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see the world in just one grain of sand
Mar. 8th, 2026 09:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
musesfoolUgh, daylight savings, why are we still doing this???
Anyway, I got up at my usual workday time instead of sleeping in so I could get the onions in the slow cooker, and I did both the "soak onions in cold water in the fridge for 15 minutes" and wore the stupid onion goggles, and still by the 4th onion my eyes were extremely unhappy with me. *hands* Thankfully I only had 6 onions total, so it all got done, and for dinner I made French onion pasta as planned, and now I have dinner for 3 more days as well. I do love this pasta dish - and I always use bucatini, which is one of my favorite pasta shapes, so it was pleasing all around. Every time I make it after not having made in a while, I'm like, why don't I make this more often!? and then I remember the onion-slicing and how annoying it is. Anyway, definitely recommended for a delicious and easy dinner (except for the onion-slicing). I also made bacon so I have lunch for the week also.
I meant to mention this yesterday and forgot, but The Mountain Goats collaborated with Mary Chapin Carpenter to cover World Party: Put the Message in the Box (don't worry if you only recognize one or two of those names - the song is good!).
*
Anyway, I got up at my usual workday time instead of sleeping in so I could get the onions in the slow cooker, and I did both the "soak onions in cold water in the fridge for 15 minutes" and wore the stupid onion goggles, and still by the 4th onion my eyes were extremely unhappy with me. *hands* Thankfully I only had 6 onions total, so it all got done, and for dinner I made French onion pasta as planned, and now I have dinner for 3 more days as well. I do love this pasta dish - and I always use bucatini, which is one of my favorite pasta shapes, so it was pleasing all around. Every time I make it after not having made in a while, I'm like, why don't I make this more often!? and then I remember the onion-slicing and how annoying it is. Anyway, definitely recommended for a delicious and easy dinner (except for the onion-slicing). I also made bacon so I have lunch for the week also.
I meant to mention this yesterday and forgot, but The Mountain Goats collaborated with Mary Chapin Carpenter to cover World Party: Put the Message in the Box (don't worry if you only recognize one or two of those names - the song is good!).
*
Tallying.
Mar. 8th, 2026 08:42 pmhannahKnowing my parents' summer plans, I don't think I'll want to attend the full vacation with them. I don't know yet if I'll want to attend any of it with them. They're staying in a town a half-hour's drive from Beacon, which is a pleasant enough train ride, so I'm thinking maybe three days, tops, would be okay.
Last time they did this, I only stayed a handful of days. It's not unprecedented in our vacation plans. I'll probably want to get out of New York City in its sticky season, and knowing I'll have a limited amount of time there from the get-go is probably one of the better things I can do to be able to enjoy myself. I've seen what happens when it's all on my parents. It doesn't end well.
Last time they did this, I only stayed a handful of days. It's not unprecedented in our vacation plans. I'll probably want to get out of New York City in its sticky season, and knowing I'll have a limited amount of time there from the get-go is probably one of the better things I can do to be able to enjoy myself. I've seen what happens when it's all on my parents. It doesn't end well.
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I'm not a renter anymore — I just thought you should know.
Mar. 8th, 2026 05:08 pmnewredshoesI slept??? until 11 this morning??? Blame DST, but I also walked more than eight miles yesterday, much of that inside the Art Institute with ![[archiveofourown.org profile]](https://archiveofourown.org/favicon.ico)
Shibrogane, who was in town for a conference, hurrah! I am also on newsletter fill-in duty at work; last Monday, I wrote our afternoon newsletter, which I usually edit, and from Friday to this coming Friday, I wake up at ugly o'clock and put together the morning newsletter, which is horrific. It actively makes me ill to not get enough sleep and throw myself right into work as I wake ("wake") up. Like, thank goodness I found some melatonin so maybe I can get enough sleep early enough tonight, but that's a gamble.
GOSH. It has been a month! We've got elections stuff at work (the Illinois primary elections are March 17th and it requires so much prep work), and then Jesse Jackson died and that became our ENTIRE output (not literally, but it's felt like it) for two or three weeks. I am TIRED.
