past and present

[fandomonymous]

• The better weather, coming out from under all the layers into sunlight and greenness, is doing good things for my sanity.
  
• In general, my body has been low level unpleasant - hay fever, a particularly cramp-happy menstrual cycle (when I skipped March, and timed particularly poorly), some minor skin issues. Stupid meat bag. This partly undoes the mental health benefits of the weather, tragically.
  
• The dentist stuff happened, blargh, whatever. I'm a little suspicious that my current office over-treats, particularly my current hygienist, but I don't have the spoons to research a switch just yet; I'll probably just ignore some of the more aggressive suggestions until I do.
  
• I mentioned before that my parents were selling their house; the closing date was mid-April and that's worth noting here for personal history purposes. My place now has a ton of things they weren't using/weren't using much, which is kinda weird, but whatever, I'll find ways to use most of it and donate the rest. Some of it is my sister's, which I am resolutely ignoring for a few weeks before asking her to come over and pick it up, hahahhahahaaaaaaaaaaaugh.
  
• Work is roooooough. Not 'look for another job' rough, but 'things aren't working the way they should and motivation is hard' rough. Blah. Some of it is actual technical difficulties and the rest is probably burnout or something similar, sigh. I'm thinking of spending the last week of May working from home as a pseudo-vacation, like I did last April in Florida, but focusing on New York City.
  
• I ended up getting PartnerBeast and myself ringside seats for a local Lucha Libre night, which was pretty neat. Not the highest quality night of wrestling according to him, but plenty fun as a shakeup of routine. On his actual birthday we met with his friends for Chinese food and cheap beer, and I went to his place for once - again, a nice change of pace. (And partly possible since my parents moved - yes, PartnerBeast and my mom share a birthday!)
  
• Alison was here for a few days and we went to a really neat local Thai food/culture festival. Sharing my home and life with her on occasion has been A Delight. <3 <3
  
• It's been hard for me to motivate myself to keep up with Transparent - it's not good at prompting me to keep up with it like Duolingo, and the software itself, particularly the voice recognition, is buggy. Gotta work on it. Maybe I'll make a daily task/reminder in some Google app to duplicate the Duolingo 'reminder owl' behavior.
  
• DESSA WAS AMAZING as per usual, and I'm so glad one of my best friends and I got to experience her music together. <3
  
• Tabletop games this month were Dialect and Lady Blackbird, both of which were delightful in really different ways! I had a moment in Lady Blackbird in particular where I realized I wasn't the weakest roleplayer at the table. More 'levelling up in adulthood' I guess, for a very specific form of levelling.
  
• Roguelike Celebration is confirmed to be in October and the call for proposals is up. I think I have a topic, and I also might refine something else I've been working on, but the usual bittersweetness of not being able to run something similar for the East Coast has been present. My therapist talked about this as an issue of identity - what do I mean in this community - which, yeah. Something to contemplate. I don't think I am, and don't want to be, the token not-male not-developer, but what I actually am and do for this scene is a work in progress.
  
• Speaking of Google apps, a question for the audience: I'd really like a plain text or minimal HTML email every other Sunday, telling me what my various Google calendars (six calendars, plus two not run by me) have on them in the next two weeks. What's the easiest way for me to do that?
  

In May:

• A few professional networking events that are out of the ordinary for me, but could be interesting. I'm planning to go to one in masc-of-center clothes and a subtle they/them pin with backup from a friend, we'll see how THAT feels.
  
• One of my comets is in town! For only one night, but still!! <3 <3 <3 <3 <3
  
• And in other poly news, both the PartnerBeast and Alison have agreed to have lunch with me on Saturday the 18th. I haven't decided yet if the three of us will go out somewhere or if I'll cook something for them both (I'm kinda thinking the latter, if only so it can take as much or as little time as we want). I haven't done one of these intentional multiple-partners-having-a-meal things before - PB's met folks I've been dating at birthday parties, but always in the company of other people. It's exciting and a bit scary and wooo.
  
• Mom will be in town all month, staying at an AirBNB in the glorified suburbs, finishing a semester of adjunct teaching; I'll only see her Mother's Day though, unless something happens.
  
• By the end of May I should have submitted whatever I submit for RogueCel. (I'm 90% sure what my topic will be, but I want to do some more preliminary research to get an idea of whether to ask for a full slot or a short one again.)
  
• I'm also taking the end of May semi-off - working from home with few major plans - so that'll be nice.
  
• And you know, chugging on with work and life and whatever. It's a full life.