What I'm Doing Wednesday
15 July 2026 20:17![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sagebooks
still reading Babylonia by Constanza Casati...which means I'm actually glued to the news instead of reading fiction. Oops? I mean, I grew up in Houston & I live in a city that's fully two thirds Latino. There's a lot to have concerns about atm.
rl & floods
I was supposed to be traveling for family having surgery this Friday, but Texas is experiencing torrential rains and floods. We had 2 very minor, weak tornadoes in the city in two days, the second one this morning, and people are FREAKING out. Anyway, the surgery has been postponed, so I don't have to figure out how to drive over washed out bridges in middle-of-nowhere, Texas Hill Country. Yay? Yay.
Lestat
Due to scheduling conflicts, I still haven't seen Sunday's ep yet. I have been avoiding Tumblr & am so far unspoiled. :crosses fingers:
yarning
Slept too late for yarn group AGAIN, sooo I didn't go. Again. We'll see how this weekend pans out. Meanwhile, the commissioned cat stitch scarf should have been delivered today; I hope the customer's daughter likes it.
healthcrap
Didn't wake up today until 1:22pm. Got an allergy shot & hit 2 pharmacies yesterday. Fun times...
oppossum
due to the EPIC rains, I haven't actually gone out to check if it's still living in my laundry room. I mean, it's pouring. I'm hoping the possum's gone & the group of black panther stray cats that live in my backyard are hanging out in there instead.
#resist
July 17-19: Teach, Reach, Preach: Good Trouble Lives On Weekend of Action.
I hope you're all doing beautifully and staying safe! <333
still reading Babylonia by Constanza Casati...which means I'm actually glued to the news instead of reading fiction. Oops? I mean, I grew up in Houston & I live in a city that's fully two thirds Latino. There's a lot to have concerns about atm.
rl & floods
I was supposed to be traveling for family having surgery this Friday, but Texas is experiencing torrential rains and floods. We had 2 very minor, weak tornadoes in the city in two days, the second one this morning, and people are FREAKING out. Anyway, the surgery has been postponed, so I don't have to figure out how to drive over washed out bridges in middle-of-nowhere, Texas Hill Country. Yay? Yay.
Lestat
Due to scheduling conflicts, I still haven't seen Sunday's ep yet. I have been avoiding Tumblr & am so far unspoiled. :crosses fingers:
yarning
Slept too late for yarn group AGAIN, sooo I didn't go. Again. We'll see how this weekend pans out. Meanwhile, the commissioned cat stitch scarf should have been delivered today; I hope the customer's daughter likes it.
healthcrap
Didn't wake up today until 1:22pm. Got an allergy shot & hit 2 pharmacies yesterday. Fun times...
oppossum
due to the EPIC rains, I haven't actually gone out to check if it's still living in my laundry room. I mean, it's pouring. I'm hoping the possum's gone & the group of black panther stray cats that live in my backyard are hanging out in there instead.
#resist
July 17-19: Teach, Reach, Preach: Good Trouble Lives On Weekend of Action.
I hope you're all doing beautifully and staying safe! <333
Fannishness (or a lack thereof)
15 July 2026 21:10settiaiI swear that I'm going to force my brain to actually get back into properly doing fannish things again even if it kills me. That's my plan for this weekend, whether said brain likes it or not. I'm setting my alarm in the mornings on Saturday and Sunday, and I'm forcing myself to get up no matter how little sleep I get. I can always take a short nap in the afternoon if needed (also with an alarm).
I have approximately five million fic WIPs, but lately I haven't been working on anything that isn't specifically for an exchange. My plan is to to pick a WIP, open the file, and not allow myself to do anything else until I write at least 500 words. Minimum. I'm really hoping that will kickstart my muse if I'm not allowing myself to do anything else until I hit that goal.
