2025 Knott's Trip #2 (10/27/25)

Oct. 28th, 2025 07:17 pm
torachan: my glitch character (glitch)
[personal profile] torachan
We keep thinking about how we should go to Knott's, but never going. We've only been once this year, during the Boysenberry Festival, and we really did want to check it out during Halloween, but their hours are so limited (even on nights when they don't have Scary Farm (which is not only a separate ticketed event, but one we have zero interest in), they close at like 6pm, which makes a dinner trip difficult to plan. But I had the day off yesterday, so we went down for lunch.

Read more... )
oursin: Illustration from medieval manuscript of the female physician Trotula of Salerno holding up a urine flask (trotula)
[personal profile] oursin

Not sure these links are particularly appropriate, but maybe so.

Well, I do remember her saying she scarcely noticed The Change, though she did nuance that statement by adding that she had so much else going on at the time (eldercare and other stuff) she didn't have time to notice:

Yet more on monetising the menopause: Menopause getting you down? Don’t worry, the wellness industry has a very pricey solution for you.

I am probably being horribly cynical, but when somebody goes for a home birth after a first high risk experience of parturition, one does wonder if some kind of wellness woowoo was in the mix (“She had read or heard somewhere that there was less chance of bleeding at home and that is why she wanted a home birth.”)? but this is a dreadful story: 'Gross failure’ led to deaths of mother and baby in Prestwich home birth.

This is also a really grim story about reproductive politics in Brazil: Two More Weeks: The Brutality Behind Brazil’s Reproductive Politics:

In complicated childbirth scenarios, when the life of the pregnant person and the fetus are in conflict, therapeutic abortion has historically been considered the last resort. But in Brazil, since the nineteenth century, this solution has been replaced by the cesarean operation. This was not based on medical reasons. Cesarean sections, up until the early twentieth century, were rudimentary procedures, almost always fatal to the birthing person. What motivated its adoption in Brazil was based on different logics: religious, legal, and moral. The cesarean became an acceptable alternative to abortion because it allowed the fetus to be born, even if the birthing parent died. The nineteenth-century theological and medical debates that gave rise to this sacrificial logic still shape birth in Brazil.

Synchrony between 'Catholic and fundamentalist Evangelical actors... promoting cesarean as a morally acceptable alternative to abortion' in present day.

Daily Happiness

Oct. 27th, 2025 07:14 pm
torachan: karkat from homestuck looking bored (karkat bored)
[personal profile] torachan
1. We went to Knott's Berry Farm for lunch today! This is actually only the second time we've gone this year. ^_^;; It just feels like there's never a good time to go, since there's not much we're interested in doing there other than checking out the food. We plan to go again a time or two during the Christmas season (especially during the last ten days of the year when we're blocked out from Disneyland), but I don't think we'll renew our pass next year.

The food is so good and if we lived closer, it would make sense to just pop in whenever, but the park hours suck, so we can't do early mornings or later in the evening like we do with Disneyland to avoid the crowds, the parking situation is often bad, and there is nowhere in the park to escape the constant noise of rollercoasters. Plus the park is so small that you don't really get that satisfying a walk out of it. I will miss the food, though! Next year we're thinking of maybe getting a Universal Studios pass and seeing how we like that (we'll go once to try it out first as neither of us have ever been).

2. It was nice to have an extra day off. Not super looking forward to going back to work tomorrow, but on the bright side, now it's just a four day week!

3. Tuxie tried to hide behind the charcoal when I went out to garage lol.

torachan: (Default)
[personal profile] torachan
We skipped the majority of the mix-in time and got into the park a little after five. There were still some non-event guests, but going by the amount of costumes, it was mostly other Oogie Boogie folks already.

Read more... )
cimorene: two men in light linen three-piece suits and straw hats peering over a wrought iron railing (poirot)
[personal profile] cimorene
Yesterday Wax and I went and bought a new curtain rod to replace the one in the bedroom that's been hanging crooked for... several years.

We haven't put it up yet, but we got it!
silveradept: A head shot of a  librarian in a floral print shirt wearing goggles with text squiggles on them, holding a pencil. (Librarian Goggles)
[personal profile] silveradept
[The folks at [community profile] holly_poly wanted a little exchange primer for people who haven't done things before, and since I'm helping out a little bit on their socials side, I thought I'd put one together, based on my extensive experience over the years in participating. If you've never taken part in one, I highly recommend it, they're fun. And if you have additional information to contribute, please do!]


