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podcast friday
Dec. 19th, 2025 07:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sabotabby This week's episode is Wizards & Spaceships' latest, "Postcolonialism in SFFH ft. Suzan Palumbo." Suzan is a rising star in the Canadian speculative fiction scene and also just a very lovely, funny person. In the episode, she discusses the tropes and traditions that are baked into genre that reinforce colonialist mindsets, and the BIPOC authors pushing back against it. It's really good go listen.
friday 5; about me
Dec. 19th, 2025 01:09 amarchersangel1. What is one thing about you that you hate?
most everything.
2. What is one thing about you that you love?
i have a pretty good imagination. for better or worse.
3. If you had to change one thing about you what would it be and why?
i'd loose some weight. it would provably help my knees.
4. What is one word that you would use to define yourself?
basic.
5. Imagine what you would look like in a perfect world...what do you look like?
about 4 inches taller, better hair, thinner, feet that are not wide width or with a high instep, better skin, smaller nose, fuller lips, lower forehead.
more answers are over here.
Reading Wednesday
Dec. 17th, 2025 06:50 amsabotabbyJust finished: Censorship & Information Control: From Printing Press to Internet by Ada Palmer. This was really good. Feels like even though it's pretty recent and deals mostly with history, it could use an update as the technology for censorship has advanced rapidly in the past few years, so I hope she/her students are still doing some work around it.
Currently reading: The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann. Usually in December, after I've hit my Goodreads goal, I read something that's gratuitously long and would otherwise fuck up my goal if it didn't spill over into January (yay for anything and everything in my life being quantified and gamified, love that for me). This year's winner is my high school English teacher's favourite book, which he recommended but said that we wouldn't get until we hit middle age. Well, now I am middle aged so I'm reading it.
It's a curious book. I always hit the literary classics and go like. Oh. Haha. This is stranger and funnier than I imagined.
Am I enjoying it? I dunno, as much as you can enjoy a 1000+ page book which goes into detail about the breakfast, second breakfast, rest period, lunch, dinner, second dinner, etc. of the character. Which is the point, really—the mountain in question is a liminal space where in theory, the tuberculous patients can leave, but don't. But it's a slog.
Currently reading: The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann. Usually in December, after I've hit my Goodreads goal, I read something that's gratuitously long and would otherwise fuck up my goal if it didn't spill over into January (yay for anything and everything in my life being quantified and gamified, love that for me). This year's winner is my high school English teacher's favourite book, which he recommended but said that we wouldn't get until we hit middle age. Well, now I am middle aged so I'm reading it.
It's a curious book. I always hit the literary classics and go like. Oh. Haha. This is stranger and funnier than I imagined.
Me: I guess I will finally read literary classic The Magic Mountain.Thomas Mann: Allow me to introduce my himbo failson, Hans Castorp. He is pure of heart and dumb of ass.
Am I enjoying it? I dunno, as much as you can enjoy a 1000+ page book which goes into detail about the breakfast, second breakfast, rest period, lunch, dinner, second dinner, etc. of the character. Which is the point, really—the mountain in question is a liminal space where in theory, the tuberculous patients can leave, but don't. But it's a slog.
Well, that was quick
Dec. 14th, 2025 11:29 amthewayneMy brother passed away late last night. He had congestive heart failure, pneumonia, and a septic infection. It caused massive stress to his heart which simultaneously cratered his BP and spiked his pulse and did major damage to his liver and kidneys. His body didn't want to breathe for him anymore.
Now begins the fun of wrapping up his affairs, most of which I won't be able to do until I get death certificates in a couple of weeks. At least I got his truck and trailer safely secured. I got his phone powered up, but it's locked: I was hoping it might be the code that I expected, so maybe I can get ahold of a data recovery company to crack it so I can see if there's anyone whom I should get ahold of for the grave-side service that I'm hoping that I can arrange for the end of the week.
Now begins the fun of wrapping up his affairs, most of which I won't be able to do until I get death certificates in a couple of weeks. At least I got his truck and trailer safely secured. I got his phone powered up, but it's locked: I was hoping it might be the code that I expected, so maybe I can get ahold of a data recovery company to crack it so I can see if there's anyone whom I should get ahold of for the grave-side service that I'm hoping that I can arrange for the end of the week.
writing songs
Dec. 14th, 2025 08:47 amenchantedsnowforest Dear Diary,
I've been writing song lyrics again. I just have to buy some instrumentals either on Uppbeat.io or Beatstars.com I can't wait to start loving music again! My latest song is based on Disney princesses.
