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Amanda Watson

@amndw2.bsky.social

1.1K followers 570 following 1.5K posts

Librarian, literature geek, knitter, opera fan, book history person. Writing a book about commonplace books and poetry readers. Opinions here are my own. She/her/hers. Queer and furious. 🏳️‍🌈

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 15d

All right! I think I've sorted out the feed issues. Here's the link to the new and improved #pleasingterror feed for our October M.R. James ghost story reading club: bsky.app/profile/amnd...

And the reading schedule is below. Join us for some antiquarian horrors next month! 😱📖🐋🛖💐💯🪵🌰🪛🪞🚀

A Pleasing Terror - October 2025

docs.google.com

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Reposted by Amanda Watson

Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.bsky.social · 1d

aaand we are officially in the hide-your-neighbors stage

Sophie Sherry @sophiesherry.bsky.social · 2d

During a military-style raid on a building in Chicago’s South Shore, one resident heard a knock on his door.   It wasn’t the feds — it was a mom and her 7-year-old daughter, pleading for help.

He let them hide in his unit for the next 3 days.

chicago.suntimes.com/immigration/...

Neighbor shielded 7-year-old during South Shore federal raid: ‘I didn’t want them to take her’

During the Sept. 30 raid one tenant protected a terrified girl and her mom. Remnants at the complex, including a detailed map of all the units, offer clues to what authorities may have known before th...

chicago.suntimes.com

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 17h

I want psychologists to study the impact of the current regime on our executive functioning, and then -- in addition to all the criminal trials that the authoritarian fascists deserve -- I want a massive class-action lawsuit against them for the theft of our ability to focus.

Laura Jedeed @laurajedeed.bsky.social · 23h

This year, I've had so many productivity issues. Whole days lost, deadlines completely blown I've been trying to figure out what's wrong with me

Yeah, so for the last 48 hours I decided to tune out the news and concentrate on an article and surprise surprise: it was the fascism this whole time

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 18h

Quite possibly “get a poet to be your librettist” is a lesson more opera composers should take to heart!

Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 23h

That too! It feels like this story looks ahead to later weird fiction in that regard. Reminds me a bit of Robert Aickman.

Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 1d

“Oh Whistle” is maybe my favorite James story. Something about the vivid sense of place combined with the escalating series of manifestations leading up to the final reveal of the ghost, which is described so unnervingly. 😱

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 1d

I will be in book deadline mode all month but will drop in for the 🐋 shenanigans whenever I can!

Jacob Harris @jacobharr.is · 1d

Alright, the people have spoken, let’s bring THE MONTH OF DICK read-along of Moby Dick back on January 1, 2026!

We still need to work out some logistics (new feed? new emoji?), but it will happen!

But get ready! Get that fancy edition, stockpile your memes, start your whale dimensions tattoo… 🐋

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Reposted by Amanda Watson

Sarah Weinman @sarahweinman.com · 1d

A remarkable, much-needed political ad, and also read @katelynburns.com on her reaction to it: www.patreon.com/posts/you-ha...

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 1d

"Gothamist...asked Schiffmann if he’d like to join us as we spoke to passers-by about the posters and his product. But he repeatedly declined and asked that we not identify him...'I'm just tired of talking to New Yorkers,' Schiffmann said. 'It’s just such a ordeal, I just don't want to do it.'"
🤣🤣🤣

The guy behind those ‘Friend’ ads in the subways is tired of talking to New Yorkers

New Yorkers are taking note and even scribbling their own graffiti on the ads. Avi Schiffmann, 22, says that's the point — but doesn't feel like talking to them.

gothamist.com

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Reposted by Amanda Watson

NightMar on Hicks Street, Part 4: The Rabbit’s Revenge @histoftech.bsky.social · 1d

The Virginia Senate just told UVA it’s not getting state funding if it accepts the compact since UVA exists to serve Virginia, its residents, & their interests—not be a tool of the federal govt. Scoop from our student newspaper, who’ve been doing vital reporting www.cavalierdaily.com/article/2025...

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 1d

“It was, as you might suppose, a person of antiquarian pursuits who said this, but, since he merely appears in this prologue, there is no need to give his entitlements.” MRJ invented Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Film nearly a century before Monty Python? 😱

Frame from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” showing what looks like an illuminated manuscript with an illustration of “the aptly named Sir Not-Appearing-in-this-film,” with a picture of a medieval knight with a baby’s face.

