eruthros

1. We were supposed to get a lot of rain, but that seems to have blown over. We did get a little rain last night (I was awake in bed to hear it, which is always lovely) and it was raining again this morning when I went out for my walk, so instead of walking around the neighborhood and getting wet (I did take an umbrella but it would still be blowing in from the sides) I walked over to the parking structure across the street and just did laps in there for about the same distance I usually walk.

2. Just one more day before the weekend!

3. We've been getting some really delicious grapes lately. They're called autumn crisp, which is not a variety I'd heard of before, but they live up to their name. Suuuuuuper crisp, which is just how I like my grapes, and a nice sweet flavor (I don't like them too sour).

4. Oh, too sleep as easy as a kitty!

yourlibrarian posting in

common_nature

In our final few days we left Oregon, though stayed the night just outside its border in Mount Shasta. The mountain is clearly seen looming over the city but we could see it for many miles as we headed south and finally passed into California.

( Read more... )

festivids_mod posting in

festivids

( You're about to view content that a community administrator has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

china_shop

Just a quick one today, because I'm trying to write half a dozen other things. :-)

Previous poll review
In the phone poll, 61% of respondents hold the phone to their ear, 40.7% put the call on speaker, and 28.8% wear an earpiece or headphones.

In ticky-boxes, cats with resting blep face came second to hugs, 61% to 69.5%. Thank you for your votes!

Reading
More of Inventing the Renaissance by Ada Palmer, read by Candida Gubbins. Andrew has started listening with me, so I needed a solo listen and, accordingly, am trying Black Water Sister by Zen Cho, read by Catherine Ho, which is great so far. (I've heard it contains one of my DNWs, so I'm approaching with caution.)

Kdramas
Finally finished Nothing But Love (it's so good!). Also finished Aema, which was fantastic, dramatic, pacy, with tons of complicated female relationships and femslashiness (fair warning: gets very dark in places). Two more episodes of Mystic Pop-Up Bar, which continues to be delightful, I did not see that romantic pairing coming!! (It's doing the Gobin "who is the reincarnation of whom??" mystery thing.)

In theory I'm still watching My Youth in the hopes it develops some/any dramatic/romantic tension... but now You and Everything Else is out, who knows. Viewing time is limited.

More Low Life this evening, yay!

Other TV
Mostly Dark Winds and Bluey. We would have watched more Chief of War and Prehistoric Planet, but my Apple app is refusing to stream, grrrr.

Guardian/Fandom
So much is happening! It's great! The Slo-Mo Guardian Rewatch is delightful,

guardian_wishlist is in its creating period (which is always much too short, argh), and I still haven't caught up with

fan_writers comments. Also, omg, my tabs!!!

I nominated for Yuletide and am having some earnest conversations with myself about signing up. Last year was my first year; it was a blast, but it was a lot. I could always just treat...

Writing/making things
I'm very close to finishing the unexpected-kink fic (still needs a title), but most of my focus is on

guardian_wishlist. I've finished one gift and started another, which is threatening to get long (the joy and curse of rarepairs), and I have a laundry list of things to write after that. I'm aiming for, like, six or eight in total, by 6 October, but it will depend on whether I can write short.

Anyway, the current one is at least doing that delightful thing of occupying my brain when I'm not at my keyboard, making me jot down notes and dialogue when I wake up. I've missed this level of engagement.

Life/health/mental state things
Andrew's taking some time off work, which is an adjustment for both of us, and also great and much deserved.

Good things
Tuesday was a glorious sunny summery day. My new glasses are nearly ready. So Many Kdramas! TV-watching dates. Biking again. Bluey! Writing. Fandom and you all. <3

Poll #33633 Muppets

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 31

View Respondents

It's time to play the music, it's time to light the lights

View Answers

Kermit
14 (45.2%)

Fozzie
7 (22.6%)

Gonzo
8 (25.8%)

Miss Piggy
6 (19.4%)

Animal
11 (35.5%)

other / none / what?
9 (29.0%)

ticky-box full of I keep biting my lip, ow
7 (22.6%)

ticky-box full of paper tigers prowling stripily through their 2D jungle
12 (38.7%)

ticky-box full of Yuletide nominations
9 (29.0%)

ticky-box full of so many WIPs, so little time
9 (29.0%)

ticky-box full of hugs
22 (71.0%)

sinesofinsanity posting in

fancake

Fandom: Avatar the Last Airbender
Pairings/Characters: Zuko, Iroh, the GAang in the background
Rating: G
Length: 2,889 words, 19min 30s
Creator Links: Haicrescendo
Theme: Food & Cooking, character development, family, families of choice, going home, missing scenes,

Summary:

[Zuko’s greatest failing, not his only but just one that stands out the most in a very long list, is that he’s never known quite what he had until it’s gone. Or, on the opposite hand, he covets the things that don’t matter, that seem to matter so much at the time and turn out, in the end, to be something that Zuko’s made up in his head.

