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Laura Williams

@ljwilliams.bsky.social
671 followers 287 following 1K posts

Librarian turned University Teacher in Librarianship. Part-time PhD student researching running, information behaviour and social media. Stroke survivor and neurodivergent. Evertonian. Prone to typos.

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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
It’s been less than two weeks since I moved to a job without Microsoft Teams. Initial reflection is my brain feels calmer without multiple chats and channels sending notifications all day. Anxiety levels are dropping now that Teams no longer needs constant monitoring for urgent work tasks.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Why do the AI life hack crowd apparently hate all the joyful things in life? Joy and leisure shouldn’t be optimised in this way
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Looking forward to the commute to Sheffield returning to normal next week. Huddersfield station is closed so today I did 30 mins on the regular bus, 15 min walk to a station, 25 min wait for train. I’m on a painfully slow train. I’ll eventually get to the office over 3 hours after setting off.
static.klipy.com
Cat Tired
Alt: Cat with coffee gif with so tired text
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CILIP Information Literacy Group @infolitgroup.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Details here of a forthcoming workshop to discuss practical tips for submitting an abstract to the LILAC Conference. This event is on Mon 12 October 2026, 12:00-13:00 BST and is free to join. Register here: buytickets.at/cilipinforma... #infolit #LILAC #conference
buytickets.at
Select tickets – LILAC abstracts workshop – Microsoft Teams
LILAC abstracts workshop – Microsoft Teams, Mon 12 Oct 2026 - Facilitators: Georgie Broad, Sam Aston, and Heather Lincoln.We would like to invite you to attend a workshop to discuss practical tips for...
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Sauna and cold plunging this morning. Busy week in a new job has caused a little chronic pain and fatigue crash this weekend but I feel so much better after this session.
Sauna in a woodland
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Yoga class this morning was on the theme of pause which was perfect after a busy September. This last week has been full on. First week of new university teaching job during welcome week. Hotel hopping around Sheffield. House hunting and big decisions. At least 20k steps a day in my heavy boots.
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Smooth Dunk @smoothdunk2.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
when ai leaves u behind
7 panel comic.

Panel 1:
A Red Guy with AI across his chest looks like he’s about to run away. A Yellow Guy stands next to him. Red Guy says “I’m the future, buddy. You comin’?”
Yellow Guy replies “Nah”

Panel 2: 
Red Guy is almost out of the panel. He leans in and says “Enjoy getting left behind, pal”
Yellow Guy replies “ok”

Panel 3:
Yellow Guy stands alone.

Panel 4: 
Close up on Yellow Guy, there is a quiet “huff-huff-huff” noise coming from behind him

Panel 5:
Yellow Guy turns to look behind him

Panel 6: 
Close up on Yellow Guy’s face as if from the point of view of an attacker.
Yellow Guy yells “Jesus Christ”

Panel 7:
AI Red Guy is now chasing the Yellow Guy. 
Red Guy: “Use me”
Yellow Guy “No”
Red Guy “USE ME”
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Do you think I might have talked about mushrooms at work occasionally? Leaving presents from team Huddersfield are very on brand for ‘the mushroom librarian’ 🍄🍄‍🟫 however as I spend a lot of time where I’m going next anyway I think my brain hasn’t realised this is the end of an 11 year job
Assortment of leaving gifts including mushroom book, a mushroom ornament and mushroom mug
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
I’ve been on the edge of a migraine and fibromyalgia type pain attack all day. Even my fingers are aching. It’s been a two diet cokes and a doughnut type day to survive. But I’ve dragged my to yoga and hoping it helps shake something out of me.
Yoga mat and tape on floor saying resilience is in your breath
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
People of BlueSky with long commutes. Please tell me how you cope? Until I move my commute to Sheffield will be quite mega. Thankfully I can stay with a friend one night a week.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Today has been spent walking up and down a lot of Sheffield hills to scope out streets to prioritise and streets to avoid in the Sheffield house buying quest.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
I’ve been listening to the new Arab Strap album on repeat since it was released earlier this month.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Today in life with health anxiety we are trying to remember that Russian twists with a weight are the cause of abdominal pains rather than the cause being a medical problem.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Returned to work to birthday gifts from my colleagues including vouchers for an art shop. I’m going to miss this team so much after 11 years together. But as the card appropriately states, life begins now.
Birthday card saying fourth and life begins now 

