Happy new year! I forgot to make an update when the new year actually happened, so here I am. I had a really good holiday, did lots of cooking, saw lots of family, had only a minimum of severe conflict. I ended up spending my entire paycheck twice, once on gifts, once on gifts and a surprise fee for missing a therapy appointment. I am pretty angry about that, still having a hard time being okay with my therapist charging me so much for missing my appointment when I haven't missed one in 3 years. She tells me its the industry standard, but having a grace period is also the industry standard. That being said, there's not much that I can do about it besides either stop going to the therapist, which would be frustrating at best, or just take it on the chin and keep on keeping on. I imagine I'll end up doing the latter, although that's not to say that I'm happy about it. So I'll concede and complain about it. Beside that, my mental health has been pretty decent. Having a job that I enjoy, and feel passionate about is really helpful for my mental wellbeing, although I do still not like myself very much. I consistently wish that I could switch my autism off sometimes, since many of my autistic traits are suboptimal for making people like me.

I wish I could be one of two things: 1) the type of person who doesn't care what people think of them, and simple exist as I am confidently or 2) be the type of person people like, thus making the problem moot. But I care what people think, while also not being particularly interesting as a person. My interests are niche, the way that I talk is obtuse (for instance, I was about to type "the manner in which I speak" rather than saying "the way I talk"), and I'm generally off-putting otherwise. All of this equals a person who has a hard time making friends, is generally disregarded beyond the point of being considered "the smart kid/person", and am largely ignored. Regardless, I don't think I'm gonna change one way or another, so I'll just be me, and be upset by that fact.

At any rate, I am otherwise satisfied with my life, despite my continual low-self esteem. All told, I plan on uploading another very delayed Assassin's Creed review soon, and then I'll be posting the even more delayed creative writing stuff.

I hope whoever is reading this is happy, and wherever and whenever you are, I hope you're having a great time :)