Empress of Mars: Undisputed @zebratron2084@awoo.space

It's weird. Since I went off my meds, my mood issues have been Whoops All Anxiety! As in... little or no depression.

I _like_ me for the most part, despite a lingering "Bojack Lite" undercurrent of regret, for all the people I've accidentally hurt. I am the least suicidal I've been in my adult life. I would fight tooth and nail to keep all this.

I just can't stop thinking about losing it all, everything from my eyesight (there are some valid reasons *sigh*) to those beautiful, sweet cats. And my parents. Am I just at a lossy point in my life-- one with something substantial to lose, finally-- or what?

I've got plans. I've even got Goddamn Furry Plans, which are the best kind of unwise plan. I will probably also do conventional therapy once COVID is sorted and it's less emotionally costly to go to a clinic.

But yeah, it's all kinda hitting me hard right now... and yet is still far, far closer to manageable than I expected. The payback in emotional vividness, creative urges, libido, and general *weirdness* glimmering back in here is still worth it. I really needed this break, and i needed to watch the wheels spin unobstructed for a while.

This would still be so much easier if this were a legal cannabis state. >___<

@JulieSqveakaroo @001zlnv Listen, roo, I know you like craft beers, but that's NOT a good flavor idea! (Says the person who eagerly bought and drank fish-food beer, and was mostly disappointed it didn't taste more like fish food...)

Oh. Oh, you mean Scientology. Yeah, no, they could definitely get much worse. I'm just not sure they need these other guys' help. :D

@001zlnv I mean, you add a teaspoon of beer to a barrel of sewage, you get sewage; you add a teaspoon of sewage to a barrel of beer, you get sewage. It's not like Scientology could get any worse. :)

@JulieSqveakaroo Well, crud! Hope the crud is at least minor and routine, keep us posted!

I just filled out a form for an extremely scammy and hilariously macho $12,000 "personal development" course being run by two ex-military goons.

I gave my contact info as the Boston Scientology office. I also left a message for them, expressing interest in Scientology under the name of one of said goons.

If the gods are willing, and I am very lucky, there's going to be a very interesting conversation tomorrow that I really, really wish I could overhear.

St. Calvin, I give this humble offering in your name. Hail Eris.

@woozle This freakin kid is amazing.

https://twitter.com/ewintang/status/1349197768074514432

@anthracite Another fine example, somehow, of why I love you.

Oh, and we saw the kittens' new dad yesterday! He just seems like such a good, warm-hearted guy, and we had another great converation about local history and politics.

The kittens weren't interested in coming out to visit but they're apparently still doing great! Only thing to note is that they've been nicknamed "Wilykit and Wilykat," which is HILARIOUS since even after all the trouble to give Olive a unisex name after mis-sexing them... they're still named after a catgirl. Their dad didn't even know they used to be Olivia, never mentioned it. XD XD XD

Yanno, I should really go back to being a raccoon for a while. Could be pretty therapeutic, embodying someone with an innate sense of "It's amazing that we've even got THIS, isn't this trash great?"

Someone who is intensely aware life is just one disease after another, there's nothing you can do about it, and just being alive and uneviscerated is pretty good, plus everything is a potential toy.

I shifted into zebra for three reasons: (1) needing a figurehead for a libido revival I was hoping would be MUCH larger (2) embarrassment over username dissonance (3) just really needed to put some space between me and felinity after all the kitten trauma.

And I just ain't feelin' it. No point in playing the drunk pretty horny wastrel when the bars are closed, I've got no sex drive, can't afford anything to dress up in, and don't feel pretty in the slightest.

But a just-fat-enough just-happy-enough scavenger feels pretty much right. Time to hunt for those old Kirsch icons-- or maybe create a new self who *doesn't* constantly get mistaken for a red panda.

=(>).(<)=

(Oh, that truncated bit was going to be about having to run interference between our worst, touchiest annotators and our nitpickiest, rudest reviewer. -__- )

Can't shut the cat anxiety off. It's always running. Someday maybe I'll have known them long enough and gone long enough without a disaster that I can stop constantly fretting.

They seem pretty happy today, though-- the closest thing to Cat Drama is that Peebles DESPERATELY wants back inside for a ninth(!) playtime. Oh, and I took her feather away. Neosporin was involved in the aftermath. She's still a good kitty. :)

Otherwise, yeah, the general malaise is still wearing deeply at me. Most of my friends seem bummed for one reason or another, the apparent consensus is that the country's stuck in a holding pattern before it gets worse again, and I'm just... stuck every day, trying to find some aspect of my culture I'm not low-grade allergic to.

Everything is boring. Except work, which has been a little too interesting, with a string of really bad, delicate, difficult evaluations to write. I'm currently stuck running a lot of interference between the

And seeing my whole stimulus, assuming we ever get one, getting eaten up by taxes has been demoralizing. Though here too I am SO MUCH LUCKIER than everybody else. I didn't need it, it was just a Royal Road back to having some savings and getting to buy some nice stuff for once. I get to do it the honest way now, I guess. *shrug*

New Orleans is still very pretty and Peggy is still very patient so as long as they and the cats stay intact, I guess things are okay. I can't stop thinking about what will happen someday when they're not. I should probably be in therapy, but there's just no fucking way I'm going to have the energy to set that up until we're back to something like normal.

@Austin_Dern So "Williams Street"/[a d o l e s c e n t s w i m] basically?

@balinares No but I've definitely made a note to go look! Got a link handy hun? Thanks a lot!

Huh. Well, that's an interesting surprise.

https://www.comicon.com/2021/03/02/webcomic-weekly-parallax-a-tale-of-two-perspectives/

Pretty good review all in all, especially given that the pacing and clarity the reviewer mentions are a Known Issue.

Guess that clinches it, no matter how cynical I'd gotten over it, Parallax has potential. We just gotta figure out how the hell to fix and somehow find the time and focus to actually *do* it.

@JulieSqveakaroo Thank you, sweetie, it helps a lot to hear from Those Who Cat. <3

@Phorm @001zlnv but if you enter "452" it opens straight into thomas dolby's living room

@Leucrotta OH SHIT, I'd forgotten about the awakened labor droid subplot AND the personality-merging plots. :D

@Leucrotta Oh, here's the premiere miniseries! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNjsPwR8Apo

@Leucrotta Probably also really early example of a solid story arc in an adventure cartoon, no earlier one really comes to mind

@Leucrotta Chung designs for a futuristic version of the old comic hero. Number one best portrayal of real genre cyberpunk on Sat morning tv. Sincere ecofable elements (and some unfortunate white savoir stuff they couldnt quite scrub off the original property). Really REALLY good lead villain too, with remarkably realistic personal and political motives that actually MAKE SENSE. Criminally underrated.