we are not lost

Aubrey; also Birdie.
Student and writer. Polyamorous and really gay. Chronically ill.
Local queen of cait sidhe. Powered by caffeine, anxiety, and spite.
Apr. 12th, 2026 11:00 pm

vital functions

kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett

Reading. Still, uh, not quite exclusively She's A Beast archives. ("Not quite" because I am reading some of the things the links letters link to...)

Writing. Over 11k words. Progress is very very slow but it IS progress. (I'd feel worse about She's A Beast eating my entire brain apart from the fact that a whole bunch of it is extremely relevant, and yet more of it is sparking decidedly useful contemplation...)

Cooking. NEW OVEN NEW OVEN NEW OVEN today used for Kaiserschmarrn (worked just fine) and a new cake recipe from Blackberry Cottage (used settings suggested in oven manual and... it took over twice as long as it ought've to cook). Cannot yet report on what I think of it because have not yet eaten any. Elsewise: ... lots of the smitten kitchen braised chickpea thing?

Eating. Of particular note: blood oranges!!! and Decadent Spanish Raspberries, acquired on our way out of the Big Supermarket post-vaccination.

Making & mending. ... ADAM NOW HAS TWO GLOVES. I just (...) need to Weave In The Damn Ends. (Does anyone have a favourite weaving-in-ends guide? Because twenty-five years into this hobby I still pretty much hate every end I have ever woven in as Lumpy and Unsightly.)

Growing. Aubergines hatching! Whole buncha weeding including sorting out the raspberry thicket! When last I made it to the allotment the cherry tree had two bundles of blossom out, and was clearly on the point of Bursting Forth en masse...

Observing. SO MANY baby waterfowl, and, also, A Goldfinch. A friend's tiny cherry tree In Flower! Holly getting Extremely enthusiastic about flowering also.

umadoshi: (lettuce 01 (leesa_perrie))
[personal profile] umadoshi
Our impending new raised planter is still showing as scheduled to arrive tomorrow while we're both home/not working, so here's hoping!

We just spent a while sifting through some seed listings on the Halifax Seed website (and I mostly kept myself from looking at tomato seeds, since we are not growing any tomatoes from seed*).

*I really wish there were some indication of what tomato varieties will be offered as seedlings, and also wish I knew if the different plant nurseries tend to offer similar varieties of tomato seedlings or not. (ALSO-also, we need to decide whether to focus on trying a few different types to see how we like them vs. focusing on a few determinate plants with the intention of just processing most/all of the fruit into sauce.)

(The seedling sale from a relatively nearby nonprofit that I'm hoping to make it to does offer a short list of potential varieties of things, with the caveat of "These are all the options that we have intended to grow but as all farmers and gardeners know, not every crop pans out. We apologize in advance if some of these options are unavailable, or not ready." For tomatoes, it says "Roma, Brandywine, Scotia +more! / Tropical Sunset, Sungold, Red Torch +more!")

But as noted yesterday, we don't plan to put tomatoes in the actual planter anyway. Thoughts for the actual planter so far: thoughts + variety notes )
Apr. 12th, 2026 01:01 pm

Done Since 2026-04-05

mdlbear: blue fractal bear with text "since 2002" (Default)
[personal profile] mdlbear

Not a great week -- very down on myself for having sent N off with the wrong charger for (scooter)Gizmo. It was hiding in a box, and I overlooked it several times. G found it immediately, when asked. I need to change some of my habits to keep it from happening again. N finally managed to get one locally on Friday, with help from the seller and the hotel concierge. The seller had express-shipped one, but it somehow got held up in Turkish customs despite their having charged N extra for getting it expedited. She got back yesterday evening, and we now have a spare charger for Gizmo.

Meanwhile our other scooter and scooter-like vehicles are still out of commission: (Folding scooter)Lizzy is still in the shop, (carlet)Scarlett came back from the shop without her charger, and (walker/wheelchair)Roman is still unusable without a software upgrade. Which requires some kind of special interface (being shipped by boat) and Windows. All of this is due to my procrastination and phone phobia.

On the other, um..., foot, I now have two pairs of compression socks. Getting them on is fairly easy, because I can pull. Getting them off is not; I have ordered a foot-extraction tool. And I walked every day, so there's that.

Germany Just Made Open Document Formats Mandatory! This is particularly timely, because WireGuard And VeraCrypt Developers [were] Locked Out Of Microsoft Accounts... It may or may not be fixed by now, but the fact that they did it means that it will almost certainly happen again.