The biggest thing is: condo got! Closing is this coming Friday! I am — scrambling to get packed and organized in addition to All of This Above, because my original shipment of moving boxes was delayed and then stolen. I'm also constantly laughing at myself because I was like, oh yeah, I'll have two weeks for contractors to fix stuff and for painting and gradual move-in and they can obviously just let themselves in to get things done! And then I remembered, with horror, that no, I am the one who will have to constantly ferry back and forth between the apartments in order to let them in etc etc etc. It's awkward on public transit and too long for a morning walk, but it's a straightforward bike ride, so I'm hoping my ex-dislocated elbow will let me travel that way for now. But yes, I do not know when I will actually be moving, aside from "before the end of the month." We'll see!
Gingko, of course, continues to be herself, by which I mean around Valentine's Day, she ate about a cup's worth of therapy putty for my hand. It was nontoxic, luckily, and she got two and a half slices of white bread with every meal to "bulk her diet" until it came out (which — ultimately, it sure did!). One of her favorite things to do to get my attention while I'm trying to relax or focus is to chew on cardboard boxes while making eye contact with me, so the arrival of so many boxes for packing up the apartment has me a little worried for the next little bit. We'll make it work, I guess! I keep trying to use my weekends efficiently or productively or whatever, and then Gingko has other plans, through no fault of her own — she does need those long walks and equally long cuddles, but I cannot afford to put her in doggy day camp for two weeks straight. We'll see!!!
Zhang Linghe's new drama Pursuit of Jade is on Netflix and it's freaking fantastic so far. Slow, patient, character-focused, beautiful to look at, excellent-af women — it's by the same director as Blossom and A Familiar Stranger, which explains a lot. I am excited to see where it goes! It is not the kind of show I can watch while doing other things, though, that is what podcasts are for.
Chaos, chaos, chaos. I keep saying I can't wait to be at the phase of moving where you have to buy out an IKEA. Today, at least, I've been able to sort through and prune a bunch of books. Maybe going one room at a time will keep me from going absolutely batshit? I've never been good at this part, but I'm very grateful that I've got some buffer time so it's not all in a rush. We haven't even talked about the storage unit I need to source and rent indefinitely... oof. Hi! ✶
GOSH. It has been a month! We've got elections stuff at work (the Illinois primary elections are March 17th and it requires so much prep work), and then Jesse Jackson died and that became our ENTIRE output (not literally, but it's felt like it) for two or three weeks. I am TIRED.
The biggest thing is: condo got! Closing is this coming Friday! I am — scrambling to get packed and organized in addition to All of This Above, because my original shipment of moving boxes was delayed and then stolen. I'm also constantly laughing at myself because I was like, oh yeah, I'll have two weeks for contractors to fix stuff and for painting and gradual move-in and they can obviously just let themselves in to get things done! And then I remembered, with horror, that no, I am the one who will have to constantly ferry back and forth between the apartments in order to let them in etc etc etc. It's awkward on public transit and too long for a morning walk, but it's a straightforward bike ride, so I'm hoping my ex-dislocated elbow will let me travel that way for now. But yes, I do not know when I will actually be moving, aside from "before the end of the month." We'll see!
Gingko, of course, continues to be herself, by which I mean around Valentine's Day, she ate about a cup's worth of therapy putty for my hand. It was nontoxic, luckily, and she got two and a half slices of white bread with every meal to "bulk her diet" until it came out (which — ultimately, it sure did!). One of her favorite things to do to get my attention while I'm trying to relax or focus is to chew on cardboard boxes while making eye contact with me, so the arrival of so many boxes for packing up the apartment has me a little worried for the next little bit. We'll make it work, I guess! I keep trying to use my weekends efficiently or productively or whatever, and then Gingko has other plans, through no fault of her own — she does need those long walks and equally long cuddles, but I cannot afford to put her in doggy day camp for two weeks straight. We'll see!!!
Zhang Linghe's new drama Pursuit of Jade is on Netflix and it's freaking fantastic so far. Slow, patient, character-focused, beautiful to look at, excellent-af women — it's by the same director as Blossom and A Familiar Stranger, which explains a lot. I am excited to see where it goes! It is not the kind of show I can watch while doing other things, though, that is what podcasts are for.
Chaos, chaos, chaos. I keep saying I can't wait to be at the phase of moving where you have to buy out an IKEA. Today, at least, I've been able to sort through and prune a bunch of books. Maybe going one room at a time will keep me from going absolutely batshit? I've never been good at this part, but I'm very grateful that I've got some buffer time so it's not all in a rush. We haven't even talked about the storage unit I need to source and rent indefinitely... oof. Hi! ✶
Cheerful Tumblr nonsense
Mar. 8th, 2026 11:56 amsholioRecently I made:
• A gifset of Babylon 5 hugs
• A Londo & G'Kar text/image collage
Obviously these are wildly full of spoilers.
