Curled Up With Machines

There's a tiny game I play in the mornings on the way into work.

So — I live about 20 minutes (by car) away from the fab. It's a short enough commute that I don't really mind it, and most of it is through (legitimately) wild/green space (or farms) — I drive past the local university's dairy farm, for instance (and always wave at the cows, when they are out, and tell them I love them and hope they have a good day), as well as one of the big natural areas in town. (There's a hiking trail I drive past the turnout for.)

Short enough that it doesn't make sense to put on a podcast or the like, because I'm going to be getting out of the car soon, and the podcasts I like to listen to while I'm driving (things like Normal Gossip, A Way with Words, etc) are not things that I like to listen to while I am working. (Driving requires focus in a way that work doesn't, oddly.)

So, music! There's a playlist I made literally years ago and have just sort of horrifyingly kept adding to over time (503 songs, 33 hours and 59 minutes as of, uh, tonight!) called "stuff I don't usually skip" (a name that has become increasing ironic, but oh, well). I queue it up, and —

The game, which is amusing only to me, is to hit shuffle I pull it up, and then determine, based on what plays, which fictional character from whatever media I have most recently consumed would listen to it.

...of late that has mostly been Baldur's Gate 3, because everything else has been stuff that doesn't really have meaningful characters, per se (looking at you, Oblivion Remastered!), or my...own...stuff? which is weird and also I already have playlists for that.

Anyway, all of this to say, I drove into work blasting Chappel Roan today and realized I have way too many thoughts on "which of the origin characters would listen to which songs", none of which I'm going to share here, but also that it's this tiny thing that has made me dread driving into the fab slightly less. (The commute is short! I can't really complain about it! AND YET.)

(If you are at all familiar with BG3, you will not be disappointed to know that yes, of course Karlach's go-to would be "Hot To Go", you're welcome.)


Also on the music-and-commute front, I find myself increasingly tempted to make teeny tiny (5-7 songs) playlists that are exactly the length of time it takes me to drive in, with hyperspecific names.

"It is Monday and you woke up with a migraine and don't want to work but ALSO you don't want to work Friday!"

"It's 7:30am and you've already gotten so many Slacks that you have to SCROLL BACK"

"fancy coffee because it's YOUR FRIDAY"

"fancy coffee because you're working on your day off :( "

"today you get to be a feral goblin :)"

"today you have to make some asshole feel important :( "

and so on and so forth.

I may actually, genuinely do this, mostly because I find it amusing, but also because I can picture what songs would go on which playlists (e.g. a couple of these are going to get "I Just Can't Stand You Anymore" by Sleigh Bells, ahem).

(I feel it necessary to state here that by and large I don't hate my job, just specific aspects of it. Like having to kowtow to VCs, who look at me and decide that I must not know anything because I have the double sin of not only being the lab scientist, so not a businessperson, but ALSO having tits.)


Final tiny music note —

At work today, waiting for something to cool so I could tape it and coat it again (...we're very sophisticated and the tape keeps the solvent from going where I don't want it to go...), one of the guys from next door came and banged on my back door.

"Hey! Need something?"

"Yeah, do you have a minute?"

"I have...three? I'm waiting for glass to cool."

"Follow me!"

I figured he needed help with the spectrometer again, so I went, "okay!" and followed him into his lab, where I was shown...a prototype of the device they've been trying to make?

"We've been working on this for weeks and we want to know if it looks cool or if it's jank."

I blinked and did my best not to laugh. "Uh..."

"Switch it on! Show her!"

One of the other Fab Gremlins switched it on, and demonstrated how it worked. It was actually quite clever — very well-done, and I said so.

"Ah, but we forgot the music! Fuck!"

"...there's...music?" I was honestly sort of scared.

"Good music!"

And then they pulled it up, and.

Y'all.

I made it about half a second in before I blurted out, "oh my God, REALLY?" because it was fucking Saint Motel's "My Type".

(If you're not familiar, you can listen here.)

"Yeah!" Long pause. "Wait, you know it?"

