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Yesterday was Bicycle Day, and today is 4/20. I looked up Owsley Stanley AKA “the Grateful Dead’s chemist,” and fell down a rabbit hole of 1960s counter-cultural references. I’d only known of Wavy Gravy by name, but his Wikipedia page is impressive. Also in his Greenwich Village beatnik days he sort of looked like a thinner version of Victor Buono as “Bongo Bennie” on 77 Sunset Strip.

Simon Fisher Turner and others talk about scoring the reissue of The Great White Silence.
Plus you get someone from the BFI remarking “Gaumont, one of the (Terra Nova expedition’s) sponsors, had specifically requested footage of penguins, and by God did they deliver.”

Turner’s Wikipedia page is also a rabbit hole.

L.T.C. Rolt's ghost stories are kind of like M. R. James, except Rolt was an industrial historian rather than a medievalist, so a large number of the stories are about haunted railways tunnels, canals and in one case, a car-racing track. It’s a good thing I watched that video of a foundry a few weeks back, or I’d have had a hard time visualizing the climax of 'Hawley Bank Foundry.'

Even more so than James or other ghost-story writers I’ve encountered, Rolt will give the reader just enough information to guess what likely happened, and then end the story very abruptly, implications hanging. He’s also quite adept at something I’d subconsciously noticed with this genre and still don’t have a convenient name for.

See, the protagonist’s usual job in these stories is to be the witness to/victim of events, so he (the characters are usually men) doesn’t actually do all that much. But at the same time, for the story to be believable we need to believe in him, so he’s got to be characterized economically, yet vividly.

Also the supernatural elements are scarier if our protagonist 'isn’t prone to flights of imagination.' In Rolt’s stories, that means we meet a gallery of veteran railway workers, hard-headed retired manufacturers from the Midlands, etc, along with the usual ambiguously-middle-class urban professionals on holiday. We usually meet them rather briefly.

puddleshark

( +1 )

james_davis_nicoll

Congratulations to the finalists!

2026 Aurora Award ballot announcement

The nominees are ( Read more... )

meningioma

I've been looping 幸福絶頂!! りむ・で・らてんと☆ and YUNYUN HARDCORE today, i really want to play all the new songs...
I also drew them! yay!
yunyun

also, happy 4.20

quillpunk

Throne keeps emailing me that 'my fans miss me' orz, and it's getting to be kind of annoying. So this is me linking my throne wishlist again, freshly added with some new books and of course some bookbinding material. I currently have four projects in pogress!

Maybe if I get some views on the page, even if nobody buys me a gift, the emails will at least slow down. (They keep getting my hopes up and it's bumming me out)

Link: https://throne.com/drowsy

duckprintspress

Graphic 1 of 4. A decoration of pink and orange leaves and text on the orange-white-pink gradient of a lesbian pride flag. The text reads: Our Favorite Lesbian Books for Lesbian Visibility Day.

Graphic 2 of 4. Eleven book covers and a decoration of pink and orange leaves on the orange-white-pink gradient of a lesbian pride flag. The books are: Breaking Character by Lee Winter; Brighter Than Scale, Swifter Than Flame by Neon Yang; The Girl from the Sea by Lee Knox Ostertag; But Not Too Bold by Hache Pueyo; Kase-San and Morning Glories by Hiromi Takashima; The Lady's Guide to Celestial Mechanics by Olivia Waite; Goodbye, My Rose Garden by Dr. Pepperco; A Master of Djinn by P. Dj�l� Clark; Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab; Unconquerable Sun by Kate Elliott; Matrix by Lauren Groff.

Graphic 3 of 4. Eleven book covers and a decoration of pink and orange leaves on the orange-white-pink gradient of a lesbian pride flag. The books are: Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone; The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson; One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston; The Beauty's Blade by Feng Ren Zuo Shu; Spent by Alison Bechdel; Alter Ego by Ana C. S�nchez; Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir; She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan; A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine; All the Painted Stars by Emma Denny; The Unbroken by C.L. Clark.

Graphic 4 of 4. Eleven book covers and a decoration of pink and orange leaves on the orange-white-pink gradient of a lesbian pride flag. The books are: Pembroke Park by Michelle Martin; Mrs. Martin's Incomparable Adventure by Courtney Milan; Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle; The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows by Olivia Waite; Navigating With You by Jeremy Whitley; Burning Roses by S.L. Huang; Idlewild by James Frankie Thomas; Yuri Espoir by Mai Naoi; Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo; Proper English by KJ Charles; Skullrunner by Vyvre Argent.

