The necklace screamed, craving someone to eat
Mar. 15th, 2026 09:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shamanicshayminListening to the Wuthering Heights audiobook has been an endurance run. D: I think the most I enjoyed myself was the chapter when Catherine I died, since I actually genuinely felt sad for Cathy and Heathcliff. Most of the time, I'm going through the book with begrudging patience and trying to analyze why the characters are behaving the way they do rather than throw in the towel, declare how much everybody sucks, and summon meteors to crash into Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange like I did in my last reading attempts. It still remains the book with the most difficult and unlikable cast for me to deal with outside of Certain Shitty Books That Will Not Be Named. Which always throws me off because I don't mind dysfunctional casts; I even encourage them, especially if they're at least interesting or entertaining to read about! There's just something about the Wuthering cast that really grinds my gears, though funny enough I don't despise Heathcliff nearly as much this time around. And the kids/second gen are more tolerable by sheer virtue of how much they keep getting screwed over and manipulated by the adults. And Edgar is pretty much... there. Unable to do anything. I felt sorry for Isabella, but she's dead now. :(
I'm having a lot of fun playing Ultra Moon again! :3 I actually got disappointed when my 3DS got low on power since I was ready to do an enormous grind session with my grass/water/ground types before we take on Olivia. Half my team is Eevees! :3 (Kris the Umbreon, Mercury the Vaporeon, and Tatara the Leafeon. I have Butter the Ribombee, which is why I shockingly don't have a Sylveon) I'm hoping to evolve my Dartrix Olan Hoyt (or should I say, Olan Hoot? (rimshot)) into a Decidueye soon. Battle Royale is ludicrously hard, but I want to see if I can crack the code to getting better at it, RIP
Five more days until the penultimate episode of The Amazing Digital Circus, aaaaaaaaaaaa
I'm having a lot of fun playing Ultra Moon again! :3 I actually got disappointed when my 3DS got low on power since I was ready to do an enormous grind session with my grass/water/ground types before we take on Olivia. Half my team is Eevees! :3 (Kris the Umbreon, Mercury the Vaporeon, and Tatara the Leafeon. I have Butter the Ribombee, which is why I shockingly don't have a Sylveon) I'm hoping to evolve my Dartrix Olan Hoyt (or should I say, Olan Hoot? (rimshot)) into a Decidueye soon. Battle Royale is ludicrously hard, but I want to see if I can crack the code to getting better at it, RIP
Five more days until the penultimate episode of The Amazing Digital Circus, aaaaaaaaaaaa
~GoodBYE, Columbo
Mar. 15th, 2026 03:29 amzarlaA few things going on lately!
I sent out the next Vargas chapter to be beta'd so it's happening!! Depends on when I hear back from her and how long I decide to fret about it before I post it, haha. It always feels like such an event to me! It's nice to get the ball rolling on it though.
I went back and fixed the broken images in the giant sketchposts at least, although posts with individual images are still broken. I figured the giant posts would be the ones people would most likely be looking at, haha. Relive the memories! Or not! I can't tell you what to do!
In terms of my cool music page, I added two more cassettes I found! One called "Radio Picks 92" which really only has a handful of songs and, mysteriously, Silent Lucidity like four times in a row?? If it was me who recorded it I don't know what I was thinking. The other one is "Special tape for car only" which despite its name just has very normal music on it. BACK BEFORE MY TASTE IN MUSIC BECAME TERRIBLE BEYOND BELIEF
If I decide to do any more tapes maybe I should set up a second page, it seems long with just the four on it already! Or maybe my resolution is just too small.
On a related note, there is now also an ipod on that shelf! You can click it to get to a new page for my car playlist, which is like 1300+ songs long at current. No downloads or links for that one because christ but I have been working on a youtube mirror of the playlist, although I'm only like 900 songs through it. You can get a taste of it though!
Setting up the ipod to flip open on hover was really annoying, I ended up trying like a few different methods and running into weird roadblocks before I got it doing what I wanted. Tough to get it to stay in place too! Getting a good shot of the ipod itself I could use was also annoying, I went through like three different versions of it open/closed before I decided on this one. It looks so realistic on the shelf!
I also made some Teeny Tower rooms!
One for Horses because that's so inappropriate lol. I need to make a post about that at some point. I love how the little horses came out, cute and creepy at the same time, poor things. Had a hard time thinking of a background but then I figured I could work with the whole silent film/theater symbolism it has going through it.
BRAINLESS RAAANDYYYYY there is SO MUCH fog in the Illbleed cutscenes I swear
Hornet and Shakra are girlfriiieeenddsss god, everything in Hollow Knight/Silksong is so ornate and intricate, it was murder to try and get it all down into such a small space. I based it off of my bellhome in Silksong so I have all the relics in there and everything, haha. Very hard to get a sense of metallic surfaces on a small scale!
Something reminded me or made me think of how a lot of Undertale environments would make for good little rooms, so I went with Asgore's throne room first. He looks so cute!! Cutest tiny Asgore! The window was a pain to try and shrink down. It's interesting seeing this one set against all the others since it has dark outlines, which very few of my other rooms have. Really emphasizes how simplistic Undertale's art style is...
And the brothers' room! Well really it's all about the Mettaton TV, haha. Mettaton on every channel! He's gotta be doing something! I spent way too much time on all those little segments. I could still add one for the news if I felt ambitious...
And as a complete tonal shift, that one scene from Hereditary. If you've seen it you know! I wonder how recognizable it will be to people when it's so tiny? It was a lot of fun to recreate this, trying to balance the right amount of darkness in the doorway so you're not sure if you see something.
lj post
I sent out the next Vargas chapter to be beta'd so it's happening!! Depends on when I hear back from her and how long I decide to fret about it before I post it, haha. It always feels like such an event to me! It's nice to get the ball rolling on it though.
