iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

Archived the relevant emails from my Liverpool account before it gets shut down. Sent Chris my admin angel a final thank you for almost 9 years of impossible queries. Somehow it all feels like years ago already, but my (second) viva was in March?? Time is weird. Did it though. Dr Cat now, innit.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

Oh look, it’s me in post-neurovascular surgery recovery mode! Lounging and eating 😺 Another brilliant art print from @tokyosexwhale.bsky.social, signing up for the meow print club was one of the best decisions I made this year 🐾 #CatArt #ToeBeans #PostOp

Printed drawing of a white, grey and ginger cat, lounging on an orange cushion with its belly exposed and massive saucer pupils. It has pink toe beans visible on its back feet, a stripy tail and a pink heart-shaped nose. Next to it is an empty (EMPTY!!!) food bowl and a grey fish, with a textured red background within a black and white frame. White framed Japanese characters are in the top left corner, which I think read “Tokyo Sex Whale”… The A5 printed image is on my usual turquoise textured yoga mat background

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Reposted by Dr Cat Crossley

Alicia Spencer-Hall @aspencerhall.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

OK set up a feed for #IMC2026 for easy following along #MedievalSky 🗃️ @imc-leeds.bsky.social bsky.app/profile/did:...

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Right, postdoc application bits getting done today. Updated my CV to include all the Leeds etc papers I’ve given since 2017. And this is why I hold onto the physical things, as an external memory system! Genuinely forgot about the mini mappamundi paper… Is that enough? Can I go outside now pls?

A variety of Leeds IMC programmes, with another conference pamphlet and the handout from one of my Leeds papers, arranged in a fan shape on my turquoise bedding. My computer keyboard, black trousers and the post doc job description are also found around the frame

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

I do love to get my post on a Saturday and have it be from @tokyosexwhale.bsky.social Latest print is here! I have the sticker version as well which lives on the back of my phone 😺 #CatArt #ToeBeans #bumhole

Photo of @tokyosexwhale.bsky.social’s latest cat print, depicting a tuxedo kitty on a grey-green background, walking away from the viewer. The cat is looking back over its shoulder with big yellow eyes, the toe beans are visible on the back left paw, and the cat’s bum hole is prominently displayed 😹

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

Okay Super Furries were so good last night I’m seriously considering going again. It might be the last time I get to see them live! But even if I go twice I still have spare tickets so I’m bumping this again here (and on IG, and fbook…) #SFAOK #GigTickets #LastCall

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 14/05/2026

I get basically zero engagement on here so this really is a shot in the dark, but I’ve got up to 4 tickets to see Super Furry Animals in Llandudno tomorrow night (Friday 15th May) and they really want a good home. Gimme a shout if interested! #SFAOK #GigTickets #Llandudno #SuperFurryAnimals

Blue-green faded colour background with white text reading:

SFA OK!!

Wales’ best ever band are back on tour for the first time in years and I have spare tickets for Friday. Someone out there surely wants them so spread the word!!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

Realised that this animal encounter, and the previous one (red squirrel) in the same tree, both happened on days I was listening to Guerrilla, by Super Furry Animals 😺

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

Bloody hell guys, just had a VERY close encounter with an owl 🦉?!? I was sitting in my oak tree, it was being chased through the woods by two blackbirds. It flew up and landed on a branch A FOOT AWAY FROM MY FACE before it saw me and, with a start, flew off again. Dunno who looked more surprised!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

🚨New cat friend klaxon!🚨 Okay I may have met them before, they live nearby, but I’m sure they’ve not been properly friendly with me…until now!! They have a big fluffy grey tail, not pictured, and a cute tiny meow, not recorded. But trust me, this is an excellent cat 😺 @thecatreviewer.bsky.social

Photo of a white and grey fluffy cat giving my hand a little sniff before she decides if I’m friendly or not…

Photo of the same white and grey fluffy cat – whose cute pink nose and long white whiskers you can now clearly see – happily accepting ear scritches, as she now knows I’m a friend of all cats.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 14/04/2026

