Daily* Miscellaneous Thoughts

today less coherent. um. Finished another Halo book. I'm averaging two 400 page novels a week this month... That seems like a lot idk. Haven't video gamed in what feels like forever. Remembered I was supposed to watch the Hadestown proshot but it's too late near me. Reading makes me feel so physically detached? I guess it's just another way of saying it's a soporific, sleepytime inducing. It's annoying to be in a constant state of half-awake while reading the whole weekend though. Starting a new book is always hard. Calves are sore. Feel like something is wrong physically but I think it's just the book sleepy thing. I'm normal on weekdays. um. cleaned up my neocities dashboard, no visual changes to site? or did I slim down the book title cards today. Korra epi, Amon spoopy. Slowly remembering plot resolutions but not how we get there. Only for this season, too. I have like a single memory of one scene from another season but there's three of them so that's not helpful at all. Pothos didn't instantly die. I named it Aramis originally because it's not quite Porthos and not quite Athos. Splitting it into two separate plants means one should be Dartagnan but idk which one yet. Three Musketeers was not as good as Count of Monte Cristo, that's for sure. Should reread. Need to not reread things, I have new stuff to read first. East of Eden also sounds good though, friend was reading that. I almost almost want to give Robin Hobb another chance but I'm still extremely extremely upset at the ending of Liveship Traders. Fitz is so good though... A friend I haven't talked to in years updates her goodreads every couple of weeks and I really like having that small connection to her again. I wonder if she thinks the same, if she sees my updates. She was the big sister in the friend group. She recced Hobb's stuff bc I like fantasy. Dunno if she read it. I felt sad again today? Last night? about being smushed into this quiet little body. Last night. Now again, I suppose. Just not feeling allowed to be physically expressive. Nobody to break that momentum with either. Angela Giarratana on Last Meals talked about her autistic uncle being excited to go grocery shopping just to get out. I have more ability than that but can see myself there as well in another or possibly future time. I feel like the world naturally compresses people and we have to fight to give ourselves room to be. Hard, though. Don Hertzfeldt on Dropout continues to be weird as hell. Wisdom Teeth is uhhh. No. Me was okay. I'm starting to think of his stuff like Fantasia for Freaks. The other animated or puppeted stuff on dropout has been hard pass but this at least is watchable. Realized that the Real Science youtube channel got discontinued and the host went (had to go?) independent and has a couple things on her new channel. Jackdaw upload today. I think the video was a bit messy but also it's a really messy topic, so the whole idea is that since there isn't a clear answer, the answer can't be yes in either direction. Neuroscience is utterly fascinating but sooooo opaque. She had some typos but I had to remind myself to excuse dyslexia bc she's not an academic. Causal vs. casual is also just difficult. She's somebody willing to research and present it and talk about it, and do that well. Respect. Settled upload, always a treat. Made salsa. Supposed to have a work thing this week for homemade salsa but I don't wanna. Catered taco stuff as the main. HR uses AI to make the flyers. Feels weird. Dystopian. Like Steve Buscemi and the fellow kids meme. Uncanny. Slightly off, but passes at a glance. Ok so not really like Steve Buscemi but. Kimi no na wa 10th anniversary this year, saw theater showings while looking for Hadestown ones. Haven't movie theatered in a while. Probably wouldn't do an anime romance by myself. Been meaning to watch something but nothing quite feels right. Too big of a commitment. Almost picked up my guitar today. Might still. It's funny how out of tune it gets. I only play the same stuff I already know, just to see if I can. More of an exercise than expression, even when I was decent. Creating music has never spoken to me, as much as I find its consumption to be one of the most important things in my life. maybe if I had my own place I would play more. hate making noise. Would like to learn classical stuff for guitar. Violin feels out of reach. Want to have a passable Chaconne. Pretty end-game stuff though. Performance also isn't something I want. First guitar teacher I had 'threatened' it and it made me quit. Playing is for me. Really cool guy though. I have a painting on my wall from an elderly neighbor whose dog I caught. It's bad but good story. Connection. His last name is Money. Crazy. I feel like I should get a frame for it but idk. if you read this ur cool. past and present tense. future too, why not. my eyes get dry reading. I wonder if it's the position of my chair under the fan. Putting blanket over my head is really cozy and helps. otherwise I read in bed. then get sleepy and nap. New Halo novel time skips past Halo 5. Didn't play 4 or 5 so I don't really know what's up in the timeline. Forerunner shit. Cortana is a despot. Just realized Microsoft sunsetted Cortana for Copilot. RIP. At least her name will no longer be sullied by association. I forget Halo Infinite exists. What a block of nonsense text. That's my brain.

designed and printed some shelves that hook onto my tv so I can keep plants out of the cat's reach, came out pretty nice. Replanted one of my not-very-successful hydroponic pothos into soil so it will probably die but maybe it won't and will do something else instead. Realized that I could potentially straighten my closet doors (the bad sliding double door style) so that when they're closed the reveal line is even. It was easy and now every time I look at them all nice and snug against the frame it makes me happy. Reading Halo, still good. Did some psuedo-hiking this morning by stepping up and down from a stool while holding weights. Not as fun but sort of worked. I'm not being very communicative and it's sort of eating at me, but the over-under isn't there yet to just do it. I think still recovering from last evening's nap dream. Not fun. Did have a fun normal dream though. Watching Korra, one epi a day max. No binging. It's really front-loading the romance and they're all so hot, it's not fair. Is it gender envy if I'd rather be a hot woman than a hot man? I'll take either one. It feels fraudulent to have the envy but not the dysphoria. Haven't written in my physical journal since just before starting this. Not sure what I'd put there that I don't here.

Slept 8 hours last night and still was so tired I fell exhaustedly asleep face down with my hoodie still on, which of course induced a fever dream. I like, almost understand that the fever dream is the mechanism to say "hey wake up ur body is Not okay", but seriously? You couldn't have figured out a better way to do that than put me into realistic scenarios of Bad and Traumatic shit that I had to, upon waking up, leave my room and go sit somewhere else for 15 minutes to control my breath while my body decompresses and then another 15 minutes trying to comfort myself and not concede to the trigger. I fished out the big guns from the closet, a stuffed animal I got on vacation that I've been avoiding because it makes me miss my friends too much usually, but I really needed to remember a real hug from a real person who really cared about me, and not the other kind of person.

I ended yesterday with hyperfocusing on CSS until past my bedtime. Mostly trimming fat from the original template and trying to make things a little more mobile friendly and consistent, and actually thinking things through instead of hammering it until it works lol. I spent 30 minutes trying to derive a simple system of equations of how to find the width ratio of a vertical 3:4 image and a horizontal 4:3 image if you want the heights to be the same. I felt so dumb for so long, but I got there eventually. That was after I already guess-and-checked my way to the right values, so I didn't even *need* to, but my brain was wired so I did in fact need to. 4x = 3y; 3x + 4y = 3 --- x = 9/25, y = 16/25, ez. It's so simple when you already know the answer. Then you find out that CSS borders mean your math is ever so slightly off. I did not derive that equation.

Made chicken biryani with garlic naan. Very good. I enjoy forcing my parents to eat food they would never otherwise try. I also *love* how yellow curry and garam masala smell when cooking. Warm spices go hard.

Pre-ordered merch from the Midst show (sidebar link) as an early birthday present to myself, but it's a pre-order so it'll be here well after my birthday hehe. sticker and a candle. one of the creators is a big scent nerd so having a candle as merch is so on brand. I need to buy a candle warmer though bc burning candles is so much less efficient and especially for a one-off thingy I wanna savor it.

Aforementioned coworker is defaulting to spanish when talking to me and I am caught off guard almost every time and flubbing my way through with context clues. He talks so fast man, I get cooked just a few words in. It's fun though.

Another Long day yesterday, was pretty up and down but ended average.

Today has been *very* good though, like easy 7/10. Great day. Excellent day.

Which is funny because I woke up pissed that I dreamt about being on a road trip and giant scorpions and spiders were swarming over and into the RV and ugh ew eek.

Today was a very music-y day. I have a playlist of classical stuff, and it's essentially the only 'physical' remnant of my first relationship (which ended in Lots of bad traumas). but I'd always wanted to get into classical music and she just happened to be the one to introduce me to it, and the playlist was nice and didn't really remind me of her much except for one song. I've added to it myself over the years, a fair bit recently, but I don't actually listen to it very much bc it's kinda disparate and not super developed. but today was a day to listen to it.

The first song that came up was Kol Nidrei, which is a fantastic piece. Love a good cello. Then a couple more bangers. Then, the one song. Every time I've had this song come up in the queue I've pretty much panic-skipped it, but I've been feeling good and strong and brave and so I held back and let it play. It's a really nice piece, Song to the Moon from Dvorak's Rusalka. Josh Bell on the violin (I'm (hopefully) seeing him play the Bruch violin concerto in February; every time I see a cool violinist I do still think of it as a little fuck-you to my ex). and it was... a nice piece. Not scary, not depressing. Not triggering. What a relief that is.

The rest of the day is above average, hard vibing. Work ends, get in the car, and *bam* the literal only other classical song that I panic-avoid is on the radio. What luck. but I've been feeling good and strong and brave and so I held back and (loaded up a new recording of it that I've been consciously avoiding, so I can listen to it from the beginning) and let it play. It's a really nice piece, Butterfly Lovers Concerto by Gang and Zhanhou, Chloe Chua on the violin. It was... fine lol. More western than I remembered, and the first (and only time) I listened to it (with my ex) it was with an erhu not a violin. I remembered the tale a little bit so it still evoked some emotions but it was not scary. Not depressing. Not triggering. What a relief that is. I don't think it's enough my style to make a place onto a playlist tho, sorry.

Feeling so blessedly little about a thing I expected to feel altogether too much about was so nice. I suspected, through other related trains of thought and occurrences, that I would continue to have fewer strong triggers, but it's one thing to suspect and another to really put it to the test. I'm glad I did.

I had a good work meeting (Crazy, I know) but it was with a cool Finnish guy that we like working with and it had been a while since we heard from him. I also got to flex a tiny bit of Spanish today, which is silly to say because flexing in front of native speakers is like being proud of bench pressing just the bar in front of Arnie. but it's so... odd feeling?? talking in another language and being understood. Like, I was giving instructions and tips to a new guy. He talks a bit fast for me if he's not thinking about it, but we didn't have to repeat ourselves much or struggle really. That's real (and professional!) application. Crazy. Then! My (also native spanish speaking) team lead sitting nearby complimented me on my accent 😭 please, I'm just a silly little white guy 😭 but it was just an extra cherry on top and I had to like go back to my desk and sit there and process the compliment lol. Not gloat in it but like actually figure out how to accept it. Needless to say I wanna practice some more Spanish soon hehe. I did learn a new word in the convo too! Inclinado, tilted/angled. Love a good cognate.

I'm also stupidly in love with the new animation I have for my header rat. I need to draw a better one tho.

Ok yes, I have an astronautics degree and yes, I have hundreds of hours in KSP, but is orbital mechanics really that hard to grasp? (yeah it is, okay fair)

It's just funny to run into supremely incorrect orbital mechanics in sci fi, when they try so hard to get it right.

In my silly Halo novel: "The [ship] was at the apogee of its parabolic orbit, so the extra momentum would be enough for the [ejected] cylinders to break orbit and continue into deep space."

First! Parabolas are not orbits.

Second! A parabolic trajectory has no apogee (or an infinite one maybe technically idk, that's math nerd stuff not engineer nerd stuff)

Third! If you were in any elliptical orbit other than the maximum possible orbit, adding velocity at the apogee will only raise the perigee, not send things out of orbit (unless you add a lot of velocity, much much more than can be assumed in the scene). Plus you have to add it in the right direction, but I'll give them that.

Fourth! (I didn't actually remember this, just noticed when I looked it up) A parabolic trajectory is the mathematical cusp between elliptical orbits and hyperbolic trajectories, so it's highly improbable that any real trajectory would be parabolic.

Fifth! They're ostensibly around a moon, so putting something out of the orbit of a moon wouldn't technically be putting it into 'deep space' if it's still in a similar orbit around the planet.

Sixth! I'm satisfied now, back to reading.

Tidied up a couple things around the site and my literal room. Feels nice.

Started back into the Halo books last night, and started rewatching Korra today. I think I'm pretty deep back into cozy media vibes for the moment, insofar as bilateral xenocide and class wars can be considered cozy. My friends once made fun of me for claiming Nausicaa was a cozy movie. Sure, it's a post-apocalpytic anti-imperialist movie with terrifying plague-ridden bugs, atomic bomb analogs, and a creepy child who sings but only in flashbacks, but it can still be cozy...

I think it fits the mood of just waiting, not really being up for new stimuli.

Finished Hell Bent. Today kinda blurred between reading and napping and suddenly it was 6pm. Again kinda just opened my mouth and vacuumed up the book instead of chewing it, but that's okay.

My bones can feel the end of summer drawing near. I want to fast forward two months. I should start getting a bit into hiking shape, get my legs back up to strength. Cardio is harder to train. I only really have one goal hike this year so far, I did *so* many of them last year, ones I didn't even know I had. I'll definitely repeat some of them. A 12 mile, 3500ft elevation gain hike is not gonna be the start of the season, that's for sure. I did two of about similar difficulty last year, so I know I can get there.

I've been consuming a lot but not creating much. Feels like I need to soon.

