dear diary

I set regular reminders to read articles on various subjects (I may have mentioned repeatedly).

One of the things I keep an eye on is about property, namely, getting one, getting the finances ready.

I've been looking into shared ownership just now. I've seen one shared ownership property that is in a really delicious location, just near to my gym. So fucking near to my gym, it is painful. They are up to 50% share ownership. I don't really understand the situation but what I gather is that the rent is lower than regular mortgages, but there are service fees.

I fit in the lower-middle bracket for the income ranges that they are interested in. I am quite assured by that.

Perhaps...

perhaps...?

I'm in the middle of lots of other things right now. I must write this down.

One of the things I've learned from my father is: resilience. I've learned how to deal with crisis situations, tragedies, urgent problems. I've learned of the mentality to rise up to the situation when an extreme thing happens.

And some of those problems I have seen him help were my own.

I've learned from my mum the importance of supporting others. Through her actions, I've seen her be supportive and comfort others in difficult times. I am a bit like my mum at work, with that skillset I support a team of award-winning people to do their job, and they confide in me during their crisis times, both personal and professional.

it's 4am and Im still not asleep.

I'm thinking about the pay rise I've been offered. I've been offered an incremental pay rise (pay rise in january then april 2019).

I have opted to reject the pay offer. but it stands I understand as a mandatory condition.

When I think about it, the rejection of this offer is based on some numbers I've crunched about my own income against rises in inflation as a result of brexit and general economy things.

Then I think about some of my friends. My friend at a university isn't getting a pay rise; my friends in the public sector are not really getting a pay rise, except a 1%-er in certain sectors.

I'm fortunate, but I'm also working in a place that may not exist in 10 years.

I've been working on spreadsheets, data entry and some basic csv documents all since about midnight. I've done a solid 4 hours of work.

Later today I hope to go to the gym in the morning. I am also hoping to meet a friend to see Aquaman in the afternoon. After that, I shall have a non carbonated drink in a pub.

Carbonated drinks make me anxious.

Eating makes me anxious

Anxiety makes me anxious.

I have a problem with anxiety. It exists on the su

I think that I've done a satisfactory amount today.

Let's let go and relax, friend.

Onwards, bedwards

I've enjoyed this time we've had together lately. I like writing more on this blog. I should do it more.

negative feelings

• I don't like how my sister thinks she is in control of me, her domineering nature over me carries over from years ago which is no longer relevant
• ditto for my mum
• They do not wish to recognise i am an independent adult, and it makes me behave in especially 'limbic' ways*
• I feel insecure about my body lately (maybe the 'easy' reaction to the top two)

*lately, I've set up a weekly reminder to read about personal development, things that I feel will help me develop as a person. As such, I have been reading a bunch of psychology articles, papers and so on. This is in contrast (or addition) to the regular kinds of things that I read about: mathematical structulralism, Kantian themes, post avicenna Islamic philosophy, and tech reviews for external GPUs

I miss mia lately. I wish I had someone who saw inside my soul to talk to me. It would be easy if I had mia. It's harder to live and go on without her. The harder path is the one which makes me the wiser and the better. 

One day in Late November

On this day November 21:

• 2013: Received my first tablet computer with money i earned from the sport desk, I also bought some tactical gear and was invited to an interview (did not get it)
• 2015: I wrote copy for a Christmas gift guide at the paper that didn't give me that job in 2013
• 2017: Was invited to a 'major artist's book launch - made it as a date with J
• 2018: First day that I made overnight oats - seemingly life has gone downhill since that book launch

December 17 2018

was the last episode of the show people just do nothing. the main characters are aged between 32-33, which is basically my age.

I also discovered how to upgrade my earbuds so that they can connect to my laptop, basically making my headphones obsolete.

Fuck me.

The 'on this day' function on my calendar is quite telling about the time my life suddenly changed:

2015: saw the new star wars movie - got home bloody late
2017: bought a 'glenn gould hat' from M&S, a sign that I'm well and truly middle aged. Later on that day it was 'onesie sunday', the third time I've done it.
2018; my (presumably fourth onesie sunday, I also found out that L from the gym (who I nickname as Harambe -long story) is preggers

Here's something that marks the age.

