TV night once more

Oct. 24th, 2025 12:18 am
silver_chipmunk: (Default)
[personal profile] silver_chipmunk
So I actually managed to get up at 10:00, amazing because I forgot to turn on the alarm so there was nothing to wake me up.

I had breakfast and coffee, then called [personal profile] mashfanficchick who said I should come over around 3:00. So I puttered online awhile, then showered and dressed.

Then I did something that I'd been meaning to do for a few days. One of the two lightbulbs in the ceiling lamp of the kitchen blew out so I had to change it. This is more involved than it sounds as I have high ceilings, a bit higher than eight feet, and I am short, 5' 3" if I haven't shrunk. So I have to stand on the very top of the step ladder, the step that isn't supposed to be stood on (but everyone does) and stretch to reach the lamp. It is always scary and nerve-wracking.

But I did it in a shorter time than usual so I am proud. After that I puttered online until 2:15 when I started getting ready to go.

I took the 44 bus, and then the 46, and got to [personal profile] mashfanficchick's by 3:15, so it took a bit longer than usual. There was another fare check by the transit police along the way They didn't even bother to scan my card this time, I guess I look responsible, or else they just don't care.

Anyway I got there and we hung out talking til 6:00 when ze had to do something private on the phone, so I went down to Starbucks and had a pumpkin spice latte and attempted to Team the FWiB. Unfortunately the music in the Starbucks was so loud that it didn't work out, so we got off and I started reading the book I had brought with me, Somewhere Beyond the Sea, the sequel to The House on the Cerulean Sea. (I finished Wooing the Witch Queen last night. Very nice and satisfying ending to a cozy romantic book)

[personal profile] mashfanficchick called me and said ze would meet me there and we'd get food for dinner. So that's what we did. We decided on Indian. I got chicken korma and a mango lassi.

We took the food back to zer place and ate, and at 8:00 we watched 911. It was a very good episode. At 8:30 during the commercials I called Middle Brother. He is fine, took a walk in a park yesterday but was disappointed there was no water in the pond. He's looking forward to Halloween though.

At 9:00 we watched 911: Nashville, which was better than the preceeding episodes were. Still awfully soapy though.

We hung out for awhile afterward, and then I Ubered home. Got here and fed the pets, and started here.

Gratitude List:

1 The FWiB.

2. Good TV.

3. Got the lightbulb changed with no problems.

4. The new Lois McMaster Bujold Penrick and Desdemona novella is out (though not for Nook yet, darn it)

5. Indian food.

6. Middle Brother is well.

(no subject)

Oct. 23rd, 2025 08:54 pm
greghousesgf: (Boingboing)
[personal profile] greghousesgf
Had some Lapsang Souchong this morning before I went out. I had a great breakfast of a crab and jack cheese omelet, grits and an orange ginger scone. One of the buses had the extra comfortable seats (the local buses usually don't have those). Had a gimongous bowl of hot chocolate at a cafe I hadn't been to before. Couldn't get the skull cakes, Nabolom didn't have them for some reason. Heard some live jazz over at the Berkeley cheese board collective, bought some of their pastries to make up for not being able to get the skull cakes. When I got home my stove was busted for some reason I can't even guess at and I needed to fix dinner but I couldn't find the maintenance guys so I wound up having to do it myself.
[personal profile] partypaprika posting in [community profile] heavyartillery





Hi All! A quick reminder that sign-ups for the exchange close tomorrow, October 24 at 11:59 pm ET. You can sign up here or by going to the Heavy Artillery Holiday Exchange 2025's profile and then selecting "Sign-up Form" from the options on the left. 

The full FAQ can be found here

Please leave any questions in the comments or reach out to the moderating team.

Palestine/Gaza

Oct. 23rd, 2025 08:25 pm
toastykitten: (Default)
[personal profile] toastykitten posting in [community profile] thisfinecrew
Even though there is ostensibly a ceasefire in place, not enough aid is getting in, Israel is also bombing Lebanon despite the ceasefire they agreed to with the Lebanese, and Israeli settlers beat Palestinian farmers during their olive harvest in the West Bank

So 1 thing I've been doing is joining a weekly Zoom "Power Hours for Palestine" every Thursday at 9am PST. Feel free to join me. Today we called our reps regarding HR 3565, sent a few letters, and were updated on different things going on. It's hosted by Rising Majority

Also a Jews Demand Action letter toolkit, signed by many including Spencer Ackerman, Debra Winger, etc. 

Since last I posted:
Some things to read/watch:Places to donate to:

Dear Yuletide Writer 2025

Oct. 23rd, 2025 09:15 pm
karanguni: (Default)
[personal profile] karanguni

Dear Yuletide writer,

Thank you for writing for me! I'm a generally omnivorous reader and excited to read anything that you come up with – everything in this letter is optional. Have fun!

AO3: karanguni
tl;dr: I happily opt into gen, porn, unusual media types, and crossovers with fandoms I have read/written/requested before; ignore or take as many parts of this wall of text as you want! My AO3 account has gifts enabled for treats.

Initial D, Kamusari Series, Heike Monogatari, The Bedlam Stacks, The Culture )

(no subject)

Oct. 23rd, 2025 09:06 pm
flemmings: (hasui rain)
[personal profile] flemmings
So rush tickets are not SRO-- that's literally standing room,  no chairs or equivalents allowed, also in the balcony so no, not SRO. Rush if I understand correctly are half off whatever seats are left day of, purchaseable online but no, I want to ask in person if there's a place for my walker. Still thinking about it. There's no time constraints on rush because it's a lot more than $15 wherever you sit. So I could do virtual funeral-- am not up for an Anglican mass with the stand up sit fown and kneel, which titanium knees don't do, not to mention the handshake of peace that I hope they've dispensed with in these plaguey times  but get they haven't.  And then go down to Queen St. to check the nox office. Shall continue to consider.

