![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png){kind=small}
2026
Jan. 5th, 2026 08:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
moon_custaferSo, I’ve avoided posting about this, but just before xmas eve we discovered a bedbug infestation. It could be worse, I suppose—it’s pretty much localized to the bedroom, we threw out the bedspreads and a lot of stuff, and washed everything else, and have been camping out on the folding couch in the living room while we try to prep for the fumigators to come.
This has so far involved throwing out all the boxes that house Andrew’s comics collection—the comic books themselves seem to be ok, but the corrugated-cardboard boxes were definitely providing the ideal hideout for the disgusting critters. I bought thirty plastic bins and we’ve been transferring the comics and many of the books. Andrew’s been keeping it together better than I could have hoped, at least.
In order for pesticide spraying to happen, we need to 1. get as many of the shelves as possible away from the walls, and 2. to get the cats out of the apartment for 4-6 hours. This will be the hard part—Nana can be wrangled into a carrier, but in the five years since we brought her home, we’ve never been able to capture and hold Beatrice.
I guess, living in an apartment, it was only a matter of time. Meanwhile, of course, the wider world continues to be even worse.
In slightly better news, last week I read Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Children of Time. An SF novel about large intelligent spiders might seem an odd choice of comfort reading under the circumstances, but I’ve a feeling that in addition to watching a lot of David Attenborough nature films, Tchaikovsky has seen a lot of classic Doctor Who. His spiders are easy to root for, and his desperate human colonists fleeing a doomed Earth are somehow not quite as bad as real-life politics. I’ve also fond of Holsten Mason, the tragi-comic Classicist who, due to only getting woken out of cryogenic suspension when the crisis du jour specifically requires an expert on Old Galactic Empire dialects, is experiencing the whole multi-millenial epic as “a rough few weeks” during which most of the other crew outage him by decades.
I think my own writing is coming back after a rest following my Yuletide fic—I at least managed to make a bunch of notes today for Gentleman of the Shade, which for some reason has decided it needs another flashback, this one set in a 1970s supper club.
This evening’s migraine is being held at bay by rizatriptan, but it included, for the first time in my life, one of those zigzag rainbow auras I read about. Weird.
This has so far involved throwing out all the boxes that house Andrew’s comics collection—the comic books themselves seem to be ok, but the corrugated-cardboard boxes were definitely providing the ideal hideout for the disgusting critters. I bought thirty plastic bins and we’ve been transferring the comics and many of the books. Andrew’s been keeping it together better than I could have hoped, at least.
In order for pesticide spraying to happen, we need to 1. get as many of the shelves as possible away from the walls, and 2. to get the cats out of the apartment for 4-6 hours. This will be the hard part—Nana can be wrangled into a carrier, but in the five years since we brought her home, we’ve never been able to capture and hold Beatrice.
I guess, living in an apartment, it was only a matter of time. Meanwhile, of course, the wider world continues to be even worse.
In slightly better news, last week I read Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Children of Time. An SF novel about large intelligent spiders might seem an odd choice of comfort reading under the circumstances, but I’ve a feeling that in addition to watching a lot of David Attenborough nature films, Tchaikovsky has seen a lot of classic Doctor Who. His spiders are easy to root for, and his desperate human colonists fleeing a doomed Earth are somehow not quite as bad as real-life politics. I’ve also fond of Holsten Mason, the tragi-comic Classicist who, due to only getting woken out of cryogenic suspension when the crisis du jour specifically requires an expert on Old Galactic Empire dialects, is experiencing the whole multi-millenial epic as “a rough few weeks” during which most of the other crew outage him by decades.
I think my own writing is coming back after a rest following my Yuletide fic—I at least managed to make a bunch of notes today for Gentleman of the Shade, which for some reason has decided it needs another flashback, this one set in a 1970s supper club.
This evening’s migraine is being held at bay by rizatriptan, but it included, for the first time in my life, one of those zigzag rainbow auras I read about. Weird.
I shall play you the song of my people
Jan. 5th, 2026 05:32 pmmildred_of_midgardMy people are Frederick the Great salon, and our song is two 18th century covers of Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" that we put together!
Mine was inspired by this medieval/Renaissance cover that came out a year and a half ago, which is great and a total earworm and you should listen to it, too!
But meanwhile, here's mine:
selenak's lyrics were inspired by the original, and thus this one goes in chronological order, unlike mine.
Shout-out tocahn, who obtained the music and sang the songs for us! She was absolutely indispensible, seeing as I'm as tone-deaf and musically untalented as they come. We put her through the wringer: it's a very fast-tempoed song, with tons of unfamiliar names in foreign languages, and almost no chance for anything to roll off your tongue before you have to switch to a different foreign name! Another challenging aspect: trying not to break out laughing while singing. If you're familiar with canon, and especially with our interpretations of canon, a lot of these lines are hilarious. Even my wife, who's unfamiliar with canon, laughed at "Bleeding counts as medicine."
I'm very proud of us, and I look forward to never, ever doing anything like this again. I was in charge of video editing, and syncing the subtitles, the audio, and the images to my standards of perfectionism took me 30+ hours. I suspect I could do it faster now, having learned what I've learned, but I don't want to find out!
All in all, putting these together took us a year and a half, because one person would do their part, and then we'd have to wait several months for the next person to have time to do theirs, rinse and repeat as we went through two rounds. If we did a third round, we've identified places where we could make it even better, but it would take another year and we're hitting diminishing returns, so enjoy it as it is!
Someday I'll find time to write up all the millions of other things I've been up to, and you'll see why you never hear from me any more. Short answer: full-time job, volunteering at the university to a degree that could be called an unpaid part-time job, trying to get an 18th century history article published, trying to get an 18th century history book published, a sudden social life since moving to a city where I know people, still trying to find time to study all the things I'm interested in. It's probably for the best that I'm too injured to take up running or serious hiking or caving! But I'm also trying to get that fixed, so that I can have more projects on my to-do list!
Mine was inspired by this medieval/Renaissance cover that came out a year and a half ago, which is great and a total earworm and you should listen to it, too!