We're also edging closer and closer to Yuletide season, so I really want to start re-reading/re-watching/etc. a few things now both for requesting and offering purposes. Reading is easier, since I can fit that in at work between calls and such, but the re-watching part is harder to fit into my schedule. I'm going to try to set aside time every day (within reason - Wednesdays and Fridays will probably be out since I have work all day and then D&D in the evening) for that purpose if I can manage it.
Not to mention that I still need to get caught up on Critical Role, especially since they're taking a break right now which is the perfect opportunity. I think part of my problem is that I left off when they were split into my least favorite group of the new campaign (The Seekers) so that's why it's been harder to convince my brain to just shut up and catch up.
My plan right now is that I'm going to watch the next episode (maybe tomorrow if my brain isn't mush after work? Saturday if it is) with a summary pulled up. That way I can more easily fast-forward if I get to a point where I've lost interest without losing track of what's going on, which is the biggest reason that I usually force myself to not fast-forward with Critical Role.
I'm not sure if any of those plans will actually work, but I'm going to try. Because lately it feels like all I've been doing is working, sleeping, and blinking only to find out that hours have passed without me accomplishing anything.
I have approximately five million fic WIPs, but lately I haven't been working on anything that isn't specifically for an exchange. My plan is to to pick a WIP, open the file, and not allow myself to do anything else until I write at least 500 words. Minimum. I'm really hoping that will kickstart my muse if I'm not allowing myself to do anything else until I hit that goal.
We're also edging closer and closer to Yuletide season, so I really want to start re-reading/re-watching/etc. a few things now both for requesting and offering purposes. Reading is easier, since I can fit that in at work between calls and such, but the re-watching part is harder to fit into my schedule. I'm going to try to set aside time every day (within reason - Wednesdays and Fridays will probably be out since I have work all day and then D&D in the evening) for that purpose if I can manage it.
Not to mention that I still need to get caught up on Critical Role, especially since they're taking a break right now which is the perfect opportunity. I think part of my problem is that I left off when they were split into my least favorite group of the new campaign (The Seekers) so that's why it's been harder to convince my brain to just shut up and catch up.
My plan right now is that I'm going to watch the next episode (maybe tomorrow if my brain isn't mush after work? Saturday if it is) with a summary pulled up. That way I can more easily fast-forward if I get to a point where I've lost interest without losing track of what's going on, which is the biggest reason that I usually force myself to not fast-forward with Critical Role.
I'm not sure if any of those plans will actually work, but I'm going to try. Because lately it feels like all I've been doing is working, sleeping, and blinking only to find out that hours have passed without me accomplishing anything.
YMI -- ODB: 15 July 2026
15 July 2026 20:48sparoweODB: Always Giving Thanks
July 15, 2026
READ: Ephesians 5:15-20
Be very careful, then, how you live . . . . always giving thanks to God. Ephesians 5:15, 20
A fifty-ton, female humpback whale swam into a web of crab lines off the coast of California, trapping her in a tangled mess. Hundreds of feet of line and hundreds of pounds of traps wrapped around her body as she struggled to stay afloat. Four divers came to her rescue, swimming under her belly. For an hour, they cut rope—dangerous work since one flap of her tail could have killed them. After they freed her, rather than immediately escaping, she swam to and gently nudged each diver. “It felt to me like she was thanking us,” one rescuer said.
Whether or not whales are able to express gratitude, being thankful is truly an important part of being human. It’s vital for our life with God. Many of us thank Him for larger blessings (the birth of a child or healing from a disease). However, Paul tells us to offer gratitude for every gift we receive, for every bit of goodness we encounter. We’re to be “always giving thanks to God,” the apostle writes (Ephesians 5:20). Not sometimes. Not only for exceptional moments. Always. And to make sure he’s made his point, Paul adds a bit more. “[Make] the most of every opportunity” and give thanks “for everything,” he says (vv. 16, 20).
Genuine gratitude is more than an occasional word we offer; it’s the posture of our lives. Gratitude turns us to God over and over again, always giving thanks in celebration.
