Now 1 - February 3rd, 2023

I saw the idea of the 'now' page from a few other neocities sites. The concept is beyond just an about, you have a page about your current interests and projects. So I guess I'll just put what's on my mind right now here.

Games: Pokemon Scarlet/Violet and I Was a Teenage Exocolonist. I just finished my full dex on Scarlet (my second time) so I've been shiny hunting with mass outbreaks and encounter sandwiches. I'm trying to get a bunch of blue shinies like klawf and wugtrio. I just got Brute Bonnet! In Exocolonist I'm halfway through a mind oriented playthrough. I want to get the cure ending and second engineer so I can get the two shield endings. After that, I probably have to - very unfortunately - befriend Vace to get him on the title screen [gags]. Or I can avoid it forever. That'd be good too. In fact, I'll probably do the runaway and gardener endings next out of spite.

Art: I'm currently working on a project to draw every single pokemon. I haven't been in practice drawing in years, so I figure I'll learn something or I'll die. Right now Ponyta is up next. To be honest, Kanto is kinda daunting just because there's no many alternate forms of things. Give it a break, gamefreak!! But on the bright side, I don't have to do mega evolutions until I get to Kalos.. I also just had some really nice stuff from Poketo come in - an art pouch and some eraseable markers! Plus, foil washi tape that's largely space themed. I'm glad I got the markers because I've really felt some of my drawings could use color.

Writing: I've been toying with a new conlang, which I probably shouldn't do until I've uploaded stuff about the two or three main ones I have up here. But the concept is a series of hooks per word, with tone indicating stops (more than english has that's for sure) and the 'hook' is either a consonant or a few select vowels, indicated by the form of the hook itself. I actually got kinda emotional when I decided to see what other scripts other languages use, since I've only really ever looked at Japanese and Russian, and I was just so struck by their character. It's genuinely incredible how humans have created so many languages in so many ways. It makes the possibilities feel limitless.

Music: Nothing to really report here - no new artists I'm discovering. However, I do want to start experiementing with making music sooner or later. Garageband is free, but I'm really intimidated by the idea of music theory.. I'm a practied writer, but I don't know the first thing about song composition!

Life: I'm a week on getting glasses. This is my first pair and I'm in approaching my mid twenties, so you can image the shock. I thought halos around lights was normal! It's really funny because I kept worrying I was making it up and I wouldn't need glasses, and then I got my absolute ass kicked trying to do the eye test. I can see so much now.. too much. I've unlocked a hidden power...

Mulch - February 6th, 2023

Today I wanna ramble/rant about a regular patron we have. I'm not gonna use names out of common courtesy, but his name is super common so it's not like you'd be able to find him anyway. For the purposes of this his name is Mulch. Before we get started, I wanna say very explicitly about this anecdote and any other I post online: these guys are the exception, not the rule! Most of our homeless patrons at the library are super chill and we don't ever need to know their names. They're the same as anyone else in public work, in the sense that most people are basically okay. They just want a place to warm up, spend time and hang out. In that sense they're part of our target demographic of people who can't access certain materials or resources otherwise and they're wholly welcome. There are some problems they're more prone to like drug use and mental health problems, but even that doesn't necessitate a problem. Hell, we straight up have insane patrons here. And I don't mean that in an insulting way. We have people who talk to themselves or have delusions, and usually they just want someone to talk to. It only becomes a problem when they bother other patrons. So, with all of that said--

Mulch is homeless. He's Russian, which is common in my town, but I don't know if he's an immigrant or not. The far more important factor is he's a nuisance. He comes in every day and commandeers a large table in the communal area on first floor, spreads all his stuff across it and camps out the whole day. This is normal! We'd much prefer he takes up a smaller space, but as long as you're not breaking the rules just about anything goes. What isn't normal is him talking loudly on the phone and swearing, as well as invasion of staff space. We had multiple staff members be forced to put on his (!!!) headphones and watch a russian video they have no hope of understanding. He's also, frankly speaking, loud and a bit of an asshole. Anytime something doesn't go his way he yells 'discrimination!' in his signature russian accent. He'll start fights about the most petty shit. He has also repeatedly asked staff to watch his stuff while he goes out for a smoke, which we've told him no every time and it never fails to annoy him. Prism, our social worker, has been doing a lot of help for him. She got him English classes, links to housing and employment, the works. The problem is he never sticks to any of them, or refuses outright. So we have a very selfish, angry russian man in our library every other day or so, usually multiple days a week. Mulch has good days, of course. Lots of them! It's sweet when he calls you over by 'brother' or 'sister', even if it's usually in a pretty demanding tone. But at his worst he's actively disurptive and takes up all of our social worker's time.

The extra special thing about Mulch is that he's banned from everywhere. Like, everywhere he can hang out in town, he's gotten kicked out. We are literally his last place to stay during the day and it's still winter. He also has a youtube channel! Full of videos of him getting kicked out of places, which he calls discrimination (one time while we were having another active altercation with some patrons he got mad and called it discrimination because we weren't kicking them out fast enough). So why wasn't he kicked out already? In my opinion, he's more than earned it. But the problem is dear Prism. As a social worker, she wants people she's trying to help to succeed, and if he lost access to the library all the resources that come with it would be gone. Which is.. yeah. Devastating. I understand her hesitance there. But the fact of the matter is, Mulch is disruptive to everyone and can even cause some people to leave because they're not comfortable. Like, people get triggered by his shouting! It's stressful! Once Prism had had enough and had him leave for a weekend, and that helped. I think he spent a day or so out in the cold and realized this was his last chance. After that he was good for a few months.

Well, today marks the end of that streak. Mulch was incredibly irate the entire morning and was shouting at Prism when she wouldn't immediately give him the attention he wanted. She managed to get him off her case once, but the second time it was too much and the managers ended up getting involved. Now, I ask of you, dear reader: if you want anything from an establishment, who should you scream at the least? Yes, the managers. Because when the managers get yelled at they do not take your shit like a typical desk worker might. Mulch, in his rage at not being perfectly catered to, screamed at security, our manager, and her manager, Ring. Ring is just below Saturn. Saturn, the director of our whole location way up in administration, is NOT someone you fuck with. Saturn got a guy trespassed for a month for having his dog bark at him. We knew a trespass was unavoidable as soon as Ring got involved. But boy, did Mulch knock it out of the park! It took twenty minutes of him yelling and screaming at them, as well as Prism, using every swear he knew as they slowly, agonizingly walked him out the door. Apparently he was trying to get in their faces and at one point became physical with Ring. When they were leaving his trespass was a month. Piddly for the commotion he was making, but understable given Prism's investment. After that encounter with Ring? A year.

Frankly, I'm just relieved. Prism says it's not productive to be glad someone is gone, but fuck that. Mulch was a time bomb and you had to be extra nice to him just to ensure he didn't start shit with you. People were uncomfortable and afraid of him. Yes, what he was dealing with sucks, but we have so many patrons dealing with the same shit who don't make our lives hell. You can only give him so much special treatment and to be frank we was taking every single inch we gave him until it was a mile. I'm sure the saga is far from over, but work week is over until Thursday. I suppose I'll see what's happened when I get back from my weekend!

This is a spare entry.