It’s that day again! Happy Avril 14th to all who celebrate… www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxTd...

youtube.com

Avril 14th

YouTube video by Aphex Twin - Topic

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

*deliberately mishearing Chappell Roan lyrics so they’re about bees* “🎶…Baby do you like this bee? 🐝 It’s made to waggle dance with me I’ve got a 199 more bees 🐝🐝🐝 🐝🐝 I’ve got 200 bees, 🐝 🐝🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝🐝🐝 🐝🐝 🐝 🐝🐝 🐝🐝yeh 200 bees 🐝 🐝🐝🐝 🐝🐝 🐝🐝 🐝🐝 🐝🐝 🐝 🐝🐝🐝🐝 🐝 🐝🐝🐝 🐝🐝…🎶”

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 05/04/2026

Another of the interesting pieces my old uni friend Peter Jones has done to promote his new book, now in the Guardian! I’ve been reading more of “Self-Help From the Middle Ages” today and really enjoying it, learning much about Pride, Envy, Peter (and myself?!) in the process. Anger is up next!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

Okay I’ve just finished the intro and I think this is going to be an excellent read. It reads just like Pete speaking and he’s already compared the four centuries from 1100-1500 to Beatles albums, which is very on brand for him 😹 Buy this book everyone, it’s not just for the #MedievalSky crew!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

On my way home from a flying trip to London to attend my old uni pal Peter’s debut book launch. Lovely event at Daunt Books, great speech from the main man from the balcony, and great to see so many ex-Bristolians in the room — sorry I had to dash off! #medieval #SelfHelp #book

Photo of a book by Peter Jones called Self-Help From the Middle Ages: A Journey into the Medieval Mind

The book cover is white with shiny gold lettering, and features a medieval manuscript illumination-style illustration of a writer at a desk, spilling red wine upon themselves as they check their phone and work at their laptop.

Two quotes on the cover read:

‘A lovely book’
Peter Frankopan

‘One of the most compelling medieval history books I have ever read’
Ian Mortimer

Available now from all good bookshops!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 30/03/2026

This month’s cat print arrived this morning, another brilliant piece from @tokyosexwhale.bsky.social I think I need to put the chonky cat sticker where everyone is going to see, it makes me very happy and I want to spread the joy 😺 #Cats #CatArt #Chonk

Photo of a print image of a white and black cat with a grey nose and yellow eyes, sat on a shelf with its head tilted quizzically. It has a grey (toy?) mouse hanging from its mouth by its tail. The picture has an orange background, white and black frame, and yellow Japanese characters in the top-right corner. I am holding the print in my left hand, and also a sticker of a very happy looking chonky orange and white cat with a speech bubble saying “chonk!”

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 30/03/2026

Been seeing quite a few bumblequeens browsing the ground lately, I told my mum this info but had no idea how it got in my head. May have been @thebeeguy.bsky.social last year!

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Reposted by Dr Cat Crossley

Clare Downham @downham.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

Many Congrats to @catscreatechaos.bsky.social on passing your Liverpool PhD viva today with no corrections “Mappaemundi, illuminated manuscripts and a lost map model: making sense of the multiple representations of monstrous men in the encyclopaediac ecosystem of the later 13th century” #medievalsky

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

Yes so after the most minor of minor corrections (fuck knows how, but I won’t complain!) I’m going to be Dr Crossley! Bloody hell, took a while to get here but I am absolutely delighted 😺 Thanks to everyone that helped me to stubbornly keep going on this PhD until I finally got it. What a ride…

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

Right then, today it’s time for Viva 2: The Resubmission! I’ve reread my thesis and cleaned my trainers, and I’m going to be wearing a CARDIGAN rather than a hoodie. Not really sure what else I could do to prepare :) Wish me luck!

