GHDR Postmortem: A Review

Postmortem Day is January 13! A new GHDR rule is that 13/13 (technically the 12 month of GHDR) is POSTMORTEM DAY Since there are only 12 months in a year, month 13 is simply January.

Anyway, my postmortem format looks like

1. write out how I feel about GHDR 2025 as a whole based on just what I remember
2. review month by month reports, noting insights and changes in particular, as well as success markers
3. write a nugget or two that summarizes the trends of 2025 in a way I can remember.

How I think it Went The highlights of the year that come to mind

• the **month of building **showed I could still make things and blog, and I accepted with confidence that I was skilled enough to keep doing it
• I felt good in general about how my tools and productivity methods have matured nicely with lots of empirical data to support them
• I think the process of identifying my values to live by in the early part of the year was really foundational to my life philosophy, and I feel good about process I applied to tease it out. I let life events and my reaction to them guide me through the insights; this was not only therapeutic, but also demonstrated maturity of some kind on my part.
• I did deliver some stuff, but I forget what it was. I don't remember when I did these things, like making improvements to my code.

Takeaway insights that I think happened this year

• When it comes to doing my own projects, getting started is still the hardest thing for me. I need to have some kind of liveliness coming from somewhere other than just myself all the time
• I am pretty adaptable and capable, and don't let things block me too long. I can usually reroute around anything.
• I still dislike anything that is uncertain or ambiguous, or doesn't speak directly and truly. However, I find myself being more resilient to it now.
• In construct theory, the idea of "magical adventure cats" became a helpful metaphor for understanding how to combine my inner meta weirdness with approachability by everyone without being "fake"
• The idea that "human emotions" is at the heart of everything I am interested in of a technical, organizational, and media nature. I engineer and design so the human emotional experience is meaningful and adaptable to people's actual needs where they stand right now, with an eye toward where they want to go
• Reinforcing thought: I love seeing people grow and overcome obstacles they faced with uncertainty before. This is Mom Sri's nurturing nature.

Things I did this year

• Various improvements to SriGarten and dsriseah.com web experience
• Word Counting Calendar and ETP Journal Renderer
• URSYS related library stuff understood
• The new graphics toolchain on Affinity etc works, whew
• I started to shift DS|CAFE more firmly toward being the humane supportive productive space I would want to be part of
• Restored ETP Stationery physical product chain
• Survived sudden loss of old car, and am super happy that new one worked out
• Interesting documentation on Master Vantage Points, new processes
• Made a new identity and business card foundation
• Oh, I turned the old wordpress static!!! that was a huge deal!!!
• Dipped toe into more leadership positions by starting various group initiatives on DS|CAFE

Summary of the Year (as I understand it right now)...hm...

• Part 1 - defined personal values in a way I can remember (Feb to May)
• Part 2 - consolidated identity and insights with communicating with people (May-June)
• Part 3 - closed three significant life chapters, and began strategic planning (July-August)
• Part 4 - tested self: can I simply use physical motion as way to resolve starting stuckness? (September)
• Part 5 - tested self: knowing I need to make things for strategy to work, building challenge (October-December)

Sriii — 12/17/25, 16:59 No movement on health care issue, but I have between 2 and 8 weeks to resolve something. Otherwise it will be a year without health coverage. First step is to get 2025 numbers in order so I have data to provide when I call for clarification. The Cat's diet is out of whack due to change in dinner. I've asked SisEtc if they were willing to do two nights of cooking per week, which they were amenable to. Last night's dinner though was very acidic tomato pasta and highly processed garlic knots out of a frozen box, which instantly nuked my digestive system. I also had some of their supermarket sandwich bread for lunch and the same thing happened. So, I have to be very protective of delicate Cat stomach! Feeling rather overwhelmed and demoralized with all the things I have to do, but I made an outline of how to run business activities. An overall idea might be coalescing, though, which might help simplify the big tangled balls of possibility into one sleeker ball that The Cat would find easy to tussle with and playfully bite until it produced revenue! One insight today is that daily production of something to share does seem to be important to me. It is not only satisfying, but it is an emotionally governing behavior. This is a new idea for The Cat!

Sriii — 12/17/25, 17:06 Next, sharing effectively chains from the daily production, because The Cat likes the feeling of sharing, also applying the gift mentality to her work. This is emotionally soothing and makes The Cat feel happy.

The sharing of daily nuts of progress is at the heart of The Cat's sense of feeling like a productive and industrial entity. And so, the revenue generating work in this category follow! The items in brackets are systems that have some implicit transactional value to others, which is The Cat's notion of business:

• [Blogging] through the [PKMS] system is the continuity stream that attracts eyeballs through mainstream SEO/Social Media channels, increasing reach and credibility so [Design Ideas] are findable.
• [Design Ideas] made available through the above are engagement portals that lead to either [form downloads] (a seed for future engagement), [information graphic design] for hire, or [stationery] for purchase. These ideas are what add to genuine reach and credibility, and a small subset of people will like them so much that they become associates or friends. LONGER TERM
• A new area is [Information System Visual Design] which is the particular niche that I would want to offer as a freelance software developer, relating to my interests. I have the architected back-end systems to draw from (e.g. [URSYS]), but what I lack is the [Front End UI] equivalent that demonstrates my core competency in [information design] that is on display in my forms and all documentation I produce.

The Cat has spent most of the day working on operational systems. I've identified

• the two immediate things to do
• reviewed my task systems
• come up with a new operational format to manage tasks in sprint-like time-boxed chunks
• come up with a name that works with the rest of my crazy cloud of Sri Tropes and System Concepts.

The new concept is renaming sprints as sorties, which are limited-context operational mission briefs. The brief is part of the strategic initiative plan, and the sorties are the series of actions taken to meet actualize the strategy into results. The sorties manifest as a sortie card which I am going to design; they work well with the idea of expeditions conducted by trusted pilot Sri!

Now that I think about it, there are multiple mission types associated with a strategic goal

• production - nuts and bolts making stuff
• survey - gathering information
• expeditions - exploration of a space, learning
• patrols - regular sweeps of a territory to monitor status
• parlay - negotiations with other people
• delivery - providing an asset
• procurement - retrieving an asset
• security - finances and adulting tasks
• facilities - home base, auto, and maintenance tasks

I do miss having people to soundboard with.

