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Dear [manager], re: your wondering about scheduling the next server-synch, and uneasily pointing at the steaming pile of unfinished tasks we have left that I've had zero help with:

I'm just wrapping up the 'EWF' (which you drafted the spec for) that took about 2 weeks to do properly rather than the ~8 hours that you tagged it as needing. I'm not overjoyed to be getting a call for info about all of the other things that were set to one side in order for me to focus on the DS-creator that would bear immediate fruit. Each in turn, when other things are ready, you'll see them in the appropriate repo since I actually push my commits on a relatively regular basis (unlike you and [the data-manager]). It often bothers me that I have to write you separately with duplicate information that you could just read in the commit-logs; either you're too busy to bother reading anything more (meaning you value your time more than you do mine), or you're not interested in learning to speak my language (which is English). In either case this seems dysfunctional given we’re part of a team.

I'm trying not to even think about doing any kind of server-synch in the near future; the tightness of our development-cycle is ludicrous; there's approximately no time for robust testing, and no time for code-review, sprint or project retrospectives, or even for refactoring bad or duplicative code. My choices right now are either to gird myself for another set of 'workends' and all-nighters, or just walk. These synchs are physically and mentally taxing on top of being a (bad,) nonstandard practice, which I pointed out well before we adopted our current workflow. I was then blithely ignored. It's injury to insult to insult that I have to hold everything together every time this nerve-wracking process is required, despite having explained that it was going to be dirty to operate this way. On top of that, a server-synch is never so much 'scheduled' as "careened into at dangerously high speed". So again, I don't want to think about it.

More broadly, the pressure of this job pretty much never *ever* lets up; even when I ask for time away it's loaded with stipulations about what has to happen not only before I can go but also while I'm gone. The time itself is garnished with minor rescue-missions and messages asking about status that to me read like signs of mistrust, inattention, or both. I can't go off-grid and I can hardly sleep in without worrying that something's gone wrong without my constant attentions. I know it's your job as a manager to crack the whip on everyone, but this turns toward the negative when I generally feel neither respected nor heard. Since you know maybe 15% as much as I do in terms of coding, you also can't offer sensible tips as to how to be more efficient. You basically only tell me to write slippery hacks or stopgaps to finish things faster if you think they’re taking too long

I've raised flags before (in person and writing) about basically everything I've mentioned in this message, including that our team is unbalanced in terms of important skills (and the corresponding workloads). For years now, these observations have pretty much entirely fallen on deaf ears at least from where I stand. Although the pay-raise you and [the bossman] managed for me recently was a good gesture, money is just part of the picture; quality of life is lacking, which I'm losing my ability to cope with; I continually find it difficult to just *get away*. Getting a web-developer in isn't ultimately going to help, since – even if we find someone good who won't need babysitting – they will not have the ops experience to handle crises, and they may be out the door anyhow by the time they do, since we couldn't secure funding for more than a year for them. Introducing another teammember is also going to be an ops and security fiasco, stemming largely from the fact I can rarely get time to work on a build-system for the database, as setting up a local stack for experimentation is a days-long process, rather a simple shell-script that would handle the steps. You wouldn't understand this because you don't really care about security, or the lengths I go to smooth things out for everyone else.

All that said, I'm hereby #done. Do enjoy dealing with all the things you drove me to neglect while I was with y'all, and with all the hours you'll wish you spent working and learning side-by-side with me, rather than riding on my back most of the way.

Sincerely,

[Seldom]

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Maybe a lot of this is just loneliness

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I had a dream that I wanted to describe.  I got dropped off to go to some kind of camp or something, though this was in what seemed to be a big city, in an older district with big buildings like churches, multi-story housing blocks, blocks of offices for assorted small businesses, and that sort of thing.  Not sure how long I was supposed to be there, but presumably at least a few weeks, maybe for the whole summer, maybe for longer. There seemed to be some kind of choice of what I would actually go and do (like, several different programs to enroll in, all in buildings that were in this close grouping on this one block or within a few blocks of there), but for whatever reason, I decided to go to the biggest one, probably because it had my old German teacher as an instructor in it.  Presumably, all the different programs offered there would've been uncomfortable in some way or the other, but I had to pick one.