HAPPY LESBIAN VISIBILITY WEEK! We asked our rec list recommenders for books starring lesbian characters, and boy did they deliver! With these books added in, we’ve now recommended over 100 books with lesbian main characters over the past few years (links to those full lists are at the end of the post). The contributors to the list are: Ivy L. James, Tryan A Bex, Shea Sullivan, jumblejen, Evangeline Giaconia, Shannon, Rascal Hartley, Shadaras, Sebastian Marie, Dei Walker, Mikki Madison, Puck, Nina Waters, E. C., and Linnea Peterson.

Breaking Character by Lee Winter
Brighter Than Scale, Swifter Than Flame by Neon Yang
The Girl from the Sea by Lee Knox Ostertag
But Not Too Bold by Hache Pueyo
Kase-San and… series by Hiromi Takashima
The Lady’s Guide to Celestial Mechanics by Olivia Waite
Goodbye, My Rose Garden by Dr. Pepperco
A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark
Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab
Unconquerable Sun by Kate Elliott
Matrix by Lauren Groff
Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone
The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson
One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston
The Beauty’s Blade by Feng Ren Zuo Shu
Spent by Alison Bechdel
Alter Ego by Ana C. Sánchez
Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan
A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine
All the Painted Stars by Emma Denny
The Unbroken by C.L. Clark
Pembroke Park by Michelle Martin
Mrs. Martin’s Incomparable Adventure by Courtney Milan
Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle
The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows by Olivia Waite
Navigating With You by Jeremy Whitley
Burning Roses by S.L. Huang
Idlewild by James Frankie Thomas
Yuri Espoir by Mai Naoi
Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo
Proper English by KJ Charles
Skullrunner by Vyvre Argent

Find these and other books on our Goodreads book shelf, grab our Pagebound.co list, or buy them through the Duck Prints Press Bookshop.org affiliate page.

Join our Book Lover’s Discord server to chat books, fandom, and more!

mific

I'm feeling too tired to write properly about this, but here goes. I'm subscribed to NZ National Geographic online magazine, which is a reasonably trustworthy source, and last Friday I learned that NZ only has 18 days of onshore diesel stored. By now I guess it's down to 15 days. No idea if the article is accessible if you don't have a sub, but here's the link.

I've been ruminating in a confused way about that, since Friday. Will it be the start of supply line collapse here, as we're at the far end of that chain, in worldwide terms? Or just a period of restrictions, annoyances and a degree of belt tightening? It'll affect two things massively - transport, and farming. Like, the trucks that bring food and essentials to supermarkets, and deliver groceries to us, and in the longer term, it'll affect the farms growing the food.

Bring an old bastard who's profoundly unfit and who doesn't get out much, there's not a lot I can do for others, except maybe to help my immediate neighbours in some way. And I vacillate between vague prepping notions, nihilism, and thinking it'll turn out to be nothing after all. But I read apocafics, so I wonder. I mean, my car's petrol tank is fairly full and I use it only occasionally, but if it runs out will there still be buses? Which doubtless run on diesel. And if petrol gets harder to come by will people start stealing it, like, siphoning it off from cars parked outside like mine is, close to the road?

The fuel crisis expert guy in the article, Nathan Surendran, recommends talking to neighbours to prepare, but I'd definitely feel weird if I did that. At this point, anyway, when things alternate between feeling totally normal or like we're all fiddling while Rome burns. Or doesn't burn, due to the lack of diesel.

Guess I'll get an extra grocery delivery in, and make sure I have seeds in case I need to clear my garden beds of flowers and plant veggies more seriously. And I did unearth my camping gas stove and lamp in the last "cyclone", but I think we'll have power, as most of our grid runs on hydroelectricity (with the parts to repair the power stations probably delivered by diesel-powered trucks).

Well, we'll see if this is anything. Covid was fast. A week or three of worrying reports then (for us, here) whammo, lockdown. It felt surreal at the time. This is like that pre-Covid prodromal period with some signs and warnings cropping up but no one here taking it seriously, mostly. And our government now is largely shits and idiots, not a decent crisis leader like Jacinta, who actually listened to experts.

