Interesting, didn't realize it was that strong. I've never gotten either drunk (getting slightly buzzed at age 11 barely counts I think) or high. I wonder if there's any other anxiety medications...
Anyone here ever take benzo for anxiety? Did it work for you and would you recommend it?
(for the record I currently take mirtazapine, which i think??? is helping me regulate my mood a bit better because at least i'm not having many days laying in bed all day consumed by thought-spirals. but i still have incredibly bad anxiety especially around texting and communication, as I've mentioned before)
fashionposting #2 (musings about sewing)
idk if this is a common misconception, but before I started to learn how to sew I was under the impression that the actual sewing was the main time-consuming part of the process? but that idea died pretty quickly once I actually started. in reality, making a garment from start to finish is like, 20% sewing At Most and actually mainly about cutting, pinning, and ironing. If trying to self-draft patterns, that's another thing on top of everything else; even if using a ready-made pattern, many people end up having to make adjustments so that the pattern better fits their proportions and their desires.
I'm under no impression that my clothes look "professional", there's still am amateurish quality about them because despite having been at this for about two years, I haven't actually made many full projects during that time (for various reasons — mostly I've been preoccupied by other stuff, and I also do a lot of modifying clothing which is very different from making clothing from scratch.) I do think that I'll get a lot better at garment construction the more I do it, but something I think is fun is that with a little bit of "idc what people think" energy even the messy, amateurish results of beginning sewing can be worn out and look cute! I've mentioned this before, but I made a pair of strappy plaid pants and I messed them up a lot, including in some fairly visible ways; but nobody noticed the messy parts, they just saw cool pants and I got a shit ton of compliments on them. I dress for myself and myself alone, so I really don't care that much what other people think of my clothes, which helps me go out in my imperfect pieces with basically zero self-consciousness.
That being said garment construction is an incredible skill, and it boils my blood when people imply that ready-to-wear clothes are put together poorly or without skill or whatever. I do not possess the skills of a seamstress of ready-to-wear clothes, and the vast majority of people doing this kind of complaining don't either. When I see people being snobby and elitist about cheap clothing, implying it all falls apart quickly, I actually want to shake them because like — the problem with cheap clothing is not that the clothes are poorly put together, it's the labor exploitation of the incredibly skilled garment workers, many of whom are located in the global south.
Rain World... post-apocalyptic world trying not to get eaten by lizards...
Oh yeah, I'm of the opinion that the whole system of therapy is fucked and that good therapists are fairly hard to find in a system which seeks to uphold the hegemony of a conception of "wellness" under the doom-spiral of capitalism. My last therapist was an older white person who had absolutely no advice for me dealing with a horrific anxiety disorder, severe OCD, ADHD, autism, and constant retraumatization from covid, capitalism, and the difficult family situation I was living in. She actually victim-blamed me once in the aftermath of a moment of physical violence and then when I confronted her about it later, she denied it and tried to gaslight me. She also kept harping on about me wearing a mask and taking covid precautions. I also had no idea of how to even breach the subject of being a Chinese trans person with her. It was such a bad experience that it put me off trying to find a therapist again for months, and now I'm trying again but with OCD-specific therapy this time.
It's definitely covid's fault, sickness is a year-round thing now.
If your search turns up results, please let me know. I’ve been wanting to try wearing boxers but I don’t feel comfortable wearing mens boxers
I see, this is how I propagandize sewing...
fashionposting (mostly about pattern-drafting)
So as some of you may know, I've been pretty into learning pattern-drafting for myself lately, and I thought that I could start out with a basic bodice block. For those unaware, a bodice block is essentially a pattern base for garments that go on your top half (bodices, essentially.) When self-drafting patterns for shirts and tops, it's important to have a bodice block that you can trace and then base the pattern off of, and then you make adjustments so that the pattern is unique and fun. For ready-made clothing and also ready-made patterns, the bodice blocks used for pattern-making are fit to standardized sizing measurements. For the home sewist, you can make a bodice block that fits your precise measurements. I'm lucky to be able to pretty comfortably fit "womens" standardized sizing, but this is one of the appeals of pattern-making for many people who don't, as the proportions in standardized sizing absolutely do not map to the diversity of body shapes out there.
The tutorial I used for drafting my bodice block was this one from the Shape of Fabric, which in retrospect probably wasn't the best tutorial especially for a beginner, but oh well I worked it out in the end. There are a lot of bodice block tutorials out there and all of them do things slightly differently, which was the source of about 90% of my frustration with the process; otherwise it was smooth sailing. I started with a bodice block with darts because if you search up "bodice block tutorial" this is what pops up first. If I had gone in with more knowledge, I probably would have gone with a dartless bodice block to start with, because 1. it is easier and 2. it doesn't highlight my curves, which as a transmasc person I'm not the most comfortable with. A dartless bodice block is next in line to be drafted, once I get my sewing machine working (I do not need a sewing machine to do the actual drafting, but I do need it to make a mockup so I can fit the block to myself and make necessary adjustments.)
The block I ended up drafting definitely needs some adjusting — I want to give it more ease and the sleeve part is way too small to comfortably fit around my arm, so I need to increase the armscye length basically. I also made a basic sleeve block to go along with it and I think that needs some adjusting too — it definitely needs to be longer. Other than that, I'm pretty proud of it as my first attempt, and I'll probably keep it around for if I want to draft some more form-fitting garments (though I foresee myself using a dartless bodice block more often because I prefer looser clothes.)
For the difference between "mens" and "womens" bodice blocks (gender is fake, etc etc), men's bodice blocks never have any darts and usually have a much straighter side seam. I want to draft a men's bodice block at some time too, but I feel like I should wait for post-top surgery for that because I would want to draft it to my post-surgery measurements. Honestly the whole "top surgery" thing is a bit annoying to deal with as a sewist, because I know I'll have to redo my bodice blocks after it happens, but it's not going to happen soon enough for me to put off making them until it does.
Thus here are my beginning explorations in pattern-drafting. I know that if I was in some sort of pattern-drafting class, I would be told to start with drafting a skirt instead; but the bodice block was calling to me. I self-drafted a circle skirt in 2022 and it was pretty easy and fun, I love circle skirts and they're an incredibly beginner-friendly sewing project for anyone who's interested in picking up this hobby. The basic pants block is apparently the hardest to fit, but I'm excited to try that at some point too.
During the cold war, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence— 
Chinese family-style meal, all vegan of course. Cabbage, bok choy, homestyle Chinese cauliflower, and green chili + Wenzhou dried tofu. Everything stir fried except the rice (not pictured.)
Bump amber whataboutism