Reading

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weekly update

Me-and-media update

Previous poll review
In the Mind's eye poll, 22.4% of respondents said their mind's eye is as vivid as IMAX (wow!), 20.7% said pretty vivid, 25.9% said they can visualise if they work at it, and 22.4% said it's a bit patchy/vague. Nearly fourteen percent, including me, have no mind's eye. (I do occasionally see things in my dreams, eg, wake up with the memory of an orange cat, so I voted "other" as well.)

In ticky-boxes, spices (56.9%) came second to hugs (67.2%), followed by being able to name characters from Winnie-the-Pooh (39.7). Thank you for your votes!!

Reading
I was trying to write romance for Yuletide, and digressive murder mysteries were not helping my subconscious to deliver the romance beats/pacing, so I stepped away from Murder Must Advertise (Peter Wimsey) for a while and read a Jennifer Crusie instead. Not one of her better ones, but I've read the better ones so many times... I haven't returned to Murder Must Advertise yet, but I will (and I'll have forgotten everything, oh well).

In audio, I'm relistening to The Wedding People by Alison Espach, read by Helen Laser. It's so good! Phoebe's POV is specific and observational. As I said last time I read it, "Give me all the middle-aged women's midlife crises! Warning for suicidal protagonist, but the book is overall life-affirming."

Kdramas
Still loving Knight Flower. It's adorable and dramatic and silly, with many great women. Competent goofballs FTW! And Andrew and I started Jeongnyeon: A Star Is Born, set in the 1950s after the Korean war, about an all-female theatre troupe. It is fabulous, incredibly gay, and I love everything about it. See also "so many great women!" Moon Okgyeong is mesmerising, ahhhh, I totally understand why everyone's smitten with her (or is it him? or them?). We are racing through it (by our standards).

Other TV
We finished Down Cemetery Road, and I want more, especially of Emma Thompson as Zoe. Finished The Lowdown with Ethan Hawke. We're still going on Pluribus, which continues to be fascinating, and Prehistoric Planet. (My Apple+ subscription runs out on Sunday.) We finished the available episodes of Stranger Things, and I have Robin, Will and Max tied for first place as MVP.

I'm having a bit of trouble with season 3 of The Cleaner, but we might watch some more. And then there's Krapopolis, which is mixing things up this season. My sister and I are still watching Fringe and Bluey.

Audio entertainment
Writing Excuses, Letters from an American, Cross Party Lines, some Brandon Sanderson youtube lectures.

Online life
I am seriously not keeping up with Dreamwidth or my inbox. Sorry! I keep opening things in tabs to read/reply to later, but I'm going to have to give myself an amnesty and just close a bunch of them.

I'm enjoying the hockey show squee on my reading page, and though I don't know if the show will be for me, I plan to take a look at some point, just in case.

Writing/making things
I had a good writing run in November, but we got some bad news and now brain is refusing to brain, stories are refusing to story, sentences are refusing, etc. I ended up defaulting on Yuletide, though there is still a chance I'll finish the fic.

I am enjoying doodling, though -- it's freeing not having a clue what I'm doing. I posted one pic to Tumblr and it got notes and everything, and I just posted another to

fan_flashworks. (I bought an ancient second-hand flatbed scanner for $15, but I couldn't convince my computer to recognise it, so I guess I'll continue to photograph my sketches for now, even though it messes with the colour balance. I don't know how long this art phase will last, so investing in a newer scanner seems premature.)

Life/health/mental state things
I've been staying up too late lately (including to write an angry submission on a stupid roading project), and it's taking its toll. Offline things are a bit stressful and distracting (stuck in a waiting phase). Summer keeps coming and going. Christmas is imminent.

I need to get more active here on Dreamwidth again. *clings to you all*

Goals
Maybe I should make some of these for next year? Hm.

Good things
The boy! The cat! The house! Coloured pencils and a sketchbook and an ArtLine pen. TV that centres female characters. Also: Guardian! The slo-mo rewatch. ♥ ♥ ♥ Christmas mince pies. Early Christmas present bone-conduction earphones (after years of using this kind of earpiece, now I have stereo sound!).

