Made it 3 and a half school days into the new year before I had to go angrily ugly cry in the car (in the garage, in the dark). I’m not wearing shoes. It’s cold. I brought a blanket.

Helping a bored, easily distracted autistic kid through first grade is NOT for the weak. I have done so much yelling today that I’m ashamed of myself. But I also asked for help and was greeted with eye rolls (thanks 🖕🏻🖕🏻) and asked someone else for clarification and everyone sucks today.

I hate everything today. I need to get out of my fucking house but there’s nowhere to even go. I guess at 3pm I’m going to go walk around Target, even though I mostly don’t need anything, except boys size 8 sweatpants which aren’t in stock anywhere in the civilized world.

Actually realized the other night during insomnia theatre that I’m not depressed, I’m angry, bored and in mourning over the loss of my past life - even pre-pandemic. That realization helped a lot emotionally, but it still doesn’t fix things. I am a person who Needs Places to Go and Look at Things. None of those places are open (or even exist anymore).

Can’t look at/buy CDs because most of those shops don’t exist anymore. Nearest yarn stores are like 15+ miles away, closed forever or closed due to COVID. The mall has a weird app-based queuing system to ensure capacity is kept at a minimum (which I agree with) but it’s so unusable that I don’t want to go there for that reason AND it’s just not a good idea. No restaurants except takeout. No museums. Too cold for zoo (and I have to be home to help with school shit).

I’ve been mulling this over for a few days and having that clarity is great. I’d love to write this out in long(er) form but I don’t really currently have a blog set up, and I’d like to keep things a lot more anonymous/pseudonymous than I have in the past. Remember livejournal? I need one of those but less sketchy.

I spent so much of my life online and doing online things from 1999-2007 and I am just BURNED OUT. All this tech was SUPPOSED to make things easier, but it’s really... not. At all. I’ve been looking for boys size 8 pants on a specific retailer’s site for at least a year. They have been sold out the entire time. The customer service responses are, “we add new stock all the time, keep checking!” yeah, I HAVE. For an entire YEAR. Hence my email. Thanks for the help 🙄

Somehow *I’m* the one being unreasonable. When Target and Old Navy and EVERYWHERE ELSE don’t have pants in a specific size in stock forever. I just need sweatpants. His are too short and too tight in the butt. Because autism & school at home I can’t ever do anything that makes noise or keeps me out of the room, so making them won’t happen. Not to mention it’s not like Joann (the ONLY fabric store anymore) has the right fabric anyway.

When I say I miss the convenience of late-1990s California, this is what I mean. Need pants? Mervyn’s/Target/anywhere, cheap.

This was the last few years of my life in CA and it was AWESOME. And there were like 2-3 more within a short drive.