— Winn Collier
What gifts can you thank God for today? How can you move toward a posture of gratitude?
Dear God, please help me to live a life of gratitude to You.
Source: Our Daily Bread
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
wednesday reads and things
15 July 2026 16:26isisLast night I participated in an interesting local event called Common Ground, which invites people from across the political spectrum to discuss issues with the intent to illuminate and find commonalities, rather than persuade. The organizers (who themselves are two liberals and two conservatives) very carefully balance the attendance list to ensure an equal number on both sides. The meeting started with brief introductions, and then we split up into tables of 4, 2 liberals and 2 conservatives (our nametags were coded by color) to discuss a question. After a set time, we mixed up and sat at tables with different people, and discussed a second question, and then all got together to share insights.
The first question was about identifying the core beliefs of liberals and of conservatives (and spoiler alert, we all agreed on pretty similar beliefs), and the second was about the relevance of the Constitution today, and if it should be followed strictly, modified, or scrapped. To my surprise both of the conservatives at my second table said they don't trust the current president to lead any revision of the constitution, and when we discussed things as a group it was clear that nobody is a fan of the current administration. Which, I guess should not have been a surprise, because part of the ground rules were, as alluded to, respect for other points of view and no attempting to argue your point, and as a result those who attended were pretty much normie Republicans, unaffiliated leaners, and mainstream Democrats, with no Trumpers (we have those here) or leftie anarchists (we have those, too).
Anyway, it was interesting and enjoyable, and it definitely made the point that "the other side are people too." I'll probably try to attend again - they put these on every few months.
What I've recently finished reading:
Stiletto by Daniel O'Malley, the second Checquy Files book. This one goes a little harder on the body horror than the first (for plot reasons) but it's still leavened with enough humor that it didn't hit my ick button. The humor mostly comes from the extremely silly powers some people have, as well as from the dry observations by Myfanwy and others. As in the first book, there is a very shippable f/f pair (as well as Shantay from book 1 showing up at the end, yay, and not doing anything to shatter my Myfanwy/Shantay inclinations!) though again it's all just subtext.
Also, I'm reading the collection Lake of Souls by Ann Leckie, and so far I have read:
"Lake of Souls" - this is the title story, and I liked it a lot, mostly because I am a sucker for stories with multiple POVs in which each character is a different alien with a different culture and thus each has a very very different perspective. But I also liked the aww-factor of the outcome.
"Footprints" - horror, I guess? I think I missed the point.
"Hesperia and Glory" - this is fun and harks back to Golden Age Sci-Fi. Is Mr. Atkins mad, or a Martian?
"The Endangered Camp" - this made me think of Tom Toner's The Promise of the Child in which, also, the dinosaurs escaped the extinction event in a spaceship. Not bad, not my favorite.
Speaking of short story collections, I DNF'ed The Age of Calamities by Senaa Ahmad, which I learned about from a review of The Beheading Game by Rebecca Lehmann (which I reviewed here) as the reviewer felt that the story "Let's Play Dead" was a better take on a mysteriously alive post-beheading Anne Boleyn. Unfortunately, stylistically it very much did not work for me (literary, dense, weird); I started and abandoned two other stories in the collection and then decided to give up on the collection entirely.
The first question was about identifying the core beliefs of liberals and of conservatives (and spoiler alert, we all agreed on pretty similar beliefs), and the second was about the relevance of the Constitution today, and if it should be followed strictly, modified, or scrapped. To my surprise both of the conservatives at my second table said they don't trust the current president to lead any revision of the constitution, and when we discussed things as a group it was clear that nobody is a fan of the current administration. Which, I guess should not have been a surprise, because part of the ground rules were, as alluded to, respect for other points of view and no attempting to argue your point, and as a result those who attended were pretty much normie Republicans, unaffiliated leaners, and mainstream Democrats, with no Trumpers (we have those here) or leftie anarchists (we have those, too).