Sriii — 12/18/25, 00:51 The Cat has listened to maybe a couple hundred "compliance/architect/infrastruture revenge" stories on YouTube over the past month, and has developed a narrative sense of office dynamics, contract law, doing the work, and kindness in the face of corporate crisis! This has helped ground me in facing legal things that I would have scurried away from before or handwaved away. The vast bulk of the stories featured professional women in their 40s or 50s who worked thanklessly for their business services company, enjoying the responsibility and challenge of wrestling with complicated systems. Some younger person with entitlement and a disdain for the technology they are now overseeing then fires the woman, who is the person who holds their entire company together. It crashes, the entitled person is destroyed, and the woman starts her own consultancy doing things she's always done them, for an appreciative client or as a key licenser of core technology. I am feeling encouraged now to look into patent filing and forming an LLC to figure out how that could work for me 😄 What an odd revelation. The Universe tends to show The Cat funny things that end up introducing a new perspective on the world to her!!! I have two hundred character potraits in my head now merged together of steel-spined, principled, super-competent women engineers, architects, compliance officers, logistics, and steel plants on dirty power grids that don't get mad, but keep the receipts! heee heee heee! The Cat is pleased with this new archetype! I wonder if a construct could be born from it? I would have never been exposed to this with my upbringing on a seminary campus!

Sriii — 12/18/25, 02:12 The Cat has a new insight about joy: it comes from being Sri's cheerful, chatty self because it's her fundamental nature! The directive version: "Be cheerful chatty Sri and see what happens!" which has implicit connection to the idea of the Universe changing only if Sri makes the effort to release something into it. It's experimental! It's daring! This could be...Sri's actual embodiment strategy??? It's not a framework. It's just being? Mew?

Sriii — 12/18/25, 10:20 Previously, I was focused very intensely on finding a systems solution or set of causal triggers, rather than looking inside. “I will be happy if I do …” vs “I am happy when I am me, now that I am comfortable being a me’l

Sriii — 12/18/25, 10:52 Uh oh, the Epson 8550 printer is on sale for $150 off… Must resist…I am not ready yet to launch a printables store. I will only buy it when new revenue covers its cost

Sriii — 12/18/25, 12:42 I've announced to the private admin channel of the gamedev group that I'm "leaving the admin group to focus on my other online communities" but didn't go into more detail. We'll see how they react, if at all. The way that new meetings were established and the general lack of interaction from the other admins has reached the point that I no longer care.

Sriii — 12/19/25, 19:05 Minimally updated Shopify theme [Image]

Business cards arrived. Not happy with them, but they are serviceable [Image]

Sriii — 12/19/25, 19:12 ProtonMail configured and security sending/receiving domain stuff complete!

The Cat is also starting to evolve several old management systems into something that feels clean and romantic (in the golden age of aviation sense). My daily standups are kind of a narrative wrap around sprints and such, but in more Cat ways. Might be fun to develop into New Forms!

Sriii — 12/20/25, 18:33 Mew! I have made a dune awakening character that gives shy auntie vibes!

Sriii — 12/21/25, 10:40 The cat is thinking how my sister and many of her friends seem to value being with a person despite their shortcomings, and call this love. But there is little actual negotiation of what that means; the men have separate lives from the women and overlap only a little.

Sriii — 12/21/25, 13:43 The Cat finds it so weird that they do not want to reveal too much of themselves or share their thoughts with enthusiasm and empathic support, to make plans that consider both parties. Is just what neurotypical people expect and want from each other? Not seeking whole integration with individual brilliance sparkling and catalyzing each other? The Cat never really clicked with other romantic interests because of this ultimately. The Cat used to think this was a deficiency in her personality for not being accommodating of other people’s needs somehow, but in hindsight maybe it was for the best, hearing these stories from sister and noting how older married generations have this pattern. They mask with each other! As partners???

Sriii — 12/21/25, 13:52 The Cat is self-sparking and self-catalyzing now thanks to this year’s GHDR goal to choose values over productivity, because alignment leads to effectiveness…or so I surmised. The true evaluation of success will come should I successfully get sustaining revenue streams going.

Sriii — 12/21/25, 14:34 In general, the Cat distrusts people to really communicate because of justifiable concerns about being too vulnerable. Also, people who can not articulate their needs, goals, and desires as as part of seeking self improvement. And with that they lack or undervalue the presence of mind that sees other people’s needs, goals, and desires so they can create a mutually beneficial situation. Then they may lack the ability to remember and retain these understandings permanently for the duration of their commitment, week-by-week at minimum. The Cat wants those things, but also openly joyful conversations. Everyone wants that I think! But they don’t see the work that goes into it, I’m starting to realize.

Sriii — 12/21/25, 14:41 The Cat doesnt care what the goals, needs, desires actually are. They can be different than mine! They can be modest beginnings! They can be silly! Being scared or daunted is not shameful! But the presence of mind to LOOK, THINK, FEEL and articulate that without guile to another human is so fucking fundamental in The Cat’s Humanity. This is the minimum requirement for Cat Partnership of any kind. The Cat is The Cat because humanity experience thus far in her life has shown that these ideals are seen as foolish and overly demanding when it comes from a peer. Its ok to be selective in what one shares, of course. It’s respectful to not overshare or demand too much attention (The Cat when infodumping, for example, now held back with checks for interest) I suppose it’s also ok not to feel you have to take responsibility for other people’s feelings or try to fix them, but this is a gray area. Related is not to feel slighted when no one asks about one’s self or forgets to include. Being stuck with people lacking genuine mindful commitment to be good stewards of the ongoing relationahip is the wrinkle. I don’t have a solution for this.

(possible expansion of 90S theory)

Sriii — 12/22/25, 09:11 I awaken feeling very cat embodied. Picking the parameters of Sri-ness to manifest today.

Sriii — 12/23/25, 12:40 MEW! Thoughts on Creativity! Comments welcome should they burble up!