So, you're thinking about participating in a fandom exchange, and you're not entirely sure how this process all goes? Don't worry. Here's a walkthrough of what exchange participation looks like, from the first parts of nominations to the joys of reveals. Since a fair number of exchanges are run on the Archive of Our Own, this guide assumes you already have an account there to sign up with. If not, they're free to get, but they might take a little while to get to you in the queue, so getting one now, before the meat of an exchange starts, will ensure that you're ready to participate.

Let's get into it with the first phase of an exchange - nominations.

Nominations



Nominations is the part of the exchange where you get to suggest what kinds of things should be included in the exchange's tag set. Nominating does not obligate you to sign up afterward, but a lot of people will if their nominations get through because then they know they'll have something they'll be excited to write about. Most nominations are also finite, so even if you're brimming with things you want to see, you'll only get to put in so many into the tag set.

Nominations have to fit the exchange's focus and format. For something that's just a general exchange, anything might be possible, but most exchanges focus on specific fandoms, characters, situations, or relationships. Holly Poly, for example, is a polyamory-focused exchange. Holly Poly nominations must include more than two entities in them, otherwise it wouldn't be a polyamorous relationship. And since it's about polyamory, they want "/"-type relationships that are romantic or sexual, rather than "&"-type relationships that are platonic and don't have romantic or sexual components to them. If I Fics, I Sits, however, says that anything can be done, so long as there's a cat in the relationship, since it's focused on cats.

Where possible, try to use the canonical tag on AO3 for nominating. Two things to remember when you're doing nominations for Holly Poly or any other exchange hosted on AO3:
  1. AO3 does not do ship names, so if what you want is Zutaraang, you have to put in "Zuko/Katara/Aang." Yes, they make you spell it out.
  2. All canonical AO3 ships are in alphabetical order, by last name, if the character has one, and by their only name if not, so that Zutaraang relationship is in the AO3 database as "Aang/Katara/Zuko". The autocomplete can try to help you some if you put in at least one of the participants, but you'll have to wade through the dropdown to get to the thing you want if AO3 thinks you're looking for something else first.


Make sure you also check anything the exchange mod has posted about any deviations they might be making from AO3 canonical tags for their exchange. Sometimes a tag tries to slide into another place and the mod has to change the tag to make it stay in place, or separate shows / games set in the same continuity are being combined into a single universe tag. Or exchange moderators will ask you to nominate the most specific version of the character or relationship as possible, because characters and their relationships do change between media adaptations, and sometimes fans have strong opinions about which version they want to see.

Once you've nominated, keep your eyes out for any "clarifications" posts, because those happen when the exchange moderators detail the problems they're having with nominations. It can be something as simple as having nominated characters and relationships under the incorrect fandom, and sometimes it's as complex as trying to disambiguate which of the six canonical versions of a spandex-clad superhero was intended in a nomination, or whether it will be up to the people signing up to work it out for themselves which one they want. If you're the nominator, then you get to provide additional information to help the moderators place your nomination correctly. Moderators will also usually provide a threat to make sure that information comes in a timely manner, with the idea that either a nomination will be selected to be something, or the nomination will be rejected from the tagset, if clarifying information doesn't arrive by the deadline.

Signups



Set some time aside when it's time to do sign-ups.

More than that.

Still more.

Why? Because unless you're here only for the things you nominated and nothing else, you're going to want to spend some time looking at the tag set. Even if you are here just for the things you nominated and nothing else, you want to look at the tag set. There are a lot of gems in there, from properties you haven't thought of in years, or other popular things, or pairings that you might not have thought of initially, but there's a germ of an idea in your head about what you could write if you were assigned that, and now you're interested.

I'd also look in on the Crossovers and the Original Works tags, if you want to see some of the really fun ways that people imagine relationships and what kinds of worlds they envision or want to collide together. Original Works is also where a lot of the Omegaverse prompts live, but even if you're not an Omegaverse fan, some of the prompts in there can be creative sparks without having to try and figure out how to make existing characters work with it.

If you don't have enough from your nominations and the tag set by itself, some people start looking at the sign-up summaries, once they're posted, to see what other people have posted in their optional details field. It's still true that Optional Details Are Optional, but hearing someone describe what they do and don't want to happen in a work can help someone decide whether they want to offer that combination, or possibly stay away from it if the person who is offering it has Do Not Wants that would conflict if they were assigned that recipient.

Between nominations, tag set looking, and sign-up summary reading, it should be possible to build enough things to request and offer that meet the minimum requirements the exchange has set forth. So let's look at the sign-up form. It's split into two major sections: requests (what you would like to get) and offers (what you're willing to make for a potential recipient). There's a minimum number of each that you'll have to provide to successfully sign up for the exchange. The AO3 matching code works better with more options than fewer, so signing up with as much as you can is preferable to signing up with the minimums, but you should always only sign up with things you'll want to create or receive. The AO3 matching algorithm has the Bastard's sense of humor, and if you put in something that you're only half-hearted about, it will ensure that you match with your recipient or your gifter on that thing and nothing else.

