oursin: Brush the Wandering Hedgehog by the fire (Default)
[personal profile] oursin

So, at long last, I finally have an email address associated with My New Academic Position (this has been A Saga to do with their system upgrade).

I have also achieved reader's card for library of former workplace (spat out from the bowels of their system with A Very Old Photo of Yrs Truly).

And went and looked at the items I wanted to check, and found that lo, I was right and they did NOT have anything pertinent, as I had in fact hoped they would not. Though I had hoped to look, for another thing, at a couple of closed stack items and discovered that these cannot be ordered on a day's notice INFAMY I am sure I recall the times when there were regular deliveries throughout the day. Not actually critical, but irksome. (Also irksome was that I moaned about this on bluesky and got various responses that had no relevance at all to research libraries, in the UK, in particular this one.)

I then managed to get a digital passport photo at one of the photobooths on Euston station and have applied for a new passport, as mine is well out of date and I seem to keep seeing things that want 'government ID' to verify WHO I AM (over here, making like Hemingway....) so thought this was probably the way to go.

Also this is a trivial thing but in the course of my perambs of the day I walked past the statue of Trim, and his human.

In the niggles department, I did that thing of putting my phone down in place I never usually put it and flapping about trying to find it.

The lockers at the library have really annoying electronic locks.

Printer playing up a bit again. Though I think this really is that one has to let it mutter and sulk for a bit between turning it on and actually trying to print anything.

Birdfeeding

Jan. 22nd, 2026 01:32 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Today is cloudy and chilly.

I fed the birds.  I've seen a few sparrows.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 1/22/26 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 1/22/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

EDIT 1/22/26 -- I filled the trolley twice with large branches that I hauled to the ritual meadow.  Now all that's left of the brushpile by the driveway is one big forked branch that I can't break down myself, and the leftover twigs that will need to be raked up. \o/

I've seen a large flock of sparrows, a male and a female cardinal separately, and a starling.

EDIT 1/22/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

I've seen a pair of cardinals.

I am done for the night.
 
rachelmanija: (Books: old)
[personal profile] rachelmanija


A teenage boy, Ambrose, wakes up on a spaceship with no memory of how he got there. OS, the AI programmed with his mother's voice, reminds him that he's on a mission to rescue his sister, who went to Titan two years ago and sent out a distress call. And also, he has a surprise companion on a journey he thought would be solo: Kodiak, a teenage boy from the rival nation, who is ensconced in his own quarters and refuses to come out.

Ambrose, who is a typical teenager in lots of ways apart from being a genius and an astronaut, manages to coax Kodiak out and immediately starts thinking lustful thoughts about him. Kodiak, whose country is much more austere and militarized than Ambrose's, very gradually warms up to him.

And then what I thought was going to be a slow-burn gay YA romance in a science fiction setting takes a huge left turn. To be fair, it does still centrally involve a gay YA romance. But the science fiction aspect isn't just there as a cool background. It's actually a YA science fiction novel that has a romance along with a plot that goes in multiple unexpected directions, and is very moving in a way that's only possible because of the science fiction elements.

If you're a stickler for hard science fiction in which everything is definitely possible/likely, this probably has at least one too many "I don't think that's likely to work that way" moments for you. But if you'd like to read a fun and touching science fiction adventure-romance that will probably surprise you at least once, just read the book without knowing anything more.

Spoilers! )

New type of spam?

Jan. 22nd, 2026 12:24 pm
mxcatmoon: (Bingo keyboard)
[personal profile] mxcatmoon
 Here's a new one on me: Has anyone ever gotten gibberish as a spam comment on AO3?

It was a huge block of text that looked like this: 

.'smylxL2P>sS5j=RIE]ScX-7DR&V\FU?[79jO94@\f!IB:w[3"aJv%J:}pIRO$q=K `q4Bv_ C6=q%OD-8MY^(;|EHNh3bS7C3e#gf}IsNZ(ETXFlS'V4ZipY|rr^2_kVqs]?ty4a8

It was from a guest. Yes, I have guest comments turned on for most of my works, I get so little engagement with my work that I'm not going to turn it off unless I have to, heck I've only gotten a couple of spam comments in all the time I've been on AO3.