But meanwhile, here's mine:
selenak's lyrics were inspired by the original, and thus this one goes in chronological order, unlike mine.Shout-out to
cahn, who obtained the music and sang the songs for us! She was absolutely indispensible, seeing as I'm as tone-deaf and musically untalented as they come. We put her through the wringer: it's a very fast-tempoed song, with tons of unfamiliar names in foreign languages, and almost no chance for anything to roll off your tongue before you have to switch to a different foreign name! Another challenging aspect: trying not to break out laughing while singing. If you're familiar with canon, and especially with our interpretations of canon, a lot of these lines are hilarious. Even my wife, who's unfamiliar with canon, laughed at "Bleeding counts as medicine."I'm very proud of us, and I look forward to never, ever doing anything like this again. I was in charge of video editing, and syncing the subtitles, the audio, and the images to my standards of perfectionism took me 30+ hours. I suspect I could do it faster now, having learned what I've learned, but I don't want to find out!
All in all, putting these together took us a year and a half, because one person would do their part, and then we'd have to wait several months for the next person to have time to do theirs, rinse and repeat as we went through two rounds. If we did a third round, we've identified places where we could make it even better, but it would take another year and we're hitting diminishing returns, so enjoy it as it is!
Someday I'll find time to write up all the millions of other things I've been up to, and you'll see why you never hear from me any more. Short answer: full-time job, volunteering at the university to a degree that could be called an unpaid part-time job, trying to get an 18th century history article published, trying to get an 18th century history book published, a sudden social life since moving to a city where I know people, still trying to find time to study all the things I'm interested in. It's probably for the best that I'm too injured to take up running or serious hiking or caving! But I'm also trying to get that fixed, so that I can have more projects on my to-do list!
(sitting at airport waiting for flight)
Jan. 5th, 2026 04:56 pmtozkaOne thing I'll miss while in the UK (besides family obv) is my PBS Passport that I just got at the start of the year. It's very basic UI design compared to other streaming services, but it's chock full of things to watch. So many shows, some of them my favorites (This Old House) and some I've never even heard of (Travels with Yankee). Lots of British and European murder mystery and historical dramas, of course, but also fascinating craft documentaries, travel shows, history, nature, etc etc. AND no commercials in the middle of an episode-- just at the beginning, and they're all local ones which interest me way more (and there's only like 1-2 anyway).
Apparently PBS doesn't have int'l broadcast rights, neither can you download things nor use a VPN to bypass (apparently), so once I'm abroad I'll be cut off. :(
That said, I MAY have access to some of the British stuff because I'll be...in Britain.....
Maybe I can finish the 1983 Partners in Crime show then.
Apparently PBS doesn't have int'l broadcast rights, neither can you download things nor use a VPN to bypass (apparently), so once I'm abroad I'll be cut off. :(
That said, I MAY have access to some of the British stuff because I'll be...in Britain.....
Maybe I can finish the 1983 Partners in Crime show then.
Three Random Thoughts Make a Post
Jan. 5th, 2026 04:57 pmmuccamukk- I was just thinking, "IDK who would even buy the English language side of LJ at this point!" (Especially with sanctions on Russia. Who could buy it?) Then I remembered hungry hungry data miners looking for things to feed into LLMs/Gen AI, and sighed. I guess they've probably scraped all the public posts anyway, but might be interested in paying for the locked content?
- I'm vicariously delighted by everyone being so bouncy and excited about the hockey blorbos. I aggressively don't like men's ice hockey (except for that one fic), so will pass, but it's fun to see the enthusiasm all over my reading list. I wish you all a very merry time of it. ❤️
- I seem to have found the other half of that one ship in D.K. Broster's "Mr. Rowl". He shows up 48% mark. (Though I can see the point about Mr.
HowardHunter, especially given that farewell). I find the comment,a girl to whom his attention had subsequently been drawn—indifferent though he was to the sex
to be VERY INTERESTING for at least two reasons.
Music Monday: Committed to Parkview
Jan. 5th, 2026 05:34 pmstonepicnicking_okapiI decided to go back to this list of a 30 day music challenge from mx_morden to get inspiration: https://mx-morden.dreamwidth.org/24574.html
Day 5 is a song that reminds you of someone
My mother was as clean a living person as I can imagine. She's been dead for 32 years now. As far as I know, she never drank or smoked or used any kind of drugs, but she really liked the Highwayman (Cash, Waylon, Willie, and Kris Kristofferson) and I can remember her ironing and wearing out this record on the record players and I can remember her sing along to this song about people in a mental asylum. I don't know. Just one of those things.
mx_morden to get inspiration: https://mx-morden.dreamwidth.org/24574.htmlDay 5 is a song that reminds you of someone
My mother was as clean a living person as I can imagine. She's been dead for 32 years now. As far as I know, she never drank or smoked or used any kind of drugs, but she really liked the Highwayman (Cash, Waylon, Willie, and Kris Kristofferson) and I can remember her ironing and wearing out this record on the record players and I can remember her sing along to this song about people in a mental asylum. I don't know. Just one of those things.
Candy Hearts letter
Jan. 6th, 2026 10:56 amcyphomandraDear Confectioner,
Thanks so much for creating a bonbon for me! Really anything in these would be great, but here are some directions:
Writingwise: in general, I like humour, excitement, angst (if justified – not massive amounts of agonising over accidentally returning character X's library book before they finished it), food, moments of peace amongst activity, things that give me new thoughts about canon, and things that bring me back to feeling like I’m experiencing the canon again for the first time. I'm fine with ratings from G to Explicit. I like experimental formats - epistolary, IF, found documents etc.
Romantic tropes I like include sharing a bed, undercover as a couple, forced to seek refuge in a Canadian (equivalents accepted) shack etc. Two of my requests (Horizon and DCC) are for platonic relationships and for these I really like shared low-key activities (as a respite from the canon!), or moments of character. For both, I like non-mundane AUs, like psychic wolf companions, daemons, or Sentinel-Guide. I don't usually like mundane AUs for canons with sf/f elements but if you put your coffeeshop in space and add enough aliens I will probably like it.
Artwise: I like a range of styles, from cartoon/chibi to black & white to photorealism. I tend to like art that focuses on the quieter moments in canon and gives characters a breathing space between dramatic events; I also like quirky interpretations that give me a new view on characters. I’m happy with explicit art as long as it’s tagged!
DNWs: child/animal death or child/animal sexual abuse. Omegaverse or trans headcanons. I have previously DNW’d earthquakes but am back to being okay with fictional natural disasters.
Compilation of Final Fantasy VII
Zack Fair/Cloud Strife
Genesis Rhapsodos/Cloud Strife
Pretty much anything goes with this; I love Cloud, I love how much he tries despite how messed up he is, and he deserves pretty much anything from fluff to angst to complete crack. I am always up for Zack & Cloud, pre-game or Nibelheim, sharing a moment or on a mission or trapped in the lab - Zack is such a great character. I am also up for Zack Lives AUs and I always like time travel.