Today was blowy showery October,  sun and sprinkles and the great cumulus clouds of autumn doing their Hasui/ Baroque/ Maxfield Parrish thing. Had to go out because no electricity and my house is dark. To Loblaws for one of their remarkably good roast beef sandwiches, library for the hold on Cinder House, home to sit on porch and read same and watch Hydro guys hook up transformers: in doing which they cut 2 feet off Mrs. Prof Islamic Studies' conifer because it was too close to the wires. Hope she doesn't mind. Wish I had a line running to a transformer so the guys would take their billhook to my linden, but no. If I want that thing trimmed must jump through city hoops to get permission, as I know from six years ago, and the city hoops are a pain.

Got too cold outside even with winter jacket so came in and read in the study which at least has light. Eventually came to the surface, looked at clock saying 4:28, clicked on light and behold, illumination. So that's alright.
lannamichaels: Astronaut Dale Gardner holds up For Sale sign after EVA. (Default)
[personal profile] lannamichaels


In my reading of Game Of Thrones fic, I developed an urge for fic where Elia Martell Targaryen (why some married women are only referred to by their maiden names and some are always only referred to by their married names, I do not know) and her kids don't die. It would be interesting to see what it would change!, I thought. Surely it doesn't need to change a huge amount necessarily, but it would great to see it!

And so I went looking and found a bunch and it turns out.

It turns out that when you want fic where legitimate claimants to a throne survive, you get a ton of fic about Targaryen restoration. You get so many fics that are love letters to the Targaryens.

I don't care about Targaryen restoration! I don't like the Targaryens and see no reason why I should! (Except for Aemon, the Targaryen maester who is still alive at the Wall, I allow that he's really intruiging.)

Also I will admit the first time I saw the pairing of Jon Snow/Rhaenys Targaryen, I had a full blown "why? why the fuck?"

But yeah I get it, if Jon Snow is her long lost half-brother, then it's true Targaryen heritage to ship them. I don't see it, I don't even like the ship, and it's interesting how I have no problem whatsoever with Jon Snow/Sansa Stark, who were raised as half-siblings, but my reaction to Jon/Rhaenys is "I'm completely uninterested in reading this". Also I'm not really into Jon/Daenerys.

Maybe it's the whole enforced-incest of the Targaryens? IDK.

But also.

Reading the fic.

Okay so I am never going to read the books, I have long since been warned off from all the grimdark rape, and I am never going to watch the show, ditto.

I did not realize how small the amount of time the Targaryens have actually been ruling in Westeros. They only showed up like 300 years ago???? In a setting where people are like "my family has been ruling in this one spot for 10,000 years" or whatever, the Targaryens are new kids on the block who showed up with dragons, conquered everyone, had several (!) really bad rulers, constantly married each other (in violation of the local religion, and no one else was allowed to copy their behavior because they're special), seemed to do very little marrying out to the locals because who needs to shore up support, dealt with civil war/rebellion, lost their dragons, had a really fucking awful last king, and then, surprise, they were overthrown.

And you want those folks back? You are nostalgic for the wonderful days of the people who showed up five minutes ago and were generally terrible?

Also blowing my mind was, okay, I had been told over and over again that Baratheons all look a certain way since time immemorial and so that's why obviously if you look into it, Cersei's kids can't be Robert's.

But the Baratheons were founded as a new house by a Targaryen bastard. The looks of the Baratheons are the opposite of the Targaryens. Also this is also only like 300 years ago, and Westeros seems to enjoy a society where there are several pathways to ensure that only one or two of your sons are allowed to have children (maesters, the wall, endless wars).

So all this is kind of amusing from a "reading fic without knowing canon" perspective, the slow unfolding of, oh my god, what is going on in this canon. But also the mismatch of people who have actually read/watch this canon and what they want to write (Targaryen restoration, Targaryen incest) vs. me who has not done that, and what I want to read.

But actually what I want to write is a fic where Jon Snow actually is Ned Stark's bastard. Ah, yes, I see here that "Ned Stark is very honorable". Uh-huh. Well, he had an affair with a woman who is a sex worker/laundress/woman who was interested before his marriage and then, because he is so honorable, he took the child in and raised him, rather than leaving Jon Snow to live in poverty.

This explains nothing about why Ned Stark wouldn't tell Jon Snow about this mother but I'm sure we can come up with something (the mother was already married? who cares).

But I'm not writing this, entirely because I have no idea of a plot to go along with this. Oh and also I'm not reading/watching this, but I wrote an MDZS drabble without reading the book/finishing the show.

New York Again

Oct. 23rd, 2025 09:01 pm
fauxklore: (Default)
[personal profile] fauxklore
I got back from LoserFest on Sunday afternoon and on Tuesday afternoon I was off to New York for a few days. The official reason for my trip was the premiere of a Yiddish opera. But, me being me, I also had to throw in three musicals and a museum excursion.

When I got to New York, I walked over to my hotel. I had planned to go down to Little Italy for the San Gennaro festival. But it was drizzly and I was tired and, as much as I have fond memories of eating zeppoli at the Feast in my home town, I just wasn’t really in the mood for greasy overpriced food. I did stick to the Italian theme and got cheap pizza. For what it’s worth, $1 Pizza now costs $1.50 a slice, but they haven’t changed the name. (It does also cost extra to add toppings. I like my pizza with mushrooms and black olives, by the way.) It was perfectly adequate and filling, allowing me to collapse happily with a book.

On Wednesday, I had plans for seeing two Broadway shows. I didn’t really do anything touristy in the morning because I had a bit of storytelling business to attend to and I wanted to get further on with a book club book I was in the middle of. After getting a smoothie for lunch, I went to the first of the two shows I had tickets for - the matinee performance of Maybe Happy Ending. For those who are unfamiliar with the story, the premise sounds really strange. Two decommissioned helperbots (i.e. robots that act as domestic companions to people) live across the hall from each other in a complex for retired helperbots. Claire’s charger fails, leading her to beg to borrow Oliver’s charger. This eventually leads them to a relationship. Oliver believes that his former owner, James, will come for him some day, but when Claire expresses a desire to go to Jeju Island (where James now lives) to see the fireflies there, Oliver joins her on a road trip. I thought the show was really sweet and I liked the jazz music used throughout it. I also thought the issues it raised about whether robots can feel the same emotions as humans and the ethics of robot to human relationships were handled well. Overall, this is a clever and original musical and well worth seeing. As an aside, the bio of HwaBoon in the “who’s who in the cast” section of the program is almost certainly the best cast bio I have ever read in a theatre program. Highly recommended.