Love,
Kathryn Rose
I've been writing song lyrics again. I just have to buy some instrumentals either on Uppbeat.io or Beatstars.com I can't wait to start loving music again! My latest song is based on Disney princesses.
Love,
Kathryn Rose
a random weather poll
Dec. 13th, 2025 11:25 pmarchersangeli read once that people really didn't care if they had a white christmas (a.k.a snow on christmas day) until Bing Crosby sang the song white christmas in the movie holiday inn & then people started looking forward to having one and getting annoyed when they don't get it.
Poll #33956 white christmas
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 8
do you want snow on christmas day?
do you live in a place where it could snow on christmas?
Life genuinely sucks, and I have a quandary
Dec. 12th, 2025 10:53 amthewayneI blitzed back to Phoenix Tuesday to get my brother, 66, to the hospital. Turned out I couldn't move him and it required paramedics and an ambulance.
He's now sedated and on a ventilator in intensive care, in critical condition. He has improved a bit since admission, but still critical. At least they haven't called me in the middle of the night for permission to do stuff. He's got like ten different meds being pumped into him. If I'd been delayed a day or two he wouldn't be in the hospital, he probably wouldn't be at all.
Fortunately the library closes from the 24th through the first Monday in January, so I'm not losing much work. But I'm not going to leave town until he's at least out of ICU and breathing on his own. If he lives and gets out of the hospital, he'll have to go into a critical care facility to recover from some wounds (not assault-type wounds), and he'll probably will have to go into assisted living after that.
When I was here in November, he did a holographic will (hand-written) in which he explicitly gave me everything, which isn't much. And after this hospital stay, it may be pretty much nothing. He absolutely hates our sister and the will is phrased to specifically exclude anyone but me, i.e. her and her kids. And the hatred is returned: she hates him, and I know the kids don't like him either.
I'm 95% comfortable with not telling my sister and her kids that he's in such shape. I don't think they'd come to see him. But there's that tiny, niggling bit that if he were to die and I didn't tell them, there'd be problems. At the same time, I never hear from them. And if he does recover and finds out I did tell them, there's also the chance of blowback. Quite the Catch-22.
Thus the quandary.
Anyway, I need to get dressed and off to the hospital.
Pity I couldn't have transported him, he would have been a mile away. Instead, it's half an hour with good traffic.
He's now sedated and on a ventilator in intensive care, in critical condition. He has improved a bit since admission, but still critical. At least they haven't called me in the middle of the night for permission to do stuff. He's got like ten different meds being pumped into him. If I'd been delayed a day or two he wouldn't be in the hospital, he probably wouldn't be at all.
Fortunately the library closes from the 24th through the first Monday in January, so I'm not losing much work. But I'm not going to leave town until he's at least out of ICU and breathing on his own. If he lives and gets out of the hospital, he'll have to go into a critical care facility to recover from some wounds (not assault-type wounds), and he'll probably will have to go into assisted living after that.
When I was here in November, he did a holographic will (hand-written) in which he explicitly gave me everything, which isn't much. And after this hospital stay, it may be pretty much nothing. He absolutely hates our sister and the will is phrased to specifically exclude anyone but me, i.e. her and her kids. And the hatred is returned: she hates him, and I know the kids don't like him either.
I'm 95% comfortable with not telling my sister and her kids that he's in such shape. I don't think they'd come to see him. But there's that tiny, niggling bit that if he were to die and I didn't tell them, there'd be problems. At the same time, I never hear from them. And if he does recover and finds out I did tell them, there's also the chance of blowback. Quite the Catch-22.
Thus the quandary.
Anyway, I need to get dressed and off to the hospital.
Pity I couldn't have transported him, he would have been a mile away. Instead, it's half an hour with good traffic.
podcast friday
Dec. 12th, 2025 07:03 amsabotabby Here's a series from a week or two ago that you really should check out: It Could Happen Here's "Darién Gap: One Year Later." It's four parts and I recommend listening to the whole thing, as it's some truly brilliant reporting, but if you are like me, the one that will stand out the most is the second episode, "To Be Called By No Name." It begins with a song written in 1948, Woody Guthrie's "Deportees (Plane Crash At Los Gatos)" that has horrifying resonance now, nearly 80 years later. From that jumping off point, James discusses the media coverage of the manufactured migrant crisis.
