rmc28: (reading)
Rachel Coleman ([personal profile] rmc28) wrote2025-12-07 01:48 pm

To-read pile, 2025, November

Books on pre-order:

  1. Platform Decay (Murderbot 8) by Martha Wells (5 May 2025)

Books acquired in November (and all read!)

  1. Testimony of Mute Things (Penric & Desdemona) by Lois McMaster Bujold
  2. Goalie Interference (Austin Aces) by Kim Findlay [7]
  3. After Hours at Dooryard Books by Cat Sebastian

Books acquired previously and read in November:

  1. Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan [May 2016]
  2. Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan [May 2016]
  3. Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan [May 2016]
  4. Percy Jackson and the Battle of the Labyrinth by Rick Riordan [May 2016]

Borrowed books read in November:

  1. Murder at the Grand Raj Palace (Baby Ganesha 4) by Vaseem Khan [3]

Rereads in November:

  1. Heated Rivalry (Game Changers 2) by Rachel Reid
  2. Tough Guy (Game Changers 3) by Rachel Reid
  3. Common Goal (Game Changers 4) by Rachel Reid
  4. Role Model (Game Changers 5) by Rachel Reid
  5. The Long Game (Game Changers 6) by Rachel Reid

Yes there's a TV adaptation of Heated Rivalry, no it's not available (legally) in the UK yet, also I have had no time to watch it even if it were. But watching it is very definitely in my future plans.

[1] Pre-order
[2] Audiobook
[3] Physical book
[4] Crowdfunding
[5] Goodbye read
[6] Cambridgeshire Reads/Listens
[7] FaRoFeb / FaRoCation / Bookmas / HRBC
[8] Prime Reading / Kindle Unlimited

adrian_turtle: (Default)
adrian_turtle ([personal profile] adrian_turtle) wrote2025-12-06 01:52 pm

Defect

I heard there was a new version of the musical Chess, much better than the original. I don't know the details, but I think they added some outside narration for context, to help it make sense? And changed the focus? (I am not really worried about spoilers. Even if they make the plot less inane, the audience should be there for the music, not the plot.)

A big problem with reviving a Cold War musical in 2025 is that there is a major plot point about a guy choosing to leave the Soviet Union and come to the US. It's 40+ years ago, so the Soviet government is the conventional Bad Guys. The only obstacles to this are coming from the place he's leaving; there aren't any worries that the US might not let him in. The song that nods to paperwork barriers plays it as a joke. Neither because he's from their great enemy, nor because he's just generally a foreigner. For an audience that doesn't remember the 20th century, that just doesn't make sense. The difficulty with getting INTO America is obviously the hard part.

https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2025-12-05/immigrants-kept-from-faneuil-hall-citizenship-ceremony-as-feds-crackdown-nationwide

(Story at link is about an incident yesterday. Immigrants with green cards who had paid all fees and passed all tests and screenings for citizenship, and were minutes from taking the oath of citizenship in a historic building in downtown Boston...were stopped because the government disapproves of their countries of origin.)
rmc28: Rachel in hockey gear on the frozen fen at Upware, near Cambridge (Default)
Rachel Coleman ([personal profile] rmc28) wrote2025-12-06 12:58 pm
Entry tags:

Off to Oxford

I'm playing for Cambridge Womens Blues against Oxford Womens Blues tonight. My BUIHA stats page tells me this will be my second game for Cambridge WBs against Oxford WBs, hopefully it goes better than the last one three years ago. None of my teammates from that game are playing today, although five of the Oxford women are the same (and one of those five was on my Biarritz tournament team this summer).

My stats page also tells me that I have scored more points against Cambridge Huskies than for them (1 is more than 0), and that two of my current teammates were my opponents in my WBs v Huskies game three years ago. I have no memory of either of them in that game.

The Womens Blues game is immediately followed by a matchup between the Mens Blues teams, so I'm looking forward to watching that, before we all pile on the coach back to Cambridge.

Dork Tower ([syndicated profile] dorktower_feed) wrote2025-12-05 09:10 pm

Bill Bored – DORK TOWER 05.12.25

Posted by John Kovalic

Most DORK TOWER strips are now available as signed, high-quality prints, from just $25!  CLICK HERE to find out more!

HEY! Want to help keep DORK TOWER going? Then consider joining the DORK TOWER Patreon and ENLIST IN THE ARMY OF DORKNESS TODAY! (We have COOKIES!) (And SWAG!) (And GRATITUDE!)

