Before knowing about this new information I had the feeling that a badly torn and stitched together sheep’s udder with a really big hole started healing a lot faster when I stopped doing (in this order) Peroxide - Betadine - Omnimatrix - Charcoal and just went with Betadine - Omnimatrix - Charcoal. It’s very anecdotal data from one sheep, but I find it interesting to be confirmed by some science.

Oh I love this one! I’m all for slowing down!

Unfortunately I already played my “going to another country where it’s all better” card 25 years ago, and because of that didn’t even notice I was autistic for quite some time, so there’s some truth in that.

At this point I can report that I’m repulsed by my native country’s culture, my country of residence’s culture, and probably that of any other country once I learn enough about it. So my main criteria for finding a new place at this point are “Small affordable house with a garden for rent, understand the language at least a little, rural area in the mountains without too many fascists, not too dry and hot”. Let the other expats have all the beaches and leave me alone.

I guess I do have some people? Lack of object permanence doesn’t help the situation very much. Who can prove my loved ones even exist when they are not here?

Good point, and I do wish I had some jazz cabbage together with the self discipline to enjoy it in moderation, but I spent the last months under an atmosphere so heavy with smoke I’m actually surprised they didn’t send a fire fighter plane to my house. I’ve got to take a break at least for a while.

As you can see it’s going great so far. /s

Or is he?

That as well. Don’t want my dad to be sad, he’s a good guy.

Don’t bite off more than you can chew, I hope it gets brighter once we’re older!

That does it for me on some days, and by the amount of likes it seems to be quite a common thing. If only I could channel the spite and rage away from the internet into real life. Found a nice motorway bridge and thought about hanging up some protest banner - but then people would read it and that’s all. Need to accumulate more rage before acting, maybe until I’m angry enough to put up a strongly worded protest banner.

Trying to find somewhere quite like here but not entirely, just so I can get busy with the relocating and building something new. It’s a hack, but an interesting one. Of course, on the other side of the fence we’ll meet our face in the mirror yet again.

But I need it for myself!

I used to have tobacco and weed for that. Gave it up recently as I don’t want to be alive only because my brain craves the next dose of [substance]. But it’s a working solution and I have been considering going back to it.

Maybe my brain is just adjusting to raw reality and happiness will return, but just watching any random bit of news these days makes me doubt that very much.

I do keep Eat The Rich and Smash Some Shit as my secret plan C. Seems better than just leaving this world quietly. But I sometimes wonder if I’m past that point already and will just keep fading away in hopelessness as a lot of others seem to do.

Suppressed hatred towards the powerful who don’t give a shit is maybe the underlying feeling I carry, and maybe that’s why my usual strategy of being a positive force seems to fail lately. There’s too much anger about the state of things to even care about anything anymore. Then again, adding to the anger that is already in the world seems such a horrible thing. Shouldn’t we be building a better world instead of destroying stuff?

We didn’t want to spend much money in Porto city and wanted more privacy than in a hostel. The “window” (didn’t have glass, just a metal grid) was on boardwalk height, perfect for drunkards to pee into the room from outside. We repaired the bed to the best of our abilities when it fell apart during the night. The “bathroom” was probably the most luxurious feature: a corner of the room, separated by a curtain. It kind of matched the rest of the city.

“I have watched them all day and they are the same men that we are. I believe that I could walk up to the mill and knock on the door and I would be welcome except that they have orders to challenge all travelers and ask to see their papers. It is only orders that come between us. Those men are not fascists. I call them so, but they are not. They are poor men as we are. They should never be fighting against us and I do not like to think of the killing.”

“I hope I am not for the killing, Anselmo was thinking. I think that after the war there will have to be some great penance done for the killing. If we no longer have religion after the war then I think there must be some form of civic penance organized that all may be cleansed from the killing or else we will never have a true and human basis for living. The killing is necessary, I know, but still the doing of it is very bad for a man and I think that, after all this is over and we have won the war, there must be a penance of some kind for the cleansing of us all.”

The question reminded me of “For whom the bell tolls”. It’s rather strange that during all these months whenever I get bored and grab a book it’s about one of the various wars of last century. I can’t help but read all of them with an eerie feeling of anticipation. Remarque’s “The Night of Lisbon” hit especially hard, but this one is a tower of a book as well and I had totally forgotten how deep it is. If Hemingway was alive today, would he get involved in some conflict elsewhere? Should more of us be on the way to Gaza, or at least involved in a general strike to force them to stop this nonsensical warmongering? Even not being in the US settling into business as usual makes me feel like a fascist, every day the feeling gets a little stronger. Non-violent protest would be my weapon of choice and always has been, but if I’m ever forced into hiding for who I am? Might just get really creative out of pure spite.

Some kids will test your boundaries. They don’t mean to upset you, they just want to be sure the rules are the rules. Just stay firm, keep repeating. I had to put the 2yo kid of a friend in ‘timeout’ (put in another room and briefly close the door, explaining why) because he was testing out my boundaries by throwing my stuff on the floor. This can get worse when they are tired, to the point where they want everything and nothing till they pass out - this particular toddler stood next to my bed, complaining about everything (especially the lack of mother’s milk!), not wanting to enter while I was just repeating my invitation to join me. In the end he fell asleep standing. No problem, I then lifted him onto the bed where he took his nap.

I think a lot of us still grew up in situations that were escalated into some kind of conflict by the grown ups around us, and we somehow carry the idea that when our kid doesn’t show the desired behavior we have to become louder, more threatening, come up with punishment … It’s not what I see working well in real life. As a grown up your job is to be the rock, the source of calm, the unbothered person, the voice of reason (I know, it’s so hard!). And repeat, repeat, repeat. The toddler will not understand immediately that throwing stuff is a bad idea, so you tell them, and tell them again, and again … but always keeping your cool. In a couple of years they will have grown out of being a gremlin, you know that and they don’t. The toddler phase is intense, seems to last forever, but is actually very short! I find it useful to explain everything in words even to very small children. They understand more words than they are able to say. Letting them know why they can’t have or do something shows respect and consideration and can avoid a screaming match.

Putting a toddler in bed and let them wake up with someone else is not an easy situation for them, it was probably a bit of a no-win. I know I’d freak out waking up in a strange house without my usual person!

I was leftie before I was techie. If you don’t know anything around tech and computers you wouldn’t know what to do. Even as a fairly tech-adjacent professional it took me quite a while.

Then again, I only became a real leftie again after kicking all the corpos out of my computer.

Tech used to be (and still is) obscured by heavy gatekeeping. We who understand a little more like to joke about those who don’t, and I guess we’ll have to stop that if we really want to unite the left. Don’t ridicule, explain. The person might never have had a chance to learn the concept.