No preamble today, you all know what this is by now. As I sew a Cthulhu patch onto my vest, I just wanted to check in with my favorite comrades! This is your space to talk and vent!
A lot of you remember that show I had last week with the people who don't like me. It actually went pretty horrible for my partner, not so much for me. I walked out during the performances of the people in question, and the 3rd person just walked right past me without saying anything, and I had my best friend with me so it ended up being a fun, drunken/high evening for me, in some respects.
My partner tho...one of the performers (who I fucked things up with) had a mental break right before the last act, was screaming and crying about how they didn't wanna do it. I can't help but wonder if my presence played a part in that. Partner isn't holding the break against them, but they haven't reached out since to say anything at all about it. My partner produced and directed the show, so they won't be inviting them back. On top of that, they ended up losing money on the show that they worked hard for, and they found out that some other people in their community were trying to poach the venue, which upset them. ON TOP OF THAT - they're coming off Lexapro, so it hasn't been an easy week.
Beyond that, I've been making new friends, some of them from Hexbear, some of them from Lex. Talking with someone right now who is spitting Marx quotes at me and I'm just like....oh yeah, let's fucking do this. Had a GREAT day on Saturday doing mutual aid work and then hanging out. My partner seems to be working on us doing ENM/poly stuff in a positive way, so that's cool. Band practice tonight, rest tomorrow, and then back to distributing food on Saturday.
Hope you're all well!
rn i'm stuck feeling like my i'll never be able to get surgery and that i need to sufficiently prove my dysphoria and sadness to a point that will eventually end me
Hope you're not hurt! Falling down stairs is scary as fuck
Oof the end of the show sounds brutal, glad it sort of worked out in the end but ooof.
I had a BBQ with some comrades this weekend and introduced some people to each other. It went really well and I'm glad I could help people meet.
Also I got a part time office gig and I'm very stoked because it's on a bus route, it pays the bills, and it has a consistent schedule with no weekends. I'll be able to go to pride and have money, woo!
Also the court thing with former abusers. Ugh. It's still going, a second trial is in a few weeks. The silver lining is that I reconnected with some of the people the abusers isolated me from and we caught up. It's been bittersweet. I'm still angry at some of my former friends for turning on me so easily. I don't know if I can look past that.
Congrats on the gig! That's exciting! Anything you're particularly looking forwards to at pride?
Thanks!
This is my first pride where I'll be going with my fwb and riding along with a caravan full of people. We'll be there for the whole weekend and partying hard, it's going to be fantastic.
Have fun and be safe! Bash some protesters if you can!
My ass hurts so bad from fencing, apparently it's common to like wear out your piriformis. Butt pain is such a silly thing, I seriously need an ass massage 😭
Just a few weeks now. It's really good exercise and swords are cool. I'm alwo so bruised up cause everyone is beginners so we all hit pretty hard - eventually you have to lighten the hits cause it's faster.
Did a whole assignment yesterday, now rewarding myself by skipping that class
Been worried for the ass-reaming my boss is going to give me when I admit my fuck-up on some report to her. In the grand scheme of things it’s not the hugest deal, but this mistake does call into question my “team’s” competence. This mistake was seen higher up the chain than her, which makes things slightly worse.
At the end of the day, it’s stupid to place this much responsibility on a trainee, but I can’t stop thinking about how this will affect the workplace down the road lol.
it’s stupid to place this much responsibility on a trainee
Big oof. Some places are so bad at onboarding. No training, bad training, flat out wrong training. And then putting actual responsibility on people who are still learning, or even interns. : p
good in all the things that are within my control. a year into transition I'm really feeling more confident and self-assured than I ever have and more of a willingness to actually take care of myself then I've ever had.