Some dreams need to not be dreamt, otherwise they make me sad :( at least it was absurd enough to also be funny.

Finished listening to What Doesn't Break by Cassandra Khaw (another Critical Role novel) and it was really good. I had to wait a while after finishing ATLA bc Grey Delisle (Azula) voices one of the main characters and the sound of her voice gave me the willies. It could probably pass as a standalone novel. I do still giggle hearing penchant being pronounced like it's French. Also, Mai's voice actor is a licensed therapist now, that's sick as hell.

Spotify recced a really silly sounding novel and it is wondefully silly so far, Kitty Cat Kill Sat by Argus. A far-future sentient housecat in a space station rules high and mighty above all the remaining mortals on Earth. Very cheeky and low-stress without being juvenille feeling. Helps that I love cats, too. The narrator, Eva Kaminsky, really brings the vibes. Apparently it was written episodically-ish on Royal Road (which seems like it's AO3 but less... sus) so that's a whole new world of stuff I could explore if I get the mood to.

Trying to do brain things but brain keeps going 'no this is too hard just be stupid instead'

I noticed like a month or two ago that I really stopped taking note of how long it's taking me to get home from work. There's been construction on my most viable route (it's still faster than the alternative), so it's added like 5-10 minutes consistently for a while and for the foreseeable future. But yeah, I've just not been like keeping track of how much time I have in the day after work to do things. It used to be like, ok I'm home at 3:15 that's 2 hours before dinner, 1 hour for that, and then another 2 hours until getting ready for bed, here's what I can do in each of those time slots. Very conscious about it. Lately it's just been more of like, doing things until the next time slot takes over, being able to put something on pause rather than needing to segment into finalizable chunks. idk, it's just different. I think it's better? Less pressure and less constraint is always nice, especially with time that's supposed to be free. I just worry a bit that it's from apathy more than positive non-anxiety, but por que no los dos.

New Bobby Fingers video... the purest of art. 10/10 no notes.

Weekly kitty update gonna have to wait til tomorrow bc I was out for 14 hours today. It'll be a good one tho. Started walking on my lunch break again, spent a little over 3 hours at the rescue today, then went for another short evening walkies at my fav park. I was in a sort of manic feeling mood that life is really beautiful and almost started crying when a flock of ducks flew in front of me in a cinematic silhouette of flapping yapping quackers. They're just some ducks bro, chill. Definitely nice to have an above average day, though. Almost makes me forget how annoying work has been. Almost.

New Bobby Fingers video... also for tomorrow. I'm scared.

LEGO Hubble...

Been listening to the local classical radio station again (shoutout KBAQ), it's nice not to have to choose what to listen to while driving hehe. Also listened to some of the aforementioned potential concert pieces, I really liked Dvorak 8, such good melodies and fun vibes. The orchestra that's playing it is one of the smaller ones and I've had one bad experience with a different local orchestra (they butchered poor Dvorak 9) but this one is in the fancy part of town so it'll probably be better. Tickets are so much cheaper than *the* symphony(s) too so yk that doesn't hurt.

I've been in that sort of headspace that's like... nothing is wrong but something feels like it's lurking in the shadows just waiting to pounce. Things are sort of returning to normal, but the potential for disruption is there kinda vibe. or maybe like being stuck in quicksand but I don't really have anywhere else to be, so it's not that big of a deal y'know. Everything I *need* is within reach but things I might want would be out of reach? iunno

I finished Ninth House again, read 9 hours today, 3 hours yesterday evening. Haven't gone that hard in a while, my brain is wired into the world and is gonna need some time to get back to reality lol

Discovered a cool concert in November with a bunch of fun music that I wanna go to. Gives me an excuse to watch totoro again. Another in October I might go to but I need to listen to the pieces to see if I like them. That would give me my one-a-month for October through May, including one very bucket list item and a couple smaller ones. Hooray things-to-look-forward-to. Boo spending money on tickets and driving.

I think August is a nice word

emotionally spent. Want to just curl up into a ball in somebody's hands and be held

mad at work and mad that I'm thinking about it rn, fuck capitalism

favorite coworker got fired without cause, because they're moving in two months. That's the literal only reason. Nothing says employee appreciation like leaving people with no income for the two months they still have to live here and pay rent, whose daughter and son-in-law also both still work here... Idiotic and inhuman decisions made by people who've never even met the workers they get to fire on a whim. Not to mention it's just a stupid business decision because now we're shortstaffed again, heading into the busy season. I will not work any harder than I already am just because corporate is too stupid to know how stupid they are.

I think I set a new record today (for me). I had two (2) things I would consider full conversations today, with two separate people, one of them I barely knew: coworker, V, who shadowed me for a couple hours today, then my volunteer grandma later. Training people at work is so draining, but thankfully it's never permanent. I haven't had to do so since I came back (over a year ago), but it's going to be very nice to have a third person to take up the excess once V's up to speed. It was nice talking though, if awkward at points. Somebody brought donuts and I would never say no to a donut, but V is on a diet so I felt a little gluttonous eating it in front of her lol.

I am finding it a little easier to open up to people. Not Easy, but easier. Today was family, dogs, cats, my grandparents' health. I want to say I'm only telling people things that aren't personal but they are, I suppose. They're just things that aren't uniquely personal to me. I dunno, it's good and I'm glad to be able to do it and I hope it keeps getting easier. It would be nice to talk to a real person about a book I'm reading or whatever. Something truly personal to me and me only.

Speaking of book, I got stunlocked by an exchange in the story in a way that I haven't been stunlocked in a long time. Having to sit there and just process, reread it and process some more, then reread it again and process some more. Then think, damn I can't keep reading any more of this I need to keep thinking about it, but I want to keep reading, but I wanna think about it, but if I stop reading then I'll just get distracted doing something else. I ended up continuing reading hehe.

It was such an.. I dunno how to describe it. It was like if you're a screaming child throwing a tantrum while your parent is holding you, and they've been telling you to relax and that it's okay and that they're there for you, and it's only once they set you down and you lose that physical contact that you can finally take it in and understand what their words meant, the love that was there and the stability. But now you're set down, away from their touch, and since you were so hard to hold, they don't particularly want to offer to hold you again at that moment. The moment is gone, and while the love is there it's not what it could have been.

"'I was never in love with you, if that's what you mean,' I said, thinking it was time to be blunt. 'I never expected that you would marry me.'

"'Dear Mildred,' he smiled, 'you are not the kind of person to expect things as your right even though they may be.'"

There's So much to unpack in just that exchange that it'll probably take up the majority of my review when I finish.

ALSO can I legally co-opt the label of spinster? I vibe with it so much.

A pretty mid day, but we take those.

Talked to grandma on the phone, she's awake and improving enough to have a somewhat coherent conversation. That, I could do.

Looked into Les Mis tickets and eeeek them's spensy. I mean I guess proportionally for a 3 hour theater production it makes sense but still, unless I go to a showing that's at least a month out even the cheap seats are triple digits. It's hard to commit to a date when health things are up in the air though. They extended it out to another month and a half of shows, so that might be good for us. I can only imagine how draining doing the same show A HUNDRED times in the span of a couple months is for the performers, though, what the heck. I guess that's what they signed up for and get paid to do, so yay job stability? What's the sweet spot for having all the rust off but not being tired of it yet? Show number 80? lol

I'm really digging Excellent Women by Barbara Pym so far, about halfway through. It's giving me so so so much born-in-the-wrong-era envy. Life seems so quaint and uncomplicated. We can gloss over the fact that it takes place a few years after the most devastating war Europe ever saw that I would have probably died in. Unless I had been born a woman... but it's nice to be inside the head of somebody who also doesn't automatically like people, who's skeptical but still has feelings and isn't quite sure what to do with all of them all the time, and often resists them. A story with no stakes is a welcome little escape right now.

My step mom sent me a text asking me how I'm doing with all the grandparent hospital shenanigans, so I had to actually sit down and spend 30 minutes coming up with the words for the emotions going on and shed a few tears in the process, finally.

I can't visit, not by myself. I look at the hospital on google maps and it overwhelms me. Getting there would be fine. Where do I park? Do I bring something? Who do I talk to? Is there a front desk? Are they even going to be conscious? If not, what's the point? For me to see them in the worst state of their life? Then literally multiply that by two, because they're in different hospitals in different parts of the city. Or maybe the more accurate math operator is to square it. I just can't.

And that's okay. I know myself enough now to know that stressing about the things I can't do doesn't make them more possible. Processing the fear, the grief, the potential for regret, instead of living in the anxiety, is a much better use of my limited emotional bandwidth.

I remembered to acknowledge that my brother who visited the same day it happened doesn't have these barriers. It's not that he loves them more, or fears their imminent demise more. He worked in hospitals, of course he's less afraid of what goes on in them. Of the sounds and smells and lights and people, what all the machines mean. I'm envious sure, but trying to not be so in a way that degrades myself.

I wanted to be more brave than I was, but I think I can allow that I'm still a little brave for trying. Or if not 'brave' then at least satisfied with the effort that I put in.

I do love my grandparents, I'm just as incapable of showing it traditionally as I am of anything else that I love. Maybe that's another thing I should try to give myself more grace on hmmm

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Brother's birthday is [redacted], we went out for dinner tonight. I almost didn't go but made myself, and it was nice. Last time I went to this place, all I did the whole time was stare at peoples' lips lustfully, but my seat wasn't as good this time to do so. I did get hit in the side by a projectile menu thrown by the toddler at the table over from us though hehe. On the way home we almost hit a dog that got loose, but we pulled over and somebody helped us grab him, and thankfully the owner was just two hundred yards or so away, so he spotted us as we were kinda sitting there wondering where to go next lol. Doggy dog was FAST, pacing us at 25mph at a brisk jog. German Shorthair my mom said. Super friendly once I had him by the collar. We walked him over to the owner who told us he had jumped the fence while they were doing yardwork. Good luck in the future, I guess >.>

Came upon a small list of books in Spanish from another person's page and figured it had been a while since I've truly tried to practice. Working on Oscar Wilde's The Canterville Ghost (La Fantasma de Canterville). No idea what it is other than that it's short, so that's fun hehe. Two pages an hour is Rough going. I'm sure I'll speed up as things get more comfortable again. It's really neat to hit a stretch of words that you can just read no problem. It's extra silly when you can read a thing in Spanish and know what it means, but not really be able to translate it back into English. I've already stopped writing every little word down to learn it, mostly now it's just the ones that I'm not picking up from context clues and various turns of phrase. There's those paragraphs where it's nothing but non-basic vocab, and you get to learn pigeon/dove, rabbit, squirrel, pheasant, and tail and various other nouns and adjectives describing some forested hills that you're not very likely to ever use in conversation anyways but it's fun to learn I guess.

So many words in Spanish are just so fun to say. Ornitorrinco is my favorite, but new words from today are bandada (flock) and vislumbraba (would glimpse) but that one's a conjugation so it's not quite as cool.

grandparents are more stable today, will visit tomorrow

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One of my mom's childhood friends has been married to this racist shitbag of a person for like 30 years and they hang out with him still, idk why. Sometimes I think it's because they're lonely and friends are hard to come by, other times I think it's because they might agree with his worse aspects, just more quietly. They have to hide the laser pointer because he points in the cat's face like a toddler. He once bragged about having his siri voice be black sounding because [insert abhorrent racism]. Literally. He's like 60 years old. It's a not-leaving-my-room kinda night while he's here. I guess that's one thing I miss about a two story house, that guests can stay downstairs and I can still exist normally upstairs. Alas, no longer.

Ok well now Grandma is in the hospital. I haven't thought about her mortality much before, always assuming she would outlive my grandpa. There would be time to think about it after he passed. I guess the time to think about it is now.

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Ok well now she might outlive my grandpa, because HE'S IN THE HOSPITAL. Having "heart surgery" whatever the hell that entails. bleghhhhhhhhhhhhh I wanna throw up.

I'm thinking about their rude ass dog who has attacked me every time I've visited. and how my dad said it's not urgent enough to need to come visit immediately but my brother who's worked in emergency rooms was already over there so I'm like, idk am I a bad grandson for not imposing myself into the situation when it's been told to me that it isn't necessary but I also don't really fully believe that myself. I know I can't *do* anything, and I don't really grieve publicly so it doesn't do me any particular good to be there and see things and be seen. It would exhaust me for sure.

I decided today was a good day to listen to Les Mis. It's actually absurdly better than either Wicked or Cats, because it has a not nonsensical story. I don't like when groups of people sing because it becomes unintelligble, and some of the solos are pretty musical-y, but overall it's fairly digestible. I still don't know that I will like it enough to make it a thing I would want to do repeatedly, unlike symphonies, but I have no further doubt that I will enjoy the experience (if my grandma is still alive next month...). Also it made me yearn, which I'm extremely pissed about. I haven't acutely yearned in like two months, I fucking hate yearning.

I'm less in the despair than I sound like I am in my anthropocene reviewed review, which is nice. Maybe just too sleepy.

Step sister having a lil get together next weekend to celebrate new baby being born. It (idk the sex, so it's an it for now) has the name of an objectively evil vampire lord in media, but it's a cool name so I give it a pass. I made myself reply and affirm my attendance (but it's an hour and a half drive ugggggh). I do like all of my niblings though, and I don't see them often. If I'm gonna be an unc anyways, I'll try to live up to it. I JUST made cookies but I feel like I want to make some more just to have something to bring. I am *terrible* at gifts because I hate vapid gifts. Don't even get me started on cards.

