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Media update (13/07/2025)
Trying to come back after weeks of not even opening this page. I actually started writing an update two weeks ago, but life got too busy. This list comes without commentary because, honestly, I don’t even remember what I wanted to say about the stuff I was watching (I mean, I remember the important points, but putting them into words would take time and energy, and I prefer to use that for the latest update). That said, I do have this week’s update ready, but that’ll go in a separate post. For now, I figured I’d just post this draft.
Finished making
- The Heart Killers fanmeeting freebies
- The Yuri on Ice embroidery
Currently reading
- SVSSS Vol. 4 - Chapter 26
Finished watching
- Break Up Service (Thai drama) – 12 episodes
- Mentiras La Serie (Mexican drama) – 8 episodes (Look I watch mexican stuff once in a blue moon)
Currently watching
Dramas:
- Winter Begonia (Chinese) – Weekly, weekends – 43/49 episodes
- The Ex-Morning (Thai BL) – Weekly, Thursdays – 8/10 episodes
- The Promise of the Soul (Taiwanese BL) – No idea what day it’s airing, lol – 4/12 episodes
- Desire (Chinese* Omegaverse drama) – Weekly, Saturdays, hopefully – 3/16 episodes
- 10 Things I Want to Do Before I Turn 40 (Japanese BL) – Weekly, it air on Fridays, but I’ll probably watch it on Saturday or Sunday - 2/12 episodes
Anime:
- Komi Can’t Communicate – No schedule – 4/24
- Sanrio Danshi – No schedule – 2/12
- Rokuhōdō Yotsuiro Biyori – No schedule – 2/12
- The Summer Hikaru Died – Weekly, Fridays – 1/? (I haven't looked up the number of episodes)
On hold
- The Bangkok Boy (Thai BL drama) – Weekly, Saturdays – 2/12 episodes
- Perfect 10 Liners (Thai BL drama) – No schedule – 4/24 episodes
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Climate Change
Unprecedented continental drying driven by severe droughts and groundwater overuse are reducing freshwater and contributing to sea level rise.
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Row, row, row your boat

177/365: Bewdley Regatta
Click for a larger, sharper image
It was Bewdley's main regatta weekend yesterday and today, and this lunchtime I spent a little time down at the river watching it. Here you see the last moments of the open eights (as opposed to lightweight eights), the fastest race in the programme. I can't actually remember which team won, but the winning margin was only a couple of feet. A bit later on I wandered over to the railway viaduct to see Flying Scotsman go over. It's not my favourite locomotive in spite of its immense fame, but it was worth a few minutes. Sadly I wasn't able to get a very good photo of that, but I was using my eyes rather than a camera most of the time anyway. At least it wasn't raining!
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Weekly Blog: 07.20.25 - 07.26.25
I was scrolling through Tumblr this morning and I came across someone who announced their intention to ship Bowser and Bowser Jr. All I can say is godspeed, friend. o7 Stay strong and don't let anyone take your joys from you…! (Their blog proudly states that their a fan of incest ships, so they'll probably be alright, hehe)
Made a foray into using the ao3downloader to get the html files of all my fics for my site. Had a bit of trouble, but this GitHub post solved my issue. This program is really neat! Worked like a charm~
Last night I found a Murderbot Diaries fic where the narrative is told via you playing a game of Minesweeper. It’s really cool. The code also goes nuts, lmao (I peeked at it to see all the different endings).
Also I finally finished cleaning up my Dreamwidth blog!!!! 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉 Everything I want to be up here is posted here now! So now I can turn my attention to Phase 2 of this project: Making my Neocities website.
