recurring dead wife flashback where it becomes increasingly apparent that the person remembering her has dishonestly claimed a romantic dynamic to their relationship that never actually existed and erased any conflict that ever existed between them now that she's no longer able to say no to them
dead wife flashback where each time we see her she looks more confused and upset by how she's remembered, then desperate and furious, until she's hammering on the glass screaming to be let out
this isn't how it happened. you know this isn't how it happened. but you still keep coming back, keep disturbing my grave so you can play out your fantasies. voyeurs crowding around my autopsy, straining for the best view; pawing through my entrails like grubby butchers trying to find some golden meaning in blood and shit because you can't bear to face the cold light of truth. you just can't bear the thought of never having really known me at all.
"retiring for the evening" is a very useful concept lol we should be free to say "i'm not gonna be chatting anymore tonight" without then having to pretend to be asleep. if we ever talk and you say goodnight don't stress it if i see you online later hahahahah
Perhaps this is an obnoxious take on my part, but video games should, above all things, prioritize the ability of being paused. At any point. Regardless of whether it's during a cutscene, a special animation, or a time-based puzzle. You never know when you're gonna get a phone call, or someone will need you in another room, or you get a sudden urge to go to the bathroom, or you hear your cat licking plastic, or whatever. Other entertainment mediums like books, movies, and music can be paused whenever you want. Why do some games not give you the same luxury??
I've been meaning to make a post talking about my stroke because y'all got bits and pieces of the recovery but I never actually told the story of HOW it went down and the thing is the type of stroke I had is usually the type young people have and since having mine i've now heard multiple stories of people under 40 having very similar strokes and the scary thing is, is that they didn't get help right away. Because you're young and healthy and sure you feel weird but it'll pass right? but it doesn't, and it gets worse, and by the time you get to the hospital (some people literally take days to go) the deficits are worse and recovery is harder.
so here's a super long post about strokes in general, and mine in particular/what I went through.
So for strokes the signs are abbreviated BE FAST. Balance loss, Eyesight changes, Face drooping, Arm weakness, Speech difficulty, -> Time to call 911.
Had I known those MAYBE I would have figured it out but my symptoms were a little mixed. I was reading (fanfic!) in bed because it was a sunday morning and i had nothing pressing to do and suddenly got dizzy. I put my laptop aside because my eyes were blurring (Eyesight changes - symptom #1), and laid down, thinking it would pass, it didn't, it's a little vague how it progressed because I'd been having headaches and neckpain for about 3 weeks leading up to it so I was like 'idk is this a migraine?' (headaches can be a stroke symptom so symptom #2) but i got nauseous and eventually got up and to my utmost surprise I immediately fell over as if I was the drunkest of frat bros. The room literally spun before my eyes as I fell to the floor (Balance loss - symptom #3). I have had some Nights and I had never been that unsteady before. I crawled my way to the bathroom, threw up (nausea - not a common stroke symptom) , took 800mg of ibuprofen, and crawled back to bed.
if you know anything about ibuprofen you might know it's a mild blood thinner and that's a high dose. I may have inadvertently helped myself with that one. I was just feeling like shit and thinking 'idk this might help'
At this point I still thought we were still in Normal Land. Sure, it was a weird morning, but Surely There Was A Reason. (Yes There Was) Anyway, as I'm lying there willing my body to stop suffering I realize my arm is going numb (stroke symptom #4) and I switch positions, because weird, but it doesn't go away, and I gave it a good little while. I'm on a medication that can make my limbs tingle but it usually just does it to my fingers and it dissipates quickly but this wasn't dissipating, and then I realized one of my legs was also going numb. Then one side of my face is going numb.
(at the time I did not look in the mirror but I had a drooping eyelid - symptom #5)
Those all seem bad. I grab my computer and google 'when to go to the hospital for dizzyness' as that felt like the worst of my problems. and indeed the list I found highlighted that if you are also experiencing loss of balance, blurred vision, nausea, and limb numbness, you should see a doctor. That seems like far too many symptoms to be having all to be listed. I grab my phone (thankfully plugged in and by my bed), and start layering on more clothing because it's about 10 degrees out and i'm in a pajama dress. The very nice man at 911 talks with me and sends an ambulance, I tell him I don't think I can get out the front door of my building on my own and he asks if I can get to MY apartment door to which I say yes and he assures me that's fine they will have keys to my building.
(I have been since informed they love to chop down doors but no, I could get that far)
I wait by my door laying down on the ground and they arrive pretty quickly. They see to me in the hallway, which is more of a lobby in my building and the only place with room for me to lie down (I cannot stand unassisted at this point) they ask me a bunch of questions, take vitals, and ask me where I would like to be taken. Me, having never had to go to the fucking hospital in an emergency before, simply go 'wherever is close' because I again, I am having a stroke and do not have the wherewithal to think through these things.