With Genesis - he's grown on me and there's so much scope here. Meeting up when Cloud is a trooper and somehow impresses him, or post-game when they're the only two survivors who can really compare experiences - or PWP at any and all times inbetween. I am okay with dub con for this pairing and it doesn't have to be a happy ending, although if they earn it that's great.
For art - really I will just stare at all of them forever. Fight scenes! Uncomfortable meals together! Lost in the snow!
Final Fantasy VII Remake and Rebirth (Video Games 2020-2024)
Roche/Cloud Strife
Sephiroth/Cloud Strife
Gosh I have no idea who my fave is :D Anyway, I love these games and their shiny, beautiful characters. Midgar looks amazing and the open world is gorgeous, and I just want more. Roche is such a delightful goofball who ends up breaking my heart - could things have gone another way? Is there still a chance for him to come back? What would have happened if he'd not let Cloud go after Junon, or even followed after him earlier?
Sephiroth - well. He's so obsessed with Cloud, and the end of Rebirth is just brutal. I will take pretty much anything in this, from what actually happened in Nibelheim to canon AUs to dubcon/noncon (which is practically canon), although please actually don't turn Cloud into a mindless puppet. He's fought so hard to avoid that.
Horizon (video games)
Aloy and Beta
I am replaying Forbidden West at the moment and I just have so many questions about these two. What was Beta's upbringing like? I'm not sure the Far Zeniths had any other children on the ship (too wedded to their control and power) - what did she think of her role, and what was it like when she saw Aloy for the first time? How does Aloy feel about being no longer alone? Really I just want more of the interactions between them, in game or after (although I haven't yet played Burning Shores so nothing that relies heavily on events then).
Dungeon Crawler Carl Series - Matt Dinniman
Carl and Princess Donut and Katia Grim
I love Carl, who is trying so hard despite everything being so stacked against him, and how he teeters between his goals and their costs. I love Princess Donut, who is very much a cat despite everything, and Katia, who has grown so much (ha!) during her time in the dungeon. I love the gamelit/RPG tropes (loot boxes! stat increases!) and the horror tropes and the pokes at reality TV. I love that everyone has their own agenda (look at Donut, running a revolution in her spare time) and I really, really love the way that Carl, even as he blows everything up and gets increasingly unstable, can listen to others, respect their opinions, and give them chances to make their own paths.
Prompts - go wild. I'm okay with glimpses of backstory for all three (what did Donut think of Carl originally?) or a missing scene from the series, or an AU where a floor goes differently (or, I don't know, a bizarre AU where suddenly everyone is a cat EXCEPT Donut :D ). Feel free to play with formats. Please don't permanently kill any of the requested characters but otherwise darkness consistent with canon is fine. I am fine with gore. I do not ship any of the nominated characters - one of the things I like about DCC is that Carl hasn't had any sexual relationships since entering the dungeon. Canonical relationships (Katia/Bautista and I SUPPOSE Donut/Gravy Boat) are fine but I don't really want them to be the focus.
Thanks so much for creating a bonbon for me! Really anything in these would be great, but here are some directions:
Writingwise: in general, I like humour, excitement, angst (if justified – not massive amounts of agonising over accidentally returning character X's library book before they finished it), food, moments of peace amongst activity, things that give me new thoughts about canon, and things that bring me back to feeling like I’m experiencing the canon again for the first time. I'm fine with ratings from G to Explicit. I like experimental formats - epistolary, IF, found documents etc.
Romantic tropes I like include sharing a bed, undercover as a couple, forced to seek refuge in a Canadian (equivalents accepted) shack etc. Two of my requests (Horizon and DCC) are for platonic relationships and for these I really like shared low-key activities (as a respite from the canon!), or moments of character. For both, I like non-mundane AUs, like psychic wolf companions, daemons, or Sentinel-Guide. I don't usually like mundane AUs for canons with sf/f elements but if you put your coffeeshop in space and add enough aliens I will probably like it.
Artwise: I like a range of styles, from cartoon/chibi to black & white to photorealism. I tend to like art that focuses on the quieter moments in canon and gives characters a breathing space between dramatic events; I also like quirky interpretations that give me a new view on characters. I’m happy with explicit art as long as it’s tagged!
DNWs: child/animal death or child/animal sexual abuse. Omegaverse or trans headcanons. I have previously DNW’d earthquakes but am back to being okay with fictional natural disasters.
Compilation of Final Fantasy VII
Zack Fair/Cloud Strife
Genesis Rhapsodos/Cloud Strife
Pretty much anything goes with this; I love Cloud, I love how much he tries despite how messed up he is, and he deserves pretty much anything from fluff to angst to complete crack. I am always up for Zack & Cloud, pre-game or Nibelheim, sharing a moment or on a mission or trapped in the lab - Zack is such a great character. I am also up for Zack Lives AUs and I always like time travel.
With Genesis - he's grown on me and there's so much scope here. Meeting up when Cloud is a trooper and somehow impresses him, or post-game when they're the only two survivors who can really compare experiences - or PWP at any and all times inbetween. I am okay with dub con for this pairing and it doesn't have to be a happy ending, although if they earn it that's great.
For art - really I will just stare at all of them forever. Fight scenes! Uncomfortable meals together! Lost in the snow!
Final Fantasy VII Remake and Rebirth (Video Games 2020-2024)
Roche/Cloud Strife
Sephiroth/Cloud Strife
Gosh I have no idea who my fave is :D Anyway, I love these games and their shiny, beautiful characters. Midgar looks amazing and the open world is gorgeous, and I just want more. Roche is such a delightful goofball who ends up breaking my heart - could things have gone another way? Is there still a chance for him to come back? What would have happened if he'd not let Cloud go after Junon, or even followed after him earlier?
Sephiroth - well. He's so obsessed with Cloud, and the end of Rebirth is just brutal. I will take pretty much anything in this, from what actually happened in Nibelheim to canon AUs to dubcon/noncon (which is practically canon), although please actually don't turn Cloud into a mindless puppet. He's fought so hard to avoid that.
Horizon (video games)
Aloy and Beta
I am replaying Forbidden West at the moment and I just have so many questions about these two. What was Beta's upbringing like? I'm not sure the Far Zeniths had any other children on the ship (too wedded to their control and power) - what did she think of her role, and what was it like when she saw Aloy for the first time? How does Aloy feel about being no longer alone? Really I just want more of the interactions between them, in game or after (although I haven't yet played Burning Shores so nothing that relies heavily on events then).