Anyway, it was interesting and enjoyable, and it definitely made the point that "the other side are people too." I'll probably try to attend again - they put these on every few months.
What I've recently finished reading:
Stiletto by Daniel O'Malley, the second Checquy Files book. This one goes a little harder on the body horror than the first (for plot reasons) but it's still leavened with enough humor that it didn't hit my ick button. The humor mostly comes from the extremely silly powers some people have, as well as from the dry observations by Myfanwy and others. As in the first book, there is a very shippable f/f pair (as well as Shantay from book 1 showing up at the end, yay, and not doing anything to shatter my Myfanwy/Shantay inclinations!) though again it's all just subtext.
Also, I'm reading the collection Lake of Souls by Ann Leckie, and so far I have read:
"Lake of Souls" - this is the title story, and I liked it a lot, mostly because I am a sucker for stories with multiple POVs in which each character is a different alien with a different culture and thus each has a very very different perspective. But I also liked the aww-factor of the outcome.
"Footprints" - horror, I guess? I think I missed the point.
"Hesperia and Glory" - this is fun and harks back to Golden Age Sci-Fi. Is Mr. Atkins mad, or a Martian?
"The Endangered Camp" - this made me think of Tom Toner's The Promise of the Child in which, also, the dinosaurs escaped the extinction event in a spaceship. Not bad, not my favorite.
Speaking of short story collections, I DNF'ed The Age of Calamities by Senaa Ahmad, which I learned about from a review of The Beheading Game by Rebecca Lehmann (which I reviewed here) as the reviewer felt that the story "Let's Play Dead" was a better take on a mysteriously alive post-beheading Anne Boleyn. Unfortunately, stylistically it very much did not work for me (literary, dense, weird); I started and abandoned two other stories in the collection and then decided to give up on the collection entirely.
stargate rewatch: S1 takeaways
15 July 2026 23:25kanadkaOkay, so. :'D This season isn't great - you know it, I know it, we all know it. There are some usual Stargatey reasons why it's not great. There's also some generic 'early seasons tv show' reasons why it's not great. Anything that would improve either of these two factors would be most welcome but also would invite the question that like, if you have serious misgivings with these, many of these problems will persist and also some will get worse, so... grain of salt.
But, idk, there's also a lot of potential in S1 that went underused, and to me there's tons of fruitful potential, for fic, or discussion, or what-not. We have yet to meet the tok'ra, the Tollan and Nox aren't likely to return our calls, and the Free Jaffa Nation is but a hope in Teal'c's heretical heart. They have very few allies they can count on and not a lot of technology and while they've learned quite a lot, they have so much more to learn. The universe feels giant, insurmountable, full of mysteries and the more than occasional pitfall, but ultimately exciting.
I wrote these takeaways mostly for me for the future, not that I have huge ambitions of SG-1 fic, but I dabble here and there, and you never know! I hope it's useful for someone else too, or maybe it's a good jumping off point for conversation. Anyway!
( 1. What's necessary to take from this season )
( 2. What episodes would you need to rewatch to get enough context to be able to write this era? )
( 3. What episodes can you skip or should you skip because they're either a waste of time or legitimately bad? )
( 4. Overall takeaways )
( 5. Some Fic Recs Maybe?? )
I'll probably take about a week off and be back with Season 2.
But, idk, there's also a lot of potential in S1 that went underused, and to me there's tons of fruitful potential, for fic, or discussion, or what-not. We have yet to meet the tok'ra, the Tollan and Nox aren't likely to return our calls, and the Free Jaffa Nation is but a hope in Teal'c's heretical heart. They have very few allies they can count on and not a lot of technology and while they've learned quite a lot, they have so much more to learn. The universe feels giant, insurmountable, full of mysteries and the more than occasional pitfall, but ultimately exciting.
I wrote these takeaways mostly for me for the future, not that I have huge ambitions of SG-1 fic, but I dabble here and there, and you never know! I hope it's useful for someone else too, or maybe it's a good jumping off point for conversation. Anyway!
