Oliver Bateman Does the WorkVerified account

the thing i don't miss about academia is telling people, especially non-specialists, that I "work on X subject" and then they immediately recommend a bunch of books I've either read or know about and have no intention of reading

we don't talk about the books, mind you--that would require much more than just dropping a title like "beyond a boundary," which i've annotated almost into nonexistence. no, as soon as I would move to engage, I'd be faced with another recommendation, or silence

but i've never read books anyway. i work with books, incorporate material from books into my work, but i sure as heck don't read them. that's a pretty bougie way to pass the time.

nor do books "furnish a room" in my house. my office is a functional space and the books that are there are in use and related to the work i do. books not currently used for work are stored, much as files on a USB drive are, albeit in far more inconvenient boxes