I marked it as Spam and moved on, but I've never seen it before. What's the point of this one?


badly_knitted: (Rose)
[personal profile] badly_knitted
 


Title: Not Restful
Fandom: The Fantastic Journey
Author: 
[personal profile] badly_knitted
Characters: Varian, Jonathan, Travellers.
Rating: PG
Setting: After the series.
Summary: Spending the night in a comfortable bed is proving less restful than Varian had expected.
Written For: The prompt ‘Luminance’ on my 
[community profile] 1character table.
Disclaimer: I don’t own The Fantastic Journey, or the characters. They belong to their creators.
A/N: Quadruple drabble.
 


 

Fic: Adaptability

Jan. 22nd, 2026 05:01 pm
badly_knitted: (Ianto Smile)
[personal profile] badly_knitted
 


Title: Adaptability
Author: 
[personal profile] badly_knitted
Characters: OCs, Ianto, Team.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1031
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Very little of what Torchwood find themselves dealing with can be prepared for in advance; it’s a good thing they’re so adaptable.
Written For: Weekend Challenge - Unprepared, Part II at 
[community profile] 1_million_words.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
 


 
[personal profile] cosmolinguist

I did an interview that might become part of a radio piece on e-bikes as pavement obstacles for blind people today.

He'd done some reconnaissance before I showed up and had found the most e-bikes I have ever seen in one place, taking up most of a pedestrianized side road. We came around a corner to this nest of chaos and all I could think of was "If we were in a science fiction movie about aliens invading the Earth, and the aliens were Lime bikes, I feel like this would be their mothership."

He pointed his microphone at me and said "Say that again." Ha! I gotta watch my goofy metaphors better.

So if you ever hear someone on the radio say they found the giant egg all the Lime bikes hatched from...uh, that's me.

soricel: (Default)
[personal profile] soricel posting in [community profile] smallfandomfest
Title: Overlap
Author: soricel/freevistas
Fandom: Sense8
Pairing/Characters: Nomi Marks & Lito Rodriguez
Rating/Category: G
Prompt: Closeness

On AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/78102826

 

Read more... )

 

james_davis_nicoll: (Default)
[personal profile] james_davis_nicoll


An unhappily married man's quest for the truth leads into a past almost everyone has forgotten.

The Iowa Baseball Confederacy by W. P. Kinsella
[syndicated profile] joshreadscomics_feed

Posted by Josh

Comics Curmudgeon readers! Do you love this blog and yearn for a novel written by its creator? Well, good news: Josh Fruhlinger's The Enthusiast is that novel! It's even about newspaper comic strips, partly. Check it out!

Rex Morgan, M.D., 1/22/26

You really gotta give it up for today’s Rex Morgan, M.D.: it truly offers a master class in absolutely nothing happening. Rex asks if his and June’s current situation could get any less interesting, and June counters that she plans to quietly read books on her tablet, something that would be interesting for her but very boring for anyone who might be watching her in a visual medium like the comics. Rex then proposes an extremely low-stakes bit of tension: will they call his name soon, or will he have to wait around for a while? This is resolved in that very panel, as his name is called almost immediately. A truly wondrous series of soap opera panels. These two did not in fact have sex in the lead-up to all this, just in case you were wondering.

Judge Parker, 1/22/26

You know how Alan’s been drunk and depressed ever since Randy disappeared? Well, apparently he forgot that he had another child whose location he could be very sure of, since she was in prison, and that he could’ve confided in her, or at least told her about her brother’s disappearance. They let you get letters in there, you know! And make occasional phone calls! Whoops! It’s easy to let that sort of thing slip your mind, I guess, when you’re very sad and very drunk.

spikedluv: (winter: mittens by raynedanser)
[personal profile] spikedluv
I switched my morning around and left home an hour later than usual. In that hour I put a chuck roast in the crock pot and did some online fandom things. I went with the Cinnamon Orange tea again this morning. Downtown I hit Price Chopper, then went to my chiropractic appointment.

THEN I went to McD’s and got some writing done; ~700 words, which is less than the last couple days, but it’s not nothing, so \o/

I picked the dogs up on my way home (my winter schedule for picking up the dogs has been different than usual because I tend to not want to go back out and get them if it’s cold or snowy), where I put groceries away and walked them (I had on so many layers!).