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Reposted by Dr Cat Crossley

Nat Guest @unfortunatalie.bsky.social · 17/03/2026

A friend just sent me this perfect piece by Karel Čapek, trans. Dora Round, ‘From the Point of View of a Cat’.

From the Point of View of a Cat
This is my Man. I am not afraid of him. He is very strong, for he eats a great deal; he is an Eater of All Things. What are you eating? Give me some!
He is not beautiful, for he has no fur. Not having enough saliva, he has to wash himself with water. He meows in a harsh voice and a great deal more than necessary. Sometimes in his sleep he purrs.
Let me out!
I don’t know how he has made himself Master; perhaps he has eaten something sublime.
He keeps my rooms clean for me.
In his paws he carries a sharp black claw and he scratches with it on white sheets of paper. That is the only game he plays. He sleeps at night instead of by day, he cannot see in the dark, he has no pleasures. He never thinks of blood, never dreams of hunting or fighting; he never sings songs of love.
Often at night when I can hear mysterious and magic voices, when I can see that the darkness is all alive, he sits at the table with his head bent and goes on and on, scratching with his black claw on the white papers. Don’t imagine that I am at all interested in you. I am only listening to the soft whispering of your claw. Sometimes the whispering is silent, the poor dull head does not know how to go on playing, and then I am sorry for him and I meow softly in sweet and sharp discord. Then my Man picks me up and buries his hot face in my fur. At those times he divines for an instant a glimpse of a higher life, and he sighs with happiness and purrs something which can almost be understood.
But don’t think that I am at all interested in you. You have warmed me, and now I will go out again and listen to the dark voices.
Translated by Dora Round; revised by the editor. Originally published in Intimate Things, 1935.

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Reposted by Dr Cat Crossley

Alicia Spencer-Hall @aspencerhall.bsky.social · 17/03/2026

Come to Aberystwyth & do some medieval gender! Still plenty of time to get your abstracts in 👉 Gender in Medieval Insular Literature Symposium 📍 Prifysgol Aberystwyth University 🗓️ 29-30 May, 2026 ⏱️ Abstracts due 6 April wp-research.aber.ac.uk/medievalgend... #CfP #MedievalGender 🗃️

Gender in Medieval Insular Literature Symposium

Friday 29th and Saturday 30th May, 2026

Tŷ Trafod Visualisation Centre

Prifysgol Aberystwyth University

(CFP Cymraeg isod)

The Department of Welsh and Celtic Studies at Aberystwyth University invites you to join us for a symposium on Gender in Medieval Insular Literature, on 29 and 30 May, 2026,
in Aberystwyth and online.

We invite proposals for papers of 20 minutes on any aspect of gender and sexuality in the medieval literature of Britain and Ireland, inclusive of Celtic languages, English, Latin and Anglo-Norman. We especially welcome queer and trans theoretical perspectives, PhD students, and early career scholars.

Please submit abstracts of no more than 300 words (plus short speaker bio) to Dr Kit Kapphahn at krk14@aber.ac.uk by 6 April 2026. Please include ‘Symposium Submission’ in the subject of your email. indicate in your submission if you are proposing to speak in-person or online. Papers may be submitted and given in English or Welsh.

The symposium will be free to attend, but delegates are responsible for their own travel and accommodation costs. There will be opportunities for socialising and informal discussion as well as exploring the beautiful seaside town of Aberystwyth.

Questions may be directed to krk14@aber.ac.uk.

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Reposted by Dr Cat Crossley

Irina Dumitrescu @irinadumitrescu.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

Some books are so well done you wish you'd written them yourself. Next best thing is blurbing them! This is a very smart and thoughtful book, readable and interesting for a scholar who isn't already waist deep in the sources.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 01/03/2026

Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus Pawb! Happy St David’s Day everyone!