 

flamingsword: LINKS! (LINKS!)
flamingsword ([personal profile] flamingsword) wrote2025-12-05 09:22 am
Entry tags:

Links post!

a song: Occupy Your Mind by Grace Petrie on Bandcamp

a taste: chocolate-and-floral tea I need some of.

a cause: Donate to Unicef in the name of your least favorite antivaxx/regressive relative this holiday season!

a sight: a pretty rock. I kinda want to chew on it?

a groove: Do Not Break, a DrumNBass music generator by myNoise

a kinship: AuDHD Belonging with guest Pasha Marlowe on Audhd Flourishing podcast

a thinky: Heteropessimism: A fun new word for my vocabulary! I don’t necessarily agree with the article, but it is an interesting way to look at heterosexual's meta-experiences around their relations.

a project: How to keep track of important papers by ms-demeanor from tumblr. I am collecting GLP-1 data right now, but also want to start cleaning up and clearing out all the stuff from the garage that I don’t need. Feel free to leave comments below with links to / ways that have worked for you to stay organized and relatively de-cluttered.

cut for YouTube links:Read more... )
Dork Tower ([syndicated profile] dorktower_feed) wrote2025-12-03 06:00 am

Dork Friday – DORK TOWER 03.12.25

Posted by John Kovalic

This strip was first published in 2012. (Time has no meaning anymore.)

MANY DORK TOWER strips (though possibly not this one) are now available as signed, high-quality prints, from just $25!  CLICK HERE to find out more!

HEY! Want to help keep DORK TOWER going? Then consider joining the DORK TOWER Patreon and ENLIST IN THE ARMY OF DORKNESS TODAY! (We have COOKIES!) (And SWAG!) (And GRATITUDE!)

rmc28: Rachel in hockey gear on the frozen fen at Upware, near Cambridge (Default)
Rachel Coleman ([personal profile] rmc28) wrote2025-12-03 07:36 pm
Entry tags:

Wednesday reading: Percy Jackson

About ten days ago, my hockey-and-languages buddy Owen enthused about Percy Jackson to me on the journey to/from my game in Lee Valley. (Owen was riding along to provide photography services.)

I was like, I've never read the books but I'm pretty sure I've got Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief somewhere in my to-read pile. So I took a look and sure enough, I had ten Percy Jackson books in my kindle account. My emails tell me I bought them in May 2016, and I have no memory of doing so or why (except that they were all 99p so that might have had something to do with it).

I opened up Lightning Thief to see if it was as good as expected ... and got fairly instantly hooked. I've read the first series of five books, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, then I briefly borrowed and read the short story collection The Demigod Files, before moving on to the next series of five, Heroes of Olympus. I'm currently a few chapters into the second book in that series, Son of Neptune. I'm having a great time: the books are good reads and I'm reviving a lot of memories from my childhood Greek myths phase. The positive ADHD rep doesn't hurt either.

flamingsword: A mug of coffee and open book sit in front of a row of old books (coffee and books)
flamingsword ([personal profile] flamingsword) wrote2025-11-30 10:34 am
Entry tags:

The Elf Meme!

Back in the heyday of Livejournal this went around -- my friend [personal profile] nyyki is revivifying it here. It’s Elf Meme II: Son of Elf Meme! Okay, maybe not that, but we could all use some connection and holiday cheer, right?

Step One:
Make a post (public, friendslocked, filtered ... whatever you're comfortable with) to your journal. The post should contain your list of 10 holiday wishes. The wishes can be anything at all, from simple and fandom-related ("I'd love an icon that's just for me") to medium ("I wish for _____ on DVD")
to really big ("All I want for Christmas is a new car/computer/living space/TV.") The important thing is, make sure these wishes are things you really, truly want.

- If you wish for real life things (not fics or icons), make sure you include some sort of contact info in your post - whether it's your address, or just to ping your DMs, or your bare-faced email address if that’s how you roll - where a Holiday Elf could get in touch with you.

- Also, make sure you post some version of these guidelines in your journal so that the holiday joy can spread.

Step Two:
Surf around your friends list (or friendsfriends, or just random journals) to see who has posted their list. And now here's the
important part:

- If you see a wish you can grant, and it's in your heart to do so, make someone's wish come true. Sometimes someone's trash is another's treasure, and
if you have a leather jacket you don't want or a gift certificate you won't use - or even know where you could get someone's dream purebred Basset Hound
for free - do it.

You needn't spend money on these wishes unless you want to. The point isn't to put people out, it's to provide everyone a chance to be someone else's holiday
elf - to spread the joy. Gifts can be made anonymously or not - it's your call.

There are no rules with this project, no guarantees, and no strings attached. Just...wish, and it might come true. Give, and you might receive. And you'll
have the joy of knowing you made someone's holiday special, which is a great feeling.




1. I could use some books to help me think differently about other peoples headspaces. If there’s a book that explained a different type of person to you, I’d like to hear about it. Possibly also to borrow the book?