My evening theatre excursion was Heathers the Musical. I liked the movie it was based on and I have nothing against dark and violent musicals. Unfortunately this show has a fan base of shrieking teenagers who were never taught proper audience behavior. The constant screaming at any mildly amusing line and loud stomping of feet really detracted from the show. That’s a pity because there is some good material and some fine performances. In particular, Erin Morton was excellent as Martha. File this under shows I won’t go to see again, along with Wicked and Six for similar reasons.

I had a bit of shopping I wanted to do on Thursday during the day. An excursion to a dance wear store didn’t yield a brown unitard, but did yield a long-sleeved white leotard that can be died to the correct color for my costuming purposes. And I have a reliable source of tights in pretty much any color I might want. I still need a bunny tail and ears and an apron which I can cross-stitch. But I have a few months before I need this to be done. I could have bought the ears at a costume store one of my friends had mentioned, but the store was more crowded than I wanted to deal with.

I should also note that I’d never noticed the upside-down A in the Herald Square signs before. One of my Facebook friends solved the mystery. That A represents the shape of Herald Square which is really more of a triangle with extended legs.

IMG_5371

Anyway, the actual purpose of the trip had been to see the opera The Great Dictionary of the Yiddish Language at YIVO. I had enough time to check out a few exhibits, including one about people who rescued Yiddish books in Vilna (Vilnius, Lithuania) during World War II and one on Jewish artists in Lithuania. The latter, alas, failed to mention any of my artistic cousins. As for the opera, it’s based on the true story of Yudel Mark’s attempt to write a complete dictionary of the Yiddish language, despite the insistence of Max Weinreich that it wasn’t essential to capture every Yiddish word. The conflict between the two men was interesting and provided some opportunity for comedy. I didn’t find the music particularly memorable, but the performances were good and I was glad I’d had the opportunity to see it.

By the way, on the way back to my hotel, I stopped at Aubi & Ramsa, which specializes in liquor-infused ice cream. I got the Old Fashioned, made with Woodford Reserve bourbon and Cointreau. It was very tasty and the place gives new meaning to the term “ice cream bar.”

IMG_5373

I’d decided I should use Friday to go to a museum I’d never been to before. Several of my friends were enthusing over the recently renovated Frick Collection. The only place you can take pictures inside it is the courtyard.

IMG_5374

For the most part, I found the decorative arts, e.g. the wallpaper and ceilings, to be more impressive than the actual art collection. But I generally prefer modern art to old masters. I will say that they have a nice app that lets you look up info on the endless array of portraits of rich people, shepherdesses, and/or rich women dressed up as shepherdesses. (The biblical scenes are a bit better or, at least, less fluffy.) I’m glad I went to see it, but there are other museums in New York which I prefer. I will also note that their cafe is one of the few places remaining anywhere that serves a Caesar salad with actual anchovies on it.

I decided to spend some time in the afternoon strolling around Central Park. Back in high school, I went to a Saturday science program at Columbia University, which is where I met my 10th grade boyfriend. We had classes in the morning and periodic afternoon special lectures. On the Saturday afternoons when we didn’t have a lecture, he and I would often go to Central Park. My funniest memory of that was that we had an obligatory stop at a store that sold telephones, which he collected. Even 50ish years later, that’s still my major mental association with Central Park. That store is, of course, long gone. So I settled for looking at people playing with remote controlled yachts on the lake and listening to various street musicians. I also had to take a photo of the Alice in Wonderland statue.

IMG_5380

I had bought a ticket to see the musical This Is Not a Drill at York Theatre on Friday evening. I realized that the Upper East Side branch of Pastrami Queen is just a few blocks from there, so I decided to fulfill my periodic need for Jewish deli food. I got my standard order - a tongue sandwich, pickles, kasha knish, and Doctor Brown’s diet cream soda. It was delicious.

IMG_5381

By the way, I posted that photo to the Save the Deli Facebook group and got over 300 likes for it! Plus, of course (and alas), people telling me I was doing it wrong because the rye bread is unseeded and I prefer tongue to pastrami and I like cream soda, not cel-ray. But most of the comments were positive.

As for This Is Not a Drill, the premise is that a group of people are at a resort in Hawaii when there’s an announcement over the radio about a North Korean ballistic missile alert. This is based on an actual event in 2018, by the way. Since this is musical theatre, all of the people at the resort have relationship issues, which they resolve in song during the 38 minutes between the announcement and the revelation that yes, actually, it was a drill. I liked a lot of the music and the performers were good. But I thought the story was rather thin and predictable.

I took a train home early on Saturday. I ended up calling into my travel book club from the food court at Union Station shortly after I got to D.C., then took the metro home. I finished off my theatre binging on Sunday with Damn Yankees at Arena Stage, but I already wrote about that. (Short version: it’s wonderful and you should go see it if you’re local-ish.)
neonvincent: For posts about cats and activities involving uniforms. (Krosp)
[personal profile] neonvincent
I used the preview image but not the video itself in Ohio State and Michigan marching bands for National Horror Movie Day.

Daily check-in

Oct. 23rd, 2025 08:22 pm
mecurtin: Icon of a globe with a check-mark (fandom_checkin)
[personal profile] mecurtin posting in [community profile] fandom_checkin
This is your check-in post for today. The poll will be open from midnight Universal or Zulu Time (8pm Eastern Time) on Thursday, October 23, to midnight on Friday, October 24 (8pm Eastern Time).