I prepared lunch for all of us (including Midnight who was howling for more food – he’ll sometimes eat very little on a day, then be starving the next day, and apparently blaming me for it), though I planned to take mine with me.

I hit the post office and filled my gas tank on the way to visit mom (where I ate my lunch). When I got home I took the dogs for another walk (and fed Midnight yet again; apparently today was a day when he wanted all the food *g*).

I also did a load of laundry, hand-washed dishes (why does it seem like dirty dishes just sort of keep appearing?), checked on Midnight’s dry food and water dishes (this is where I normally say ‘scooped kitty litter’, but there was nothing to scoop, probably because yesterday was a day he didn’t eat much), and paid a bill online. When Pip got home we went for another walk.

One nice thing was I received a set of tea bag coasters that I’d ordered. With sunflowers on them!! (I tried to link to them, but apparently they are sold out so it won’t even link to the item so I can show you.)

ETA: Forgot to mention that I watched one of my fave HGTV programs, Fixer to Fabulous!

Temps started out at 9.0(F) and dropped exactly 2 degrees to 7.0 before I left the house. The high I saw was 25.5. We had a tiny bit of snow late afternoon, big fat flakes, but not enough to accumulate, thankfully.

The bad news is that I’ve been concentrating on the low temperatures we’ll be having (overnight lows in the negatives and highs in single digits) and Pip informed me that we’re in for a big snow storm Sunday. 3-5" during the day, 3-5" overnight, and an additional 1-3" Monday. DNW!!!


Mom Update:

Mom was doing okay when I saw her. She was tired. And cold. She used a heavy blanket when she’s in her recliner, but I suggested she turn her heat up. (She has it set at 70, but her living room felt cool even to me, and I generally overheat.) She ate lunch while I was there. I got her mail and wrote out a check that I put back in the mailbox, stripped her bed, and brought home her laundry. I also opened one of her protein drinks, because I’m handy that way. *g*

She’s looking forward to company tonight, a woman she knows from the village who just recently found out that mom was sick. She called her yesterday to ask if she could come visit. So that’ll be nice for her.

ETA: I later learned that Sister A and Ian also visited her.

It's always more complicated

Jan. 22nd, 2026 12:00 pm
rmc28: (cuihc)
[personal profile] rmc28

It's been a whole adventure watching Heated Rivalry go mainstream (for once I can claim I was a fan before it was cool!). I turned on Radio 2 in a hire car on Tuesday evening and the presenter was talking about it. Half the UK ice hockey clubs are making social media posts riffing off the show, or at minimum using music from it in their updates.

But it's also more complicated. Zach Sullivan, one of the very very few out queer professional male hockey players in the world, made an Instagram post a few days ago, about how conflicted he feels about the show. Well worth a read if you have time. Heated Rivalry is a romantic fantasy, the hockey aspects are often wrong, and I agree with Zach that I'm not at all sure the enthusiasm over the show is making things better for closeted male players right now. (I hope it will in the long term, but I worry about the harm right now.)

Also, I am developing a visceral loathing for the phrase "boy aquarium" for hockey rinks.

  1. it's gross
  2. it's not just boys (men) who play ice hockey
  3. please stop sexualising the spaces where people play and get changed

That last point: I play with two mixed (male-dominated) teams, I get changed in the same room as the men, and because my teams are not gross and the changing room is not a sexualised space, I feel safe doing so. If I changed separately, I would miss out on a whole load of the team connection and conversation, all the stuff that creates a team out of a bunch of people who turn up in the same place each week. So I stay and change with my team, and it's not a big deal, and I don't want people to make it a big deal.

community thursday (jan. 15-21)

Jan. 22nd, 2026 11:49 am
tozka: title character sitting with a friend (Default)
[personal profile] tozka

Welcome back to another Community Thursday! Original Community Thursday info here, if you're interested and want to participate, too.

Posted/Commented

New-to-me Comms

  • [community profile] vkotd -- Visual Kei of the day! A song-sharing comm focused on Japanese rock bands
  • [community profile] fanmix_monthly -- recently-opened fanmix community
  • [community profile] pkmnkinkmeme -- a new Pokemon Kink Meme comm!

Interesting Comm Posts

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