Dungeon Crawler Carl Series - Matt Dinniman
Carl and Princess Donut and Katia Grim
I love Carl, who is trying so hard despite everything being so stacked against him, and how he teeters between his goals and their costs. I love Princess Donut, who is very much a cat despite everything, and Katia, who has grown so much (ha!) during her time in the dungeon. I love the gamelit/RPG tropes (loot boxes! stat increases!) and the horror tropes and the pokes at reality TV. I love that everyone has their own agenda (look at Donut, running a revolution in her spare time) and I really, really love the way that Carl, even as he blows everything up and gets increasingly unstable, can listen to others, respect their opinions, and give them chances to make their own paths.
Prompts - go wild. I'm okay with glimpses of backstory for all three (what did Donut think of Carl originally?) or a missing scene from the series, or an AU where a floor goes differently (or, I don't know, a bizarre AU where suddenly everyone is a cat EXCEPT Donut :D ). Feel free to play with formats. Please don't permanently kill any of the requested characters but otherwise darkness consistent with canon is fine. I am fine with gore. I do not ship any of the nominated characters - one of the things I like about DCC is that Carl hasn't had any sexual relationships since entering the dungeon. Canonical relationships (Katia/Bautista and I SUPPOSE Donut/Gravy Boat) are fine but I don't really want them to be the focus.
Yuletide reveals
Jan. 6th, 2026 10:38 amcyphomandraYuletide! I was neither travelling internationally nor moving house this year, so I signed up with enthusiasm, got my assignment, and then played video games (mainly Blue Prince) with all my spare time in a completely unhelpful fashion until I was right up against the default deadline and starting to panic.
Mostly this was me procrastinating, but there was a little bit of assignment angst; I’d matched on Dungeon Crawler Carl again, and I’d offered Carl, Katia and Donut. I specifically didn’t offer the AI because this mainly seems to get people wanting Carl/AI (which rejoices in the ship name aiCarly :D) and I really don’t want pairing fic for Carl, either reading or writing. However although my recipient only nominated Carl, they obviously do like this pairing and indeed prompted for it. This meant I dithered a bit about whether to attempt it, how to do it, etc etc, but this was not their only prompt and they did mention outsider pov and playing with formats and in the end I stopped trying to do the AI and went for that.
The title, a riff on Wallace Stevens, came to me early on and was great apart from the bit where I only had three segments written by the posting deadline and would need another ten to make it work. I therefore moulded these into a story under a modified title, added the first part of the framing sequence, posted this for the work deadline as a functional but brief story, and then reread the entire DCC series, fixing each segment as I went and writing new ones (obviously I am a terrible example when it comes to deadlines and if you are a Yuletide mod please ignore this entire discussion :D).
Deciding who to do for each book pov was fun. Mrs Parsons was an early pick for opening book 1, with Bea as the closer, and I really wanted Katia in book 4, so you get her character arc at two points, from her and then from Louis' pov. I wanted noncrawlers as well, which got Signet (and her writers' room), Gary (with bonus AI), Fire Brandy, and also Mordecai (I dithered about where to put him in but there's a lot going on in Butcher's Masquerade so it worked well there). I couldn't decide between Imani or Elle but when it ended up being Bedlam Bride Imani worked better for a character pov that needed to be about Carl. And I also wanted villains with complexity, so Lucia Mar and Quan Ch. I was slightly startled by the number of character tags I ended up using.
I’d thought that book 7, which was the turning point, would be the longest piece, and as I was going through the first draft I just wrote three or four lines of Prepotente fuming in prison to see if I could get his voice, and then did the rest of the sections before skimming This Inevitable Ruin. At which point I re-read the lines and realised they were infinitely stronger if I didn't add a whole bunch of text, yay.
A pinch hit for Blue Prince came up while I was hastily working, and while it went very quickly, it meant I’d checked the app and seen the other Blue Prince requests, includingthefourthvine’s. I went back to DCC, but the prompts nagged at me, especially the one about new upgrades for rooms. On a quick writing break run through Mount Holly (the house in Blue Prince), I ended up staring thoughtfully at what look like doggy doors on the back of the Kennel and it occurred to me that you could combine the Kennel (contains dogs) and the Patio (spreads gems) and spread puppies all over the house.
After that I made random notes whenever another room occurred to me, finished the DCC fic (almost - I wrote the second half of the frame sequence three different ways and didn’t like any of them) and wrote the Blue Prince treat on Christmas Eve, allowing for a suitably festive battle with formatting on AO3 arrgh why can I never get the spacing right although at least swapping to rich text helped with most of it. I then wrote the final final version of the DCC closing frame sequence a whole hour before reveals, after present and stocking opening but before cooking Xmas dinner. I was probably highly guessable by anyone who read my previous DCC fic due to using the same chat skin but I really didn't have time to sort another one!
Both works have been pretty successful for me in Yuletide and I had a lot of time to read fic, so all around an excellent experience.
13 Ways of Looking at a Lit Fuse (4100 words) by Cyphomandra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dungeon Crawler Carl Series - Matt Dinniman
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Carl (Dungeon Crawler Carl), System AI (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Katia Grim, Growler Gary (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Princess Donut (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Louis Santiago, Firas Zaman, Beatrice (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Miriam Dom (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Lucia Mar, Imani (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Prepotente (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Quan Ch (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Mordecai (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Tsarina Signet (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Fire Brandy (Dungeon Crawler Carl)
Additional Tags: POV Outsider, Karaoke, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Chatlogs, canon compliant up to the end of book 7, Ethical treatment of NPCs
Summary:
Blueprints (the we're going up up upgrade remix) (1127 words) by Cyphomandra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Blue Prince (Video Game)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Simon P. Jones (Blue Prince)
Additional Tags: terrible puns, Puppies, Yuletide Treat, adventures in drafting, hey I found a bunch of blank upgrade disks
Summary:
Mostly this was me procrastinating, but there was a little bit of assignment angst; I’d matched on Dungeon Crawler Carl again, and I’d offered Carl, Katia and Donut. I specifically didn’t offer the AI because this mainly seems to get people wanting Carl/AI (which rejoices in the ship name aiCarly :D) and I really don’t want pairing fic for Carl, either reading or writing. However although my recipient only nominated Carl, they obviously do like this pairing and indeed prompted for it. This meant I dithered a bit about whether to attempt it, how to do it, etc etc, but this was not their only prompt and they did mention outsider pov and playing with formats and in the end I stopped trying to do the AI and went for that.