Poll #33756 Daily check-in poll
Open to: Access List, detailed results viewable to: Access List, participants: 17

How are you doing?

I am OK
10 (62.5%)

I am not OK, but don't need help right now
6 (37.5%)

I could use some help
0 (0.0%)

How many other humans live with you?

I am living single
4 (25.0%)

One other person
8 (50.0%)

More than one other person
4 (25.0%)



Please, talk about how things are going for you in the comments, ask for advice or help if you need it, or just discuss whatever you feel like.

physical exam

Oct. 23rd, 2025 07:18 pm
redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)
[personal profile] redbird
I went to my doctor today, for an annual physical and so she could write the next Ritalin prescription.

So: I had a fasting blood test last month, and the glucose number was high enough that she is ordering a re-test and an A1C test, which means another morning trip to Somerville on an empty stomach. My "bad" cholesterol is high, but not high enough for her to be prescribing statins right now. My "good" cholesterol is also high, but apparently that's less protective in older patients, and I'm approaching that age.

I also asked her to look at my calves, because I frequently have swelling by the end of the day, especially in the left calf. She said it sounded like a vascular issue, then measured the circumference of both my calves. The left calf is noticeably bigger, which supports the idea that there's some kind of vascular issue.

What I'm supposed to do for that is try to reduce my sodium intake, and try wearing compression socks for at least a little while each day. Reducing sodium intake means I'll be looking at ingredient labels for quantities--right now, I'm mostly checking to make sure that various things don't contain any of the various things that we know that one of the three of us needs to avoid.

Carmen also did a breast exam (no longer part of the standard physical exam, but she asked if I still wanted one, and I said yes), and looked at my back for any suspicious moles or freckles. Also, before the appointment they asked if I was OK having them check height and weight, and I said yes, then asked the assistant how tall I now am. Five feet two inches, confirming what I think is what the neurologist's office said, which is an inch or so less than when I was 30.

grumbling about paperwork and MyChart )

yuleswaps 2025 announcement <3

Oct. 23rd, 2025 02:01 pm
kindness_says: (yuletide - swap all the things)
[personal profile] kindness_says posting in [community profile] yuletide
Hello! A few people have been wondering in the Yuletide Discord whether we would have swaps this year... tl;dr it was dicey, but YES!

You may thank [personal profile] morbane (even more than usual ;)) for following up on everyone's behalf; Livi and I had been having an extremely slow/distracted convo about it since early September, but as always, knowing people are waiting on us motivated me LOL. But neither of us will be your primary mod this year! It will be the lovely Helen ([personal profile] patrokla), who started helping out last year. <3

Here is the lil statement I made in Discord, very slightly modified for DW:

Hi everyone! Official announcement (and thank you, Morbane, for playing go-between while we worked things out behind the scenes :)) -- yuleswaps WILL go forward this year, we hope, and we're sorry for the delay!

Indeed I (Kat/Kindness on AO3/[personal profile] kindness_says) had some commitments in Sept/Oct and did not think I'd be able to prioritize swaps this year, and Liviania/[personal profile] anialove is also pretty busy irl atm -- but Helen/[personal profile] patrokla (a great longtime swapper who joined our team last year) is stepping up to give it a shot in spite of their own busyness! We're meeting tomorrow in hopes of getting sign-ups open by the end of this weekend and matches out in early November so as to stay roughly on the usual timeline. Perhaps ambitious, but we will try!

If anybody else was interested in running swaps, Morbane absolutely was speaking for me that we're not offended, and please feel free to DM me comment or email (yuleswaps at gmail) if you're interested in helping out. ESPECIALLY if you are at all code-savvy/great at answering emails efficiently/bursting with ideas for future improvement. <3

You might hear from me again, or you might not! I will def be helping on the backend, for at least this year/as long as I can, and we really appreciate your patience if we're a little slow or clunky this year as we try to sustain/transition. I also apologize to anyone who didn't get fully covered after January (haven't done 2024 cleanup yet... will try if there's time)!

I have LOVED running swaps, well mostly I have anyway ;) for the past 15 (!!) years. Back in the day I did not read coal but was always charmed when friends occasionally sent me screenshots of anons thrilled about swaps, and I similarly really enjoyed skimming like...1-2 years' worth of this discord not long after Morbane emailed me (was very tempted to answer some super old questions but refrained lol). Your enthusiasm has absolutely been the thing to make all the time and headaches worth it.

<3 <3 <3

So that's that!

Love/candy/books/drinks always,
Kat

P.S. For any newer Yuletiders who are interested (or just confused as to what Yuleswaps is), here is last year's sign-ups post, which links to our FAQ, etc. This year's sign-ups post will come soon, if all goes to plan!

Last Day to Sign Up for 2025

Oct. 24th, 2025 10:08 am
yuletidemods: A hippo lounges with laptop in hand, peering at the screen through a pair of pince-nez and smiling. A text bubble with a heart emerges from the screen. The hippo dangles a computer mouse from one toe. By Oro. (Default)
[personal profile] yuletidemods posting in [community profile] yuletide_admin
Sign-up instructions
Collection
Letters post

Countdown to Sign-Ups Closing


Some notes/reminders:
  • If you don't select characters in a request, it's your author's choice which character or characters to include from the tag set. Please don't say you want a particular character more than others when you have not selected character tags.

  • Please check the additional tag you've selected makes sense for the characters you've selected. For example, "One or more characters (giver's choice)" doesn't make sense if you select several characters and you really want at least two to interact.

  • Please check you can access the email associated with your AO3 account. Mods may use this to reach out to you with questions.

  • If you are open to treats, feel free to say so - it isn't greedy! It's just letting people know that you haven't disabled the treat setting.


Schedule, Rules, & Collection | Contact Mods | Participant DW | Participant LJ | Pinch Hits on DW | Discord | Tag set | Tag set app

Please either comment logged-in or sign a name. Unsigned anonymous comments will be left screened.