• I've been continually cheered and impressed by Mroo energy and drive, particular in all the areas of media exploration and creativity, but also professional balance and self care.
• Empirically, Mroo has alluded to creativity, passion, and pushing into daring in the same breath, and that's an interesting contrast to my own energy and drive. While I wish it was joyful, passionate, and creative, it doesn't come to me naturally. I think this is because I'm driven by something else that didn't have a name until recently: all the animals are friends! The Cat (magical adventure cat) is the first successful INDULGENT SELF EXPRESSION of this!
• Theory: My creativity is perhaps a bridge building desire, not a personal expression skill! My expression, perhaps, could be described as the desire to help see other people shine brightly. My light doesn't come out at all without it. I know that I am motivated when I can imagine me and others enjoying the fruits of our labor. There are two stories from my youth that are formative or reflecting on my nature: (1) And Then a Harvest Feast about a collective of animals that leave the city and learn how to grow their own food despite their bickering, and of course (2) The Little Red Hen being the justice version of that. Also, The Cat does seem to love her revenge stories about Villainesses Rebuilding Society while swatting down mean people and finding a loving competent partner, and the more recent Silent Workplace Competence Destroys Tech Bro/Influencer Executives Simply By Not Being There to Clean Up Their Messes.
• Corollary: Professionally, this expresses as (again recently identified) human-centered problem solving where I holistically address both "technical" and "emotional" solutions as one. The emphasis, though, is on humans, because it's humans doing the work and having to deal with it, and ideally it should be stress-free and tuned to their sense of fulfillment and happiness because all the animals are friends. This is not a common emphasis at all; there's a tendency in technology and process to see humans as system components for the illusion of ease in problem solving.

I've known the community angle for a looong time, so that's not new at all. It dates back to at least 2000 as I started to see my patterns. But I have a hunch that shifting my notion of creativity as a bridge building desire might give me a new row to hoe as far as finding my "creative spark" in the absence of having actual people in the room with me, like it was in computer club in high school and (sigh) art school, and to some extent in our game startup.

Sriii — 12/23/25, 13:00 The Cat has made a ton of stuff this year, actually. It just doesn't feel particularly joyful. It feels like endless infrastructure building and preparation. But for what? I think I might be taking the long way when maybe there's a shorter way, but The Cat leaps very carefully. The Cat doesn't like risk at all, as evidenced by her anxieties about traveling anywhere new. Perhaps The Cat has traded Joy for Security. That sounds very human. The Cat doesn't like it (not being human, in her own head canon) but admits that it appeals to sense of safety. A lot of internal shifting is happening today.

So let's do a thing. That always helps. It doesn't even matter what the thing is. My future is shaped emergently and experimentally, and perhaps THAT is the joy I readily embrace. And it is the bridge to new experiences. Other people who naturally have their own definition of joy, duh. bonks cat affectionately on fuzzy head for being silly

Sriii — 12/23/25, 15:32 The cat is totally dragging today. I'm making some software refactoring improvments but I'm totally crutching on AI to handle the annoying typescript details.

Sriii — 12/24/25, 09:04 The Cat maybe also needs to have her own way to define joy. It could just express differently than media suggests. Yesterday my neighbor texted me to say that she had made treats and wanted to bring them by, and I said she could meet my sister. So when she came I was Sri Enthusiastic for the first time with sister in the house, like Sri at the Farmers Market, exuding warmth and excitable appreciation and bustling to give her some treats in return. She also tried some soup I was making. A whirlwind visit. It only struck me afterwards that my behavior was quite a shift from how I’d been with sister herself in unfettered enthusiasm of this kind. I had been subconsciously holding myself back, trying not to spook her, while processing her impact on my life and whether she was going to thankful or considerate at all about it.

Sriii — 12/24/25, 09:15 With neighbor we have a food exchange, high level and thoughtful from time to time! It’s an ongoing connection we both work at. Sis doesn’t have anything like that with me except sharing links of cats and recipes. This is not sufficient to trigger Sri Joy threshold. Making and exchanging small gifts that express one’s own interests to develop a connection is the threshold. This brings me a feeling of joy.

perhaps my joy is meaningful exchange between people as partnership and friendship It would be a much simpler values-based metric to pursue, generatating emergent opportunity that leads to Meadow then Colony.

Much better for The Cat’s natural rhythm. I can’t think of a fault behind generating opportunities for genuine exchange between people. It’s similar to the intent of networking but not so talky-lame with unproven capability. The strategy of blogging as a gift plays into that. It seems like a superior networking strategy. I am feeling pretty certain that this is what my “joy and passion” is, especially when operating as The Cat. It’s quiet, observant, and oracular! It readily gives and responds to warmth, drawing from its vast reservoir of affordable giveaways. Like being a magic bird that sheds its feathers occasionally and gives them away to people who find them incredibly valuable, but are just easy gifts for the bird. It required little effort!

Sriii — 12/24/25, 09:29 I do like the implied lore update that magical adventure cats have feathers :murr: The tail has a tuft of cat feathers that are useful for guiding a leap! mew! this is great! So now I’m expecting joy that feels like what media describes: elation, excitement, expression! From the idea of being magical adventure cat with feathers. What is this joy? Mental embodiment of a willfully fantastical belief that is steeped in fundamental emotional truths?

Sriii — 12/24/25, 09:39 Identifying and creating Mythic Systems that incorporate whimsy, truth, narrative, experimention in service of personal adventure leading to growth. And then finding Meadow and Colony, which are places founded on mythic systems themselves and made task by participants engaging in gift culture protocol.

Sriii — 12/24/25, 09:46 The key idea of a “mythic system” is that it eschews quantitative observation as the sole and primary foundation for understanding the world. My systems adds the human psychology element, and the magical adventure cat puts its paw heavily on the scales to tilt the outcome toward creating virtuous circles of small acts that compound into quiet everyday joyfulness.

The Meadow and the Colony are what accrues organically, where one can discover their personal myth That sounds familiar…checking the internet Hoo, a rich trove of Sri-aligned themes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_mythology

Sriii — 12/24/25, 09:56 The wiki refers to a subfield of psychology called “personal construct theory” that I skimmed, but it’s described as subconscious (not for me it is) The Cat likes any concrete field of practice that leads with psychology and succeeds due to meaningful work done by empowered, engaged people.

Sriii — 12/24/25, 10:09 Anyway, I’ll have to do some digging of existing terminology as I sharpen the definition for what I’m talking about.

Sriii — 12/24/25, 11:05 Ughh, denied feeling of joy has struck with sudden brutal gender dysphoria. It has been a while, perhaps buffered by being The Cat, but this has emerged. Maybe left out by joy analysis, the subconscious has emerged. Gender euphoria needs to be back in the table. Intellectual I had accepted lack of physical transition being necessary reality, but the heart is screaming bloody murder.

Sriii — 12/24/25, 11:15 This is “I don’t want to exist” levels of feeling. It’s still there. Primal. But also difficult to realize fully without turning back time and having hundreds of thousands of dollars. I will need to find a way to meet this need. It’s possibly a TGHF mood event that will fade but the emotional truth is persistent. I despair being in this form, but it is the form I was given. This is a physical truth that I can’t wish away or refuse to see. It’s constantly reinforced with every social interaction and facial cue I experience.