…After I play my fill of Fields of Mistria. The new update is tomorrow! 😀
MONDAY - TUESDAY
Fields of Mistria update dropped! It’s fun to get back into the game~ You can date people now! Multiple people! Apparently! (I haven’t gotten there yet)
Played it through Tuesday, although on that day I got like a bunch of messages from people I know in a bunch of different channels. A high school friend on Discord, a mutual on Tumblr, a former coworker on LinkedIn, someone I'd been chatting with late last year on Pillowfort. Nothing bad; it was just a bit overwhelming ^^;
I also took a break to go shopping today because our water's being shut off tomorrow morning/afternoon so I wanted to make sure water was in the house for the duration. I also bought snacks :D
WEDNESDAY - THURSDAY
On Wednesday Dad came with a couch! We’ve been trying to convert the spare room to a living room (because my brother claimed the living room as a bedroom, and we’re finally getting started on that process. The couch can convert into a relatively firm bed, just in case we ever have guests.
I also went out to sing at an event with some other a cappella folks. It was fun! We got ramen after~
And then I played more Fields of Mistria into Thursday. I wanna try to complete Year 2 before putting it down again.
FRIDAY
Apparently Nintendo officially declared that Princess Peach and Mario are “good friends”. Platonic Mareach FTW!!!!! Everyone else is super crashing out about it tho 🤭 (Everyone loves the power of friendship until it interferes with a ship they like, lol) (also by god the casual misogyny about it all! Yikes!)
DC-Slash Con starts today! It's not about DC comics; it’s ‘cause the con originally was tied to Washington DC. I’m glad that cleared up for me, because otherwise I wouldn't have thought to go XD. There are lots of good panels! I especially enjoyed the Building Inclusive Fandom one.
SATURDAY
More DC-Slash Con! I’d meant to blitz the creation of pages for my website, but ended up distracted by the con, haha.
There was a panel about vidding and now I wanna get into vidding but i dont have anything to vid! Mario cutscenes? Probably not that viable! Weh! Maybe if it was a very short vid…
Also during the meal break they streamed the first 2 episodes of the Murderbot TV show in the Discord and I had to check it out. People weren't wrong in saying its fanfic of the books. They handled the inner monologues and the awkwardness very well, though!. Makes me wanna reread the first book again. And apparently in the Discord someone shared a link to their treasure trove of a bunch of TV show rips. One of those was Murderbot. Another was Ted Lasso, which is a show I want to watch sometime. I have both on my hard drive now 🙂
They had Buddy Daddies playing in one of the con rooms and I watched a little of that, too. Couldn't get into it, though. A shame, ‘cause that was another show that was on my watch list. But the character dynamic of the main leads (to start off, anyway) isn't very compelling to me. I didn’t like it 🙁
The Vid Show was AMAZING! There was an Ace attorney vid set to I’m Blue that was fun. Also there was a Thunderbolt Fantasy vid that was intriguing! It had puppets and 3d animation and 2d sprites and LEGO and is this all the same source??? And the action scenes were super cool, too…! There was also a vid about Ted Lasso that made me really wanna watch the show more than I already did. And there was a multifandom vid starring a whole bunch of F/F couples, and hopefully the vid will be released somewhere because I’m super curious about the Black couple that kept being shown and the fandoms list scrolled too fast to clock it. 🙁 Also there was a vid about New Life Begins and another about a universe of Bollywood spies(?) that looked really cool as well. One of the vids had Frog and Toad in it and another was like a minute long so truly you can vid anything if you try hard enough…🤔 Vids are cool and I’m adding vidding to my ever-growing list of hobbies I don't have time for.
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Birdfeeding
I fed the birds. I've seen a mixed flock of sparrows and house finches.
EDIT 7/27/25 -- I put out water for the birds.
EDIT 7/27/25 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.
EDIT 7/27/25 -- I did more work around the patio.
EDIT 7/27/25 -- I did more work around the patio.
EDIT 7/27/25 -- I potted up the last of the black cherry seeds.
.
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Tesla Diner
The retro-futuristic Hollywood establishment opens as a tourist trap whose nicest amenity is probably the parking lot.