Starfall Stories 50

Oct. 23rd, 2025 08:22 pm
thisbluespirit: (viyony)
[personal profile] thisbluespirit
I've left it a while since I did a crosspost for [community profile] rainbowfic, which was because I was doing a very long sequence divided up into five parts and wasn't sure what to do about it now it's complete - it's something like 28k altogether (this is what has been absorbing my whole writing time for four months, when I've had any). Anyway, I've decided I might as well crosspost all the parts at once and move on. People certainly aren't obliged to read any of it, let alone all of it.


Name: Calla Island
Word Count: 5053
Rating: PG
Summary: Viyony visits Calla Island, the ancestral seat of the Allin family.


Name: Dazzled
Word Count: 5364
Rating: PG
Summary: Viyony explores a sacred cave and gets considerably more than she bargained for.


Name: Assignations
Word Count: 8293
Rating: Teen
Warnings: Death, blood, injury.
Summary: Viyony arranges an assignation with Leion, but she's not the only one with plans for midnight.


Name: Storms
Word Count: 5326
Rating: PG
Warnings: Threat of drowning, sea-sickness.
Summary: Viyony's determined to get Leion off the island.


Name: Harbour
Word Count: 5079
Rating: Teen
Summary: Leion takes Viyony home.

Yuletide Letter placeholder

Oct. 23rd, 2025 02:05 pm
dira: Bucky Barnes/The Winter Soldier (Default)
[personal profile] dira
Yuletide letter coming soon!
oursin: Illustration from medieval manuscript of the female physician Trotula of Salerno holding up a urine flask (trotula)
[personal profile] oursin

(Yogi Tea Bag tags, bringing the woowoo by random bollox generation long before AI started getting in on the act.)

Anyway, are we at all surprised by Millions exploited by ‘menopause gold rush’ amid lack of reliable information.

(Query: how far is lack of reliable information due to its being overwhelmed by menopause quackery, murmurs historian of medicine.)

Millions of women are being exploited by a “menopause gold rush” as companies, celebrities and influencers take advantage of a “dearth” of reliable information on the issue, experts have said. Healthcare companies and content creators saw menopause as a “lucrative market” and were trying to profit from gaps in public knowledge, women’s health academics at University College London (UCL) said. Researchers called for the rollout of a national education programme after finding a significant number of women do not feel well-informed about menopause.

You know what? I think part of this can be put on to the decline in the good old trad women's magazines, which had a) health columns written by pseudonymised health professionals b) agony aunts prepared to Do The Research and having a stack of helpful leaflets written in conjunction with qualified experts.

Brought to you by someone who was devouring her mother's magazines pretty much from the time she became literate and therefore encountered the concept of menopause decades before it became of personal relevance.

And what still gets very little play is what Stella Duffy points out in this piece:

while everyone in my research talked about physiological and emotional difficulties in the transition, once they were out the other side – even while dealing with workplace discrimination and the caring demands of their loved ones – all of them also described postmenopause as time of thriving and growing. We’re not done yet.

Margaret Mead mentioned this, but I'm not sure the 70s feminist discourse around 'croning' did a lot of favours to the idea of what happened after the pause.

yhlee: d20 on a 20 (d20)
[personal profile] yhlee
A Random Walk through the Goblin Library" by Chris Willrich [Beneath Ceaseless Skies]. Superlative fantasy + math short story. I am excited to FINALLY be able to shout about this now that it's published - I had the privilege of reading this in draft and I love it to pieces. :3
[personal profile] karios posting in [community profile] yuletide
Are you interested in text adventures, CYOA, Twine games, or other sorts of interactive fiction? Do you want to let your writer know you'd be happy to receive something along those lines? Are you looking for someone to write IF for? This post is for you.
 
 
(I copied and pasted this directly from last year which was also copy pasted from previous years. Let me know via comment or discord ping if any of the links broke or anything else needs editing.)
 
 
What is IF?
 

Interactive Fiction (IF) covers everything from text adventures through to visual novels, by way of all sorts of experimental works. It can be mostly a game, or mostly a story; it can be a way to immerse the reader, or to play around with the concepts of storyteller and audience; it can be an exploration of chance, or of fate; it can be a straightforward story, or something else entirely. From Healy's post:
 
 
[IF] is a term used for games which are made up primarily of text, like Adventure, Zork, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and other text adventures, or more experimental hypertext works like My Father's Long, Long Legs, or even visual novels. Interactive fiction these days is generally divided into two groups based on how you interact with the game: parser-based IF, and choice-based IF.
 
 
Parser-based IF, more commonly known as text adventures, are controlled by typed in commands, like "GET KEY", "OPEN DOOR", "GO NORTH", "LOOK UNDER BED", and stuff like that. Not every command you type in will work, though, so they're hard to get used to if you haven't tried them before. To make things easier, here's a card of most of the common commands. Some good parser-based IF to try first would be Ryan Veeder's So, You've Never Played a Text Adventure Before, Huh?, Admiral Jota's Lost Pig, Andrew Plotkin's The Dreamhold, and Adam Cadre's Photopia.
 
 
Choice-based IF is simpler; you just pick from a number of options. This can be done through hyperlinks and other clicky selections, though more rarely you may have to type a number from a list. Good examples of choice-based IF include Anna Anthropy's Star Court, Alan DeNiro's Solarium, the various games hosted by Choice of Games, and most every given visual novel.
 
 

Writing IF for Yuletide

 
IF is considered opt-in for Yuletide - please don't write it for people who don't want it. If you aren't sure whether it would be welcome or not, ask a mod to check with the intended recipient.
 
You are still required to follow the normal rules, such as focusing on requested characters (unless the recipient has said you needn't include them all).  

It can be hard to figure out what word count an IF story really is - what you've written is full of code that doesn't count, and what your recipient sees may vary in length depending on their choices. If you're posting to the main collection, try to overshoot the minimum requirement a bit, just to be on the safe side. Say a minimum of somewhere between 2,000 and 4,000 words. Or probably about 10 to 15 minutes play through.
 