Sriii — 12/25/25, 15:39 The Cat is realizing she is quite judgmental of people sometimes but isn’t sure what it is that’s the cause Adding direct expression of judging is forbidden in 90S protocol (which is used in expectations of peer-level communication) The Cat would rather just address it directly and is happy to change up accommodate needs given tangible expanples and guidelines. I’m realizing that SisBF is perhaps innately a slow thinker, not purposefully lazy. Difficult pickle to juggle.

Sriii — 12/27/25, 11:35 I watched most of a video on how manga got established in America, which is only the second industry that I am familiar with from late adolescence to maybe my 30s. https://youtu.be/W51QlQVWqwQ

matttt - comic & manga history How manga broke the US comic industry

It’s interesting because of the memories of being a comics consumer, but it’s even more useful for driving home the realities of business changes as the consumer market shifts enormously from one thing to another due to butterfly effects shifting the taste of entire masses of people through the reach of mass media. unique personal voices and hard work build the foundation of that change by taking bets the the market has unmet needs, and then navigating success through measured risks. And preventing hubris from setting in, and not assuming that anything lasts for more than 5-7 years before it collapses from fatigue and too many players and generational shifts in attitude. All very helpful for contemplating business leap off the moment.

Sriii — 12/27/25, 11:43 The people in the video are older than me, and I hear the weariness in their voices as they recount their journey with some incredulity at their brazenness and also how much luck was in their side are key moments, until the luck ran out while they had convinced themselves they had cracked the formula for success. The Cat thinks that planning for permanence is comforting and looks justified for a period of time, but getting too comfortable creates false confidence. Nothing is stable except maybe hard currency and real estate. I’m starting to understand the why behind “old money” I’ve read about.

Sriii — 12/27/25, 11:51 The push to generate new business revenue not only has to work in the short term, but think also in terms of creating more lasting foundations that retain their intellectual property value and association with me as the source, rather than chasing trends. A humbling, good thought is that there is no one smart enough to predict the whims of the future. So I don’t need to prove myself to the universe. I just can observe and position in accordance to its cyclical whims. My intelligence has always been shifted toward adaptability and being about to make a good enough decision, and I had thought this a weakness since “leaders know what their doing”, but I think I have found another way to be the cautious scout establishing specialized base camp services.

Sriii — 12/27/25, 11:59 This relates to earlier thoughts about not wanting to be trapped or stay in one place becoming too comfortable. There is no redundancy or durable assets that I placed ahead of time! Thinking I know what I’m doing is foolish, but thinking that following a method without changing for more than 5 years without putting down other seeds is also foolish. There is a long term nurturing kind of leadership that does make durable, long lived companies because they are doing what I’m just beginning to realize. Working under such leadership is a good move. Identifying companies with this leadership and succession planning across all executive levels id the treasure hunt. Aspiring to build such leadership is the aspirational daring goal.

Sriii — 12/28/25, 09:36 The Cat came across this link in bsky follow back accounts (slowly growing in size while retaining quality of people) that tell three stories about how its uselessness dominates the world by size. It's an interesting comparison with the more humble "how manga got starts in America" story of success from yesterday, and it is nice to have a datapoint that affirms what I thought finance was (a betting industry that produces no material value)

London Review of Books

John Lanchester · For Every Winner a Loser: What is finance for? In our society the classic three ways of making a fortune still apply: inherit it, marry it, or steal it. But for an... https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n17/john-lanchester/for-every-winner-a-loser

Particularly interesting is the story about the guy who started Renaissance, a company I had seen mentioned somewhere and found intriguing. How the founder of this company was genuinely smart and a good person, and how his successors turned that goodness into badness. It's a nice piece of writing also, thought the Cat! The effect these two pieces have on the Cat, as they contemplate their uncertain financial journey for the next year, is on how one manages themselves and manages other people, in particularly recognizing the good geniuses who are capable of and extremely focused on creating wealth from production of goods that genuinely add to the pile of useful, humane, and beautiful/aesthetic things. The Cat feels they have a slightly better feel for the type of person that is and how to recognize them, and also how to recognize the bullshit spewers: If they can not tie their activities to one thing that is MADE where it's their skill or expertise leads to this (e.g. even creating more capable humans through training, not more financial analysts) then that's a point in their favor in The Cat's Eye.

(gasp, The Cat's Eye! Like a nicer Eye of Sauron!)

Sriii — 12/28/25, 09:51 (I'm trying a different kind of writing style in Sriii Channel, to be more deliberate and draw more obvious conclusions between points even when the connection may be obvious. Was thinking that by doing such, I'm not insulting readers intelligence, but am instead making my connection explicit so they don't have to wonder what I'm thinking. This is a major shift...previously, I would worry about overexplaining. By shifting the metric to clarity from A to B to C I eliminate the worry by turning it into a practice. The trigger for making this change is both the article I linked above, and also the Dragon's review of their gym clothes situation reminding me that Dragons are generally clear in their writing) (At times it is fun and cathartic to be the super excitable Cat that leaps around and explains nothing which is part of the Magical Adventure Cat charm being weird and unpredictable and largely unfathomable but also undeniably cute because cats are magic and love) (and also bitey assholes sometimes, but you know..."because cats are cats". Heh heh heh.) (MEW!)

Sriii — 12/28/25, 12:58 Business thought: my products must be hard to cheaply digitize and knock off. Planner PDFs are poor products in themselves! The PDF downloads market today is very crowded. Writing a book would be the differentiating factor, though AI slop can rip that off now too.

Sriii — 12/29/25, 10:25 I was reading about Comiket and Comitia, two doushin (fan created works) conventions in Japan. Comiket is the biggest, and there was a split between the founders with one focusing on a convention for only original works. I was curious about the difference in attendance numbers; best estimate is about 300K to 30K (about 10%) This got me thinking about what percentage of people were consumers versus creators, which is a common disconnect I have with people, though I know from extensive logging that I have relatively low creator time vs mindless consumption. Anyway, roughly 1 in 10 people is a number that pops up a lot. It mirrors the 90S made-up figure, interestingly. Ramifications are that roughly 1 in 10 people I meet at random will have a creator mindset: learning and doing and expressing original thoughts as their mode of existence. Knowing this will help me temper disappointment I feel interacting with random people even at interest-based gatherings. 90% of the attendees will be interested in derivative works or consuming the interest rather than wanting to contribute to it. This suggests a strategy is to find interest-driven groups that are creating original works with an eye toward reaching a high standard of human to human connection. A population of such a group, I theorize, would have a higher percentage of Sri-kin compatible people.