( A little nattering about giffing on Tumblr again )
• A gifset of Babylon 5 hugs
• A Londo & G'Kar text/image collage
Obviously these are wildly full of spoilers.
( A little nattering about giffing on Tumblr again )
As Canadian As Possible Under the Circumstances
Mar. 8th, 2026 03:07 pmfairestcatPart of trying to use Dreamwidth more is realizing all the things I haven't shared here. Such as: As of December, after 16 years in Canada, I am now a Canadian Citizen!
I had a celebratory citizenship/birthday party last night, surrounded by the family and community I've joined/built here in Canada and it was so lovely and affirming and energizing in exactly the way I needed right now.
I had a celebratory citizenship/birthday party last night, surrounded by the family and community I've joined/built here in Canada and it was so lovely and affirming and energizing in exactly the way I needed right now.
I know. I never write, I never post...
Mar. 8th, 2026 02:55 pmfairestcatI'm going to be in France, The UK, Belgium, and Germany in May and June!
I'm quite sure I know many people in at least some of these places and I'd love to see as many of you as I can make happen!
As I noted to Ian just now, seeing things is great and awesome and absolutely something I want to do, but the highlight of travel for me is seeing people, especially ones I've known for ages but never met in person.
Tentative schedule currently is:
- arrive in Paris the morning of May 26th
- May 26-June 5 - various locations in France including but not necessarily limited to Paris and Limoges.
- plane from somewhere in France to Birmingham the morning of the 5th of June.
- June 5-7 VidUKon in Birmingham
- June 7-??? - various locations in the UK including London and Portsmouth, other options depending on people and travel options.
- ??? - Train from London to Brussels
- 2 days later - sleeper from Brussels to Berlin
- ??? (tbd quite soon) - fly home from Berlin.
I'll be buying my flight home in the next couple days, at which point all the dates between Birmingham and Berlin will firm up at least a bit.
This is going to be my first time in Europe since I lived in Berlin for three months in 2000. I've never been to France. I've never been to Belgium. The last time I was in England was a high school trip in 1997. It's all both incredibly exciting and kind of terrifying.
Also, while I've done some solo travelling in the US and Canada, both my previous trips to Europe I was always travelling with at least one other person. So that adds an extra layer of nerves.
So, where should I go??? Who should I see??? How much can I vibrate out of my skin with nerves and excitement between now and the end of May???
I'm quite sure I know many people in at least some of these places and I'd love to see as many of you as I can make happen!
As I noted to Ian just now, seeing things is great and awesome and absolutely something I want to do, but the highlight of travel for me is seeing people, especially ones I've known for ages but never met in person.
Tentative schedule currently is:
- arrive in Paris the morning of May 26th
- May 26-June 5 - various locations in France including but not necessarily limited to Paris and Limoges.
- plane from somewhere in France to Birmingham the morning of the 5th of June.
- June 5-7 VidUKon in Birmingham
- June 7-??? - various locations in the UK including London and Portsmouth, other options depending on people and travel options.
- ??? - Train from London to Brussels
- 2 days later - sleeper from Brussels to Berlin
- ??? (tbd quite soon) - fly home from Berlin.
I'll be buying my flight home in the next couple days, at which point all the dates between Birmingham and Berlin will firm up at least a bit.
This is going to be my first time in Europe since I lived in Berlin for three months in 2000. I've never been to France. I've never been to Belgium. The last time I was in England was a high school trip in 1997. It's all both incredibly exciting and kind of terrifying.
Also, while I've done some solo travelling in the US and Canada, both my previous trips to Europe I was always travelling with at least one other person. So that adds an extra layer of nerves.
So, where should I go??? Who should I see??? How much can I vibrate out of my skin with nerves and excitement between now and the end of May???
short fiction rec: Morag and Seamus stories
Mar. 8th, 2026 01:35 pmjadelennoxI am enjoying this Clarkesworld subscription. Snail mail once a month full of stories! And my favorite part of the subscription has been the recurring Morag and Seamus stories by Fiona Moore (all free online). I believe it's every one of her Clarkesworld stories from "The Spoil Heap" on. The list on the site is reverse chronological, so if you want to read in order, scroll down to "The Spoil Heap" and read up from there.