If your post to the main AO3 collection is under 1,000 words (e.g. you're just linking to an online playable version elsewhere), please drop the mods a note so they know it isn't someone posting something under the minimum, and provide them with an estimated word-count.




If you're writing a treat, unless it includes over 1,000 words of text and you're also sure your recipient would be happy with it as a main gift, please post it to Madness

Your recipient does need to be able to access what you've created! Please link to a suitable IF interpreter if required, or if possible make a web-playable version.
 

Requesting IF for Yuletide
 

If you would be happy to receive IF this year, please leave a comment below, following this template:
 

 
 

IF Canons Nominated for Yuletide

 
Plenty of IF canons get nominated for Yuletide! While it's still important to ask before writing IF for someone, someone who consumes IF already will probably be more interested in getting it. (Some of these canons were adapted into other mediums, so it's possible that someone who's interested in one of those isn't at all into the IF side of things. Thus why it's important to ask.) Consider requesting or offering one of these if you're interested in IF for Yuletide. For 2025 moontyger thoughtfully composed a list of IF canons in the tagset, available here: Interactive Fiction in the 2025 Tagset!
 
Some IF Tools

 
A * means they can make web-based games.
 

Parser-based

Inform*: One of the biggest development tools for making parser-based IF. Has an English-like code. Available for Windows, Mac, and Linux.
Quest*: Another big IF development tool. Has a click-and-point editor with the option to check out the code. For Windows and web.
TADS*: A long running engine for writing interactive fiction, though generally not as easy to use as Inform. The latest version can make web-based games, although they need to be hosted on a non-https address or on the IFDB.
 

Choice-based

Twine
*: Very popular tool for making choice-based IF. Has a visual editor, with some code-y bits for variables and the like. Can be extended with some Javascript passages. Available for Mac and Windows, and Twine 2 is web-based. See this comment for more notes.
ChoiceScript*: Used by the fine folks over at Choice of Games. Uses simplified Javascript to make games. It's very stat heavy. Requires a text editor. See this comment for notes.
Ren'py: Engine for making visual novels. Uses a simple scripting language. Available for Windows, Mac, and Linux, and can make games for all those platforms.
Inklewriter*: A completely web-based engine for making CYOA-style games.
 

Thursday 23/10/2025

Oct. 23rd, 2025 03:51 pm
lhune: (3L)
[personal profile] lhune posting in [community profile] 3_good_things_a_day
1) No alarm this morning and I could sleep in ^_^

2) I do not have to go out while a storm is blowing over the country, just reading a good book while the wind is howling

3) Doing the skipped Pilates lesson from Tuesday this evening
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
handspun yarn

This one's headed for [personal profile] helen_keeble. :3

(Sorry, I need to source some purple spinning fiber! I'm running low on inherited detash wools and most of what I have is blues or neutrals.)

cat loafing on spinning fiber

Cloud was VERY HELPY.
littlefics: Three miniature books standing on an open normal-sized book. (Default)
[personal profile] littlefics posting in [community profile] pinchhits
Event: Seasons of Drabbles is an exchange for the creation of drabbles and drabble variants. The minimum is 100 words.

Event link: Dreamwidth | AO3 Collection

Due date: Saturday, November 1st, 11:59pm Eastern time (Countdown).

Pinch hit link: Please view the details and claim it at this post.

PH 2 - The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes - Suzanne Collins, Classical Greece and Rome History & Literature RPF, Fallout: New Vegas, Daredevil (TV), Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

PH 8 - Psychonauts (Video Games), Umineko no Naku Koro ni | When the Seagulls Cry, No Straight Roads (Video Game), Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types

PH 10 - The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across The 8th Dimension (1984), Crossing Jordan (TV 2001), NCIS: Los Angeles

PH 11 - เขาจ้างให้ผมจีบนักฆ่า | The Heart Killers (Thailand TV), วาระซ่อนเร้น | Hidden Agenda (TV), KinnPorsche: The Series (TV), ทำนายทายทัพ | My Magic Prophecy (TV), แฟนผมเป็นประธานนักเรียน | My School President (TV 2022), เพื่อนายแค่หนึ่งเดียว | Never Let Me Go (TV 2022), สายรหัสเทวดา | Perfect 10 Liners (TV 2024), Thai Actor RPF, We Are คือเรารักกัน | We Are (Thailand TV 2024)

Watching The Diplomat

Oct. 22nd, 2025 10:22 pm
silver_chipmunk: (Default)
[personal profile] silver_chipmunk
I slept even later than I have been this morning, almost 2:00, though in my defense I had trouble sleeping last night and was awake late. But even so, this must stop. I WILL get up at 10:00 tomorrow!

But anyway, I got up and had breakfast and coffee, and puttered online for awhile. I called the plumber back up and ascertained that they were going to winterize the cottage on the 3rd. And send me the bill. Laurie emailed during the day about the winterizing and I was able to tell everyone it was set.

I then watched three episodes of The Diplomat. It's as tasty as the other seasons. I am loving it. Sad that it's only an eight episode season. Which means I'm halfway done already!

I stopped watching at 6:00, and Teamed the FWiB early tonight. My gaming session was cancelled because the GM wasn't feeling well, bummer but it meant I could talk longer to the FWiB. So we went for a little over an hour and a half.

Then I had dinner, and went to the bedroom and played solitaire. Then I called [personal profile] mashfanficchick to discuss tomorrow.

And then it was pet feeding time. I am almost out of turtle food. Petco for some reason discontinued the large cans of specifically adult turtle food I was getting delivered, and substituted smaller cans of regular turtle food. I went into my settings a few days ago and changed the size of the cans I'm getting, but the next delivery isn't until November 20th. So I'll have to get more before then.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. Good shows.