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The Online Safety Act really is a horrendously bad law
The more I think about it, the more convinced I am of this -- not least because of the massively larger "attack surface" of personal data there will now be. And some of that will be facial data. As is sometimes said: "If your password is compromised, then you should change it. If your face is compromised... good luck." I think the OSA is a perfect example of how a blind, superficial repetition of "protect our kids!" without thinking beyond headlines can actually make people, children included, less safe overall. Given what we already know about the extent of cyberattacks (the M&S and the Co-op hacks are only the tip of the iceberg) introducing a law like the OSA without from day one having seriously strong transparency, privacy and data protection is... well, "foolhardy" is a very polite way to put it.
I suspect that when the OSA was first announced by the Tories, most people imagined that it would be primarily used to keep children off porn sites. Lots of support for that, as you'd imagine, and fair enough. But just a few days after implementation, we're already seeing that it causes issues far, far more widely than that. On BlueSky now, you can't even send DMs without age verification. Wikipedia's parent organisation is in court as I write, pointing out that if it's required to implement the OSA fully it will likely become impossible to keep Wikipedia itself accessible to a general UK audience. These won't be the last examples. To those of us with long online memories, there's an unhappy parallel with how early filtering software in places like public libraries in the late 1990s prevented access to stuff like LGBT resouirces.
And our politicians of almost all parties have just blindly gone along with this through a combination of stupidity, electoral calculation and craven cowardice. The Tories and Labour are most at fault as the governments who saw the law through to implementation in this terrible state. But most of the others are complicit as well. That doesn't only go for politicians, it goes for other authorities, sadly including charities. The OSA in its present form does not make the UK a safer place for children to be online. Because of the poor privacy safeguards, the lack of rigour in considering its reach and the almost certain massive data breaches that will come along at some point, matched with politicians' proven inability and/or refusal to understand how IT works ("backdoors for good guys only", anyone?) I'm afraid I think everyone, including children, is actually less safe now.
I doubt anything much will be done about it until there's a disaster, though -- just as specialists had been screaming about the risks of a major pandemic for years, but most politicians didn't really want to listen until Covid came along. We may yet get serious, meaningful balance between a workable internet and protecting children from harm -- but the OSA in its current form is not it. Amazingly, the UK isn't even the worst: Australia is planning to require minors to use age verification, as it's setting a minimum age of 16 for much social media. Shame on the politicians and media who used the Yes, Minister approach of "Something must be done. This is something. Therefore this must be done." You, personally you, will bear some of the responsibility when (and no, I don't think it's "if") there is a catastrophic data breach.
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The Fields of Mistria Update
I've got Hayden, Valen, and Rhys left! Of them, Rhys is the one I'm planning to date. We'll see how that goes! Also there's a mechanic where you go on weekend dates with your romance partners (one at a time) but I'm waiting until I get everyone eligible to 8-hearts before I venture into that.
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Phone dreams
Also last night I had a rare multi-episode dream about a friendly alligator and a terrorist and having to pick between a bar and a restaurant for sheltering in place. Oddly, I picked the bar and then had to keep dodging alcohol because I wanted to keep my wits about me. Also I was starving.
My nights are entertaining with NO streaming charges.
Today is Hall of Fame induction day and Ichiro is being inducted. There are several others and I feel for them having to share the spotlight. One of them recently died - probably not to avoid this sticky situation but still. I was mildly interested in watching the ceremony but the pre-ceremony hype has now succeed in swapping that interest for one that it just be over. Let us move on.
The Phillies game is this morning and the Mariners game is this afternoon. So that's my game plan.
At least one of the Susan Dennis's who use my email address likes to spend her Sunday mornings signing up for shit. This morning she signed up for Trendr and a couple of other mailing lists. I wonder if she instantly realizes her mistake and corrects it or just signs up for shit, gets nothing, and then says the internet is broken. I'd email her and ask but...
She or another one, is also still looking for a job. Signing up for porn may get you more spam but honestly job hunting is really the best way to fill up your spam folder.
Joan got a motorized wheelchair yesterday. And Hazel was downstairs gathering dinner. I overheard her tell someone who asked that John wasn't doing well at all. Noelle's David is also having lots of problems and there is a pine tree outside my window that has lots of dead branches. Lots of things here share the same accelerated exit plan, it seems.