Sriii — 12/29/25, 13:08 The Cat is still trying to resolve issues with health care. I tried calling the state office that handles medicaid, but got redirected to a dead line. None of the links to regional offices go anywhere but dead links. However, The Cat is learning some resiliance from this. The world is full of messed up process and rather than get stressed and upset about it, I can just take the time to learn how to navigate it like everyone else; it's not a deficiency on my part. It is just large and confusing, and all organizations suffer from this. This is a way for me to take things less personally and relax a little. There is still very strong anxiety embedded in the experience, but I don't want to let that control me. I am an adaptable magical adventure cat, and that means getting into the mud and sifting through it until I find what I need. Deep breaths.

Sriii — 12/29/25, 13:15 The Cat has to manage feelings of uncertainty and insecurity about the future and still function despite the enormous anxiety.

Sriii — 12/29/25, 14:08 I'm feeling quite squished. I managed to close the health plan and waited for an hour to talk to a representative and I should be set with health care moving forward on the plan I picked through the Marketplace. So that is a huge relief. One pending flag is receiving the letter of non-coverage by the state. Now I can breathe again.

Sriii — 12/29/25, 15:17 The Cat is reviewing printer purchases for selling packs of custom stationery and selling through shopify and pirate ship, possibly investigating shipping daddy for 3PL then dropping the Amazon Marketplace as it offers no benefit anymore for discoverability due to the planner market racing to the lowest price. Was previously considering the Epson 8550 wide format printer, but it uses a mix of dye and pigment inks ($800). The more expensive pro version is the 16650 ($1200) which uses 4 color pigment inks and has higher throughout. Color isn’t as nice as photo printer but my design work doesn’t need that. As The Cat noted recently, she loves the printing process but forgot this because of digital things being more bankable. Making this one pillar of 2026 might be a good move across multiple dimensions in personal satisfaction, business development, and business opportunities.

At two cents per color page, a 50 sheet pad would be a dollar. Cost of cardboard and shrink wrap would be more, especially if I need to pad them myself. Now that I think of it, short run pads would be better to do through Papergraphics. Padding press from CFS Products impress me the most. 150 or so, plus some one-time tool purchases for about 150 and then supplies. Double wire loop punch and bind manual systems are around 300-500, and the wires are a buck or less. Automatic paper counters are quite expensive, so I’d use the PDF page count itself to produce the stacks of pages separated by chipboard. It takes an hour for padding compound to dry, so the batch size is constrained by the number of pads that can stack in the press.

The printer can do approx 25ppm in color, so printing a notebook of 92 double-sided pages is 8 minutes (92/12) minutes. I can print 7 notebooks in an hour. The rough cost of goods is 5 cents total for printed sheets, then a dollar for chipboard. About 5 bucks cost of goods to produce.

if I sold the notebook for 25 dollars, the total net profit for 7 notebooks printed in an hour is 175-35 dollars or 140. However, this is not an hourly wage because each notebook requires packaging and fulfillment. shipping 7 packages requires 10 minutes of order reconciliation per item, and includes shipping label prep plus packaging. That’s another hour or two, followed by the time just shlepping packages to post office if they don’t just pick up. So the worst case hourly rate is more like 20-30 bucks an hour 😐 Id probably batch production more efficiently though. Build up sample products, no more than 10-20, for test selling on website.

If demand is there, then that’s when I outsource production and use 3PL. Shopify can handle both situations. my numbers are missing several things but it’s did food for thought. I have all the pieces of a viable business, from audience and market engagement to design and production. Order Fulfillment is the last wrinkle and the most annoying. First, start with digital. Low capital cost up front, builds engagement Printing can wait for when that part is developed. Still need Shopify for digital sales and potentially sales tax filing.

Sriii — 12/30/25, 11:45 Ok, I am feeling today I am back and am ready to invest in planning. One major issue is managing mail and mail filing in a way that is non-annoying and not just shoving them into a box. Another is the number of projects on the Activity Bingo Board and the subprojects, as well as managing "projects of opportunity" Another is creating a blogging structure that is more relaxed but similar to the 30-day build challenge. Monday posts (written Sunday) and Thursday Posts (written Wednesday), then maybe a Saturday Post (written Friday) that is a "fun topic".

Sriii — 12/30/25, 12:26 The Cat has taken a bold leadership step to offer 2026 moderated future planning sessions in DSCAFE!

Sriii — 12/31/25, 10:34 It’s The Cat’s Birthday! It’s delightful to write that statement instead of “It’s my birthday”, which I find very interesting. Perhaps The Cat and I are a kind of “royal we” :murr: I do so love the Cat. A proxy for loving myself? A tongue in cheek wink toward myself?

Sriii — 1/2/26, 16:15 The Cat is embarrassed to say that she's played 200 hours of Dune Awakening between Thanksgiving and today 😮 It's starting to get into the dragging part now, the grind to the second to last tier of materials, so the maintenance and logistics load is considerably higher. But that said, it was a good game experience and I can just check in once every two weeks to maintain my base. There is one last base I'd like to build, so the goal this weekend is to dismantle my existing two bases and start the third which will replace them. I have a design style now for bases that I'm looking forward to implementing!

Sriii — 1/2/26, 19:58 I tried rolling up all my underwear and it’s pleasant. I need more pretty underwear! I could use a larger genuine dresser drawer and fit all my regular clothes in it. Right now there is some shirt overflow

Sriii — 1/3/26, 10:48 The Cat came across a quote about competing differences between east and west

"The American approach is like, I'm a genius, I'm going to win the Nobel prize; I'll invent something and beat everyone to it," Lee said. "The Chinese approach is We're all good students; we're not geniuses; we're going to do our homework together."

