I spent most of today trying to avoid spiraling. It is election day as I’m writing this, though this is going up a week later, and this election feels particularly fraught. Perhaps more telling, though, is that this level of anxiety is starting to feel normal for elections. After all, the past four major elections (two presidential elections and mid-term elections, specifically, since there’s been a lot more of the local ones than just these four) have been either a step directly toward fascism and authoritarianism or a desperate attempt to move further away from it. I know that the situation we’re currently in is the result of decades of effort so it’s not like any of this stuff came out of nowhere, but that’s not really comforting to know that given how much of it happened before I had any say in the matter. What would be comforting would be knowing that our elections are fair and safe from a bunch of far-right facist fuckers worming their way into enough positions of power that they can thumb the scales by disenfranchising voters or outright meddling in the elections. What sucks the most about that thought is it feels on the same level as all of my “what if I won the lottery” fantasies.
Continue readingReflection
No NaNoWriMo This Year, But I Think I Wrote More This Year Than Any Other
I’ve been avoiding the topic for a while now because I don’t really want to think about it that much, but I decided not to do National Novel Writing Month this year. Which means it is the first time in ten years that I haven’t even attempted it. It will be the second time in that period that I didn’t succeed. The last time I didn’t complete NaNoWriMo was back in 2016 while the election and its results were happening on top of job hunting and dealing with an increasingly difficult roommate situation. I realized after only a couple days that I couldn’t handle writing on top of everything else that was going on, so I stopped. This year, I realized I wasn’t going to be able to do it a few days before the month started and resigned myself to skipping it.
Continue readingSocial Media Migration
I wrote a whole post about what feels a lot like passing the point of no return on Twitter’s decline and eventual collapse, since the day I wrote this is the day that the world’s richest man showed up to make “good” on a dumb-shit promise he made because he’s actually also a moron and has only managed to get this far because consequences don’t matter to rich people. I went on a whole rant about corporate dystopia and the collapse of modern civilization because there’s less and less metaphor separating us from sci-fi and cyberpunk dystopias every day. It was cathartic, but probably not helpful to read since most people probably don’t care. Twitter, despite how large it feels to me as an active user, is not that big. Lots of people rarely or never go on that site and, honestly, we’d probably be better without it.
Continue readingCompliments That Sting and My Short-Sold Self
I had what felt like a funny, appreciative moment at work today. One of my coworkers was introducing a new engineer we’ve hired to everyone, making the rounds of the folks who were present at the time. When he got to me, he introduced me and said (quote edited to use my correct pronouns since I’m not out at work and I’m not going to use the wrong ones on my own dang blog, even in a quote) “I don’t know what [they] do, but [they’re] great in conversation.” I laughed, the new engineer laughed, my coworker laughed, and I shook the new person’s hand before explaining that I’m a tester AND that I have an extensive collection of anecdotes about what you can prepare in a waffle iron. After a bit more small talk, my coworker moved on and I returned to my lunch.
Continue readingWearing New Clothes Can Be Exhausting
I bought some new underclothes recently. I haven’t gotten new underwear in years and new undershirts in even longer, to the point that my supply of those clothing items was dwindling to dangerously low levels as I was forced to toss things out as they disentegrated past the point of wearability. I put this purchase off for a long time, not because of money or any of the usual reasons people don’t buy socks or underwear or undershirts or bedsheets or whatever (I mean, c’mon, those are some of the most boring things to spend money on, most of the time). I put it off because I have issues with the textures of clothing and I knew that even replacing the items I owned with the same cut, style, and brand would be a problem. This is also the same reason I’ve been using the same deodorent for the past decade and live in constant fear of it being discontinued like my last brand/scent were. I just can’t filter out the sensory input in the way that most people can.
