Network

Entry tags:

Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered, am in Birmingham

Wot a saga, eh, wot a saga, first time I have ventured significantly forth these many years -

And to start with, MAJOR HEAT EVENT.

In anticipation, I had - or so I thought - prudently booked a taxi via taxiapp, with a certain amount of leeway, just in case -

- which turned out very prudent, as when I went to check the booking this morning the app was showing 'network error' and this was clearly on their end rather than mine, and a little looking about suggests that this is not their first ~~rodeo~~ server problem.

So when, at designated time, taxi cameth not, I set out towards the Tube, not without some hope that a black cab might pass me on my way, but that Was Not To Be -

And on reflection, I should perhaps have waited for a Bank train, because getting out on Charing X platforms at Euston involves rather too many stairs.

However, Avanti kindly texted me the approx time my train would be boarding, and this all seemed set - although my (1st class) seat was aisle, backwards, there was nobody in the other 3 seats so I switched -

HAH.

When we reached Coventry, choochoo sighed and gave up, and we had to debouch and take the next Birmingham bound train - which was delayed....

At Birmingham New Street had considerable faff trying to discover a Way Out that would take me to a taxi rank.

When I finally arrived at hotel booked by conference organisers there was an immense performance trying to find the right group booking, as it was not under any title that I might have thought of but that of some hireling booking agency.

However, I am now in nice cool room and have had tasty room service snack. Even if I have had to wrestle with getting my laptop to talk to the free wifi...

Current Mood: giddy
Current Music: CIX 용희 & 현석 - 내 귀에 캔디

Entry tags:

k-pop: cix

ATTENTION: I HAVE A NEW SHIP

(blanket headphone warning for all the fancams featured here: LOUD fangirling)

Y'all! I can't BELIEVE this ship has only 10 fics on AO3. I mean look at this!!! The fics should be writing themselves by now!!!!!

The rolled up sleeves?! The loosened ties?!?! The PULLING of said loosened ties?!?!?! The waist grabs?!?!?!?! The hands on waists, period?!?!?! The FLIRTINGGGGGG?!?!?!?!

They literally walked towards each other, holding eye contact, while singing to each other that they're in love?!?! It's canon now!!!!!

Watch on YouTube

I have watched every fancam ever of Yonghee and Hyunsuk performing this. For research purposes. The research being finding the perfect one. There isn't, but this one's a splice of several fancams and edited well (what keeps it from being perfect is that the OP is clearly Hyunsuk biased, and I'm Yonghee biased by Vindrae at Kingdom of Knuffel

Watch on YouTube

So, I must mandatorily sign off with a Yonghee fancam:

Watch on YouTube

No but seriously, the fact that there are no canon compliant fics about this performance and all its implications? IS A FACT I CANNOT ACCEPT. I will fill this ship tag all by myself if I have to but like LOOK at the glory of this! It's a miracle, and my soul is so well fed, I must now spread the word. Hear ye. Kim Yonghee/Yoon Hyunsuk. Amen. //mic drop

Entry tags:

Round 176: Working Together

Photograph with added text: Working Together, at Fancake. Workers in India use wide wooden paddles with long handles to shove a huge yard of drying grains into big piles. The grain, most likely rice, is a beautiful golden color, and there's a mix of western and traditional clothing among the seven men and women.

Our theme for July is working together!

This round is for fanworks that feature characters working together to achieve a common goal or—and this is not necessarily the same thing—fanworks set in the workplace.

The tag for this round is: theme: working together

If you're just joining us, be sure to check out our policy on content notes. Content notes aren't required, but they're nice to include in your recs, especially if a fanwork has untagged content that readers may wish to know about in advance.

( Rules! )

( Posting Template! )

( Promote this round! )

Reblog on Tumblr | Reskeet on Bluesky | Retoot on Mastodon

Current Mood: accomplished

Entry tags:

mission 116 update

Mission 116 Update for June 2025 (Month 14)

More big activity this month as the renovation continues. A very busy and stressful month!