On the requests side, the form will ask you for what fandom your request is in, then what relationship(s) from that fandom you're requesting. Both fandom and relationships should match exactly what's in the tag set, or your sign-up will be rejected with errors. The autocomplete dropdown will try to help you get the exact tag from the tag set, but on those rare occasions where the dropdown isn't helpful, copying and pasting the tag exactly as it is from the tagset should still allow it to go through.

After that, choose from the tickyboxes about what kind of thing you would like to receive. Common items there are fic (written), art (still drawings and/or comics,), vids (video content, usually re-cut footage set to music or some other audio track), and podfic (an audio track recorded by the gifter or the gifter and others). Most exchanges, if they're not specifically about vids or podfic, will usually just have fic and art in this space.

After saying which fandom you want, which relationship(s) you want, and what form you'd like to receive a gift in, there's the Optional Details section. The first rule about Optional Details is that they are optional. The person who is creating for you is not obligated to follow any of your optional details, but many people who are looking to make gifts will find those details useful to give them a direction to go in. A good reason to provide optional details in some form is that if you don't, the person gifting you the work is likely to write what they will enjoy, and there's no guarantee that your tastes will line up completely, even if you match in the algorithm. If you don't leave anything as a guide, you are tempting fate, and if I haven't mentioned it enough already, the AO3 algorithm has the Bastard's sense of humor and will give you someone who can complete an assignment that fulfills all the requirements and may not be anything like what you wanted.

The one exception usually granted to the Optional Details Are Optional (ODAO) rule is the Do Not Wants (DNW). Do Not Wants are the stuff that if it appears in a gift work will sour it immediately and permanently, no matter how well it's done, how tastefully it might be done, or how small the quantity of it is. You know people who have allergies so severe that they go into anaphylaxis even at the slightest inclusion of an ingredient in their meal or the presence of it in their environment? That thing that causes them such problems is a Do Not Want. It's poor form to use your Do Not Wants to box your gifter in to giving you something that is extra-tailored to you, if those things really aren't Do Not Wants, and some exchanges will say explicitly that they won't enforce Do Not Wants they consider unreasonable. Better to say what you do want and hope your gifter will follow that and leave the Do Not Wants for those specific things that will just turn you off the gift completely.

In your Optional Details, you can also indicate whether you'd like to receive treats, works created by someone other than your assigned gifter that otherwise meet the requirements of the exchange. Treats are generally pretty neat to receive, but sometimes a person doesn't want them, for their own reasons. If you do want treats, you'll also want to make sure that your AO3 account preferences have "Allow anyone to gift me works" checked, or any possible treats will fizzle.

The last field on the requests side is a place to link to your "Dear Creator" letter. Some people find it easier to put all of their optional details into a single entry, whether on Dreamwidth or Tumblr or somewhere else, and then point their gifter to that letter for things like what they like, what they dislike, possible prompts for their gifter to work off of, and the like. The "Dear Creator" letter is considered to be part of the Optional Details, and many times, exchange moderators say they won't enforce any Do Not Wants in a creator letter, because the letter itself is not required to be read, so make sure that you put your DNWs in the Optional Details box, just to be safe.

Okay, time for the offers side. The offers side works mostly the same way as the requests side, with choosing a fandom, relationship(s), and media, but for what you want to offer to someone else. Same rules apply about only offering what you want to create, because the AO3 matching algorithm is even more perverse on this side of the sheet than it is for request matches. It will almost unerringly choose the one that you were least enthusiastic about. The optional details field may still be Optional Details, but in some places it's re-titled as "Notes to Mods." This may be a place where you can mention if there are particular users that you don't want to match with, for whatever reasons you may have for this. There's no guarantees that such preferences can be accommodated, but those who are forewarned will do their best.

Once you've made your sign-up list and put in your details, click submit and wait. If you've forgotten something, or AO3 balks at something, the sign-up form will return, with highlighted spots where the errors are. If you succeed, you'll go to the sign-up summary page, and you'll see your own sign-up now in the list for other people to peruse and see if they can gather anything from your sign-up to assist their own.