I'll keep fiddling, and let you know how it goes.

themanemod posting in

the_mane_event

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james_davis_nicoll

Looking for more romance in your SF? Look no further...

Five Science Fictional Solutions to Finding Your One True Love

larryhammer

For Poetry Monday:

A Sapphic Dream, George Moore

I love the luminous poison of the moon,
The silence of illimitable seas,
Vast night, and all her myriad mysteries,
Perfumes that make the burdened senses swoon

And weaken will, large snakes who oscillate
Like lovely girls, immense exotic flowers,
And cats who purr through silk-enfestooned bowers
Where white-limbed women sleep in sumptuous state.

My soul e’er dreams, in such a dream as this is,
Visions of perfume, moonlight and the blisses
Of sexless love, and strange unreached kisses.

Moore (1852-1933) is best known for adapting French naturalism into English fiction, but before he turned novelist he was a poet under the influence of French symbolists. (He was also a childhood friend of Oscar Wilde.) This is from his first collection, Flowers of Passion (1878). After all the preceding orientalist imagery, that “sexless love” gets some heavy sideeye. Commit to the bit!

---L.

Subject quote from Hotel California, Eagles, and yes colitas are cannabis buds.

mishey22 posting in

abc_onceupon

"Mother's Little Helper" is the sixteenth episode of Season Six of ABC's Once Upon a Time. It was written by Paul Karp after a story by Edward Kitsis & Adam Horowitz, and directed by Billy Gierhart. It is the one hundredth and twenty-seventh episode of the series overall, and premiered on April 9, 2017.

The title card features the forest covered with spiderwebs.

aurumcalendula

Still no joy on my hunt for a functional StudioWorks Wiseguy season 1 DVD set (if disc 3 works at all, 'The Marriage of Heaven and Hell' is very glitchy and 'No One Gets Out of Here Alive' refuses to play altogether).

(I'd think about asking Wahl if he has transcripts of his commentaries, but it looks like he doesn't have a website outside of Facebook and the idea of messaging him on Facebook weirds me out.)

I finished watching season 1 of NCIS: Hawai'i this weekend - I enjoyed it overall and I like that one of the season's significant subplots was Lucy and Kate's romance!

I also finally got around to making subtitles for a bunch of the fanvids I finished this year (I'd been kinda putting them off).

cooperscreosote

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Current Mood: giggly

james_davis_nicoll

lucy_roman posting in

drabble_zone

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princessofgeeks

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Current Mood: excited

cloversome posting in

dw_community_promo

hello!

just wanted to promote my new DW comm

queerbookclub!

the community is a no pressure book club dedicated to fiction books of all genres that are queer in some way! each month we take suggestions on what the next month's book should be and we vote on it. if you're not interested in the book for the month, that's perfectly fine! you are free to come and go as you please. :)

we plan to start in may and currently book nominations for may are open until april 26th.

hope to see you there!

sallymn

Because I got distracted, but they are up on Ao3 now, from prompts on threesentenceficathon and done for picowrimo.

- for Stargate Atlantis, and the prompt 'creatures' here (and yes, the creatures are unblushingly self-indulgent Lovecraftian ripoffs :),

- for The Sentinel, and the prompt being 'three sentences: first is past tense, second is present tense, last is future tense' it is therefore very very short and here,

- and for The Untamed and the prompt 'any small child (or adult character zapped into a small child by magic or science), tiny terror' (the fandom loves de-aging, but I don't recall seeing this particular character done... may extend it later, Or not.) here.

Current Music: Westlake - The Book of Fish

siria

Another year has gone by! It's meme time.

First up, ordered by hits.

( Annual AO3 Meme )

As is traditional to say: no huge movement. Every fic in my top 10 had fewer hits this year than it had the year before, with MCU having the steepest drop-off. H50 continues to be popular to an extent that quietly baffles me. Maybe one day that silly Suits ficlet will drop out of the top 10.

jazzyjj posting in

awesomeers

It's challenge time!

Comment with Just One Thing you've accomplished in the last 24 hours or so. It doesn't have to be a hard thing, or even a thing that you think is particularly awesome. Just a thing that you did.

Feel free to share more than one thing if you're feeling particularly accomplished!

Extra credit: find someone in the comments and give them props for what they achieved!

Nothing is too big, too small, too strange or too cryptic. And in case you'd rather do this in private, anonymous comments are screened. I will only unscreen if you ask me to.