I went back and fixed the broken images in the giant sketchposts at least, although posts with individual images are still broken. I figured the giant posts would be the ones people would most likely be looking at, haha. Relive the memories! Or not! I can't tell you what to do!
In terms of my cool music page, I added two more cassettes I found! One called "Radio Picks 92" which really only has a handful of songs and, mysteriously, Silent Lucidity like four times in a row?? If it was me who recorded it I don't know what I was thinking. The other one is "Special tape for car only" which despite its name just has very normal music on it. BACK BEFORE MY TASTE IN MUSIC BECAME TERRIBLE BEYOND BELIEF
If I decide to do any more tapes maybe I should set up a second page, it seems long with just the four on it already! Or maybe my resolution is just too small.
On a related note, there is now also an ipod on that shelf! You can click it to get to a new page for my car playlist, which is like 1300+ songs long at current. No downloads or links for that one because christ but I have been working on a youtube mirror of the playlist, although I'm only like 900 songs through it. You can get a taste of it though!
Setting up the ipod to flip open on hover was really annoying, I ended up trying like a few different methods and running into weird roadblocks before I got it doing what I wanted. Tough to get it to stay in place too! Getting a good shot of the ipod itself I could use was also annoying, I went through like three different versions of it open/closed before I decided on this one. It looks so realistic on the shelf!
I also made some Teeny Tower rooms!
One for Horses because that's so inappropriate lol. I need to make a post about that at some point. I love how the little horses came out, cute and creepy at the same time, poor things. Had a hard time thinking of a background but then I figured I could work with the whole silent film/theater symbolism it has going through it.
BRAINLESS RAAANDYYYYY there is SO MUCH fog in the Illbleed cutscenes I swear
Hornet and Shakra are girlfriiieeenddsss god, everything in Hollow Knight/Silksong is so ornate and intricate, it was murder to try and get it all down into such a small space. I based it off of my bellhome in Silksong so I have all the relics in there and everything, haha. Very hard to get a sense of metallic surfaces on a small scale!
Something reminded me or made me think of how a lot of Undertale environments would make for good little rooms, so I went with Asgore's throne room first. He looks so cute!! Cutest tiny Asgore! The window was a pain to try and shrink down. It's interesting seeing this one set against all the others since it has dark outlines, which very few of my other rooms have. Really emphasizes how simplistic Undertale's art style is...
And the brothers' room! Well really it's all about the Mettaton TV, haha. Mettaton on every channel! He's gotta be doing something! I spent way too much time on all those little segments. I could still add one for the news if I felt ambitious...
And as a complete tonal shift, that one scene from Hereditary. If you've seen it you know! I wonder how recognizable it will be to people when it's so tiny? It was a lot of fun to recreate this, trying to balance the right amount of darkness in the doorway so you're not sure if you see something.
lj post
Hello!
Mar. 15th, 2026 03:11 pmstarrysam posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
addme_fandomName: Sam
Age group: Early 20's
Country: Australia
Subscription/Access Policy: I don't have anything that isn't public rn, that could change, I'm new to dreamwidth so still figuring everything out.
Main Fandoms: Haikyuu!, sk8 the infinity, Cute high earth defense club LOVE!, Cute high earth defense club HAIKARA,
Other Fandoms: Powerpuff Girls Z, Monthly Girls Nozaki-kun, WataNare
Fannish Interests: I read a lot of fanfiction, and write it too, but I write slower than I can read, lol
OTPs and Ships: Nanjo Kojiro/Sakurayashiki Kaoru (sk8), Miya Atsumu/ Suna Rintarou (haikyuu), Bokuto Koutarou/Kuroo Tetsurou (haikyuu), Kozume Kenma/Yamamoto Taketora (haikyuu), Nishinoya Yuu/Tanaka Ryuunosuke (haikyuu), Kuroo Tetsurou/Sawamura Daichi (haikyuu)
While these are my main ships in haikyuu, I have read all sorts of ships and if the story is well-written I will read most ships for haikyuu. Miya Atsumu/ Suna Rintarou (haikyuu) is my ultimate long standing favourite though.
I also have ships that have stuck around even tho I'd say I have left the fandom, mainly Voltron and BNHA, I left BNHA cause I dropped the show years ago and now only read fics of a couple of my favourite pairings that don't go into the actual plot of the show (I do not plan to pick it back up). Whereas with Voltron I was there as the last season at least was dropping but I only go back occasionally only for certain tropes or certain ships.
These ships are primarily, Bakugou Katsuki/Kaminari Denki (BNHA), Lance/Shiro (Voltron).
I like to post about: I've been posting my fanfiction so far, may post some original work, may post some reviews of whatever I'm watching or whatever, may post about stuff that comes up as I learn Japanese that I find interesting.
About Me/Other Info: I'm a writer, read a lot of BL manga and watch BL shows. I love mind reading and fake dating as tropes, especially. I dabble in truth potion/serum works quite a bit too. (If I'm being honest, in most of the fandoms I read for I've read almost every mind reading fic on ao3 and even started just reading random pairings for fandoms I'm not in just cause I wanted to read mind reading as a trope)
I would love to brainstorm haikyuu fanfic with others, or talk about the show especially.
Performing some traffic maintenance today
Mar. 14th, 2026 01:04 pm![[staff profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user_staff.png){kind=small}
mark posting in ![[site community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/comm_staff.png){kind=small}
dw_maintenanceHappy Saturday!
I'm going to be doing a little maintenance today. It will likely cause a tiny interruption of service (specifically for www.dreamwidth.org) on the order of 2-3 minutes while some settings propagate. If you're on a journal page, that should still work throughout!
If it doesn't work, the rollback plan is pretty quick, I'm just toggling a setting on how traffic gets to the site. I'll update this post if something goes wrong, but don't anticipate any interruption to be longer than 10 minutes even in a rollback situation.
vicious circle?
