Sometimes I think I'm a Horseshoe Crab

Now imagine you've had a life long fascination with animals. And this turned into an interest in animal care. You personally have done a lot of research into specifically enclosure creation. And you just got hired at a nature center that has sub par enclosures. You learn they had better enclosures but the person who made the better ones no longer works there.

Then you learn the old man who thinks he's right all the time and is stubborn is the one telling you stuff about the animal care at the nature center. He has told you things that are incorrect about the animal's care. You also pick up he remade the enclosures to the current subpar state. You also also pick up he is very protective of these animals and thinks he's doing a better job than the other person. He currently feels he has ownership over this situation and doesn't seem open to you trying to correct him. Despite saying two animals have died since the changes he made.

Now imagine trying to navigate that situation.

Okay now try and imagine that a few days before this you and your sister got a new roommate. And when this roommate moved in you met their adoptive father who was helping them move. Okay now merge the two. Imagine when you showed up to work to learn about animal care. It turns out your coworker is your new roommates adoptive father.

So he really takes a shine to you and has decided to take you under his wing. So this stubborn thinks he's right all the time, fussy, old man who is incorrect about animal care and always wants his way thinks he needs to be the one to teach you everything. So he won't leave you alone. So now you have to navigate the social situation of trying to figure out how to get this old man to take you seriously and hopefully listen to you when he has filed you away under "child who should learn from me" in his head but also you can't let this slide because you don't want his mistakes to hurt more animals.

Yesterday asked another coworker about the animal enclosures. They were bioactives. Now need to get old man to clarify because if he is upset that someone put plants and leaves and clean up crew in in a tank I'm genuinely baffled on how I should explain that's not a bad thing. It's actually a good thing.

He (old man) also was like "you need to change the filters monthly the last guy didn't change them enough thats gross". NO PLEASE DON'T CHANGE YOUR FILTER MEDIA MONTHLY OH MY GOD. DID YOU ONLY READ THE FILTER BOX AND DO NO RESEARCH.

Flase foward yesterday. I asked my other coworker about the changing filters monthly. And yes they only looked at the filter media box and did no research. So I explained doing that disrupts the cycle in your tank. You don't need to be doing that. You shouldn't be doing that. He seems to listen. Okay nice it seems like one of my coworkers will be an ally here. <- thought this far too soon.

Not 10 minutes later he walks over to me and going "okay but this says you should change out the actived carbon in the filter monthly" then shows me the google AI overview.

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if you get a new adderall prescription i am medically advising you to start your first dose at 5mg or below, same for ritalin. the entire idea of medication of this type is to titrate up slowly until you hit the homeostasis of your own tolerance, genetic metabolic factors, and use case. titrating DOWN from a dose thats too high is wasteful and unpleasant and puts you at higher risk of psychosis

i posted on here a few days ago the idle thought that i wondered if prescribing physicians are all on long term adderall tolerance anyway (based on the adderall usage stats in med schools) so they think their patients should be started at higher doses and one of my pharmacy industry mutuals replied to me privately and just said “yep” so keep in mind the entire field of western medicine as it exists today is practiced by functional speed freaks and adjust your expectations

Spent a ridiculous amount of time last night obsessively editing my hand written zines in Photoshop to take away any tiny blemishes so they were definitely readable.

This goes for other symptoms as well: although pain can definitely contribute to people’s experiences of these symptoms, fatigue and brain fog are actual migraine symptoms, not just pain symptoms.

[5 years later]

highly throwable imp: hoohoohee

My parents threw away all of these things (even the vacuum cleaners and the dryer) when they got too dirty to function, because no one even told them THAT they could be cleaned. Cost them thousands of dollars over the years.

All I'm saying is that cleaning is not intuitive, and not knowing how to clean is not a moral failing, but it is something you can learn.

I like this video because it does a great job of introducing the basic foundations of house cleaning (and because he doesn't use bleach, which is a common allergy in addition to being awful to inhale). He also talks a little about how to clean a vacuum. And why you shouldn't put grease from your pots and pans down the sink drain. I also love that he mentions that different houses and different people have different needs and different versions of what clean and cleaning looks like.

This is another video from the same guy about cleaning and depression. This advice, especially at the beginning, can feel really really difficult and oppressive to hear. However, I find that it's generally pretty solid. But I'm autistic and so is he, so that gets a massive Your Mileage May Vary stamp on it.

I have a favorite part of this video. It's from 10:52 to 12:36. I think we could all use to hear that. There's a HEFTY pause after that one. I promise the narration does come back.

This is a pair of videos about how to correctly load and use a dish washer.

The first one is a quick 1 minute 30 second overview on loading. I can't find the exact video I'm looking for, so consider this a substitute for that. If I can find the one I'm looking for, I'll swap it in.

Here's a blog post about scrubbing brushes and how to clean them.

And a video for all cleaning tools, including scrub brushes. This video does use bleach. I'll try to find some alternatives to that.

How to clean a top loader (without the removable agitator thing). This should be done every 1-3 months depending on you unit, or every time you wash really soiled clothes.

How to clean a top loader (with the removable agitator thing). This should be done every month, or every time you wash really soiled clothes.

This video is for pet owners.

These carpet brushes are a LIFE SAVER if you have dogs. This thing allows me to go from vacuuming about 4 square feet before my vacuum is full to vacuuming half the living room (I don't vacuum often enough. You should vacuum weekly, and I just can't.). I have to unclog the vacuum less often. It fluffs up some of the flat spots in the carpet. And I also use the brush to shampoo my rugs in the spring.

A spot cleaner (or a carpet cleaner with a spot cleaner attachment) is another life saver, ESPECIALLY if you can afford to splurge on a heated one. I see them at Goodwill or at yard sales occasionally, and they're worth picking up. The shark one in the video is great too.

It's America's Housekeeping Book (1941). Available for free download on the Internet Archive. (Large PDF file at the link here).

The LISTS y'all. The step by step lists. The emphasis on efficiency and arranging spaces for the least resistance possible. The basic concept of "take a tray or basket into a room when you are tidying up so you can put things that belong elsewhere on it and take them out LATER in ONE GO".