The title, a riff on Wallace Stevens, came to me early on and was great apart from the bit where I only had three segments written by the posting deadline and would need another ten to make it work. I therefore moulded these into a story under a modified title, added the first part of the framing sequence, posted this for the work deadline as a functional but brief story, and then reread the entire DCC series, fixing each segment as I went and writing new ones (obviously I am a terrible example when it comes to deadlines and if you are a Yuletide mod please ignore this entire discussion :D).
Deciding who to do for each book pov was fun. Mrs Parsons was an early pick for opening book 1, with Bea as the closer, and I really wanted Katia in book 4, so you get her character arc at two points, from her and then from Louis' pov. I wanted noncrawlers as well, which got Signet (and her writers' room), Gary (with bonus AI), Fire Brandy, and also Mordecai (I dithered about where to put him in but there's a lot going on in Butcher's Masquerade so it worked well there). I couldn't decide between Imani or Elle but when it ended up being Bedlam Bride Imani worked better for a character pov that needed to be about Carl. And I also wanted villains with complexity, so Lucia Mar and Quan Ch. I was slightly startled by the number of character tags I ended up using.
I’d thought that book 7, which was the turning point, would be the longest piece, and as I was going through the first draft I just wrote three or four lines of Prepotente fuming in prison to see if I could get his voice, and then did the rest of the sections before skimming This Inevitable Ruin. At which point I re-read the lines and realised they were infinitely stronger if I didn't add a whole bunch of text, yay.
A pinch hit for Blue Prince came up while I was hastily working, and while it went very quickly, it meant I’d checked the app and seen the other Blue Prince requests, including
thefourthvine’s. I went back to DCC, but the prompts nagged at me, especially the one about new upgrades for rooms. On a quick writing break run through Mount Holly (the house in Blue Prince), I ended up staring thoughtfully at what look like doggy doors on the back of the Kennel and it occurred to me that you could combine the Kennel (contains dogs) and the Patio (spreads gems) and spread puppies all over the house.After that I made random notes whenever another room occurred to me, finished the DCC fic (almost - I wrote the second half of the frame sequence three different ways and didn’t like any of them) and wrote the Blue Prince treat on Christmas Eve, allowing for a suitably festive battle with formatting on AO3 arrgh why can I never get the spacing right although at least swapping to rich text helped with most of it. I then wrote the final final version of the DCC closing frame sequence a whole hour before reveals, after present and stocking opening but before cooking Xmas dinner. I was probably highly guessable by anyone who read my previous DCC fic due to using the same chat skin but I really didn't have time to sort another one!
Both works have been pretty successful for me in Yuletide and I had a lot of time to read fic, so all around an excellent experience.
13 Ways of Looking at a Lit Fuse (4100 words) by Cyphomandra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dungeon Crawler Carl Series - Matt Dinniman
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Carl (Dungeon Crawler Carl), System AI (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Katia Grim, Growler Gary (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Princess Donut (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Louis Santiago, Firas Zaman, Beatrice (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Miriam Dom (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Lucia Mar, Imani (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Prepotente (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Quan Ch (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Mordecai (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Tsarina Signet (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Fire Brandy (Dungeon Crawler Carl)
Additional Tags: POV Outsider, Karaoke, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Chatlogs, canon compliant up to the end of book 7, Ethical treatment of NPCs
Summary:
Carl, as others see him.
Blueprints (the we're going up up upgrade remix) (1127 words) by Cyphomandra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Blue Prince (Video Game)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Simon P. Jones (Blue Prince)
Additional Tags: terrible puns, Puppies, Yuletide Treat, adventures in drafting, hey I found a bunch of blank upgrade disks
Summary:
Simon proposes a few changes.
Purimgifts Letter 2026
Jan. 5th, 2026 04:49 pmzdenkaDear Purimgifts Author,
Thank you for making gifts for me! Please tell me a story. Take one (or more) of these fandoms that we both love, and find a story that speaks to you and that you want to tell. And I am sure it will be awesome. :)
General Things
( Read more... )
( Likes and DNWs )
Requested Fandoms
Books:
The Angel of the Crows - Katherine Addison
Dragaera - Steven Brust
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Mirror Realm Cycle - Ariel Kaplan
The Raven Tower - Ann Leckie
Spinning Silver - Naomi Novik
Uprooted - Naomi Novik
The Way Back - Gavriel Savit
The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Briar Rose - Jane Yolen
Religion/Mythology/Legends/Folklore:
The Aeneid - Virgil
Jewish Scripture & Legend
Movies:
Adieu Monsieur Haffmann | Farewell Mr. Haffmann (2021)
Der Dibuk | The Dybbuk (1937)
Miscellaneous (plays, kdrama, webcomic, cdrama, opera):
Adieu Monsieur Haffmann - Daguerre
아랑사또전 | Arang and the Magistrate
Borrowed Prophecy (Webcomic) [First half available for free on the author's site here, complete comic available to buy for $6 (USD)]
琅琊榜 | Nirvana in Fire (TV)
Die Zauberflöte | The Magic Flute - Mozart/Schikaneder
Thank you for making gifts for me! Please tell me a story. Take one (or more) of these fandoms that we both love, and find a story that speaks to you and that you want to tell. And I am sure it will be awesome. :)
General Things
( Read more... )
( Likes and DNWs )
Requested Fandoms
Books:
The Angel of the Crows - Katherine Addison
Dragaera - Steven Brust
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Mirror Realm Cycle - Ariel Kaplan
The Raven Tower - Ann Leckie
Spinning Silver - Naomi Novik
Uprooted - Naomi Novik
The Way Back - Gavriel Savit
The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Briar Rose - Jane Yolen
Religion/Mythology/Legends/Folklore:
The Aeneid - Virgil
Jewish Scripture & Legend
Movies:
Adieu Monsieur Haffmann | Farewell Mr. Haffmann (2021)
Der Dibuk | The Dybbuk (1937)
Miscellaneous (plays, kdrama, webcomic, cdrama, opera):
Adieu Monsieur Haffmann - Daguerre
아랑사또전 | Arang and the Magistrate
Borrowed Prophecy (Webcomic) [First half available for free on the author's site here, complete comic available to buy for $6 (USD)]
琅琊榜 | Nirvana in Fire (TV)
Die Zauberflöte | The Magic Flute - Mozart/Schikaneder
Tags:
- au: addison.katherine,
- au: brust.steven,
- au: clarke.susanna,
- au: kaplan.ariel,
- au: leckie.ann,
- au: novik.naomi,
- au: savit.gavriel,
- au: tolkien.j.r.r.,
- au: yolen.jane,
- cdrama: nirvana in fire,
- comic: borrowed prophecy,
- dear author letter,
- jewish,
- kdrama: arang and the magistrate,
- movies/tv: adieu monsieur haffmann,
- mu: mozart.wolfgang amadeus,
- opera,
- opera: die zauberflöte,
- public,
- purimgifts,
- romans
monday
Jan. 5th, 2026 03:51 pmsummersgateFirst "hike" of the season today. Candy and I walked out to the Dennison Overlook. The snow in the woods wasn't very deep. Pictures of snow and looking down on the Allegheny River as it runs by Kennerdell (something I have taken pictures of many times before):( Read more... )
The Book of Guilt, by Catherine Chidgey
Jan. 5th, 2026 12:38 pmrachelmanija
This is a difficult book to review as almost all of the plot is technically spoilery, but you can also figure out a lot of it from about page three. I'll synopsize the first two chapters here. We follow two storylines, both set in an alternate England where Hitler was assassinated in 1943 and England made peace with Germany.