After a little while, there a some big opening ceremony to welcome all the new attendees to this one I'd rolled the dice on, where various speeches were given.  At that point, it swiftly became clear that it was some sort of spiritual recovery program for atheists. I don’t think it was strictly denominational or whatever, but still kinda weird.

My teacher said something along the lines of "In this program, you will nourish all of the things that you held deep inside, neglected for a long time."

I raised my hand and then asked, "What if all those things that we've held inside for so long have been consumed by one or more worms?"

He responded, "Well, if that's true, then at the very least, you'll be able to nourish your inner worm." Big laugh from attending crowd.

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From 1990 to 2015, income for top-1% households increased by roughly 200% [ source ]

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The best thing about being depressed is that you don’t even need a girlfriend or boyfriend to beat you up or leave you to feel awful, so when you start to feel abysmal with no warning or obvious way out, you can just focus on those feelings, rather than worrying about excuses.

Now that’s convenience.

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Never take an outside perspective ...You’ll invariably regret doing so.

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Dreamt that I was at my old house on the north side of town, downstairs at the sink, washing my hands or something in the bathroom with the door open. Somebody came down the stairs and started giving me grief, telling me to hurry up or that I was germophobe or somesuch. He was biggish, wearing a plain white shirt and a street jacket. I had no idea who he was or why he was ranting at me. I was irked for a few minutes and was planning to ask the guy to leave before I called the police, but then I realized it was (a white version of) Datte, who had come to live with me for a bit while he got his living situation sorted out since his other family-members had been failing to make rent.

Another snippet I recall was me doing something down in some busy, ID3-software type industrial underbelly, with lots of wires, metal walkways, hissing pipes, valves, hissing pipes, etc. From what I can piece together, I may have been one of the Adeptus Mechanicus. One of my colleagues came to speak with me but he was hellish-looking, basically rotting, and it was possible to see the locks of his hair behind his head through the holes in his skull as he was talking. I don't remember anything specific about what he was saying, but given how grisly he looked, in the intensity of his gaze, he may have been trying to get me to serve Chaos, though he was being none too subtle about it. I think the imagery was inspired by re-watching a few parts of Hellsing Ultimate.

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Fuck literally everything about November

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I had a brief dream wherein I was outside the union building screwing around inside a tent, playing Pogs or something. I was sort of narrating aloud that I was acting childish and knew it but was having fun at it anyways so would continue.

I crawled toward the back of the tent and exclaimed with mock panic, “Oh no, she fell over!”. I caught a brief glimpse of what the tent looked like from outside, and it was (vaugely) Lacera shaped.

Stray was standing outside. I could see him walk over through the mesh wall to correct the problem from outside.

This might’ve been inspired by one of the “I’d like to be inside her” comments which he tends to make.

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I had chickpeas cooking in the crockpot near by bed last night, which caused me to have a food dream...

While upstairs, I found a bowl of chunked apples. I added milk (or maybe they already had it?) and was eating them with a spoon. I remember thinking it tasted remarkably good for what it was.

I wanted to add something to it and was about to look for some other fruit but I believe had to throw something away first. I found three slices of pizza (one with pineapple) on the top of the trash in the trash bin. They were clean and all wrapped neatly in this see-through foil (or thick, shape-able saran wrap, if you prefer). I took them out and totally chowed down on them, wondering why they’d been thrown away despite being so pristine. One slice was ‘Hawaiian’ but only had a small bit of ham or bacon, and the other slice I remember had cherry tomatoes and what appeared to be extra cheese. I don’t remember what the third one had.

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I dreamt that D. & A. drive us to the mall for some late-evening event that started around 7 or 8.

Probably the kind of thing that’s meant for teenagers, but you know. Everybody seemed to think it was a great idea so I wasn’t about to spoil it.

Once we get through the little gate or turnstile that leads through the sorta metallic-tubing fence that’s surrounding the main area inside, Kristen turns to her folks asks something like,

“Can I go roleplay?”

I don’t know exactly what this was supposed mean in context… maybe there was D&D or something at the event somewhere. Anyhow she receives a firm reply of

“No, Kristen. I don’t want you doing that tonight.”

Poor Kristen looks pretty dejected at this response. It’s not clear whether they just think RP of any kind is a form of degeneracy, or whether they know already that Kristen will get so into it that she won’t want to leave when it’s time.