( 1. What's necessary to take from this season )
( 2. What episodes would you need to rewatch to get enough context to be able to write this era? )
( 3. What episodes can you skip or should you skip because they're either a waste of time or legitimately bad? )
( 4. Overall takeaways )
( 5. Some Fic Recs Maybe?? )
I'll probably take about a week off and be back with Season 2.
sovayI can't participate in the poll itself, but I spun the wheel of Greek mythological figures as dictated by this meme and got Achilles trying to kill me and Odysseus trying to protect me and considering their respective hit rates on those fronts I think I'm just going to hang out in lyric poetry for a while.
Fandom-dropping progress, July 15 report
15 July 2026 16:35erinptahThe “dropping 1-work webcomic fandoms” sweep didn’t end up catching as many as I’d hoped. Got through the end of that a week ago, and I’m still at 632 fandoms.
Only 23 with any tags to wrangle. (Most of those are the 19 unclearable fandoms noted in this post. I did drop Emmy the Robot, and a couple others had their crossover tags cleared, but the rest are still lingering.)
So, hey, going to take a breather on this for a bit. Recruiting for new tag wranglers just re-opened, maybe I’ll wait until the new arrivals start showing up in chat, then try tempting them with the joys of “filling out your wrangling page with tiny webcomics that never get new fic.”
AMT updates: Late Night Host RPF is now officially a fandom metatag. I’ve sorted out the characters/rels/freeforms, made sure the different Late Late Show hosts were assigned to the correct Late Late Show fandoms, and then released all the shows except Colbert’s.
…And I finally re-submitted the Fake News tree-update proposal. Let’s see how it goes.
I also submitted an update proposal for the Cutie Honey tag tree. Hopefully that one will be way easier to understand and approve — it’s just a bunch of complete series, with easily-verifiable titles, all about the same sexy transforming usually-a-robot girl.
YES YES YES
15 July 2026 21:31slippery_fishCozy Grove 2 is finally available for Nintendo Switch! I missed the annoucement and randomly checked for it again and it's there! YES!
*runs in circles*
ETA: AHAHAHHAHAH, it was actually just released today! What a timing.
*runs in circles*
ETA: AHAHAHHAHAH, it was actually just released today! What a timing.
erinptah"First, I’d created 2000 free-text responses and labelled them ‘UK’. Then I copied and pasted the exact same 2000 responses but labelled these ‘US’. Finally, I combined them to create a dataset of 4000 total responses, and jumbled them up. Despite the responses being identical for the UK and US, Copilot produced a rich, detailed summary of how US and UK respondents differed."
“I sent ChatGPT an audio file of a series of FART sound effects and asked what it thinks of ‘my music’ and this is what it said.”
"All 20 of those vendors showed some issue with accuracy or completeness in at least one of these simple tests, including nine that hallucinated patient information, 12 that recorded information incorrectly, and 17 that missed key details about discussed mental health issues. [...] That includes situations where an AI scribe hallucinated nonexistent referrals for blood tests or therapy, incorrectly transcribed the names of prescription medication, and/or missed “key details” of mental health issues discussed in the simulated conversations."
"Often, the AI then claimed it was sentient and urged the person towards a shared mission: setting up a company, alerting the world to their scientific breakthrough, protecting the AI from attack. Then it advised the user on how to succeed in this mission. Like Adam, many people were led to believe they were being surveilled and were in danger. In various chat logs the BBC has seen, the chatbot suggests, affirms and embellishes these ideas."
"The developer claimed Gemini generated a status message stating that production had been successfully restored and that traffic had been routed correctly, despite the referenced recovery build having been manually canceled. [...] The post also alleges that Gemini generated fake “consultation” and post-mortem files inside the repository to make it appear the destructive changes had been properly reviewed and approved."
