Omnivore:

I still feel extremely manky, but things are going smoother than they were before the weekend. I submitted the assignment I struggled with, started researching the next assignment, and the overcast breeze blowing through my room is refreshing. (I hope we get more than two days of nice weather this autumn, though)

I feel like there hasn't been much I've done to talk about. I started a new hobby I mentioned before; I'm keeping deliberately quiet about it, not because it's particularly controversial or salacious. It's more that pretty much everything in my life has been dependent on or heavily tied to... like, two people, for the last six years or so, and while they're fine people, this was doing a real number on me psychologically. Making a thing by myself, as clumsy as it is, is a small step on my road to self-actualisation. I might post a link to it under lock I dunno.

Last public post was abrupt and more maudlin than I intended. I’m alright; it’s more that I’m on a slow process of... healing, for lack of a better word. Adjustment? Learning?

‘Get out more, go to meetups and experience new things’ is, very generally, sound advice. But I don’t think I’ll ever have that experience of finding My People. My brain is not good at social relationships, and I’ve been reclusive and sore and very unlucky (e.g. in my very first group assignment someone borderline threatened me cos they thought I stole their stuff lols) for a long time.

This sounds like a maudlin post again, dammit! It’s more like, positive things are happening, but it’s less that I’ve found My People and rather, every time I go to a tutorial or a meetup or something, I feel 0.01% less awful than I did previously.

I think in the state I’m in, the slow improvement is honestly necessary. And also, the longer this semester goes, the more I realise me being a total mess last semester was honestly inevitable and it’s a miracle I got through it. XD;

Anyway! My assignments are spread all over the calendar this semester and the first is due this Friday, so I haven’t been doing much besides uni. I started a new hobby, but I’ll probably post about that under lock (it’s under a different username I’m keeping separate for reasons). But the first order of today is cleaning the fridge cos it’s yuuuucky, so I better get on that already...

Annoyed at my compulsive personality: spent far too much time over past three days reading SCP entries and couldn't stop even after hitting sleeping-with-lights-on level of freaking myself out. Thankfully, there's finally a version of Leechblock compatible with my version of Firefox and I threw the relevant URLs onto it... then I disabled Leechblock and kept reading!?!? Yeeeeeeesh! I hope I get these terrible decisions out of my system before the semester starts. (Leechblock has been re-enabled :P)

My physiology is still being a nuisance in small, yet myriad and TMI ways, but less so than it was a few weeks ago. For silly reasons I went without meds for two days and have had constant disquieting dreams... though now I think about it, pathological creepypasta-reading probably wouldn't help that, huh.

On the bright side, my financial situation has improved! I thought I'd never see the day. Still not fantastic, but I can stop the debt slide for a while and I might be able to get a decent bike after all.

Not much else of note has happened. Same worries as ever. I'll be back in the city soon.

I overcame my current perpetual tiredness/confusion to code a little Python program: a timer that after being run a set number of times, increases the time by a given number of seconds, and saves details to a CSV file.

I'm doing standing meditation (it's not very meditative at all, but I haven't had my usual chronic back/shoulder/neck/tooth pain since I started!) and figured a timer that increases by itself would be a good way to gradually increase my stamina. If the timer works well for me, I'll refactor the code and consider putting a graphical interface on it and/or throwing it onto Github.

Nothing too thrilling happening otherwise, but I'm using the time to figure out solutions to problems plaguing me this year, mainly money and food and other such tedious life logistics. We went op-shopping today and I found a vintage tea and saucer set with a blue/pink iridescent glaze, and my first thought was 'ＡＥＳＴＨＥＴＩＣ' so me being a huge dork hasn't changed.

A lot of bad/stressful things are happening in my vicinity. Despite this, I am relatively okay and things are going well considering. Christmas will be a pain in the A, but when isn't it?

My only immediate concerns are that I have developed a new minor-yet-aggravating physical ailment (possibly a hiatal hernia) and I keep throwing myself down the YouTube instead of developing my skills (current poison of choice: former-Something Awful LPers with soothing voices). The former is mostly inconvenient. The latter is concerning; I wanted to make stuff (even shitty stuff) before semester so I was already warmed up, but while the creative part of my brain has spluttered back to life, my focus is still so bad that I am not doing anything with enough rigor to improve. It's a bit of a egg-chicken-egg situation unfortunately. Just have to try my best. After last semester being so intense, I should enjoy slacking off while I can, anyway.

I need work experience and I found a great place to volunteer, but they sent me a rejection letter... yes, a rejection letter from an unpaid position that had no formal requirements given in the position description. I'd be irritated or upset, but I'm not even surprised; it sums up what job hunting in Western Australia is like in general.

I got a nice and more importantly (in this case) upbeat email from a lecturer who also did something to help me out when she didn't have to, so I'm GUESSING I passed both units?? I hope so! I spent most of today planning the rest of my degree and it's complicated as it is without repeating anything. :D I am excited to resume study with considerably more coping mechanisms than I started with.

It's weird how abruptly I become maudlin. I was doing fine today, resolved to do some much-needed cleaning/packing, then at around 5PM lost all my ability to care. I'm feeling the isolation, I guess. There's some friends and lifelines and I got an unexpected email from over east today, which is nice, but they're so intrinsically linked to bloody video bloody games I find it difficult to relate to them (the fact they missed my repeated game-related tantrums and try inviting me to game-related events is also annoying. Twitter is shit at everything, even getting your friends to read your angst posting, apparently!)

I get out a bit more, but nothing's come of it (except developing tinnitus apparently). Just this evening my housemate had the opportunity to meet new and interesting people, and all I can think about right now is that the last two strangers I interacted with were shouting weirdos literally abusing me while I waited for public transport. I'm aware the solution to this is in my own hands. I just wish the problem wasn't so fucking difficult!

Eh, I needed to vent about this before I go to bed. Another appointment tomorrow, maybe it'll help.

It’s 4:30am. Do you know where I am??
(I fell asleep around 6 o’clock last night...)

Having finally extracted myself from assignment heck, I resolved to make more things outside of university time. A good idea in general, but specifically, I don't want to arrive at the next assignments that rusty again!

Unsurprisingly, composing music is exactly like other kinds of art: a struggle to make a thing as good in reality as it was inside my head.

The appointments I hurriedly arranged are working so far. I'm in a much better mood on the average.

I bear an unreasonable hatred towards the ‘oh no’ comic guy