Fourth night of Chanukah. ✡️🕎

Second night. I frickin’ love sufganiyot.

חנוכה שמח Thoughts are with Bondi. Am echad. ✡️💙

Anxiety is such an intense, awful feeling. Tried music & reading to distract myself in hopes I'll stop feeling so unwell and will be able to head to work. Made myself eat to try to feel better (stomach ache and feeling sick)/reduce the dizziness (like going down in an elevator).

The worst bigots always dress up their bigotry as heroism. The transphobes are "protecting women and children!" (Excluding women who might not look feminine enough, or this specific group of marginalised children who are already more likely to be bullied and alienated.)

Watched Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein last night. You can tell it's a labour of love. Beautiful, horrific, gory, heartbeaking. So many thoughtful details that give us deeper insight into the characters.

Little boy I do some extra phonics work with likes to chat between every word. Today he was telling me about his dad keeping everyone awake with his snoring (he didn't know the word, so did an impression). Then he said when he's big & a dad he'll keep his kids awake by *impression of loud snoring*.

A little bat pup came to help us give out treats to trick-or-treaters. She liked my curio cabinet and also the magen david from the plant stand. Cutest, funniest little being.

Went out and did things, today! The Frankenstein: Creating a Tale Eternal exhibition at the Old Selfridges Hotel was great. It's made me all the more excited to watch the film! Wes Lang's Thank You G-d art show was also delightful! Birds and skulls, what's not to love?!

London: Time and Tide photography exhibition at Art in the Docks. I collabed w/ Briony Campbell on ‘Pieces of Me’ & ‘Distance is Nothing’ (film originally for Out of Touch Festival, shown at Bloomsbury Theatre!) Briony’s pieces are collabs w/ Autistic ppl about our experiences/relationships.

It takes 2.6 seconds for me to go from “there’s something beautiful in every human being” to “get me off this planet”

Had a different reading group this week and clearly it made my usual group appreciate me more because one little boy was like, 'Ben I made you something, come look!' So I looked at his building block structure and complimented him on it. Then said bye and left the class...

Wins this week: Bro's dog (extreme firework fear) slept through fireworks when I was dog sitting. AND the TV was muted (I was reading)! Situationally mute girl who's in one of my groups is always visibly VERY anxious and I've never seen her smile EVER but she proper beamed when she saw me today.

Kids. When they’re not handing me bogies or coughing in my face or repeatedly shouting ‘chicken banana’ or trying to climb fences or shoving each other or repeatedly asking for something you’ve already repeatedly said yes to (???), they’re quite cute.

Seeing Atreyu on Friday was ace. Being a(n autistic) teenager mostly felt very shit most of the time but somehow listening to music from back then still feels good. So seeing Atreyu perform The Curse was like revisiting my teens in a good way. I hate leaving the house but I proper enjoyed myself.

G'mar Chatima Tovah.

Interesting article! Informative. Worth reading in full. Makes it clear how idiotic/fascist the whole thing is. The EHRC basically renders itself unfit for purpose. How can someone create pseudo-laws it would be unlawful to actually enforce? How are people this incompetent in such important roles?

I’m proper overstimulated and unwell (last night my gf asked me which hot dog buns I wanted for dinner and I covered my ears like, ‘no no no’ because choosing was Too Much - this is the level of overloaded I am this week). And today her messages:

Dog sitting misadventures: Constantly in a state of exhaustion & disregulation. Different rules for both dogs makes things difficult. House is in a state of refurbishment so I have to go upstairs to shower/pee and the dogs have to remain on the other side of the stair gate so they freak.

My dogs have never been scared of fireworks. Bro’s dog is terrified, has meds at home. She was screaming & shaking, TV wasn’t working to block out the noise. I was panicking (I have hyperacusis so her screaming and barking was excruciating). Put on Avenged Sevenfold and she immediately calmed down!

Whenever I feel bad about myself I think, ‘Well, Louie loved you. He always chose you. He was always happy to see you.’ And I feel better (even though I miss him). This boy’s memory is such an immense blessing. Some lights just can’t be put out.

Miss this boy all the time but it’s harder today. Louie, Little Bear, my best friend, my shadow, the sweetest, kindest soul. Used to get homesick for him when I was at work or away, so it’s like being constantly homesick with him gone. His memory is such an immense blessing. 29.12.07-21.08.21

I basically stim the letters off my keyboard. Always the same ones. Who else does it? And what keys do you ruin? (It’s been years since it was first pointed out to me, but I’ve yet to find anyone else who does it. I’m certain there are more of us!)

Only took us three years to get some shutters ordered (the 'temp' paper blinds are still hanging in there!) and to arrange to get some fitted wardrobes (the one we bought when we first moved in we never quite fit together properly so it's more like a glorified yet really impractical shelfy thing).

