Empress of Mars: Undisputed @zebratron2084@awoo.space

@Leucrotta Oh, YIKES. I didn't realize what that was a photo of at first—I just saw the article. That is a serious fucking loss. (Pho Big Bowl wasn't bad either. :| )

@Leucrotta That's a damn shame—La Isla is pretty damn good. I was heartbroken when they stopped delivering. Even the rice and peas were kind of a revelation.

Oh, and if you can ever make it there after it's been exorcised, you should definitely go—the beer garden would actually have been really nice if it hadn't been a lure for wayward souls to be tormented and devoured for eternity, and if the menus were any indication, the Jamaican bakery would have been really good if it hadn't basically been a retelling of the Tantalus myth actually had food. Lots of purple food. Don't ask me, I don't write this stuff.

@Leucrotta I don't know, those are good points, but I think it's different for me, because my previous moves were respectively (a) getting the hell out of my hometown (b) getting away from my increasingly libertarian nutcase ex and moving to a REAL CITY (c) moving away from a lonely situation and a terrible housemate to be with Rik and (d) leaving the memories of a humiliating job experience and harsh winters to go back to a city I, back then, really loved. I've never had anything like this level of regret before—in general, let alone regarding a change of scenery.

I think this is the first time I've ever moved to a place where I didn't have some kind of clear opportunity waiting for me. It's a nice city with a lot of things to offer, and the fact Peg's enjoying the hell out of it is VERY much worth it, but... I think this is the first time I've really, truly felt like I left unfinished business behind—even if that, the more I think about it, is an illusion. It sure FELT real for a while.

In more cheerful news, I just remembered a few fragments of last night's dream, wherein some friends and I were trapped in a demonic, reality-warping shopping center that hated us all. It was like the 1408 Mall. It was fuckin' awesome. :D

The best part was getting to try out the trick that I've been wanting to use ever since I saw the actual 1408: sitting down and just _asking_ the poor damn supernatural presence what its problem was and whether we could do anything for it.

It didn't work, but it was gratifying to try. :) And we did eventually get out—by going to the bar that was the entry point for most of its victims, drinking until we blacked out and woke up on the other side of its fence, and just NOT GOING when the timeloop came around again.

Also, one of the possessed complex's "torments" was one pop-up restaurant after the next that had no food left. Man, my brain knows how to get to me. n.n;

Sorry to be Sadness Raccoon lately. I... I don't know. The adjustment down here has been harder than I expected.

I'm slowly coming to realize that the problems weren't with leaving Seattle, they were with the way I related to most people up there, and... that hasn't been a healthy realization. It's brought a lot of old social anxiety and self-hate to the surface.

If I were a really Self-Actualized Zen I Ching Granola Warrior, I'd be accepting the fact that my life down here is peaceful and quiet in a way it never was up there... that Peggy is an excellent partner for a temperamental idiot like me... and that being cut off from all those agonizingly ambiguous social opportunities and false hopes for decadence was a blessing in disguise.

I'd be accepting that I was destined for quieter, tamer pleasures. I'd be accepting that just getting to work on something like Parallax (even if it often feels like I'm doing it in a vacuum, or a Total Perspective Vortex) with a talent like Peg is fucking amazing.

But I guess I'm just not that mature. Or not that ready to get over my midlife crisis. Or not that ready to be 44 and accept that I was SO CLOSE to getting so many of my bucket list items, and then it all fell apart with an ego-incinerating fall from grace, with no hope for getting anyone to listen to my side.

I worry that I'm bitter and burnt-out for good. I worry that I'm such damaged goods, and ever getting a social circle in the first place—even just getting anyone to like me—was an unreconstructable miracle. And I worry that we are truly in a Final Age of the Weird Internet, that I came of age in the one and only set of conditions so bizarre that even a lumpy, boring male-presenting self-hatey greaselump like could get my unreasonable and hyperspecific desires met, and maintain for a brief shining moment the illusion I too was something cute and glamorous and worth it.