Photo of a whole stack of yellow daffodils with bright green long thin leaves, sat amongst green grass with a thin white yellow fence running just behind (it’s technically an electric fence, but pretty sure I saw a sign sitting on the floor that used to be attached to said fence saying NOT LIVE, so it’s just a kind of pointless fence now. Anyway…)

Pretty sure there were at least three different types of daffodils in this cluster that sits on the route of one of my usual local walks near Menai Bridge. Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus Everyone!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 07/02/2026

*goes on a micro hike on wet ground, scrambling down a slippery cliff face I’ve not done before* Easy! No problems at all… *walks around my parents garden for five minutes* Stacks it on the stone steps, smashing my arm into a nice lump of granite. FFS, can I just be consistently clumsy maybe??

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 05/02/2026

So the back pain has mostly gone, but my nemesis — Aaron from DPD — has yet again failed to deliver my parcel and lied about it. And the DPD complaints form won’t send. So looks like I’ll be writing a letter to customer services… I swear if I ever see that prick I’m gonna [heavily redacted] him.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 04/02/2026

So far I have had 1xparacetamol, 2xcocodamol, 2 lots of ibuprofen gel, 10 minutes on the spiky acumat and 2xibuprofen, and we have made some progress with the pain. I haven’t screamed OR a collapsed in at least half an hour. But I still don’t have my parcel…

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 04/02/2026

Ah FFS, woke up with the worst back pain I’ve had in years, on a day where my nemesis — Aaron from DPD — has yet again “delivered” my parcel to some random secret location which is not my house. This is not a good combination! I need my cocodamol to kick in already!! Or if it has, I need more!!!

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Reposted by Dr Cat Crossley

Natalie Hopwood @nrhopwood.bsky.social · 29/01/2026

We're looking for ONE MORE paper for Medieval Temporalities and Comics! If you or anyone you know studies comics and the medieval, consider submitting an abstract 😀

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 24/01/2026

My Blep print from @tokyosexwhale.bsky.social arrived today and I am fucking delighted! Look at this! Isn’t it great?! I’m already very pleased with my decision to sign up for the Snail Meow Print Club this year. I’ll be getting a print every month and I can’t wait to see the rest. #CatArt #blep

A print by @tokyosexwhale.bsky.social of the head of a black cat drawn from below, with a yellow background, yellow eyes, and an excellent big pink tongue sticking out — an outstanding image of a blep.

The A5 print is accompanied by three small stickers of two small cats called Aggie and Bean aka “the bean machine” who I must assume are the artist’s own feline friends. They have a lot of white fur with some orange and black/grey in the mix, both with pink noses and very cute.

The whole lot, as usual, is presented on a dirty cat-scratched turquoise yoga mat, my signature background for any and all images I take photos of. Look, if I put the yoga mat away then I can never be arsed to unroll it again to do my stretches; if I leave it out the cat scratches it. So my yoga mat stays flat, dirty and cat-scratched. I don’t know how you do it in your house, this is just how things work round here.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 20/01/2026

Ok WTF is going on today, I haven’t had any spam calls in weeks/months, but I’ve had four already from four different numbers…why?? Why the coordinated attack on my mobile this particular Tuesday?!?

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 17/01/2026

Okay I’m starting to think this year might turn out okay. My missing kombucha crates (one lot anyway – don’t ask…) has been found by a lovely local man and brought to my door! So I now have plenty of fruity CBD kombucha to get me through the final phase of the PhD. Fuck yeah, let’s go 2026 🤘

Photo from above of three brown boxes filled with silver cans of kombucha, sitting on a black and white patterned rug. There is a wooden chest of drawers and an overfilled shoe rack in the background.