5. Read Vorkosigan series
Thanks to friends, I was able to find an ereader app that works on my tablet and then sent the books I am missing to me, so I could read again, yay! Thank you,

spiffikins and

mrlnpndrgn!

Read Captain Vorpatril’s Alliance and Flowers of Vashnoi. Ivan and Ekaterin get their own books!!

28. Weight monitoring
This was depressing, although not unexpected. Still stress eating, still gaining weight. Must find the discipline again. I don’t feel anywhere near as good as I did before gaining, although stress is likely a big part of that.

29. BMI monitoring
We all know what happens when you gain weight. The BMI goes up. *sigh*

33. Semi-annual checkup with PCP
Not nearly as bad as I’d feared, despite the weight gain. The visit was cordial and he was kind and sympathetic about all my stress issues and didn’t lecture me on the weight gain. Most of the labs were way better than expected.

35. Tracking A1c to keep under 7
Honestly, I was shocked that my A1c came in at 6.6. It’s a far cry from the previous 5.7 but I’ll take it, and at least it remains under 7.

67. Replace damaged closet door in middle bedroom.
I had thought to replace two doors in that room but the entry door was salvageable. The closet door was purchased, painted and installed. I have a new handle but someone needs to drill a hole in the door so it can be installed.

69. Replace damaged subflooring at stairway landing
Done! Also ended up replacing a few pieces of subflooring in the upstairs family room – most likely pet damage from previous years.

71. Renovate upstairs bathroom
This part of the job was seriously noisy but the room was gutted at long last. All the tiling is done as well – the shower and the flooring, with plumbing rough-ins. The old hanging fluorescent light in the bathroom has been removed and a nice clean can light installed. Still waiting on a few things to be done, but the main bones are there now.

73. Repair damaged wall areas in upstairs rooms
Lots of remudding work involved on the ceilings and walls. Quite the lengthy process – mudding, sanding, remudding, more sanding. So much dust! The A/C got so clogged it stopped working. I’m changing filters every couple days at this point to get rid of lingering dust.

74. Paint ceiling, walls and trim upstairs
The upstairs painting has been completed, and as I said elsewhere, the white on white effect is underwhelming to me, but at least it is done and is fresh, clean and the rooms upstairs are now flooded with light.

This wasn’t a separate item in my list, but the electrical work is also completed upstairs. Those horrid old fluorescent lights in the ceiling have been replaced by snazzy new can lights, 6 in the family room, 1 in each closet and 4 in the bedroom. Oh, and one in the bathroom. Let there be light!!

92. Curate book collection
Done and done! I did go through my final selections and decided to keep all of them. I’ve kept around 50 books, just those I tend to read over and over.

Current Mood: happy?
Current Location: Schildhaven in Den Haag

Entry tags:

mood,
recurring

"Rabbit rabbit rabbit!"

Welcome to July, 2025!

It's worth noting that "happy" is a very rare mood tag these days. The last time I used it was in 2019, after Mom's 99th birthday party.

(no subject)

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250630.html

It's raining stars.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250630.html

no more camping

Our basement is full. We need to clean it out and eliminate a lot of crap we don't need. So yesterday Cindy said "let's go work in the basement." It might have been me who suggested attacking the shelves that hold our camping gear. I used to go camping all the time, being in Boy Scouts. And then I started going camping for fun, and accumulated more/better gear. I had a lot of gear for different activities, like my big frame pack for backpacking. And cast iron for cooking. And tent pegs, ropes and poles. Stoves, lanterns, fuel.

To make any headway on the stuff, the question needed to be asked. "Will we ever go camping again?" We haven't gone in a good fifteen years, despite my thinking about it every year. So the answer was no.

So that was depressing.

And then, of course, going through the stuff and convincing myself that we needed to get rid of it was also difficult.

But how do we get rid of it? We did nearly fill up the trash can in the garage. But there's a lot of good stuff. Selling it is not worth it, so I guess giving it to Goodwill or whatever is the best route. Listing it for free on Craigslist seems like too much work, but at least someone might take it away. I need to check if anything is worth money. I have some vintage Coleman gear, but I doubt if it's old enough, or in good shape. The cast iron might be worth money, unless everyone else is trying to unload theirs too. I guess I should start by asking friends on Fb if they want anything.