I did the thing where you only eat cookies for breakfast and then also for lunch. Worth.

Another good day, a bit sleepy. Lion King 1.5 is very silly. I didn't remember it quite as well as I did Ice Age, but it was still like 50% ingrained in memory.

Listened to a lot more of John Green book today. I think the more I learn about him the less I care for him, he's not my kinda person. I think I'm also struggling a bit from envy? like he's So normal and less relatable (to me) the more he talks, plus generational difference is noticeable in several of the essays. He likes people way more than I do, I think is the best summary. Some of the essays are kinda just like, 'yeah being in love and having friends is great, 4 stars'. Even his depression is different than mine, that's weird. He's a dude struggling with lockdown, Not with loneliness. The little anthropology or history or science essays are nice though. Might have been better to space it out a little more, but whatevs.

I've been putting the title into practice just a tiny bit more. The big thing yesterday is done and out of my hands, a very big exercise in speaking without overthinking. If you don't count the two months of overthinking it already.

Made lots of small talk with both volunteer grandmas this week; got to hear about old phones and computers that one used to use at work (a box of punch cards to load just one program eek), and from the other I got to be an outlet to give her some breathing room dealing with an unexpected death and just some nice small human moments.

Got home, asked mom finally about my idea of getting a second cat, which she pretty much immediately shut down lol. She's not into the one we have so I didn't expect a different answer, but it was nice to air the idea. Maybe she'll talk with step dad about it and we can gang up on her.

Started listening to The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green. I only know him as Hank's brother pretty much, but he's got similarly good vibes to nobody's surprise. Bro keeps giving awesome things 4.5 stars, so when he gives a 5 star review that bitch better be the greatest thing to ever exist. I appreciate the humanness in his Voice and prose, and that each little essay is evocative of a single part of humanity whose irrelevance to the previous topic instead helps establish the whole of us. I suppose more accurately the whole of John Green's view of us. He paints a pretty picture regardless. Bro is not gonna get me to like The Great Gatsby though.

also cleaned up the rotted roots from my plant, bro needed some love

I'm very proud of me today, good job me.

Doing a big thing without double checking it and being able to second guess yourself and back out 😓😓😓 ( I could technically still back out but I won't I swear I promise )

I had to look up where I remembered today's title quote from. Lion King 1 1/2, apparently. Absolutely gonna have to rewatch that soon, now. Peak childhood.

I made cookies because I haven't in a while and somebody at work said I should, then spent the rest of the day doing the aforementioned big thing. I might be able to actually relax soon. Wouldn't that be a treat.

Also yippee more than a month of journaling

Another relaxing weekend of intense media and intense thoughts to go along with it...

How do other people handle this? Surely if many forms of media over the centuries validate the existence of Big Thoughts, then they must exist and have existed and be able to be managed. Here I am, feeling crazy because all these big thoughts run my life now that I'm letting them have their say. Is it a lack of alternatives? Isn't this *more* real than a life of meagre distraction? Why does it feel so much worse?

It's funny that today I tried playing a game (Mina the Hollower) but quickly dropped it because it was too hard and I wasn't up for that. Instead, I chose to read a 1967 novel about a mutually abusive elderly couple and all their deepest grudges and machinations against each other, then write a long-winded review incorporating my own perceived abuse-adjacent actions, because that was so much easier than pressing a and x and moving a joystick around.

I feel like I'm really trying to get somewhere by doing all of this journaling and introspection, but I'm not sure that where I want to end up is where this path is taking me. But I don't know that it isn't, either. This is the hard road. Doesn't that make it the right one? Isn't that what everyone says? Or is that just my autistic ass taking things literally again and people really mean to just chill the fuck out and be happy like everybody else. That's the goal, but... I dunno. Sometimes this feels like a form of self harm. Trying to face everything that I detest about myself, to find some way through, when the answer is just that I'm overthinking everything and not that everything is too big for me.

I can know that, and still find a way around it. I know what I really need to do is make friends and talk about inanities and get the natural chemicals that I refuse to get artificially. I am both Marguerite and Emile, my victim and abuser, revelling in the control that I yield to myself. Stick with the known harms. They're so much safer than anything good could ever be.

---

My emergency threshold for therapy is suicidal thoughts, which are hardly present even among tumultuous shitshow I have in my head. I'm just delaying, delaying. I can switch insurance to something usable in December, that's only 5 months. I can live another 5 months. Winter is coming, but this is Phoenix baby. Winter is amazing.

I do feel better after getting the thoughts out, every time, but it's never easy to do. Like passing a kidney stone (probably idk, never had one). I just wish I didn't have them, y'know.

---

Finished ATLA. I'm not gonna overanalyze it I'm not gonna overanalyze it I'm not gonna overanalyze it I'm not gonna

I've been trying to be cute with sticking with re- words for my entry titles, but I realize they're not very descriptive always hehe

So I watched Whiplash. Very intense movie, to say the least. I give it a 9/10 because movies aren't my favorite medium so that's my maximum.

I'll go back the crux of Crime and Punishment: "If I worried myself all those days wondering whether Napoleon would have done it or not, I felt clearly of course that I wasn't Napoleon." I have been taking it to mean to be who you are, not who others want you to be, but I find another interpretation swimming around in my head. What if Raskolnikov had a Fletcher to push him? To abuse and manipulate him, to be sure, into being something great. Could he have been so? When is doubt an undeniable truth and when is it just an obstacle? If it's not a static answer, when does it change? Is greatness earned or is it given? Does it make Neiman great, or Fletcher great?

I gave up greatness a while ago. I wonder when greatness gave up on me. It certainly wasn't a single occasion. I guess everybody lives to live up to the expectations of others, and those expectations for me were vague and uncomplicated. All of my brothers went into the Army; I was expected to go to college. I did that. I don't know what else there was, really. I have societal things to draw upon, 'better' jobs or whatnot. Become an engineer like I went to school for. I find the same issue with future goals as I do with past ones: there's nobody these goals are for. I don't know what my parents want from me. It's telling in its own way that that's an overarching thought. My supervisor is the closest person I have to a mentor. He pushes me and supports me both. I understand the limits of his influence as much as he does though. He doesn't push me to exceed my own boundaries necessarily, to be greater than himself. He isn't a Great man. But it's the most I have, and I drink it up as much Neiman ever did.

I don't believe that self-motivation is real. We live in a society, as the saying goes. Being Great is being observed to be Great. Is Fletcher selfless because he's teaching another person to be Great instead of himself? I don't believe that for a second. He's observably monstrous, an abuser; he wields the power he takes with the same force he takes it with. We saw the care he put in Neiman, and the other kid who hanged himself. We saw the remorselessness in spite of that care. Accolade over life itself. Fletcher's version of greatness, imposed upon impressionable young men.

I'm thinking of my brother now. Of the military, and war, and patriotism, and duty. These things impressed upon young men by their elders. My family's definition, the legacy of a generation. Two, if you count my dad. I struggle with the idea of having 'escaped' that fate, when by most metrics they're all better off than I am. They have families and retirements and healthcare in perpetuity (theoretically). All for the cost of a little PTSD, watching people you swore to protect and defend and heal as a medic, die against your best efforts. I didn't have to go through *that* and I still almost ended up killing myself. I don't need a Fletcher, but it sure would be nice to have a dad who took me to the movies.

I had *this* thought a while ago too. Would my dad and step mom have been better parents for me? How does that vibe with a childhood of suppressed hatred for their harm against my mother? My step mom is A Lot. She's shameless. Their relationship is contentious but loving. It's been many years since I took note that they've been together longer than my mom and dad were. But she has a verbose and explicit love, as loud as the rest of her. My mom shows so little of that. My step-dad even less.

These thoughts are messy. They all kind of dead-end in feeling stuck. Like leaving this trap of stable confinement is to enter another trap of unstable freedom. I've nobody to be free for besides me, and I don't believe that self-motivation is real. Nothing in my life is bad enough to drive change, but nothing is good enough to either. Waiting on the world to change.

Me, sleepy, getting a text from my dad that my little brother is getting medical care for a drone blast from 40 feet away. He's okay, shaken, concussed, scratched. Lil bro I'm trying to sleep, don't get blown up, thanks.

Lots of complicated feelings. It's easy to hate the whole of a war, on principle. It runs much deeper when a news headline matches a text from your father; "Iran attacks injure several US troops in [redacted] this week: Report". I read it earlier today. I know my brother is over there. I haven't been thinking about him being over there though, and what it means, or could mean. I think it'll be hard to ignore going forward. Disdain for the war and for the president and the secdef runs so deep in my blood, it's hard to think of nuance when it comes to soldiers on the front lines. The only thing I can think of right now is all the anti-war music I know. BYOB, Soldier Side, War Pigs, Fortunate Son, Disposable Heroes.

I dunno what I would think if he got killed. Could I be more mad at this administration? Yeah, probably. Mad at my brother for enlisting with this fucking administration? Yeah, but mostly would be misplaced grief.

Not like I needed another excuse to say it, but Fuck Trump. Fuck Hegseth. Fuck every single Republican in Congress. Fuck Lindsey Graham in his dead fucking face. Fuck any dems who support this shit too.

Fuck

Grandma renewed her earlier-this-year promise of taking me to Les Mis for my birthday. I took to her see Scheherezade (Rimsky-Korsakov) for her birthday last year and it's probably like the most proud of myself I've ever been. There's so many factors that put it into play, it was like a culmination of feeling like a real actual adult for once in my life. Buying tickets, dressing up, driving across town to her place, picking her up, driving downtown, having lunch together, then the concert... So many little things that I've picked away at being able to do, all put together to make something special happen. A wonderful date.

I have Zero experience with musicals and low-key a quite negative pre-disposition to them, but I don't have any defensible expectations set. I've seen the Cats movie which... yeah. and I tried watching Wicked but could not handle the raw theater kid energy pouring from every scene without remorse. I know Les Mis is a little more serious than either of those, so that'll probably help. Also it'll be a real actual theater production, which I've never experienced at all. Well, there was that first grade school play where I played a maggot, and my only line was a very staccato "I am a maggot!". I don't think I'd count that though. I should *probably* familiarize myself with the vibe a little bit. Maybe just the music, not any of the movies or anything, so I can have something truly novel from the experience.

Honestly a part of me is afraid that I'll like it... It's impossible for me to deny that I have repressed theater kid instincts somewhere inside of me. I've been watching critical role for 10 years and they are *all* theater kids. Big into Dropout stuff. I used to voice act the Phoenix Wright games with friends once a week, which was expressive in a way that I hadn't done since being told never to make a silly voice again by an asshole in high school who I called a friend. I liked voicing women the most, ngl. Nothing to read into there, surely.

I guess the fear is mostly the fact that theater kids are canonically loud and strong and shameless personalities, which is super rough for me to match, which I would have to do because mimicry is a survival instinct. It would be enough for me to like it alone in my shell, but liking it amongst other people who like it is a spooky situation. It's the same idea of like why live shows for CR or D20 are Terrifying. I feel like a fraud, not because I don't really really like it but because I can't express it or show it in the way that other people can. I also don't have the kind of brain where I can endlessly quote things (though I think a large part of that is that I don't have anybody to endlessly quote things to, to solidify phrases into memory). I don't have the guts to cosplay. Shit, I don't even have the guts to talk to my actual literal brother about CR even though he just started watching recently. but! I do wear my CR socks all the time (e.g. right now), so that's some sort of progress in expressing things in a physical scenario. Aw man I just remembered in uni I saw a guy wearing a CR shirt and didn't say anything.

Anyways uhhhh. Les Mis. It'll be nice to have another date with my grandma at the very least. I'll probably like it. Oh yeah, I guess another hiccup is it being my birthday. Not my favorite day of the year. Attention and all that, to say nothing of depressy Bad vibes of years past. but it's fiiiiine, I'm allowed to be treated to things and be loved or whatever other affirmations I should tell myself.

It's been rainy this week which is nice. I say this every week but I *need* to hike this weekend lol. It won't be 100 degrees by 9 AM like the last time I tried. Today went by quick. It's 6pm but i'm eepy as hell, might have something to do with journaling for an hour. you can tell i'm sleepy because I'm not going to capitalize those i's and I'm rambling now and whatever time to go watch avatar and be cozy goodbye

Today was better. Quieter in the ol' noggin. Decided to message my friend instead of being a spiteful bitch. Wrote out two different emails (the only way we can communicate now lol), the first was very sobby and scared and it felt real but didn't feel like what i want to actually get out of sending a message. The second was more 'normal' i guess. Less needy feeling. Lighter. Glad I went that route. (she replied while I was typing this, so, extra glad hehe).

My grandma called me while I was cooking dinner, so I had to answer and tell her I'll call her back while already a bit stressed at the stuff going on in the kitchen, then I had to deal with the fact that I had to call her back. We talked for a good ten minutes though, which is about ten more minutes than I've talked to anybody on the phone in months. Being the favorite grandson is fucked up bc everybody always points out how she's mean and spiteful but she's never like Overly so to me. I've seen her go off tho lol. It was a long overdue call, and her reaching out to me was like the tipping point for motivating me to reach out to my friend. Thanks grandma 💕

My other grandpa is also in the hospital apparently. That's all three of my living grand- and step-grandpas at the same time with more or less the same shit lol. Old guys and heart failure, what a combo. They're all still kickin tho. Stubborn to the bone. My step grandpa almost lost his good leg to a blood clot, but miracled his way out of that somehow. I really would doubt his ability to recover from that, considering his other foot has been missing since he was 18. I'm not close to him (haven't seen him in years) but the secondhand effects of close family are definitely felt. My step dad and his mom haven't been on good terms, but this finally got them to reconnect a little bit, which has been another little boost in the direction of me trying to do similarly.