Poll #33963 dance dance revolution

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 17

View Respondents

Have you danced this week?

View Answers

yes, with other people
0 (0.0%)

yes, with a pet or other animal
0 (0.0%)

yes, on my own
3 (17.6%)

kind of / only briefly
5 (29.4%)

no / not yet
10 (58.8%)

other
1 (5.9%)

ticky-box full of "Fighting!" (화이팅!)
4 (23.5%)

ticky-box full of books borrowed from an acquaintance quite some time ago, which really need to be returned but it's super awkward
4 (23.5%)

ticky-box full of enthusiastically and fervently loving what you love
9 (52.9%)

ticky-box full of giant prehistoric otters roaming the savannas
11 (64.7%)

ticky-box full of hugs, so many hugs
11 (64.7%)

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scattered as usual

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Books and Media

1. ( Reread: Georgette Heyer mysteries )

2.( Reread: almost all my DWJ books )

3.( Reread: Agatha Christie Parker Pyne short stories )

4. ( Wake Up Dead Man, the new Benoit Blanc movie )

5. ( Heated Rivalry )

Entry tags:

dark souls,
games

So

... I just beat Ornstein and Smough.

For anyone who would like context -- Symbalily meets and gets to grips with O&S, from the timestamp: https://youtu.be/3TKhwbveyVE?si=14uuwYlVq1ywUwRk&t=5681

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Ominous music sting for the right shoulder

My right shoulder has been making itself felt with a very small uncomfortable pain since I finished the first triplet sweater last Thursday. (Or before.)

You may remember that last spring I knitted way too much and did Something to it. When I consulted the health center advice, it said that barring certain more severe symptoms, you should rest it and take painkillers and just give it time and that it could take three months to feel better. So I did, and it didn't keep hurting after that. So I haven't talked to a doctor about it.

And that's why I was trying SO HARD to not knit too much when I started knitting again last month. I tried to knit only a few hours a day, though I did get into hyperfocus and knit for five hours a couple times. A couple of weeks ago I hit upon the idea of making myself read one complete paperback book per day to constrain how much time I could spend knitting. I thought it was going pretty well, but just the last few days I noticed this minor discomfort... I hoped it would go away with a few days of rest. But I've kept free of knitting, sewing, and even drawing and writing for five days now, and taken paracetamol even though it's not really that painful, more like mild discomfort.

But it's still like this! I'm afraid to start knitting in case it sproings again! And I'm even worried that targeted stretches might make it worse instead of better!

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Night Vale

I haven't listened to Night Vale in a few years, but I happened to see this mentioned by one of the creators on bluesky and I am listening now and it is so weird and delightful.

Welcome to Night Vale, ep 280: The Story of Hanukkah

I'm not sure I knew that Cecil and Carlos are both canonically Jewish? (Or at least -- Cecil has a bubbe and a zaide, from whom he inherited a chanukiyah?) Though I suppose the fact of a floating cat named Choshech should've tipped me off.

(Needless to say, the story of Chanukah articulated in this episode does not initially seem to have anything to do with Chanukah. But stick with it. It's wonderful.)

Entry tags:

using up yarn

Sock yarns

Wearing wool boot socks over your normal socks is standard in winter. For this purpose it doesn't matter how rough or itchy the socks are.

But wearing warm and cozy socks against the skin is different. It's best if they are wool because of its superior warmth, breathability, and anti-smelly properties, but not every sock yarn is good for the purpose. For instance, the popular Schachenmeyer Regia Pairfect, dyed to make two identical socks including the self-striping Pride socks, is a bit scratchy.

Merino "luxury" sock yarns are pretty popular - merino being the finest and least scratchy of sheep wools - especially hand-dyed ones, which were so trendy about ten years ago that small dyeing businesses were springing up like mushrooms and ill-advised ugly projects made with spatter-dyed wools (it looks fine on socks but the colors do unfortunate things on sweaters and other large canvases) were similarly all over Ravelry. Merino is smooth and silky, but it feels a little like cotton because the fiber is so fine and so tightly spun, so as a result the socks are not fuzzy or cozy.