Not pictured: the nice man from the nearby bookshop who found these boxes dumped outside the garage weeks ago and brought them round to me today after finally tracking down my location :)

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 15/01/2026

It’s a new year, and time for a new game of “Will I Give Myself Food Poisoning: Homemade Kimchi Edition!” After the success of last autumn’s edible mushroom foraging, decided to find some new and exciting ways to (possibly) destroy my gastrointestinal system. It smells incredible, but I’m scared 😹

Picture of a glass jar filled with orangey yellow homemade kimchi, held by a white hand, with green plants visible in the background outside the window

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 11/12/2025

And we’re done. I hope…I had to send the thesis PDF as a google drive link coz it was too big to email direct, but it should be fine….?? I’m off for a windy walk, hopefully at some point my left eye will stop twitching and I can recover from this frantic final fortnight of thesis-writing!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 09/12/2025

Oh thank fuck. I have permission to hand in my thesis on Thursday instead of the actual deadline, today. This extra day or two is going to make all the difference. Fingers crossed this storm doesn’t knock out the power though else I’m proper screwed!!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

Hmm. Thesis is due tomorrow, and I feel a bit shit today. This is not great.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 07/12/2025

Praying that the full British Library manuscripts catalogue is back up tomorrow, so I can at least find information about all the MSS I’ve been writing about in this thesis. I just need some provenance info guys! Just let me know some dates!

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 05/12/2025

Fukujyu Friday! So I kicked off today really well, did some high-brain work adding some paragraphs to my Introduction and fixed a few footnotes. Now I’ve crashed a bit, so time for another cup of Fukujyu Sencha tea and some low-brain work on the bibliography before I give up for the day…

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 04/12/2025

Thursday is another Ti Kuan Yin day In brain-fail news, I just realised that the Descriptio Mappe Mundi and the Expositio Mappe Mundi are two different texts. I don’t have a “real” edition of the EMM that I can cite properly, and now it’s too late. How did this happen?! I really hate my brain 😹

Closeup view of the Black Dog Teas brown paper bag of Ti Kuan Yin oolong, with my black cat mug peeking out from behind

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 03/12/2025

It’s Wednesday, so today’s tea is Lung Ching Dragonwell, which is particularly delicious. Had a zoom call w/my supervisor, who said there’s “nothing atrocious” (lol!!) he could see in my thesis, so I should crack on with polishing and finishing it. Went for a micro walk in the sun. All is well.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 02/12/2025

Love how my version of Word just occasionally randomly decides that important documents can’t be accessed right now. Yeh reckon you must have deleted it mate, it says. Can’t find it anywhere. So I have to find them in my email outbox and re-download to read. Great use of my dwindling time.

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 02/12/2025

Today we are fixing some of the problems I found in the Maps chapter yesterday, and we are now exactly a week out from the thesis resubmission date. Fuck. It is Tuesday, so today’s tasty tea is Ti Kuan Yin Oolong.

Image of a brown paper bag with a blue sticker and the Black Dog Teas stamp on, labelled “Ti Kuan Yin” China Oolong tea. A black cat mug is peeking out from behind, ready to be filled up with tasty tea

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 01/12/2025

Probably too late for me to move away from medieval history to mycology proper, but I'm def gonna be trying to influence my niece and nephew to study fungi when they grow up... Fucking fascinating things, fungi...hope for the future! #MushroomMonday #mycology www.theguardian.com/science/2025...

theguardian.com

‘Nature’s original engineers’: scientists explore the amazing potential of fungi

Unique properties of fungi have led to groundbreaking innovations in recent years, from nappies to electronics

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 01/12/2025

Just over a week until my thesis resubmission deadline, and I’m back on the massive maps chapter edits. Turns out that in the big restructuring, I skipped over f.119 of the Getty miscellany, which is why a big chunk doesn’t make sense! Anyway, here’s today’s tea, Genmai Cha aka popcorn tea

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 27/11/2025

My sister is currently editing my bibliography from Brisbane, and I threw some notes in the document for extra texts to add in. But they were more “notes to self” than actual useful biblio info… She managed to identify the “world map, 1400-thingy” because I put the author in (Evelyn Edson, obvs)

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Dr Cat Crossley @catscreatechaos.bsky.social · 04/11/2025

Was absolutely convinced it was Wednesday when I woke up this morning, no idea why. Apologies to my cat, who should not have had her meds today because she had them yesterday. (Partly writing this to remind me not to give her meds on her usual day tomorrow as well!!)

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