I'm sure I'll stumble again, and again, and again. Having this little moment to fucking breathe is such a blessing. I gotta write this shit down so I make sure my future self knows it too. It does happen occasionally. Gotta take it all in.

I miss being a numb shell like when I was on antidepressants. This shit is so hard. If healthcare access wasn't an opaque nightmare I'd probably still be on them, but this is America. I could start them again but I hated my psychiatrist because he made me feel like a free money machine, "yeah my meds are fine" "okay that'll be $150 for this appointment, see you next month", and now I think they'll all be like that. I got my final rx through a pcp but then I quit my job and lost insurance and ran out of meds eventually (this was Decemeber 2024). I know I'd have to start slow and I don't know that a pcp would be able to accommodate that. Not to mention current insurance being a hdhp that only covers a single visit before deductible, and not having a pcp. Psych wouldn't be covered at all, and it's why I still haven't restarted therapy. My previous therapist gave me a huge ick, so I'd have to find a new one. I *can* afford it but fuck the systems that this country uses to discourage seeking treatment. Meanwhile my grandpa is in the hospital every other week for chronic health issues that they can't do anything about since his diagnosis is he's old and eats like shit while diabetic and is taking (LITERALLY) 15 medicines to keep him alive for some reason that I can only conclude is that he's a good source of income for all the doctors. Just let all the old people fucking die and give me healthcare instead.

I resent the idea of being so fundamentally broken that I need to be chemically altered to fix it, in the same way that I despise the idea of being drunk or high or getting put under for surgery and all the repressed shit that I would let spill out when I wake up intoxicated. I have no idea what it's like. I've tried alcohol several times but it's literal poison and disgusting even in the smallest quantities, so like, ew. Weed is legal but I have no safe person to be with that I would trust with me. The only person I would have trusted with it didn't even need to get me high to abuse and traumatize me, so...

The idea of dependency is also more horrifying than the idea that I'm just an unhappy piece of shit, so at least I've got that going for me.

Man, I'm really deep in the self loathing lately ain't i

---

I wonder what the cost-benefit analysis is on self-loathing vs. letting myself be angry

I do feel a little better ? It is kinda nice to spout some vile shit like let the olds die without feeling too bad about it. The more genuine feeling is that idk how a person can be so motivated to stay alive that they put themselves through all that, plus the literal cost to society. I'm the kinda guy who hates being in a dedicated turn lane and making ten cars have to wait for me to turn. Everything is countable in man-minutes e.g. ten cars waiting 30 seconds for me to turn is 5 man-minutes, but I could wait one minute for the lane to clear enough, then the world saves four man-minutes. Being any kind of a burden is my idea of a bad time. That's why I abandon relationships instead of trying to resolve them when things go bad, even if I really really care about the other person and low-key need them in my life to be happy. Yee haw.

It also is demotivating when you establish a point of crisis with a friend, later tell them you've reached it, and get no support from them (or anything; we haven't talked since I told them). Sometimes I feel like the abandoner and others like the abandonee. It flips back and forth a lot honestly. Getting left on read three times in a row over three consecutive occasions does feel quite bad, regardless. We were already drifting apart a little bit, but like damn, y'know. I've had two separate dreams about talking to her. Once was a nice catch-up dream (on discord, which I deleted now), but the other was having to physically chase her down to get her attention and that one feels more plausible even though she's 1400 miles away and I don't know her address. It's been a full month and I want to reach out, but I'm also still spiteful enough to feel that if anything resembling friendship is going to happen, it will have to start on her end.

I deliberately chose not to reply to another friend just to not be the last one to send a message (his message didn't Need a reply, so it's cool). If I can have just one (1) friendship die that doesn't die with me as the last voice, I can accept that end. It's really a state of mind to be in when you'd rather win at losing a friendship than try to keep it... Not that trying to keep it was doing any good.

Those are kinda all the thoughts that I was typing out yesterday but with much less vitriol. yesterday's version was Bad.

---

I notice I'm doing this thing where I almost have my life turned inside out? Like, I care so much more about the online friends that I'm chopping from my life with a blunt axe, than I care about the people that I interact with on a daily/weekly basis as a real human being. Part of that I think is that I'm not my whole true self irl. I only* get to be that online (see: this whole website). The qualifier there is that I probably could do well for myself offline but I haven't tried, reject opportunites to try, or just idk... For example my two closest coworkers play DayZ and they've tried to get me to play several times but I don't. A big enough part of that is that i don't wanna play DayZ lol, but just as much is the part of me that wants to be a separate entity online vs offline, and having an overlap of the two is anathema. I hide so so much irl, but I know that people be talkin, and if I give people things to talk about about me, then they will. I'm a little control freak and I *hate* when people know things about me that I didn't tell them personally, it freaks me the fuck out because I get reminded that I exist outside of this stupid little bone prison, and I routinely forget that other people exist and then have to face the fact that I'm a terrible person for it.

All of the facets of my life are so compartmentalized. Work is work, full stop. Volunteering is volunteering, full stop. Home outside of my room is home outside of my room, full stop. Home inside of my room (and online) is home inside of my room (and online), full stop. Separate, distinct, minimal to no overlap wherever possible. I rarely talk about myself at work. I very very rarely talk about work (or anything) at home. I find it like oddly violating to talk intimately about people outside of their ability to know about it? I guess that's a bit broad or hypocritical bc I'm talking Very intimately here about lots of people who won't know about this, but it's a diary so idk if it counts, but... but like even when I would talk to friends about things at work, I bodily cringe at the idea of using my coworkers' names as some sort of violation of privacy and thus just complicate my anecdote by vague references and pronoun usage when a name would make it so much easier to both share and hear and has literally no possible effect on my coworker ever at all ever and enables further anecdotes to be more easily understood. Just one of many quirks that make me difficult.

Yesterday I think was especially bad because that compartmentalization got challenged very very supremely. My co-volunteer at the rescue is a wonderful, friendly, sweet old lady who loves to chat, and I like her because we actually have things in common (mostly loving hiking/nature/cats). But talking at all means talking about things I don't want to talk about (because I'm a freak, not because they're painful), so she's asking me about camping and I bring up that my brother and step-dad camp but I haven't been in a long time but I could totally borrow their stuff if I wanted to; and about work stuff, questions about what I do, how'd I learn that, did I go to school for it, yada yada yada. The most innocuous chit-chat that has me screaming on the inside to please stop, I don't wanna talk, but I can't make her think i don't like her because I do like her but aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. WHO MADE THIS FUCKING BRAIN. and why do I have to be the one to unfuck it, ugh. somebody fix me.

---

Okay brain, is that enough? Can we be quiet for the rest of the day? please :(

I hate my brain today. Deleting everything I type because it fucking sucks from a human perspective. Can I be somebody else yet?

The flicker of a candle keeps the room in a deep gloom. Lumps of wax litter the corner. Some are puddles, a body in rigor mortis, the flame long gone. Others are intact, used yet unlit, holding the memory of flame, one moment in time waiting, waiting for the next.

The man sits holding a pristine candle in one hand, a fine layer of dust coating the top. His last. It's been so long since he's crafted one.

There are no matches left. No fire is burning in the hearth. One waning candle is all the warmth left in this room. He has two options: light this last candle and keep the flame alive, or let it die.

To light it would begin a race. He would need its luminance to work by, its heat to melt new stock, to trim new wicks, mix new perfumes, to set the mold, secure the wick, to pour the wax and wait. One candle can't do all that. It could go out before he's finished, leaving him left with nothing but invisible effort. Or he might craft a single replacement just in time to transfer the flame, do it again, then again, and again until he runs out of wax, or wicks, or scent, or breath.

He thinks of the memories scattered on the floor, mere shadows now. Their scent would make him nauseous, the smell of lost joy. No, those mustn't be lit. Better to suffer the acrid slap of burning dust and endless toil. Better still to sit and watch this last gentle flame dwindle, clean and pure. Of course it too will go out eventually, but he'd have one good candle left to his name. There's a certain light in that, isn't there? A certain warmth? Yes, better to sit and watch the flame flicker out, to wait for that one last pitiful exhale of smoke and be done.

The chandler wakes, dusty candle heavy in hand, to find the threat of day relieving the tiny watchman holding vigil in the corner. Pillars and pools of color now litter the floor, the muted hues of sunrise: darkest purple, lightest yellow, deepest orange tinting the once-gloom. He stands, makes his careful way past the taunting spires teasing him with their mutual secrets, towards this old chance at something new. The flame catches. An acrid pinch starts the clock. Time to work.

Oh boy this one is a jumbled mess, which is appropriate given how much of a jumbled mess it is. Might delete it later idk. It's intended to be topical to the shame self-discovery but it's a bit of a well-worn path that's hard to diverge from. Brain isn't at full capacity to make this much more than word vomit.

--

I wonder what it would be like to be out.

I've never really considered myself in the closet, but I suppose I am (irl). I'm like 90% straight, but that remaining 10% is like a full-blooded 10%, not just like 'oh I wonder'. It's much less common that I'm attracted to a guy, not necessarily less intense. To one of my coworkers, for example. I have no gaydar or maybe he's just straight, idk. Would tho fr.

There's some cases where it's like, being exhausted by the idea of women and it's really nice having a little place to retreat to still. Other times it's just the body craving certain things. I'd love to suck a dick, y'know. It sounds fun as hell.

Aside from being bi, there's being ace/demi. Very demi. I feel like demi is more difficult to cope with because it's not a blanket No, it's just a very very specific and delayed yes. I feel like the canonical gay man is exhaustingly horny, even though my gay friends don't fall into that category (or at least have the ability to keep it to themselves). Especially like, Grindr or whatever. Is this internalized homophobia... hmmmmmm

I don't hate loud gay people any more than I hate loud straight people, so probably not? I'm just jealous of anybody who gets to be open and out and proud. About anything really, not just sexuality. I oscillate between horniness and sex repulsion on the regular, so the motivation to come out is usually already decimated by the time it would have any legs. And coming out as demi is like... I already ain't getting any so... Coming out wouldn't make much difference because most of my repression is still really internalized, I suppose. The impermanence of my sexuality also makes it really difficult to want to commit to anything.

Trauma really puts a damper on exploring things. Like, if it was just irl trauma or just long distance trauma, I could isolate it and use the other to explore. But noooo, it's gotta be the full package.

I've found it interesting how I've had *zero* desire to get on the Apps again lately. I had one modestly succesful relationship from Hinge and broke down a lot of the trauma, but also I kinda was using her as a way to break down those barriers and get over trauma more than I was y'know, trying to fall in love and form a partnership. Not to say I didn't really really like her and respect her and find her fun and cute and safe and worthy of my trust, but once I hit a serious wall with some of the remaining issues, it fell apart pretty quickly. Triggering trauma with her essentially turned her into a new trigger :/ and I didn't really see a way through that. Now, knowing how long it took to get things where they were with her, having to do that again with another person and risk the same thing happening or just moving the needle a tiny bit farther, then having to do it again, then again, then again... and that's if when I get far enough with the other person to ask them out, they say yes.

I call it my trauma trauma.

The hopeless romantic in me imagines that it'll just happen some day. The realist in me knows I need to provide myself with those opportunities. The social anxiety in me says nah fuck that. Repress the repression and keep vibing.

--

This is mostly in response to the latest Smartypants episode with the presentation on chopped politicians. I just don't really identify with any broad group. I'm not one of the girls, nor one of the boys. I'm not one of the straights, nor one of the gays. I'm just a guy, man. Like, I know for sure which group I'd rather be in, but having such a mixed identity in a polarized world is confusing as fuck. I know what I am but I don't know where to place myself in the world. I'm enormously intimidated by communities that I agree with or like but feel like I would be rejected for for being unable to qualify that agreement or have the appropriate experiences or enthusiasm or whatever the hell is needed to fit in.

Ceding control is terribly difficult. That ineffectual child needing to have something goes his way, battling the adult that knows when a thing is lost. That inexperienced child deeming a thing lost, battling the adult that knows there could still be something to salvage. I can't ignore that child. He's been neglected for far too long. I hear him. I see him. I love him. I respect him. I think he's a silly little ignorant fool, but that doesn't mean he's wrong. Belief is truth, whether or not the belief is true. I'm the adult. I get the final say. But I know that ceding to his truths is often as necessary as recognizing reality is. Let him believe. Give him agency. Let him grow up how he should have. Kids are the most capable learners, the quickest minds. He will learn too to give me the same courtesy, I am sure.

Spent a fair bit of time and emotional energy doing something I've wanted to do for a while but haven't been in the right mood to do properly. It's very very important and personal so no peeksies, but I'm happy with the first draft.

Had this bookmarked from another person's page, very much up my alley. Ray and TwoSet are a big reason I like the violin so much even though I've never touched one. 90% sure I saw Eddy when I was at the Concertgebouw in May (not on stage, sadly). Anyways, the opener made me weep. I wasn't ready. Well, apparently I was absolutely ready to cry because it was almost instantaneous, but it still surprised me lol. Here's that if you wanna cry too. Instant add to the playlist. I have the opportunity to see the Bach violin double concerto next season too... I thought about not bc I'm so-so on the other pieces, but it's soooo good. The Piazzola piece was fun as hell, what a guy.

