ordered a cheap wearable timer¹ that has a 'buzz every [multiple of 5 you select] minutes and repeat by default until deactivated' function and have been experimenting with it as a source of gentle non-judgmental 'do i still want to be doing what i'm doing at this time' queries that i can choose whether to ignore or respond to
anyway it's only been like a day and a half but so far it seems like a helpful tool to have in my toolkit—like it hasn't magically turned me into a go-getter or anything but it has meant i did a bit of crafting² today and went for a tiny little run which is like. usually i'm pleased with myself if i scrape together enough executive function to initiate one enrichment thing superfluous to subsistence, so
we'll see how repeatable the results are but in any event: some little wins today :)
⸻ ¹ yes i could probably also have just used my phone but (1) while you can of course get the built-in timer to repeat it doesn't default to that, which was an important part of the concept (2) i was also working from a vague notion that, while i'm not as fussed about my phone dependence as i know some people have gotten, maybe it would be good not to actively reinforce it, lol ² and yes i do mean my tiny little mends from earlier but like. sewing's a craft (zie says defiantly)
Erich Dieckmann Bauhaus Development of a Metal Tube Chair.
just having one of those little upswell-of-gender-despair moments, you know how it is
specifically of the nonbinary variety where like. you know you don't really like how you look¹ or how other people react to you but the Opposite Version wouldn't really be better, really you want something in-between or ambiguous or nothing at all but that isn't actually a real option you get to have in real life, in real life you either get to be a mannish woman whose real gender desires are a painful secret or you get to become Pronoun Pin Guy and then are still effectively seen [and treated!] as a mannish woman, just, you know, a crazy, annoying one
i mean obviously part of the problem here is that i don't really have nonbinary/agender/&c people in my life, i'm super isolated and then even my internet circles have historically been comprised of like. trans people μέν who care about medical transition but not about the language other people use for them (which to be clear is perfectly valid but like. unfortunately my maybe-deepest identity is 'poet (non-practicing)' and i care so much about language. [i may or may not also care abt (some aspects of) medical transition but like. i don't atm have any health insurance or income and also due to the ongoing cptsd frozen-rabbit psychological situation it's a bit hard to tell what ""i"" might ""want"" so. question mark there]). cis+ people δέ who basically are like 'well the real practical, adult approach is just to accept that one's Basically Materially Cis unless one's strongly motivated to medically transition, but, like, your special-snowflake baby sensitivities are Valid or whatever…'² which, again, you have to let people frame things for themselves and pretend it doesn't imply anything abt you, because if nothing else, your differences of inclination wrt how to frame things make your situations different! but unfortunately, even though i do genuinely intellectually believe that, emotionally it hurts my feelings every time, because i really resent this idea that like. cis is the box everyone starts in + stays in unless they kick hard enough to get out of it. bodies shouldn't mean anything by default!!
⸻ ¹ i think this gets worse every time the season changes and i have to re-figure out how to walk the extremely narrow sartorial line i can actually bear, is part of what's going on here ² to be clear and fair to the people in question the level of superiority i've portrayed here is entirely my projection onto them, it's not on them that this stance makes me feel this way, it just does :/
The Battle of the Frogs and Mice, from Up One Pair of Stairs of My Bookhouse by Willy Pogany (1920)
Gute Sheep/gutefår. Värmland, Sweden (April 24, 2020).
this is from january but i felt like it should probably be on this blog somewhere?? baby's first knitting project, will probably end up frogging and redoing it at some point bc really i like a tighter cowl, but it's extremely Color and extremely cozy and i made it myself :)
Terrace paddies in North Vietnam [Shortlisted in National Geographic Photo Contest 2015] by Quynh Anh Photography on Flickr
a groove-billed ani doodle digital / photoshop 2025
one of those 'extremely grateful for jarred indian sauces you can stick a protein and some veg into and eat over rice' sort of nights
at first when i was remaking i thought 'now i can voice all the controversial opinions i felt obliged to keep mum about before!' (to be clear, my controversial opinions are things like 'it's possible to oppose monarchy in real life AND still enjoy a fictional king from time to time.' 'i don't entirely reject the idea of so-called cultural christianity, but i feel strongly that the label should be reserved for patterns of behavior, rhetoric, etc, and not applied to individual people.' idk i don't keep a running list but you get the idea probably.)
but un/fortunately i've been so selective in my refollowing (which to be clear is still very much a work in progress) that i'm not actually encountering any of the discourse to which i'd previously built up all these objections! which is very restful, but doesn't exactly stimulate me to articulate my positions…
it really is true, i think, that no matter where you fall on a moral spectrum you'll be shocked at some things other people are willing to condone, and will seem sanctimonious to them if you disclose as much; and that in turn other people will be shocked at some things you're willing to condone, and will seem sanctimonious to you ditto…
for context this post is brought to you by my genuine (and unexpressed, ftr, except here!) startlement at seeing a blogger i've historically considered conscientious admit to not recycling their cat food cans