The four part series focuses on two migrants in particular, Primrose and her daughter Kim, from Zimbabwe. Primrose's family opposed the regime there and her father was disappeared; she and her daughter fled a deadly situation to try to claim refugee status in the US. The plight of migrants from African countries is even less discussed than those from Latin America or the Middle East; in detailing Primrose's story, James makes her visible, a heroic protagonist facing impossible odds, someone who lodges in your heart and stays there. It's great storytelling as well as great journalism. He refuses the objectivity of the mainstream reporters, who just don't bother to talk to migrants, let alone give voice to their names and stories.
Even posting about this tears me up. I know a lot of you reading this are doing your best to fight ICE but I want to beat every one of those bastards to death with my bare hands and by the end of this series, you will too.
The four part series focuses on two migrants in particular, Primrose and her daughter Kim, from Zimbabwe. Primrose's family opposed the regime there and her father was disappeared; she and her daughter fled a deadly situation to try to claim refugee status in the US. The plight of migrants from African countries is even less discussed than those from Latin America or the Middle East; in detailing Primrose's story, James makes her visible, a heroic protagonist facing impossible odds, someone who lodges in your heart and stays there. It's great storytelling as well as great journalism. He refuses the objectivity of the mainstream reporters, who just don't bother to talk to migrants, let alone give voice to their names and stories.
Even posting about this tears me up. I know a lot of you reading this are doing your best to fight ICE but I want to beat every one of those bastards to death with my bare hands and by the end of this series, you will too.
Congress strips Miltary's Right to Repair from the Nat'l Defense Authorization Act
Dec. 10th, 2025 10:24 amthewayneBig surprise. After Senator Elizabeth Warren started raising a stink about the military being unable to repair its own equipment, military contractors started "intensely lobbying" for a new system of "data as a service", which would probably have been even worse. Both systems were excluded from the final bill.
https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/09/us_military_right_to_repair_stripped/
https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/12/09/2123219/congress-quietly-strips-right-to-repair-provisions-from-us-military-spending-bill
https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/09/us_military_right_to_repair_stripped/
https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/12/09/2123219/congress-quietly-strips-right-to-repair-provisions-from-us-military-spending-bill
Reading Wednesday
Dec. 10th, 2025 07:06 amsabotabby Just finished: You Better Be Lightning by Andrea Gibson. I never had the privilege of seeing Gibson perform, other than on YouTube, so this is as close as I'm ever going to get. They really were a brilliant poet. Some of the poems lose a bit in print—they tend towards the storytelling and autobiographical, and that reads much less powerfully on the page than in speech—but this is a fairly minor critique. Gibson writes powerfully about queerness, gender, disability, and the climate crisis, and their furious energy is made all the more poignant by their premature death earlier this year.
Currently reading: Censorship & Information Control: From Printing Press to Internet by Ada Palmer. This is an exhibit based on a course that Palmer taught and it just makes me wish I could take the course. I'm screenshotting bits to text to people. Her central argument is that the total state censorship we see depicted in 1984 is the exception rather than the norm; more often censorship is incomplete, self-enforced, or carried out by non-state entities like the church or marketplace. This is obviously important when we talk about issues like free speech, which tends to be very narrowly defined when most of the threats to it have traditionally not come directly from the government (I mean, present-day US excepted, but it took a lot of informal censorship to get to that point).
The bit about fig leafs, complete with illustrations, is particularly good, as is the bit on Pierre Bayle, who hid his radical ideas in the footnotes to his Historical and Critical Dictionary in lengthy footnotes that he knew no one would read.
You can get this for free if you want to read it btw.
Currently reading: Censorship & Information Control: From Printing Press to Internet by Ada Palmer. This is an exhibit based on a course that Palmer taught and it just makes me wish I could take the course. I'm screenshotting bits to text to people. Her central argument is that the total state censorship we see depicted in 1984 is the exception rather than the norm; more often censorship is incomplete, self-enforced, or carried out by non-state entities like the church or marketplace. This is obviously important when we talk about issues like free speech, which tends to be very narrowly defined when most of the threats to it have traditionally not come directly from the government (I mean, present-day US excepted, but it took a lot of informal censorship to get to that point).