Your Assignment



In normal circumstances, the AO3 algorithms will generate matches in such a way that every valid sign-up set will have one match of a fandom/pairing/medium trio in their requests with a fandom/pairing/medium trio in someone else's offers. In rare situations, a sign-up's request set may have no matches in anyone's offer set, or might only be able to match with someone who has already been matched with someone. In such rare cases, the moderators will reach out to the unmatched user and ask if they want to add requests to their sign-up. Adding additional requests and re-running matching often reshuffles everything so that everyone is matched. On the occasion that someone isn't matchable and doesn't change their sign-up, they'll usually head to the pinch hit list.

In any case, after matching, you should receive an e-mail from AO3 with your assignment for the exchange. Your recipient has matched you on at least one fandom/pairing/medium trio. Sometimes it's only one, sometimes there's more than one compatible match in the set. Your responsibility, once you have an assignment, is to produce a new work that meets one of the requests on the list, avoids the stated DNWs, and is sufficiently long/detailed to meet the requirements of the exchange. You don't necessarily have to create the thing that you matched on if something else catches your fancy, but you do have to create something off the request list put in front of you. The match is there to make sure there's at least one thing on the list that you said you wanted to create and they said they wanted to receive.

Your assignment is a secret.

Your assignment is a secret.

Because there's a good chance that you're in the same social spaces as your recipient, and you don't want to spoil the surprise! Even oblique hints about what you're creating might be enough for your recipient to deduce that you're their gifter. Run silent, run secret. The secret period extends from your assignment through the reveals of the works to the point where the authors of the works are revealed. Therefore, in your assignment, you cannot use the Notes or any other means to identify yourself as the creator of the work. Not even obliquely. Don't talk about the work anywhere during the anonymous period. Don't reveal who your recipient is.

If you have questions about your assignment, or need clarification on anything, contact your exchange moderators. If needed, they'll relay your question to your recipient, usually with some obfuscation in the form of other relevant questions to their sign-up and requests so as not to tip off the recipient about which of the things being asked about is the important one. Then they'll relay the response back to you.

Your assignment also comes with a deadline. Your completed work that conforms to the requirements of the exchange must be submitted to AO3 before the time posted as the deadline. The deadline is often something like midnight or 11:59pm on a specific day, but check the time zone. If it's UTC, that may mean you have more (or less) time than you think. I generally try to have my assignment done and submitted the day before the stated day of the deadline, just so that I don't potentially trip over any time zone issues.

To fulfill your assignment, you'll need to log in to AO3, and then choose "My Assignments" or "Assignments". You'll be presented with a list of all the exchanges you've received an assignment for. Scroll to the right assignment and click "Fulfill". At this point, you'll be taken to the AO3 New Work page, with a couple of key details already filled in about what exchange you are submitting this to, and who the gift recipient will be for the work. Everything else you fill in just as you would for any other AO3 work, with one exception. AO3's anonymity mask does not extend to series. If you put your work as part of a series, your recipient can click on the series title and be brought to the series page, with the author of the series unmasked, spoiling the anonymity. Series must be edited in after the anonymous author period expires.

If you know you're not going to get something done in time, or that you can't make the requirements, on your assignment page, there's a "Default" button next to the "fulfill" button. Most exchanges have a "no-fault default" deadline around a week before the deadline. Defaulting on your assignment means that you're saying you're not going to be able to complete something on time that meets the requirements. It happens, whether it's the well of creativity running completely dry, or life events conspiring to ensure that you have no time to complete your assignment, or any other reason. If you're not going to make it, and you know you're not going to make it, hit the default button as soon as you're sure. Doing it before the default deadline usually means you won't incur any penalty or be required to do make-up work before you can sign up for the next incarnation of the exchange. Default after the default deadline, or miss the assignment deadline, or turn something in that doesn't meet the requirements or hits someone's Do Not Wants will also likely incur a default, and there's a strong likelihood that you'll have to sit out an exchange round, or complete your assignment properly and give it as a gift, or otherwise pay a penalty of some sort before you're allowed to sign up again. Eject at the earliest point you are certain you can't complete the assignment to avoid being penalized for it.

Pinch-Hits



("Pinch hits" here refers to the baseball practice of substituting a different batter for the scheduled batter in the lineup, usually because the pinch hitter will have a higher chance of successfully getting on base and generating scoring potential.)

Every unmatchable assignment and recipient who has their gifter default and who has not defaulted themselves gets put on a list of people who need to have someone give them a gift. (Most exchanges run on the rule of "If you complete your assignment and gift someone else a work, then you must also receive at least one gift work based on your own requests.") This is the pinch hit list. ("Initial" pinch hits are unmatchable assignments, and "post-deadline" pinch hits are those that happen after the assignment deadline.)