(Filk-adjacent, s4s-adjacent) linkies: (from Monday -- great way to start a week!) (also serious rabbit-hole warning) Angine de Poitrine - Full Performance (Live on KEXP) - YouTube (h/t to siderea) polka-dotted aliens with loopers, polyrythms and a double-neck quartertone guitar/bass. The band name, Angine de Poitrine, translates as "chest pain" More on Monday and Wednesday. Possible s4s post soonish; this will do until then.

And from Friday, Take a mind-bending ride through the cosmos at light speed Deep time and beyond: the great nothingness at the end of the Universe, both from Aeon.co. Take note: eternity is longer still.

Notes & links, as usual )

Tags:
Apr. 11th, 2026 11:35 pm

today I have been mostly horizontal

kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett

I think the exhaustion and aches are down to my COVID spring booster yesterday afternoon, but I am definitely planning to not ever Touch A Barbell For The First Time on vaccination day again. (Conveniently, this is an eminently achievable goal.)

SOME GOOD THINGS, though:

  1. weekend spring date breakfast, which for me included cinnamon roll and hot chocolate, consumed while watching the goslings experiment with going into water. coot nest #1 had at least six Hatched Squeaking Babies in it (some of them adventurously exploring down the sides of the nest); coots #2 were still Enthroned. AND we saw a GOLDFINCH on the way down the hill!!!
  2. braised chickpeas with courgette & pesto continue very good and fairly easy food. the whole I Am Flat meant we Acquired pre-made pesto, and this was an extremely good move. project Eat The Freezer Stash Of Tortilla continues apace also.
  3. A has successfully disposed of our old front door, complete with doing all necessary talking to other humans about it. our front hall now contains only one (1) front door and it is in the door frame where it belongs.
  4. got raspberries from the supermarket yesterday, as a vague approximation of The Custard Fish Of Civic Responsibility (from the one shop in Chinatown, on the way back from the sexual health clinic to the tube). am enjoying raspberries a v great deal.
  5. all three flowers the big white orchid had produced are now in glorious bloom. (still need to work out how to make the tiny purple orchid happier, but.) flowers!
umadoshi: (kittens - Jinksy - soft)
[personal profile] umadoshi
Seasonal crunch is over! Feels like freedom, if you ignore the part where I still have, y'know, a job + freelance stuff. Increased freedom. We'll go with that.

My day off yesterday entailed such thrilling things as sleeping in and then taking ages to get up because Jinksy came to snuggle*; finishing my breakfast and tea by around noon; getting some banking done; washing my hair; vacuuming the two main levels of the house; spending several full hours being a cat-lap for Sinha; and starting in on a new novel for the first time since March Break or so.

*When I texted [personal profile] scruloose to say good morning, they said, "When my first alarm went, it was competing with Jinksy over on your other side rumble-purring so hard I swear the mattress was reverberating with it."

Reading: A couple more chapters of Braiding Sweetgrass, and I've finished Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks, which has a fair number of recipes but is, as the title indicates, more of a family history than a cookbook.

And last night I didn't want to spend much mental energy on choosing what fiction to read, so I decided to just go with Tough Guy, the third Game Changers novel. I imagine in the not-too-distant future I'll pick up the ebook "box set" of books 4-6 just to have them on hand.

Watching: We're caught up on The Pitt and have seen five episodes of One Piece season 2, and I imagine we'll finish the latter before backtracking for the last couple-few episodes of Frieren. (I've also made note of this elsewhere, but to reinforce it in my brain: after The Pitt finishes, I need to remember to cancel our Crave subscription again.)

Eating: After the crunch ended on Thursday, [personal profile] scruloose and I ordered from a new (?) Korean BBQ place (bb.q Chicken) that a stranger in the local Bluesky feed had mentioned was good. We tried the bone-in Classic Fried Chicken (very minimal spicing, but very solid) and the boneless Golden Fried Chicken, the description of which didn't indicate any particular spiciness, but it turned out to be right on the edge of my comfort level...but also a really delicious seasoning to go with the heat, so I'm counting that as a definite win. The place offers a whole array of flavor options, so I imagine we'll be trying it again.

Weathering/Growing: Yesterday was sunny and relatively warm, and now we're back to a slightly-chilly rainy/damp stretch, but a few days in the forecast will theoretically get back up into the double digits.