FORTY
(40)
See also: LIFE BEGINS NOW
The age when you can still do just as much as you used to but you decide you'd rather not
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Helen Simmons (She/Her) @littlehen.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Friendly #PhDSky backup reminder: if you haven’t saved your writing or thesis files somewhere safe this week, now’s a good moment. It’s always worth keeping a copy in two different places—just in case. Sharing because I always appreciate these nudges when I see them elsewhere!
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tante @tante.cc · 07/09/2026
"Once again, the LLM’s trick is its superhuman patience for assembling puzzle pieces, not the ability to make some profound intellectual leap."
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
Three hours into a five hour journey with CrossCountry trains. Starting to get restless now and a manspreader has taken the seat next to me. Only two more hours to go. Two hours.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Even though I’m leaving my job I did the mandatory e-learning training about AI because I wanted to see what it featured. It featured lots of content that made me shout at my computer.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Already hinted at a job change. It’s a big one. I’m joining the team at the University of Sheffield as a University Teacher in Librarianship and Information Services Management. I enjoyed the feeling of occasion that came with this congratulatory pop up box on accepting my job offer.
Congratulations pop up box for job acceptance
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
August was a long and ridiculously busy month. Successful job interview and subsequent moving plans, had a cat come to stay for 10 nights, made more thesis progress, visited family, went to a wedding, and much more. No wonder I’m tired!
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 23/08/2026
Back at the Hill Dickinson yesterday.
South Stand at Everton match
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David M. Perry @lollardfish.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Editing a longer draft into shorter drafts is writing, is thinking, is deciding things. It’s as intimate, perhaps even more intimate, as human, perhaps even more human, as any act of writing.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
Part of the M62 is closed almost every night until the end of September. I don’t live on the official diversion but I live on an alternative route. Despite being on a main road it is usually very quiet at night. Currently listening to constant traffic zooming past 😭
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
Seriously though. I’ve been laughed at my whole life for not being able to pronounce words. It’s partly a dyslexia thing and partly an accent thing. Hated reading aloud at school. Dreading my PhD viva because academic words are complex.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
I’ll stick with pronouncing words the way that works with my accent. Also nice to see acknowledgement that squirrel rhymes with the Wirral.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Attempted bound triangle at yoga tonight and managed to do it on one side. I’ve never managed a bind before.
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Dr Surekha Davies, Historical Monster Consultant (she/her) @drsurekhadavies.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
AI "provides [billionaires] the thing they most crave: relief from their greatest fear, the unwashed masses rising up against them and insisting on actual democracy." 2/
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Robin Ince @robinince.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Wow , just saw a 4 star review of the ADHD Myth ? Documentary in The Guardian - on so many levels it failed as a proper investigative documentary and yet…? It is hard not to despair at just how terrible our journalism is in this country - Relentless damaging mediocrity
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Annalee Newitz @annaleen.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
A perfect conceit for the 20s: the world's biggest bookstore has become a destroyer of books
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Far too many stressful things on my mind for thesis writing to be productive today. But I need to make progress so I’m trying to forget everything else.
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Dr Eleanor Janega @goingmedieval.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
The entire country is literally on fire. We have had 2000 extra deaths this summer, so far, there are no mitigation strategies in place to deal with this, our PM wants to drill more in the North Sea, and - oh my god a black man has the temerity to get a job at Cambridge!!!?
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Dr Eleanor Janega @goingmedieval.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
This entire disgusting situation with Arday has shown the horrible priorities of a society built for the ruling class. Our press isn't free, and it is used solely and exclusively to pursue the interests of the ruling class which owns it.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Desperately hoping tomorrow feels less hot and humid. I have to do 4 hours of library tours at our clearing open day. The library has been get sweaty walking around levels of ridiculously hot this week.
