solarbird | Reading

so now I'm spending some part of my evening with another coworker instead of by myself, which means I can't just summarily turn off the TV. Other people are weird when they want the TV on even if they aren't watching it, but since they think I'm weird for preferring blissful silence I guess sometimes I have to compromise.

Which means that the other day my entertainment choices were either a long and frankly tedious piece on the JFK conspiracy theories, or HP1. Welp, JFK won't get any deader, and practically speaking, JKR won't get any richer. The choice wasn't really very agonizing, is what I'm saying. I feel like maybe it ought to have been, but no. (That place does not have enough channels. If I'm going to be stuck watching TV for even part of the night I really need to figure out how to get my phone on the screen.)

All this led me to realize something that I somehow don't think I ever thought about before, which is that the plot of book 2 doesn't make any fucking sense, like, right from the start. How exactly did Lucius set it up so that he'd happen to bump into the Weasley family? What if they hadn't gone shopping that day? There clearly was a lot of planning that went into this, so what was his backup? Really, none of those plots hold together if you look at them too hard. And that's not too unusual for fiction, but I'm not particularly inclined to be charitable about it.

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conuly

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But never fear, he no longer has a bear living in his crawlspace. He now has two bears.

l33tminion

Was really nice going home for Thanksgiving, though I was feeling under the weather for the first part of the trip. Melissa and her family were also home for the holiday. Simon is four now.

We went out to see the second part of the film adaptation of Wicked, and it was pretty good. Not as good as the first half, but it's stuck adapting the weaker half of the musical after too long an intermission. Worth seeing if you liked the first half.

I started watching Pluribus. Really good. Vince Gilligan's shows have more thought and creativity put into individual shots than many shows put into entire seasons.

Current Mood: restless

kitewithfish

What I’ve Read

The Invention of Love – Tom Stoppard – I read this along with a bookleg recording of the 2000s Broadway production, which is amazing. It’s a deeply compassionate and reserved play that I deeply enjoyed. A friend of mine said this was a foundational work for them, and I absolutely see how. It’s the story of AE Hausman, particularly thru his relationship to the Classics, and the story weaves past and future together thru the Young Housman having conversations with his Old Housman self. I really enjoyed the unexpected appearance of Oscar Wilde, whose trial happened during Hausman’s post-university years.

What I’m Reading

The Fortunate Fall – Cameron Reed – The 1996 cyberpunk book is just deliciously weird. Like, so much weirder than I expected. Also, gay! The book was recently re-issued under the author’s new name.

Into the Drowning Deep – Mira Grant – Ten years ago spooky deep sea mermaids killed everyone on a research mission sponsored by Not The Discovery Channel. Our main character’s sister died, and now she’s going to be able to use her research to figure out what happened for herself. I am slowly working thru all the tentpoles from Be the Serpent, a finished podcast that I deeply enjoyed, and this is one of them! I find Mira Grant to be rather like Michael Crichton in her commitment to Doing the Research on how various elements of her characters’ scientific work remains. I feel like this should be scarier but that might be just the beginning of the book. Grant, like Crichton, has a very visual and cinematic style, and sometimes that works for me and sometimes it does not.

Guillermo del Toro: Cabinet of Curiosities – on hold.

What I’ll Read Next
Natural History of Dragons
The Hunger Games
The Grief of Stones

neonvincent

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Looks like NYPD is popular.

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: House in the woods at the edge of town
Current Music: Rhaco_dactylus Twitch stream

sistawendy

No, that's not dirty.

I submitted (an image of) "Dysphoria Devil" to the Seattle Erotic Art Festival. Well, to the exhibition store anyway; I chickened out submitting to the actual exhibition. I have two prints ready to go. If both sell, I'll get a whopping $36. If not, I have to pick them up, which is going to be a problem because...

...I belatedly realized that SEAF happens less than a week after I'm supposed to have surgery on my face. It is to laugh. I may be designating someone to pick them up, or better in my opinion, donating them to SEAF. I know the latter is an option because a print that I really wanted last year got donated by an artist and snatched up by a volunteer before I could buy it.

Calling "Dysphoria Devil" erotic is stretching things a bit. It's about what it's like to be trans, and I hope to Goddess that nobody takes it as a fetishization of trans women, because that isn't how I meant it. But what it really means is out of my hands once other people see it.