The bit about fig leafs, complete with illustrations, is particularly good, as is the bit on Pierre Bayle, who hid his radical ideas in the footnotes to his Historical and Critical Dictionary in lengthy footnotes that he knew no one would read.
You can get this for free if you want to read it btw.
The Shattered Realms by Cinda Williams Chima
Dec. 9th, 2025 11:49 pmarchersangelthis is a 4-book series that is a sequel to her The Seven Realms series (also 4 books)that i read several years ago. both series are YA fantasy.
i was reluctant to start these books because i was afraid i would not like them as much as the other books. i did like them, with some exceptions that i will get into in the spoiler section.
this series is set 25-30 years (there's a time jump) after the first books. there has been another war going on because a prince (now king) of another realm was mad that the woman who became queen in the last series had rejected him for marriage. he's had his brother killed to become king and has subjugated the other realms & he can't conqueror the queendom because it is 90% mountains and his army is really only good on flat land.
in the first series you could possibly handwave their ages and consider the main characters to be 20-22, but you can't do that in this series because they mention ages a lot. and it's Young Adult (which i rarely read), so all of the main, and most of the secondary, characters are teens.
( all kinds of spoilers )
there's more LGBT+ representation in these books in the first series (if that's what you're looking for in YA fantasy). in that one 2 very minor female characters are in a relationship. they get a brief mention in one of the these books, but in this series there are two young men that briefly spent time together & spend about 95% of the later books separated and yearning for each other.
there might be a transgender character too. the wizards/mages are referred to with he/him (it was the same in the first series too) but one is she/her. i probably should not speculate, if it's not what the author intended. but they are the only wizard/mage that i can recall being referred to with she/her.
i was reluctant to start these books because i was afraid i would not like them as much as the other books. i did like them, with some exceptions that i will get into in the spoiler section.
this series is set 25-30 years (there's a time jump) after the first books. there has been another war going on because a prince (now king) of another realm was mad that the woman who became queen in the last series had rejected him for marriage. he's had his brother killed to become king and has subjugated the other realms & he can't conqueror the queendom because it is 90% mountains and his army is really only good on flat land.
in the first series you could possibly handwave their ages and consider the main characters to be 20-22, but you can't do that in this series because they mention ages a lot. and it's Young Adult (which i rarely read), so all of the main, and most of the secondary, characters are teens.
( all kinds of spoilers )
there's more LGBT+ representation in these books in the first series (if that's what you're looking for in YA fantasy). in that one 2 very minor female characters are in a relationship. they get a brief mention in one of the these books, but in this series there are two young men that briefly spent time together & spend about 95% of the later books separated and yearning for each other.
there might be a transgender character too. the wizards/mages are referred to with he/him (it was the same in the first series too) but one is she/her. i probably should not speculate, if it's not what the author intended. but they are the only wizard/mage that i can recall being referred to with she/her.
scent memory, Halloween
Dec. 9th, 2025 07:32 amdarkoshiI just remembered what a bag of Halloween candy obtained by trick-or-treating when I was a kid used to smell like. The candy I've given out as an adult doesn't have those scents. It was probably a combination of scents, but maybe mostly from one kind... chewy and shaped like tootsie rolls with twisted-end wrappers, with several flavors...
I found it, Brach's Royals. The wrappers have changed a lot over time, but this is how I remember them looking:
Brach’s – bulk candy salesman display – 1970’s
The Royals are in the upper left section of the tray, 2nd from the top.
Maybe I'm also thinking of the "Toffee" ones in the lower right, 3rd column from the right.
Ahh, nostalgia. I wouldn't eat those anymore as they are not vegan, and I don't like it anymore when candy sticks to my teeth. But remembering them is nice.
This reddit thread is interesting in regards to children nowadays prefering different candy (not the chocolate ones!) & treats compared to adults/parents:
Are kids these days getting much better Halloween candy than decades ago, or is it just me?
I found it, Brach's Royals. The wrappers have changed a lot over time, but this is how I remember them looking:
Brach’s – bulk candy salesman display – 1970’s
The Royals are in the upper left section of the tray, 2nd from the top.
Maybe I'm also thinking of the "Toffee" ones in the lower right, 3rd column from the right.