Girlfriend asked for another book rec. She loved Memorials (Richard Chizmar), & My Best Friend's Exorcism (Grady Hendrix). The pressure to make it 3/3. I went for Devil's Creek (Todd Keisling). Let's hope the audiobook is good and she enjoys listening to it as much as I enjoyed reading it!

Wrote a creative piece about Louie (my best friend, my wonderful dog, who died) but from his perspective and broke myself. The last few lines muller me every time I read it. Let my gf read it and she cried (the last few lines got her, too). Louie, my time with you is worth the ache, but ouch.

Submitted my final assignment, got feedback, now I just need to prep for my last assessment event and I'll have my degree. Wow. Then I can focus on finishing this novel.

Digging my girlfriend’s updates as she listens to @richardchizmar.bsky.social’s Memorials on her way to and from work today. 😂

Seeing kids outside of work when the parents/carers don't know me is a bit awful at times. They'll high five me or run up to give me a hug, which is very sweet, but their caregiver will be ALARMED.

Was at an event. Had to take a group of boys to the toilet. Some older boys from a different school, on realising that I block my ears when the hand dryer is in use, spent AGES drying their hands and moving their hands back & forth to make it start & stop repeatedly. Watching me to see my reaction.

Kid: You can't watch Squid Game, either. Me: What? Yes I can. Kid: No, you have to be 18 and you're not 18. Me: How old do you think I am? Kid: 17. The babyface strikes again.

Few books on the go. Kept infodumping at my gf about my interest in indoctrination/radicalisation/cultism and one day she actually used loads of what I told her to create safeguarding training. 😎 Sometimes I’m useful.

I tend to get my hair cut then leave it for about 6 wks before getting it cut again, so the change is kind of dramatic (bad thing, rly). 1st time my bro's gf saw me after a haircut she said, 'You got a proper haircut! You look like a real teenager!' Er, excuse me, I'm a full grown adult, thanks.

Last year a little girl with situational mutism was in a small group of children I was working with and she spoke to me! The other kids freaked out because they'd never heard her speak before and thought she couldn't speak. I thought they were exaggerating, but the teacher was just as gobsmacked.

The one negative of my gf being so cool and accepting, however, is that sometimes I say or do things and immediately think, 'Oh shit, that's weird and off-putting.' And I'd usually be embarrassed. But my girlfriend will laugh and make my weirdness a good thing.

Why my gf is a keeper: When we first started dating we were going somewhere and waiting on the tube platform. I was VERY SAD because I'd had to leave the house. And I didn't realise I was doing it, but I hummed a song that clearly I felt with my entire soul...

Expecting rejection does not make it any less gutting. Being a writer and being AuDHD (with the subsequent low self esteem and RSD) is like constant self-torture. Gotta keep trying though, right?

Went back today with different classes and took a picture of Captain Queen Elizabennett!

Think I broke a heart this morning. Little girl has a bit of a crush on me & was all chatty & smiley then: ‘Ben, do you have a girlfriend?’ 😁 ‘Yeah.’ 😟*silence for ages* Don’t worry, kid. In a few yrs you’ll realise I’m old & ugly & wonder what you ever saw in me!

Local school trip to St. Margaret’s church to explore graveyard and scavenger hunt inside. Kid saw the sculpture on Captain John Bennet’s tomb and asked if he was Queen Elizabeth. 😂

Punched in the face by nostalgia this weekend. Found my favourite poster frm teen yrs (love Cab Calloway), & my old punk band’s set list in my snare drum case. Kinda miss it! Songs came flooding back and they were bangers! And my gf framed both! (She’s the artist of the bats on the right btw!)

It won't upload as a gif. :( So here's another photo.

Isopod appreciation post. Gif'd my Armadillidium gestroi. Proper cute, ain't they?

@richardchizmar.bsky.social As a writer, but also - dude set up Cemetery Dance in his early twenties! My idea of success is when I don't forgot to attach the file to the email so don't have to email again w/ the attachment, apologising. (Forgetting the attachment twice is its own horror story.)

Got a gift: the #bbcghosts Button House Archives book. So that makes three. One I bought myself, one my girlfriend got me, & this one! But I only have 2 of the other Ghosts book. Getting another copy would be silly, but the lack of balance is almost intolerable.

When it came to writing up the description of the ship's dog for the "Meet the Crew" pages on our website, we did add one category that we thought he might appreciate... maryrose.org/meet-the-cre...

‘AI is in everything! If you use spellcheck, you can’t be mad about ChatGPT!’ Look, you determinedly obtuse cantaloupe, don’t slander spell check, first created in 1961, made for PCs in 1980. NO ONE THINKS A SPELL CHECKER IS GEN AI. What in the ever-loving straw-man tomfoolery.

If I ever need to evidence my autism diagnosis and can’t find my paperwork I’ll just send them this picture of my dinner last night (I actually had 15 chicken dippers but I already ate some).

Welp, just came across some reels/posts about a 12 year old boy mourning the loss of his best friend (his 14 year old staffie) and I think I'm broken.