I have several posts in draft but they’ve stayed in draft because I can’t convince myself you give half a crap. I don’t expect or require you to, of course: you owe me nothing. At the same time I’d like to entertain or teach you rather than irritate you, so shouldn’t I consider you, my audience, more than a bit?

I thought about it and here are the categories of things I’m thinking about the most at the moment. Maybe one of these things particularly interests you and you would like to hear more about it. Feel free to let me know. On the other hand, if you want to say something mean please take that feeling by the scruff of the neck and bury it in your backyard.

Things I’m thinking about

Search Engines / Web Search — Over the last decade or so I’ve felt search engines have devolved into boring, uncreative, and less-useful tools. Google’s “info-pellet” approach, where search remains simple and more and more user options are removed (the fewer syntax, the lack of cache in the results, the results themselves showing less useful information like size of page and date of crawling) is getting worse in the age of AI as Google’s AI mode continues to make mistakes while also using disturbing amounts of electricity and water.

There are so many ways we can develop web search and search spaces that I see no evidence of Google considering. So I’m thinking about them, making tools, and giving them away to you. I think you deserve simple, transparent ways to access useful information in the same way that you deserve clean food and water. My resources are limited but I will do the best I can. For you: Search Tweaks, Local Search America, MiniGladys, WikiTwister, Attention Junction, RSS Gizmos, MastoGizmos. Most of this blog is talking about those projects and my work exploring various ideas.

Menopause — The amount of research on autistic women in menopause is slightly more than the square root of zippity squat, so I’ve had to figure out a lot of stuff myself, including how to best deal with hot flashes (two miles hilly walking every morning at dawn helps a lot), how to adjust my eating as my digestive system reassembles itself (lots of plant-based protein, I’m getting really good at freestyling bean stews) and how to deal with the mental health issues (still working on this one.) My first hot flash was March 14 2020 because God has a good sense of humor — I had some bangers when I needed to wear serious PPE (the mask/gloves combo.)

Aging — My Granny will be 102 this month while my mother is in her 80s. I spent much of 2020 at my Granny’s looking after her as she still lived at home, but she fell at the end of 2020, got covid in the hospital, and ended up in long-term care. It made me think about what she was doing to end up being able to stay at home in her old age and resolve to keep up my exercise and moving around. It also made me more intentional about talking to and supporting my mother in her needs, because sometimes Granny didn’t want to ask me to do something for her. She didn’t want to be a bother to me. I would hate it if my mother ever felt that way and had her needs unmet thereby.

Cultural Heritage — One way doing ResearchBuzz for the better part of 30 years has changed me is it’s left me with a great tenderness for humanity. Beyond the art and culture that I read about daily are the stories of the people who are trying to study and conserve and recover that art and culture. Climate change and conflict have left so much at risk, but I feel hope at the brilliance I discover regularly.

Okay, this is a real post, hopefully not too irritating.