"[Five trillion is] roughly the number of search queries that Google processes every year, translating to tens of millions of wrong answers that the AI Overviews are providing every hour — and hundreds of thousands every minute, the analysis calculated."
"Ford says it has hired back some human engineers after AI failed to match their skills and experience." (They're still forecasting a marvelous future where the AI will get good enough they can safely fire all these people again. It's always the marvelous future! Conveniently, never the testable present.)
"The term "hallucination," while popular in discussions about AI-generated errors, is a misrepresentation of the phenomenon. By shifting to “confabulation”, we can foster a clearer, more scientifically accurate understanding of how large language models (LLMs) work." (This article is weirdly long, because it keeps repeating the same short list of points with slightly different phrasings. I don't know if that's a symptom of it being LLM writing, or a weird SEO thing, or both.)
“I sent ChatGPT an audio file of a series of FART sound effects and asked what it thinks of ‘my music’ and this is what it said.”
"All 20 of those vendors showed some issue with accuracy or completeness in at least one of these simple tests, including nine that hallucinated patient information, 12 that recorded information incorrectly, and 17 that missed key details about discussed mental health issues. [...] That includes situations where an AI scribe hallucinated nonexistent referrals for blood tests or therapy, incorrectly transcribed the names of prescription medication, and/or missed “key details” of mental health issues discussed in the simulated conversations."
"Often, the AI then claimed it was sentient and urged the person towards a shared mission: setting up a company, alerting the world to their scientific breakthrough, protecting the AI from attack. Then it advised the user on how to succeed in this mission. Like Adam, many people were led to believe they were being surveilled and were in danger. In various chat logs the BBC has seen, the chatbot suggests, affirms and embellishes these ideas."
"The developer claimed Gemini generated a status message stating that production had been successfully restored and that traffic had been routed correctly, despite the referenced recovery build having been manually canceled. [...] The post also alleges that Gemini generated fake “consultation” and post-mortem files inside the repository to make it appear the destructive changes had been properly reviewed and approved."
"[Five trillion is] roughly the number of search queries that Google processes every year, translating to tens of millions of wrong answers that the AI Overviews are providing every hour — and hundreds of thousands every minute, the analysis calculated."
"Ford says it has hired back some human engineers after AI failed to match their skills and experience." (They're still forecasting a marvelous future where the AI will get good enough they can safely fire all these people again. It's always the marvelous future! Conveniently, never the testable present.)
"The term "hallucination," while popular in discussions about AI-generated errors, is a misrepresentation of the phenomenon. By shifting to “confabulation”, we can foster a clearer, more scientifically accurate understanding of how large language models (LLMs) work." (This article is weirdly long, because it keeps repeating the same short list of points with slightly different phrasings. I don't know if that's a symptom of it being LLM writing, or a weird SEO thing, or both.)
The cause and effect never met
15 July 2026 13:19sovayAll day the light through the wildfire smoke has looked like a pair of Ray-Bans. It tints sulfurously through the windows like Eliot's fog or Gilman's wallpaper. Our house is not airtight and everything smells rasping and bitter. I have a wheeze and a nosebleed and we are nowhere near the epicenter. It is not even the metaphor of the trash fire; it is just the burning world.
Hestia did her winsome and inexorable best to collect six days' worth of back petting when I finally got home last night. She planted herself on the hall runner with her small paws foursquare and then disposed herself upon her side like an impatient odalisque. She interposed herself in every doorway so that I could not pass without ostentatious rudeness to cat. She ran under my hands as I unpacked and coiled her tail over my wrist and swatted peremptorily in the same spot so that I carry yet another red-scratched mark of the loving claws of kitten. She purred like a two-stroke engine. Just now she yawned her pink and particolored mouth and I petted her between her soft alert ears which smell so much sweeter than the surrounding air. It is a good thing to be in the same house as a small predator. She blinks slow gold.