2. Tea recommendations? Tell me what teas you like, and why. If you are getting rid of a tea that you wanted to like but can’t really deal with, you can send it here, I’m basically a bottomless pit of plant-flavored hydration. *sips tea*

3. When I downsized to move here, I gave away my soul the stencils for messing with my bullet journal and I am now wishing I had not. If you have bujo stuff you don’t use, I am in the market for all of that stuff.

4. I want to start getting rid of some of the Japanese EGL fashion dresses that I have, most of them are an Asian XL or XXL in size. I need an accountability buddy for listing them on LaceMarket or someone to give them to who will love them and take them out of my closet. If you can help with either thing, give me a DM.

5. I could use someone’s brain to pick about how to do website stuff for modern HTML and Wordpress, and especially if you know how to do this for any blind/vision impaired folks. People who can help my friend [personal profile] nyyki navigate doing this for herself.

6. I want That MotherFucker Over There to not be president, so light a candle or whatever that looks like for you. Please.

7. I really need someone to talk to about doing Shadow work who knows their own emotional safety limits. I don’t know how to talk about the wack shit that happened to us when we were kids that made us think we were better off cutting off whole parts of ourselves, while also having to deal with looking out for someone else’s distress and feeling like I have to manage their feelings. The task switching is way harder in that state, and I want people to be safe, but I also need to stay on task with an accountability buddy or something. Idk. Something along those lines.

8. A multitude, a plethora, a veritable cornucopia of different colors of blue paint. I want to do something new to my painting, bc I am bored of it looking like this.

9. I want links to pet pictures. Do you have a pet? I want to see them, and tell you why they look like a good pet.

10. I want you to have good end-of-2025 holidays, and I want to help spread that love around.



So, when you see this post a wish list? And let me see what I might be able to help you with.

Hit my DMs for anything, or I’m on Discord as @.flamingsword - yes there is a period before my name.

[Edit: there’s a blank copy to use in the comments]
azurelunatic: Vivid pink Alaskan wild rose. (Default)
Azure Jane Lunatic (Azz) 🌺 ([personal profile] azurelunatic) wrote2025-11-28 07:20 pm
Entry tags:

Post-Turkey (well, there are leftovers...)

The new dryer is just fine, except the top is ever so slightly slanted in a way that makes it a bad place to set your dryer balls.

Have I mentioned that especially after Colonoscopy Week I've had more trouble than usual walking? I've been using my cane inside the house for the first time in quite a while, and I'm limited in how much I can carry without (more) pain. It sucks. Belovedest has set up the short ramp against the shortest outside stairs, and while going up it is Bad, going up the stairs without it is Worse. (Both outside doors have stairs.)

I wasn't available to assist with any of the Thanksgiving cooking. Belovedest did it themselves! Including: turkey, the epic tray of dressing, biscuits from the mix, and instant potatoes made the way that erases the taste of Box. (There was also salad available, but there's quite a bit of vegetable in the sausage-cornbread dressing.)

Today we had some roof inspectors. The inspection's free; the quote for fixing things up is *sigh* very much not free.
flamingsword: We now return you to your regularly scheduled crisis. :) (Default)
flamingsword ([personal profile] flamingsword) wrote2025-11-28 06:39 am

This sorry state of affairs

I fell asleep at 9:30, woke up at ~4:30 with chest pain that then went away after about a minute, and I fell back asleep. Then when I tried to sit up on waking I overstrained something in my neck. So this whole night is going in here under the tag “ways I have injured myself” 😓😣😖

If the chest pain thing happens again, I’ll go to the doctor about it, but I really don’t want to do that this week when urgent care places will all be full of people who had accidents or did dumb stuff over their holiday. I’ll go on Monday and until then I’ll just take an aspirin every day and stop eating things with sugar alcohols and artificial sweeteners, which do slightly elevate your clotting and therefore are a stroke risk.

In good news, I have one more of the dumb “flash cards” to do before doing a bunch of review for the Pathology final, which will be hard, but I’m not that concerned about.

In news which is currently receiving mixed reviews, it is below freezing here, and I for some reason told Mom that I would go to the bookstore with her today. And now my aunt is coming along. I’m glad we get to support a small business but I had somehow forgotten the existence of Black Friday when I agreed to this. Boo.
Dork Tower ([syndicated profile] dorktower_feed) wrote2025-11-28 06:00 am

Ia! Ia! – DORK TOWER 28.11.25

Posted by John Kovalic

 

 

 

This strip was first published in 2012. (Time has no meaning anymore.)

MANY DORK TOWER strips (though possibly not this one) are now available as signed, high-quality prints, from just $25!  CLICK HERE to find out more!