In one storyline, a young girl named Nancy lives an isolated life with her parents. In the other, which gets much more page time, three identical young boys are raised by three "mothers," in a home in extremely weird circumstances. They rarely see the outside world, they're often sick and take medicine, their dreams are meticulously recorded by the "mothers," and all their schooling comes from a set of weird encyclopedias that supposedly contain all the knowledge in the world, which are also the only books they have access to. There used to be 40 boys, but when they recover from their mysterious illness, they get to go to Margate, a wonderful vacationland, forever.
I'm sure you can figure out the general outline of what's going on with the boys, at least, just from this. What's up with the girl doesn't become clear for a while.
( Spoilers through about the 40% mark )
( Spoilers for the entire book )
This book was critically acclaimed - it was a Kirkus best book of 2025 - but I thought it had major flaws, which unfortunately I can only describe by spoiling the entire book. It's not at all an original idea, and I do think we're supposed to be ahead of the characters, but maybe not that much ahead. It also contained a trope which I hate very much and its thesis contradicted itself, but how, again, is under the end cut. It's a very serious book about very serious real life stuff, but that part really didn't work for me because of spoilers.
Lots of people loved it though. It would probably make an interesting paired reading with a certain very acclaimed spoilery book (( Read more... )), which I have not read as I have been spoiled for the entire story and it doesn't really sound like something I'd enjoy no matter how great it is. But I suspect that it's the better version of this book.
Content Notes (spoilery): ( Read more... )
Snowflake Speed Run (Challenges 1-3)
Jan. 5th, 2026 12:22 pmmuccamukkPSA: LiveJournal may be about to geolock to Russia. If you have shit there that you like, and want to see again without visiting Russia, now's a good time to save it. (ETA: Not sure if the terminology is entirely correct, but the sentiment is.) Here's a long bluesky thread about it by ![[staff profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user_staff.png)
denise, which includes ways to export LJ to DW and/or to your drive. IDK how people are saving LJ scrapbook.
I'd say pass it along, but I think it's pretty widely broadcast by now. Pass it along to spaces where one can find LJ people are who aren't on DW?
Anyway, on with the show.
Challenge #1:
Hi! I'm Muccamukk or Mucca. You may know me from Age of Sail, Stargate, Babylon 5, Marvel Comics, Band of Brothers or Top Gun fandoms, plus an extremely random selection of others across twenty plus years in online fandom spaces. I used to write fic and comment quite a bit, though I've been less active the last few years.
My pinned post and profile seem to be in good order, and I do still post link lists, book reviews and music from time to time.
I helped mod Snowflake for a few years there, and am taking this year off (mostly), so I'm looking forward to slightly lower-stakes participation, and maybe digging up some old memories/meeting new friends.
If you want to play an ice breaker game, check out my 2025 Media Tracker and ask me for a hot take on any albums, movies or shows on there (I think I've reviewed all the books up to December, which I'll cover in the next few weeks, but other media not as much).
Challenge #2:
Somehow, the only pet I can now think of is Darwin from seaQuest: DSV, who isn't strictly speaking a pet. The talking robot dolphin was a lot of fun, though.
Instead: here's a list of fic I've written that include significant pets (canonical or otherwise), because writing pets is really fun, given they're often (very cute) chaos goblins designed to throw plans awry. (Presented in order written):
Unstinting
Fandom: Marvel 616 (Captain America)
Summary: Sam Wilson, downtime.
Pet Content: Sam Wilson's canonical cat, Figaro.
Read on DW | Read on AO3
Found Sleeping
Fandom: Band of Brothers
Summary: After Replacements, Bill and Johnny look for Bull.
Pet Content: Original mama cat and kitten characters.
Read on DW | Read on AO3
To Say Nothing of the Tiger
Fandom: Hornblower (TV)
Summary: Admiral Pellew wants a favour. Horatio wants to do anything to help. William just wants to spend time with Horatio.
Pet Content: Admiral Pellew's [historically] canonical tiger.
Read on DW | Read on AO3
A Dog's Eye View
Fandom: Band of Brothers
Summary: How Trigger sees the events of "Crossroads."
Pet Content: The dog that Tabprobably stole found in Holland.
Read on DW | Read on AO3
Also, here's a picture of my cat, who is a fandom pet insofar as she's named after Kaylee from Firefly.( Read more... )
Challenge #3:
I have a vague memory of a History of Psychology class some twenty years ago, where the professor was talking about the uncertainty of knowing if the world you perceived with your sense and senses was even remotely similar to the world anyone else perceived. He described philosophy (which is more or less what psychology was for most of history) as being like creating an image of the world, and holding it cupped in your hands, then opening your hands to show it to other people, and inquiring if that matched their image of the world, a process which bagged a number of questions for future philosophers to attempt to unpack. (Some of all of these details may be incorrectly recalled, with apologies to Professor C.)
This is how I feel about art in general, and fandom specifically: that need to articulate how one understands the world, and see if anyone else feels the same. And, yes, that does often involve a lot of pornography, but the point of transformative works as a form of philosophical communication remains.
I see a story out in the wide world, and it sparks something in me: resonates with a life experience, and emotion, something I want and don't have, an aspirational or cautionary way of moving through life, a new idea, something that just really pisses me off. The story speaks to me about how I perceive the world, and I wonder if that's true for anyone else, too.