And then Zuko finds, of all things after it all, that he misses Uncle Iroh’s tea.]

Or,

Zuko screws up his life and in the process of fixing it, figures out some tea wisdom along the way.

Reccer's Notes: This story is so beautiful and gentle. I absolutely love seeing how Zuko's growth and character development is mirrored with his finally learning to make a decent cup of tea. Plus the neat detail of how he despite learning from and trying to emulate his uncle, he makes it his own way. Zuko and Iroh's relationship is lovely in this too. Just an all around lovely story. klainelynch does a beautiful job with the podfic as well

Fanwork Links:
Heat, Wait, Steep, Repeat
and the Podfic both on AO3

westiec posting in

flashexchanges

Fat Bear Flash
A fic & art exchange for fat bears of all kinds!
- minimums: creator's choice of 300 word fic or a nice sketch

Schedule:
Noms & Signups open: now!
Noms & Signups close: September 22
Works Due & Revealed: September 30
Creators Revealed: October 5
all deadlines are 11:59PM UTC

Tagset 🐻 AO3 Collection 🐻 AutoApp

spiralsheep

Won't be around for the next few days as I will quite literally have my head in the sand. /duneroamin'

With Jonathan Livingston Seagull (4 votes) on my phone and Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop (5 votes) in my rucksack. Imagine, the library could've provided BERYL BAINBRIDGE's much maligned English Journey (after J. BOYNTON Priestley's earlier English Journey). Or I could've cheated and borrowed Mr Lucton's Freedom by Francis BRETT Young which I saw on a returns trolley.

Two books diverged at a sandy shore
And, sorry I couldn't leaf through more
And be one reader, branching out
I took each text as far as I might
Re-turning leaves in autumn light.

aurumcalendula

I'm excited to hear that Reading the Remnants might get an official English translation! (I do hope it was licensed by one of the more reliable publishers)

full_metal_ox posting in

fancake

Fandom: Mo Dao Zu Shi; Chen Qing Ling
Pairings/Characters: Gen; M/M; Lan Wangji/Wei Wuxian; Jin Zixuan, Wen Qing, Wen Ning, Nie Mingjue, Nie Huaisang, Jiang Fengmian, Wei Wuxian, Jiang Cheng, Jiang Yanli, Lan Xichen, Lan An, Lan Wangji
Rating: General Audiences
Length: 1,209 words
Content Notes: No Archive Warnings Apply, arrant pedantry, Author Showed Her Work, Food Porn, gastrotravelogue, tea nerdery, Tumblr work
Creator Tags:
headcanon, the untamed 陈情令, cql, mo dao zu shi, mdzs, wei wuxian, lan wangji, nie huaisang, jin zixuan, wen qing, nie mingjue, wangxian headcanon at the very end because that's what i'm here for, tea, i really like tea, heicha, oolong, white tea, green tea, dragonwell, my ramblings, qi is a thing for some tea drinkers

Creator Links: (AO3)

Haoppopotamus; (Instagram)

haoppopotamus; (Tumblr)

watch-grok-brainrot (formerly ~~wangxianbunnydoodles~~)
Theme: Food & Cooking, Cultural Differences, Meta, Research, Worldbuilding

Summary: Since watching ep 3 for the first time (i.e. january), this has been knocking around in my brain. In ep 3, we see JZXuan waltzing into the same inn as the Yunmeng Trio, booting them, and then rejecting “bad tea”. Ever since, I’ve watched a lot of tea being poured in CQL. It got me thinking, what kind of tea would different sects prefer and what would different characters drink?

