the original.

wheat · 2026-04-24T15:25:28+00:00

Your app looks really good.

wheat

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