One thing that's really tricky about journaling is how focused each entry has to be in order to finish the train of thought. I can look back at the previous entry and see how it can so easily read as me hating both my parents and that they have no redeeming qualities, but I do love them. It's hard to fit nuance in and hard to develop a comprehensive picture of all of everything in my head and then put it to paper. It's something I want to try to do, to connect entries into a coherent whole and not just scattered thoughts. I re-read them more than I should, honestly, but eventually there'll be so many that it becomes improbable to do so. Dunno. Just gonna ride the rest of the emotional release down into a blissful contentedness for today.

"What the fuck is the point of all this, then?"

Well, mother, it's been 10 years since you asked that and I still don't have a good answer for you.

I was a senior in high school. AP classes, great grades (4.67 GPA, but who's counting?), full scholarships to either state uni. College was what life has been leading up to, of course I was going to go to college. Go to school, keep learning, that's the thing you want from me, the thing that I do well. I'll keep on doing it. There's some whispers about a thing called a job that you're supposed to do after college, but that was just a word to me then. I had a path, at least for a while.

Right before my mom asked me the point of her spending time and money to take me on a tour upstate, she asked if I even wanted to go to college. I said I didn't know. She'd probably heard that a lot over the weekend, enough to the point where she felt the need to ask so obvious a question. I could do math, physics, chemistry, write an essay, say the alphabet backwards, recite 27 digits of pi, whatever else you learn in school. Explain myself to my mother? I was never taught how to do that. What class was that in?

I still don't know how to do it.

I do know who my teacher was, though. Who else could it be? But the lesson that stuck the hardest, the one most sharply delivered: comply. What the fuck is the point of all this, then, you ask with a whip you've never used on me before. The point now was to not be yelled at by my mother for not having an answer ever again. I didn't know the answer, but I knew that she did. The correct answer was "yes". So I did. I went to class, I came home, and did that a thousand or so times over the next four years. I've got a piece of paper to prove it.

I have a memory of my dad.

My parents were recently divorced. Living separately, split custody (dad every other weekend), the typical story. We're in his truck, driving to his place. It's a white Ford F-150. There's a number pad to unlock the driver door. A grey fabric interior. A spacious backseat, all mine, except for mine and my brother's luggage, of course. Picture a truck, and you've got the picture. I have with me my blanket, a thing of home, my safest of objects. I was not truly leaving home if my blanket was coming with me. We're on the freeway. My dad rolls his window down and the air in the cabin starts pulsating as waves of pressure force their way in, then out, anathema to my sensitive ears. I complain, or he notices it himself, and my brother's window cracks down enough to quiet the barrage, though the sound of rushing air is still loud and unchanging. There's the *click* *click* of a practiced thumb against a lighter, and the perfume of burning tar and tabacco gets stirred into the atmosphere, the open window meant to serve as a vent instead pushing the scent into every nook and cranny.

I'm a smart, precocious little fellow. I've seen people on TV or around campires cover their mouths to filter out smoke. I grab my blanket, throw it over my head. The rush of air quiets down a little. One sense balmed. It's darker underneath the cover. Another. The familiar touch of the fabric. A third. The smell is still there. This acrid, nauseating, vile concoction of my dad's choice. Even my blanket is not enough. That's my earliest memory of my father.

When you're six years old, many choices are made for you. What food to eat, what clothes to wear, when bed time is. Whether or not your parents stay together (no). Whether or not the woman your dad cheated on your mom with is going to be there with your new baby brother when you're dragged away from home for scheduled visitation (yes). Whether your dad will smoke in the car, to start each visitation off the exact wrong way (yes). Fighting back yields no results. Hiding dad's cigarettes, but he yells at you to give them back. Pleading with mom not to have to go, but going anyways. The choices that matter, made for you.

Visitation slowed but never stopped until my brother went into the Army. Finally I got to say no, but by then, was it even still a choice? or was it the echo of a decade of enabled abduction, the betrayal of my mom's heroic status as an adult who could say no if she wanted to, and the persistence of a father who wouldn't see how much it was hurting me. I don't blame an angry cat for biting me when I get too close or a dog for barking when I encroach on their territory. It's instinct, not a choice. How could I do anything but exercise every bit of opportunity I had to stay home?

The choice was made for me. I went to college.

Years later, and I'm still compliant. Get along to go along. Cause no trouble. Make no enemies. Make no friends. Stand for nothing. Sit down and shut the fuck up and do what's expected of you.

Explain myself to you? Sorry, Mom. You never taught me how.

--

Story over, brain dump time.

She's a fine person, but a shit mom. No offense. It's... different saying it in a public space. I don't remember if I got to this stuff when I was in therapy? Hopefully it helps, letting the parts of me that never got to, express their feelings.

I can't say I'm super pleased that this is mostly becoming an anger outlet lol, but I don't want to shy away from myself in any manner in this space either. It'll all get out eventually.

Today's inspiration is that my discord account no longer exists. Full deletion. Irrecoverable. Gone, after five years. The latest and greatest manifestation of me leaving entirely instead of causing the barest amount of trouble. At least I can commit to the choices I make.

Not too much in my head. Wrote book review for Senlin Ascends, which I finished at work today instead of working. Started making my way through the Beethoven string quartets (Emerson String Quartet). Got up to 4 today before getting distracted. First three were fine, but the fourth was the best so far. Also was the only one in a minor key, so that's probably the difference. Started listening to *another* political book but I don't think I have it in me, it's especially exhausting lol. Escapism hours for now.

still quite content today. I have been eating a little more consistently so that's probably helped. Same breakfast and lunch three days in a row goes hard (yogurt and leftover pasta).

update: ok I got miffed exploring sites and reading somebody's blog post about how people with social anxiety or lack of social skills should just suck it up and get over it because the only way out is through (though the misandry was probably the thing that made it feel especially vapid).

It's weird having a literal diagnosed anxiety disorder and still feeling like I don't deserve to be able to call something like that out as ableist. Can I say that? That it's unhelpful, ableist bullshit? I sure want to.

Why can't I? I want to say, because it's just as unhelpful to call it out, as the original post was unhelpful itself. That it's a reactionary self defense mechanism and not the product of informed reason. That all the experiences this person has, that they're able to spout inane criticisms of a class of issues under the guise of advice, is the photo negative of the reasons that I don't feel like I can rebut it. Why talk to people who have their minds so made up about you already? Am I supposed to partition off the part of me that's offended by somebody's strongly held beliefs just for the droplet of social nectar that could be squeezed out? and it is squeezing, a laborious task. Why can't I just be my whole self to people?

My social anxiety is as much a part of me as anything, and being judged for it is not, in fact, a cure, nor even a little bit helpful. (I know I'm playing victim a little bit here bc in no way was it directed at me personally). I hardly know if it's something that needs curing. Like yes, to an extent, but I'm able to exist and contribute to society and still have enormous amounts of social shortcomings. It took a lot of work to get to this point, and I'm proud of that work and the results, even though I want to be better than I am about it all still. Let me be socially anxious and maybe I'd feel more open to not being it.

Worked a little bit on the water* chakra (*editor's note: I'm an idiot and it's been the Fire chakra this whole time). Shame is definitely bigger than I thought. Today I mostly ran through my brain trying to put down some memories of times that people made me feel ashamed and some things that I feel situationally shameful about that don't have a specific source. Since my biggest goal is to be more comfortable in my own skin irl, I also imagined the most basic scenario of meeting a random stranger and then thought of all the things I might be ashamed about that I might hide from them or would be reasons not to engage with them, etc. It's easy to start with idealistic random strangers because they don't actually exist, and even if they did, a chance meeting is impermanent and oft forgotten. I'll have to gradually work towards shame regarding sharing actual things with actual people.

Some sources of shame are definitely things unique to when my brain is just being mean to me i.e. things that a healthier, happier brain would give me grace on. Posture, hygiene, unfailingly wearing a hoodie even when it's *checks weather* 112 degrees today. Others have graceful explanations outside of my brain, if I let it be such. One example is being called out somewhat snidely for being a bit of a barnacle on the boat that was my best friend in uni. If that analogy was insufficient: I mostly clung to him and didn't contribute much. The occasion was especially egregious bc it was just three of us and late on a Tuesday evening and I didn't say *anything* on the whole 15 minute walk to the parking lot while they chatted about whatever. Upon saying goodbye, our tertiary member just made some comment to me like 'good talkin to you'. It wasn't mean, really, but definitely made me self-conscious. The graceful explanation is that, yeah it's weird to silently shadow like that lol, and him acknowledging it is more of a thing about him trying to make sense of it than trying to shame me for it.

Other sources of shame are pernicious devils, even when their perpetrator was a huge piece of shit you know better than to give any credit to, at all, ever, in any situation. If only the brain were so easy as that to control. He's a long-litigated yet not fully-resolved issue in my head that I know needs professional external assistance to quiet, so I won't dwell more than I have to to write it down. Just a bad person.

One last tricksy shame is things said offhand that don't have a graceful explanation but also weren't intended to shame; raw negative comments, but not made in bad faith. The only real thing to do with those is to just be more self-assured, but that's tough sometimes, especially when it's from somebody whom you care a lot about their opinion.

Since it's the hottest day of the year so far, I went for a nice 2 mile walk in my favorite park. I needed to sweat and be stinky enough that I'm compelled to shower, but also exercise is good for you or something. Saw lots of cute tiny baby quail that are too skittish to get a good picture of :( but for all the dwelling on shame and insecurity, brain is quite content. Doing something right.

messed with css+js some more, added minor gradients to the backgrounds of stuff, made buttons more tactile, and refined the journal pages a tiny bit more (still not fully happy with it but I'll get there). Definitely need to figure out something to do with my header, it's ugly af still. Index page idk, I'm mostly fine with it being 90% my dog hehe, but would be nice to have something for better first impressions as far as the vibes, though sidebar does an okay job with that

water* chakra (*editor's note: I'm an idiot and it's been the Fire chakra this whole time) is still fully blocked, not sure I want to tackle shame just yet. Rather, it will be a multi-day process that I haven't started yet and may continue to procrastinate.

I spent a bit of time trying to cleanse my earth chakra, but hit a bit of a wall. Turns out intense introspection is difficult, who woulda thought. I spent time kinda RPing a therapy session with my fear of authority figures, and it ended up as me being miffed that I'm so judgy of people by default and that I don't feel like I can hide it very well, so people know I'm judging them and thus don't like me very much etc etc, and so it's extra hard to break down that initial barrier of getting to know them enough to either not be judgy or to have judged them properly.

I have a Core Memory from high school of being made to sit next to some totally normal kids in my art elective. I was in advanced classes, so I didn't really interface with other students outside of those except for electives. But I go and sit next to them and like the first thing the cool one says is that he can tell that I think I'm better than them just by looking at my face. It was probably true and he was probably right, but the idea of my internal thoughts playing out so obviously on my external features and with such specific detail absolutely was a foreign concept. I wasn't aware my face could say that much without me knowing it.

I carry that idea with me still. Especially being not very normal, I tend to be proactively self-defensive as a way to not feel lesser; judging before I can be judged, I guess. Not the healthiest mechanism, to be sure. And wearing a face that I don't know how to control makes that a tricksy prospect, and I end up being judged for my internal judging. I don't even know how true it is, in many cases. There's lots of social cues other than facial expressions that I either don't know to give or don't remember to give, in order to make somebody feel like I'm engaging with them on an equal and impartial level. I'm aware of it sometimes, like people ask me how my day was and I answer but don't ask back. Like, I understand that it's part of the social norm to do so, but also understanding that the answer I give doesn't matter so why should I care about the answer they give, so why ask? etc.

The fear there is that I know how important it is to get people to like you, especially people in authority, but I don't care enough consistently enough to put in the work to get people to like me that I don't already like. So if something happened and I had to defend myself (verbally) (with my very poor ability to manage confrontation and articulate feelings in real time), being talked around or talked over is such a real possibility, and if the given authority figure doesn't like me then I don't feel like I'd get a fair outcome. It's a little silly because I do my very best not to cause drama, and like with 2 years at my current job there's never been anything I've had to worry about with that sort of thing. Conflict avoidance is deep in my veins.

There's probably locked memories somewhere in my head that relate to being in trouble and not being able to verbalize my defense, but I don't have any specific ones on tap. Maybe there's too many for any one to stand out? But being just a little on edge every time authority figures walk past my desk (multiple times a day) because they might come talk to me (they almost never do) and I might be in trouble (literally never happened yet) is a fun fact of life. Part of the solution is to like, break down those barriers and make nice, but there's also a significant part of me that usually thinks that's so not worth the effort and they can deal with the real me. Masking at work more than I already have to would not be super sustainable. That bit of anxiety only rarely culminates in real/lasting anxiety (physical stress, negative thoughts, etc.), not that it wouldn't be nice for it to go away completely, but it's manageable as far as work goes.

When it's not manageable is in the wild, when topics can be Anything and Everything with people that I don't know how they're gonna respond and my whole brain is in overdrive to stay ahead of any perceptible social lack (which is an unachievable goal, let's be real). So often it just ends up as disengagement, even if I'm not having a bad time. Socializing is just that difficult.

