iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

My sewer is busted & last week I spent so much time on the phone with the sewer insurance and Ron…and Josh…and Dan…all had the same voice…same weird inflections/ pauses in their speech…now that I’ve accepted the insurance is a scam + have to pay for my own plumber, at least I can talk with humans

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 28/05/2026

I'm brainfarting on who wrote this recently (I think John Warner or Marc Watkins?), but they pointed out that the costs companies are currently paying for AI now are VERY subsidized bc every AI company is trying to build share, so imagine how many billions when they're paying the true cost!

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

AI writing has such a specific cadence to it that I hate. As soon as you read the first line, you can predict where it’s going. I want writing with a little surprise in it! Little phrases that will pop back into my head months after I read them!

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

With apologies for the coming serious Ellen, the one thing I can think is how to make PDFs accessible, which is actually pretty hard and maybe we should just stop using them because so few people do it correctly? Though I’m maybe being generous reading this into such a vague response

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 02/05/2026

I will never recover from a grilled cheese sandwich made on bread with fennel seeds. Cheddar and licorice. Absolutely vile, still haunts me.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

Now even my local gardening FB group is being invaded by AI slop and I am "not fun" for asking if we can keep this stuff out. I think I just need to quit the entire internet at this point?

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

I mean…you paid for it, so I think it’s fair to do the survey regardless of their feelings? Like, if it wasn’t at all what you expected based on how they described the program, they should know that! I think I’d stay quiet if it was free but not for programming they charge for

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Maureen Langloss @maureenlangloss.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

Very happy to hear I inspired one of you to make a plan to give blood this week. Does anyone else want to join me? Apple juice, Lorna Doones, & helping someone who really needs it? The best. 🙌

Red Sign that reads “25% of blood donations go to cancer patients.” Hanging on white brick wall

Selfie at the blood center with the blood pressure cuff on and wearing a mask.

My arm with tube connected collecting blood.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

Platelet donation next weekend! Donating blood has become a really surprising way to make myself feel a little more hopeful about the world. I wasn’t allowed to donate for most of my life and am trying to make up now that rules have changed

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Richard Mirabella 🐝 @rpmirabella.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

"Studies show that overreliance on these digital tools causes cognitive decline, but if current events are any indication, nobody’s making much of a contribution anyway. Go ahead and use A.I. however you like." This is so great.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

My cat is 15 and has just learned windows can be like doors, and now he demands that I run inside through the door to admit him through the window.

A black and white cat who has just been exploring his yard, perches on a windowsill and waits to be let back inside his house

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Greg Zimmerman @gregzimmerman.bsky.social · 05/04/2026

Love @biblioracle.bsky.social's piece today. AI cannot read, and AI does not write. Support writers who DO write. biblioracle.substack.com/p/writers-wr...

biblioracle.substack.com

Writers Write

People who use AI to produce text are doing something else, which is fine for them, but it's not writing.

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Mike Ingram @mikeingram.bsky.social · 03/04/2026

You spend your whole life hearing that English majors can't get jobs, and that you should stay away from drugs, only to reach middle age and find out "large language model that occasionally hallucinates" is worth billions of dollars

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

Oh and this reminds me! If you have time to make them at home, look up Lukas Volger’s book Veggie burgers every which way. He has so many great recipes

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

Besides what you can find in the grocery store, I hate how many restaurants just started doing an impossible patty instead of the house made black bean burgers they all used to make. The impossible burger freaks me out (too meaty) and maaaan does it mess up my stomach

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

I’ve been working through a jar from Rancho Gordo which is super smoky and nice. But also excited to try penzey’s next…I’ve started buying from them more because I can’t resist the owner’s politicking emails

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

I have such a ridiculous number of spices but I think the MVP is smoked paprika just based on the fact that I currently have 5 jars of it (I panic that I'm out, buy a jar, add it to the line up)

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Lilly Dancyger @lillydancyger.bsky.social · 18/03/2026

Proof that if we all just ignore shitty technology that nobody wants, no matter how much money these dinguses throw into it, it will eventually go away. Next up: AI!

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Linda Holmes @lindaholmes.bsky.social · 16/03/2026

This is really wise and candid. It’s not often that people are willing to be like “I wanted to do this, it hasn’t gone as I hoped, I’m putting my focus elsewhere.” Jen’s a smarty.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 11/03/2026

Brought home one more priceless gift from AWP (am so sick)

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Split Lip Magazine @splitlipthemag.bsky.social · 05/03/2026

The fiction team is here! 🤩 Have you stopped by for a tote bag yet?? @whatll-i-do.bsky.social @tinazhu.bsky.social @ellenrhudy.bsky.social

The Split Lip Magazine Fiction Team sits at the Split Lip booth. Tote backs, stickers, and pins sit on the table, including a Library Kids Club tote bag.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 05/03/2026

My AWP adventure is that my hotel has been without hot water or a working shower (of any temperature) since I arrived yesterday afternoon, and I am a person who cannot move an inch without sweating 🙃

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

It's been so bad lately. I feel like wherever I go online, I'm trailed by photos of women who are honestly so thin they are on the verge of death :(

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

Seriously considering buying an aquarium membership instead of a single pass so I can just spend all of AWP, every day, in the jellyfish room

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Split Lip Magazine @splitlipthemag.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

Exciting news, FAM ✨ At our reading next Thursday, we'll be raffling 2 LIBRARY KIDS tote bags with goodies inside, including postcards, pens, & books from contributors @sfeycreates.bsky.social, @litmagreject.bsky.social, @jrfenn.bsky.social, Monica Brashears & the late Martha Silano 😘

Our fancy new Library Kids Club tote bag and an assortment of postcards and books, including TINY VESSELS, BLOB, DECOMPOSE and TERMINAL SURREAL. Not featured: Monica Brashear’s novel.