In the dream, I’m aware that she’s recently learned the joys of roleplaying, although again it’s unclear which kind. Apparently, Tongs actually taught her the basics of it, which she had to beg him to do. As a precondition to agreeing, he apparently made her do some embarrassing act like perform a pinkie-promise or something.

Overhearing the answer she gets, I can’t help but comment aloud at this.

“>Have to stoop to doing an extended pinkie-shake with Tongs for him to teach you the first of the three ‘R’s of roleplaying >Now that you’ve learned, your parents won’t allow you to do it in public”

After saying this I’m afflicted by an uncontrollable bout of laughter. I almost knock Tongs over as I’m sorta leaning on him for support as I’m laughing so hard it’s difficult to stand.

…It’s weird to have laughter within a dream but it happens.

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It’s better to steal time than to borrow it.

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[3:14:19 AM] Quill: DUDE

[3:14:23 AM] Cell: I'm mirin' her gains brah

[3:14:42 AM] Cell: CELESTIA

[3:14:43 AM] Cell: LIFT

[3:08:12 AM] Cell: you know what i wonder

[3:08:18 AM] Cell: if a unihorser picks something up

[3:08:23 AM] Cell: is the weight of that object applied to them?

[3:08:53 AM | Edited 3:09:02 AM] Quill: There was a fanfic a few years ago that proposed this as part of the physics of levitation

[3:09:44 AM] Quill: Disproven by Boast Busters because Twilight lifted several large, heavy objects without getting squished

[3:09:56 AM] Quill: Or at least cracking the ground

[3:09:58 AM] Cell: twiggy is SWOLE though

[3:09:58 AM] Cell: oh

[3:10:08 AM] Cell: she works out at the library

[3:10:22 AM] AcidRedux: >tfw ywn be levitated by your unicorn mommy

[3:10:25 AM] AcidRedux: Where's my noose

[3:12:00 AM] Quill: I prefer to theorise it as that their magical ability is itself like a muscle

[3:13:48 AM] Quill: Hey Cell

[3:13:51 AM] Cell: hi

[3:13:52 AM] Quill: If magic is a muscle

[3:13:55 AM] Quill: And sun lifts the sun

[3:14:06 AM] Quill: Is Sun the swolest bruh on the planet?

[3:14:13 AM] Cell: bruuuuuuuuh

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[2:17:33 AM] Cell: what if ps don't make any noise aside from what their talent sounds like

[2:17:44 AM] Cell: >lacy starts talking

[2:18:18 AM] Cell: >sound of fabric ripping and tearing, sewing machines, moaning

[2:18:28 AM] Cell: >flare says something

[2:19:02 AM] Cell: >flamethrower ignition, the gay pride theme song, heavy flamer terminator voice lines

[2:19:51 AM] Quill: None of which are even remotely related to what her talent is

[2:20:11 AM] Cell: >the sounds that those british guards with the fuzzy hats make

[2:20:13 AM] Cell: :^)

[2:20:17 AM] Quill: Nope

[2:20:28 AM] Cell: >flashlights turning on and off in rapid succession

[2:20:36 AM] Cell: >fireworks

[2:20:39 AM] Quill: Nnnope

[2:20:43 AM] Cell: >being *extremely* gay

[2:20:48 AM] Quill: Nope!

[2:20:57 AM] Cell: saying Wow!

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My favorite awkward moment of recent note was from earlier this year.

As a background: at least when I'm riding – I wear sunglasses and a scarf on my face about year round because either: [A] SUN or [B] COLD or sometimes [C] BOTH.

So I'm outside the library on campus and this one rejecty-looking kid says hey to me as he walks by the racks while I'm getting my bike. My scarf is already up, and shades are on. He says, "You know, you shouldn't really dress like that."

There is a long pause, during which I consider all manner of insults or vaguely-threatening things like, "Do you think it’s a good idea to say things like that to strangers who look like me?" I don't make any sort of selection, and wind up remaining silent.

He unexpectedly completes his sentence, in the flattest, un-funniest possible way, "Or people might start thinking you're mysterious or something."

Again, I reply with silence and ride off.

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A text post.

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Colon to the power of closing parenthesis.