But not before someone's picnic. They are setting up table and chairs outside. The 1st floor is, apparently, having their picnic tonight. Glad we're done with ours.
I think I'll go get dressed and brush my teeth and see if I need to do laundry before I sit.

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Violin vs. Fiddle
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Philosophical Questions: Utopia
What would a utopia be like, how would it function and continue to exist?
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link
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Good Omens ficlet - "Perfection"
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Title: Perfection
Fandom: Good Omens
Author: Cat Moon
Rating: G
Characters/Pairing: Aziraphale/Crowley
Words: 189
Summary: Just fluff with a dash of mush
Notes: First I've written anything in many months. Go, me!
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2 Purrcys, looking forward to Worldcon
#cats #CatsOfBluesky #Caturday
Under the breakfast table, up against the sunny window, keeping an eye on the human while cleaning his paws -- it's a good life if you're a cat. And you get to rest your head on a metal window crank, which is apparently choice.
We've now finished the online WSFS Business Meetings, it's just a question of how much Business Meeting stuff will get down in-person at Worldcon. But at least this time, unlike Glasgow, I can plan to spend most of my Worldcon time *at Worldcon*, which should be much more fun.
One of the things the Business Meeting did was vote for a Trial Committee to decide what to do about those accused of mis- and malfeasance around the 2023 Chengdu Hugo Awards, and ... I'm on it. So I guess I'm officially a BNF now 👀! That'll be an adventure, all right.
One of the things I'm looking forward to at Worldcon is that Martha Wells is the Guest of Honor, so there will be *lots* of Murderbot content, it'll be more or less the first Murderbot con. I'm not really *in* Murderbot fandom, yet, I read some of the fic but I don't really have time/brain cells for fannish immersion right now. But it's just so nice to have something that makes both halves of my fannish life, the SFF half & the fanfic/AO3 half, so *happy*. And when we all know Wells is a good person who's worked really hard for her success, and who's had to deal with a lot of crap in the last few years and now a ship full of money has come in for her.
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Forest Greens Design
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May 2025 Blog Prompts
2. When you look at an elderly person's hands what do you see? Looking at my hands, I see some wrinkles.
3. Have you ever bought shoes online? Did they fit? I am a big fan of Hot Chocolate Designs and have bought them online several times. Their sizing is consistent so I know they’ll fit.
4. What did you eat as a child that you can't stand now as an adult? I developed an aversion to certain textures (specifically mushy foods) as I grew up. As a child, I ate bananas in sour cream, applesauce, and soft cooked eggs, none of which I eat now.
5. Describe your typical day, from wake to sleep. All of this assumes that I am home, not traveling. I typically wake up somewhere between 3 and 4 in the morning and do puzzles on-line for a while. I eat breakfast around 7 a.m., then read for a while and go back to sleep for a few hours. If the weather is decent out, I go out for a walk. I try to get through various chores, though my to-do list is generally several pages long. I eat dinner about 7 p.m. I often talk on the phone with one of my friends. I spend too much time on-line. Some evenings I go out to some sort of performance (or go to one on-line) or play games with friends. I typically go to bed about 10:00 p.m. and I pretty much always read for a while before that.
Of course, if I’m traveling, then I’m generally sightseeing during the day.
6. What if your life had been harder or easier? How do you think you'd be different? I think my life has been relatively easy, though there were difficult times, like grad school. I’ve generally been able to pull myself together and fight my way through the challenges. So I don’t think I’d be very different if my life had been harder or easier.
7. What did you want to be when you grew up? It varied from year to year. At various times, I wanted to be an astronaut, a chemist (specifically Marie Curie), a race car driver, an actress, and the first woman to pitch for the New York Mets.
8. What would it be like to be in a tornado? I don’t know and I don’t want to find out.
9. What would you do if you woke up one morning with a tail? I think that depends on what sort of tail. A cute little puffy bunny tail wouldn’t be very intrusive, but a long prehensile monkey-ish tail would make it challenging to adjust clothes to fit.