Didn't journal yesterday, went to sleep at 8pm after trying to take a bath and just being exhausted by the heat of it. There's tradeoffs to being so tired. Brain is less active, so the anxiety and dooming lessens. It's not exactly fun though. Feels a bit depressive. No real energy for fulfilling hobbies and more just like bedrotting trying to be comfy, being sick without the sick idk. 9 hours of sleep and a 3 hour nap today.

I've had this sore inside my bottom lip that's been extremely annoying, my mouth constantly feels sticky no matter how much water I drink or if I brush my teeth or rinse my mouth, and it's swollen and sensitive and ugh. I hate lips on a good day, and this is not helping that opinion at all.

caught up on critical role s4 now. real good. it's silly of me to want to share it with people but also refusing to engage with the community at large, idk. sharing things with friends in general so rarely ever got met with earnest attempts at trying it, or at least if they did try it they never talked to me about it after which is like, kind of the point of sharing things with other people?? which is fine for cr bc it's an enormous catalog of a niche product, but like a ten minute album of piano music i think somebody would like, or a 20 minute video I found interesting and wanted to share and sharing it just like ends up being 'ok i'll check it out' and then never hearing from them about it again idk. I feel like it's such an important thing in a friendship to be able to share things with candor and without judgement, and it sucks when it isn't there. Part of me feels partly responsible? I won't say I'm perfect at it either, but idk I feel like I try. I struggle with short form stuff especially though, like not *ever* having had any social media except tiktok for a month several years ago bc my therapist recommended it but I deleted it bc I hate how it feels to be sucked into the short form algorithm (even though I curated it decently well, I just Hate the format). It feels like a lot of the choices I make to keep myself true to myself, actively push me away from methods of connection, and there's no lasting compromise even when I try to reach for it.

Stuff like reddit and various fora never quite did it for me either. Anything large and anonymous just feels so fruitless. I'll read it but not really engage with it. Yes it sort of achieves the social outlet but it's like comparing masturbation to having loving sex. One is empty and hollow the second it's over, and the other is soul-fulfilling. Meaningful connection is just so hard to find when you have so many walls up against the idea of people and refuse to play ball. Imagine that. It explains not getting new friends but not losing existing ones, that one's still a mystery how it happens. Well, why it happens. I can mostly guess how.

update: brother over for dinner (steak and lobster yee haw, but I don't like steak and am allergic to lobster), I was just leaving the table back to my room and he mentions watching a nerd show and that there's a lot of it to catch up on and I'm sus so I linger just enough to hear him name it and it's critical role hehe. I've thought about telling him about it for years bc he's played dnd since high school but idk same kinda vibe of it being my thing and sharing is scary. I think if it was just me and him I'd probably be able to talk about it with him but my parents are such suppressants when it comes to me opening up that I just can't in front of them. i have no idea how much they know about me but I don't share very much despite living with them. Housing stability is nice, and saving lots of money on rent, and I feel like if I start sharing things eventually I'll share things that I don't want them to know (how I vote, being bi-ish, having trans friends, etc.). I don't think my mom would care mostly? but step-dad is questionable. I used to not even treat my room as mine really, but over the last couple years that's been better. It's not even like they're abusive or dismissive, it's just not a thing that we've ever had really.

update 2: finished earth season of atla. I think I'm going to try as an exercise to clear my chakras so I can freely enter the avatar state or just be more at peace with myself or something. There's seven but only like five-ish are relevant really. Focusing on the things that block them:

• earth chakra - fear
• water chakra - guilt
• fire chakra - shame
• love chakra - grief
• sound chakra - lies
• light chakra - illusion
• thought chakra - earthly attachment

fear and shame I think are the two biggest blocks for me. Fear is I think pretty reasonable? or rather the things that are just fear and not also shame are. fear of being alone, fear of domestic instability, fear of spiraling into a depression, the usual.

honestly I kind of forgot shame was an emotion, but thinking about it more it's kinda like the biggest emotion I might struggle with overall? that's gonna take some real processing.

guilt I work with a lot, I'm pretty good at apologizing when I feel like I did things wrong so I don't harbor a lot of guilt. There's a bit of guilt harbored in just like situational stuff, privilege and the like. Nobody wants to hear about the cis white man being guilty about having privilege tho fr.

grief I find to be relevant if I broaden it to loss in general, grieving friendships and the like. It's a hard one to process while also not feeling like you're dwelling in the past, bc they're not Dead yk just moved on. It also feels very final to declare something worth grieving over, and I'm not sure when that should be.

Lies is a little deeper, there's definitely some stuff there that aren't quite Lies lies but are things I think of myself that might not be true? tricky

Illusion was taught to be that things of the earth are all interconnected, and it's an illusion to think otherwise. I'm not sure what to do with that one. I agree that it matters to leave the world better than we find it and I generally live by that rule.

Letting go of earthly attachment go naysayed by Iroh so I'm gonna listen to him.

pretty sleepy, not too many thoughts. updated the visuals of blog pages a bit, rearranged things to newest first (mostly so I don't have to keep scrolling to the bottom of the html page to add new entries lol). Only one episode behind on critical role now, d20 vampire season should be wrapped up soon, Midst/Unend should keep me happy until then for sure. need to hike this weekend at least once. started new book last night, Senlin Ascends. not deep in yet but interesting so far, very chaotic in a coherent way which is fun, the world feels huge and overwhelming but not confusing. lots of ways things can go even more wrong than they already have hehe.

The frustration at unforced errors at work and anxiety at being angry and general anxiety for meetings bleeds over a lot into thoughts outside of what's relevant. Been thinking about that since realizing I haven't really been defining some anger as anger. When it's as one dimensional as being fed up with dumb stuff, it's easier not to be overwhelmed or immobilized by it I guess? Whereas being angry at friends I care a lot for drags in like a dozen other emotions, each with their own niche and trail to follow, and it's an absolute process to nail them down. But it's like, anger is a shared emotion between the two sources and since the one is so easily glossed over, it tends to leave me thinking about the other that is Not easily glossed over and lingering there like I always do. Not that profound a realization I guess, but good to realize.

I think taking more active steps to manage the lesser emotions rather than simply being angry would be beneficial. Like, I am frustrated to the point of non-communication again by the work stuff with the work people, but that absolutely is not gonna solve anything ever and is not the way to handle it. I want to give up on a thing that me giving up on would only get me in trouble for giving up on because it's not my decision to make. I could send a passive aggressive email because they no-showed the meeting this week again even after rolling out the broken update, but that puts zero pressure on them to actually do better work. It covers my ass but isn't actually useful, and I do genuinely want things to get better. Escalating is probably the proper avenue, but that's so scawy. Especially since I by-default don't like 'normal' people and let's be real, all high level managers are normies. Plus aspie communication skills (zero) with crippling anxiety. It's a valid source of stress that I should manage and not just vent frustrations about to the void.

Been trying to pare back on 'multitasking' at home, e.g. playing runescape or being on my phone while watching videos, etc. I crave more than the easy dopamine to have a functioning attention span and sense of curiosity and interest in knowledge. It's reading articles instead of just headlines, it's avoiding YouTube shorts like the plague even though it gets shoved in my face constantly. But damn it's hard to do sometimes. I wouldn't really say I have ADHD but I did 99th percentile both aspects of the one ADHD test (Qb test) I did with my psychiatrist, so there's that. I just vibe more with the autistic label. Needing stims or fidgets is necessary to keep focus on something like Critical Role, where there's not uncommonly downtime between scenes or combat. That's all well and good until my autopilot brain is too invested in what's going on to control the stimming when it becomes a snacking impulse, so four packs of fruit snacks and some cheez-its and a rice krispie treat at like 9:30pm when I should already be laying down to sleep is something I should not let myself do lol. Getting less, worse sleep almost definitely contributed to being more on edge today.

Halfway through 2026. I think it's a rare feeling to be like, yeah that checks out. Maybe that's a product of the last month feeling like it's been 6 months. Waiting for a lot of things to happen. Summer to end, midterms to be over, orchestra season to start, emotions to settle. Things to look forward to. Staying busy and staying sane in the meanwhile is the hard part. I've done it before.

Remembering series that I liked a lot and need to catch up on, Midst came to mind. It is *so* fucking good, but it's also weird as hell in so many ways. It's a long-form structured improv show with three concurrent narrators, so it kind of reads like an Actual Play but there's no game systems or anything, just them creating scenes and story and being really good at it. It's like sci-fi fantasy idk, like imagine a Western + steampunk but remove all the steam and replace it with weird ass magic in a weird ass world and then make it completely different than that. It's so hard to describe hehe. Absolutely recommend it.

While listening to it I encountered a strange issue that made me realize I am an absolute fool and have had my phone audio set to Mono for like all of forever, I guess?? I use only one earbud a lot so I guess I did it for that. But they used an effect that phase shifted the left and right audio channels to emulate a reverb hall kinda thing, but when that merged back into a mono channel it did exactly what noise cancelling headphones do and zeroed out the waveforms so it was just silence and post-effects where a big speech was supposed to be happening lol.

I realized that it's been mono for *everything* so I had to listen to music on the drive home that would be Much better in stereo now, so I did what anybody else what do and put on Beethoven's 6th. It contests itself with a couple others for my favorite symphony, because when it hits, it hits so hard, and I think yesterday's thoughts with the whole loneliness and mountains and yada yada set it up perfectly. The first three movements are cute and vibey and very much in line with a stroll through the countryside and set things up so the fourth movement just absolutely makes you feel like an ant in a hurricane. I've seen it live in a Loud hall and o m g it's probably my favorite experience at a concert to date. So when I listen to it and I get close to the fourth movement I turn that shit up to where I know it will Feel just as loud as that, and fuuuuuck it works every time. Headphones can't remotely do it justice. Just feeling so humbled by the power of the storm and the music that's creating it, tiny and helpless and powerless and awestruck. Then coming down from it, the fifth movement is so sweet and forgiving and it made me cry some more. I'm averse to seeing repeats of pieces bc concerts are spensy, but it's absolutely one I would take any (reasonable) opportunity to see again. Good emotional release though, very much needed. I love having music that I know can really affect me, and being able to choose the right one for the right mood is such a great tool.

this idiot company we've partnered with at work for new software SUCKS at their one job of making software. They have to be cheap as hell to work with, otherwise I can't see any reason why anybody would choose these chucklefucks. It's a bit telling that I, a nobody tech at my company, am the main liason with the *CEO* of their company for implementing everything, and even more telling that he's the fucking CEO and they still do shit that I tell them not to do bc it fucks with our work flow, is not good, or is literally broken bc they have no fucking QA process to test shit bc they don't know what they're doing. Well okay, to be fair, they have a development version that I can test the updates on, so I do and tell them what's not good or literally broken so they can update it. Then they don't update it, push the development version to the live version anyways, and make mine and my coworkers day worse trying to deal with problems that we shouldn't have bc AGHGHGHGHHGHGH. At least it keeps things interesting 🙃 How's that for being angry on main lol. I guess I only hate expressing anger when it's about people I care about.

Took today off of work mostly to have a 3 day work week this week. I don't know what I'm gonna do next weekend though.

Not as good today about feeling okay doing nothing, but that's mostly what I did. More ATLA, some Critical Role, some site stuff. Read another hundred pages or so of Catch-22 before deciding that was enough. Book review for that is up, kinda short.

Mid earth season, finally getting introduced to Toph (the best best character) and Azula (the best worst character). ZuZu yelling at the storm to strike him with lightning so he can fling it back in the world's face is so relatable. Getting in return the purest apathy that only the natural world can give is so relatable. One of my favorite Wheel of Time scenes is Rand on the Throat of the World, same scene as with Zuko pretty much. I've been on the tops of mountains alone (not in storms though, I'm not that stupid) and it's just such a humbling experience. It can be very lonely, not just to be literally alone, but also to think like, damn there's millions of people out to the horizon and I'm the only one at this spot right here able to see all of them. Not feeling better than any one of them, but feeling different to all of them. But also being purely me, having the strength and the confidence to do a hard thing alone and relishing the freedom and opportunity to do so (and also appreciating the park services who maintain trails that actually make it possible). It's also just really cool to be able to look at all the mountains that dominate the valley and know what the view is like from up there. It makes life in the city less constricting, knowing that I can achieve freedom outside of it, that I have a place to escape to.

Excited to see kitties tomorrow. I wonder if I should volunteer more than once a week to fill my time better. We've been a little short staffed lately but with work not uncommonly needing overtime now, it's harder to feel reliable.

Amongst the cities I stumbled upon an asynchronous bookclub, whereupon I do not have to directly interact with my fellow clubbers! Perfect! (I'm sure I might once I feel more comfortable). Peeping the pages of all the peeps put a lot of pep in my p... ppp..... step. Ok no more alliteration. I adore books and the not having to choose a book to read sounds lovely (thus avoiding constant rereads). I definitely struggle with remembering things I've read (or seen or heard or...) so cataloging ongoing experiences as I've started to do here is a good way to not treat escapism as ephemeral and make it mean something, even if only to mean sometimes that escapism is valid. Books have certainly affected me greatly before; Crime and Punishment lives in my head rent free any time I feel like I should be a different person than I am. "If I worried myself all those days, wondering whether Napoleon would have done it or not, I felt clearly of course that I wasn't Napoleon." I am no more Napoleon than Rodya was, and luckily for me I don't need to murder old ladies and fumble the bag and resent myself for the rest of my days to know it (I just have my own long, different struggles instead).