Go!

abyss_valkyrie posting in

fandom10in30

Hello, all! We have some entries in already.
There are 12 days remaining for Round 63: Let's go outside to end.

Participants that need to enter their sets:

1.tinny
2.debris4spike
3.abyss_valkyrie

glinda

I need some help/advice. (I definitely still know at least a few fannish Canadians right?)

So I’ve been thinking about going on holiday later this year, maybe end of September, beginning of October. Originally I’d planned either coastal Spain or bimbling around the low countries on an inter-rail ticket. (My local airport flies directly to Schipol, trains from there around Europe are easy.) There is - as of like a week ago - an absolute shitshow going on with the new post-Brexit passport controls/biometrics for UK travellers with the current advice being to get to the airport at least 3 hours early. And look, this may all be sorted by September, but I got caught in the post covid/Brexit nonsense on a work trip to France a few years ago - fucking running with a giant rucksack of Camera kit through Charles De Galle airport from passport control to my gate with a gate agent - and I’m not keen to repeat the experience. So between programmes the other day I pulled up seat61 intending to look at fun inter-rail options via Eurostar because, so my internal monologue went if I need to be at the airport that early I better be flying transatlantic at least. And like fuck am I going to the states while Trump’s in office…

…Yeah.

So back in 2008, when I worked in a call centre and used to plan train adventures between calls to keep myself sane, one of my favourite ‘and while I’m dreaming I’d like a pony’ plans was to do the ‘Canadian’, through the Rockies, across the prairies, across a fair chunk of Canada really. I spent way too long looking at pictures taken out the domes of the viewing carriages along that route. It was out of my budget, and oh goodness, I could not cope with the logistical uncertainty - the train shares tracks with freight, which has priority, so when it’s late it’s not minutes it’s hours, even now with the adjusted compensatory timetable they still recommend you don’t book onward travel or flights for at least 24 hours after your expected arrival time. But all these years later, I can afford it - not the fancy ‘prestige’ option, but the tiny individual sleeper cabin? A couple of nights in Toronto and Vancouver at either end to explore those cities and act as a buffer zone? Totally do-able.

Given the state of the world right now, neither Japan or Australia feel entirely feasible right now - I was never going to be willing to fly via Dubai, it was always going to be via Singapore, nonetheless - the logistics are just beyond me right now. But Canada. I could do Canada. And I’ve wanted to do that specific train journey for a very long time. I’d half planned to get my other bathroom re-done, but the thought of taking that money and turning it into a new bathroom suite when there’s so many places I’ve never been and things I’ve never done, just feels so pointless. I want to knock a destination off my life-list.

So Canadians - or just folks who’ve spent time in Canada - what’s your advice? What am I missing/not taking into consideration? Which direction do I go: East to West (with a detour to Vancouver island) or West to East (with a detour to Montreal?) What time of year? (I was thinking Autumn colour but I’m persuadable. However, I remember Chicago in February, and my friend C’s other bridesmaid flew in to meet us from Manitoba, and nothing she said made me want to do Winnipeg in winter…Would Spring be a better choice?) Should I stop off along the way? If so, where? Have I, in fact, lost my damn mind?

Current Mood: curious
Current Music: Alanis Morisette - Head Over Feet

beanside

Today's subject line is courtesy of the lovely

dine 's daily post, which reminded me how much I like this song. My body decided that 3am was an appropriate wake up call, which no, body. It is not. I'm still working off the sleep debt from the NYC trip on Saturday, so 3 is pushing it. Oh well, I'll deal.

It's going to be psychotically busy today at work, though it's been psychotically busy every day lately. There's just no breaks to the calls. It's just back to back calls the moment you log in.
We need ore people, but the higher ups just think we need more efficient people, and won't give us any more people. Hell, they wouldn't even backfill my job, which is why I get to spend part time on the phones. I'll admit, as I'm settling into the job, I'm doing less and less time on the phone, especially in the later part of the week where we'll have slightly less call volume.

I have to decide what I want to have for dinner tonight. I'm considering the halibut, but I need to decice what to put on it. I have a great tasting blackening seasoning, but it might be a litlte spicy for me. I'll think upon it. Probably will be the fish and maybe some baked potatoes in olive oil and seasonings. I've got some great Hawaiian blends from Kaulua Seasoning Companywho I know I've mentioned before. We got more seasonings to try. Some of it is rather spicy, but some of them are just really flavorful. But I'm leaning towards just sprinkling the blackening seasoning lightly on one corner for me, because I think Jess and my sister would enjoy it. Or there's a lemon fisherman's seasoning that might be even better. The halibut might be too delicate for the other.