Loads of people who used to be beloved are now hated, or are deemed not woke enough. Apparently the fucking guy from peep show and father ted are now transphobic.

Also, it feels positively regressive to reminisce the 2000s. INstead of it being a way of me processing what has been in order to embrace what is now, it's a potentially dangerous form of rumination.

That's what I think anyway.
Rumination is one of my distraction schema now.

Dear Diary,

It's 3am on Christmas Eve. I can barely tell to be honest.

I am off for 9 days. I'm on day 3. It's gone by ever so quickly.

I've started watching Killing Eve. It's really interesting. It's not unlike my job at the Sentinel. Boring, but the other guys have all the action. I'm catching up on logging all the past events of the week into my calendar.

Let's do an 'on this day'.

A day in 2013: I went to a local pub. I saw a band called The Tuts and Kate Nash was there. It was awesome. I anxious because there was a guy who didn't really understand social interactions and he was talking to the musicians on stage without understanding that he was not entitled to a response or that they would be interested in him. In fact it almost seemed like heckling. I did get annoyed at him and almost wanted to get him thrown out, but I realised that he's more likely learning disabled the more I saw him. It wouldn't be right.

5 years later. I'm at a party in The Sentinel. It's the bigun, the feature writers, fashion desk, my magazine and other sections are there. I have dinner with the grown up film and tv critics beforehand. What do they talk about: salacious rumours of the personal lives of their colleagues. Jesus wept. I grew up with some of these people on my computer, reading their critiques and so on.

The bizarreness of my life situation has not been lost on me, but I do not pause too much to think about it, as I have been so busy these past few weeks. I've had social event after social event. I've had a couple of family engagements and I've been through some career defining work. My life feels like something that my seriously depressed and previously suicidal self would have dreamt up, then woken up and cried about as his reality consisted of a brass bucket full of piss and a lamb shank that is under the bed, uneaten for a month.

I had to be that person to be the person that I am now.

Who am I now? I have a to do list to log all my activities of the past week. I then have to process them into my calendar, and then enter them into a weekly report. I am 10 weeks behind on my weekly report. Once I have completed the weekly report, I then do the monthly and annual 2018 document. I see and analyse patterns from said document as I have been compiling these records for a few years now. I then design the 2019 document.

This all began from me setting an album listening document back in 2006-2007. I set lists of albums that I listened to, a lot of heavy metal as it happened. I then expended the idea to create a system of organising my life. It grew, it grew to something that I used to get a hold of the confusion that is aspergers life. It's no longer 2006-2007 and I'm scouring people's facebook music interests to understand what they are into and simultaneously getting a grasp on the culture of the time. As it happens the culture is always changing.

It helps to work in a pop culture magazine, but I'm still making lists. So many lists that its' a full time occuptation to enter everything in.

So long as it makes me a functional and normal person in society. I'm using this system to orient my savings and work towards a mortgage. Maybe I can get a 300k property.

Positives of the week and month (December 2018)

• Lots of people my age going bald, but my hair still awesome
• I'm in great health
• Mum and dad are alright 
• I'm seeing family on Christmas day - tick that off for the family quota
• I went to 4 workplace parties
• I went to lots of new and unfamiliar social situations/interactions
• I had onesie day at the gym last week
• I have been offered a payrise of 5.05% (paid in two increments)
• I'm going to see my friend from canada
• I'm going to see my friend from sheffield
• I'm going to see my friends from school
• I have 10 days off work

My colleague and I were walking to the train station after some drinks. He said to me when he meets up with old friends, he avoids talking about the past. S invited me to his 50th birthday party. I should heed his wisdom. 

note to self: one way in which I am working on plasticity is that I've set tasks to read articles on self help, positive psychology and advice on how to deal with specific adverse situations.

This will feed into my flash cards project.

The busy period

Dear Diary,

I'm trying to keep up with all the things that have happened so far and are yet to happen. Basically there are loads and loads of parties. I'm really pleased about it.