And I need to make time to sort through the remainder of the stuff, checking for anything useful.

Entry tags:

just one thing

Just one thing: 01 July 2025

It's challenge time!

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

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

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

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

Go!

Current Mood: hot
Current Location: on my Chandler/Joey chair

Entry tags:

Hot Words, Cold Drinks: July is the Month of Fic

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

Entry tags:

Oneonta Gorge

Our next stop on the trip that day was Oneonia Gorge. It has a tunnel through the rock in between the trees, though we didn't go through it. Instead, we stopped just before it to take pictures of the creek and gorge.( Read more... )

Current Music: Mad Dogs & Englishmen

Entry tags:

Because the sun is far too sultry And one must avoid its ultry-violet ray

How is it the end of June already? Where did it go?

And tomorrow I have to travel to Birmingham for a conference.

I am telling myself that I survived the Hot Summer of 76 in an un-airconditioned office where, if one opened a window in came the noise and fumes of a heavily traffic-polluted thoroughfare.

Of course, I was Much Younger in those days.

I see that it is supposed to get somewhat cooler (and wetter) on Weds.

Current Mood: sad
Current Location: Schildhaven in Den Haag
Current Music: Purple Haze?

Entry tags:

rip,
river

River: A shade of purple has left the world

I have heard the sad news from several friends, who heard it from a friend of a friend, that acelightning passed away suddenly two days ago.

Sadly, I never got to meet her IRL; all I knew of her was her signature purple posts and comments that occasionally brightened my days. I was always glad to see that flash of purple on my reading page, and now it's gone, never to be seen again.

Farewell, Ace -- perhaps I'll see you again, with Colleen and Ame, somewhere over the rainbow bridge. The purple rose icon I made for Amethyst has rarely been so appropriate.

Dehumidifier

https://xkcd.com/3109/

It's important for devices to have internet connectivity so the manufacturer can patch remote exploits.

https://xkcd.com/3109/

Entry tags:

Lord Peter Wimsey: Tea For Two by Beatrice_Otter

Fandom: Lord Peter Wimsey - Dorothy L. Sayers
Characters/Pairings: Harriet Vane & Mary Wimsey
Rating: Gen
Length: 1951
Creator Links: Beatrice_Otter on AO3
Themes: Female relationships, Female friendship, Female characters

Summary: "I was complaining to my brother about how few friends I had, and he suggested that you might be an interesting person to know."

After Harriet is exonerated, she and Mary Wimsey meet for tea.

Reccer's Notes: A lovely, quietly perceptive story about two slightly lonely women finding commonalities and starting to become friends - one of Lord Peter's more successful machinations. It's beautifully written and the author's note at the end is interesting if you're a fan of the Wimsey books.

Fanwork Links: Tea For Two

Entry tags:

travel

Packing

Regrettably, we have to go home again this afternoon. I am packing with the intention of leaving our luggage at the hotel while we do one last amble along Southsea beach.

Swag count:

11 pens
9 commemorative guidebooks (to the various ships, museums, and the dockyard as a whole)
2 notebooks
2 postcards
1 travel mug
1 fridge magnet
1 birthday card from the Spinnaker Bar staff

Also some chocolate from the Lindt outlet store. My suitcase was fairly full when we came. I'm sure I can make it all fit ... somehow.

The seed for choosing Portsmouth for this getaway came from seeing a sign for "Explosion Museum" while driving a bunch of hockey players to Gosport rink back in May. I'm very glad I went with that impulse, it's worked out well.

(no subject)

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

If you know where to look, you can see a thermonuclear explosion from a white dwarf star.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

(no subject)

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250629.html

Are these trees growing on Mars?

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250629.html

Entry tags:

just one thing

Just one thing: 30 June 2025

Entry tags:

vital functions

vital functions

Reading. ( Scalzi, Wells, Gordon + Ziv, Burch + Penman, McMillan-Webster )

I have also done a bunch of variably directed online reading about models and theories of pain, and will happily recommend the British Psychological Society's Story of pain should this be relevant to your interests!