So I take that story, and say to a friend and peer, "Hey, did you see that? Did it inspire/intrigue/inflame you too?" And someone else comes back and says, "Yes, but also..." or "Yes, and this too..." or "No, because..."
(or they don't, ask me about being in a fandom of one...)
And that communication can take the form of edits, or discord conversations, or meta posts, or pic spams, or setting the story to music, or rewriting it into a new story, or making a picture, or... or... or.... (In some ways, those reaction fic, that just retell a scene in a show or movie from the PoV of the author's blorbo, are the most immediate form of this.)
As a form of philosophy, it's imperfect, and often shallow, and inherently biased, but holding my fannish heart between two cupped hands and showing it to others has gone a long way to formulating how I interact with the world, and often made me feel less alone.
And for that, I'm grateful.
denise, which includes ways to export LJ to DW and/or to your drive. IDK how people are saving LJ scrapbook.I'd say pass it along, but I think it's pretty widely broadcast by now. Pass it along to spaces where one can find LJ people are who aren't on DW?
Anyway, on with the show.
Challenge #1:
The Icebreaker Challenge: Introduce yourself. Tell us why you're doing the challenge, and what you hope to gain from it.
Hi! I'm Muccamukk or Mucca. You may know me from Age of Sail, Stargate, Babylon 5, Marvel Comics, Band of Brothers or Top Gun fandoms, plus an extremely random selection of others across twenty plus years in online fandom spaces. I used to write fic and comment quite a bit, though I've been less active the last few years.
My pinned post and profile seem to be in good order, and I do still post link lists, book reviews and music from time to time.
I helped mod Snowflake for a few years there, and am taking this year off (mostly), so I'm looking forward to slightly lower-stakes participation, and maybe digging up some old memories/meeting new friends.
If you want to play an ice breaker game, check out my 2025 Media Tracker and ask me for a hot take on any albums, movies or shows on there (I think I've reviewed all the books up to December, which I'll cover in the next few weeks, but other media not as much).
Challenge #2:
Pets of Fandom: Loosely defined! Post about your pets, pets from your canon, anything you want!
Somehow, the only pet I can now think of is Darwin from seaQuest: DSV, who isn't strictly speaking a pet. The talking robot dolphin was a lot of fun, though.
Instead: here's a list of fic I've written that include significant pets (canonical or otherwise), because writing pets is really fun, given they're often (very cute) chaos goblins designed to throw plans awry. (Presented in order written):
Unstinting
Fandom: Marvel 616 (Captain America)
Summary: Sam Wilson, downtime.
Pet Content: Sam Wilson's canonical cat, Figaro.
Read on DW | Read on AO3
Found Sleeping
Fandom: Band of Brothers
Summary: After Replacements, Bill and Johnny look for Bull.
Pet Content: Original mama cat and kitten characters.
Read on DW | Read on AO3
To Say Nothing of the Tiger
Fandom: Hornblower (TV)
Summary: Admiral Pellew wants a favour. Horatio wants to do anything to help. William just wants to spend time with Horatio.
Pet Content: Admiral Pellew's [historically] canonical tiger.
Read on DW | Read on AO3
A Dog's Eye View
Fandom: Band of Brothers
Summary: How Trigger sees the events of "Crossroads."
Pet Content: The dog that Tab
Read on DW | Read on AO3
Also, here's a picture of my cat, who is a fandom pet insofar as she's named after Kaylee from Firefly.( Read more... )
Challenge #3:
Write a love letter to fandom. It might be to fandom in general, to a particular fandom, favourite character, anything at all.
I have a vague memory of a History of Psychology class some twenty years ago, where the professor was talking about the uncertainty of knowing if the world you perceived with your sense and senses was even remotely similar to the world anyone else perceived. He described philosophy (which is more or less what psychology was for most of history) as being like creating an image of the world, and holding it cupped in your hands, then opening your hands to show it to other people, and inquiring if that matched their image of the world, a process which bagged a number of questions for future philosophers to attempt to unpack. (Some of all of these details may be incorrectly recalled, with apologies to Professor C.)
This is how I feel about art in general, and fandom specifically: that need to articulate how one understands the world, and see if anyone else feels the same. And, yes, that does often involve a lot of pornography, but the point of transformative works as a form of philosophical communication remains.
I see a story out in the wide world, and it sparks something in me: resonates with a life experience, and emotion, something I want and don't have, an aspirational or cautionary way of moving through life, a new idea, something that just really pisses me off. The story speaks to me about how I perceive the world, and I wonder if that's true for anyone else, too.
So I take that story, and say to a friend and peer, "Hey, did you see that? Did it inspire/intrigue/inflame you too?" And someone else comes back and says, "Yes, but also..." or "Yes, and this too..." or "No, because..."
(or they don't, ask me about being in a fandom of one...)
And that communication can take the form of edits, or discord conversations, or meta posts, or pic spams, or setting the story to music, or rewriting it into a new story, or making a picture, or... or... or.... (In some ways, those reaction fic, that just retell a scene in a show or movie from the PoV of the author's blorbo, are the most immediate form of this.)
As a form of philosophy, it's imperfect, and often shallow, and inherently biased, but holding my fannish heart between two cupped hands and showing it to others has gone a long way to formulating how I interact with the world, and often made me feel less alone.
And for that, I'm grateful.
Book Review: Beasts by Joyce Carol Oates
Jan. 5th, 2026 12:14 pmjuushikaTitle: Beasts
Author: Joyce Carol Oates
Published: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2002 (2001)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 140
Total Page Count: 556,575
Text Number: 2088
Read Because: ??, borrowed from Open Library
Review: In the 1970s, at an all-girls college, a naïve 20-year-old falls in love with her professor, but, "if you love a married man you exist in a special, secret, undeclared relationship with his wife." Fascinating to read this soon after Jackson's Hangsaman; which could be how it ended up on my TBR, I can't remember. Regardless, much the same premise, very different treatment. Oates, unsurprisingly, forgoes the subtlety of subtext for the horror of text. And I don't mind; I've had poor success with Oates in the past, finding her tryhard, style over grace; but the writing here really worked for me, punchy declarations and an effective use of repetition. Layered levels of unreality, the experience of early adulthood and being in love, of open secrets, of being taking advantage of in increasingly overt ways, builds an effective atmosphere within this brief, surprisingly dense novella. It makes me want to give Oates another try.