Current Mood: accomplished
Current Location: the living room of the Devil Girl House
Current Music: The Cure & Daniel Avery, "Drone:Nodrone (Daniel Avery Remix)"

conuly

Honestly, if you ban somebody it ought to warn you before you comment on their posts so that if you forget or don't realize you don't end up in an awkward situation.

cosmolinguist

You know you had a bad day when the next day angelofthenorth brings you coffee as soon as she gets home, saying "well your blog post from yesterday made me think you'd need it!"

I actually had a much better day at work today: no meetings to speak of and I even started messing around with the slides for the presentation I have to give on Tuesday. Plus, Tuesday turns out to be the London staff's Christmas lunch and I can go to Wahaca (yes, that's how they spell it) with them, they're all excited about Taco Tuesday.

I was able to slip away from work early enough to walk Teddy before D and I went to see Pillion, which was well-acted and horny (even in the audio description!) and had some genuine funny moments but is a little too Fifty Shades of Gay in that its basic message that being a dom makes you a dickhead who is incapable of healthy relationships. But I had fun and I'm glad we had time for a pint in the twinkly outdoors before coming home to delicious homemade stew and dumplings.

And before I'd finished eating, angelofthenorth offered wanted cinnamon tea and when I made interested noises brought me some in the clear glass mug with the flower petals between its two walls which V bought in the Hebridean Tea Store, and then D asked if anyone wants a mince pie, so I had my first mince pie of the season with the perfect tea pairing for it.

Before bed I emptied the food waste bin, locked the doors, turned off the little plant lights, and changed my bedding. How nice to be in such a functional house, doing my little bit to reset, maintain, upkeep.

All this made me think of Kurt Vonnegut saying:

My uncle Alex Vonnegut, a Harvard-educated life insurance salesman taught me something very important.

He said that when things were really going well, we should be sure to NOTICE it. He was talking about simple occasions, not great victories: maybe drinking lemonade on a hot afternoon in the shade, or smelling the aroma of a nearby bakery; or fishing, and not caring if we catch anything or not, or hearing somebody all alone playing a piano really well in the house next door.

Uncle Alex urged me to say this out loud during such epiphanies: "If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is."

So I do the same now, and so do my kids and grandkids. And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, "If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is."

full_metal_ox posting in

little_details

https://domestic-medicine.com/

This website is an unromanticized purview of historical health care, with an emphasis on household and community practices shared and recorded by women and the overlaps of medicine and cookery.

Author Stephany Hoffelt’s credentials: ( Continue. )

(Content note: Hoffelt, with her lived experience, research into historical context, and insistence upon practical results, has a whole catacomb apiece to pick with both the patriarchal medical establishment and the proponents of a Magical Pagan Witch Sisterhood who got burned by the millions for providing safe and reliable herbal abortifacients.)

james_davis_nicoll

This new Worlds Without Number Bundle presents Worlds Without Number, the tabletop fantasy roleplaying game of far-future sword-and-sorcery adventure from acclaimed designer Kevin Crawford of Sine Nomine Publishing.

Bundle of Holding: Worlds Without Number

cosmolinguist

Thanks to BorrowMyDoggy, we've connected with a neighbor who lives ridiculously close, a retired couple who need help walking their 3-year-old labradoodle. Teddy was named by a tiny grandchild and it's the perfect name for him: he's got the softest curly fur and he loves everyone; when we went over to meet him he almost immediately snuggled into Vee and fell asleep pressed up next to them.

The two of us took Teddy for a small walk on Friday when I was done with work, just as it was getting dark, and Vee did a walk over the weekend while D and I were out and yesterday at the same after-work time but I wasn't able to join this time thanks to an overrunning meeting and counseling at 5:30.

I just got back from walking him now; we didn't go far but I left him sniff around for about 20 minutes. It was really lovely to be walking a dog again.