While very different, they remind me in vibe of Naomi Kritzer's "The Year Without Sunshine". One of my difficulties with some hopepunk is that it can ignore hard truths—which, I admit, is sometimes what I want! But like "The Year Without Sunshine", the Morag and Seamus stories don't pretend mutual aid can create Abundance™️, or outcompete bad and selfish actors, or defeat natural disasters, or solve medical and ability needs, or create entire post-scarcity planets or large societies where goodness reigns. In fact, the Morag and Seamus stories specifically roll their eyes at people who think we can achieve fully automated luxury gay space communism.
They're just about people (and possibly robots) figuring their shit out, in myriad ways. Some are helpers and some aren't; some make family in all kind of ways; nobody's sure what the future holds. Helpers beget helpers, greed begets problems, the world moves on, Morag and Seamus grow potatoes in Wales.
Progress on the vidding catchup project on AO3
Mar. 7th, 2026 08:49 pmsholioThree more older vids crossposted to AO3 in the last few days:
Waking Up in Vegas (Greatest American Hero) from 2021 - original DW post with a brief show manifesto as well. (I don't think the Youtube links still work, however.)
Landsailor (Star Wars OT) from 2015 - original DW post from when I made this right after the new movie came out.
Odds Are (Lethal Weapon movies) from Festivids 2015 - original DW post and original Festivids post from back when the exchange was anonymously posted on DW by the mods rather than run through AO3.
I've been checking the embeds and download links as I go, but let me know if you notice anything not working.
Waking Up in Vegas (Greatest American Hero) from 2021 - original DW post with a brief show manifesto as well. (I don't think the Youtube links still work, however.)
Landsailor (Star Wars OT) from 2015 - original DW post from when I made this right after the new movie came out.
Odds Are (Lethal Weapon movies) from Festivids 2015 - original DW post and original Festivids post from back when the exchange was anonymously posted on DW by the mods rather than run through AO3.
I've been checking the embeds and download links as I go, but let me know if you notice anything not working.
that wasn't a no
Mar. 7th, 2026 09:07 pmmusesfoolWent to the office yesterday and as much as I enjoyed seeing so many of my co-workers, almost no work got done. it is just not a good use of time if they want us to be productive. Since it's an open office and we are all sitting together with no walls between us, we just chat and jump into each other's conversations and people stop by and also join in, and it's great for socializing but most of my work is stuff that requires concentration and quiet, which is in short supply at the office. But the anniversary celebration is a lot of fun and I probably won't have to attend another one for 4 more years. *g*
Our next in-office day is in late April, and I floated the idea of maybe bringing in baked goods, so I'm already considering what recipe I might choose to make, since I can experiment.
Today, I made these orange shortbread cookies and they're good, though I would zest another orange (I did 2 this time) if I make them again. Also I didn't sift the flour and instead of rolling out the dough and using cookie cutters, I rolled it into a log and just sliced them (after chilling), since they are just for me so there was no need to get fancy.
I also planned to caramelize onions overnight in the slow cooker, but then I ended up engrossed in F.D. Signifier's Tyler Perry video (which is FOUR HOURS long - I have one hour left but I'm taking a break to watch the WBC) and didn't end up doing the slicing I need to do, so I figure I'll do it in the morning, let them slow cook for most of the day, and then make French onion pasta for dinner. Anyway, I have never seen a Tyler Perry movie or show, but F.D. Signifier's videos are always worth watching.
So yeah, I've been sort of paying attention to the WBC and why is the "S" in USA like a strip of curly bacon on the Team USA jersey??? Once I saw it I couldn't unsee it. Also so many of these unis could be cool and yet so many of them are just meh. Design fail, Nike! Come on! Also, I might be rooting for the DR since Juan Soto is on that team; if Lindor were in it, I'd probably be rooting for Puerto Rico. Though of course I was pleased for Clay Holmes just now, and will be interested to see Nolan McLean pitch.
*
Our next in-office day is in late April, and I floated the idea of maybe bringing in baked goods, so I'm already considering what recipe I might choose to make, since I can experiment.
Today, I made these orange shortbread cookies and they're good, though I would zest another orange (I did 2 this time) if I make them again. Also I didn't sift the flour and instead of rolling out the dough and using cookie cutters, I rolled it into a log and just sliced them (after chilling), since they are just for me so there was no need to get fancy.