Reccer’s Notes: In which Haoppo uses her tea connoisseurship as a vehicle for characterization and worldbuilding (and invites her imaginary friends to illustrate and share her interest.) For the likes of me (with no claim to Asian cred by birth or upbringing, and whose blunted sensory range reduces almost all tea to hot leaf juice), this serves as a window into an unfamiliar area of interest and body of cultural reference frames (the idea that tea might possess qi, not necessarily related to its flavor, was a new one on me—but of obvious importance to cultivators.)

Fanwork Links: Tea Preferences by CQL Sects - a Headcanon

(The original post, preserved on the Wayback Machine, includes a beautiful and apropos GIF header: Tea Preferences by CQL Sects - a Headcanon (~~wangxianbunnydoodles~~)

Current Music: “Cha Ge”

torachan

1. I got my covid and flu shots today. Since I didn't have any meetings or other time-sensitive things this morning at work, I just stopped in the same medical offices where I'd made my appointment for next week and asked if they were doing walk-ins, too, and they were. Had to wait about ten minutes or so, but otherwise it was over pretty quickly. Carla hasn't been able to get hers yet because she's sick. D: (First test said not covid, but she's going to keep testing throughout the duration to make sure. So far I am not showing any signs of catching it, but we'll see. It is hard to avoid each other in our smallish house, though at least since it's summer all the windows and doors are open and the fans going all the time, so there's a lot of air circulation.)

2. Molly just loves this scratcher/ball toy. Sometimes for the scratcher, once in a while for the ball, but mostly just to lie on. It's apparently very comfy.

xkcd_feed

https://xkcd.com/3143/

Although now people will realize three-per-em space that all this time I've been using weird medium mathematical space whitespace characters in my hair space hair space hair space speech dot dot dot...

https://xkcd.com/3143/

spiralsheep

- Book blurbs: the trend for covering the outside of a book with meaningless blurbs (often from off-putting authors) while hiding any description of the actual contents, such as whether it's even fiction or non-fiction, on an internal dust jacket flap is annoying to me, especially when browsing in one of those posh bookshops with rubber bands around the books to prevent them being opened by anyone except the purchaser. And if I use my phone to look up whether Tom Cox's latest hardback is another novel or more essays then the sales assistant probably assumes I'm checking if it's cheaper online (which, yes, it would be). /grit in my book oyster

- Reading: 92 books to 17 Sept 2025.
- To Read shelves 8 September 2025: 78 (down from 90 on 1 Jan but up from 68 at lowest ebb this year so far).

85. Endemic, Exploring the Wildlife Unique to Britain, by James Harding-Morris, non-fiction natural history, 5/5.
Engaging citizen science via travel memoir, but probably only of interest to UK readers for obvious reasons. I would happily have read a similar book twice the length, even though some of the individual chapter subjects don't especially interest me (the Elms are haunting me though). I can see why the author is employed as a science communicator.

89. Lady Susan, by Jane Austen, 1794, epistolary novel, 4/5.
This is not a moral tale, lol. Fun though, and I note that ALL the women get more or less what they wanted: Lady Susan ensures her place in society at the expense of a gullible man, the Vernons and De Courcys keep their precious respectability, Frederica remains unmarried, and Mrs Johnson remains secure although she gets her comeuppance to some extent for being a Bad Friend - the one sin Austen never forgives in a woman. The 2016 film, confusingly titled Love and Friendship, was also fun with many glorious costumes.

90. The Hotel Avocado, by Bob Mortimer, 2024, comedic crime novel, 5/5
Entertaining sequel to The Satsuma Complex. Very Bob Mortimer. Better read with the first novel freshly in mind. I sensed the set-up for a third novel featuring the corrupt councillor and Brighton underworld.
Warning for descriptions of physical violence, including to children by other children.

92. Current reading quote: pg28 [Corrour railway station] "was featured in the film adaptation of Irvine Welsh's Trainspotting, the remote station to which Renton, Spud, Sick Boy, and Tommy travel in a bid to remove themselves from the pharmaceutical temptations of Scotland's Central Belt." (I'd just borrowed this train-based travel book from the library yesterday when Born Slippy drove past so fate clearly decreed I would simultaneously indulge two types of trainspotting.)

runpunkrun posting in

fancake

Photograph of steel spoons and spices in a dramatic setting with added text that gives it the look of a gourmet magazine cover: September 2025. Food & Cooking, at Fancake. Steel teaspoons are arranged in an elogated oval to suggest a fish, with the bowls acting as scales and some of the handles left visible to create the fins and tail, giving the creature a spiky appearance. The concave bowls are dusted with a powdery orange spice for color and one spoon at the front of the fish is filled with a coarse black spice to create an eye. The fish is on a black surface with a rough texture and around it are three skinny green peppers, a mound of salt, a mound of orange spice, and a dipping bowl filled with a clear amber liquid.

aurumcalendula

The fact that the option to enroll in extended security updates for Windows 10 hasn't shown up yet on my PC is stressing me out.