At my instigation, we're going to take another stab at Doing Garden Stuff this year. VERY preliminary notes )
Apr. 10th, 2026 10:53 pm

VICTORY

kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett

Behold my works: today I went to the leisure centre, and went into the leisure centre, and went into the gym, and poked around a bit, and retreated to the stairwell to hyperventilate... and then WENT TO A CHANGING SPACE and CHANGED MY CLOTHING and went back into the gym. And picked! things! up!!! and put them down again!!!!!

I have now Touched Barbell, appear to have accidentally skipped most of Phase 2 of Liftoff in favour of Barbells, Apparently, but honestly the biggest and most exciting bit of this is that I did go back into The Gym and I did push through the social anxiety of What If I'm Doing It Wrong.

It is an excellent time of year to be doing this; the cherries on the way from the gym to the bus stop are in full and exuberant flower.

Apr. 9th, 2026 10:45 pm

some! good! things!

kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett
  1. Therapist was Mean and got me to do the thing of substituting "I'm excited about" for "I'm anxious about". I Have Signed Up For The Gym, without first fixing my bike, and might even make it there Tomorrow.
  2. On the one hand Wagamama have dropped my default order from their menu again ('tis the season!), and on the other they have introduced a gochujang-tamarind-sesame corn "ribs" situation that I am very pleased to have tried.
  3. Social wiggles were OUTSIDE because we have achieved LIGHT ENOUGH EVENINGS.
  4. I have almost finished A's gloves??? All That Remains is Weaving In The Second Set Of Ends.
  5. Lebkuchen And A Glass Of Milk.
Apr. 9th, 2026 05:34 pm

Thankful Thursday

mdlbear: Wild turkey hen close-up (turkey)
[personal profile] mdlbear

Today I am thankful for...

  • Compression socks. (Writing this in the waiting room; we´ll see whether they fit in a few miutes.) (Update: they fit.) NO thanks for having to wash them after every other use, but...
  • Battery life.
  • Linux Mint, LMDE (Linux Mint Debian Edition), and Linux Weekly News.
  • Emacs. See also, The Agent-Native Editor Was Invented in 1976 (N.B. I have not, and may never, tried adding AI to Emacs. But with a small local model it could work.)
  • Induction cooking -- we just acquired a 2kW induction hob. Because we have to worry about our gas supply.
  • Sometimes, for sleeping with cats.

Tags:
[personal profile] paradoxcase posting in [community profile] rainbowfic
Name: Rejection
Story: The Fulcrum
Colors: Light Black #12: Leave, Warm Heart #4: Pain
Styles and Supplies: Silhouette, Life Drawing, Novelty Bead (End Love, Ok Go, given here), Stain ("When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor." - Elon Musk (This is way more important than Elon's dumb need to go to Mars, though, which is apparently what that quote was about.))
Word Count: 1,688
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Characters: Setsiana, Qhoroali
In-Universe Date: 1912.5.4.5
Summary: Setsiana tries to make use of her dream.

Rejection )
Apr. 8th, 2026 10:39 pm

... whoops

kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett

Things I thought would be fine: continuing to use the coffee table as an ersatz bench while I try to source a proper one at less-than-new prices.

THINGS THAT WERE NOT FINE: guess.

(I am unharmed! The coffee table is... not. The previous session was fine!!! ... the previous session was 10-20lb lower in terms of what I was lifting.)

special interest within )

Apr. 7th, 2026 10:00 pm

mrgh

kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett

Today I have had MRI #1 (NHS), booked follow-up appointment #1 (NHS; in June), and also booked follow-up appointment #2 (private; next Thursday).

feeeeeeeelings )

But. BUT. I made myself put the allotment keys in my pocket before heading out for the MRI (the allotments are right behind the hospital) and then did spend two hours Communing With Plants (by which I mostly mean "weeding", obviously, which is I suppose a kind of Communion) in pleasant weather, and. And. The cherry blossom is out. Only two clusters of it so far, but -- that's two more than a week ago, and the rest of the tree is thinking really hard about it. The unfortunately sited apple I appear to have inherited is also absolutely riotous. The garlic chives are finally Properly Established. I got to graze on allium and spinach. Small fierce joys, and that.

Apr. 6th, 2026 06:50 pm

Peach Puff #4: Waffles

skeran: (screaming skeleton)
[personal profile] skeran posting in [community profile] rainbowfic
Name: A Night Out
Story: Silverborn
Colors: Peach Puff #4: Waffles
Supplies and Styles: None
Word Count: 1,125
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: None

Owen learns more about his daughter's life in the last few years, and the young woman who has been taking care of her. )


Edit: May I please have an author tag? "Skeran" is fine.