Alpaca is the best fiber to add the fuzziness to a cozy sock, but it's not as stretchy and elastic as sheep's wool. Wool socks made without elastic already don't always stay up well, depending on a lot of factors, but alpaca by itself is limper, so the challenge is how to blend alpaca and sheep's wool.

I have raved in the past about the sock wool Spøt by Sandnes, which made wonderfully fuzzy thick socks and is now discontinued. But their elasticity was so bad that they couldn't be worn out at all.

My newest socks are made with Drops Nord, another alpaca blend, which I am currently very happy with. It's 45% alpaca, so it's likely that the texture of the fabric makes a big difference. My socks are cabled, and that might be holding their shape. Ribbed and stockinette socks are the worst at staying up.

Current Mood: productive
Current Music: Mr.. Big Stuff - Jean Knight

Entry tags:

do you think i can afford to give you my love?

Humble Bundle's got a bunch of Adrian Tchaikovksy's books on offer here, if you are interested. I haven't read any of these ones, so I got them all (for $18) but I have liked sci-fi stuff I've read by him (even if he is way too into bugs for me).

I am attempting to clear out my fridge and freezer in order to lay in baking supplies for all the Christmas baking, so today I used up 2/3 of a bag of blueberries and made this blueberry muffin cake. It's very good, and very easy. I still have about a pound and a half of cranberries in there that need to get used up, so I'll probably be trying some orange cranberry rolls or make those scones again, or possibly both. *g*

Today I packed up my gifts for my co-workers (jars of candied pecans, as there were no nut allergies when I polled them) and also a bag of "prizes" for whatever games are happening at this party on Tuesday (a couple of candles, a cute notebook, a little book of pasta recipes, some holiday soaps) and a couple of extra gifts in case someone bails on the secret gift exchange (another candle, a travel mug), so we'll see how it goes.

It actually did snow last night and this morning, and if it does that again on Tuesday, I'm staying home, but for now the weather looks clear.

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Entry tags:

things I'm doing/sleep I'm getting

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Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Dancing in the Flames - the Weeknd

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"You can hug it out, or you can pick up a bat."

Fascinating read here: Whose League Is It Anyway? on Defector. The comments are mostly worth reading too - I especially liked this one: "One of the reasons that collective bargaining exists is that it channels labor into a well-controlled process of negotiating and grieving within a framework that still respects the legitimacy of capital and is willing to enforce its prerogatives with violence."

I also added both books discussed in the post to my to read list: Every Day Is Sunday: How Jerry Jones, Robert Kraft, and Roger Goodell Turned the NFL into a Cultural & Economic Juggernaut by Ken Belson, and Lords of the Realm (about baseball) by John Helyar.

Also, I don't know who Maggie Nelson is (I am old), but I thought this was a really good piece of criticism of her new book: Maggie Nelson Sputters And Stalls In ‘The Slicks’, which is apparently a (hamhanded and faily) attempt to parallel Taylor Swift with Sylvia Plath. I mean, I'm not going to lie, I enjoy many of TSwift's songs and I'm not a huge fan of Plath's work, but come the fuck on!

Anyway, I continue to find my subscription to Defector worth it, even if I don't read it as often as I'd like.

In other news, I was up early this morning, because the super said he was going to stop by to install my new apartment doorbell (when they put in this app-based front door system, it for some reason caused the bells at the apartment doors to stop working), but he hasn't shown up yet, and I'd be very surprised if he does at all. Oh well, I will try again when I'm off next week. Maybe 3rd time is the charm!

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writing is my anti-drug

GYWO 2026

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health

signal boost: US health insurance, time-sensitive

If you are in the US, don't have employer-provided health insurance (hello layoffs, among others), and are thus buying your insurance on healthcare.gov or the state marketplaces, you might want to read siderea's series of posts on the subject soon: introduction, A health plan is a contract, and HSAs and bronze/catastrophic plans (so far). Technically you have until January 15 to sign up for 2026 insurance, but if you want insurance coverage in January, your deadline is Real Soon Now -- December 15 in most places, but earlier in some states. (I'm in PA where it's December 15; I haven't been tracking other places but Siderea mentions some in the introduction.)