The following happened:

• 2 work parties
• saw aquaman
• nightwish
• gym socialising 
• (mind is a blank)

Things yet to happen:

• Christmas with fam
• Aquaman at least 3 times again
• 2 more christmas parties
• Socialising xmas with neighbours, 
• socialising xmas with badminton crew
• Meeting The Microbiologist (uni friend) over Christmas

Today on my day off I need very much to just get all the logging done and keep up.

Keep up! 

I'm really behind on logging stuff.

Lets talk about december 5:

I went to the dentist. I had 2 fillings in. It was immediatley after that point that my other filling (in the week before) started really hurting.

I left work early after arriving late, to go sohpping. I went to M&S and PC world. I was looking for a fancy velvet or print blazer for Christmas, A size 46 slim does not fit me. I thought I would rather not get anything than get a thing that ill-fits.

Anyway in PC world I saw a really nice gaming chair. I've seen them all on websites and things but when I sat down it felt simply heavenly.

Anyway I looked for chairs,GPUs and blazers and bought neither. I did eat some M&S crisps on the way home. I love M&S crisps.

Dear Diary,

If i were to be blunt, I struggled this week.

I struggled with my energy levels. I struggled with a work life balance. I struggled with my sleep and I struggled with distraction.

In other ways it was a fine week. I went out to see Nightwish (amazing!), I got invited to a fouth Christmas party and...I can't really remember the rest.

Anyway.

Lets talk about the egg swallowing things:

• I'm really struggling with being efficient with my time. There are lots of time holes: youtube, mobile phone games, mobile phone distractions, youtube (did I say that?)
• I spoke to my brother and sister to ask what they wanted for Christmas. I have a plan forward to sort out Christmas. I also feel like they will be accepting towards me during Christmas day.  - I just need to sit there for Christmas day and not be bad or mean or malignant or insincere. Just be nice. Failing that, just be quiet. 
• I'm dealing with a lot of jealousy. I'm jealous of how other people my age are living their lives. Many of them getting married, having kids, one woman I used to cover for on the sunday sentinel has 3 already! I'm jealous about income stuff. I'm jealous of my girlfriend's partners. I'm jealous of people going to parties. I'm jealous of people who aren't afraid of planes. So, yeah, I'm afraid of airline travel. 

I'm really behind on my logging lately. I'm also really behind on my planning. I'm living each day with the plan I set originally, but I need to refine the plans. 

This Friday I decided to take the day off work. I was so unwell I just couldn't manage. 

I'm goping to do the minimum for the remainder of the night. Mostly planning

Yesterday (Monday) I did some egg swallowing. 

I sent my sister a text: is there anything I can get you, hubby or the kids for Christmas?

Her reply: thank you but nothing for me or husband, let me get back to you about the little ones...

I sent my brother a text: anything for you or the wife? 

Bro: Nothing for me, let me get back to you about the wife, she probably wants something.

I got my mum and dad a £500 vacuum cleaner this year.

I'm a really shitty son. I've done shitty things and even if they forgive me, I don't forgive myself. 

I'm also getting quite angry lately. I'm angry at myself and it manifests in other things.

When I got home yesterday (monday), I had a really nice bit of food from Sainsburys. I had a vegetarian cheese and cauliflower bake. Mum really liked it. I was very tired and immediately went to sleep. I woke up around midnight or 1am (about 3.5 hours ago) and had to do all the things I didn't when I fell asleep: personal hygiene foremost, then charging my earbuds. 

I have since been working on my schedule and I've done a bit of planning and catch up right now.

I feel like i'm in a good place with my routine. I do wish that I had a chance to go to M&S last night. I want to get a dinner jacket for the Christmas parties. 

Also 3 years ago: I saw Klitschko vs Fury.

Last saturday (2018) I saw Fury Vs Wilder.

How things change and yet stay the same...

Other things in 2015 of the week beginning 23/11: I bought a Jawbone UP3 (Jawbone is no longer a company) and I was playing a bit of fallout 4 (Fallout 76 has since come out. I got a fallout 76 mask and giant hand)

Thursday 26 2015

Thursday 26 2015: i went to Body combat and CX Works, which I haven't done in ages. I logged that I was emailing about casual work with work. A casual scheme that hires short term cover. I was the shrot term cover.

