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everything but the kitchen sink
[A cliche phrase used in the English language] Also, everything under the sun. Including just about everything, whether appropriate or not. For example, Our new car has every feature-everything but the kitchen sink. This hyperbolic term may date from the early 1900s but only became widespread in the mid-1900s. The variant employs under the sun in the sense of “everything on earth,” a usage dating from about a.d. 1000.

https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/everything+but+the+kitchen+sink

Graduation is quickly approaching, yet…

(That is to say the graduation ceremony is in about a month. I already received my degree in the mail).

I don’t know where I want to go for college.

…Well, sort of.

I refuse to go to college in any red states because its unethical. Why would I send money to places that won’t fight back against republican gerrymandering or favor the pedophiles in office *, or those who have shown support for Israel or continuing genocide across the world. I would prefer to go to college outside Seattle as I have lived here all my life and have been ready for a change for years. If I stay here, I won’t change. Living here, I feel like I’ll continue the pattern of being a failure and not meeting the minimum requirements of survival necessary for being an adult.

* (Note: I would consider it if there are a lot of people who live in that place fighting back against injustices such as Tennessee after that bullshit Supreme Court ruling which stripped the Voting Rights Act recently).

The mature and easy path would be to stay where I am and go to school nearby to finish the next steps in my degree path. Considering my health needs and struggles, this is the logical thing to do. The problem is that I feel so stuck here in familiar habits that make me feel far less than I want to be. It’s also true that no matter where I go, there I am. I’m concerned about the future where I will inevitably have to grow up and get a job that pays enough to take of myself and my mother when her health starts to fail and those bills become crazy. Healthcare already was insanely expensive before the recent Trump caused inflation. It’s unlikely that the worst could happen as things are currently stable, however with the combination of my health and energy being unpredictable and less overall, in frustrated at my lack of work options.

In a way, whatever I do is just a means for a job I can do with the tools I have. (With tools being the given strengths, learned abilities, and capabilities as a base trait). I’ve rarely enjoyed working, and I view it as chores or tasks I am forced to do, to survive.

While I do have family and friends here, it doesn’t feel like anything would really change as I rarely leave the house and mostly socialize online.

I would really like to work a job that I feel is fulfilling and isn’t a compromise because its available, or soul crushing. One that pays decently and works with my new limitations too. However that seems increasingly impossible with the current state of the economy here, and what the experience on my resume currently is.

I’m so sick of working minimum wage or near minimum wage jobs. I’ve made it work before, but I’d rather be able to comfortably afford things and live more. Which is asking a lot right now. It’s looking like I don’t have any other option.

Recently, I’ve thought about starting a YouTube channel where I go and cook the hundreds of cooking videos I have saved for later. I’ve only made one video of me at Cape disappointment talking about one of its beaches and posted it on YouTube before, which got a couple hundred views. I know that it’s hard to make money on social media through videos and it will take a while for a channel to get going, but compared to working a terrible job that I hate, maybe that could work out enough to pay bills? Who knows. I have the skills, and able to learn others it would need. Which I would have to do at any job anyway. The last time I worked for myself as a personal Chef, it didn’t work out, for a lot of valid reasons, but this feels different about eighteen years later with more wisdom.

I gotta do something somewhat soon.

Social media & Rage addiction

It might be odd having this section right after what I just said about considering to become a cooking influencer/online personality who cooks, (Since I don’t have a crystal clear idea of how this venture would be in practice, this is what I’m calling it), but, I have a social media problem.

If this were any other substance or activity, you would call me an addict.

I spend far too much time scrolling on it, watching video after video, and thread after thread on Instagram and Threads. I feel informed or satisfied for about 1-2 hours of the content I consume. It doesn’t feel like a drain if I’m, say, into a new special interest and actually engaged with what I’m watching. As compared to dual screening by having it my tv while I also scroll social media on my phone at the same time.

After that, I recognize it as an addiction because most of the time I’m barely actually watching or paying to attention to the video, and I feel like I can’t quit it. Despite this behavior making me constantly angry and upset–A personal algorithm I built with my likes, time, and watch activity, I still go onto these platforms and spend way too much time on them.

My doom-scrolling has gotten way worse since the pedophile in chief was elected.

I hate it.

Both of these social media platforms have just enough interesting and positive content that hooks a person which makes them addicting.

I want to quit, but replacing all that time with other fulfilling activities is expensive and challenging with my health limitations from long Covid. I do have more energy to do things as compared to a few years ago, but I always have to be vigilant around groups. It’s isolating to be the only person wearing a mask in public. Or to rarely see it.

Doing stuff online is an  incredibly cheap form of entertainment which allows me safety from catching Covid again, or other worse viruses like hanta viruses. The pandemic proved that I will never ever be able to trust others to consider my health or safety for the easiest protection barrier, a mask.

I want to be online less, but changing is such a high barrier that it feels impossible to do myself. I’ve tried many, many times to quit or lessen how much I’m on, but because I’m stuck in this environment, this house, I can’t.

It’s insanity.

Craving love and sex

I need to get laid. I would like to start dating to find a girlfriend.

The reasons I don’t try is because I’m unemployed, live with my mother at 40, and live a boring life.

I’m also one of those guys who doesn’t feel comfortable approaching women because I’ve read over and over that women don’t want to be approached anywhere in public. Not to mention me being autistic makes recognising these signals difficult. Unless they say they’re interested in me, I just assume they’re being generally nice and sociable or doing their job.

While these things can change, with the work one going to by necessity, the other two can’t easily, or I don’t want to change.

I would be open to slightly changing my lifestyle as I like trying new things. At the same time, I want to be accepted and loved who I am right now, not a hypothetical version of me.

I’ve already done that. Postponing life until I have it all together, feeling the need to be 100% healed or ready before dating. Additionally, I’ve tried the other method of trying anyway, and failing at that too. A big part of that was a dating skills issue, where I was learning on the go, with lots of bots, no feedback, and online relationships that didn’t work out. I’m not sure all of those women were real people, not scammers, or geniune. I’m not going through that again.

Lately I’ve been having nightmares about every terrible thing I’ve done to others. While I’m apologizing and accurately pointing out every single way I went wrong and how it affected them, I never heard their response. I wake up and remember that, I chose to do these things because I was selfish. I earned this shame and guilt. I don’t feel like I deserve to not feel these emotions.

It’s a major reason why I distance myself from romantic relationships. I don’t want to hurt or disappoint anyone again.

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