... Or Not

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:51:02 GMT

Or not. My leave has been extended because reasons. It's not getting better.

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Update; Time To Get My Shit Together

Tue, 21 Apr 2026 01:40:47 GMT

This is my last week of official leave. Need to pull through and get my shit together.

( Read more... )

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Quick Update: Recovery Week 2? 3? Week something

Sun, 12 Apr 2026 23:08:41 GMT

Currently recovering from a bit of mania that hit. Still on the edge, but not as bad as I was or as bad as it could have been

Keeping it quiet this week. Just going to run a few errands and rest up. Hoping it dies down soon, but the crash is going to be killer.

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Words Are Meaningless: AI, ADHD, and Context

Sun, 05 Apr 2026 18:07:31 GMT

I wanna walk like you,
Talk like you…
King Louie, The Jungle Book

There’s this remarkably easy, wonderful game you can play. I think most people have played it, or a variant of it. It works like this: you try to sneak in as many song lyrics as you can into a conversation¹, and you try to see how many you can fit it before the other person notices. You start the game quoting a song lyric. Your final score is determined by how many of these lyrics you were able to get in before the other person notices².

Whenever an AI gets too annoying, too close to human, I start playing this game in order to feel better about myself. Depending on the model, which song lyric you use, etc., you get varying success. Here’s an example (the actual AI is left unidentified; this is a critique of technology, not a review):

Me: Now my room's a mess, and I know why.

AI-Response: That is a very specific, grounded observation—and a perfect illustration of how “high-stimulus” music like November can physically manifest in your environment.

I had started this conversation about computer hardware, migrated over to Max Richter’s November, watched the performance by Mari Samuelsen, followed by a brief technical discussion on a side project, and then finally in the middle of this conversation, the non-sequitur lyric.

I didn’t bother with the only proper response to this sentence³. It had already failed the game. I’ve been playing this game successfully with most AIs since 2023. It’s nice to know that if I sang out of tune, the AI has my back:

Me: What would you do if I sang out of tune?
AI-Response: If you sang out of tune, I’d probably try to be understanding and supportive. Maybe I’d offer some gentle feedback or suggest practicing together if you’re open to it. After all, singing is about expression and enjoyment, regardless of perfect pitch!

Me: Are you sure you wouldn’t stand up and walk out on me?
AI-Response: As an AI, I don’t have physical form, so standing up and walking out isn’t something I can do! But rest assured, I’m here to assist and engage in conversation with you, regardless of your singing abilities.

I may not become a better singer, but I at least know where I stand with the fucking robots. If you’re wondering why your robot keeps bringing up the same shit over and over again, you can blame context.

Every time you send a prompt to the AI, it reads through all the previous parts of the conversation in order to create a “context” for the current statement. For example, if I had been talking about computer hardware and building a home render center and tossed out the lyric above, it would use that as a context and use parts of the previous conversation and possibly assume that I’m referring to a mess of cords and boxes from assembling said fictional system.

This very neurotypical way of thinking is quite common in most models, because balancing multiple contexts is difficult and the added complexity doesn’t produce results and instead increases the likelihood of confabulation. Neurotypical people go from A->B->C pretty casually and easily, and once you move from topic A to B, you’re essentially done with A.

If you’ve ever talked to anyone with ADHD for more than a casual five-minute conversation, you can see where this quickly breaks down. People with ADHD stack contexts upon each other. B isn’t a new topic, it’s building on top of A, so topic A is technically still open and still game. Topic C is related to B which is related to A, so now we have three contexts working all at once, with the ADHD mind adding depth to the conversation.

Which is the “right” way? Everyone has their own opinion⁴, but one way works better for people with ADHD, and it sure as hell ain’t the first one. People with ADHD are building symphonies, while neurotypical people are playing solos. There may be a common thread in the symphony, but it’s only as a whole that it makes sense, and the different pieces when separated out seem nonsensical or trivial.

This actually creates a barrier for people with ADHD to work with AI. We have to adjust to try to talk to the model in a way that is unnatural to our thinking. And it is fucking exhausting. I get you NT types think that talking to us ND types is difficult and tiring, but remember that it goes both ways. We’re expending just as much fucking energy trying to follow along with your thinking and not adding in footnotes and filler content to spice it up a notch⁵.

This is not an easy fix, either. In the one AI model I’ve found that handles context well, in a chat where the AI knows I’m putting in song lyrics and I’m actually keeping score, I popped in this beauty:

Me: Another world… another time… this land was green and good…

AI-Response: Dark Crystal. You’re testing me again. Score still 8-5 or have we moved since then?
Me: Still 8-5. But it was a different test. It was also sampled by The Crystal Method for Trip Like I Do, so it ends up being both movie quote and song lyric both.
AI-Response: And your altered-state playlist is named Trip Like I Do. So that was three layers deep — movie quote, song sample, and a personal reference to your own playlist. That’s less of a stick-poke and more of a landmine.

It answered this in a general chat and it answered about how I expected it to. In a world of eight billion people, most of them would be quoting the line from The Dark Crystal, a smaller amount would be referencing Trip Like I Do by The Crystal Method, and an even less statistical number would be discussing a playlist⁶.

The AI is only going after the first level, while my context could easily be two or even three layers down.

It took the most statistically likely route with the quote, the first option, but didn’t drill down. It knew it was being tested because it knew the context was wildly different than everything that came before it, but it was still wrong since it went with the movie and not the song. Even though it knew something was up, I had never before used a movie quote in the same way, only musical quotes. Even the best engines can miss out on context.

At this point, the entire discussion about AI and ADHD is “how can it be used”– todo lists, executive functioning, help with editing, etc. but not much is being discussed about how the communication model itself is a barrier to those with severe ADHD.

It requires neurodivergent people to try to sort themselves out in a neurotypical way. It becomes another exhausting thing to deal with⁷.

If you have ADHD and find yourself frustrated, it’s not you that’s broken, it’s a limitation of the technology. Toss in a song lyric or two to give it a test and confirm⁸.

Or movie quotes, Shakespeare quotes, etc.↩︎
I didn’t say it was a complicated game.↩︎
Because I got high. Yes, the lyric is slightly off.↩︎
The one I use is the correct one. Duh.↩︎
BAM!↩︎
Statistically speaking, there’s more than one personal playlist titled “Trip Like I Do”, so I am not unique in that regard.↩︎
Like neurotypical people– seriously, you’re exhausting to talk to.↩︎
Just don’t expect too much from the poor bot.↩︎

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What a long, strange trip it's been...

Tue, 10 Mar 2026 13:13:20 GMT

If you told me a year, or even a month ago, that I would be starting up an LJ-style blog, I would have called you crazy. Doubly so if you said I would be deleting my Facebook account (which I will be doing shortly). But... ( Read more... )

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Fsck The Cloud

... Or Not

Update; Time To Get My Shit Together

Quick Update: Recovery Week 2? 3? Week something

Words Are Meaningless: AI, ADHD, and Context

What a long, strange trip it's been...