Yesterday was a good day. We picked up the dog from daycare, and he was SO excited. He barked and yelled at us for a while. It was very sweet. He came home and was a little clingy for 0.5 seconds, and then he sighed and flopped on the couch and fell asleep. It was great. He was so very tired.

Then, we had a couple of hours to relax before we had to get ready for game. First up, was my slightly delayed Mounjaro shot, which continues to burn like a sonofabitch. I think the new dose started working immediately, because I got full much faster and with more finality, and then I stayed full for a long time. I'm going to have to watch what I shove in on the boat, because otherwise, I will feel like ass if I overindulge.

As per usual for an early game day, I put in the order for some dumplings to come at Biobreak. I was vibrating before game, just so eager and nervous to start the new session. Finally it was showtime, and we started. It went really well, despite not all of my players feeling their best, but it was a lot of fun. My players bought into the characters and the world, and we had an awesome time. Everyone was generous and let each player have the spotlight, and they have such awesome characters!

We have Hollie, a rogue whose children were recently kidnapped, and she is trying to find them. There's Dalton, a paladin who did bad shit in the past, and now is a pacifist. We've got Rowan, who is an unpredictable shifter, and we've got Nix, who is a total sociopathic pied piper bard. It's going to be fun bringing the party together and seeing what changes will occur as they find family and friendship. (The answer may be that they murder each other, but we'll see!) This session was mostly set up. I did the same thing I did for Crooked Moon, where I gave each character an introductory vignette, which worked really well. I had them send me music that would represent their character, and played that softly as they were introduced and had their little set up scenes. I felt like it gave the player a chance to get into the character's headspace, but it also introduces the other players to that character, so they could buy into them and the game. By the time we got to introducing the characters to each other, everyone was just full into it. Even the player who wasn't feeling up to snuff perked up and was able to somewhat forget about it for a few hours. I think it's going to be a really fun campaign. I have no idea how they're going to react to some of those side quests. The players were still in the discord chat talking about the characters and the game 4 hours after it was finished, so I'm guessing it went okay.

After that, I was so tired that I laid down for a couple of hours to nap. It wasn't 100% sucessful. I mostly dozed and had nightnaresm but I at least got a little rest. I dreagged my ask out of my bed long eough to sit for a couple of hours and nibble some appetizers for dinner, then went back to bed, took sleepy pills and crashed out for a nice sleep. Kind of a short sleep, but it happens.

17 days to vacation. The cruise app has begun to add things to the daily program, and soon the boarding passes will drop (at around 2 weeks, but I check every morning.) This weekend, I need to look through my bags, and just verify that I have everything. I believe I need to add either my orange dress, or the orange cardigan to the bag for Orange Night on the ship. Being that Holland America is not shockingly of Dutch heritage, they have a night each cruise to celebrate that heritage wiht Dutch food and orange clothes and Dutch flags. It should be super fun, whatever night they end up doing it. I think I have everything else in there. I need to find room for our sound machine, and my pills, and whatever orange thing I want to take. There's a couple of other dresses that I kind of want to take, but I'm going to be good and not put my suitcase over 50 lbs.

I confirmed with the car that's picking us up on during our Saturday NYC trip before they dropped us off. So we are all set for a 3:30-4am pickup on 5/7. And then, it shall be off towards Seattle.

I'm looking forward to and nervous about our first day in Seattle/Vancouver. We're getting up at probably about 2 am to leave at 3:30am. Then, we shall fly to Seattle, and thanks to the time difference will be landing at about 10am Pacific time. For us, it'll be 8 hours later. Hopefully, I can sleep on the flight. After that, our car service will whisk us away to the Space Needle and Pike Plade Market, and possibly a nice park to get pictures of the skyline. Then, it's off to Vancouver, arriving in around 5:30-6. After that, we have reservations at Hy's Steakhouse for our celebratory "Yay vacation" dinner. By the time we get back to the hotel, it'll be roughly 9am, or midnight our time, making it a 22 hour day for us. That seems like I a lot.