Mar. 13th, 2026 10:53 pmprimeidealMaybe I'm on the threshold of being able to articulate some new facet of the problem that I haven't been able to express before, or maybe it's all the same noise.
( tldr )
( tldr )
(no subject)
Mar. 12th, 2026 04:39 pmdani_meowsI am so freaking tired.
I don't remember what I last updated about the cats.
Jasper Bean the old boy, is refusing to eat much of anything despite appetite stimulants. He will always eat his baby food but I have so many different cans and varieties of food that I shift in between in the hopes that today it'll please him. His next checkup is in April and hopefully his kidney disease hasn't progressed but I suspect with the worsening of his appetite that we'll find out he's in stage 2. But I will keep him alive as long as possible.
He's come so far from the stray we rescued four years ago who bit me so savagely and often at random with no warning from his body language. We have worked with him and his moods and he has come to trust us that he only gives us gentle affectionate nibbles. For the past two years it's been daily cuddles and he takes his aggression out on paper bags. Which he tears into like a goat. It's hilarious.
Mushi Boo is doing better. He finished his meds yesterday and we'll have him retested soon to make sure his liver function has bounced back to where it was in December.
I'm drinking a matcha boba and trying to have a good day. Trying to remember what else I wanted to babble about.
But my head hurts and I'm cranky.
I don't remember what I last updated about the cats.
Jasper Bean the old boy, is refusing to eat much of anything despite appetite stimulants. He will always eat his baby food but I have so many different cans and varieties of food that I shift in between in the hopes that today it'll please him. His next checkup is in April and hopefully his kidney disease hasn't progressed but I suspect with the worsening of his appetite that we'll find out he's in stage 2. But I will keep him alive as long as possible.
He's come so far from the stray we rescued four years ago who bit me so savagely and often at random with no warning from his body language. We have worked with him and his moods and he has come to trust us that he only gives us gentle affectionate nibbles. For the past two years it's been daily cuddles and he takes his aggression out on paper bags. Which he tears into like a goat. It's hilarious.
Mushi Boo is doing better. He finished his meds yesterday and we'll have him retested soon to make sure his liver function has bounced back to where it was in December.
I'm drinking a matcha boba and trying to have a good day. Trying to remember what else I wanted to babble about.
But my head hurts and I'm cranky.
Not Sure if I've Done One Here (or it's been forever)
Mar. 12th, 2026 12:04 pmdame_grise posting in addme_fandomETA: Still looking for a Luci!
Name: Sam
Age group: 50+
Country: USA
Subscription/Access Policy: Anyone can subscribe. I've not been super active lately for reasons. If you give me access, I'll check you out and may give it back. I have one access level which is mostly for people who can put up with my mental and physical health whining.
Main Fandoms: The Scarlet Pimpernel, Hazbin Hotel, Helluva Boss
Other Fandoms: Les Misérables, Jekyll & Hyde (musical), Revolutionary Girl Utena, Rose of Versailles, Le Chevalier D'Eon, Leijiverse anime, The Owl House
Fannish Interests: I like to read and write fic. I've been binging Hazbin Hotel fic on AO3. I used to RP a lot in big games, but I don't have the stamina. I would love to find a parter or two who wants to RP Hazbin Hotel, especially if they can play Lucifer.
OTPs and Ships: LuciLillith, Enjolras/Grantaire, Utena/Anthy, radioapple (guilty pleasure, though appleradio is hotter)
Favourite Movies: Doctor Zhivago, Red Cliff, Moulin Rouge, Love Actually, Die Hard, Legend, Stargate
TV Shows: Star Trek anything, Babylon 5, Firefly, Stargate SG1, Blake's 7, Red Dwarf, Dr. Who, All Creatures Great and Small, The Good Witch, Lucifer
Books: War of the Flowers (Tad Williams), Good Omens, Man of His Word series, Incarnations of Immortality, Vorkosigan Saga, El Dorado (Baroness Orczy), Mordant's Need series (Donaldson) Tailchaser's Song (Williams), etc. I'm a book whore.
Music: Indigo Girls, Billy Joel, Blackmore's Night, Lilliac, Within Temptation, Dar Williams, musical theatre
Games: TES: Skyrim, Spyro, Fable
Comics/Anime/Misc: Watchmen, Freakangels
Name: Sam
Age group: 50+
Country: USA
Subscription/Access Policy: Anyone can subscribe. I've not been super active lately for reasons. If you give me access, I'll check you out and may give it back. I have one access level which is mostly for people who can put up with my mental and physical health whining.
Main Fandoms: The Scarlet Pimpernel, Hazbin Hotel, Helluva Boss
Other Fandoms: Les Misérables, Jekyll & Hyde (musical), Revolutionary Girl Utena, Rose of Versailles, Le Chevalier D'Eon, Leijiverse anime, The Owl House
Fannish Interests: I like to read and write fic. I've been binging Hazbin Hotel fic on AO3. I used to RP a lot in big games, but I don't have the stamina. I would love to find a parter or two who wants to RP Hazbin Hotel, especially if they can play Lucifer.
OTPs and Ships: LuciLillith, Enjolras/Grantaire, Utena/Anthy, radioapple (guilty pleasure, though appleradio is hotter)
Favourite Movies: Doctor Zhivago, Red Cliff, Moulin Rouge, Love Actually, Die Hard, Legend, Stargate
TV Shows: Star Trek anything, Babylon 5, Firefly, Stargate SG1, Blake's 7, Red Dwarf, Dr. Who, All Creatures Great and Small, The Good Witch, Lucifer
Books: War of the Flowers (Tad Williams), Good Omens, Man of His Word series, Incarnations of Immortality, Vorkosigan Saga, El Dorado (Baroness Orczy), Mordant's Need series (Donaldson) Tailchaser's Song (Williams), etc. I'm a book whore.