I went to speak to someone who was working on the magazine do to a handover. I told her that I've worked on the magazine loads of times so I didn't need a handover, so instead she told me about how to do expense claims for the food magazine. It seems she got a lot of invoices for the food mag.

My parents were in Peru that week.

The day before I was doing a shift at my old job in events. I went to the discussion group too. On Tuesday 24 I got an email asking me to come in. Thursday 26 I had a conversation about what was needed. The week after: I started working on the magazine.

I've never left.

I've never worked for 3 years at anything before. I must admit that I feel very...proud of being able to keep a job.

I'm going to put some 'on this day' reminders about this. I realise only after the event that these days were more significant and pregnant with meaning than I realise.

At the time it was just another job.

Dear Diary,

Today being a sunday night/monday morning I seem to allow myself to write in this blog as a kind of review of the week or something like that.

Here's my insight: I've been reading this book about Bullet Journal, which is not dissimilar to the techniques that I employ when I'm organising myself (except with GKeep). Anyway, I've managed to really up my organisation game lately. I've managed to organise the next two weeks (also allowed for changes) and I haven't hit 3am yet.

Lets talk about this week: I went to a press event for a thing that I went to on saturday with my friends. I went to this interactive exhibition thing. I basically went twice. I had booked it months ago with my friends. I realised that I really need to make reasons to meet up with the guys. It's just not happening lately. Anyway, we managed to make it work and we had a really good time. The best part was to be with my friends and I felt a big boost of energy.

I realise that this month (December) I really am doing well in terms of socialising with others, going out, meeting people and even spending time with work colleagues outside of a work setting.

So, that is pretty cool. It's also very challenging in terms of my time, my energy and the other things I want to do.

When I had depression over 10 years ago. I really didn't know how to do the adult thing. I'm getting better at it and I'm getting stronger and more resilient.

I should be honest about my recent challenges:

• Night terrors are still an issue
• I have issues with social eating 
• I have triggers more often now
• I get angry and distrustful a lot. - especially with specific people
• I feel a tiny bit paranoid. I know that at work, there are people who are trying to undermine us. It makes me worry about the wider situation with the world at large.
• I worry about my parents.

The big one: I had a falling out with my brother, sister and brother in law. A thing for which I must spend the rest of my life paying a debt to society and to my family for. A thing for which I accept responsibility and accept my part in causing very real harm. 

I feel like i'm not forgiven. I also dread some things. I dread having to text my brother and sister asking about christmas presents for their families. I dread that Christmas Day is likely to be with them all. I don't want to sit with them. I don't want to be around them for Christmas and I don't want to be around all the noise. But I have to make an effort. 

I keep saying I need to rebuild bridges and have a better relationship with family. In the group sessions I had this year. I realised that having positive relationships with friends and family is an important aspect of my life. Also being able to manage problems in my life. It's difficult when other people in my family are less good at dealing with their own problems. It's difficult when other people's problems become your own. It's also important to have healthy thinking, this also includes not blaming others for too many things but accepting your own responsiblilty. 

How do I work through all 3 of these? I think if I did Christmas day, just the lunch time, and went home. If I didn't get angry and let things slide. If I were quiet and didn't offend anyone or upset anyone. If I just sat there and did my bit to be a part of the family by just being physically present and anodyne. If I could do that for a day, fine. That's enough. That's enough to say I'm working on family relationships. That's enough to say I'm doing better than I did before. That's enough to...build on a base for better future relationships with them. 

In the Doctor who specials with Matt Smith, he used to say: every Christmas is the last Christmas. 

I really need to treat this as the last christmas. It's the last christmas for somebody. I just need to do one day and then I have the rest of the week to work on my spreadsheets and projections for the year or any of that other stuff. 

It's important to me. It's very challenging for me at the same time. 

A guy at the group said that the relationships that are really valuable do require a bit of work. 

I guess I need to man up. I can lift weights and push my mind intellectually but none of that is as tough as facing down the shame I feel about my judgmental family.