but in terms of things I can't control... my very conservative brainwormed in-laws were at first okay with my transition (probably because I'm NB/transfemme so can still boymode around them), but one of their relatives asked them about my wife having they/them in her instragram bio and they freaked and now think I am forcing Gender Ideology on my wife, that we shouldn't have kids while I'm "figuring things out" (which, like, I wasn't planning on it, but they've been forcing the idea of kids down our throats for years so suddenly this has been the one thing that made them reconsider), and now my MIL is starting to tell other family members - without consulting me on whether I want her to tell anyone or not, how I would phrase that, if that's a conversation I should be having, and what the point of telling them is in the first place considering I boymode around family... so like what's the difference anyways other than I have better skin, longer hair, and a more bulgy chest? I just want to yell at them to be normal but they read shit like the Epoch Times so I'm worried they are past the point of reasoning with, and we might just have to cut them off entirely one day.
but everything else outside of that rules so I'm happy that the bad shit in my life isn't my shit at least
ugh, sorry comrade, that's some real sicko shit to have to deal with, but I'm glad you're able to stay positive too :) i just don't understand what goes into people's brains to make them this way.
Glad you're keeping positive about it! Hope your folks come around. Sending love and solidarity :meow-hug:
Actually doing really fucking well lately.
- Started my second job in march, so been collecting 2 massive paychecks every 2 weeks.
- Bought a new car.
- Doing some open source work and made a PR for Ryujinx (spurred by totk). Also continuing lots of work for Hexbear. Gonna probably pick up some work for Jellyfin sometime soon.
- 6 year anniversary for my spouse and I, next week
Interesting development. Glad it went alright for you but it sucks that your partner is having a rough time.
I'm currently struggling with back pain that makes me want to rip one of my arms off and nothing I have done relieves it in the slightest. Other than that, same old same old
Hope you feel better soon! Thanks for the kind words :meow-hug:
I've been having a psychotic break for 2 days and my meds aren't working. It might be time for grippy sock jail. Also my abusive ex (who I have to stay in contact with because we and I shit you not coparent our dog still) bought the most shit tier clip so all my dogs tags are missing because he wanted to scratch his neck on a walk. In positive news I'm replaying far cry 2 and having fun despite being in the middle of a psychotic break
Glad Far Cry is grounding you. Check your messages (not these ones, the other place). Sending love and good vibes :meow-hug:
Just finishing up the first full week of work after a week when I only worked three days. Still immensely rested and in a good mood from how those days off were placed. I may not actually be religious, but I am honestly thankful to Jesus Christ for making sure that ascension day, which is an official holiday, is always on a Thursday. Since I also got the Wednesday off because I had done some weekend work two months previous I got to spend one whole week living in a world with a 24 hour work week. After the weekend I worked two days, then I got another weekend for two days, then worked one day, then another weekend for two days. It was glorious.
I just cobbled together some lyrics for the Imperial March from Star Wars instead of eating breakfast, so that's cool.
I'm hanging in there. My sleep schedule has been shot to shit for most of the month, and I don't know if it's from stress, anxiety, or what, but I'm still more or less keeping it together in spite of not being able to get any damned sleep.
All that aside, I started (DIY) HRT recently, so that's a whole different mess of impostor syndrome. I keep reminding myself that cishet AMAB people don't typically go out of their way to source feminizing hormones from strange corners of the internet on a lark and that this isn't just some fleeting hyperfixation. At any rate, the T-blockers are definitely keeping my usual levels of angst at bay, so that's a nice change, even if my E levels don't feel like they've ramped up to anything special just yet.
On the long-winded guitar nerd front... I got my hands on a used Marshall Mode Four head for pretty cheap, and I'm really digging it so far, even through the sad little speaker-swapped 4x12 Valvestate cab that I run. I'm mostly just planning to use the head for studio stuff, since the second channel is bang-on for hot rodded Plexi/JMP/JCM800/Silver Jubilee noises, mostly if you run it through the right speakers to tame some of the treble that this thing puts out. The fourth channel is like an old Valvestate on steroids with the option to voice it like a Dual Rec, so I can't wait to hear it in a mix with my 5150. Unfortunately, it's in need of a bit of TLC. It has taken a few too many hits to the faceplate, so the control boards don't stay in place very well if you push the channel selector buttons. I have it torn apart to try to fix that issue (and also to clean up some spider egg sacs that were on the fans), and I figure I might as well take some automotive detailer to the tolex on the headshell while I'm at it. I was able to find a new-old-stock footswitch for it, which was a pleasant surprise, so that should cut down on the "buttons jamming the PCBs off the friction-mount standoff posts" issue. (Absolutely bizarre footswitch cabling choice, too -- it uses a 15-pin D-sub connector, like an old PC gamepad or Sound Blaster MIDI breakout port.) I just wish I weren't too exhausted all the time to actually work on the thing.
