hugtheteadrinkthekitten

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

People are so much more sad, and desparate, and lonely than you think. I have had three incidents in the last four months were a technician I was working with was being either dangerously unfocused (we work with high voltage), or just flat out angry with their coworkers, and every time when I just pulled them aside to say hey, this isn't you, you're nice, and you're competent, so something must be up - what can I do to help - they have responded by bursting into tears. One guy was struggling to get his wife moved into a care home, one guy just got served divorce papers, and the other hadn't slept a wink the night before because his daughter had the pukes.

I haven't spent my whole life responding to people being rude, or stupid, or dangerous with knee jerk compassion. It's a new habit. The first time I did that as the lead for my lab, it was because the guy genuinely was so good natured that I knew something had to be off. But the other two times were just me going, alright, lets see if it always goes this well, and so far, it has. I'm almost 30, and I just figured out that the #1 reason people are shitty are because they are going through shit.

I don't think you have, like, a moral obligation to respond to people being jerks with knee jerk compassion. But it has made my life so much easier the last four months that I would recommend trying. For your own sake. Please.

(I'll step off my soapbox now. Enjoy your Sunday.)

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

Hi I just went to Mad At You island and pushed everyone there into the fucking sea. Got on a boat and paddled away just as the ocean storms rolled in to drown them, and vomited my own anger into the ocean as I left. You're safe now.

Of course without my own anger I do sort of regret drowning all of those people, but whatever. Some probably survived to swim to Mad At Me island instead (for trying to kill them) and that place sucks, I always leave my beer cans behind when I holiday there.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

Love how tumblr has its own folk stories. Yeah the God of Arepo we’ve all heard the story and we all still cry about it. Yeah that one about the woman locked up for centuries finally getting free. That one about the witch who would marry anyone who could get her house key from her cat and it’s revealed she IS the cat after the narrator befriends the cat.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

this is so rogue but does anyone have the poetry template that went semi-viral on twitter a while back? it was designed for kids but someone gave it to their mother who has dementia and she wrote a really moving poem about her experience.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

The fae smiled, sharply: “Give me your name, child.”

“Uhhhhh. Stick.”

“What.”

“Does Leaf work better? I’m just kinda looking around this clearing. Look, I’m trans, I haven’t decided on one yet, I’m throwing some spaghetti at the wall, you know how it is.”

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

Since I already have established myself as a little pickle freak with no shame I have another extremely embarrassing story that will probably make you laugh.

When I started dating Brendan he was still living at home, but after we'd been dating a while he and his best friend Charlie decided to move in together. Another friend of theirs was looking for roommates and they decided to go for it. It was the lower level of a house.

Here's where I need to set the stage a little. Looking back on the time I spent in that space, I don't actually even know if it could have been nice under other circumstances. I feel almost pity for that house, full of young disgusting boys. Bare and wretched, it had minimal threadbare furniture, no decorations, and the guy who lived there already was hands down the most disgusting person I've ever met.

Not his character, but his habits. This boy's name was Josh. I genuinely don't know if their moving in with Josh was a handshake deal or if they saw the place beforehand. No sane person would ever have chosen to live there otherwise, I feel certain.

There was a kitchen. Sorta. But like. Was there a kitchen? Every counter, the whole sink, everything was just covered in dirty dishes. Brendan and Charlie said, "Josh, you need to do the dishes, we can't even wash anything cause it's so full of dirty dishes."

Josh's response to being asked to clean was to load all the dirty dishes onto a blanket. And then he dragged that blanket down the hall into the laundry room.

Crusted on residue, molding slimes, and horrible odors arose as he moved the blanket. After two months they said, "Josh, you can't just leave your dirty dishes on a blanket in the laundry room."

Josh's response was to drag the blanket of misery and miasmas into his room instead.

Josh didn't shower very much and he was a big guy. At one point I walked past his door when it opened. His girlfriend was crossing to the bathroom and I almost dry heaved directly in front of her. The smell of rotting foot, dried on sweat, and sex musk swirled together into the most eye watering assault my nose had ever faced.

So that's where our story takes place. A home of no hand towels, no soap by the bathroom sink, a blanket covered in months of early-twenties depression dishes.

I was meeting some of these people for the first time on the night of our story. Josh had a crew of two others guys who just hung around constantly. So it's me and five dudes hanging out, chatting, ignoring the various smell scapes to live in the moment. Josh left briefly to go pee.

Then I felt a stabbing in my guts. I shot a panicked look to Brendan and casually said I had to pee too. At that time in my life I was experiencing some of the most god awful IBS I've ever experienced. I knew I was going to make a crime scene in there. To my dismay there was no fan to turn on. But Brendan, like the champion partner he was, started telling a story at extremely high volume to cover the sound of my anus exploding under the force of my anxiety poops.

When I flushed and turned to the sink, I was dismayed. There was no soap. I looked around the bare bathroom and didn't see anything useful. No one had ever wanted to wash their hands here before. I then looked over the tub and spotted a tiny window that I wasn't tall enough to open. I wanted to let out the truly rank and terrible smell I had filled the bathroom with, but I had to give that up as impossible.