Music: Indigo Girls, Billy Joel, Blackmore's Night, Lilliac, Within Temptation, Dar Williams, musical theatre
Games: TES: Skyrim, Spyro, Fable
Comics/Anime/Misc: Watchmen, Freakangels
Wednesday Reading Meme for March 11 2026
Mar. 11th, 2026 06:41 pmkitewithfishWeekly reading journal for march 11 2025
I am! On! Vacation! Muahahahahaha.
(Happy 11th of March to the few, the happy few, Due South fans out there!)
What I Have Read
Apparently, Sir Cameron Needs to Die by Greer Stothers - I finished this is a fevered rush on a plane, so take my review with a grain of salt. This was fun, it was sincere, it was unpretentious, it was a good time! I wish there had been a little more substance to the ending as the emotional core of Cameron's journey, but I am not upset by it! I did call the main revelation but not all of it! And I'm not sure what I would recommend this book for, exactly, but I had fun.
Chivalric Academia by OldShrewsburyian This fic! Is a delight! The writing is just a pleasure to read - funny and clear, gently ironic and sincere by turns. It's a Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth modern day academic AU where they are both new faculty at a small college. She hates him, he gets his handcut off, they fall in love. Brienne is written with such absolute conviction and commitment, Jaime is always dancing between hiding in the shadows and baring his soul in stupified awe of her. Wonderful, go read it especially if you like Dorothy Sayers. https://archiveofourown.org/works/57674458
Daniel Molloy's Incredible Showstopping World-Famous Model Train Extravaganza for Children and Easily-Awed Vampires (Please Knock) by
Ariaste - I read this bc Ariaste is now posting the sequel as a weekly fic. Its wonderful and porny and like Chivalric Academia, involves people who want to be together figuring out how to make it work.
What I'm Reading
Sword Heart is still slow because it is so so sweet and tender.
What I Will Read Next
The grief of stones
My real children
I am! On! Vacation! Muahahahahaha.
(Happy 11th of March to the few, the happy few, Due South fans out there!)
What I Have Read
Apparently, Sir Cameron Needs to Die by Greer Stothers - I finished this is a fevered rush on a plane, so take my review with a grain of salt. This was fun, it was sincere, it was unpretentious, it was a good time! I wish there had been a little more substance to the ending as the emotional core of Cameron's journey, but I am not upset by it! I did call the main revelation but not all of it! And I'm not sure what I would recommend this book for, exactly, but I had fun.
Chivalric Academia by OldShrewsburyian This fic! Is a delight! The writing is just a pleasure to read - funny and clear, gently ironic and sincere by turns. It's a Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth modern day academic AU where they are both new faculty at a small college. She hates him, he gets his handcut off, they fall in love. Brienne is written with such absolute conviction and commitment, Jaime is always dancing between hiding in the shadows and baring his soul in stupified awe of her. Wonderful, go read it especially if you like Dorothy Sayers. https://archiveofourown.org/works/57674458
Daniel Molloy's Incredible Showstopping World-Famous Model Train Extravaganza for Children and Easily-Awed Vampires (Please Knock) by
Ariaste - I read this bc Ariaste is now posting the sequel as a weekly fic. Its wonderful and porny and like Chivalric Academia, involves people who want to be together figuring out how to make it work.
What I'm Reading
Sword Heart is still slow because it is so so sweet and tender.
What I Will Read Next
The grief of stones
My real children
Wednesday Reading Meme for March 11 2026
Mar. 11th, 2026 01:38 pmkitewithfishWeekly reading journal for march 11 2025
I am! On! Vacation! Muahahahahaha.
(Happy 11th of March to the few, the happy few, Due South fans out there!)
What I Have Read
Apparently, Sir Cameron Needs to Die by Greer Stothers - I finished this is a fevered rush on a plane, so take my review with a grain of salt. This was fun, it was sincere, it was unpretentious, it was a good time! I wish there had been a little more substance to the ending as the emotional core of Cameron's journey, but I am not upset by it! I did call the main revelation but not all of it! And I'm not sure what I would recommend this book for, exactly, but I had fun.
Chivalric Academia by OldShrewsburyian This fic! Is a delight! The writing is just a pleasure to read - funny and clear, gently ironic and sincere by turns. It's a Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth modern day academic AU where they are both new faculty at a small college. She hates him, he gets his handcut off, they fall in love. Brienne is written with such absolute conviction and commitment, Jaime is always dancing between hiding in the shadows and baring his soul in stupified awe of her. Wonderful, go read it especially if you like Dorothy Sayers. https://archiveofourown.org/works/57674458
Daniel Molloy's Incredible Showstopping World-Famous Model Train Extravaganza for Children and Easily-Awed Vampires (Please Knock) by
Ariaste - I read this bc Ariaste is now posting the sequel as a weekly fic. Its wonderful and porny and like Chivalric Academia, involves people who want to be together figuring out how to make it work.
What I'm Reading
Sword Heart is still slow because it is so so sweet and tender.
What I Will Read Next
The grief of stones
My real children
I am! On! Vacation! Muahahahahaha.
(Happy 11th of March to the few, the happy few, Due South fans out there!)
What I Have Read
Apparently, Sir Cameron Needs to Die by Greer Stothers - I finished this is a fevered rush on a plane, so take my review with a grain of salt. This was fun, it was sincere, it was unpretentious, it was a good time! I wish there had been a little more substance to the ending as the emotional core of Cameron's journey, but I am not upset by it! I did call the main revelation but not all of it! And I'm not sure what I would recommend this book for, exactly, but I had fun.
Chivalric Academia by OldShrewsburyian This fic! Is a delight! The writing is just a pleasure to read - funny and clear, gently ironic and sincere by turns. It's a Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth modern day academic AU where they are both new faculty at a small college. She hates him, he gets his handcut off, they fall in love. Brienne is written with such absolute conviction and commitment, Jaime is always dancing between hiding in the shadows and baring his soul in stupified awe of her. Wonderful, go read it especially if you like Dorothy Sayers. https://archiveofourown.org/works/57674458
Daniel Molloy's Incredible Showstopping World-Famous Model Train Extravaganza for Children and Easily-Awed Vampires (Please Knock) by
Ariaste - I read this bc Ariaste is now posting the sequel as a weekly fic. Its wonderful and porny and like Chivalric Academia, involves people who want to be together figuring out how to make it work.