Author: Joyce Carol Oates
Published: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2002 (2001)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 140
Total Page Count: 556,575
Text Number: 2088
Read Because: ??, borrowed from Open Library
Review: In the 1970s, at an all-girls college, a naïve 20-year-old falls in love with her professor, but, "if you love a married man you exist in a special, secret, undeclared relationship with his wife." Fascinating to read this soon after Jackson's Hangsaman; which could be how it ended up on my TBR, I can't remember. Regardless, much the same premise, very different treatment. Oates, unsurprisingly, forgoes the subtlety of subtext for the horror of text. And I don't mind; I've had poor success with Oates in the past, finding her tryhard, style over grace; but the writing here really worked for me, punchy declarations and an effective use of repetition. Layered levels of unreality, the experience of early adulthood and being in love, of open secrets, of being taking advantage of in increasingly overt ways, builds an effective atmosphere within this brief, surprisingly dense novella. It makes me want to give Oates another try.
Book Review: The Demon Lover by Dion Fortune
Jan. 5th, 2026 12:04 pmjuushikaTitle: The Demon Lover
Author: Dion Fortune
Published: S.I.L (Trading) Ltd, 1996 (1929)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 205
Total Page Count: 556,435
Text Number: 2087
Read Because: on this yearly best of post, borrowed from Open Library
Review: Chosen for her nascent powers as a medium, a young woman is held captive by a ruthless dark magician--a bond that persists after his apparent death. Fortune wrote fiction inspired by/representational of her own occult beliefs: "The 'Mystical Qabalah' gives the theory, but the novels give the practice." Unfortunately, this means that theory sometimes intrudes on the narrative, esoteric sidebars which are worldbuilding infodumps by any other name. But it also gives this a sincerity that productively complicates an already complicated would-be romance between two opposed, entwined, co-contaminating identities. This has a great atmosphere, especially in the second half, and handles its central relationship with an unsettling, compelling nuance.
Author: Dion Fortune
Published: S.I.L (Trading) Ltd, 1996 (1929)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 205
Total Page Count: 556,435
Text Number: 2087
Read Because: on this yearly best of post, borrowed from Open Library
Review: Chosen for her nascent powers as a medium, a young woman is held captive by a ruthless dark magician--a bond that persists after his apparent death. Fortune wrote fiction inspired by/representational of her own occult beliefs: "The 'Mystical Qabalah' gives the theory, but the novels give the practice." Unfortunately, this means that theory sometimes intrudes on the narrative, esoteric sidebars which are worldbuilding infodumps by any other name. But it also gives this a sincerity that productively complicates an already complicated would-be romance between two opposed, entwined, co-contaminating identities. This has a great atmosphere, especially in the second half, and handles its central relationship with an unsettling, compelling nuance.
A small list of things I did
Jan. 5th, 2026 02:38 pmunicorndukeHolidays were very good
I am attempting to motivate my parents on their renovation by just simply doing parts of it for them. this is working okay so far. I need to pick up a spackle bucket. not a bucket of spackle but something for holding the spackle because my dad used it for floor patch in the rental and it apparently because extremely solid in the container. spackling and sanding is next for them and as soon as I get my drywall pieces up in the upstairs bathroom, I will be spackling and sanding.
In theory my parents are moving their bedroom over this week, the reality is that my dad went to urgent care today to get something with his jaw looked at. I have been working with an attorney on business stuff. there's a lot going on and I'm very tired right this minute so I might get my heated blanket and take a nap in my comfy chair and then crafting tonight, can't wait for more crafting
- hung out with family and their dogs
- we did a puzzle that friend of a friend of my SIL made of their painting - it was very good and difficult
- had friends visit on their way south, they brought their dogs
- played a random series of games - exploding kittens, oh hell (family fav), some kind of game about guessing on a scale, ransom notes, some kind of imposter game. most party games aren't to my taste, but I did like exploding kittens
- new years day family party which was nice
- I pulled all my stash out organized it and it is mostly put away
- I made peanut butter chocolate chip cookies and they were so good
- I made tacos for the friends that stopped by and it was good
- went for many walks - christmas day with the cousins, twice with sibs and the dogs, friends around the farm
- I brought some furniture, my CPW and the two extra boxes of yarn stash that I didn't know I had from the shed and am now more optimized for crafting and can watch tv on the big screen while I do it
- finished upstairs bathroom floor - drywall next
- started journaling my feelings in a little physical notebook
- made a dr appointment for next week
- my brother bought me anno 1800 - time sink it's very good if confusing
- my brother and SIL came overnight because they realized their ski lesson place was closer to here and so brought their dogs for two days and I got to hang out with the dogs which was very good
I am attempting to motivate my parents on their renovation by just simply doing parts of it for them. this is working okay so far. I need to pick up a spackle bucket. not a bucket of spackle but something for holding the spackle because my dad used it for floor patch in the rental and it apparently because extremely solid in the container. spackling and sanding is next for them and as soon as I get my drywall pieces up in the upstairs bathroom, I will be spackling and sanding.
In theory my parents are moving their bedroom over this week, the reality is that my dad went to urgent care today to get something with his jaw looked at. I have been working with an attorney on business stuff. there's a lot going on and I'm very tired right this minute so I might get my heated blanket and take a nap in my comfy chair and then crafting tonight, can't wait for more crafting
crafting monday
Jan. 5th, 2026 02:38 pmunicorndukeHey all, if you'd like to join the crafting hangout, it is tonight from 6-8pm ET!
Video encouraged but not required!
Topic: Crafting Hangout
Time: Mondays 6:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
Meeting ID: 973 2674 2763
My love is like footprints in the snow
Jan. 5th, 2026 04:58 pmdolorosa_12It's the end of my last day of holiday, and it snowed overnight! This was the absolute perfect end to what's been a delightful twelve days (made better by the fact that I didn't have to leave the house at 7am for a train commute that was likely to have been disrupted by the weather). I went to the pool for a final morning swim, and it was blissfully empty: I had the lane to myself, and swam 1km in twenty minutes. I also went for a little wander around town. All the children had congregated in Ely's sole grass-covered hill, and were tobogganing, having snowball fights, and making snowmen. Everyone was in a great mood. I took a lot of photos.
I skipped the second![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
snowflake_challenge prompt, but I'm back for the third: Write a love letter to fandom. It might be to fandom in general, to a particular fandom, favourite character, anything at all.
( Love is a verb )
I skipped the second
snowflake_challenge prompt, but I'm back for the third: Write a love letter to fandom. It might be to fandom in general, to a particular fandom, favourite character, anything at all. ( Love is a verb )