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Linda Holmes @lindaholmes.bsky.social · 26/02/2026

Voiding documents that make it legal for people to move through the world normally—especially but not exclusively when you give them no practical opportunity to get new ones even if they wanted to—is (still) not about bathrooms or sports. It’s about erasure.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 25/02/2026

I’ve had this on my shelf for months! Thanks for the nudge to get to reading it :)

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 23/02/2026

My new measurement system is “how big is fire hydrant’s hat” (big!)

A Philadelphia fire hydrant topped with snow

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 22/02/2026

his form on the rowing machine is also incredible (shit). the man has no bodily awareness

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 20/02/2026

My current AWP plan is one volunteer shift, visit the aquarium, visit the Visionary Art Museum, panel on university presses, Laura Lippman interview, a daily run around the harbor...so basically pretend I am not at AWP for 90% of my time in Baltimore. Am I doing this right?

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 19/02/2026

YES. My friend shared with me so I wouldn’t feel so bad. He posted about it on Facebook

Writer Robert Olen Butler described his rejection from AWP’s writer-to-agent program

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 19/02/2026

(I recognize that I’m doing a lot of extrapolation here, but come on. just bonkers that he couldn’t get a meeting either.)

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 19/02/2026

Got zero bites on my AWP writer-to-agent query, then saw that Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler also got rejected. So at least it’s not just me who’s fucked, but the whole literary ecosystem!

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Jen A. Miller @byjenamiller.bsky.social · 13/02/2026

Today’s a great day to start masking again

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Lincoln Michel @thelincoln.bsky.social · 08/02/2026

I don't see how self-publishing world survives GenAI. It's going to be an absurd increase in slop books with no reason to expect any increase in paying readers. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/08/b...

But with the help of A.I., Ms. Hart can publish books at an astonishing rate. Last year, she produced more than 200 romance novels in a range of subgenres, from dark mafia romances to sweet teen stories, and self-published them on Amazon.

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Ted Leo 🍉 @tedleo.bsky.social · 06/02/2026

🚨BREAKING: Late night decision leads to late night posting of new double A-side single for #bandcampfriday! tedleo.bandcamp.com/album/februa...

tedleo.bandcamp.com

FEBRUARY 2026 DOUBLE A SIDE, by Ted Leo & The Pharmacists

2 track album

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Linda Holmes @lindaholmes.bsky.social · 06/02/2026

Yup. If you’re going to have little kids at a press conference, you have to welcome the fact that they act like little kids. What’s creepy is when people line up a bunch of silent children who behave like Act 1 Von Trapps.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 05/02/2026

Great post that kinda makes me want to reclaim my younger self who did things like make zines, make my own band T-shirts for my favorite band that didn’t have them, draw postcards and comics just for the fun of it...

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 05/02/2026

Ugh yes. We had a little collection of squashed bugs taped to index cards to help us identify anything we found in a returned book. I never encountered a bed bug thank god!

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 03/02/2026

thank you for the words of comfort! Wild for me to think of Portis not having any fiction there. (I am a little amused at my dream self’s concern with TNY, since I tend to skip over their fiction 😬😬)

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 03/02/2026

Had a dream that to comfort myself over my sense of failure as a writer, I opened up the NEW YORKER issue with my story in it. Then I woke up to a world where I feel like a failure as a writer and no important people at the New Yorker have published me. Man…

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Chloe N. Clark @pintsncupcakes.bsky.social · 01/02/2026

On January 24th, my parents home burned down. They and my disabled brother escaped with only minor burns but they lost everything they've ever had. I'm running a GoFundMe to help them recover and rebuild. I would be deeply grateful for any donations but also for any shares!

gofund.me

Donate to We Lost Everything to a Fire. Help My Family Rebuild., organized by Chloe Clark

On January 24th, our childhood home burned down. Our parents lost 50… Chloe Clark needs your support for We Lost Everything to a Fire. Help My Family Rebuild.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 02/02/2026

Oh god, Chloe. I’m so sorry. ♥️

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Aaron Burch @aaronburch.bsky.social · 01/02/2026

This is one of those quotes I think about more than any other.

from Jonathan Franzen's 2013 By the Book interview in the New York Times:

Describe your ideal reading experience (when, where, what, how).

The book creates the experience. If I’m loving something, I suddenly discover large chunks of reading time that I wasn’t aware of having.

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

one of my friends won an O. Henry Prize for a story that was rejected over 70 times. So if you believe in it, I say persist...I think sometimes the best work takes longest to place (although I have such a hard time taking that advice myself!)

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Eshani Surya @eshanisurya.bsky.social · 28/01/2026

SO STOKED

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 27/01/2026

Yeah, this is bonkers. I’m in Port Richmond and hardly anything‘s been plowed, where plows have come through you have to climb over intersection snow mountains, most of the buses still weren’t running today and even if they WERE, at most stops I wouldn’t be able to clamber over the snow to get on

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Ellen Rhudy @ellenrhudy.bsky.social · 27/01/2026

hahaha ok buddy. these always bring me a little joy. God forbid a writer also READ!!!

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