Pinch hits are usually posted to a specific place, and will contain the entire requests portion of the sign-up for all interested parties to look at and make decisions about. Pinch-hitters are not limited to those who have signed up, but those who have signed up can collect pinch hits. (There may be a rule that you have to have completed and submitted your assignment before you can have a pinch hit assigned to you.) Initial pinch hits and early defaults will usually have the same deadline imposed on the pinch-hitter as regular assignments. As the assignment deadline approaches, pinch-hit deadlines will start to move past the initial deadline, but they will try to stay close to it. Pinch-hitters are often very good at turning around works quickly, sometimes because they see the request and go "oh, I know exactly what to do with that."

This may seem obvious, but no, you cannot pick up your own pinch hit. Even if it seems like that would be the easiest and most effective way of making sure it gets filled.

Betas



No, not the Omegaverse ones. Beta-readers.

It's not required, but it is recommended that if you have the time to do so, you run your assignment's draft form(s) past another pair of eyes to catch things like spelling, punctuation, and grammar (SPaG) errors, to have someone with lived experience in a specific community read the work to make sure that it doesn't perpetuate awful stereotypes about that community (sensitivity reading), or to see if the plot coheres and the timelines work, and the characterization makes sense for the fandom, and other such things that will improve the quality of the end product. There may be channels and places where you can make these requests, but remember, your assignment is secret. You cannot directly advertise for a beta because you might be tipping off your recipient with your request.

The Yuletide exchange has created the "hippo" system to deal with the necessities of keeping assignments secret while also getting beta requests publicized, and most other exchanges use a similar system. The "hippo" is usually someone with a specific role, whose purpose is to obfuscate who is making the beta request. Use private messaging to tell the hippo the important details of who your recipient is, what you need for your work, how long the work is, and what the turnaround time you need for the betaing is. Longer turnaround times have higher success rates, because most hippos are also working on assignments. The hippo will then make a post to the channel / community, passing along those details and asking for interested parties to message them directly and privately with their interest. On the high likelihood that the recipient offers to beta, so long as there are others willing to offer and one of them is selected, the hippo can politely decline the recipient with the excuse of "another's offer has been accepted," preserving the anonymity of the exchange, with the recipient none the wiser that they've offered to beta their own gift.

If you can, getting a beta reader / viewer is helpful and often can make the final product stronger. But it does require you to be more on top of your assignments such that you can take advantage of the extra time for polish. For some people, this will be impossible, which is why betas are usually recommended rather than required for your gift works.

Reveals!



Once everyone who has completed an assignment has a gift, the deadline has passed, and the exchange maintainers and moderators have checked and made sure that all of the gifts themselves meet the requirements of the exchange, the works are released!

However! The authors of the works are not. This is to preserve a period of time where the recipient, the participants, and any and all interested parties can enjoy the works without having their enjoyment influenced by whether or not the creator is well-known, a Big Name, a Professional Name using a pseudonym, or any other factors where the prestige of the person doing the work might overshadow the work and the work's enjoyment itself. During the anonymous period, any comments on the work by the work author will be noted as "Anonymous Creator."

In the rare case where a work is incomplete and was not caught by the exchange maintainers, or steps on a Do Not Want and wasn't caught by the exchange maintainers, let the exchange maintainers know as soon as possible! That will likely produce an emergency pinch hit need, but everyone is supposed to have a gift that meets the requirements and avoids the Do Not Wants.

By accident, I did a work that trod upon a Do Not Want. The recipient let the exchange creators know, and in this case, thought the work was excellent and accepted it and enjoyed it, but still let the maintainers know, so that I was duly chastised about it. I did offer to write something that would not be that, but it was not required of me. When I wrote something that hadn't been requested by a recipient, and they pointed this out, I wrote something that did match, with a certain amount of cussing out my inability to read. These things do happen, and they are often accidents, so giving the opportunity to make things right as soon as possible is the best thing for everyone.

If you have received a gift that conforms to the requirements of the exchange, it is customary to leave an indication that you have viewed/listened to the work that someone has gifted you. For some exchanges, more may be required of you, such as leaving a comment on the gift work, but the customary indication of something having been enjoyed, even if without any further comment, is the kudos button. Comments are lovely and very much appreciated by creators, but we also know that sometimes the recipient doesn't have anything to say, or doesn't feel like they can put it down in a coherent comment. All the same, please do indicate that you have at least viewed/listened to the work in question.

Once you've gone through your gift work (or works), then it's time to explore the rest of the collection! There might be more things in there with your favorite fandoms and ships, or you might discover a new ship or fandom to check out by reading the works in the collection. While the anonymous author period is still going on, you won't know who made it, but sometimes it's a good challenge to try and get through as much as you can before the author reveals happen.

