Human moods seem arbitrary most of the time. in The Big, Blue House, year one.

I often tell people that I don’t know what to say, and I don’t like to reply to messages or try to have a conversation unless I’m as awake as possible.

What I actually mean is that I don’t know what mood or emotional response to assign to a given subject, and I’m less likely to guess wrong if it’s the middle of the afternoon, and I’ve had my coffee. It takes every bit of my processing power to try to figure out what the emotional component of any given topic is. Guess wrong and people tend to be very offended.

Guess right and then there’s the matter of expressing enough sympathy, or excitement, or whatever the other person is expecting. I rarely get that part right, even on my best days. If I had a proverbial dollar for every time a coworker came in sad, and got mad at me for failing to be adequately empathetic, I could probably buy a new gaming rig.