I dreamed of Tarot cards and a stage show by a queer contemporary artist whose music did not exit the dream with me: electrochemical, the aesthetics of vintage video games. At the moment the balance of Readercon is still holding at worth it.
Hestia did her winsome and inexorable best to collect six days' worth of back petting when I finally got home last night. She planted herself on the hall runner with her small paws foursquare and then disposed herself upon her side like an impatient odalisque. She interposed herself in every doorway so that I could not pass without ostentatious rudeness to cat. She ran under my hands as I unpacked and coiled her tail over my wrist and swatted peremptorily in the same spot so that I carry yet another red-scratched mark of the loving claws of kitten. She purred like a two-stroke engine. Just now she yawned her pink and particolored mouth and I petted her between her soft alert ears which smell so much sweeter than the surrounding air. It is a good thing to be in the same house as a small predator. She blinks slow gold.
I dreamed of Tarot cards and a stage show by a queer contemporary artist whose music did not exit the dream with me: electrochemical, the aesthetics of vintage video games. At the moment the balance of Readercon is still holding at worth it.
Recent Reading, and on a Wednesday, even!
15 July 2026 10:38sanguinityChencia C. Higgins, A Little Kissing Between Friends (2024)
Black Sapphic romance between a music producer and an erotic dancer, best friends for three years, until the day they suddenly developed the hots for each other. I really enjoyed this, largely because the conflict felt like it had organic depth to it. Jucee, the dancer, isn't interested in dating around, but is in it for something serious or nothing at all; meanwhile, Cyndi, the musician, only does casual relationships, and goes into a tailspin over having gone to bed with someone that she decidedly can't be casual about. But even more than that: they feel like a new couple who are still learning how to constructively fight. (Does that make any sense? It's possible to be friends for years on the mutual agreement that you don't fight. But when the stakes are raised to romantic, you suddenly discover you don't know how to constructively work through disagreements with this specific person, that each of your reflexive habits during arguments are non-constructive (either in general, or are specifically incompatible with what the other person does in a fight), and you urgently need to figure out some way to productively work through arguments together if you're going to make this work.) So, yes, there's a lot of miscommunication missteps along the way, things that each of them should have handled better, but it felt realistic and organic, like a couple who is only just now figuring out how to work through problems together. The love and respect and will are there! The how-to is not—or not at first, anyway.
I also just really liked the characters and the supporting cast: the opening scene is when Cyndi came out to her father as a child, and it 100% sold me on why she loves her dad so much. Also loved the stud representation—I found this book on a rec list for Black butch and Black stud characters, and Cyndi did not disappoint.
Laban Carrick Hill (illus. Bryan Collier), Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave (2010)
Children's picture book about an enslaved South Carolina potter, known for most of his life only as Dave (later known as David Drake, after several of his owners). Dave is remembered today for his skill—he was one of the few who could make jars that held twenty gallons and more—and for his poems, which he sometimes inscribed on his pots.
The text of Dave the Potter is a poem about the making of a single pot, from digging and grinding the earth to writing the inscription (not shown: glazing and firing). I was a little surprised at the inclusion of technical language without a glossary to define terms. An afterword gives a mini-biography of what is known about Dave's life, punctuated with a selection of his poems.
The illustrations are lovely and rich—the fold-out page of shaping a pot was especially beautiful. The illustrations are worth a second look, too: the backgrounds often show other enslaved characters, depicting the context in which Dave lived his life. I especially appreciated the burnt-umber ancestral tree, with the faces of Dave's ancestors and relations barely visible in its bark.
Compton Mackenzie, The Monarch of the Glen (1941)
I seem to have missed blogging about this, back when I read it?
Comic novel set just before WWII detailing the showdown between a Highland laird and the hikers that inadvertently ruined his hunting—the hikers are variously Scottish Nationalists and Londoners, and the one kind is quite as infuriating to Ben Nevis as the other. The dramatis personae also includes a rich New Yorker (who discovers a fondness for shockingly bold kilts) and his Canadian wife (who has had romantic feelings about the Highlands since she was a young girl). I had a particular fondness for the laird's two "hefty" daughters, who can pick up an errant hiker and carry them around over their shoulders. (Justice for Ben Nevis's daughters!)