"Uh, yeah, I'm very familiar with Saint Motel." Not mentioned: I bought tickets to see them at the Crystal Ballroom and then didn't go because no one wanted to go with me, and I don't regret that, but: what.

"It's a good song, Jenn!"

I stood for a second, unsure of what to say, then smiled, nodded, and withdrew. I am terrified to ask which one of them picked it.

If you did not listen to it and are wondering why I might have had that reaction, please be aware that they're going to be playing it for VCs to try to woo them to invest in their company, and the lyrics are —

You-you-you're just my type
Oh, you got a pulse and you are breathing

Knowing them, I'm fairly certain it was deliberate. Gremlins.

Three Weeks for Dreamwidth, the last one!

(I'm certain that y'all will appreciate a break from me posting regularly, anyway :P )

Question 21: Have you been given any good advice lately, and if so, what? Otherwise, share a favorite piece or few.

Over time I've come to dislike giving advice, but. Well.

A couple of things, I suppose:

1). Because it came to mind thanks to the reply I got to a different Three Weeks post (not from anyone on my flist; it was just very Odd and completely out of left field): Unsolicited Advice Is Always Received As Criticism. Yes, you are (probably) trying to be helpful, but if someone is saying, "Ugh I'm having such a hard time with [blah]" or "ugh, I hate [blah]", and does not specifically ask for help handling it or alternatives, giving advice about it is unkind! You imply that the receiver of your advice doesn't know what they're doing, and being "solution-oriented" when someone simply wants to vent invalidates their (valid) feelings.

If you feel you DO have advice to give someone, and they have not specifically asked, you can:

-hear them out first (the WHOLE problem, without interrupting!)
-ask if they want advice or compassion
-RESPOND APPROPRIATELY

Asking, "do you want advice or do you want compassion?" is much kinder than immediately going, "well have you hear the good word about [blah]?"

A great example for this is my migraines, honestly. I get them regularly! Yes, they suck.

YES, I PROMISE I HAVE TRIED EVERYTHING YOU ARE MENTIONING. I cut alcohol, chocolate, and other common triggers out of my diet (and it did fuck all, and I missed wine and whiskey, so)! I have tried meditation! I do the weird stretches and such that are supposed to help with them! I have tried CBD! I actually do take edibles (marijuana) when I get one, because that is the one thing that reliably fixes them (and it's cheaper than Imitrex!).

Telling me that they'll go away if I just do [x] instead is telling me that my chronic, "make me unable to see, leave me vomiting copiously and wishing that someone would decapitate me" headaches are entirely my fault. That's not a kind thing to do!

An appropriate response is, "wow, that sucks!" and maybe, "Hey, I found this thing worked for me, would you like to hear about it?" instead of immediately going to problem-solving.

MAYBE SOMETIMES I DON'T WANT PROBLEM-SOLVING. MAYBE SOMETIMES I WANT TO SIT AND BE LIKE, 'IT SUCKS THAT THIS IS PART OF MY LIFE, AND I'VE MOSTLY MADE MY PEACE WITH IT, BUT I WISH I DIDN'T HAVE TO.'

Fuck, man, sometimes life is hard! We all recognize that. Offer compassion to your fellow people, okay?


2). Salt will lift bloodstains. I found this out thanks to a weird and not very good book I read by Clare Dunkle when I was in my teens. If you make a paste of kosher salt and apply it to (fresh) bloodstains, let it sit overnight and it will lift the stain. May take a few applications. It doesn't bleach stuff the way that e.g. peroxide can, so it's worth trying if it's something that you don't want damaged (like, oh, fancy underwear if you are someone who menstruates...).

I don't keep peroxide on hand as it's not very good at wound-cleaning, etc, but I always have kosher salt in the kitchen, so I usually use it whenever I need to get stains out of something. Supposedly it works for set stains if you soak them overnight in salt water, but I have not tried this.


3). Your life will be happier if you assume good faith and good intentions when dealing with others (until proven otherwise).