Congrats on starting HRT! Excited for you! :lea-bounce:
That head sounds awesome, we have one in our space but idk if it works. I'm currently struggling with finding an octave pedal to do mock bass stuff for live shows that doesnt sound like total fuck with my low tuning (f standard). Even using old 70s 15" speakers and a Model T, the OC5 I'm using now sounds like ass. Maybe I need to add back some dry signal - I'll try it out a few minutes tonight before practice, but I'm looking at the Pitchfork Plus now. Maybe I should just go down a fifth instead of an octave. Ideally I'd have a biamp setup with one clean + bass amp, and the other with my regular effects. Just need to find a pedal that sounds ok. I also started playing with the Behringer HM2 clone, and actually really like it with my super low tuning! Normally not much of an hm2 person, but I vibe with this.
It's super cool that you know how to fix up stuff like that! If you were closer to Chicago, we could definitely use someone like that. Funny story, my Matamp was built in England and uses weird fuses for a guitar amp. I had problems with it and took it to tech after tech, until someone was like "oh shit, I checked the 70s OR120 schema and we need a 2A slo blow." Been rocking like a champ since then, and I can actually play it cranked all the way to 10 now.
f standard
Holy shit, I'm not surprised that the OC5 is struggling with your setup. The Pitchfork might work a little better for you; I haven't tried one, and certainly not at that low of a tuning. I have a Digitech Drop, and that does pretty well until you get into E-standard bass territory -- once your source is tuned that low, the tracking is OK, but the output signal gets weird and artifact-y past about 3 half-steps down. Are you using something like an LS-2 at the front of your chain to split off the clean signal and send it to the octave pedal/bass effects loop and then mix it back in? That should still work as a Y-pedal if you decide to send the "bass" signal to a separate amp (or maybe a modeler and a PA system).
Behringer HM2 clone
I love this thing, and not because it's hot pink. OK, not just because it's hot pink. It's a little fizzier than a real HM-2, so I've actually given mine to my kid and swapped out for a TC Electronic Eyemaster, which is a two-knob version that is also built like a tank. I've tried it on multiple amps now, and I grin like a jackass each time because it's just instant Entombed, even through my silverface Fender. I don't normally go for the Swedish chainsaw thing, but it's good stupid fun and an amazing blend tone.
I have been drinking before practice and would love to continue this conversation but once I mark this as read, I know I'll probably forget. Are you on Element or anything? Dm me and let's talk gear!
I'm doing pretty well. I switched meds a couple weeks ago and they really seem to be working. I hadn't even realized but I've been low grade pissed off and in a bad mood for the last few years and I feel better now. I'm actually able to feel happy and have good days now, its fucking awesome.
Hell yeah! That's awesome! I just upped my bipolar meds this morning, they definitely do something for me too! High five!
:High Five: Good luck with going up on your meds, I know a lot of times it can be a really shitty couple of days.
Thanks! They're absolutely going smoothly, just need to figure out the meds for my heart rate.
Have you tried propranolol? It helps me with the bi-polar twitchyness a lot and it regulates your heart rate with like no side effects.
That's what my doc just gave me actually, that and a higher lemotrigine dose. I'm gonna try a higher dose of the lols soon and see if maybe I just need more than 20mg. How much do you take? My partner does 40mg a few times a day, thinking I might give that a shot.
I'm on 200mg of lemotrigine twice a day and 120 of propranolol in the morning. Venlafaxine is what I just got added that been helping so much.
I start 200mg lemotrigine in 2 weeks, just went to 150 today. I'll try more propanolol soon. Maybe right now, cause I can feel things going in my chest a little bit even though I'm just sitting here sewing.