Going back and retroactively updating like 4 or 5 years onto goodreads is a Lot, I feel like I should write reviews more than just ratings but idk public reviews on things I don't have that much to say about or remember specifics for is kinda meh. I have done sort of book reviews in this journal thingy already, idk if I should like distill them out into something more dedicated to it or not. Probably?

I spent a fair amount of time building up my Likes page into a visual shelf for things; refactoring it to make it more functional seems like a lot of work and I'm still very new to html/css so idk I might not hehe. It's hard to limit yourself, like it would be very appropriate to list Every book of the 14 books in Wheel of Time (except crossroads of twilight zzzz). Also kinda shy about sharing playlists but albums also have stuff that I don't know or don't like too but ehh.

I see the theme of Shrines on a lot of people's pages, and I dunno where I'm at with the idea yet. It's kind of like a tattoo to me; I've never liked anything enough to make it a permanent fixture on my body. Also sharing the things that mean the Most to me in an in-depth intimate manner is very challenging, like I have to get it right and get it Whole and get it Me, not just something to slap together. Also I hate parasocial stuff and fan stuff so yk, there's that.

Also people coding their websites not in the Neocities IDE sounds like heaven, I need to try that lol. It's not the best. I dunno if I should like properly go through html/css tutorials and get a foundational understanding of things or just continue to yoink github snippets any time I think of something I should do. I'm more into the journaling of it all rn, so maybe some other day.

Primary ballots are in! The only time where my vote sort of matters insofar as choosing a candidate. My stupid fucking shithole rep is running for Governor so he isn't on the ballot this year thank fucking god. I dare to believe strongly that he's not gonna win gov. He had a 20 point margin in 2024 but was incumbent and it was 2024 and he's a mormon in a pretty mormon district. Maybe there's a chance it flips this year?? Would be nice to have a rep that isn't a monster. Who knows how the fuck mail-in-voting will be come November. State has already rebuffed calls for voter rolls and our AG is trying to revive some of the 2020 election shit (in a good way), so I'm hopeful? Is that allowed? Dare I be hopeful for this country? It's only let me down for the entirety of my adult life so far, surely it gets better.

I can't end on that, so I'll just say today was nice. I didn't pressure myself into doing anything or feeling like I should be doing something, I actually just let myself relax and explore the web and watch ATLA and vibe. I mean I did blow off my dad again, but he's had worse from me. Better a bad son than a sad son, I say. No bias.

Anger is out so the sad is in.

I feel like I'm either getting worse or am just much more conscious about bad eating habits after I'm Glad My Mom Died. The idea of making myself throw up is increasingly appealing, mentally. Just getting the shit out of your system. Feeling like something is wrong and hey, that'd be a big change... Also just wanting something actually fucked up to be going on with me, not just being sad, so I can have a real excuse to feel as bad as I do idk. Journaling is like my only coping mechanism (horrible, I know). I don't have any standard vices, don't drink or smoke or gamble or manically spend money or whatever. I've thought about self harm too. I don't even know what it would be like. People cut their wrists or thighs? and that helps? idk. I think having been Extremely suicidal for a long period of time kinda puts me off of anything less than one step removed from being able to die. Suicidal thoughts are still almost zero lately even with this terrible brain state, so I'm doing something right there at least.

Been rewatching ATLA for a bit. On the verge of tears at least once an episode, sometimes more than the verge depending on if I fight it or not. The trust and care and camaraderie and Iroh's love for ZuZu and the whole fucking show is so cute and good and wholesome and meaningful and UGH.

LVM season 4 10-12 watched as well yesterday. I think they swung a little too far on the pendulum of making Pike the center of the story vs her not being there much in the actual campaign. Dark bard did end up kinda being annoying visually and thematically by the end. Vecna is still a great villain, and I think Pike's flippy floppiness, while it Sucks right now, should play the hand of asking the gods for boons and favors and championship to defeat Vecna all the more meaningful. Definitely her being responsible for his ascension and the deaths of however many of those followers needs to have some big consequences on her. I can't really imagine Vax not dying in the end still, but Pike saccing herself too would feel appropriate, not that I think they would.

It's been a month so whatever, the anger is real and really needs get out.

Continually prompting somebody to keep their own word is something neither you nor I should have to do. Yelling at her directly feels like even more of a waste of breath than trying to have genuine conversation was. I know and knew she struggles to communicate. We've struggled in the past, dating, and after, and a year later witnessing it on the trip. I know it's a hard part of any friendship or relationship or any anything with anyone.

When I approached her about having Feelings come back, after the trip and after hanging out again after the trip, I knew to give her exit ramps and grace because it's a hard topic. She engaged with me still, a rejection to be sure, but directly inviting continued conversation. She was "open to talk" and I had expressed that as my main goal, talking.

So I did. More of where my feelings were at, the depth or lack thereof, engaging with her feelings and her known insecurities especially regarding our break-up. Leaving open options and even a direct question, and restating only wanting to talk. Not needing any specific outcomes. I didn't expect a reply for a day or so. That's hard for me, but not unusual. I sent a supportive message the next morning wishing her luck at her appointment and apologizing for adding complications. She replied, with her voice that uses perfect punctuation and grammar, that it went well and not to worry about things. Ok, great, I think. No hard feelings.

So when the next day comes and goes, and another day comes and goes, and so on, and I never get a response to the conversation that she agreed to, that I gave her open and unpressured time and space to respond to, 9 days pass before I'm pissed and bitter enough to block her. Something like "well she can't ghost me if I ghost her first" or whatever stupid brain logic can be found. Some small petty revenge against a phantom. She's not blocked anymore, but neither am I checking discord. I don't know if she tried to message me while blocked, and found out. If she did, I can't help but defend that 9 days was plenty of fucking time to say anything at all.

Talking to her now would be a lose-lose. If I try and she responds, then the timer for disappointment just gets reset. If I try and she doesn't respond, that's that much more energy I've wasted which is just going to convert itself into more pissiness and bitterness, and there's obviously plenty of that to go around.

I know it's hard. I know it's scary. I know she has issues around being liked. She had been accepting of my compliments in everything leading up to the start of the conversation, consciously fighting against her impulses to deny them.

I don't know how things changed from one day to the next, how saying I had a crush was so different than saying I Liked her. I didn't even ask her out again, I asked if I could talk about my feelings and see what was real and sustainable. Romantic, I know.

I don't feel like I did anything fucking wrong, and even now, past the stage of my emotional abandonment trauma being triggered, I can't help but be angry that she wasn't true to her word. I know she wasn't lying when she made that promise, but it ended up being one anyways.

I know the depression. I know the anxiety. I know the 12 hours a day playing games every single day to escape how bad reality sucks, how bad the thoughts in your head are to face. How one day can become two can become nine. I know the absolute hole it is to dig yourself out of - it took me years - and that it's unfair of me to expect her to dedicate some of what little energy she has to face the hardest things in life, on me. I know it's unfair that I have the age and the years of therapy and the relationship history and the cis body and the stable life. I know it, and I still can't give her any grace on this.

I'm sad and angry and upset and disappointed because she's the only friend I expected to keep after the trip. Because being my most honest and exposed self was the last thing that happened before we stopped talking, when it took so much fucking work to let myself feel that much (not even that much) for somebody else again. Because communication is so fucking important to me, and the only way to fail at it is to not do it; and she failed, and now I'm failing too by hating her silence and thinking it's all pointless, hating the hate and hating my own silence and hating that it's all bleeding over into my other relationships. Because anger is the emotion I hate expressing most, but it's the only one that I want to express right now. I am angry.

So many emotions.

The therapy saga was so blessedly heartwarming in all of its struggles and small victories. The universal, inescapable truth that you're going to therapy because you're in love with somebody and want to be better for them. The secondhand pride of her going her first 24 hours without purging, and the fall of facing the deeper issues that such a small reprieve will inevitably uncover. Worksheets, journaling, crying over the stupidest shit that nobody else would cry over but its the biggest thing in the world for you in that moment. Throwing away the scale as a gift to herself. The slow, crawling, molasses in winter pace of progress, that you can look back on years later and see how fucking far you've gone and be so proud because you know the work and the struggle and the cost and the time. To look your past dead in the eye and say what it is. To know it's not even over. Ever over.

Heads too caught up in my own shit now to write relevant stuff. Maybe tomorrow. I wish I could let myself be as angry as I am.

So when I said yesterday I shouldn't listen to anything that'll fuck me up at work, I went and did the most exactly opposite thing you could do and listened to that. Not all the way through yet because I had to take breaks because jesus. fucking. christ.

I watched iCarly growing up so I knew of her. Was more of a Miranda Cosgrove guy bc of Drake and Josh though. I did watch her Last Meals epi, which was great, as they all are. I also don't have strong attachments to pretty much anything from childhood if I haven't relived it in adulthood (like ATLA) so I have no real memory of the show that's separable from other sporadic memories of other shows. Having her childhood so mapped out is an astounding amount of effort by itself, but for it to be the level of fucked up that it is and to persevere in recreating it in a fashion that sounds as truthful as it could be given the nature of memory is such a strength of will that I madly respect. I'm sure parts of it were easier due to the documented nature of her mother's hoarding and being a child/teen/adult-ish actress, but it's all very cohesive and powerful and horrifying. Telling it to the world is another thing entirely.

I think the biggest, most recurrent theme that I can even sort of relate to is eating disorder / body image stuff. At like 10% of her level. I have enough issue there to extrapolate up and begin to understand what some of those feelings are and the drive and the necessity and the impurity of relationships to food and body image, but I would never claim to have anything diagnosable as an eating disorder. I'm not sure where my issues even come from, really. It's mostly a static body image, having a very specific interalized way that I look, and when the thing in the mirror doesn't match that, or the number on the scale doesn't match that, I do not like that. I don't want muscles too big. I don't want anything that can be mistaken for a belly. I don't want to be called skinny. I'm rarely happy with my hair, but I have more than my brothers so that's funny at least. I hate being remarked upon for any physical trait. Every. fucking. time I see my grandma or my step mom they say I've gotten taller. I hate being this tall (a mere six feet even), not that I'm not aware of the advantages that being a tall white guy has in society. It doesn't fit my body image but I know I can't change that so fuck me. Acne, ugh. Depression and skin picking make for a lifelong struggle. I hate the scarring I have from years and years of it. Whenever I see a photo of myself in a raking light it's just awful. I can't grow enough facial hair to cover it. I hate shaving. I hate this stupid flesh sack and how much it fucking matters to other people. The internet is great for being incorporeal.

I am a legally healthy weight, 6' 150lbs, but that do be skinny by most accounts. Coming out of uni I was 135. When I first started gaining weight, after starting antidepressants, I was thankfully already in therapy and so it was not a difficult thing to find peace with. It was more like something that I never expected to have to face? and being faced with the idea of being fat, that horrible fate that everybody in my family always says is bound to happen when I get older, was a bit of a system shock. I've never been fat. To date, I've never been more than 160lbs. I don't have any associated trauma with being fat, that I know of. I was an 8lb baby which I guess is above average but since then, nah. My therapist chalked it up to the fact that happy people tend to eat more, which I kind of took at face value (mostly bc she pointed to herself, a fat, happy woman) and instead I just reset my expectations of what I should weigh. Instead of 135 being the baseline, 150 was the new baseline. My self in the mirror still looked okay, I guess. I skip meals a lot. I get disgusted by food I eat regularly. One bite can be fine and the next can make me want to throw up (not bulimic thankfully, I was so happy the first time she said that she failed at making herself bulimic but then she went and figured it out later 😭). Good days are two meals. I snack to make up for calories a lot of the time, but I will go through all my snacks and then just be hungrier for a while instead of getting more. If dinner wasn't a regular thing in my household I'd be fucked there, for sure. It's not a money thing. It's not really a texture thing, most of the time? Sometimes it's a depression thing. Appetite and motivation both. I hate foodies. I don't get it. I have had good food. I am even a passable cook. I watched the food channel for a few years growing up. Food is fine. Eating sucks. I hate the obligation. I hate the necessity. I hate that it matters so much to how functional this stupid flesh sack is. I hate choosing. I hate that it's not a choice.

All of that is mostly overstated for effect and with the an elevated disposition in light of the book, but it's roots are real. It doesn't control my life, so it's not a disorder. It's just a fucking nuisance.

All parents are tough. Mine are emotionally distant, so I'm pretty emotionally stunted and uncommunicative regarding my feelings and being able to express them verbally. Divorced parents has its whole host of issues, too. Her mom though was i n s a n e. Her dad being a minor character in her life is sad, but at least he stuck around. I have no ability to wrap my head around everything I heard of her story and her mom. It's all just fucked to high hell. That sucks, I'm sorry that happened, etc etc. I have nothing to offer there.

Loss is trickier for me to feel like I genuinely relate. I had the great displeasure of spending several hours a week for years with my Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, et al. grandmother. It's tricky because I was deep in my own depression at the time. She was technically my grandmother but I didn't hold any great emotional attachment to her. Even growing up, she was always fairly distant, a bit stern and aloof. She tried to kill herself when my mom was a teenager. Good ol' ammonia and bleach. I attribute a lot of my genetically predisposed issues to her, but that's easy to do because she's dead and I don't care about her. I watched her die. Literally, but also over the course of those years. We watched lots of public broadcast, since they didn't pay for TV. Mork and Mindy re-runs. Gameshows that I don't remember the names of. Some Elvis movie in Hawaii, my first actual experience with Elvis and finally understanding what a hunk he was and why my other grandma has a long and public lust for him. I get you, girl. Looking through photo albums full of people who died before I was born, probing her fading memories and trying to get a picture of the girl and then the woman she was. I hold both women in my head: the photos and the husk.