The next day shall be all sightseeing in Vancouver. The hop on, hop off bus will whisk us through the area up til 5pm. After that, we shall split up and go to our respective dinners. Ours shall be an AYCE Koreak BBQ. I don't know what theirs shall be. There was talk about a seafod and chop house.

Then, we shall see Mortal Kombat II and have fun. And then we shall get on the boat the next afternoon.

IT's getting so close. It seemed so long when I put the deposit down. Over a year ago. And i've watched the clock slowly count down and here we are.

Okay, time to get myself woken up and prepared for the day. Everyone have an outstanding Monday!

oursin

Happy birthday,

forthwritten!

trillingstar

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ysabetwordsmith

These are some posts from the later part of last week in case you missed them:
Nature
Fossils
Read "Carcinization"
Birdfeeding
Poem: "Food Is Everything We Are"
Nature
Moment of Silence: Sid Krofft
Today's Adventures
Water
Science
Birdfeeding
Creative Jam
Philosophical Questions: Free Speech
Birdfeeding
Follow Friday 4-17-26: Merlin
Poem: "Walnut Park"
Quantum Physics
Birdfeeding
Community Thursdays
Survival Skills
Art
Climate Change
Birdfeeding
Good News

Poem: "Walnut Park" has 29 comments. Early Humans has 22 comments. Philosophical Questions: Pregnancy has 66 comments. Safety has 77 comments.

The weather has been cooler here. There's a frost warning tonight. Seen at the birdfeeders this week: a mixed flock of sparrows and house finches, a pair of cardinals, a brown-headed cowbird, a male goldfinch, and a fox squirrel. Red-winged blackbirds have been singing overhead. I heard a bluejay screaming but didn't see it. Currently blooming: daffodils, violets, tulips, anemone, Solomon's seal, pansies, violas, sweet alyssum, bleeding heart, chokecherries, alliums, lilies of the valley. Flower buds: peonies. Green fruit: mulberries. I have a bunch more flowers to plant too.

Current Mood: busy

slashmarks posting in

pinchhits

goreswap is a multifandom exchange for fic and art, featuring gore. Assignments must be at least 500 words or a sketch on unlined paper, and contain significant gore content.

Rules | AO3 Collection

Current Pinch Hit Post

For details or to claim, see the pinch hit post above. These assignments are due April 23 at 11:59 PM EDT.

Pinch Hit #3: Art, Fic - 镇魂 | Guardian (TV 2018), 镇魂 | Guardian - priest

~~Pinch Hit #5: Fic - Night Prince - Jeaniene Frost, グノーシア | Gnosia (Visual Novel), Dracula Rising (Cartoon)~~

~~Pinch Hit #13: Art, Fic - Stranger Things (TV 2016), 지금 우리 학교는 | All of Us Are Dead (TV), The Walking Dead (TV)~~

~~Pinch Hit #16: Art, Fic - NoPixel (Web Series), Runescape (Video Games), Iron Lung (2026), Video Blogging RPF, MiSide (Video Game), 文豪ストレイドッグス | Bungou Stray Dogs~~

~~Pinch Hit #18: Fic - 炎の蜃気楼[ミラージュ] | Honoo no Mirage | Mirage of Blaze, 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Dexter (TV), Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities (TV)~~

thawrecka

Now I've watched through the first season of Prince of Tennis II and the specials, which is completely uncharted territory because I haven't read any of the sequel manga. This training camp is so stupid (don't go to a mysterious training camp in the woods about which you know almost nothing and which has terrifying gates, kids), and I'm shocked and surprised to discover Echizen is a cool jacket guy?! Because that jacket sure is cool!

Atobe lightly smacking Hiyoshi on the butt with his racket - wow, I never found them shippy before, but suddenly... Though as a Tezuka/Atobe shipper I am also eating so well. As a fan I feel serviced. Look at their eyes sparkling at each other.

Kaidoh carrying Momo on his back up the mountain is also insanely shippy.

Everything about this mountain training camp is fucking stupid, but I've accepted this Prince of Tennis is about nonsense boys adventures and not about actual tennis, so I'm enjoying it. Shishido and Gakuto squabbling is so entertaining to me. I really enjoyed Inui and Yanagi's data doubles moment. The Shitenhoji dorks have grown on me. Even Sanada is growing on me, which I thought was impossible!