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Reposted by Amanda Watson

Nikkolas Smith @4nikkolas.bsky.social · 1d

after millions of views and shares of my Portland Frog art. (thank you all🙏🏾) I got requests to highlight priests, and chickens, and Chicagoans, and T-Rexes, and more… all of us who refuse to bend the knee. so this is for US.
𝚂𝚝𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚃𝚊𝚕𝚕.
𝚆𝚎 𝚆𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚆𝚒𝚗.

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 1d

Update: the right password has been found in a list of old passwords, and it may be working now?? But not before I ran into a stupid Microsoft bug that I had to search Reddit for a workaround for.

Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 1d

I am casting a curse on the entire bloodline of the person who invented multi-factor authentication. Also the entire bloodline of everyone in charge of both Microsoft and Google.

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 1d

Current status: trying to help my mom set up a new computer. It won't let her do anything without a password for a Microsoft account she doesn't remember making. Email verification is out b/c she's mislaid her current Gmail password. Text verification is out b/c she doesn't have a cell phone. 🤬🤬🤬

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 2d

Wondering if Ari Aster read "Count Magnus," because the Swedish setting and the descriptions of the "strange and hideous" folk-art church decorations are making me think of "Midsommar." #pleasingterror

Reposted by Amanda Watson

Dan Sinykin @dan-sinnamon.bsky.social · 2d

And who is the author of this op-ed? The billionaire CEO of an asset management firm who helped author the compact.

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 2d

Befriending a murder of crows is one of my life goals.

Carl T. Bergstrom @carlbergstrom.com · Aug 20

It seems to me that the time is ripe for a Bluesky thread about how—and maybe even why—to befriend crows.

(1/n)

Beautiful crow against a black background

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Reposted by Amanda Watson

Sarah Szalavitz💡 @dearsarah.bsky.social · 3d

Rutgers Professor @mark-bray.bsky.social, who studies & writes about Antifascism,Tries to Flee to Spain After Death Threats

By the time he & his family reached the gate, their tickets were cancelled.
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/n... flagrantly & appallingly lawless. Hope he & his family are ok.

Rutgers Expert on Antifa Tries to Flee to Spain After Death Threats

www.nytimes.com

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Reposted by Amanda Watson

Lisa Fazio @lkfazio.bsky.social · 3d

"American civil society has more than enough financial and organizational muscle to stop this authoritarian offensive. But it requires collective resolve. And it requires leadership, which has been in painfully short supply."

www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...

Harvard Must Take a Stand Against Trump’s Compact | Opinion | The Harvard Crimson

Harvard, rather than quietly pursuing its own appeasement strategy, should lead the way to preserve academic freedom and democracy.

www.thecrimson.com

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 3d

Still love the delightful weirdness of the protagonist composing impromptu poetry in his hotel room in the style of the heroine of The Mysteries of Udolpho. And the ghost inexplicably dancing: "a gaunt leg was kicked up with surprising agility." 😱

Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 3d

I think maybe James was still working out how much explanation to give his readers. He wrote this story a few years before "Oh Whistle," which to my mind is especially terrifying because the ghost isn't really explained at all. 😱

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 3d

On rereading, I think "Number 13" is one of James's odder stories. There are gestures at a backstory for the disappearing and reappearing room, but it feels simultaneously like too much explanation and too little (and they found...a manuscript no one can decipher!). 😱

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Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 3d

This saga continues to renew my faith in humanity.

Ars Technica @arstechnica.com · 4d

Based on the scale of the vandalism, it's clear that many New Yorkers are not on board with the concept of a wearable AI pendant.

Vandals deface ads for AI necklaces that listen to all your conversations

Critics attacked subway ads to defend human friends and broadly criticize AI.

arstechnica.com

Amanda Watson @amndw2.bsky.social · 4d

Hooray! Ordering it for our library collection!

Reposted by Amanda Watson

Randi Weingarten 🖇️📚✊🇺🇸 @rweingarten.bsky.social · 4d

Thank you @TimothySnyder.bsky.social for joining @AFT.org & @AAUP.org in calling on university leaders, faculty, staff and students to reject Trump's proposed compact and to defend the principle that no president has the right to buy obedience or sell off freedom. snyder.substack.com/p/save-ameri...

Save American Higher Education (video)

A petition that you can sign, which I read aloud

snyder.substack.com

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