Continue readingPensive Rest
One of the best feelings in my life right now is waking up slowly. To be able to slowly swim to consciousness from the pure darkness of a dreamless sleep. To slowly resurface into the world around me as I slip free of a dream that has held me within its embrace through the night. To know it doesn’t matter when I’ve come to awareness because there is nothing going on that needs my time or attention until I’m ready to give it. Even when I haven’t slept enough to feel properly rested, it still feels comforting to know that I can take my time waking up or that I can just go back to sleep if I feel like it. Having that choice is a wonderful feeling.
Continue readingLong Walks In Old Neighborhoods
One of my favorite parts of my rest has been going on long walks through the old neighborhoods just a couple blocks away from my apartment. These neighborhoods are only a few decades old, of course, since something being “old” is very different in most modern US cities than in most other places in the world, but that means they all have one of my favorite features of older US neighborhoods. Their streets make very little sense. They’re full of curves, winding bends, long lanes with no outlets, and massive old trees. It makes it very easy to get somewhat lost as you walk, since you don’t always find a cross street where you expect one and either have to walk on in hopes of finding an outlet or connection further down the line, or turn around and retrace your steps. It’s an enjoyable way to spend an hour or two on a nice, windy afternoon in the fall.
Continue readingWinter Is Coming, Weather I Like It Or Not
It snowed yesterday (here’s my usual reminder that I write these a week ahead of time, so really it was eight days before this posted). It was fairly brief and I only got a bare glimpse of it because I was busy at work. I couldn’t stop to go watch the mixed snow and sleet come down, which was unfortunate, but I did get to see a bunch of people walk down a hallway I can see from my desk and a lot of them were dusted with the stuff. It’s not really the same thing at all, but it was enough for me to know it was snowing and when it eventually stopped. It was a weird occurrence, given that there hadn’t even been rain on the forecast when I went in to work that morning, and weirder still when you consider that we had a 24-hour period that hit the mid-sixties at the lowest just two days prior. Sure, it was above freezing so the snow didn’t stick around upon landing on the ground, but it was still weird to get our first snow in mid October. I mean, just recently I was thinking about how weird it’d be if we got our first snow before Halloween again and here we are, more than half a month beforehand. Now we’ve got a span of days sitting around freezing before we pop back into the sixties and maybe even seventies in about a week. Absolutely normal weather, for sure.
Continue readingLittle Rituals
I love little rituals. Small things you do that aren’t a huge or impactful part of your day, that come and go with enough frequency that it feels weird to call them “rituals” sometimes. They’re the first things to go when you’re stressed or running out of time in a day and the first thing to come back when you get through the worst of it and can return to whatever you consider normalcy. For instance, during the time of the year when it’s usually dark before I leave work, I always stop whatever I’m doing right before sunset, make myself a nice cup of tea, and spend some time looking out at the world as darkness closes in. I never drink the tea while I’m doing this because it is far too hot during this brief ten-minute window, but I enjoy the warmth it provides nevertheless. As I return to my desk for however much time remains before I’m finished for the day, I slowly sip the tea and think about the sun setting in the distance, behind trees or clouds or the nearby hills. It always helps me feel less frustrated when I leave work after nightfall and it gives me something to look forward to that makes me feel like I’m still a part of each passing day even when my office is located in a space without any windows.
Continue readingMidweek Check-In
This upcoming weekend is my first weekend off in what feels like months. It has been long enough since I’ve had a weekend without commitments that I would have to carefully backtrack to figure out when it was and I’m currently too tired to do that, which means it has definitely been a while. I also technically don’t have zero commitment this weekend, either, because I’ve got three or four tabletop things planned (four if my Friday group meets), for a grant total about ten hours of tabletop gaming. More than half of which I’m running. Plus, most of my “relaxation” plans for this weekend are about cleaning my apartment since I haven’t had a chance to do much of that lately. Not that I’m living in filth or anything. My kitchen is clean and my bathroom is as clean as most bathrooms ever get, but it’s been a long while since I’ve done anything other than spot dusting and vacuuming. So I’ve got a lot more going on than pure relaxation this weekend.
Continue reading