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Laura Woods @woodsiegirl.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
This! As a librarian, my favourite requests were ones that started "I don't know if this is possible". Either it was actually something I could do in 30 seconds with my eyes closed, and the requester would think I was magic. Or, it would take days but be the most interesting thing I'd done all year.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Temporarily hosting a cat at my house whilst it’s humans are away. 24 hours in and settling in nicely. I was worried it would still be hiding but happily treating the house like its home.
Cat chilling out in the floor
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Ned Potter @nedpotter.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Using GenAI *reduces cognitive function*. The actual function of your brain. It reduces it. So when you use GenAI regularly for a task, you lose the ability to do the task without GenAI (just like if you used a machine to do your exercise for you, you would lose fitness and muscle).
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Ned Potter @nedpotter.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
A 2025 MIT Study (summarised below) used EEGs to record brain activity in controlled groups. The GenAI-using group has the lowest brain engagement and “consistently under-performed at neural, linguistic and behavirol levels.” The study lasted months and the GenAI users got worse and worse over time.
time.com
ChatGPT's Impact On Our Brains According to an MIT Study
The study, from MIT Lab scholars, measured the brain activity of subjects writing SAT essays with and without ChatGPT.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
I want to read this! Sadly have to wait until March 2027 for UK publication 😭
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Today max humidity in the West Yorkshire Pennine hills will apparently be 87%. Humidity combined with hot temperatures is brutal.
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Dr Surekha Davies, Historical Monster Consultant (she/her) @drsurekhadavies.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
OMG THIS BOOK, people! @timnitgebru.blacksky.app's book is one to buy, gift (to many people), assign to students, recommend, and - of course - read cover to cover in hard copy, pencil in hand. 🗃 #academicsky 💙📚 🧪
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RA Walker @tchrgrrrl.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
When we digitize 100% of our history and then give 100% of our digitized history over to corporations, it takes less than a moment to lose everything. It's scary. We as people who live in this world ought to do better about hedging our bets. Safeguards. Something.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
A past reader felt very strongly about editing the text in this book from the 1980s about household electrical appliances.
Pages of book with black out lining, pencil and pen annotations and highlights 
Pages of book with black out lining, pencil and pen annotations and highlights Pages of book with black out lining, pencil and pen annotations and highlights
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
The danger of sleeping with windows open in a moorland fire risk zone is waking up at 3am to a very smoky house. Unfortunately couldn’t identify where it was coming from to call it in to 999. So that was a horrible sleepless night.
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Dr Malice @atarbuck.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Oh i love love love love this!!
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
Anyone who came to my ALN talk about print collections will have heard about my improvised and low budget book repair efforts. Today I’ve built a book tower to hold a book in place whilst the copydex dries 🤞determined to save our copies of this reading list text!
Improvised tower of books on a desk
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Greg Jenner (Historian) @gregjenner.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Presumably if you select “Middle English”, your doctor immediately offers you bloodletting and a poultice made from frog blood
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
I think I finally worked out the overall argument of a thesis chapter today. Need to finish writing around that key discussion point, figure out one more chapter and then I’ll have something that looks like a draft thesis 🥳 #phdsky
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Oh no. I got to the station far too early. Refreshments essential. This pint is going down well after a stressful day with lots of promising thesis progress.
Pint of pale ale on a shiny table in a quiet pub
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
The surprisingly successful item from yesterdays Vinted uploading session. Instant camera film that is 5 years out of date. 6 offers overnight and then someone bought for the listing price.
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Laura Williams @ljwilliams.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
Libraries are not mental health services. It doesn't solve the problem of access to meaningful support. I was referred to a service that should have been in touch within 14 days. It's been 8 weeks. I don't think a drop-in at a library will help with all the people falling into gaps in provision.
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