So, here’s the thing...

I'm feeling a little more level-headed after this most recent episode of Steven Universe (which by the way, is absolutely amazing, and where was this show when I was growing up?). I have unemployment insurance doling out $900 at the start of this month, I have whatever I can make from the live show happening at the Billy DeFrank Center ( http://defrank.dangerpri.me/ ) on Saturday, the 3rd of September. Rent is $2340 and then we have a bunch of overdue bills and food costs. All in all, I think we'd rather keep our apartment than not, and to do that, it would take about $1500 in donations, which is not unheard of because I am part of an amazing community of artists, musicians, game developers, community leaders, technicians, and other really cool people. That said, my mother has graciously offered to let my family move in with her until we get back on our feet. This is not GAME OVER by any stretch; we'll be moving to the suburbs where it is much quieter. I'm working with the Department of Rehab to find work, I'm looking for work on my own, I'm interviewing with a company today and I have no idea how that'll turn out; my last interview took two months and after all was said and done they rejected me because they were looking for someone 'more senior'. If I lose my apartment, which seems the more likely outcome, I'm going to be burdening my mother for a little while (yet again), but we'll be all right. We're going to get back on our feet like we always do, I've learned from this experience and will keep improving, and the world will keep turning until it doesn't anymore and the sun goes out. If you'd like to hear the music I (co-)write/produce, check out Studio Thumpy Puppy on SoundCloud, and if it does something for you, consider throwing a few dollars our way. When all is said and done, we're going to start putting albums up on BandCamp for people to buy, but in the mean time we have donation links if you want to support our music or just support my family: Square Cash PayPal Patreon

How to feels?

"We'll get back to you this week with a decision." So the rest of the week I get to sit around waiting for someone to decide how the next year of my life will turn out. This is it. I lost my job April 7th; it has been about five months that we've managed to keep the apartment with no savings in pocket, we've run out of favours, this is it. We should probably start packing now, because either we lose our apartment in September, or we move to San Francisco in November. They have no way of knowing how inconsiderate they're being by making me wait for a decision and I'm too scared of changing the outcome by letting them know I'm on a tight schedule. "Oh, well if you're going to rush us into a decision then we don't want to hire you." I imagine them saying over and over again while I silently and impotently seethe about the whole situation. Advice on how to deal with a situation that is completely out of my hands is welcome. Also any advice on how to beat the 'Fight or Flight' mission in Kogane-cho in Jet Set Radio is appreciated as this seems to be the only game I can play right now without being depressed and I'm very stuck on this mission due to machine-gun-weilding jetpack soldiers using excessive force to deal with 17-20 year olds. (JSR feels a little too accurate a predicition of the future at this point.)

Thoughts on my gender...

I don't really have a good place to put my thoughts and I should definitely be articulating them more often (at least when it comes to my emotional state), so I'm going to start posting such articulations here. I have recently encountered a number of situations wherein I am incorrectly gendered in a number of ways. I identify as "non-binary", mostly because anything more specific is not important as it relates to my sense of identity, but I am regularly read as 'male'. Recently I was in a situation (yes I am being intentionally vague) wherein the other people involved knew about my pronoun preferences, but elected to repeatedly use my name or altogether avoid using any pronoun; I understand feeling uncomfortable with the possibility of messing up something like that, and so I said nothing. The thing that bothered me was that the people involved, both men, used masculine-coded language, and did not use this same language when talking to femme-presenting peers. In light of this all too common scenario I feel inclined to simplify my gender in the future by presenting myself as female (which will not be hard considering I will be taking hormones) as I believe most people understand "transgender" but don't seem to grasp "non-binary" and I feel conveying the idea of non-male-ness is more important for my comfort and mental health than presenting my actual gender and having it ignored. This feels like a Bad Thing to do because I will be intentionally misrepresenting myself for personal benefit. I would like a very simple solution that means I do not have to have the Gender Theory 101 conversation with every new person I meet, but at least gets people to stop treating me like a man. In my personal life, when making friends, when doing something in explicitly queer spaces, when in game development/audio, I will absolutely make my gender known, but outside of that... I've already spoken to a few people about this, and everyone says I should do what I feel is best for my own health, but I am not sure what that will be. I suspect that my solution is one created out of frustration and that it will only be helpful in the extremely short term. Feedback is appreciated.

Wrongful Termination

I'm under a lot of NDAs, but I was just wrongfully terminated due to circumstances surrounding me being autistic and/or genderqueer. If you can help me get a job as an audio engineer, musician, information security engineer, or pentester, it would help me out a lot.

[View the story "FF7" on Storify]