We met a couple of humans in the park who I didn't recognize and a dog that I did; they know Teddy well and gave him lots of pets, and they thought they recognized me -- "was it a jack russell you had?" Aww. I explained why a dog they knew was being walked by a human they didn't; Teddy's dad is going to have a knee replacement very soon. These two could tell that he's been having more trouble walking. It's lovely how the dog people notice and look out for each other.

malurette

Titre : Trois petits dragons
Auteure : Yue Zhang
Langue : tranduction française du chinois
Type : album jeunesse
Genre : mimi

1ère parution : 2023
Édition : Lécole des loisirs
Format :

(croisé à la librairie de chez mes parents l'an passé ; ça avait l'air mimi)

Trois petits dragons qui vont à l'école de la météo ne font que des bêtises et se retrouvent sur Terre sous la pluie qu'ils ont causée. Ils vont devoir apprendre de leurs erreurs et les réparer...

Aww c'est tout mimi !!

Very cute children's books about three weather-making little dragons mucking it up and having to fix it.

canyonwalker

Things feel like they're spinning out of control at work. No, it's not related to my personal desire to quit though it's possibly for similar reasons. There have been a rash of departures recently— so many that I'm concerned we're losing the ability to get things done.

The recent spate of departures began a few weeks ago. Two members of a team adjacent to my function announced their departures. While they're just 2 from among a team of 15 worldwide they were working with a significant number of my customers. At least two of these customers are asking us "WTF?" right now as the team struggles to fill the gaps.

The reason it's a struggle to fill those gaps is that the team was already cut down to being a skeleton crew. There's no spare bandwidth for other team members to jump in and help. And, in fact, the two employees' reasons for leaving were directly related to the overaggressive cuts a few months ago. They lost trust in management and moved on to jobs at new companies that seemed more stable and offered them career growth.

The next departure that affected my work came right before Thanksgiving. "West", a technical field leader, announced he was leaving. Because West has an executive title I wondered how much of his departure was due to the C-suite and board making cuts, versus West leaving for his own reasons. Some scuttlebutt I've picked up argues West left for his own reasons— though among those were hum not being offered career growth by the C-suite. Either way, his departure is a huge loss to us in technical sales.

Now, these departures were already enough of a struggle to handle, particularly in the customer-facing work I do. But then yesterday a small avalanche of high-level departures hit:

Our Chief Revenue Officer (CRO), the head of sales, is leaving. Unusually, he's leaving before the fiscal year is over. Typically when an account manager or sales leader leaves they finish out a quarter or the fiscal year. That really makes me wonder how much of this decision was his vs. the CEO's and board's. My best hypothesis given underlying sales data is that he was told he'll be dismissed after the FY is over, and he chose instead to leave on his own schedule.

Also, the head of HR is leaving. I'm not sure anybody cares about that, other than her underling who's getting promoted. 🤣 But it's always concerning when members of the C-suite and the next level down start leaving at the same time. What do they see that the rest of us don't?

Minutes after the message announcing the CRO's departure arrived, the CRO sent a message announcing the departure of several people underneath him. We're losing a technical VP— my grandboss— and two Senior Directors. Again, when multiple leaders are leaving at the same time, the rest of us are left to wonder: What risk do they see that we don't? What do they lack confidence in that they've asked us to believe?

So, with all these departures there are problems on two levels. First, execution. With so many people leaving a levels from individual contributors to senior leaders it will be harder to get critical things done for the next several months until new people can be brought onboard and gotten up to speed. Second, strategy. What do all these leadership departure portend? How many were driven by the board of directors— and are their cuts going from overly aggressive to just plain nuts? How many departures are because leaders don't believe the future they've asked the rest of us to buy into?

dialecticdreamer

Cold Comforts
By Dialecticdreamer/Sarah Williams
Part 1 of 2, complete
Word count (story only): 1245
[Early December 2016]

:: On a cold, sleeting day, Shiv wants to spend part of his time off at Flights of Fancy. The problem is that he finds the door iced shut. He and Fancy get to work, and later get to relax together. Part of the Shiv an Omaha story threads in the Polychrome Heroics universe; this story was written for the December prompt events, from an idea suggested by

ysabetwordsmith, with my warmest thanks! ::

On to part two

Sleet pummeled the sidewalks, bouncing away and clattering against Shiv’s boots on both top and sides as he picked a path toward Flights of Fancy. The hood of his sweatshirt had long since soaked through, but the thick jacket and gloves kept his body warm. The corduroy pants were needed in the nasty weather, but the faint noise that they made was nearly too much for him to bear. He slipped, slightly, and spent the next two blocks focused on taking slow, deliberate steps and rolling his weight from the ball of his foot back to his heels before taking the next step.