Some writers also take this opportunity to manually set the date of publication for their work. In a fast-moving fandom or a popular ship, things can fall off the first page of "Arranged By Date" very quickly. With the period of time between when something is submitted and when reveals of works are, a work might finally appear on page two or three once reveals happen. Generally, if a work is being re-dated from the original submnission date, it can be brought forward to the reveal date of the works, so it will have the opportunity to at least exist for a little while on the front page. (For less popular ships, even with the delay, the work might still be the top of the first page. You never know.)

Author Reveals!



Usually seven days after the works are revealed, the author anonymity period ends, and you can see who all the writers were. That might mean that you have some new people to follow and subscribe to. At the point the author anonymity ends, all the people who have subscriptions to you will also be notified that you've written something new, and the rest of AO3 will have the opportunity to see it regularly, instead of in the anonymous period.

With the reveal of the authors, the exchange is usually finished, with the exception of any post-event question and answer sessions or feedback requests. There's all the stories to be enjoyed, the comments and kudos to be had, and the brainstorming for what you might want to write about next time around. Or to go off with a fistful of new fandoms and possible pairings and canons to look at.

Congratulations for participating in the exchange!
oursin: A cloud of words from my LJ (word cloud)
[personal profile] oursin

But I am so, so fed up of people who use 'silver bullet' when they mean 'magic bullet'!

Silver bullets kill things, werewolves, mostly, right; or just generally Bad Guys when fired by the Lone Ranger.

Magic bullets Do Good - like curing sifilis, thank you Ehrlich and Hato, they are targeted remedies.

Also, however hyperliterate I am myself and have been from a young age, I don't think it's the panacea proposed here: There is a silver bullet for childhood happiness: a love of reading.

Just because she (and I and I daresay many of you who are reading this) found our happy place in reading, doesn't mean it's going to be that for all children.

I am entirely there for emphasising the role of pleasure in reading, for

meeting children where they are. It means allowing children to read books that might be perceived as too old and too young for them; it means relishing your child’s love for comics and heavily illustrated books

and not gatekeeping and niggling about what they are reading.

But I don't think this is For Everyone any more than Going Out and Playing In the Nice Fresh Air.

And on that, I really liked this: Children should have a right to play in the streets, alleys, pavements and car parks of their neighbourhoods. Refers to a letter about children playing in streets, etc, rather than in designated playgrounds and parks:

It assumes that children should be “taken” to designated play spaces, rather than allowing for the possibility that children should be able to access playable space without adults. And, finally, it fails to acknowledge that parks and other green spaces afford only certain kinds of play, and that children demand – and deserve – diverse spaces for diverse forms of play, not just ball games, swings and slides.

Daily Happiness

Oct. 26th, 2025 11:19 pm
torachan: (Default)
[personal profile] torachan
1. We had a good time at Oogie Boogie Bash tonight. I'm feeling very tired, so I'm glad I've got another day off work tomorrow.

2. Carla has started moving some of her books into the new bookshelf, freeing up space on the shelves in my room. Between books and legos and other knick knacks the shelves in my room were verrrrrrry overcrowded, so I'm looking forward to being able to space things out a bit more. (I was also able to dust the parts of the shelves where she took books from, which I usually don't do because too many knick knacks.)

3. Molly!

Culinary

Oct. 26th, 2025 06:51 pm
oursin: Frontispiece from C17th household manual (Accomplisht Lady)
[personal profile] oursin

I thought last week's bread was holding out pretty well until it suddenly sprouted mould - however there was still some cornbread left + rolls.

Having been out for lunch on Friday I was not feeling like anything much for supper but made partner a Spanish omelette with red bell pepper and had some fruit myself.

Saturday breakfast rolls: basic buttermilk, strong white flour, turned out v nice.

Today's lunch: Crispy Baked Sesame Tofu - not sure whether there should not have been some actual sesame seeds somewhere in the mix? also thought maybe I was a bit cautious with the amount of tamari in the sauce - and didn't think this turned out particularly crispy....; served with sticky rice with lime leaves, baked San Marzano tomatoes and mangetout peas stirfried with star anise.

(no subject)

Oct. 26th, 2025 11:41 am
oursin: Brush the Wandering Hedgehog by the fire (Default)
[personal profile] oursin
Happy birthday, [personal profile] finisterre, [personal profile] rivka and [personal profile] taelle!

Daily Happiness

Oct. 25th, 2025 06:35 pm
torachan: john from homestuck looking shocked (john shocked)
[personal profile] torachan
1. Nice farmers market haul this morning, including a big bag of dried persimmons. I had some this afternoon for a snack and they are excellent. The only problem is the same problem I have with all dried fruit: being careful not to eat too much at once!