3. Able to take a day to just watch.

4. Popsicles.

5. Winterizing is set.

6. My cousins.
but_can_i_be_trusted: from the Wayne & Shuster sketch, 'The Unholy Goalie' (Temptation)
[personal profile] but_can_i_be_trusted posting in [community profile] vocab_drabbles
Title: 'Fair Game'
Fandom: Original Fiction
Author: [personal profile] but_can_i_be_trusted
Rating: PG
Word Count: 263
Characters/Pairings: Original
Warnings: Disturbing concepts
Notes: Crossposted to
Summary: I'm lost. In so many senses of the word.

Fair Game )

"fake it til you make it"

Oct. 22nd, 2025 08:54 pm
starandrea: (Default)
[personal profile] starandrea
Oh, friends, what a month. We are all doing such a good job; kudos to us. Consider collecting a beverage of your choice while I do not try to tell a tale.

Instead:
♥ November noveling month is coming; it's year 3 of 50k in Chinese!
♥ Daphne and I got to see the weir being taken down this fall. Neat.
♥ And the wind and waves of an early nor'easter blowing in on the beach.
♥ Marci and I enjoyed an autumn craft fair with lots of crochet and cider donuts!
♥ Next is a Halloween race by the bay; matching sweatshirts may be involved.

The world is a lovely and terrible place.

Quarterly update to check in on my year goals while there's still time to achieve them:
1) [community profile] inkingitout morning pages goal going well
2) [community profile] inkingitout story goal intermittent but reachable*
3) reading goal faltered a bit over the summer
4) gave up on [community profile] chinesestudy early I see
5) restarted and re-stopped [community profile] fandom50challenge
6) finished black dragon diamond painting & started seasonal fox
7) gardens went significantly better than expected

*my plan for the rest of the year is 5% Tron: Ares fic and 95% seasonal Mo Dao Zu Shi fluff

I got a lego tree for the dollhouse; I should build that. Loved doing the poster art for [community profile] battleshipex. Very happy to have recorded more speaking during [community profile] communal_creators.

Got a shirt that says "love everyone" and every time I wear it I am reminded to act more the way I want to be.

(Thus I went with "fake it til you make it" as the subject, but "just because you can't do everything doesn't mean you can't do anything" was a close second.)
hoyoverse_ex_mod: (Default)
[personal profile] hoyoverse_ex_mod posting in [community profile] pinchhits
Event: Hoyoverse Exchange
Event link: [community profile] hoyoverse_ex
Pinch hit link: Here!
Due date: Sunday, November 16th at 10:00 AM MST

[community profile] hoyoverse_ex is a fic, art, and video gift exchange for Hoyoverse game fandoms. For this pinch hit, you must create a fic of at least 1,000 words, respecting the recip's requested characters/relationships and DNWs.


Please claim by commenting on the pinch hit post or emailing me at hoyoverse-ex@protonmail.com.

Daily Check-in

Oct. 22nd, 2025 06:13 pm
starwatcher: Western windmill, clouds in background, trees around base. (Default)
[personal profile] starwatcher posting in [community profile] fandom_checkin
 
This is your check-in post for today. The poll will be open from midnight Universal or Zulu Time (8pm Eastern Time) on Wednesday, October22, to midnight on Thursday, October 23. (8pm Eastern Time).

Poll #33754 Daily Check-in
This poll is closed.
Open to: Access List, detailed results viewable to: Access List, participants: 26

How are you doing?

I am OK.
15 (57.7%)

I am not OK, but don't need help right now.
11 (42.3%)

I could use some help.
0 (0.0%)

How many other humans live with you?

I am living single.
8 (30.8%)

One other person.
11 (42.3%)

More than one other person.
7 (26.9%)




Please, talk about how things are going for you in the comments, ask for advice or help if you need it, or just discuss whatever you feel like.
 

Season's Treatings mini-challenge

Oct. 22nd, 2025 07:09 pm
suzy_queue: Several houses have their lights on during a twilight evening (Winter: Snowy Streets)
[personal profile] suzy_queue posting in [community profile] yuletide
Do you love receiving or writing end of year holiday stories? Are you prompting a snowed in Hanukkah celebration or an Australian New Year's beach party? Season's Treatings may be for you!

This mini-challenge is all about November, December and January holidays, traditions, and cultural celebrations big and small and all over the globe--and perhaps some fantasy worlds, who knows. If you want to prompt it, someone may want to write it.

When you comment, please include:

AO3 Name:
Letter Link (if applicable):
Holiday(s) Requested:
Fandom and character(s):
Prompts:

When you upload, tag it as Season's Treatings so we can all find them.

(no subject)

Oct. 22nd, 2025 07:06 pm
flemmings: (Default)
[personal profile] flemmings
Thoroughly frustrating half hour spent trying to renew my Ontario ID online, starting with a drop down menu of services required that erases one's choice once entered and then clucks with disapproval and tells you to select a service. I'm only doing this because Service Ontario sent me a notice-- mailed who knows when--  that my ID was going to expire next birthday. So is my health card, so first I try to renew that online, and finally get it to accept the request, and then am told Nope, cannot renew online. OK, will renew my ID. Nope, cannot renew that online either. Alright, will book in-person at a centre. Yes well. Bay St can fit me in Oct 30 at 8:15 which no, not doing that. Next opening Nov 21. Other centres have nothing till December. So shall go in a month. Only up side is that they'll give me paper replacements until the card comes in, if it comes in, what with Christmas shutdown and postal strikes.

Turned the heat on for 15 minutes to take the refrigerator chill off the house. Might bump the thermostat up to 16 or so tonight since tomorrow we gave a scheduled outage mid-day while they replace wires or hydro poles or something on the block. The latter, I fancy, since they did this up the block a few weeks ago. 