I almost regret not buying a Windows 11 capable PC a few years ago (how hard they're pushing Copilot/AI stuff turned me off it and the news about one of the Windows 11 updates bricking SSDs doesn't fill me with confidence).

torachan

1. My knee is sore today but the other aches and pains I had last night when trying to get to sleep seem to have gone away in the morning.

2. I had two meetings today and both were cancelled!

3. I made an appointment to get my covid shot next Monday, which was the soonest I could get an appointment, though I might drop in tomorrow on the way to work and see if they have any walk-in availability (it said limited walk-ins online), as there is a location offering them close to work.

4. Ollie has such impressive eyebrows.

skygiants

I liked the Korean movie Phantom (2023) enough that I decided to hunt down the novel on which it's based, Mai Jia's The Message -- in large part out of curiosity about whether it's also lesbians.

The answer: ... sort of! The lesbians are not technically textual but there's a bit of Lesbian Speculation and then a big pointed narrative hole where lesbians could potentially be. It is, however, without a doubt, Women Being Really Weird About Each Other, to the point where I'm considering it as a Yuletide fandom (perhaps even moreso than the movie, where the women are also weird about each other but in a more triumphant cinematic way and less of an ambiguous, psychologically complex and melancholic way. you know.)

The plot: well, as in the movie, there's a spy, and there's the Japanese Occupation, and there's a Big Haunted House where we're keeping all the possible spies to play mind games with until somebody fesses up. Because the book is set in 1941 China, there are actually three factions at play -- the Japanese and collaborators, the Communists and the Nationalists -- and for the whole first part of the book, fascinatingly enough, we are almost entirely in the head of the Japanese officer who's running the operation and choreographing all the mind games in an attempt to ferret out the Communist agent in his codebreaking division. The result is sort of a weird and almost darkly funny anti-heroic anti-Poirot situation, in which Hihara is constantly engineering increasingly complicated locked-room scenarios designed to get the spy to confess like the culprit in a Thin Man movie, and is constantly thwarted by his suspects inconveniently refusing to stick to the script, even when presented with apparently incontrovertible evidence, placed under torture, lied to about the deaths of other members of the party, etc. etc.

The suspects include several variously annoying men, plus two women whom we and everyone else are clearly intended to find the most interesting people there: quiet and competent Li Ningyu, cryptography division head, mother of two, whom everyone knows is semi-separated from an abusive husband, and who somehow manages to keep calmly slithering her way out of every accusation Hihara tries to stick on her; and her opposite, loud bratty chic Gu Xiaomeng, whom Hihara would very much like to rule out as a suspect as quickly as possible because she's the daughter of a very wealthy collaborator, and who seems moderately obsessed with her boss Li Ningyu For Some Reason.

Both book and movie spend, like, sixty percent of their length on this big house espionage mind games scenario and then abruptly take a left turn, with the next forty percent being Something Completely Different. In the film this left turn involves DRAMATIC ROMANTIC ACTION HEROICS!!!! so I was quite surprised to find that the book's left turn ( involves spoilers )

mific posting in

fancake

Fandom: due South
Characters/Pairings: Diefenbaker
Rating: Gen
Length: n/a (artwork)
Content Notes: may induce donut cravings!
Creator Links: Wagnetic on AO3
Theme: Food and cooking, Happy endings, Crafts, Textiles

Summary: A bag featuring Dief and the imminent demise of some donuts.

Reccer's Notes:
I will never stop reccing this! An excellently crafted bag with a felt appliqué of Dief about to enjoy a stack of donuts. It's so good, and a perfect likeness of Dief with a "donuts incoming" gleam in his eye!