What I'm Reading
Sword Heart is still slow because it is so so sweet and tender.
What I Will Read Next
The grief of stones
My real children
Books Read 2026
Mar. 10th, 2026 04:47 pmcapribornioI am officially giving up on that book, for now at least. I will be back to reading The Murderbot Diaries, who flaws and all don't make me want to kill the author.
Dear Author (Sufficiently Advanced 2026)
Mar. 11th, 2026 05:54 pmprimeidealHello, thank you for creating for me! I'm also primeideal on Ao3, and I'm requesting fic for all fandoms. Treats are enabled.
Note for this particular exchange: I hope to be traveling at the time gifts are revealed, I may not be able to comment promptly. I look forward to savoring my gift when I have time to sit at a computer and read!
General likes
-canon-divergence AUs
-five things
-worldbuilding
-dialogue
-wit and wordplay
-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)
-time travel
-happy endings
-sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama; I'm fine with character death)
DNWs:
-explicit sex (but fade-to-black or innuendo is fine)
-underage characters having sex
-rape/noncon
-moralizing/didactic stories (characters Learning An Important Lesson about the value of tolerance, etc.)
-non-canonical allegories of current events and/or contemporary politics
-themes of cynicism or futility, or that the (canon's) main plotlines "are for nothing"
Anathem
Pre-Contact Mathic Life
The Dictionary After the Second Reconstitution
Pre-Contact Mathic Life:
Pre-Contact Mathic Life:
I love all the weird math monk stuff. Patterns for bells and sleeping arrangements! Clock towers! Labyrinths between the different tiers! Everything the Ita are doing behind the scenes to make it functional! Anything set in the world of the concents would be great. It sounds like Saunt Edhar's is more ascetic than some of the other concents, so something set elsewhere with different traditions could be a neat contrast.
The Dictionary After the Second Reconstitution:
What's going to happen post-canon as people react to new jargon from the Daban Arnud? Weird/nonsensical multilingual puns that make no sense? What languages do people speak with each other on the Daban Arnud? Were there Millennials patiently waiting to add their neologisms and then oops, aliens? Do the avout incorporate any vocabulary from the saeculars, or do they still consider that a corrupting influence?
Paradises Lost
WB: Any
What a fascinating story! The contrasts between how the Zeroes feel that they might be depriving their descendants of something important, and the descendants' awareness of their own good fortune, are powerful. "History must be what we have escaped from. It is what we were, not what we are. History is what we need never do again." Guh. And the commentary about "noble lies" being condescending and potentially as dangerous as fundamentalism was really well done. Anything in this setting would be fascinating, with canon characters and/or OCs.
I'd be interested in any other traditions similar to the way religion develops on the ship--things arising to respond to societal issues, and then over the generations, growing and evolving into something the Zero generation couldn't have predicted.
More about the dynamics of family units, motherchildren versus fatherchildren? What considerations do people take in choosing someone else to reproduce with?
Some of the missing scenes? How do we get from "Luis arguing about religion" to "Luis gets elected council leader" so quickly?
Future communication with earth? Do other ships eventually arrive on the new planet? What traditions have developed by that point?
Project Hail Mary
Steve Hatch
I love Steve and how faith and science complement each other for him. Ryland kind of lampshades "you're the most optimistic guy I've ever met," which is saying something by the standards of an Andy Weir novel. More about his optimism in dark times? He seems very confident in his belief that the Beatles are just objectively the best musicians; more of his unshakable takes? Is he still alive by the time of the Beatle (spaceships)' return, and if so, what does he make of them? How does he incorporate the discovery of Eridians into his worldview?
Remembrance of Earth's Past
Yang Dong
Ye Wenjie
Cheng Xin:
A fix-it where she doesn't miss Yun Tianming at their star? Any kind of outside POV on her and the many different hats she wears: Older men patronizing her during Project Staircase? The humans resenting her in Australia? Luo Ji and the museum? What if she'd stayed on the cylinder worlds near Jupiter where things felt "normal" and 2000s-y? Her relationship with Guan Yifan--is he really a different kind of human for having been to space, or are they more two sides of the same coin?
Yang Dong:
For someone who has very little time "on screen," she casts a long shadow over all of the books. More about her friendship with the programmer from "Death's End," and/or with Luo Ji? What if she'd survived--what would she have made of her mother's betrayal? How would things have gone with Ding Yi?
Ye Wenjie:
Secrets at Red Coast Base? Some more of the "declassified" documents? The early days of the ETO? What did she work out about Dark Forest theory before meeting Luo Ji? What if Yang Dong had talked to her about the documents she'd sneaked a look at? Or if Ye had lived long enough to discover more of Deterrence theory herself?
Steerswoman
WB: Any
Bel & or / Rowan
I was thrilled by the worldbuilding in this series--the depiction of Rowan's scientific inquiry is great, even if our perspective as readers is different from the characters'. And I especially enjoyed the complexity of Outskirter society in "Steerswoman's Road"--the tribes closer to the Inner Lands growing more militaristic and less cultured, the Face People and Efraim's weirdness around women, the naming ceremony and recitation of ancestors, the importance of poetry and lore--that makes them much more than "wilderness raiders."
There are lots of great tropey moments with Bel and Rowan that can be either shippy or gen: huddling for warmth, teaching each other swordplay, taking care of each other when they get dysentery! If you're so inclined, I'd be interested to see a shippy expansion on any of these, or something else along these lines. Another misunderstanding with the courtship gifts outside the tent?