10. What yes or no questions have you ever decided by flipping a coin? I don’t think I’ve ever decided anything by flipping a coin.
11. You are given 24 hours to do whatever you would like, money no object. What do you do and why? I’d travel somewhere. Maybe take the United Island Hopper through the South Pacific. The catch is that 24 hours is not really long enough for most places I want to go.
12. If you had to choose between having a personal chef, a housekeeper, or a personal trainer, which would you pick and why? I’d definitely pick a housekeeper, since cleaning is something I generally find unpleasant to do.
13. If you were in a band, what instrument would you be playing? Maybe an oboe.
14. Describe what you hear when you hear nothing. I am rather prone to musical earworms, but that doesn’t really qualify as hearing nothing.
15. If you saw an alien, what would you do? Probably scream. Then I’d conclude that I was hallucinating.
16. Tell about a time when someone made you feel welcomed or accepted. What did they do and how did it make you feel? Not long after I first got involved in storytelling, I went to a weekend retreat. The weather was terrible and the drive took ages. But when I arrived, I was immediately greeted by someone I had met at the storytelling group I had started going to and she welcomed me enthusiastically. And she is still one of my close friends.
17. What is your least favorite chore and why? Nature abhors a vacuum and so do I.
18. Describe a fair, parade, or festival you have attended. I’ve gone to lots of crafts fairs and folk festivals. I always enjoy seeing creativity on display. One particularly memorable event was a Celtic music festival I went to in northern California with two of my friends. It was the first time I heard the band Old Blind Dogs and they were having a terrible time with their instruments in the heat. But it was still a great weekend, largely because of the company.
19. Have you, or your family, ever been affected by war? Describe how. My father and grandfather were Holocaust survivors and lost most of their family.
20. Tell what you like about one of your hobbies. I like knitting and crocheting because I can make beautiful things to wear or to keep myself warm.
21. Tell a story that you have had with one of your aunts or uncles (or some other family member) When I was growing up, I really wanted a chemistry set. My great-aunt Bernice bought me a “make your own perfume” kit as what she thought was a more suitable feminine alternative.
22. Tell about something that you and your siblings used to do together. We explored the area we lived in, either on foot or by bicycle. Back at home, we played board games.
23. What is something you liked about your childhood? My family listened to music together a lot. Dad would bring home the latest Broadway cast albums or comedy records. We also sang along with my Mom playing the guitar.
24. If you had the option to know the day and time of your death, would you want to know? There’s a part of me that would want to know, mostly so I’d know what annoying chores I could just stop doing. And it would be nice to be able to bid a proper good-bye to various people in my life.
25. What rituals do you have or hold? I always put my clean laundry away in a particular order - linens first, then pants and skirts, then tops, then socks, then underwear.
26. Should there be a dress code in places such as school, restaurants, and places of business? Why or why not? I think there should be guidelines in certain places so that people can conform to expectations, which makes everyone feel more comfortable.
27. What would happen if everyone wore the same clothes? It would make choosing what to wear far easier, but it would get pretty boring.
28. List your favorite cozy fall activities and why they bring you joy. I like walking in woods full of fall color, then coming in and drinking hot cider by a fireplace.
29. Name 3 things you love about your job. I’m retired now, but when I was working three things I liked were: 1) I had a lot of flexibility and variety in what I did from day to day, 2) I worked with some people who I could bounce ideas off of, which often helped me to think through how to approach a problem, and 3) I earned a good salary and benefits.
30. What is something that you are looking forward to doing today? It’s a bit late in the day for looking forward to doing something. But I would like to make a dent in the stack of travel brochures I’ve accumulated.
31. How do you express love for someone? If you’re someone I love, I’m pretty sure I can make you know that. For one thing, I give good hugs.
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Green Energy
Fifteen years ago, solar power was nearly four times the cost of fossil fuel alternatives.
[---8<---]
According to two new United Nations reports, renewable energy has passed a “positive tipping point,” and solar power is now 41% cheaper than fossil fuels.
Progress!