Death was never so looming and imminent for her as it was for Ms. McCurdy's mother. I didn't know how to grieve or know that I should. I knew it was sad, a travesty in fact, that somebody's soul can be taken away and leave behind this barely functional facsimile of a human. I wanted her to die; I didn't see a reason for her to be alive, to take so much of our family's time and energy and emotion and never be able to contribute so much as a laugh or a smile. But I had to help out. That's family, it's what you do. I got it in my head that I had to be the one to help. Still in uni, a time to be free and explore and invest in your own future, but I had to be available to help out. Every single weekend, me and my mom would visit, me doing yard work, mom doing housework, papa doing a grocery run since he can finally leave the house and my mama alone for a bit. Towards the end, I would come on some weekdays when my papa had appointments for himself, mom was working but I didn't have class, or a job, or a club, or friends...

You get the image. I'm not trying to live in the resentment. I still don't really know where the source that feeling of obligation comes from. Eventually we convinced my papa to move her into hospice, after he fell down and hurt himself trying to help her up after she fell down and hurt herself. She could barely walk to the bathroom, a dozen steps down the hall. The first time I saw a woman's lower half uncovered as an adult, her having no presence of mind to close the door and me having to help her there anyways. COVID started around that time. They let us visit when it was time. Her laying in a bed in a stranger's house, where even if she was conscious she would have had no idea where she was. The labored breathing. Dabbing her lips with a wet rag because the nurse told us it helps them feel more comfortable. Labored breathing. Waiting. Dabbing her lips with a wet rag. Papa holding her hand, saying some soft, sad words that she wouldn't have been able hear and we all knew it. Dabbing her lips with a wet rag. A laborious breath. Her last. So uneventful. So final. A death as meaningless as the rest of the end of her life. The end of nothing important. A breath out.

I drove my mom's car home. She had a mustang at the time, a nice ride, one of the few times I got to drive it alone. I sure as hell didn't want to be there any longer. Later that night, the most we ever talked about it, my mom asked if I was doing okay. I said yeah. The timeline is fuzzy, but my planned suicide on my upcoming birthday in two months sure was awfully close.

I did better at grieving our dog. I cared more about him. I didn't stay at the end, when the tech put the needle in and pushed the plunger and, well, I don't know because I was in my room with our other dog, petting her warm fur, feeling her living breath and envying the unknowing ease of her life. I came out and his eyes were open. I tried closing them, like they do in the movies, but they were already stiff. They just bounced right back open. I didn't want to touch a dead thing any more than that. We buried him in the backyard. I would be damned if I didn't help with that; more for my family than for me, but it sure as hell is a way to get some finality. I wonder what his body looks like now. I had friends by now, some semblance of community, shared pictures and all that. I missed him, but he didn't make me think that life was utterly meaningless and want to die, so that's progress.

As my papa's health has gotten worse, a failing heart, diabetes, and skin cancer, I've been able to grieve throughout the process. We sold the house they'd lived in for 53 years. I stayed behind to 'pack up a few more things' and let myself cry. Alone, in my grandfather's house. That had never happened before. Visiting every weekend was no longer a thing. I'm still trying to figure out what the fuck to do on Sundays. But he's himself still. In a nice assisted living facility, with new friends and nurses and meals cooked every day. His is not a hollow end, if still unenviable. I don't like visiting him. I've already grieved, what do you mean there might be more to the story? but that same fact makes it easier to cope with the inevitability. I won't have to grieve as hard when it happens. Maybe it makes me a worse grandson, but keeping my sanity is more important to me.

Jesus this is already so long.

I've only just been getting into adult Jennette, so maybe I'll save that for tomorrow after I finish the book. Lots of thoughts there already. Sex and sexuality is a nightmare of a thing.

Regular ass day. Didn't eat lunch and I went out for lunch yesterday so today I just starved. Best way to stay skinny fr. My relationship with food is so normal and healthy.

Finished Nine Eyes of Lucien. I dunno, I feel like the second act didn't really need to exist, in the end. It didn't bring toooo much that was new to the story, so other than being a slightly unique perspective it was otherwise not that engaging. I feel like they tried not to re-use too much or like give a play-by-play of the campaign in novel form, but the pace was sooooo fast at the end. Fight scenes were very glossed over, time was hard to keep track of, the existence of Essek and the Krin (Kryn?) was very much shadow dropped and left to the reader to place into the story themselves. A lot of the body-horror nightmare that is Cognoza was more thrust upon the reader than left as something to sink in on how fucked it is, and the performances of the Somnovum left something to be desired (sorry Robbie, Matt did it better). Would have been fine to just leave it as a prequel novel and not do the whole second half tbh. Still okay though.

9 more audiobook hours this month hmmm. The problem with listening at work is that I can't be Super into wanting to get the full experience of the book bc I will miss huge sections and details. Maybe more nonfiction leaning stuff would be good? Escaping to fantasy while actively stuck in the real world is fun and all but idk. Never been much of a nonfiction reader. It can't be anything that'll fuck me up, which is a lot of things bc I'm sensitive lil guy, even though fighting back big emotions at work is something I do quite regularly.

Did a full solo double shift at the rescue today. Each shift only takes like an hour, so I mostly spent the same amount of time there that I usually do, I just worked harder during it hehe. I like being there alone bc I feel so much more free to vocal stim and talk to the cats and all dat, I'm quite self conscious about it even when I'm working with people I've worked with for years who do it too. Update with more pics on the other page.

I don't even like work that much other than being paid to be distracted from myself for a significant portion of the day and having an excuse to do hygiene and be social and get out, which makes it Good for me if not always the most fun thing to be doing. Getting back into a fair bit of routine after all the switchups that have been going on, so being able to predict what my work day is going to look like and to plan how much fucking-off I can do throughout the day and still meet expectations and such is nice. I feel sort of bad sometimes because I Definitely care less than I used to now that I feel more like a cog in the machine, and since I help make custom-fitted mobility devices I know that me fucking up makes a less-abled person's life not as good or worse 😓 most of the time things are simple enough that phoning it in is totally fine bc I know what I'm doing, and if it's a complex job I can usually focus up and get it right, but it's that middle ground that's like, an order that takes a little bit more effort but I might be on autopilot too much to notice that it's tricky or whatever.

I'm also letting other people's fuck ups get through more often and just focusing on doing my job right, which kinda feels shitty but I'm being actively discouraged by management from taking extra time to do things that aren't strictly my job because now i'm fully half of the throughput for the whole building instead of less than a quarter 😓 I feel like I should plan 'sick' time with my supervisor so we can build up some evidence of how fucked up things can be when I'm gone and why we need another person to be able to fill in. 5 sick days to use this year and 4 days of PTO left, idk what to do with it bc I'm boring but also they discourage using it at the end of the year bc that's our busy season. ALSO using any paid leave forfeits overtime pay for that week which fucking sucks but is legal i guess so whatever.

got free 3 months of extra audiobook time on spotify so that's been nice. Listened to This book on the Supreme Court's shitty shittiness and how shitty it is and UGH, but I think civic engagement is very important (even though I do the bare minimum of just voting) and knowing how systems are abused is soooo much more useful and powerful than just being mad that things suck.

Also listening to The Nine Eyes of Lucien. Quite good so far, most of the way through. Robbie Daymond is a dream. I didn't realize how unusual it was for a while, that the protagonist isn't a good guy. Getting into the live campaign storyline now and it's a kind of weird interweaving of retelling the story from Lucien's perspective with clips? or re-records? of dialogue, different but familiar both in the like content and also the presentation idk. A bit of a weird experience. I also feel like as a standalone novel, none of this would make any fucking sense without knowledge of the campaign already especially now that MN are introduced, BUT since I do have it it's fine and great hehe. I think it does a really great job of putting the campaign in more context though, fully fleshing out the differences between Lucien and Molly and the Nonagon, the descent into madness and power and grasping for humanity while seeking to give it all away. His losses feel very real and profoundly affect his character, and honestly I have mad respect for just how complex of a situation it was and how fucking hard MN want to save their friend as much as they want to save the world. Remembering the end now, and seeing all this shit, honestly there couldn't have been a better outcome for him. I'll enjoy seeing the rest of the story from his eyes.

Happy Summer Solstice! Nothing makes the day feel longer than it literally being the longest day, am i right? (:

binged 7-9 of LVM s4, super good ofc. Lots of divergence from the campaign which is keeping things fast and fresh. Laudna drop was so cool. Honestly I think the sun tree despoilment is the thing that hooked me the most into the live show the first time. Such strong imagery and emotion. Lionel goated as expected. Dark bard was a fun addition. I think they did fine with the time constraints, but the Scanlan's mom scene was much more powerful in the campaign. I think also bc of time between seasons its hard to keep the throughline on all the emotional beats behind it. They're keeping the cultists (the unalive five) soooo powerful which is really fun. I wonder if they're going to keep it a battle between VM and the cultists or if they're gonna still do the whole divine trammel thing and have a Vecna, sorry, a Whispered One final battle. Season 5 confirmed in the BTS so there's definitely time. Exalted vestiges yassss. Plus the whole Titan over Vasselheim thing is just like, soooo animate-able. and I want to see the shit out the Everlight's realm. Gods campaign one was so good. Maybe another re-listen is in store.

Sundays are just Saturdays but if I feel bad I know I have work tomorrow to distract me, so that's something. I decided (for now) to not delete my discord account. Still not sure where to go with things, but at least I'm a little more stable about it all. Website is feeling like a good outlet to ground to so far.

Watched Project Hail Mary, it was fine. Definitely an Andy Weir IP. Lost interest right at the end and apparently there was one last twist that I stopped paying attention to but it was a 2.5 hour movie that already reached a resolution so whatevs.

Weekend days are sooooooo long. Home alone so a little bit more freedom is nice. Got some more stuff set up for the site, getting closer to a finished product I think. Running out of steam with runescape. I'm realistically like less than a hundred hours from maxing but it's feeling like a chore so that's blegh. Trying to focus energy on real self care more than pure distraction, as much as is feasible.

not going to see my dad this weekend even though it's father's day. it always takes so much energy to visit (even when it's not a night out bowling), plus I haven't seen them since coming back from europe so having to go through all of that while still dealing with me not talking to those friends hardly at all rn is more than I want to deal with. Plus my eldest brother just moved back to the state so he'd be there and he's great but more people is more bad. I asked if I could make up lunch next weekend, so that's better than nothing.

easy to be spoiler free without social media and when ur only friend who watches knows better (and also doesn't really talk to u)

uhhhhh I don't think I cared about anything past jax and pomni hugging? I've hated jax for the entire run of the show, and this didn't really change my thoughts there. I think he's allowed to grow and heal and have people like him but I sure as hell don't have to. idk there's parts of me that relate to him, but I felt like in my case it was me who wanted me to change? like I only ever remember one instance of being called out for being an asshole and that wasn't even to my face, it was bc I lurked in the chat after hours to snoop. jax did so much worse shit and people are lining up to fix him, and I don't and won't understand that ig. good for him that it works out. I had to work really fucking hard to change, so i know he's got a long road ahead of him.

Everything after Caine was reintroduced was.. pointless? idk. In any property where I'm supposed to believe that something that was created to have sentience deserves to be treated like a human, I just cannot. E33 was the same exact feeling, like once it's revealed that nah this whole world is just a magic painting from the 'real world' like, blegh. Also the imagery I guess was trying to make Caine more human / grounded ? but again I just can't make that leap. Shit was way too abstract art-y and drawn out. Also him having like, kind of the same closing arc as Jax was repetitive? Like they put a lot of effot into 'redeeming' Jax by giving explanation to why he's fucked up, but ultimately he's dead as hell for most intents and purposes. Then Caine just comes along and monologues and is like, dang I sucked, lemme just go try again and see what happens and they all just are like ok sure whatever come on in. idk maybe I just hold grudges way too strongly, they both SUCK and should just shut the fuck up and find other spaces instead of hurting the same people all the time.

All the MCs being brain-scans is cloooose to the same meaninglessness feeling, but at least like it's presumed that they're fully replicated and thus fully human-minded. The whole show was about humanizing them, so that still played out well in the finale. The irl reveal was weird? Like hearing where their real person is. I get it being a form of closure, but I feel like it would not be healthy for me as a brain-scan to know that I was fabricated and am always and forever going to be trapped in this shit and that my real self is out there still living their best life. What's the point of me then? and like sure the other guys stuck in here with me are great but if I only had those people for the rest of forever and ever and ever, I'd still go crazy. Pull my plug out instead.

also abstraction just being a physical thing and ur brain is still in there as messed up as ever but now trapped in an even deeper layer of hell is FUCKED??

it's kind of a weird time for me, especially thinking of the show as a metaphor for online friendships in general, bc I kinda feel like Ribbit. Pushed away just enough to not want to be around anymore (though not nearly as cruelly as Jax did). I cherish the history of our friendships but where things are at right now it's not a place where I'm able to celebrate what's there.

also ribbit's back arch in some of the shots was a bit sus, but they used her posture generally to good effect

still a good show, well outside of my usual media intake style. The rest was strong enough to forgive a (to me) weak finale. 9/10.