Something more worldbuilding-focused elsewhere in the world would also be neat--documents at the Archives? Steerswomen and wizards' POV on the same events? What does religion look like in a world where Christian symbols and language exist but most people don't remember their homeworld? (I'd prefer no authorial bashing of any specific belief system or lack thereof, but canon-typical disagreements/skepticism on different characters' part is fine and expected!)
Crossover Fandom:
Sazed (Mistborn) & Taravangian (Stormlight Archive)
They both control two Shards now--Sazed's seem like inherent opposites, Taravangian's don't. What happens when they meet? Taravangian tries to talk Sazed into letting Taravangian combine more shards for the greater good? Sazed turns Taravangian's logic against him? Could they meet in some kind of pocket universe/Cognitive Realm nonsense/AU setting where their immense powers don't really come into play and it's just the two guys bickering at each other?
Books Read 2026
Mar. 10th, 2026 04:13 pmcapribornioAaaaaand now we're in the Straight Up Racism lifted straight from Brave New World. And one of them was written in the 50', and the other in 05' and Yet.
(SFF Bingo): The Bone Ships, by RJ Barker
Mar. 10th, 2026 03:08 pmprimeidealLast bingo square: "Generic Title," title needs to contain one of a handful of cliche words, including "Bone" as an option. After a false start, tracked down this, the first in a trilogy.
Bingo: Generic Title, could also count for Pirates, previous Readalong. Maybe Down with the System?
The world of the Scattered Archipelago is almost all ocean, and there's a lot of seafaring. There's an ongoing war between the Hundred Islands and the Gaunt Islands, with both sides accusing the others of kidnapping children and forcing them into slavery or human sacrifice, but it's been going on so long that the beginning has probably been forgotten. Ships have historically been constructed from the bones of arakeesians (water dragons), but they're almost extinct now, so maybe the war will fizzle out because of lack of weapons?
This was a good example of indirect worldbuilding through language choice. The captain of a ship is generically "shipwife" and the disciplinary officer is "deckmother" (regardless of their actual sex); the default for generic person is always "woman or man" (rather than "man or woman"); ships are referred to as "he," a generic form of bravado is "tits" (where our world might use "balls"), etc. Not tendentious, but a good example of how background language subtly reflects how the characters, and the readers, view society.
There is also some interesting worldbuilding going on around the nonhuman creatures in the world. A ship can get magically-boosted wind speed/direction through the help of its "gullaime," a birdlike creature with magical powers, and the gullaimes seem to be related to the arakeesians in some fashion. But humans' exploitation of the gullaimes is basically slavery plus brutal eye trauma. It's strongly implied that the only reason our protagonists' ship is able to survive when others wouldn't is because they have an especially strong gullaime, or maybe just one that's been mutilated less than typical.
Unfortunately, I wasn't really invested in the POV character. Joron Twiner, nineteen, has been condemned to the "black ships" (crewed by criminals with lingering death sentences) after a miscarriage of justice. A young aristocrat killed his father in, essentially, a drunken vehicular accident (I liked this twist just because it was so mundane and, in a sad way, reflective of our world). Joron got his revenge in a duel, but due to the very hierarchical classist/ableist society, was criminialized anyway via a miscarriage of justice. Before the book begins, he was briefly made shipwife of his own ship, the "Tide Child" just because he wasn't part of any existing faction, and drinks away his days.
Then "Lucky" Meas Gilbryn shows up. A formidable shipwife and daughter of the ruler of the lands, she's been sentenced to the black ships nevertheless, and begins whipping everybody into shape on "Tide Child." Joron is demoted to "deckkeeper" (second-in-command), and basically we're just watching from his point of view as she delivers a bunch of training montages, etc.
I can see how, if Meas is the most active, taking-agency character, you might not want the entire story to be from her POV--she could come off as too overpowered. But Joron is even less interesting. It's not clear why she keeps him as her #2, he's mostly just along for the ride, and sometimes to play good cop to her bad cop. And then there's a Goblin Emperor-esque theme developing of "I can never be friends with these people, just their officer, oh well." Even when he occasionally shows agency, jumping into a fight, he doesn't know why he's doing it: "He almost brought his hand to his mouth upon saying it, he was so shocked by his own words."
At first we're told that Joron resents Meas for "taking" his job, even though he doesn't really do anything with it, and sort of led to believe that his alcoholism will become a problem. But that just fizzles out. There's a lot of one-liner italicized flashbacks to "as my father used to say" or to his father's death, but it doesn't really add anything. And maybe there's supposed to be a plotline around him overcoming cowardice, but I don't feel like his actions are that strange or unusual, everybody has a self-preservation instinct even on a ship of people condemned to death.
Meas does a lot of "who's with me? Are you with me?" "yes we're with you, shipwife" "I can't hear you, are you with me???" "Yes Shipwife!" "Say it louder" "YES SHIPWIFE" "okay, good, let's go." I find this kind of audience-participation thing patronizing, I don't need to see it in fiction.
The text tries to depict the horrors of war via "hurry up and wait" themes and repetition. As realistic as it is, I'm not sure it pays off in prose. Joron felt anxious. And then the enemy ship drew closer. The parrot said some curse words. And then the enemy ship drew closer. Meas adjusted her lucky hat. And then the enemy ship drew closer. We get it.
On a sentence level, it didn't seem to be very well edited, there are various runaway sentences and dangling modifiers:
"It did not take long for Tide Child, carried on the strange magic of the windtalker, which cooed to itself as it worked, for the ship’s lookouts to get a clearer look at the flukeboats."
"Solemn Muffaz nodded to Gavith, who ran to the bell on the rail at the fore of the rump of the ship." There's nothing wrong with this sentence but I feel like five consecutive prepositional phrases (of the exact same word/letter count) is too much.
When it comes to Call A Rabbit a Smeerp, everyone's threshold is different, but the sun, moon, and stars are, respectively, personified as the Eye, Blind Eye, and Bones of Skearith the Godbird. Every time. Characters get "eyeburned" instead of "sunburned." For me, personally, this was unnecessary and distracting.