I also planned to caramelize onions overnight in the slow cooker, but then I ended up engrossed in F.D. Signifier's Tyler Perry video (which is FOUR HOURS long - I have one hour left but I'm taking a break to watch the WBC) and didn't end up doing the slicing I need to do, so I figure I'll do it in the morning, let them slow cook for most of the day, and then make French onion pasta for dinner. Anyway, I have never seen a Tyler Perry movie or show, but F.D. Signifier's videos are always worth watching.
So yeah, I've been sort of paying attention to the WBC and why is the "S" in USA like a strip of curly bacon on the Team USA jersey??? Once I saw it I couldn't unsee it. Also so many of these unis could be cool and yet so many of them are just meh. Design fail, Nike! Come on! Also, I might be rooting for the DR since Juan Soto is on that team; if Lindor were in it, I'd probably be rooting for Puerto Rico. Though of course I was pleased for Clay Holmes just now, and will be interested to see Nolan McLean pitch.
*
Pounding herb tea, too.
Mar. 7th, 2026 08:06 pmhannahMy plan to cope with daylight saving is to go to bed early and sleep through the worst of it. As this calls for me to go to bed early, there may be a flaw in the plan. But I'm willing to give it a shot.
I spent most of the day with a friend - the Frick art museum, both Central Park zoos, a bowl of noodles and broth. We took our time with the paintings and the parrots, and also the penguins and pinnipeds. We talked about our upcoming birthdays and traded presents, and made general noises towards plans to do it again in a couple of months. We spent about two hours at the bowl restaurant talking fandom and fic, bouncing from crossovers to omegaverse to the importance of a plurality of voices within the community. It was more than welcome.
I spent most of the day with a friend - the Frick art museum, both Central Park zoos, a bowl of noodles and broth. We took our time with the paintings and the parrots, and also the penguins and pinnipeds. We talked about our upcoming birthdays and traded presents, and made general noises towards plans to do it again in a couple of months. We spent about two hours at the bowl restaurant talking fandom and fic, bouncing from crossovers to omegaverse to the importance of a plurality of voices within the community. It was more than welcome.
ADHD with the knockout 🎉
Mar. 7th, 2026 07:14 pmjadelennoxI was writing up a navel-gazing post about grief (tl;dr turned out I think "oh MM would like that!" more often than I would have suspected) and it somehow spiraled into how I could make beautiful and accessible no-Javascript footnotes CSS given the Dreamwidth CSS restrictions. This resulted in me, among other things, reading the DW codebase to see all the CSS restrictions, and then finally after a couple of hours getting my perfect CSS, even though it's completely useless because it will only work when reading in my journal style.
(ETA: That's only because I'm being a perfectionist about placement for the purposes of this exercise, and DW doesn't allow absolute positioning in inline HTML.)
(Also even making this post resulted in me reading the code for Perl's Text::Markdown since I couldn't remember which code block syntax it used.
Hyperfixation FTW!
( CSS, FWIW )
(no subject)
Mar. 7th, 2026 06:44 pmhagar_972*sigh*
Look: not to say that I agree with the our Idiot PM or with his maybe-ally (I decidedly don't), but clearly the Europeans have learned nothing from their history. At all.
To say that something is Bad just because it breaks the law is... yeah. There is an Israeli saying on the matter of people who obey laws because they are laws, and I'm sure every Jewish person around here is thinking about the same historical example right now.
If the law is dumb, you change the fucking law. Humans wrote it and humans can change it. It isn't sacred. Breaking the law does not in itself make anything bad, and a hell of a whole lot of evil had been done as a result of that sort of thinking.
But Europeans be Europeans, apparently.
(Re; I'm sure this quote can be found in language other than Hebrew, too.)
Look: not to say that I agree with the our Idiot PM or with his maybe-ally (I decidedly don't), but clearly the Europeans have learned nothing from their history. At all.
To say that something is Bad just because it breaks the law is... yeah. There is an Israeli saying on the matter of people who obey laws because they are laws, and I'm sure every Jewish person around here is thinking about the same historical example right now.
If the law is dumb, you change the fucking law. Humans wrote it and humans can change it. It isn't sacred. Breaking the law does not in itself make anything bad, and a hell of a whole lot of evil had been done as a result of that sort of thinking.
But Europeans be Europeans, apparently.
(Re; I'm sure this quote can be found in language other than Hebrew, too.)