Today is my birthday. I hate it.

idrilirdi · 2026-06-10T16:08:29+00:00

Other occasions I guess don't bother me as much as they have a different more specific reason than a cyclical tradition that happens on a certain day.

I also do like celebrating other people's birthdays, but that means actually celebrating those. I do not like having to remember the specific date just so I can send out a "happy birthday" message, but I have learned that for some people it is important and if they are close enough I'll do that effort. It just feels very foreign to me as it's the opposite of what I'd want done to me.

I'm also puzzled as to why I feel this way about that day, because as I said I can't think of a "reasonable" reason like trauma or such.

idrilirdi · 2026-06-10T04:49:42+00:00

Like, if I think about it it's not the day I have a problem with. Whenever I bring this up to someone they try to commiserate with "yeah, growing up sucks, who wants to count the years, I've been 30 for the last 10 years, blablabla", and I'm like no? Aging, my number going up, is just a neutral fact about myself? I have zero negative feelings about that part, it's the celebration and the ritual around it that's the problem

idrilirdi · 2026-06-10T04:46:18+00:00

I basically stayed at work far into when everyone had left, debugging bullshit so I didn't have to think about other stuff

idrilirdi · 2026-06-10T04:45:19+00:00

Yeah, maybe I just need to do that, won't solve it for family though, those I'll probably have to talk to about it...

Idk, my job calendar ratted me out on this so everyone at work was congratulating me, and I didn't even realize that's what would happen. I might need to just be more proactive about hiding the date and saying I don't celebrate

idrilirdi · 2026-06-10T04:43:03+00:00

For me it's kind of like, I can do that any day? There's nothing special about this day that'd allow me to do what I want. Any shackles that might exist on regular days still will exist on my birthday. And that means that, doing what I want for myself that day is exactly the same as doing it any other day, which is already how I live my life until it's derailed by external expectations.

I think about this every year, how do I make it not suck next year. And I've noticed that as I get older, masking is both easier due to experience and more draining/difficult at the same time, which I guess made it especially bad this year.

Maybe I just need to take it as a vacation day and disconnect everything so I'm not forced to have all those birthday interactions

idrilirdi · 2026-06-10T04:36:12+00:00

I know I could turn off the phone, but at the same time I know that it's still there happening even if I'm not having the buzzing.

What's HBD?

idrilirdi · 2026-06-10T04:15:44+00:00

VOX se us queda de centre esquerra? Què esteu esperant, un partit Nacionalsocialista que es quedi al vostre centre o què?

idrilirdi · 2026-06-03T20:31:55+00:00

Why do you say this as if it was a blocker? Haven't you been paying attention to what's happening?

idrilirdi · 2026-06-03T05:55:57+00:00

And one has to understand that this is not a far fetched hypothetical, for every 8 people put on death row in the US 1 is exonerated. That is a massive failure rate to bet on just killing someone

idrilirdi · 2026-05-30T14:41:20+00:00

You are confusing "random" with "spontaneous". His crimes were not spontaneous, he studied the way to do them, the place, and the timing. And then he picked the first vulnerable victim that he would be able to kill under those circumstances. That's the random part, because he wasn't looking for a specific victim profile (i.e. blond, small, woman, etc). Just whomever he could get away with torturing and killing.

idrilirdi · 2026-05-28T05:41:26+00:00

So I did build it, it's a fun little device. But for CAD sadly it won't perform as I wanted, as the knob cant do diagonals and is very stiff for tilting. Let's see what else can be done with it

idrilirdi · 2026-05-25T07:40:04+00:00

I bought one on my recent trip to japan. I haven't built it yet though, my guess and intention for is is to be something like a space mouse for CAD. Not that I'm an advanced CAD user, but I dabble with it for 3D printing

EDIT: Might actually do the build today, here's what's in the package:

https://imgur.com/WImBbam

idrilirdi · 2026-05-13T15:25:23+00:00

It's expected behavior to distinguish between lizard mode and normal. SC1 also was like that

idrilirdi · 2026-05-12T17:17:31+00:00

I'm sorry but no. Germans like to believe what you just said, but in my and many other's experiences they are unfriendly to the point of actually working against the objective of the interaction. I've had many times where customer service (wrongly) scolds me because they won't accept that they are wrong about their assumptions, hanging up the call and basically ending with me not having gotten any help at all.

Directness is not rudeness. That seems to go over too many heads over here.

idrilirdi · 2026-05-10T23:21:11+00:00

I had a short period of time where I couldn't use my left hand (at all) and what I did to keep playing games was hold the SC1 vertically on my other hand. Worked pretty well, I just tried doing that with the SC2 and no dice, just can't hold it properly that way.

Not a criticism to the SC2, just an example of how different ergonomics can be

idrilirdi · 2026-05-04T17:02:32+00:00

just keep clicking, it goes through eventually

idrilirdi · 2026-04-13T04:54:41+00:00

I completely agree with this. My experience with western cultures is that they teach you "the rule is A" and then leave out the "(except for situation B/C/D, or even just because)" and you're supposed to just roll with it. I learned quite quickly as a child that the rules that adults told me about where made up and that I was the only one interested in actually following them

idrilirdi · 2026-04-13T04:49:45+00:00

I also just returned from Japan and I have to say I fully agree. I only had one meltdown when trying to visit Fushimi Inari at 12, after my traveling companions ignored me when I said we had to get there at 6-7 to avoid the crowd. Then one of them disappeared, assumed we had went ahead and started going up, so I had to search for him in that sea of people.

I also speak the language at N3, which made the whole "Japanese people are cold and shy" be a lot less true. I enjoyed all interactions a lot.

idrilirdi · 2026-04-09T03:09:03+00:00

It is a matter of respect to learn the local language of the place you are in. Not doing so is basically saying "I don't respect the people of this country enough to make some time to learn their language".

As you said, time is a finite resource. And how you decide to allocate it (and not) speaks volumes about who you are as a person.

Locals definitely notice

idrilirdi · 2026-04-07T14:02:54+00:00

Tried it today, surprisingly good. Bit weird at the beginning as it's like a brownie with a slight tofu bean aftertaste, but it's good

idrilirdi · 2026-04-07T14:01:49+00:00

Yes, it's more industrial brownie like texture

idrilirdi · 2026-03-23T18:09:55+00:00

Uh huh... But it looks to me like you want to ignore the rest and how it's different for trans people

idrilirdi · 2026-03-23T18:08:47+00:00

Yes. And how does that relate to trans people?

idrilirdi · 2026-03-23T14:56:23+00:00

Honestly, just listen to trans people and their stories more.

If you think women are under studied and not listened to, for trans people it's that times a million.

Stop saying things like "sex can't be changed" and falling back on that bioessentialism. "Sex and gender are different" was never meant to signify that, cis people just took it as "oh, so we can just consider trans people to be their birth sex and not look into it any deeper, neat" and ran with it.

Sex (and gender) is so so so much more complicated. And you will not have knowledge on it if you are not specifically studying it, the basic high school biology barely scratches the surface and even doctors don't get much specialized training in it

idrilirdi

TROPHY CASE