Meas' backstory was intriguing. Hundred Islands culture places a strong value on childbirth and healthy babies; if a mother survives her first delivery and the baby has no birth defects, it's sacrified to become a magical "ghostlight" for the non-black ships. But Meas survived this ritual because the gods (Maiden, Mother, and Hag instead of Crone) didn't want her, hence the "Lucky" epithet. Meas' mother had twelve more children, which, as the most prolific matriarch on the islands, makes her the ruler. But Meas got sentenced to the black ships anyway. Is that because she's secretly working to end the war once and for all? Or some other kind of treachery?
This and the worldbuilding were compelling, but I'm not sure I'd be interested in seeking out two more books from Joron's POV. There's a lot of "oh well, we will probably all die, but we've been sentenced to death anyway so let's just do our duty," but after a few quick deaths of named characters in the early chapters, most of the book comes and goes without the stakes or tension feeling earned.
Bingo: Generic Title, could also count for Pirates, previous Readalong. Maybe Down with the System?
Books Read 2026
Mar. 10th, 2026 02:02 pmcapribornioI'm rereading The Murderbot Diaries, so I can properly post on Mensahbot March (and Multiamory March as well). Books are... Ok, nowhere as good as I thought on first read. Biggest and most important is Characters that just seem to exist for the sake of the plot. They don't even get proper (or any) characterization before (and during, and after) being Used For Plot. The only characters that avoid this fate so far: Murderbot itself, Mensah, ART. Maybe Pin-Lee, Gurathin, and Ratthi, depending how Book 4 goes. (And Arada and Thiago in Book 5, but that's just my memory so they might not).
However! I feel like I owe an apology to the books for ever complaining, since I'm now also reading the Uglies series, and BOY. Best I can say about it is that someone was shown the SparkNotes version of 1984 and Brand New World, then told to throw a dart to pick an aspect of society to analyze, and then told "ok, you have to write a trilogy based only on this, and no you can't reread the SparkNotes". God. I feel like I'm still giving this franchise too much credit. Like reading a TvTropes page, except TvTropes is funny sometimes.
However! I feel like I owe an apology to the books for ever complaining, since I'm now also reading the Uglies series, and BOY. Best I can say about it is that someone was shown the SparkNotes version of 1984 and Brand New World, then told to throw a dart to pick an aspect of society to analyze, and then told "ok, you have to write a trilogy based only on this, and no you can't reread the SparkNotes". God. I feel like I'm still giving this franchise too much credit. Like reading a TvTropes page, except TvTropes is funny sometimes.
In search of silver linings, we discovered gold
Mar. 10th, 2026 10:40 amshamanicshayminI finally saved my Shiny Poiple from 3DS Limbo! :D I also evolved my level 100 shiny Bisharp Golbez into a beautiful blue Kingambit. ♥ I ran into a shiny Voltorb while training, but it exploded before I could catch it, and I stupidly forgot to save beforehand. :( Oh well. What matters is my Shiny Poiple is now at Pokemon Home and I'm hoping to get Legends Z-A soon.
~Because five ate nine! Wait
Mar. 10th, 2026 07:42 amzarlaI got a little USB Cassette converter to digitize some of my old tapes! As such I went and digitized the two tapes I could find, Randomousity 5 and 8. I had a whole series but these are the only ones on hand! I'm not sure many I made of them. :O The rips are pretty good quality, it's mostly the tapes themselves that have gotten damaged over the years. Sometimes the audio gets kind of rough or fades in and out, but mostly it's pretty clear! It always gets rough when each side stops and starts. But maybe some of you are into that kind of thing. |D
As such, they're on the site now! I added a third shelf for them on the index since they needed the space. :B They lead to the same page though. Notably for the spine/cases, I took some photos of my actual tapes! Well, one tape and one case, the others were all in pretty bad shape or had a bunch of drawings or track listings on them.
( Case in point )
They look a bit more realistic as a result than the others but still. |D I think they're neat. I figured a horizontal pile would be a fun contrast to the vertical CDs. You can download the tapes on the site itself! Should I link to them in this entry too...? Well, I can do the tracklisting anyway, haha. A lot of these songs show up in later CDs, I've had them for a long time.
Randomousity 5 went...
SIDE A
The Cynic Project - Matrix ]|[
Bamble B - Crime of Passion (Main Mix)
Bjork - I've Seen It All
Rhexx - Yellowstone
Massive Attack - Everywhen
Ben Folds - The Ascent of Stan
Blind Melon - No Rain
System of a Down - The Metro
Nine Inch Nails - The Perfect Drug
Kittie - Brackish
Cirque du Soleil - Jeux d'enfants
--
SIDE B
Cirque du Soleil - Jeux d'enfants
Zilch - Into Heaven
Hiro feat. Sweet Little 30's - Heaven is a '57 Metallic Gray (GimMIX)
Final Offset - Twin Bee -Generation X-
Mr. T - xenon
tiger YAMATO - r3
Becky and Pokemon Kids - Soratobu Pokemon Kids
Ben Folds - Carrying Cathy
Ben Folds - Zak and Sara
VA - Always (DJ Tatana remix)
The Swan Princess - This Is My Idea
Matt Wilson - Real Folked Up (Cowboy Bebop Remix)
Within Temptation - Mother Earth
Heino - Die Schwarze Barbara
This tape was odd since it started on a down note and then went up, which was the opposite of how I usually did it.
Randomousity 8 went...
SIDE A
Dr. Reanimator - Move Your Dead Bones
Haiducii vs O-Zone & Gabry Ponte - Dragostea Din Tei RMX
Gigi D'Agostino - The Riddle
Ministry of Sound - Deepest Blue - Deepest Blue
J.B.O. - Hey, Pippi Langstrumpf
Dance Nation - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
Sonny and Cher - Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves
The Pirates of Penzance - I am the Very Model of a Modern Major General
Tom Lehrer - The Elements Song
Randy Newman - I Love L.A.