Fanwork Links: Hungry Like the Wolf

j00j

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

musesfool

Last night at this time, I was on what ended up to be a 90 minute (or more - I left after 90 minutes) call with other shareholders in my building to discuss options for complying with local law 97, which is all about reducing carbon emissions. It was informative, though as usual, the people running these meetings are bad at it it, and 2 people basically monopolized all the Q&A time with very specific-to-them concerns instead of applicable-to-all-tenants stuff, but at least nobody accused the board of being racist for muting them, which is what happened the last time I joined a building-related zoom call. Still only about a quarter of the people who live here showed up, which I find inexplicable considering the financial considerations involved. While no final decision was made, it seems like there will be a recommendation to take one of the incremental measures while continuing to explore the more expensive (but not the ludicrously expensive most expensive) options. So we'll see how that goes. If it helps my apartment not to turn into a sauna going forward, I am interested!

*

Baby Miss L is still trying to finalize her Halloween costume, but as with last year, there may be multiple outfits as she has a very full social calendar. She has gotten better about school, too - apparently she waves hello to everyone as she enters, and I imagine they all appreciate her attention. *g* I have also started compiling a list of books to buy her for her birthday and Christmas, which I guess I'll start shopping for soon.

*

I complain about work fairly often, but today I learned that 1. they've confirmed that our insurance will cover covid jabs for everyone who uses it, and 2. they're giving us 2 extra paid holidays this year since both 12/26 and 1/2 fall on Fridays. So I know I have it pretty good despite...everything happening in the world to try to ruin public health and nonprofits.

*

I can't remember if I posted about the very addictive phone game I recently downloaded, but after several lelvels where the only way to advance was to spend money to get helpful items, I deleted it. I can't be spending that kind of money and I am definitely the kind of person who needs to defeat the puzzles, even though I can see they are specifically designed to not be beatable without those helpful items. It's one reason I don't gamble or play "real" video games - I tend to get feverishly obsessive about winning and neither sleep nor money matter to me in that state. *hands* At least I know this about myself? Idk, but it felt good to delete the game even though I am still craving it.

*

The Mets snapped their losing streak on Sunday and still control their destiny in terms of a wild card spot, but given how poorly they've played for so long, this series with San Diego feels like a playoff game already. We'll see if they can hold the early lead. ....and now Lindor goes deep! <333

*

Current Mood: anxious
Current Music: Mets vs Padres on tv

spiralsheep

I began an A-Z (ish) reading challenge involving going into a library fiction section and choosing an available book from the next letter. I decided to prioritise the shortest books I haven't read in each section out of laziness and got off to a good start with Jane Austen juvenilia (Lesley Castle, and "Catharine, or The Bower"), but today's B offering was Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach, lol, which I've managed to avoid reading until now. I browsed further for a book outside my usual reading zone and picked Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum because most of the other translations were either terminally literary or murdery or both. I mean, I enjoy occasional excessively literary fiction but more at the experimental end than the navel-gazing middle. Anyway, I can't decide which to read so it's up to you (you're going to engineer a dead-heat so I have to read both, aren't you?).

ALSO, when I emerged from the stacks, squinting into the pleasantly warm yellow air, a new-ish hatchback, with the windows rolled down, cruised past banging out Born Slippy which, ok, it was big hit at the time and I understand nostalgia but rly? Although it's definitely hatchback muzak: "Mega, mega, mega going back to Romford / How am I at having fun?"

Poll #33624 Life is a series of multiple choice questions

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 10

View Respondents

B says hi!

View Answers

Jonathan Livingston Seagull
4 (40.0%)

Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop
5 (50.0%)

Dr Bellfrier has forgotten how to read!
3 (30.0%)

How am I at having fun?

View Answers

Born Slippy!
4 (50.0%)

No.
4 (50.0%)

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eruthros

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Reading

Daily Happiness

Mount Shasta and Entering San Francisco

Festivids Nominations Clarifications Post #4

Me-and-media update

ATLA: Heat, Wait, Steep, Repeat by Haicrescendo

Fat Bear Flash

In which our heroine visits Llagerub on Sea

(no subject)

Mo Dao Zu Shi; Chen Qing Ling: Tea Preferences by CQL Sects - a Headcanon, by watch-grok-brainrot

Daily Happiness

Question Mark

In which me / trainspotting otp

Theme Reminder: Food & Cooking

(no subject)

Daily Happiness

(no subject)

due South: Hungry Like the Wolf, by Wagnetic

Regional commercials?

a 2-run bomb from brett baty

In which life is a series of multiple choice questions

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October 2024

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