I'm never going to like the Rikkai characters the way Rikkai fans do 😂 but I'm invested in so many characters banding together to turn Kirihara into a functional human being. It's sort of fascinating how completely Rikkai fucked themselves up, now that they're in a context where they're interacting people from outside their toxic mess. Yukimura has to learn how to enjoy things, and Sanada basically hates himself, and Yanagi even feels guilty for what they all did to Kirihara.

It's amazing how after so many episodes of watching the losers camp be forced to climb mountains, get chased by eagles, and sleep rough, switching back to the winners camp seems so decadent and infuriating in comparison! They get catered food and nice baths!!! Atobe brought his own rose petals for a rose bath!!! Maddening!

It is cute watching Eiji and Ohtori be so sad and lost without their doubles partners, though.

Me when Atobe developed X-ray vision: Of course this would happen, I don't know why I expected otherwise.

but_can_i_be_trusted posting in

100words

Title: 'Emergency'
Fandom: Original Fiction
Rating: G
Notes: Crossposted to

anythingdrabble and

vocab_drabbles. ( Challenges used cut due to length. )

( Emergency )

haunted_cherries

(b/c OF COURSE I would make the Plave-specific entry have a title with Plave lyrics xD)

I was feeling down the other day so instead of moping about, I switched it up and went out into the world! Was feeling brave about being social, so I went to an album release party for one of my fave kpop groups, Plave!! Their latest album came out recently and it so nice to meet other fans in my area and trade photocards with them!! ; u; (I was scared SHITLESS as I often am when meeting new people but FUNK YEAH WE MADE IT AND WE DID THAT SHIT ^ o^)/)

I'm usually so nervous about this kind of stuff since I consider myself a much more casual kpop fan, but this honestly felt really nice. ❤️ You can check out my haul from the event in the photos on Pillowfort (including some of the photocards that I can FINALLY cross off my wishlist and MY FIRST LIGHTSTICK LET'S GOOOOOOOOOO!!!)!!

Afterwards I drove to the top floor of one of my favorite parking garages that overlooks downtown (thankfully it was DEAD) and was just listening to some Plave music for a while. It was so peaceful and helped clear my head a LOT.

Even better that I came home and finally got around to playing a Date with Death, and I didn’t expect that game to be so HILARIOUS xD DEFINITELY gonna circle back and play the DLC for the first one before I start playing the sequel that just came out…👀

Current Music: Born Savage - Plave

cahn

Last week: Sieges are awful. Josephus tells us that Titus really totally felt bad about all the awfulness (even though he didn't stop them) and there is a theory that maybe by "us" he meant "Berenice." Titus had dancing boys?? (Josephus does not mention any, sadly.) Does Samuel the Lamanite in the Book of Mormon owe anything to Josephus speaking truth to the wicked? Unclear. Talmud on the Sages vs. the Zealots as an interesting correlated story to Josephus. Poppea's complexity including both an interest in (conversion to?) Judaism as well as being ruthless; comparison to Constantine's much better press.

This week: The temple is destroyed.

Next week: End of Book 6.

torachan

1. Yesterday was Record Store Day (a day to support indie record shops where they have a lot of limited release albums for sale) and we went to Record Surplus when they opened at nine only to find that there was a huge line all the way down the block. The people working there were passing out order sheets so you could write down the things you were interested in (including backups if your top choices were sold out) and Carla filled hers out, but after waiting for about 45 minutes and seeing the line barely move, she decided to tap out and we just went home.

Today we went to see if they had anything left over that she wanted and found several albums on her wishlist, including one of her top most wanted. We probably could have gone back yesterday afternoon or evening to check again, too, as there were only a handful of people who joined the line after us, so after that initial rush you were probably able to just go in the store normally, but it worked out in the end.

2. Tonight Alex came over for her usual Sunday dinner and TV and we were able to give her all the souvenirs we'd collected for her, which turned out to be quite a lot as we'd just been picking up stuff here and there that we thought was something she'd like. We actually found several small items with Gaara from Naruto, her favorite character, just at random shops, when last year we'd had to really go deep into the anime shop areas to find anything Naruto. Maybe it's having a comeback?

3. We've decided to get back into bike riding and that we'd like to get ebikes. The area we live in has a lot of flat spaces, but then also some directions you can't go without a hill, often a steep and/or long one, and having the ebike to get back up the hill would be very helpful, especially for Carla, and (hopefully) make us more likely to actually get out and use the bikes.