HEY! Want to help keep DORK TOWER going? Then consider joining the DORK TOWER Patreon and ENLIST IN THE ARMY OF DORKNESS TODAY! (We have COOKIES!) (And SWAG!) (And GRATITUDE!)

flamingsword: We now return you to your regularly scheduled crisis. :) (Default)
flamingsword ([personal profile] flamingsword) wrote2025-11-27 12:36 pm

The Friend Book version ... 8? I think?

I am about to run out of room in the former bullet journal and so it is time to transfer necessary information to the new one, including the Friend Book - the list of friends and their preferences that I keep in the back. Even if you only know me from DW, if you count us friends then you are welcome to submit answers to questions about how I can be a good friend to you. This also, ideally, means updating old information, if you are already in there. So here are the current version of my questions for you to answer, or not, as you choose.

What are your special interests and things you love to talk about?

What are your favorite kinds of drinks and snacks for hanging out? If I come to your house, what kinds of things am I bringing for the purpose of spoiling you?

Do you have any allergies/sensory sensitivities/trauma triggers/pet peeves/other bad stuff I should know about? How do I keep you safe?

How do I comfort you when something big goes wrong/you are overwhelmed/you are having a panic attack? Do you want to be hugged, to be helped, or to be heard - and in what order do you want them if there are multiple?

What are your favorite types of parties/get-togethers? How do I invite you to things you will like?

What kind of gifts do you like: frivolous, purposeful, experiences, perishables like baked goods, donations in your name, some completely other thing? How do inspire you to feel like I appreciate you?


If you don’t want a list of your likes and vulnerabilities floating around in the world, I get that. But if you think this information is safe with me, I would be grateful for guidance on how to be a good friend to you. Feel free to DM me if you have answers, questions, or concerns.
adrian_turtle: (Default)
adrian_turtle ([personal profile] adrian_turtle) wrote2025-11-27 09:55 am
Entry tags:

don't worry I don't have a concussion

I am just thinking about concussions in a general family sort of way. I have a lot of experience of them, and also a lot of experience of downplaying my own head injuries. I thought that was just a matter of not wanting to use up my whining points when I might need them for dealing with migraine or motion-sickness or something else that could be dealt with more usefully. When modern concussion awareness programs started treating injuries like concussions if people were not unconscious for very long, I started reassessing a lot of the falls in my memory.

(That led to weird conversations with neurologists.
"Have you ever had a concussion?"
"Yes."
"How many?"
"I don't know." This can't be that unusual for people with seizures, even non-convulsive seizures like mine are fall risks. But he looked so very surprised.)

For quite a while I looked back on it thought it was just exhausting to deal with my parents' approach to medical emergencies. So I had years of solidly motivated reasoning to convince myself that any head impact I could walk away from must not be a concussion. Then I remembered it wasn't just the kind of exhausting as their, "Oh no! A child has a bad cut! Let us all run around in a panic and shout at everyone who can possibly be shouted at until the ER doctor stitches it up!" (Which is exhausting, and not what the first aid manual means by applying pressure.) It's that AND their belief that people with suspected concussion ought not be allowed to sleep.

A few decades ago, when I was feeling oddly wistful about young athletes growing up with the modern concussion awareness programs, I thought how great it was that they were prescribing more rest as well as diagnosing concussion based on less severe symptoms. Oh well, too bad we didn't know about that back in the 1970s, isn't modern medicine great? It turns out that my mom still believes people with suspected concussion should not fall asleep. She fell and hit her head a few days ago. She didn't want to drive herself to urgent care because she felt dizzy and her vision was kind of blurry, and she didn't want to sit in an uncomfortable waiting room with a terrible headache. But she suspected she might have a concussion so she had to stay awake for 24 hours. After doing so, she called me and said she was fine and I shouldn't worry. I told her that modern best practice was to get some rest after a head injury, ("But this might have been a concussion! I had to stay awake to make sure it wasn't a concussion!") but first phone the doctor to ask if you have one of the symptoms that would need the ER. ("Why should I go to the ER? If they tell me it's a concussion they would just tell me to stay awake for 24 hours and if I do that at home at least it won't hurt my back.")

I'm not sure how I feel about this.
Dork Tower ([syndicated profile] dorktower_feed) wrote2025-11-26 06:00 am

Blank Friday – DORK TOWER 26.11.25

Posted by John Kovalic

This or any DORK TOWER strip is now available as a signed, high-quality print, from just $25!  CLICK HERE to find out more!

HEY! Want to help keep DORK TOWER going? Then consider joining the DORK TOWER Patreon and ENLIST IN THE ARMY OF DORKNESS TODAY! (We have COOKIES!) (And SWAG!) (And GRATITUDE!)