@Zanna Congratulations!

@Zanna Commiserations!

@skippy619 Congratulations!

@skippy619 Commiserations!

hah.

Now I feel like everyone is adulting better than me.

@DavidS Don't feel that way! I'm sure you're doing great!

Plus adulting is boring :p I wish I didn't have to adult.

All the fun bits of adulting aren't happening at least.

All the tedious bits are

yup :(

that sucks

where's the part where I can eat anything I want? haha

Sucks that if I was to thrwo all caution to the wind and drink and smoke and eat whatever I wanted it would still be vegan.

How much money would someone have to pay you to eat erm... a bacon sandwich, for example?

I have no idea.

I think a million pounds would do it.

oh, in that sense you mean

Erh

Yes.

I wouldn't think of it in terms of money

I'd rather think "oh okay, am I gonna die of starvation if I don't eat it?"

Because I'd think, well, PETA would do it.

And use the money for promote veganism

@DavidS I hear lots of bad things about PETA these days. This is sad. I thought they were good

No I mean like right now, where you have vegan food but some meat eating troll is like, we'll pay you to eat bacon

Because we all know these people only they don't have millions to spare to troll a vegan in this way

@DavidS Mmh. I'd look up the price of the nearest shelter and the costs it assumes for at least a year. And I'd give this amount.

shelter?

animal shelter?

yup

okay.

I don't know where to go with that really it's not a useful question :D

I was just pondering

haha

I'm working remotely today and my cat is by my side

so quiet, so calm.

so annoying

I don't like cats much :)

I'm glad I'm allergic (a bit) because it gives me an excuse to never own one.

@DavidS oh? Do you like other animals better?

I like animals generally, like, I want to see living things be able to keep on living, but I don't like animals in the house.

I'm not vegan because I want to get up close and personal with animals, I want to leave them alone.

Sometimes I say I dislike animals so much I don't even want to eat them

strange inverse veganism

oh, that makes total sense to me though

:)

I could probably be convinced to adopt a dog.

All my friends have cats :(

Dogs are amazing

I have one at my mother's. Named Frisbie.

great name

what kind of dog?

Street dog

lemme find a pic

:D

I love her so much

I like dogs because they have expressions

Happy dog looks happy

We got her when I was twelve or something

Now she's aging and it breaks my heart to think she's gonna go someday

My dog and cat are my family and it's just ... I just can't

And sometimes I'd rather only have non human friends haha

SImpler, I suppose.

yup

I haven't been feeling really good lately

You know, the thing with autism is that you're constantly pushed to act normal and so you're invited to share stuff and such. This week, anytime I've tried to open up I've been shut down. And it makes me feel so worthless. i'm like "okay so... what do you want ultimately? That I speak and share or that I stick to being caught in my thoughts?"

sometimes I wish I were a robot

anyway. Don't wanna bother you with that. it's just a clue on why I love non human animals so much :p

Who.. no it's okay, who are you trying to open up to?

I think sometimes people close to you aren't good to talk to because you have to ummm like you can't relax because you're thinking, I need to say it the right way, I can't say something about them, etc ...

The same 'act normal' problem almost :)

I mean, I can't claim to be able to relate, and I don't think I'm very good at talking so if someone expects me to have a solution it's hard... maybe that's a reason to shut someone down, if you don't think you can fix it, I don't know.

Personally I found speaking to a 'professional' helpful.

But mostly because I could get an objective view of my situation.

I'm seeing a therapist, to try to mask my autism. It helps in some ways.

But I don't understand why you couldn't share with your closed ones

hm, the word mask makes me uncomfortable.

I understand that you have to learn behaviours that come naturally to other people without thinking.

@DavidS Yup. Me too. But if I wanna have a career and keep my relationship, I have to mask.

Understood.

Do you find talking to people on a computer easier or harder?

@DavidS That's the idea, yeah. I think I now understand them pretty well. Just ... sometimes, application is hard, especially when really tired

There are no additional cues, but if those cues aren't helpful generally

I confess I know very little about autism, so I apologise if I make an assumption that's inaccurate.

@DavidS Easier, I think. You have time to think about what you're gonna say. you choose who you talk to so chances are you find people who'll be alike / will understand what you're talking about. VG.SE is great for that. I'm not called extremist for eating plants over there :D

@DavidS No worries :) I was just trying to expand on why I think it's easier to communicate with non human animals

Over there? Am I missing out on some other thing?

@DavidS I mean on Vegetarianism. Sorry, my English isn't perfect :)

That's okay, I thought that's what you meant, just making sure.

:)

Rant over ;)

Oh, so, English is also not your first language, right? So (if you don't mind me asking) does that make it harder (which I would assume is the case) or do you find that the extra layer of translation helps to hide misunderstanding behind language barrier?

I suppose in person it's worse because it's still real-time.

I'm being nosey now, sorry.

so worries :)

I should do my work instead of questioning you :D

haha. Me too.

hungry....

I think I'll mask (ha) that with a latte since it's nearly lunch time.

Then by the time I get hungry again I can have my lunch

I think my English is pretty good (especially for someone's who's born in France haha). To this day, there are little texts I can't read without a dictionary (I'm thinking Shakespeare et al). The thing is, I haven't lived abroad for long enough to be able to build my speech the way English speaking people do. A fair amount of what I say still looks a lot like how I would build my sentences in French.

If you hadn't told me you were French I would have assumed you were English or American.

Speaking in English gets more difficult when I'm tired, of course. But surprisingly, it's the same for French or any other language.

Because I never spot any tell-tale signs

@DavidS Really? That's funny because I think that you or Zanna speak in a very different way comparing to what I do

You speak correctly but not overly correct (like, you use contractions like "who's" instead of "who is" which non-native speakers sometimes do because they've been taught to do it 'properly').

If I have kids someday I'd love to teach them both English and French growing up. I love linguistics. It's just fascinating.

I will write an e-mail and then go back and add contractions because I can't remember to use them.

And it makes it flow... less... good.

Without them*

@DavidS Haha. My German is very well constructed and polite. That's because I didn't have the chance to practice that much. I used to chat with a SE German friend and the first I wrote them an email, they thought it was spam because of the way I was speaking.

True that.

I lapse into lazy typing sometimes, and then I see that Zanna isn't doing it and I fix myself.

like I'll just be typing lowercase

breaking up my sentences into a stream of consciousness

like this

and it gets annoying

haha

to read, I think

i

know

don't

does

it?

It's an old IRC habit.

ha ... the old days.

Good old days.

Sorry to remind you of your hunger but it's time for me to head to the kitchen

Have a nice day!

You too :)

mmm, free coffee.

My wife studied in Spain for a semester and speaks it pretty well -- we visited Sevilla this past summer and I did my best to listen and speak, but it's such a hard skill for me to learn