2. I finally put the Billy bookshelf together today. We got one in blue, so it matches the other blue Ikea cabinet and bedside table in Carla's room (I don't remember the name of that series, something not as easy to remember as Billy, that's for sure). I was dreading putting the doors on because I hate hinges, but the hinges on this are the easiest Ikea hinges I've done. (Rather than having to hold up the doors to screw them on, these hook on first so they can kind of help hold themselves up.)

3. Speaking of furniture, we've been wanting to get a coffee table for the garage and just not gotten around to it, but I have some Lego Christmas sets that I want to display on a coffee table, so now is the time. I poked around online a bit this evening looking for something and we settled on this one from Target, which lifts up like the one we have in the house, to make it easier to work on stuff while sitting on the sofa.

4. We had another baked potato with a Trader Joe's frozen topping tonight, this time it was chicken mole. WOW. This was even better than the birria. Would definitely get this again for baked potatoes.

5. Ollie's soaking in the sun.

Celebrating Halloween my way

Oct. 25th, 2025 04:47 pm
fennectik: Anime (Anime)
[personal profile] fennectik posting in [community profile] anime_manga
Been catching up on Vampire Princess Miyu as a way to go with the Halloween thing without doing too much about it. Its still haunting, and it has become one of my all-time favorites. I'm hoping to finally finish the series and the OAV which I also watched way back then on VHS.

(In fact, that was the first time I began watching it.)

I'm also watching episodes of Ghost Sweeper Mikami with the same goal of finishing it up as well.

Anyone here also watching Horror/Supernatural themed Anime this month?

Still coughing

Oct. 25th, 2025 06:35 pm
queen_ypolita: Woman in a Mucha painting (Mucha by auctrix_icons)
[personal profile] queen_ypolita
I had the morning for some aimless walking around and browsing in shops in Brighton. It was rather breezy but mostly sunny with a bit of cloud, no rain, so it felt good to be outside.

The concert was lovely and well-attended. It was a smaller venue (church) than on Friday, but with proportionally more listeners. I still have a cough and struggled with it badly before the start of the concert, to the extent my seat neighbours probably wished I'd see the sense and leave. But I did manage without coughing, although once again it took lots of water. The downside to having to focus on not coughing is losing some of the focus on the music, which was beautiful nonetheless.

There were some engineering works today on the train route I'd normally take, and the journey planners were suggesting all sorts of weird routes if I'd been using the not-via-London ticket. So I bought the more expensive any-route ticket, and resigned myself to having to do a cross-London transfer, which was OK, as it only involved Thameslink and Elizabeth line.

Not the effort nor the failure tires

Oct. 25th, 2025 05:56 pm
oursin: A C19th illustration of a hedgehood, with a somewhat worried expression (mopey/worried hedgehog)
[personal profile] oursin

Just one of those weeks that felt like a strain - lower back flareups and insomnia and long-scheduled commitments that could not be deferred -

Though I did get a few small bits of life admin accomplished, like finally making an appointment for the first session of dental inlay work and chasing up whether journal reviews editor actually got my review.

But at the moment having the blahs.

Database maintenance

Oct. 25th, 2025 08:42 am
mark: A photo of Mark kneeling on top of the Taal Volcano in the Philippines. It was a long hike. (Default)
[staff profile] mark posting in [site community profile] dw_maintenance

Good morning, afternoon, and evening!

We're doing some database and other light server maintenance this weekend (upgrading the version of MySQL we use in particular, but also probably doing some CDN work.)

I expect all of this to be pretty invisible except for some small "couple of minute" blips as we switch between machines, but there's a chance you will notice something untoward. I'll keep an eye on comments as per usual.

Ta for now!

(no subject)

Oct. 25th, 2025 12:30 pm
oursin: Brush the Wandering Hedgehog by the fire (Default)
[personal profile] oursin
Happy birthday, [personal profile] aurumcalendula!

UK people: Scrap The Bathroom Ban

Oct. 25th, 2025 11:33 am
rydra_wong: Grasshopper mouse stands on its hind legs to howl. (turn venom into painkillers)
[personal profile] rydra_wong
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/scrap-the-bathroom-ban

From TransActual and Trans+ Solidarity Alliance. Produces a template letter to your MP which you can customize as much as you can or want to.