Writing. I am several thousand words and 18 (of 52) questions into the consultation on the EHRC Code of Practice consultation. The deadline is in a little under 24 hours. Approximately two thirds of the questions appear to be very simple and straightforward tickboxes. I am not super enjoying the free-text responses, and especially did not enjoy that despite the total lack of any indicator of a word limit there is in fact a word limit and it's 1000 words. I discovered this having written 2511 of the damn things.

More cheerfully I am also, as mentioned, enjoying playing with my pens for the purposes of notes about pain. I am increasingly convinced (cannot remember if I mentioned?) that I have Solved the Problem of one of my fancy pens having an unwelcome tendency to dry up when looked at funny, via the method of "giving the cap a bonus little wiggle once it's on". (It's the Visconti Homo Sapiens Bronze Age which, second hand, was a PhD completion present from A, because -- for those of you who aren't massive fountain pen nerds -- it's made out of a resin that's got crushed Etna basalt mixed in with it; I spent a while going "is it just because red-family inks are typically quite dry???" but nope, the effectiveness of the extra little wiggle suggests quite strongly that the spring for the inner cap isn't quiiite activating when I'd ideally like it to. This isn't necessarily a huge surprise given how sticky it was when I first got the pen, but it still took me... a while... to catch on.

Watching. Up to date with Murderbot. Remain grumbly about Decisions including "how little time the poor thing spends with its helmet up" and "how bad people are at poly" and also, fundamentally, the word "throuple" (I AM TOO OLD AND CRANKY FOR THIS NONSENSE, APPARENTLY), but am also mildly peeved that we've run out of episodes.

Listening. An Indelicates gig, which I almost could not make myself leave the house for but was very very glad I did. Not having yet managed to scrape together the brain to listen to Avenue QAnon significantly increased the proportion of new-to-me songs!

Cooking. Bread? Bread.

Eating. The branch of Tonkotsu a short way from the Indeligig venue turned out to have outside seating! And an updated menu since last time we made it to them, so we both delightedly consumed the chilli tofu ramen and also shared the cauliflower 'wings' and some edamame and the very pleasant yuzu lemonade and also also I tried A's Smoked Hibiscus Margarita and it was great. (I mildly regretted not being in fit state to actually want an entire cocktail of my own.)

Growing. I... harvested and processed 1.7 kg of redcurrants! And ate several handfuls of raspberries! Depending on how badly my neglect since Wednesday has damaged everything given The Heat there's at least as much again to come off the redcurrant bush, and the jostaberry and gooseberry were also both looking extremely promising. AND the second sowing of kohlrabi has started to come up.

Entry tags:

Deadloch: Keep On Gruckin' by kirazi

Fandom: Deadloch
Characters/Pairings: Dulcie Collins/Eddie Redcliffe/Cath York
Rating: Explicit
Length: 5010
Content Notes: not kidding about the rating
Creator Links: kirazi on AO3
Themes: Female relationships, Femslash, Polyamory, Friends to lovers

Summary: “This is not a good idea, love,” Dulcie says, keeping her tone level. “I know I said I’d try to be more open to change, and I hear and respect your opinion, I truly do, but this is — it’s like the hobby farm. It’s really not going to work.”

“I just think,” Cath says, bright-eyed and earnest, “that it would be a healing experience for me. For us both! To share that kind of intimacy. I am committed to working through my anxiety about you fucking your partner and I’m sure that would be so much more manageable for me if we fucked her first. Together.”

(Eddie needs a gruck. Dulcie and Cath offer to help her out.)

Reccer's Notes: This is a polyamory fic where Cath decides she and Dulcie should have sex with Eddie so as to manage her anxiety that Dulcie might be unfaithful with Eddie (as happened in the past with a former partner at work). There's some nice psychological and historical exploration as Dulcie tries to work out what's going on, and the eventual sex is hot and well-written. What I like most is the character voices and dialogue for the three of them, which are spot on. It's also very funny, as are Eddie's creative takes on the English language.

Fanwork Links: Keep On Gruckin'