I don't know. I'm not dead. To the best of my knowledge, I'm FAR healthier than I expected to be in my mid-40s. I'm even damn near middle class now, by the enjoyable low-rent standards of New Orleans. That should be enough for me, in a nightmare year like 2019. But you know, I MISS being a perverted rubber alien thing in real time. I miss having so many messages in my chat that I feel overwhelmed. I miss places that are so anonymous and strange that even _I_ could flirt there.

Maybe I just miss being so oblivious that I thought all this was a good idea. Maybe I miss being able to get excited or hopeful about anything. Maybe I just learned too much about people, including and most hatefully myself. I don't want to die—in fact, I want to die less I have in any other era of my life—but it really feels like all there is to do now is wait out my sentence. The only really amazing thing that can still happen is a comics career—which would be amazing, but dammit, so were the things I was striving for. And they're all gone.

I don't know. I feel better for having finally hacked this all up into words. And I'll get by. I have a hunch most of this is just Getting Old and it's at least normal. I just feel like I've disappointed everybody, and I've done it mostly by failing to hide my real, unglamorous, embittered self. And I'm really sorry. I'm sorry I let the magic die. I'm sorry I ever came out from behind the curtain.

@Trouffee@mastodon.social Counterpoint: do you have any idea how hard it is to get decent Xi'an noodles down here? ;)

Other than that... yeah. A lot of social guessing games and a lot of opportunity to relive a past that I'm starting to question ever really existed. And some enduring friendships, too, but it would still be back to the old days of Boston, where almost all my social connections were singletons who didn't really care to see me in groups of >1.

@Balinares That would be amazing—keep me posted about your travel schedule! I do still have every intention of visiting, I just think I need to do it with a little bit more independence than current budget would allow...

@Austin_Dern Incidentally, "Rudiger" is still my go-to choice every time I have to give someone a fake name. There's... there's history behind that one. :D

@Austin_Dern Don't quote me on this, but I've seen it insinuated that, FWIW, the writers knew damn well that they were writing nonsense... and were in fact in an active competition with one or more of the other detective shows to see who could pass the worst technobabble off on their execs and audiences. I choose to believe this is all true. :D

Falling apart tonight, tbh.

I don't think I can do this. Just thinking about the idea of walking back into that nightmare of ambiguous social cues and potential disappointment has been made me break down in tears twice today already. I can't go back until something really fundamental heals up in me. And I don't know when or if that's gonna happen.

Maybe I'll try again next year, after I've got a little more money saved up and can just get a nice hotel to retreat to, somewhere that's MINE and I don't feel like I have to worry about anyone else and can just try to enjoy myself, and be alone if I need to be. Having to couch-hop is just gonna remind me of what a burden I always felt like out there.

I gotta deal with the fact that the things I originally came out to Seattle for were utterly destroyed and there's just no going back. I gotta build them here or never have them again at all.

@hystericempress the soul shriveling aint so bad, ya get used to it

@Aradia That's Savannah's, what, fourth album cover?

@Aradia Does this mean I'm gonna have to get my own reality show if I wanna get postfurry back? Nope, not worth it. x__x

@Aradia A response to your response :>

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3tvB8XFG3g

#moodsnapshot

Mood snapshot since 2016, honestly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Jwi78dYK2o

@Oneironott i mean that was the plan yeah

instead i ended up with some witchy 150 yr old dragon lady who accidentally summons 1d4 black cats

close enuf

@Leucrotta #2 but only so she didn't see the surprise party i planned for her

@Oneironott I legit cried over Good Place for the first time last ep. Some Girl from Arizona. ;___;

So, yup, I forgot to make my note to a couple of friends about Seattle crash space into a DM, so the raccoon's out of the bag...

I might be heading back to Seattle sometime in the next month! It's all VERY tentative based on whether I can save up the cash that fast, but I am definitely looking for potential crash space. Let me know if you're interested, zero pressure!

Thanks, everybody! With any luck, I might see you soon!