By the time he reached the door of the bookshop, the hood was too wet to be any use against the gusting wind, and the cold air had slapped his cheeks berry red.
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Current Mood: awake

malurette

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james_davis_nicoll

A study of the carefree life of an animal at the bottom of the food chain.

Bambi (Bambi, volume 1) by Felix Salten (Translated by Jack Zipes)

rionaleonhart

I've just finished the Silent Hill 2 remake!

'James, you can't keep doing this!' I exclaimed, as James prepared to jump down yet another seemingly bottomless pit. I paused for a moment to consider. 'Although he might be thinking the same thing about me. I always have to press the jump button twice before he actually jumps, as if he's going "are you sure it's a good idea to jump into this pit?"'

( Notes on the Silent Hill 2 remake, up to the end of the game. )

The ending stats screen gave me two stats that combined alarmingly: I'd been playing for 19h4m, or 1144m. I'd checked the map 1,131 times. I can't believe I checked the map almost exactly one time per minute.

That's a lie. I can absolutely believe that. I'm frankly surprised it wasn't more; I love checking the map in Silent Hill. It makes me feel so much more secure when I know where I am and where I'm going!

I just darted into the sitting room, where Tem was hanging out, and picked up the Silent Hill 2 remake's box to bring back to my bookshelf.

Tem: Going off to be alone?
Riona: I was just thinking that it does look like that. 'James and I are going to go upstairs now.'
Tem: 'James and I are just going up to my bedroom.'

What a fantastic remake! It's so clearly built on a deep love for the original game, and that really pays off. I absolutely loved it. It's been so good to spend time with James Sunderland, one of my most longstanding and unfortunate blorbos.

conuly

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conuly

I have the distinct impression that Adrian Tchaikovsky doesn't like Donald Trump.

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solarbird

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November 2025

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Page Summary

conuly - Switched shifts
tb - The snowflakes bring all the turkeys to the yard...
conuly - I had no idea bears were so squishy!
l33tminion - Remember That Time Back in Act One?
kitewithfish - Wednesday Reading Meme for Dec 12 2025
neonvincent - Now the most watched Macy's Parade video
sistawendy - Nun submits to SEAF!
conuly - Hey, can somebody who knows pauraque ask if they intended to ban me?
cosmolinguist - Invoking the Kurt Vonnegut rule
full_metal_ox in little_details - Resource: Domestic Medicine.
james_davis_nicoll - Bundle of Holding: Worlds Without Number
cosmolinguist - Teddy
malurette - [livre] Trois petits dragons
canyonwalker - It Feels Like It's Spinning Out Of Control
dialecticdreamer - Cold Comforts (part 1 of 2, complete)
malurette - (no subject)
james_davis_nicoll - Bambi (Bambi, volume 1) by Felix Salten (Translated by Jack Zipes)
rionaleonhart - You Can't Try Bras On In Front Of James; He'll Find It Very Confusing.
conuly - Merry Early Christmas!
conuly - Just finished Bear Head, the second Dogs of War book

収束ゾーンでのライフ: Life in the Convergence Zone

cheers, love - the cavalry's queer!

Reading

Switched shifts

The snowflakes bring all the turkeys to the yard...

I had no idea bears were so squishy!

Remember That Time Back in Act One?

Wednesday Reading Meme for Dec 12 2025

Now the most watched Macy's Parade video

Nun submits to SEAF!

Hey, can somebody who knows pauraque ask if they intended to ban me?

Invoking the Kurt Vonnegut rule

Resource: Domestic Medicine.

Bundle of Holding: Worlds Without Number

Teddy

[livre] Trois petits dragons

It Feels Like It's Spinning Out Of Control

Cold Comforts (part 1 of 2, complete)

(no subject)

Bambi (Bambi, volume 1) by Felix Salten (Translated by Jack Zipes)

You Can't Try Bras On In Front Of James; He'll Find It Very Confusing.

Merry Early Christmas!

Just finished Bear Head, the second Dogs of War book

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November 2025

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