I had hoped that there would be somewhere around here that buys used bikes, but there doesn't seem to be, so I'm cleaning the old bikes up to try and sell on Nextdoor or Craigslist or something. I don't think I'll get much for them now, but they cost enough that I'd rather not just put them out on the curb for free. I got mine dusted off and pumped up the tires and took it out for a couple mile ride today and it was so nice. I haven't really ridden my bike much since we got a car again and I wasn't using it for my daily work commute. I'm looking forward to more bike riding in my future, and I think I might even take the old one out a bit while waiting for a buyer.

4. Lately Gemma has been spending a lot of time with Chloe and Chloe has been very tolerant of her. We often see them together on Carla's bed, but the other day they were both out in the dining room by the window.

wordsmithdaily_feed

https://wordsmith.org/words/swale.html

noun: A low tract of land, especially one that is moist or marshy; also, a shallow channel or depression.

https://wordsmith.org/words/swale.html

kaffy_r

Music Meme, Day 27

A song that describes how you feel right now

Another tricky one, given that I can never be sure what I feel at any given moment. But I'll give it a try. Here's the song that had me dancing all day, and I think that's as good a way to describe how I have felt most of today.

There are actually two versions of this; one of them being filmed in L.A. (or at least I think that's where it was filmed) and the other one being very Korean. I think I like both of them for different reasons, so here you go.

Watch on YouTube

And here is a link to yesterday's post which, in turn, can connect to some of my earlier posts.

Current Mood: calm
Current Location: the home office
Current Music: BTS "ON"

rinue

Today, I rewatched the music video for Sufjan Stevens' "Tonya Harding," which is footage of Tonya Harding in the 1991 World Figure Skating Championship. It's the first time I've seen it since the Olympics, and midway through, it hit me how similar it is to the skating of Olympic gold medal winner Alyssa Liu. The muscularity of their figures, the freedom of their movement - it overlaps in ways I don't have words for.

I wouldn't have been aware of Harding in 1991; I didn't (and don't) follow figure skating outside of the Olympics. But I remember in 1994 how much background chatter there was about how female skaters should be demure, balletic, princess-like, and tiny. I'd say the 90s generally were the most screechy body size decade I've lived through, which added to it, but that was separate. This was about what was aesthetically correct for skating.

It was very strange. You were supposed to be proud of Harding because she was on the American team and would run up the points with her very high scoring triple axel nobody else could do, but you needed to acknowledge that she was not the quarterback (she was I guess an offensive lineman?) and that maybe being able to do the triple axel was sort of cheating.

Watching Tanya skate in 1991 and seeing it match Liu in 2026 makes me feel some things. Things that blur into the gymnastics coaching scandal. It's been a bad year for rollbacks of women's rights and open misogyny (and I believe domestic violence homicides are up) but maybe in some pockets we finally broke through pervy old man patriarchy. Look at Alyssa Liu.

ysabetwordsmith

Spring is a perfect time to start a nature journal. I've been talking about it with some friends so I wanted to share some resources here. It doesn't have to be fancy. It can have text, art, photos, pressed leaves, whatever you want to include. There are different approaches; all of them are good. Grab a blank book with plain or lined pages as you prefer, something to write or draw with, and head out to your yard, garden, or a nearby park.

( Read more... )

Current Mood: busy

mrkinch

This morning was even more interesting than four days ago: MacGillivray's Warbler! I heard them right away, two, in fact, one near the gate and one in the expected location. Spring is really here. A good start, but there was much more. Both Western Warbling Vireo and Black-headed Grosbeak at last made it over the ridge, but while I was waiting for the sun I also heard Cassin's Vireo and Western Tanager. There were the usual Orange-crowned Warblers and Wilson's Warblers, even a Townsend's Warbler, which becomes less and less likely every week. There was a Lazuli Bunting in the corner as earlier, and it looked to me as through he was flying the boundaries of a large territory, from the willows to the bay tree, up to the tall weeds on the hillside and back down to the mustard below the trail, singing at each stop. While I was watching him, I happened upon a pair of (silent) Western Kingbirds fluttering along the fence at the top of the ridge, something I usually see just once a year. As well, nearly all the local residents made an appearance, making quite a long list. ( The list: )

One of the Northern Flickers was sitting up in the highest power tower drumming on metal. They seem to appreciate the extra resonance.:)