Assorted things that bug me/freak me out as a geek

[azurelunatic]

Regular excess grooming. I'm clean and so are my clothes. I am wearing clothes. Clothing is often a valid life choice. The clothing has been selected to generally look at least vaguely like a trained professional and a grown-up, and not scrape, poke, or pinch any part of me. Unless something really epic is happening, this is about it. I don't generally care either way if someone else picks extra grooming above and beyond on a daily basis as one of their hobbies, I mean, some people juggle geese, but it's not one of mine because it's annoying.

People who don't want to learn. Learning things (even just passively) is a joy and basically my reason to exist. People who don't want to learn give me the screaming heebie-jeebies. (My ex River and I had an amazing row over the phrase "ignorance is bliss" until we figured out that his position on it was that learning is bliss and you can't have a learning state without having an ignorance to learn better from, and therefore ignorance is bliss because hey, more things to learn!)

Security by obscurity. This one is a religious issue with me. Since learning is so vital, and the people of my tribe learn recreationally (give me a juicy technical manual, a comfortable chair, and a relaxing beverage, and I am set for a few hours), it is never a safe bet to say that no one will stumble upon the thing you hope to keep obscure. One of the first principles of defense is that it helps to know what you are defending against. Security by obscurity leaves innocents unarmed against nefarious fuckbags. I have preached loudly about this on public transit, to the point of having complete strangers tell me to can it. Religious, I tell you.

Comments

[azurelunatic]

Oh god. Ingrown hairs on the bikini line, right where they'll get the maximum chafing from undergarments. NO THANKS.

I also get ragefaced over other people's grooming habits when it's a case where they are not doing it because it makes them feel happy and pampered and special, or because they will have adverse health consequences if they do not do it (at least one friend has the sort of keretosis pilaris where leaving hairs in place leads to irritation and all sorts of woe, as opposed to me, where if I take *out* hairs, it's going to be all woe and sadness) -- but where they don't really like doing it, they would not have any physical ill effects if they did not do it, but they would suffer from peer pressure or they've internalized the norms of the beauty-industrial complex to the point where they feel ugly and/or disgusting if they don't. Bonus points if it adversely affects their health and they do it anyway. RAGEFACE.

[cleverthylacine]

IDK. Does grooming generally make people feel happy and pampered and special? I feel happy and special and pampered when I go to a spa, get my nails done, have my hair done at a salon (which I can rarely afford because of how often it needs to be done) or take a long relaxing bath.

That doesn't mean I feel I'm hurting myself when I have to take a rushed shower at 5 AM or swearing because I got hair dye all over the wall again. If I could afford to pay to be pampered all the time, I so would, but I'm not going to go grey because I can't afford the salon or smell because I don't have time for a bath before work.

But I don't feel that I've internalised anyone else's norms because I do tedious things to improve my appearance on account of not being wealthy enough to pay someone else. I enjoy presenting myself in an artistic fashion very much, so just as I tolerate workouts in order to be a good dancer and vocabulary drills to build language skills, I do things that enable me to make that happen. I wouldn't want you to rageface about that, though of course I can't control that.

What makes me rageface is that people are treated badly, or just ignored, because they choose to present in a non-standard way or not to present at all.

At the same time...one of the things that I think goes into all this is how neurotypical you are and what senses are the most sensitive.

I can't stand getting the seam of a pair of socks under my toes, tuneless humming, the noise some fluorescent lights make that hardly anyone else hears...and badly matched colours.

I sometimes experience non-insignificant discomfort when I look at things that are the visual equivalent of someone who can't carry a tune trying to sing. :( Yellow walls actually make my eyes sting; I can only stand to look at yellow if it's harmonised with other colours. I sometimes have the same feeling looking at loose threads on clothing, or blacks and/or whites that don't quite match up, that I do when I see a painting hung askew.

You are actually fairly decent at matching or at least harmonising your blacks, largely because you have an innate colour sense that I value and trust--sometimes I am overwhelmed by my mad love of a beautiful colour to the point where I don't really notice how much it doesn't suit me until I try to WEAR it, at which point it's already bought and paid for and I may have lost all the tags. Sometimes I lust after colours, especially bright, clear, pale or jewel-like colours. I love them. I want them. I want to own them. But I should never wear them because I will hurt my brain if I do when I look at myself in a mirror!

I try to keep it to myself because it's really not my place to tell people how they should dress unless I am throwing a formal event, but if somebody asks me what I think I'm going to tell them. But there are times when the desire to fix someone else's outfit is just maddening because I can't look at them or I get static in my head. And I feel a little like that when my hair is black shading to brown and grey and my face is blotchy and red and even if my clothes match each other I can't get anything to match or harmonise with me. I really don't think that's societal programming.

[krait]

That doesn't mean I feel I'm hurting myself when I have to take a rushed shower at 5 AM or swearing because I got hair dye all over the wall again.

I think by "happy" the people saying it here (at least me) meant not so much "my mood is notably elevated" but rather "I am satisfied, comfortable, or not in discomfort" -- I'm happier after a rushed early-morning shower than I am if I skip it, so that's enough to count for me. :D

The thing about colours is really interesting to me, because aside from loathing any shade warmer than light yellow I am pretty much indifferent to them. I wear shirts and jeans till they fall apart, mix jeans-with-holes with fancy shirts (it makes me laugh when I see my reflection!) and just in general would live in t-shirts and jeans and sandals year-round if I could.

Part of the reason I hate warm tones so much, though, is because they make my face look pink/red, so there's a bit of the disharmony thing involved as well as just generally disliking those colours. (I try to ignore the existence of my hair; I am never happy with it.)

[cleverthylacine]

Jeans with holes and a fancy shirt is not something I would do, and is something I would have judged as a teenager, but as an adult, I actually think it can be done in an awesome, ironic way that works perfectly well.

I don't think many people care about colours as much as I do. I say this based on the fact that I sometimes bring in my own office supplies because if a company only orders asparagus-piss yellow post-its and army green hanging folders in order to save money, I do not want to have to look at that shit on my desk for 8 hours a day. (Also my big boss does not steal my notepads when they are purple or pink.)

[krait]

Yep, it's the whole "I do it because I must", where 'must' is defined by someone selling a product rather than your own health and comfort, that gets my rageface going.

I shave my legs because if I don't, the hair catches painfully in denim (which I wear, oh, 95% of my waking hours); underarms because it makes applying deodorant easier. Beyond that, other people can suck it up and deal with what I was born with, or chip in the money to get me gene therapy. :D

Job interviews are the only place where I cave and pretend that I care about beauty standards; for those I will wear non-sports bras and put on makeup. (The lesson in all this: if you are NOT directly in charge of my financial future, you have no influence in my grooming decisions!)