Something I had missed is that for 2026, the government has admitted that bronze plans (with the lowest-but-still-high premiums) are inadequate, and you can now set up a Health Savings Account (HSA) with those plans. It's extra paperwork but can lead to savings on the money you were going to have to spend out of pocket anyway.

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brain: mental health

I'm not even sure if pathetic is the word...

That week of ultimately unhelpful jobseeker course three weeks ago not only wrecked my energy for cleaning, any projects, and my daily stretching and exercise routines, it also left me with too little energy (focus? Even with methylphenidate!) to update my pet photos or interior design blogs on Tumblr. Or to shop for holiday presents for my parents and sister.

I have enough energy to spend that time on the computer, but just not to focus on what to post/buy. 😭 I am planning to try again today. Wish me luck.

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Blush - Dessa

Entry tags:

we could share a flashlight

My brain, as the meme says, was soup yesterday - I was so wiped out by Tuesday's everything. I logged off and took a nap and even so I slept hard last night. So I think I made the right choice not to go back into the city for the farewell to the CEO event tonight. I already have to go into the office on Tuesday for our holiday party, which part of me would like to avoid as it is now a big huge thing that I, thankfully, did not have to manage. It sounds like the party committee is as crazy as ever, and Assistant J keeps asking me things and I'm like, you're going to have to talk to $SomeoneElse about that. Like, it's nice that he wants to inform me, but also I would like him to take some initiative and fix things or at least suggest solutions. Anyway, we'll see how it goes. I did coordinate the Sesa, so hopefully that goes off without a hitch - only 20 people this time, but some of them haven't done it before, so that should be good.

I also kept thinking today was Friday and then being sad because it's not. I mentioned it to my boss who was like, "it can be Friday! take tomorrow off!" but I still have too much stuff to finish because as of next Friday I am off until January 5th.

Maybe someday I'll have something interesting to say here again, but for now, I don't. I am not very happy about what is happening with the Mets this hot stove season, but ugh. At least the Knicks are kinda good?

I did watch the Supergirl teaser trailer, and I'm excited to see what they do with it, but also it makes me feel like they aren't going to ever give us Kon, now. Or they'll use his animated!YJ personality instead of his much more fun comics personality. Sigh.

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2025: oh boy,
joy

today's good news

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using up yarn

Sandnes skeins are definitely designed to pull from the outside and it's inconvenient!

I was just getting really annoyed thinking about how it is not hard at all to wind your own center-pull yarn cake, so why can't mass-produced yarn balls pull from the center? (They can - there are some brands that do - but most of them don't work very well.) I got annoyed enough to just try a websearch for my question and found this forum discussion:

This is a very basic question, but

"...do you prefer pulling yarn from the inside of a skein or the outside? And why? I usually pull from the inside, but the other day I decided to try the outside for a swatch. I have been used to “untwisting” yarn as I knit, but this time it was ridiculous. I ended up winding the skein into a ball from the inside before trying again. (I have a ball winder, but don’t usually use it for hand knitting projects.) [...]"

[Responder B]: "You're correct, it all has to do with the twist of your yarn. Most commercial yarns are meant to be pulled from the inside, but there are so many yarns out there, that is not a rule set in stone. You obviously added more twist when you tried using your yarn from the outside. A yarn butler would help that problem because it allow the skein to roll off the skein rather than it unrolling and slipping off the end which adds a twist. Some low twist yarns or singles yarn you have to be very careful with otherwise you will completely untwist it and it will pull apart while working. Yarn bowls can be helpful with controlling twist as well."

Oh, what. Oh, UGH, that's so annoying! That makes sense, I guess. It just annoys me.

Pulling from the center seems more convenient in every respect to me, so why would you design it deliberately the other way? Obviously this isn't self-evident and there must be a lot of people who think it makes more sense or is more convenient to pull from the outside. I hate when my strong preferences are outliers like this because everything is working against me.

what the hell is a 'yarn butler'? What an annoying term. I could google it but I didn't.