Given the volume of Cecil Ten-names, I suppose it's inevitable that he would drop the ball occasionally. The last three of his I read failed to hide the clues sufficiently. If a woman is found seemingly dead and half an hour later is seen chatting merrily, you know there's been a substitution. If two women are said to resemble each other sufficiently for people to sometimes be confused as to which is which, you know that's Chekov's plot point. If a character once served on a jury that found a man guilty of murder, you know that the people being murdered randomly were also on that jury, and the seemingly benign character who denies one of these people's convinced testimony about an occurrence is pretty certain to be the formerly convicted man. So am rereading one of the library's Rhode's that impressed me first time and so far so good, though *of course* this loutish man and that shrewish woman are villains because people's faces always betray their vile characters. Like Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, say. There's no art to find the mind's construction in the face, Cyril. And a bunch of Golden Age writers, and not a few Japanese ones as well: though given how seemingly psychic the Japanese appear, I might give them the benefit of the doubt.

went to the doctor with Adrian

Oct. 22nd, 2025 07:09 pm
redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)
[personal profile] redbird
I accompanied Adrian to her doctor's appointment this afternoon, to provide moral support, take notes, and ask any relevant questions she didn't think of. This was last minute on my end, because she only realized this morning that she wanted company. So, some rearranging of my (vague) plans, but it worked.

It seemed like a good appointment, with a doctor who explained things pretty well. We walked home, which would have been a better idea if the google maps estimate of the distance had been accurate. Instead, we spent a lot of time walking around the parking lots of the hospital complex.

This used enough energy that I decided not to go to the optician tomorrow morning, before seeing my own doctor in the afternoon. I will go to Somerville, eat lunch in Davis Square, see Carmen, and then decide whether to come straight home, or stop for ice cream and/or other shopping.

Question thread #145

Oct. 23rd, 2025 12:36 am
pauamma: Cartooney crab wearing hot pink and acid green facemask holding drink with straw (Default)
[personal profile] pauamma posting in [site community profile] dw_dev
It's time for another question thread!

The rules:

- You may ask any dev-related question you have in a comment. (It doesn't even need to be about Dreamwidth, although if it involves a language/library/framework/database Dreamwidth doesn't use, you will probably get answers pointing that out and suggesting a better place to ask.)
- You may also answer any question, using the guidelines given in To Answer, Or Not To Answer and in this comment thread.

Stronk

Oct. 22nd, 2025 11:04 pm
[personal profile] cosmolinguist

I went to the gym after dinner tonight.

Not only did I get through work (I forgot to re-set my normal alarm after not needing it yesterday and woke up eight minutes before my first meeting, oops). Not only did I get a flu shot (I was very brave). Not only did I make dinner even though I was exhausted (I made the broccoli and halloumi thing because D really likes it and he's had A Bad Day at work).

But even after all that, I still was awake and energetic enough to go to the gym. And I even walked both ways (waiting for the bus would have taken a lot longer).

I didn't make it at all last week, and after losing the first two days of this week to the stupid away day, I wouldn't have blamed myself if I wasn't up for it now. But, surprisingly, I just about was.

Which is great. I was despairing that the whole winter might be like last week was, where I'd just work and sleep, or fail to sleep, and that's no kind of life. Especially when work is making you miserable like mine is.

kaberett: A series of phrases commonly used in academic papers, accompanied by humourous "translations". (science!)
[personal profile] kaberett

One of the things I'm sure I've come across repeatedly in the books I've read so far is the idea that a very high proportion of Chronic Pain Cases are down to either back pain or headache. This is important because back pain genuinely is something that has a massive nociplastic component, especially in the lower back, that is unequivocally worth treating (despite myself I remain grudgingly impressed with the Boulder Back Pain Study; and, to be clear, I do myself have a grumbly section of lower back following an injury a few years ago that I am practising all my Theories on!).

This is an Important To Me framing device because my point is that treatments aimed purely at nociplastic pain/central sensitisation cannot be expected to work as well for people with ongoing or recurrent tissue damage/injury... but why it's worth using some of these approaches anyway, with the understanding of the actual scope of what effects to hope for or expect. Which means I'd like to know where they're GETTING those numbers from.

Mindfulness for Health )

The Way Out (... long, bonus tangential rant) )

The Painful Truth )

... aaaaaaand it is now definitely past bedtime so I'll finish Revisiting Books tomorrow. (My notes on Explain Pain, consistent with it being generally competent, are that it doesn't go anywhere near talking about what The Most Common Forms Of Chronic Pain are; might have a quick flip through when I'm next in the same place as my copy. Also couldn't find anything in Touch. Will be revisiting the current book, Ouch!, in the morning...)

more financial paperwork

Oct. 22nd, 2025 04:06 pm
redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)
[personal profile] redbird
After a bunch of back and forth, it appears that the reason Chase would provide a medallion signature guarantee for my brother, and not me, is that he's an executor of my mother's estate. (Mark and I both have accounts at Chase, which is part of what confused me.)

The banker at Chase suggested talking (again) to either Vanguard or TIAA and see if they will do this. She said she looked online and it said TIAA does provide these, and I've had an account with them for at least 30 years.

Also, Attitude's and my joint account at Chase is dormant, and to wake it up, one of us needs to go to a branch, talk to someone, say we want to take the account out of dormancy, and make at least a $1 deposit or withdrawal. And no, I can't pick up a deposit slip, take it to a teller, and make the trivial transaction, we would need to actually talk to someone. To keep it active, we will need to poke at it at least every 364 days. But doing this once would at least reset the clock of "inactive account, transfer funds to the state for safekeeping."

A viral SWTOR video

Oct. 22nd, 2025 04:10 pm
neonvincent: For posts about cats and activities involving uniforms. (Krosp)
[personal profile] neonvincent

(no subject)

Oct. 22nd, 2025 12:13 pm
greghousesgf: (Horse)
[personal profile] greghousesgf
I should be able to at least get the skull cakes at Nabolom tomorrow if I'm going to be forced out all day because of the damn fire alarms. One of my neighbors seems to have no problem with having to put up with that. Is she deaf? At any rate I'm going to take my cell phone so I can watch MST3K and Archer and stuff and talk to my friends if they're not too busy and I'm also going to take some books and magazines.

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