I like the leadership framing of the latter approach, “we’re all good students and do homework together” rather than try to be the smartest person in the room. This gives me a much needed model for gathering people together in language and tone, and it is also compatible with the “all the animals are friends” vibe in the “ok let’s work!” sense Bring a good student working with others has never been something I experienced. What was accessible to me was developing cleverness and depth of knowledge by myself The social aspect is a major shift in practice, having worked solo for so long

Sriii — 1/4/26, 14:48 Hung the artwork! Now to do the timeblocked dent, which admittedly I am procrastinating on. The Cat though listened to a delightful recap of a reincarnated woman who starts a "book cafe" for herself, and has been granted high level magic so she can keep the books from getting dirty so you can read and eat at the same time! But then GASP the captain of the knights is a handsome brooding man who stumbles upon the book cafe and ALSO loves to read, and they start to hang out and GASP they fall slowly in love. When they are not saving the kingdom from threats with high level barrier magic or defending against monsters, they go on dates to the book fair and buy bags of books to read 😄 ALSO, The Cat was delighted by this video on the history of the TR909 drum machine, which was only in production for three years in the 1980s, but became (along with others) an iconic sound from the 90s and 2000s club scenes. But what caught The Cat's attention was the video production itself having a "thanking Patreon supporters" jam at the end! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06HcP6FnPZw&t=1576s Each Patron seems to get a graffiti-tag like treatment as they pop up synchronized to the jam, which is also fun to watch. The entire video itself impressed me with its clarity, wry amusement, and callout of technical notes of interest across voice and graphic overlays. The Cat was very inspired and impressed...meticulously crafted video ❤️ I would like to make a cool graffiti tag-style version of my name! They aren't really graffiti tags, on second look, but they are fun stylized letterings that turn the letters of the names into logomarks guided by the same aesthetic. It's super cool and still feels very funktional

Sriii — 1/5/26, 01:01 The Cat cleared out several boxes and consolidated things. Also found the missing Pantone Guides misfiled in a random box, probably when moving office from living room to basement!

Sriii — 1/5/26, 11:29 The Cat is having a tough time focusing, but has tidied office a bit and found new homes/containers for things. I feel like I need a paper continuity journal again.

Sriii — 1/5/26, 12:00 Finally! So many little things to nudge into space to get this written!

Sriii — 1/5/26, 12:16 I think the work I've been doing not being a judgmental cat is starting to be integrated? Still figuring out the boundaries of putting up with incompetent, thoughtless people (maybe this is just a preference and I route around them?), people who I think are slow (this is intellectual self-centeredness, methinks, and not kind, and I have been trying to reframe and reroute this into more patience). Along with this is the idea of being in a default "kindness" mindframe as a baseline emotional stance. Rather than anxiety triggers forcing me into the FIGHT/FLIGHT mode reaction, kindness to myself and broad perspective that the massive flow of time is LARGELY resilient, and this resilience can be grown through the connections one makes through kindness. Also, the small household improvements are having a noticeable lift on emotion, and maybe my sister likes it too. She seems to be comfortable now, and I think I've figured out an approach to tell her things without her guard coming up or anxiety triggering in her. Likewise with her boyfriend, who...I struggle to find a kind way to put it. He means well, but may not be as proactive as I'd want him to be as part of my household due to his anxieties. I asked my sister if I scared Robert and she said immediately YES! I said that's not good, I wondered what I could do to help that. Sis actually seems to like it a bit, because Robert doesn't otherwise act. But he's very sensitive too, I am finally realizing. I think that by comparison, I've seen my anxieties and weaknesses as aspects of myself that if I really spent time with, then understanding would lead to mitigations. Not being cowed by my ignorance and fear tends to point in the direction of improvements to make, though I don't always have the courage to follow through. Finding alternative longer paths is, for me, an acceptable deal. This might be more unusual than I think in people.

Sriii — 1/6/26, 17:05 The Cat thinks maybe I should stop being so worried about not being productive or efficient (still a problem even though by now you'd think I'd know better) and just worry at little threads into one pulls out into a long beautiful silken robe through magical means. I worry too much about finishing things, and that's the exact wrong attitude to have when you need to start them. At the moment I am experiencing great resistance to writing my ten sentence blog post. This isn't me worrying about productivity is it? Maybe a little. I just want it out of the way. It is a chore. It is not something that is coming out naturally as a joyful expression because yes, I am worried about QUALITY now. And the uncertainty of that is creating a larger barrier. worry about finishing before I start and worrying about its quality are classic procrastintation triggers. This is what The Cat's patent-pending blend of bonking things and being emergent and noisy seems to counteract. HONK WE ARE EXPERIMENTING so there is no finish! HONK WE ARE MAKING A MUD HOUSE OUT OF STICKS because we know that we can fix it later and it'll be easier to start with sticks! The Cat knows that once these things just start to move, she can trust that her analytical brain will figure out the optimal sequencing thanks to years of compulsive training to do so. Except, of course, The Cat constantly forgets this.

Sriii — 1/7/26, 19:21 The Cat has exhaustively redone the entire DS|CAFE onboarding/opt-in system. Six hours of twiddling permissions and rewriting content, plus writing the add-on questions and the answers. Now that it's done, I feel that DS|CAFE will be more frictionless for new members. I had been putting it off for YEARS, which I don't think was really wasted. It took an actual bug with using the Discord navigation to tip me over to fixing it (the conflict between using the Browse Channels and the channel bot fighting each other) I'm saving five dollars a month now too by eliminating the CarlBot 🙂 I also noted that I have a pretty clear idea of what I want to encourage now on DS|CAFE, and this affected the onboarding. A nice alignment with The Cat's current value expression goals!!! The Cat also thinks she may have done an exemplary job of handling the entire server reorg, but is too embarrassed to think so. GATHERING COURAGE...I did this well. This is a huge chunk of integrated communications, knowledge management, information design, and light technical configuration aligned with a strong theory of community. That I could do it by myself is gratifying, and at the same time a bit isolating. I wish there were others I knew who liked doing this kind of thing.

Sriii — 1/7/26, 22:05 Doing these biggish lifts always feels anticlimactic. I guess part of me still feels like everything I do is a possibility for redemption? recognition? something? When it really isn't going to come from anywhere. Is why I like to spread genuine compliments as much as possible, noting when someone does something I recognize as hard work. Maybe it just makes people uncomfortable though.

Sriii — 1/8/26, 10:10 The Cat woke up early, but frittered it away listening to stories. Did knock some small things off the task list. insight: after doing the huge server reorg last night, it clicked that doing this Big Huge Tasks often feel daunting but actually resolve themselves. Sure, there are inconveniences and uncertainty whether anything will break, but The Cat has enough mental juice to push through a lot of things even if it takes days or weeks. I've had enough life experience with projects to know this, but lacked the instinct to develop confidence from this. Instead, I felt slightly less anxiety. I can embrace now that I can "work at the edge of my ability" and have a story for that (writing GEMSTEP parser and execution engine).