Article by Jane Fae of TransActual (who have been absolutely kicking ass):

https://www.scenemag.co.uk/jane-fae-a-director-of-transactual-writes-on-the-eve-of-launching-a-new-campaign-to-get-mps-to-reject-the-ehrcs-bathroom-ban/

There are now a bunch of Labour MPs who are worried and making noises at the government, even if it's only about the impact on businesses of rules which are possibly illegal and impossible to follow without getting sued:

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/oct/23/dozens-of-labour-mps-warn-of-chaos-for-firms-over-gender-recognition-advice

It's alleged that Bridget Phillipson was sitting on the guidance because she was worried it'd scupper her bid for the deputy leadership, whereas Powell is actively trans-friendly and has called for MPs to have a chance to debate and vote on the guidance.

The below may be an overly optimistic view but it seems clear there's tension and conflict between the EHRC and government:

https://iandunt.substack.com/p/frightened-and-desperate-ehrc-anti (warning for Substack, in case you are boycotting it)

So this is a moment when leverage is possible, and letters to your MP may actually do something.

Daily Happiness

Oct. 24th, 2025 07:36 pm
torachan: a cartoon bear eating a large sausage (magical talking bear prostitute)
[personal profile] torachan
1. Not only is it the weekend, it's a three day weekend! We're going to Oogie Boogie Bash on Sunday night so I decided to take Monday off since we'll be out late (ish).

2. I love this picture of Jasper so much. Those big eyes! The little glimpse of pink tongue!

Weekly Reading

Oct. 24th, 2025 05:56 pm
torachan: john from homestuck looking shocked (john shocked)
[personal profile] torachan
Recently Finished
Murder in Matrimony
The ending of this felt like it was wrapping up the series, which is fine because I'd already decided not to read any more. antisemitism )

The War on Alcohol: Prohibition and the Rise of the American State
Finally finished this! It was actually really interesting, I just kept not reading it in favor of other things. In school Prohibition was passed over as basically like "it happened and then they repealed it", with the main focus of the early 20th century going towards the World Wars and Great Depression. I had no idea that Prohibition was so tied to the revival of the KKK, for example.

Artistic Buildings and Homes of Los Angeles
A very short book that is mainly pictures of buildings and houses in LA in the late 1800s, built by architect Joseph Newsom. The book has a forward and introduction written in 1988, and then the rest is a direct replica of a book put out by the architect to showcase his work, complete with ads that ran alongside the photos. It's very neat. Found it in a Little Free Library in the neighborhood.

Don't Hang Up
An Audible Original by the author of Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone. He's done quite a few Audible Originals (the one below being another) and they're all short and free with my subscription, so I gave them a try, but none of them have been great. This one was interesting enough, but the MC was an asshole. He's a radio DJ who's been recently demoted to the midnight shift and one night gets a caller who tells him to stay on the line or a woman gets killed. Had some good twists, but it was just fine, not amazing.

Find Us
I really wish he would stick to writing stories set in Australia. This is the second one of his set in the US and there are always nitpicky things that bug me lol. Also if I'm reading an author from another country, it's because I want to read stories set in that country or at least with characters from that country (especially with an audiobook). But that's just minor stuff. This one felt like it really should have been longer (it's four hours, so about novella length). The MC is a former police detective, now working secretly for the FBI, trying to find school killers before they act by approaching kids who show red flags on social media and forums. One day her own kids go missing and she doesn't wait for the police, convinced she can find them herself. This had some interesting twists but I felt like the aftermath could have used more focus.

spoilers )

My Home Hero vol. 4

Sunshine, avoiding rain and music

Oct. 24th, 2025 10:34 pm
queen_ypolita: Camila Grey playing the keyboard at Adam Lambert gig at Heaven (Cam_Heaven by wenchpixie)
[personal profile] queen_ypolita
The cold is still going through its stages and today's coughing has been nasty at times. I didn't get up to much beyond doing my weekly shop this morning. In the afternoon my train journey via Gatwick was uneventful. It's a small thing, but beating the train journey planner by making a quicker change than it suggested also felt good. Nice, breezy, but no longer warm autumn sunshine at both ends of the journey.

The cough was pretty bad on the first part of the train journey and in the last hour before I was heading out to the concert. I was fully expecting to have to make a quick exit at some point because it got uncontrollable. It didn't come to that, thankfully. I managed not to cough during either half but the interval was pretty bad. It did take frequent sips of water.

There was also an unexpected, quick rain shower about 20 minutes before I needed to leave for the concert and another after about 10 minutes after I'd got back, so I clearly got lucky with the weather and stayed dry. It was very breezy regardless.

The concert was very good: a baroque group playing Purcell, Bach and others, interweaved with readings from (mostly) Oscar Wilde's letters and other writings. There was a clear dramatic arc from pleasure, suffering but with no regrets, to redemption and reconciliation and being at peace.

I'm going to another concert at lunchtime tomorrow, and will do some wandering around town before it.

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