I know about yarn bowls and I always found the concept a little annoying too, because I carry my knitting around in a bag and the bowl is hard, larger than my bag usually, and also frequently breakable. I typically put the skein in my knitting bag and that usually prevents it from rolling all over the place, although obviously it doesn't have the little loop to catch the working yarn and so isn't as effective as the yarn bowl concept.

Entry tags:

brain: mental health

SAD whining

It happens every year at this season that when the sun never comes up properly all day it feels like I have never woken up properly either, but it's always just as frustrating and I'm never prepared. Sigh. Time just comes unglued, because it's overcast all the time and it's only daylight (wan gray daylight) between 9 and 4 at best. A week could be a day long or a month long. It's like I'm dreaming, but not as pleasant, because my hands or feet are usually cold during the day.

Sunlamps have never been very noticeably useful for me, which is extremely depressing, but also not bad enough for me to completely give up on them. The worst part is that regular outdoor exercise probably would help but it's completely unattainable. You might as well tell me that a hundred pushups is the cure.

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last! scene!

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cats,
tv

TV, bird tv, fire tv

I intend to watch the three released episodes of Heated Rivalry so I can know what everyone (my wife) is talking about, but I haven't got to it yet. I am obviously spoiled by Tumblr posts but I haven't watched the bits between the gifsets.

I rewatched Derry Girls over the last two weeks while attempting to knit this nephew sweater (made it to first sleeve cuff again, finally!). That show is so good, and it's so frustrating, because there's nothing more that's like it! All the main adult actors are also so good, but none of them have a long back catalogue of other comedy to watch! And of course the writer, Lisa McGee, needs time to write more things.

I have a long list of things I've been intending to watch and rewatch, but it feels like I don't have enough emotional bandwidth, or attention, or something, for starting new long things that are going to be dramatic.

So I've been watching a ton of non fiction instead:

➡️very old Folding Ideas and Hbomberguy videos

➡️Mentour Pilot's back catalog of aviation disaster explainers (previously I was familiar from watching over

waxjism's shoulder)

➡️Defunctland episodes that aren't too Disney-focused (a mention on Tumblr reminded me and I've only seen a few before)

➡️KyleHatesHiking videos about true crime, accidents, and missing persons cases related to hiking and outdoor sports (recommended by my sister last week)

➡️BobbyBroccoli science scandal documentaries (there's a new movie on Nebula, but otherwise I've watched them all before)

Meanwhile Wax is filling our bird feeders (seed and tallow ball) sometimes multiple times a day and the bird traffic is constant. Sipuli will sit by the window watching them like tv. Tristana is happy to sit in a chair facing the woodstove and watch the fire like it's a tv, sometimes for hours.

Current Mood: productive
Current Music: Rangers vs Vegas on tv

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adventures in cooking

trying to change momentum

This weekend seemed especially short. I woke up this morning with a headache and spent a couple of hours just lying down with my eyes covered, waiting for the Excedrin to kick in. Then I planned to make cranberry orange scones but my heavy cream was frozen, so that was delayed until it was liquid enough to pour. The funny part is that the recipe wants it to be almost frozen when you use it, but not quite as frozen as mine was.

Anyway, after waiting a bit, I made the scones and they turned out well (pic - that is also my new grey "spatter" pattern quarter sheet pan, lined with parchment).

I didn't make the glaze because I'd planned to sprinkle the scones with cranberry orange sugar, but then I forgot to do that. *hands* They still taste good!

I also made that garlic and bread soup again, but I got distracted and burned my croutons. *sadhair* Soup is still delicious, though. I wish I'd remembered to buy some arugula so I could have soup and salad, but alas, I didn't think of it when I was putting my grocery order together.

Speaking of grocery orders, when did Costco stop selling the 3 lb brick of Philadelphia cream cheese? I need it for the frosting for the red velvet cupcakes for Christmas, but I guess I will have to spend a little more and get what I need from Stop and Shop instead. *hands*

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