Sriii — 1/9/26, 00:09 GASP RC SAYS MY APPLICATION LOOKS PROMISING AND I CAN SCHEDULE A ZOOM??? I was going to relax for a week and not worry eep aaaa

Sriii — 1/9/26, 11:46 YEEEP I NEED TO SCHEDULE AND RESPOND I thought I had tiiiiiiime AAAA I SCHEDULED IT ON MONDAY at 1000! I NEED BETTER LIGHTING!!! I HAVE TO CLEAN MY ROOM!!! DO I WEAR A HAT OR NOT??? They also took care to ask questions in the email about how I preferred to be addressed, also the R&D projects being ok if they are programming, and what happens if I had to leave for Taiwan for a family emergency.

Sriii — 1/9/26, 12:11 I'm looking at the pairing tasks and am like eep these are not trivial. I am drawn to the parsing ones because it's the scariest! Recurse Center

What even IS a symbolic differentiator??? Looking it up. Oh crap, that sounds completely foreign. I am compulsively thinking of pre-emptively writing skeletons for each one of these. Or at least some notes.

Sriii — 1/9/26, 12:37 I am an excitable cat that wants to wear her emotions on her fuzzy exterior, and while that used to be embarassing I rather like it. The other archetype I like is the calm and collected heroine from modern times reborn into the character of a villianess in a novel, and she transforms society with her cunning understanding of society, impeccable etiquette, and business accumen, all the while attracting competent and attract men that she puts to work making the society better!

There is a story where the returning heroine finds a bracelet that turns her into a cat and she charms the sullen prince (who is buried in adminstrative work) by accident because she had heard (not knowing about the world) that humans aren't welcome in the land of the dragon people. But dragons love small fuzzy creatures, which usually run away in terror from them due to their immense aura! But the heroine doesn't, and so far stays in cat form and the dragon people pet and adore her ❤️ Of course she is ridiculously beloved by the fairies in the world and they form a dense cloud around her. Humans can't normally see them unlike her, but the beast people and dragon people can! OH AND THE DRESSES :murr: sighs dreamily

Sriii — 1/9/26, 13:26 The Cat actually vomitted and everyone heard. Sis commented that I seemed especially barfy today (the mornings I have been feeling kind of gross)

Sriii — 1/9/26, 14:57 The Basement Sort is going rather well. I have been sorting various crates into their constituent subclasses, and found a number of things I had been wondering about or forgotten!

This is a continuation of "the hard things aren't so hard really, if one pushes through the part where you think you should already know how to do it and just start moving things, aka the Cat in Motion Kata, aka Trusting Cat Senses and Auto-Organization, and purposefully not worry about when it's going to be done because that is unknowable and only idiot managers demand such things before the work can be characterized.

Sriii — 1/9/26, 23:25 Thinking of doing the space invaders task by looking at the original 8080 code and hardware spec. Was more sophisticated than I thought, though early limitations were still apparent! Representing state for real-time stuff is the appeal And creating a spec to describe the game might be interesting!

Sriii — 1/10/26, 03:25 It's late, but The Cat has done several things today

• wrote blog post draft
• fixed onboarding AGAIN for the Discord (the design does not telegraph its intent or how its page logic works)
• rewrote blog post to focus JUST on the onboarding, fulfilling Friday obligation
• forgot to do hormone patches noooo greeeassy
• set up a really tidy streaming setup with dual cameras, dual key lights, dedicated shotgun mic, streamdeck control of obs...with SECONDARY stock that wasn't currently being used. It's pretty comparable to my downstairs setup, though not quite as nice.

Tomorrow I'll pick a task from the RC list in case I get through the pair programming test. Probably Space Invaders...can be experimental with it.

Sriii — 1/10/26, 09:33 I woke up this morning feeling gross and slimy, and realized I hadn’t done hormone patches still!!! Ewww! The testosterone levels have been rising for days!!! This is the ick!!! So I’m patched back up to version Sri and hopefully things will stabilize.

Sriii — 1/11/26, 21:30 Mew interview tomorrow at 10AM Coincidentally, tomorrow is also my HRTVersary when I first started taking estrogen.

Sriii — 1/11/26, 23:14 The Cat is printing out materials for interview. Just the copy of what I actually wrote to apply. I'm also making sure that my code sample actually builds :eep: yay it works. But what about the derivatives?

Sriii — Yesterday at 00:02 Mew I’ve forgotten how to operate a lot of my code. Doing a quick review of ursys and its derivatives, and also pdfgen and srigarten. I feel my code is jumbled and needs a lot of TLC to be really useful to others (and myself) It’s going to be a battle!!! Looking at all my old code repos and feeling glum.

Sriii — Yesterday at 06:50 Visceral fat responds to motion and exercise, which aligns well with the Cat in Motion! Perhaps targeting Sexy Strong Magical Adventure Cat Science Witch is a more compelling goal to embrace rather than hiding behind blandishments like, “losing weight is good for metabolic health” So, that suggests looking at the transfemme exercises! While I tend to see myself as a potato cat, a cat in motion would be a form of training. Also, exercise might help me embody physically more by perceiving sensation in muscles and joints as pleasurable feedback instead of signal of discomfort to avoid. Sriii — Yesterday at 06:58 Seeking muscle discomfort when carefully leaning into difficult motions has helped core I think. It’s something easy for me to remember to do when getting out of a low sitting posture. Expanding the situations I feel this would be an easy extension. Better than following mindless repetitions and sets! turning potato cat’s current mechanical disadvantages into advantages! sleek! hawt! I am a little older than my mom’s age when she passed away from kidney failure, and it concerns me. Also I am trying to imagine my mom wanting to express as a magical cat, or anyone at that age. The Cat is quite old now.

Sriii — Yesterday at 07:10 This would require quite a dedication to the gym, an inversion of Cat priorities. I could see having “brain days” and “body days”. I overwork my brain as it is. Sriii — Yesterday at 08:54 Mew I want to be the kind of cat that people want to scoop up physically! i think I’m definitely at peak TGHF time, feeling frisky and hungry, but unable to actually be so because body is alllll wrong shaped… But am still enjoying the feeling, oddly. Eep interview in hour! Have to physically become presentable! Aaaa what to wear???

Sriii — Yesterday at 10:33 Mew it's over! I feel that I rambled too much and maybe wasn't as concrete as I could have been? The interviewer seemed antsy? I already forgot her name. Maybe because she was mindful of the clock and wanted to make sure that she could answer any questions I had. Mew stomach hurts It felt like a casual interview that sought simpler answers than the complex context I have around programming itself. In hindsight that's my feeling. Interviewer was an alum that just finished her second batch, after doing one 10 years ago! mew maybe it was my intensity...I forgot to 90S it But I also think if I can't be somewhat intense, then RC wouldn't be for me either. I think I was at least authentically me, and reasonably coherent. And I guess I wait and see. Mew need to nap!