A big firefighter helps me down the stairs (it's only a half flight and I still almost did not make it) and we get underway.
At the hospital they wheel me into triage and I mostly lie there gratefully and answer some questions and respond to some tests (grip strength, following a pen with my eyes, that sort of thing) and then I hear what is great when you've been at urgent care for two hours but what is Very Bad when you just arrived in an ambulance and that's 'She's next'. I jumped the line for a CT scan and an MRI. I was there less than ten minutes before I was actively being scanned. honestly closer to five.
my active symptoms seem to have been worse than some of the stories I've heard, not being able to walk AT ALL in particular, although some other are pretty equal (Footless Jo on youtube had a stroke around the same time I did of the same type and has discussed hers, she delayed going in despite the severity for a variety of reasons and it sounds like her recovery has been difficult) My recovery was pretty easy because i was actively being cared for and on blood thinners right away. I was pretty out of it in the beginning, but I was only in the hospital for 6 days and then in a rehab for another 4 to relearn how to walk and balance, then i was released unto the world and just spent time going to physical therapy and recovering for awhile. I was out of work for about 8 weeks total. I basically had the best outcome for a stroke. I recovered almost fully back to 100% (I'm about 2% less sure footed than I used to be, but it's rarely noticeable), my face still feels a little weird but has markedly improved so I live in hope it will eventually get back to normal. It massively sucked. But strokes can fuck you up for life and I came out a weird medical story to tell and have to take some extra medication now/precautions to take (i cannot do certain types of yoga, no weightlifting, no push ups, no going on rollercoasters.... things that could strain my neck essentially) but overall I escaped very lucky.
For anyone who has ever had covid before, please be sure you are aware of stroke symptoms. Each successive infection raises the risk in a pretty major way, and a lot of people are dying young due to not knowing these signs or being afraid to act on them. Please take care of yourselves.
When people argue that food from Chinese and Mexican restaurants in the US are not 'real' representations of that culture's cuisine ignore the historical reality that these dishes were developed by diasporic communities striving to recreate the flavors of home with available resources. Such criticism frames adaptation as a loss of authenticity, rather than recognizing it as a sincere and evolving expression of culture by people separated from their homeland.
they don't tell you this but when an event is advertised as "for all ages" they mean kids. they mean kids. if you, a grown-up, show up expecting to do the arts'n'crafts, you're the weirdo. even though they said "all ages."
great news everynyan, the event that inspired me to make this post in anticipation had an art'n'craft that WAS in fact for all ages, including grown-ups. (in fact it was mosaic-making from recycled glass, with the tools to cut pieces down to size yourself if needed, so it was decidedly for people of a certain age.)
I understand 100% where you're coming from and I have a rant on what the organizers probably meant by "all ages". This is coming from spending too many years running public festivals for anywhere from 100 to 20,000 people at every size of venue from school cafeteria to national convention center, though of course there are exceptions.
The organizers almost certainly really did intend that anyone of any age was welcome to participate in the activities. The problem, I have found, seems to come in 2 parts: the audience's socio-cultural expectations and how they respond to peer pressure (real or imagined), and the likelihood of who shows up at certain kinds of events depending on the regional demographics and how the event is advertised.
My rambling below the cut:
Take this with a grain of salt but I find it interesting and have spent a decade in arguments about it, so. The (US) audience for many hands-on / interactive events that appeal to both kids and adults, based on all the marketing data I have personally collected or paid tens of thousands of dollars for from third-party agencies, basically says that women ages 30-45 are driving almost all the social media views. Many of those women are trying to plan educational and fun excursions for their children ages 2-13.
The problem comes when you, the adult who is actually invited to participate in said activities, comes to an event with a lot of families with children ages 2-13. People with social graces will say: "I need to let the children enjoy this; it is uncomfortable if I take a spot from a child. Also if I am a man or otherwise have some caution I might be worried that as a solo adult surrounded by kids I will be seen as suspicious." So they just watch from a distance and then usually go home. Which to me sucks because there's often nothing inherent about the activity that makes it enjoyable only to kids.
But too many events don't seem to be at the stage of understanding you need to signal in 1) the advertising and 2) the actual physical setup that both adults and kids are welcome, or need separate stations, or hours that are for certain age groups. I think this is why a lot of museums started doing adult nights, especially science museums. If you ever go to the Exploratorium in San Francisco, this will be abundantly clear: the museum is genuinely designed to be fascinating to anyone from a preschooler to a postdoc but unless there's space to allow for all and curated exhibit design with big and small tables, for example, it triggers the mental block of "let the kids have this".
Anyway I spent a decade of my life arguing two things:
Built the event so that both kids and adults have separate and mixed space and train the activity leaders how to welcome and engage the whole spectrum of participants.
Recognize that sometimes you actually do need to provide a separate interaction time or space to make the adults feel welcome, especially childless adults, or at least signage to make sure everyone understands that no, it's actually the point.