Ahh, nostalgia. I wouldn't eat those anymore as they are not vegan, and I don't like it anymore when candy sticks to my teeth. But remembering them is nice.
This reddit thread is interesting in regards to children nowadays prefering different candy (not the chocolate ones!) & treats compared to adults/parents:
Are kids these days getting much better Halloween candy than decades ago, or is it just me?
25 y/o paper extolling the safety of Monsanto's Roundup retracted from journal
Dec. 9th, 2025 11:12 amthewayneThis could have some interesting ramifications.
The paper was published in the journal Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology in 2000, and recently revealed emails from within Monsanto show that eight people within that corp wrote the paper and it was proposed that Monsanto people write another paper and have academics edit and apply their names to it.
The paper was cited by the Environmental Protection Agency in approving Roundup for common use, saying it "posed no health risks to humans – no cancer risks, no reproductive risks, no adverse effects on development of endocrine systems in people or animals."
I remember a news program, perhaps British, was interviewing a Monsanto exec who was praising the safety of Roundup, claiming that it was perfectly safe to drink. The interviewer pulled out a transparent glass of clear liquid, and said it was a glass of Roundup, and offered it to the exec to drink as a proof. The exec blanched and blustered and didn't drink it.
An EPA spokesperson said that they did not rely solely on this paper to clear Roundup for use.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/05/monsanto-roundup-safety-study-retracted
https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/12/09/053254/science-journal-retracts-study-on-safety-of-monsantos-roundup
The paper was published in the journal Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology in 2000, and recently revealed emails from within Monsanto show that eight people within that corp wrote the paper and it was proposed that Monsanto people write another paper and have academics edit and apply their names to it.
The paper was cited by the Environmental Protection Agency in approving Roundup for common use, saying it "posed no health risks to humans – no cancer risks, no reproductive risks, no adverse effects on development of endocrine systems in people or animals."
I remember a news program, perhaps British, was interviewing a Monsanto exec who was praising the safety of Roundup, claiming that it was perfectly safe to drink. The interviewer pulled out a transparent glass of clear liquid, and said it was a glass of Roundup, and offered it to the exec to drink as a proof. The exec blanched and blustered and didn't drink it.
An EPA spokesperson said that they did not rely solely on this paper to clear Roundup for use.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/05/monsanto-roundup-safety-study-retracted
https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/12/09/053254/science-journal-retracts-study-on-safety-of-monsantos-roundup
testing DW image problem
Dec. 7th, 2025 02:43 amdarkoshiThis is a test. Images that I post, including ones in my old posts, no longer display right on Dreamwidth...
JPG:
PNG:
I have submitted a support request.
JPG:
PNG:
I have submitted a support request.
over the air TV: ATSC 3.0 aka NextGen TV
Dec. 7th, 2025 01:16 amdarkoshiI don't have any ATSC 3.0 television stations in my area and didn't realize it is already fairly widespread in the U.S. (map).
CNET: Free antenna TV is getting an upgrade and it might be in your town already Jan. 20, 2022
4K, HDR, 120Hz refresh rates and better indoor reception are coming to US airwaves for free thanks to ATSC 3.0, aka NextGen TV. ...
I Reviewed an ATSC 3.0 TV - Built-in DVR, More Channels, HDR10+ Video - YouTube video by Antenna Man, 2025/06/13.
Conclusion: Paying extra for ATSC 3.0 is probably not worth it. unless TV reception is bad in your area; the ATSC 3.0 channels may have better reception than the 1.0 channels.
The Downfall of ATSC 3.0 NextGen TV - What Went Wrong? - YouTube video by Antenna Man, 2025/10/24.
CNET: Free antenna TV is getting an upgrade and it might be in your town already Jan. 20, 2022
4K, HDR, 120Hz refresh rates and better indoor reception are coming to US airwaves for free thanks to ATSC 3.0, aka NextGen TV. ...
I Reviewed an ATSC 3.0 TV - Built-in DVR, More Channels, HDR10+ Video - YouTube video by Antenna Man, 2025/06/13.
Conclusion: Paying extra for ATSC 3.0 is probably not worth it. unless TV reception is bad in your area; the ATSC 3.0 channels may have better reception than the 1.0 channels.
The Downfall of ATSC 3.0 NextGen TV - What Went Wrong? - YouTube video by Antenna Man, 2025/10/24.