Sriii — Yesterday at 13:10 Mew I need to relax. Maybe I will work on one of my code libraries, or start a writing project. Or measure artwork for the walls. I'll do that.

Sriii — 09:02 Mew planning day!!!

Sriii — 11:39 Mew, rejected by RC 🙁 I got the feeling that Anjana wasn’t vibing with what I was saying, as I talked less about programming itself as an activity and more of the humanistic and community aspects. I also said I was a reluctant programmer that preferred to see programming as a medium to express ideas. The Cat is crushed, but this does clarify the path forward is going to be independent.

Also thinking based on the interview experience yesterday, and with extended visit by sister's entourage, that I do need to construct an intermediary that is 90S and is pre-programmed to slot neatly into neurotypical expression of interest. This feels inauthentic to me, but it is needed for fruitful interfacing with people that are not 100% on my wavelength. I'm reminded of a movie I saw as a kid called Breaking Away where there is this teen who looks up to the Italian bicycle racing team and idolizes them, but becomes disillusioned with them but uses this heartbreak to form their own hometown team in Indiana that wins a race.

I didn't think I would be so sad, but I am lightly crying. Missed opportunity due to slipped words. I get that they need to optimize for high energy, so perhaps I didn't convey that. If anything, I guess it gives me an opportunity to write about my programming philosophy. Perhaps another opportunity to apply to RC will come up in the future; this may not have been the right time. I am under a lot of entrpreneurial stress.

I was most looking forward to hopefully making new friends that liked things with passion as I did, expressing their longings through programming. This is what feels the most devastating. I can't let the feeling lead to negativity toward RC or even the interviewer's style, or build the dark inner voice that says you are too meta for people to understand or like. But I think this is, to an extent, true. And rejection, whether I like it or not, is a growth moment. Rejection happens every day. I can't let it destroy my sense of hope. It is definitely dinged a bit. But I think I will lie down for a bit.

I did take out the recycling, getting a new landfill permit for the car at the same time. On the way home, I stopped by Home Depot to get more color swatches, and also got a flat toolbox to replace my overloaded plastic bin for household tools. I also splurged on Philips Hue lighting for the two lamps in the bedroom, thinking it would be good for not only streaming, but dialing in the exact color temperature I want. (then I got home and saw the RC application rejection) The primary draw of RC was the idea of the community and sharing what we were learning, in a medium that I understood already (programming). The interviewer had actually suggested there were other programs. I don't think this is too unreasonable to ask for, so I sent a request only for that information while thanking Anja for her time.

Sriii — 12:59 Feeling less crushed. Little Sri was really hurting, but she is a dreamer that doesnt realize that people don’t connect through her desire to love people where they are at and as they are. Big Sri was hurt too, and still has that core dreamy ideal that if she is truthful, people will understand her heart. Nope! That’s like mind reading! Both Sris have to let go of the idea that editing for an audience is bad.

Sri did not want to game the interview by being strategic in answering. Sri was fully present and spoke what was on her mind. Sri expected that followup questions would happen for clarification, but this didn’t happen. Sri let her dream show more than her commitment. In 3 months I can apply again, and sharply narrow my interview focus. That is the Summer Batch starting May 18.

This is assuming that I will still want to go. The shine is off the rose; RC is an organization of people and communication is hard. A good kick in the pants to develop a V2 of the Sri public construct. I feel a faint shadow emotion of, “well screw them” but this is not the attitude I want. I’ve been processing so many negative feelings in people relations recently (with nice people, even) without a clear target deserving of retribution. The destructive energy gets channeled into the self, or by othering all of humanity as hu-mans.

I think I can remember to love and trust myself as I am. And I can still make allowances for RC, my lack of experience with their filters, and pressures unknown to me that they have to deal with. In a healthy relationship, there is opportunity to reconnect again. I have three months to address these negative forces that drive wedges between myself and other. Emotionally rather drained today. Feel strong need to lie down! I installed the new lighting also.

Thinking that embodiment takes a different form now. To live in this world it is necessary to have a social construct with clearly defined and labeled portals. This is for efficient interaction with other constructs. Few people have the time or interest in researching every new situation they come across. It’s the norm. While I personally may feel dissatisfaction with this reality, it is a also a fact of this reality. Obsession is the exception that changes things, and this is relatively rare.

I may have learned to systemize my passions in such a way they appear either scattered or actually dispassionate to others. I’ve learned to direct my focus to a subset of skills and interests for intense execution for a period of time. I didn’t convey this was the idea for RC.

The Cat is an amazing catch, but this isn’t readily apparent to people who are not attuned to whatever it is that she is. I think what people mostly pick up on is the buoyant personality when encountering the Cat in her social creating element. The rest is unique design and writing; these are by nature focused as narrowly defined deliverables which are what people need. The Cat can’t be herself in interview situations, except in warmth. She had to be edited to be comfortable and factual to others, positive in the affirming 90S way as this is the way of social interaction, and fitting within the positive traits. My feeling right now is that I might not be a good fit for RC without this edited version being available. Citizen Sri! The idea chafes somewhat.

But I think it’s very reasonable and not restricting. It demands my conscientious commitment to communicating clearly to a general audience. I really should nap a bit…I am drained and need to recover. I’ll eat something too.

Sriii — 14:44 Eating helped!

Sriii — 15:29 Am still super bummed but find that acts of creation (like starting my GHDR planning for 2026 on the new official "start planning day) pushes the gloom away. An uncomfortable growth day. Still also noticing I'm carrying tension too...I may not have really let the emotion out yet. The Cat is very hurt, as is Little Sri. Big Sri and Alice are not shocked and are fairly pragmatic about it; Big Sri has rerouted plans, and Alice has provided the strategic analysis, and they are both complying with the overall mission of living by values and trying to be the best Sri possible. But Cat and Little Sri need tending somehow, some kind of care to push away the doubt that they are too weird and too stupid to be in society with others. Alice rather unhelpfully quips, "It's not that you're too stupid, but not stupid enough", and Big Sri makes a face but absently nods as she considers the grain of truth in it. Big Sri is big sister Sri! She's older than Little Sri, but not that much older. Cat, Little Sri, and Big Sri are all trying to figure out the dilemma of what it means to be themselves and also be a part of a society, and if that is actually in the cards WHAT part that is and WHAT part they can play without compromising their values. Hmm.