The Magnetic Fields - All My Little Words
The Magnetic Fields - I Wish I Had an Evil TWin
The 6ths - Dead Only Quickly
The 6ths - San Diego Zoo
--
SIDE B
The 6ths - San Diego Zoo
The 6ths - Give Me Back My Dreams
Ryan Cabrera - On The Way Down
The Exies - Ugly
Yoko Kanno - Butterfly
Conjure One - Center of the Sun
Vast - My TV and You
explode 16 - thunderstorm
Lord of the Rings - Into the West
Spacekats - Land of the Rising Sun
Spacekats - Mellow
Crispy - Bubble Dancer
Crispy - The Game
Crush - Jellyhead
The label on the tape was so damaged I could barely read it! The tape itself played fine, mostly, although it definitely has some rough bits. I remember listening to this a lot while writing Vargas back in the day, and of course I was visualizing Move Your Dead Bones to it, hehe. This might have been one of the last ones I ever made, it's hard to remember now. I found tapes for the DDR 5th and 6th megamixes, but you could probably find those anywhere in much better quality so I didn't transfer them.
(zaaaarrr you can find all these tracks anywhere in much better quality, why did you do thiiissSs)
It was satisfying to handle the tape transferrer, it feels just like an old Walkman. Very nostalgic to flip it open, slide a tape in, click the thick buttons, hear it whirring in there. I used my Walkman so much back in the day! It was more durable than a Discman and tapes didn't skip if you banged them around, haha. I used it way after everyone had switched over to Discmans, which was foreshadowing for how I keep using things way after everyone else has left. STILL POSTING HERE AND UPDATING MY PERSONAL SITE, AFTER ALL THIS TIME
lj post
As such, they're on the site now! I added a third shelf for them on the index since they needed the space. :B They lead to the same page though. Notably for the spine/cases, I took some photos of my actual tapes! Well, one tape and one case, the others were all in pretty bad shape or had a bunch of drawings or track listings on them.
( Case in point )
They look a bit more realistic as a result than the others but still. |D I think they're neat. I figured a horizontal pile would be a fun contrast to the vertical CDs. You can download the tapes on the site itself! Should I link to them in this entry too...? Well, I can do the tracklisting anyway, haha. A lot of these songs show up in later CDs, I've had them for a long time.
Randomousity 5 went...
SIDE A
The Cynic Project - Matrix ]|[
Bamble B - Crime of Passion (Main Mix)
Bjork - I've Seen It All
Rhexx - Yellowstone
Massive Attack - Everywhen
Ben Folds - The Ascent of Stan
Blind Melon - No Rain
System of a Down - The Metro
Nine Inch Nails - The Perfect Drug
Kittie - Brackish
Cirque du Soleil - Jeux d'enfants
--
SIDE B
Cirque du Soleil - Jeux d'enfants
Zilch - Into Heaven
Hiro feat. Sweet Little 30's - Heaven is a '57 Metallic Gray (GimMIX)
Final Offset - Twin Bee -Generation X-
Mr. T - xenon
tiger YAMATO - r3
Becky and Pokemon Kids - Soratobu Pokemon Kids
Ben Folds - Carrying Cathy
Ben Folds - Zak and Sara
VA - Always (DJ Tatana remix)
The Swan Princess - This Is My Idea
Matt Wilson - Real Folked Up (Cowboy Bebop Remix)
Within Temptation - Mother Earth
Heino - Die Schwarze Barbara
This tape was odd since it started on a down note and then went up, which was the opposite of how I usually did it.
Randomousity 8 went...
SIDE A
Dr. Reanimator - Move Your Dead Bones
Haiducii vs O-Zone & Gabry Ponte - Dragostea Din Tei RMX
Gigi D'Agostino - The Riddle
Ministry of Sound - Deepest Blue - Deepest Blue
J.B.O. - Hey, Pippi Langstrumpf
Dance Nation - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
Sonny and Cher - Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves
The Pirates of Penzance - I am the Very Model of a Modern Major General
Tom Lehrer - The Elements Song
Randy Newman - I Love L.A.
The Magnetic Fields - All My Little Words
The Magnetic Fields - I Wish I Had an Evil TWin
The 6ths - Dead Only Quickly
The 6ths - San Diego Zoo
--
SIDE B
The 6ths - San Diego Zoo
The 6ths - Give Me Back My Dreams
Ryan Cabrera - On The Way Down
The Exies - Ugly
Yoko Kanno - Butterfly
Conjure One - Center of the Sun
Vast - My TV and You
explode 16 - thunderstorm
Lord of the Rings - Into the West
Spacekats - Land of the Rising Sun
Spacekats - Mellow
Crispy - Bubble Dancer
Crispy - The Game
Crush - Jellyhead
The label on the tape was so damaged I could barely read it! The tape itself played fine, mostly, although it definitely has some rough bits. I remember listening to this a lot while writing Vargas back in the day, and of course I was visualizing Move Your Dead Bones to it, hehe. This might have been one of the last ones I ever made, it's hard to remember now. I found tapes for the DDR 5th and 6th megamixes, but you could probably find those anywhere in much better quality so I didn't transfer them.
(zaaaarrr you can find all these tracks anywhere in much better quality, why did you do thiiissSs)
It was satisfying to handle the tape transferrer, it feels just like an old Walkman. Very nostalgic to flip it open, slide a tape in, click the thick buttons, hear it whirring in there. I used my Walkman so much back in the day! It was more durable than a Discman and tapes didn't skip if you banged them around, haha. I used it way after everyone had switched over to Discmans, which was foreshadowing for how I keep using things way after everyone else has left. STILL POSTING HERE AND UPDATING MY PERSONAL SITE, AFTER ALL THIS TIME
lj post