I slipped out and quietly said, "Hey, is there dish soap or something to wash my hands?"

"Oh," said one of Josh's friends, "There's a bar of soap by the window, let me grab it for you." This was not unreasonable, because again, I couldn't reach the window but I was doused in fear at the ridicule I was about to face.

He went to the door of the bathroom and literally staggered back from the unholy smell I'd left there. He had his arms up as if to protect his face from the malevolent beast my bowels had left behind. When he turned to us there was tears standing in his eyes.

In this house of awful smells and terrible hygiene, I was the stinkiest monster of all, bringing this boy to tears. I broke out in a sweat, ready to cry myself at the shame that was about to be cast upon me.

But instead. He said, "JOSH!"

"I can't believe you dude! Oh my god! That is the nastiest shit I've ever smelled!!" He waved the door frantically to dilute the awful power of my shit and then plowed through to open the window and air out the bathroom, passing me the soap. "I can't BELIEVE you had to go in there after him, oh my god, use the kitchen sink to wash your hands! It's gnarly!"

Everyone turned to rag on Josh for the newest addition to the gallery of smells in the house and he didn't look at me once. He laughed and pulled my shame onto his shoulders with grace, taking the bullet for me like a true hero. Only Brendan and I knew I was the stinky villain.

Josh never brought it up after, but I remain grateful to this day.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

I have never been able to comprehend when people spell out loud. The letters jumble up hopelessly and I can only hold up to three in my mind before I completely lose the thread of what’s happening.

That made it particularly difficult when I worked at the pizza place. It was no problem when someone said their name, but when they spelled it was like my brain was instantly replaced by panicky static.

A coworker once asked, “Why do you look petrified the second someone starts spelling?”

I just shrugged uncomfortably. It sounded silly to admit I couldn’t spell in my head. Over and over I’d hear a name and have a clear vision of how to write it only to have them start saying letters aloud and my certain spelling suddenly scrambled into gibberish. I’d stand frozen, staring down at the paper trying to remember the name and forget the terrifying jumble of individual letters.

My solution was to simply ignore people trying to spell at me. If some white girl said her name was Kristine and I spelled Christine who did it really hurt? I’d willfully stop listening and just started writing the second they said a name.

This led to a young man in line telling me his name in a light accent. He took a breath as if to start spelling but then cut off to audibly gasp, “You spelled it right!”

I looked up in confusion. “There’s another way to spell Seamus?”

“No,” he assured me.

I felt warm and fuzzy that I could make at least one person happy even if a myriad of Kristy’s went away miffed that I couldn’t listen to their spelling.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

ARE YOU TELLING ME MOST PEOPLE CAN'T TASTE THIS?

One of the bummers of being a super taster is how Big mold tastes. And because I can taste it before it’s actually sprouting I’m often disbelieved. Like, sorry restaurant. I know I’ve gotten this sandwich before and I know your cucumber is usually fresh, but today it’s moldy. I understand you can’t see the mold. But I swear. It’s there.

Tonight we had hot dogs and we picked up the buns today. Unfortunately neither of us realized the best by date was also today. The first bun I had was fine but I hit corruption midway down the second bun. I just ate the hotdog bun less, but we had to scrap the rest of the bag.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

The Murderbot tag is sadly still low on memes, so heres my contribution to the cause. (sorry if someone else has done these ones already)

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

"Autism is only a disability under capitalism."

I mean, it's definitely made worse, yeah.

But I had a meltdown yesterday because the wind was too loud when I was tired.

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[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

The war of attrition between me and the person who keeps putting anti abortion stickers on the light post outside the Catholic church continues. I don't think they liked my Hell Awaits Those Who Hate Transsexuals sticker.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

the best thing about tumblr is that you can watch a show and then you come here and someone has made a gifset of it and you can put it on your blog like a sticker in a journal

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

Heterosexual relationship culture is so alien to me and I don’t know if it’s the fact I’m not cishet or the fact I’m autistic but I hear so many things that make me go “Am I insane or are they?”

There’s a lot of hate on widowers and I saw a woman say “You cannot compete with a dead woman.” which is perhaps a reasonable statement to say if he’s constantly comparing you to his dead partner but that wasn’t what the post was about. And I realized “Oh my God, these people genuinely feel like they’re constantly in competition with their spouse’s exes and the ex being dead makes them feel insecure that they cannot best her.”

There’s also been an uptick in the ‘men and women cannot be ‘just’ friends’ rhetoric which I feel like is extremely dangerous and reflects the rise of fascism and sexism. Some of these stories of women feeling threatened by their husband’s female best friend have some merit and others are like “I feel angry that my husband still talks to the girl he grew up next door to and she and her wife are invited to family gatherings and included in family photos sometimes. Am I right to be suspicious?” No. No you’re not. I cannot imagine being you and living with that high level of stress and paranoia and constant torment and jealousy about your husband having a positive relationship with anyone who isn’t you.

[hugtheteadrinkthekitten]

i love the phrase "sex pervert" like. as opposed to what? abstinence pervert?