I usually work on events that have "low threshold, high ceiling" activities so your mileage may vary. (Meaning: anyone can try doing the thing, even at a very basic or shallow level; the ones who want to go deep focus or discussion about what's behind the activity will find the presenters are VERY capable of talking details or having a back-and-forth about it all day.)
I had a really fun time running an event at a big public television station's festival where just as many adults without kids accompanying them did the activity as kids did, and stayed for a full hour or more as it really was pure fun, and also sensory-friendly compared to much of the other activities. I also wore myself out trying to argue with co-event organizers over the years that hands-on stuff really does appeal to everybody BUT sit-down performances and lectures usually really do have age categories, and it can be a big waste of money to try to combine the two in one mega-event if you don't have ticket revenue or reservations to judge interest by in advance.
That said, I definitely find more events run by neurodivergent people or audiences try harder to be welcoming – especially if the presenters get to engage in their special interests with all kinds of people.
I could write an essay on online or hybrid event design as well, featuring such sections as "you need to ASSIGN SOMEONE TO TELL THE ONLINE PEOPLE WTF IS HAPPENING AND MAKE SURE THEY CAN SEE/HEAR" and "people's attention spans rarely exceed one hour, and even that is a lot when online". Gretchen McCulloch did a really fabulous blog post series during the pandemic about taking LingCon online only and what they learned about event design. If you enjoy gatherings as much as I do, I also highly recommend Priya Parker's book The Art of Gathering because she basically point blank says what vibes and outcomes are you trying to achieve, does the event model you believe you need actually achieve those things (whether it's a baby shower or a happy hour or a conference), and what do the attendees actually want that would make them happy to be part of it.
I am one of those adults who wants to participate but won't if it's mostly kids and their parents.
But recently I stumbled upon this incredible gem - an "all ages playground" in Katanning, Western Australia. There is normal playground equipment, but also playground equipment that's sized to adults, and specifically installed in a way that children cannot access those pieces! For example, the ladder begins a metre off the ground, or requires adult strength to pull yourself up onto it.
watching my husband get diagnosed with and treated for sleep apnea over the last year was not the thing that radicalized me re: weight and healthcare but my goodness it has solidified my stances.
sleep apnea is more common in people who are fat.
society decided for some reason that this meant that being fat causes sleep apnea. its often difficult to get referrals for sleep apnea treatment if you are fat, because some PCPs will tell you try losing weight first.
turns out!! having untreated sleep apnea causes weight gain in a not-insignificant number of people. it also makes it fucking impossible for many people to lose weight.
my husband worked out the same amount before he got a cpap as he does now. there have been no major diet changes either. yet he has been losing weight -- and gaining muscle tone -- consistently since he started using a cpap in january.
also, his blood pressure -- which was high, which docs blamed on his weight/diet -- went down significantly within one month of starting cpap treatment, before his weight changed significantly.
ANYWAYS. this is getting long. two final thoughts.
- I Want To Strangle Medical Fatphobia With My Bare Fucking Hands
- if you are exhausted constantly for "no reason", and especially if you snore, you should probably ask your doctor about getting tested for sleep apnea. it is extremely common -- estimates are around 1 in 10 people -- and is also wildly under-diagnosed. like, some estimates suggest that 80% of people with moderate-severe sleep apnea are undiagnosed.
the thing about "no one is talking about this!" posts is that at best they are weird guilt trips trying to make you feel personally responsible for the fact that you haven't heard about one specific thing happening that no one has mentioned to you. at worst they are just wrong because the op turns out to have no idea what people are talking about because they've never listened to another person in their life. either way I am not reblogging that
Having ADHD is so fun because sometimes youre looking for something that you use regularly and definitely put away in a smart and reasonable place and you have absolutely 0 hope of remembering where and finding it. And then other times ur like "hmm I need a some kind of small pointed object. I feel like i remember seeing a paperclip under the left couch cushion a month ago, i wonder if its still there" and it is
"wait but if u saw the paperclip why would u just leave it there?" its the adhd. Also if i had put it away then i wouldnt have been able to find it a month later when i needed it. So. Checkmate neurotypicals.
Problem is when the ADHD catalogue is out of date, when you go to check under the couch cushion for that paperclip and it ISNT there, sometimes your brain will just give you a montage of false memories of everywhere you've ever seen a paper clip, like this
How many old technologies do YOU recognize? Nobody is old enough for all of them!!!
DVDs
VHS tapes
Vinyl (before it became cool again)
Rotary phones
Whale oil lamps
Magic lantern shows
Gutenberg press
Horses
Antikythera mechanism
Fire
ANSWERED YES TO ALL TEN? CONGRATS, we've finally tracked you down your immortal life-sucking bastard. Hunters of the Order will descend on your lair imminently, since you weren't even using a VPN
amandla
romaincrisis
andulkaphoto
tangentwithtanner
discoholicmusic
theartofmadeline
