It’s 9pm on Christmas Day. I didn’t do my socials to see how few send me wishes, but since I didn’t send any either, it is selfish to worry about such things. My new local friend and I exchanged the formal Merry Christmas.
I got some nice gifts for real. Food and a Walmart gift card. I have enough clothes. I promised to do my hair soon, and gave some inexpensive Temu gifts I think they’ll like. Maybe. In my way, I immediately hated them, but I’m used to that feeling when I give gifts. I’m getting used to that, too. I am embracing how much of who I am is attributed to being autistic, and I had no idea exactly how much of my brain stuff is common and explainable. The ADHD thing was never quite getting it all, but once you go down the autism rabbit hole, you discover you’re a rabbit too.
I even remembered the autism trait I had when younger and the pride I had in being able to identify any vehicle from a distance by its headlights or tailights even in the dark. It’s not quite as obsessive as knowing the names and histories of every US president or state capital, so I never got invited to a late-night talk show as a child prodigy, but it was my autism thing. It cicked. It’s been fun discovering how odd and weird I have always been and not knowing it. I still wish I could get an idea of whether others perceived me that way or whether everyone just accepted weird people for who they were. It’s only recently that people are clinging to the label as new information comes out. So my brain is just different, and a lot of other things seem related. Favourite fork, finicky eating, enhanced taste buds, and emotional and temperature disregulation. Bothered by loud noises, and the way other people’s discomfort makes me very uncomfortable. If I see people doing bad things, it disturbs me physically. I currently can’t remember the term they’ve given that, but some of those are lifelong battles I thought were unique, and it turns out I just have a different way of seeing and processing the world.
The build-up to Christmas was easier this year. The car wasn’t available, and I overspent my December budget quickly, despite having a considerable increase from two major boosts and the pension. I don’t know where it all went. I was supposed to give $300 towards the house, and I didn’t. January is a big invoice month. I hate living it catch up though. I’m almost even now, but the first will see some negative balance again to keep my cloud files accessible.
But the main distraction was my programming. I went crazy over the past few weeks finalizing 11 new and exciting WordPress plugins and the accompanying website. I got close to release-ready, but in my usual way, I kept adding to them and never declaring them complete and #shareworthy yet… but they are #proudworthy
If I use AI to follow a marketing plan, even though they are free and won’t generate income, they should be popular, and I look forward to using AI to get the word out and maybe have articles written and promoted. I really am really proud of a few more than others, but I think almost everyone is a valuable, helpful tool. A couple of them are less impressive but were easy to make, and I was on a roll. They’ll help me specifically more than the average webmaster, I think.
I finished three games, and I love how they turned out, but they might not be as popular. I don’t really know if people play online games on the web anymore. There are so many quality commercial apps, but my three web games are still enjoyable. I’ll test them a bit more with friends and release them as well.
Then I’ll move on to my NetBound Tool Suite, which has been redone three times but never close to release… but I’m still really proud of several, and now that I know how plugins work, they’ll be easier to market. Most of my creations actually do things that there isn’t a lot of competition for.
I wrote some songs, and am always playing with AI, now officially referred to as AI-slop. Webster’s named the word of the year.
So I stayed happy by distraction, and I didn’t fear the new year as much as usual.
Moving forward, because we can’t find reverse.