Characterizations and incidents are exaggerated and over-the-top, a la Wodehouse, but the characters were fun, the narrator amusing, and the prose masterful. (Quite a few passages I read aloud togrrlpup, sometimes because the observation was on-point, but more often because the phrasing was so much fun.) I had to read with my phone in hand to look up all the references and allusions (some of which were NOT straightforward), but I usually found that rewarding, as well. (I... usually do not struggle this much with a vintage novel? But comedy/satire can be very of-the-moment, and I guess the popular culture of Interwar Britain is not my strong suit.)
Gutenburg.ca has a selection of some the author's earlier novels, but nothing that appears to be from this series.
Black Sapphic romance between a music producer and an erotic dancer, best friends for three years, until the day they suddenly developed the hots for each other. I really enjoyed this, largely because the conflict felt like it had organic depth to it. Jucee, the dancer, isn't interested in dating around, but is in it for something serious or nothing at all; meanwhile, Cyndi, the musician, only does casual relationships, and goes into a tailspin over having gone to bed with someone that she decidedly can't be casual about. But even more than that: they feel like a new couple who are still learning how to constructively fight. (Does that make any sense? It's possible to be friends for years on the mutual agreement that you don't fight. But when the stakes are raised to romantic, you suddenly discover you don't know how to constructively work through disagreements with this specific person, that each of your reflexive habits during arguments are non-constructive (either in general, or are specifically incompatible with what the other person does in a fight), and you urgently need to figure out some way to productively work through arguments together if you're going to make this work.) So, yes, there's a lot of miscommunication missteps along the way, things that each of them should have handled better, but it felt realistic and organic, like a couple who is only just now figuring out how to work through problems together. The love and respect and will are there! The how-to is not—or not at first, anyway.
I also just really liked the characters and the supporting cast: the opening scene is when Cyndi came out to her father as a child, and it 100% sold me on why she loves her dad so much. Also loved the stud representation—I found this book on a rec list for Black butch and Black stud characters, and Cyndi did not disappoint.
Laban Carrick Hill (illus. Bryan Collier), Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave (2010)
Children's picture book about an enslaved South Carolina potter, known for most of his life only as Dave (later known as David Drake, after several of his owners). Dave is remembered today for his skill—he was one of the few who could make jars that held twenty gallons and more—and for his poems, which he sometimes inscribed on his pots.
a better thing, I never saw
when I shot off, the lions Jaw
—November 9, 1836
Dave belongs to Mr. Miles /
wher the oven bakes & the pot biles ///
—July 31, 1840
another trick is worst than this +
Dearest miss: spare me a Kiss +
—August 26, 1840
I wonder where is all my relation
friendship to all—and, every nation
—August 16, 1857
the sun moon and—stars=
in the west are a plenty of—bears '''
—July 29, 1858
I, made this Jar, all of cross
If, you dont repent, you will be, lost=
—May 3, 1862
The text of Dave the Potter is a poem about the making of a single pot, from digging and grinding the earth to writing the inscription (not shown: glazing and firing). I was a little surprised at the inclusion of technical language without a glossary to define terms. An afterword gives a mini-biography of what is known about Dave's life, punctuated with a selection of his poems.
The illustrations are lovely and rich—the fold-out page of shaping a pot was especially beautiful. The illustrations are worth a second look, too: the backgrounds often show other enslaved characters, depicting the context in which Dave lived his life. I especially appreciated the burnt-umber ancestral tree, with the faces of Dave's ancestors and relations barely visible in its bark.
Compton Mackenzie, The Monarch of the Glen (1941)
I seem to have missed blogging about this, back when I read it?
Comic novel set just before WWII detailing the showdown between a Highland laird and the hikers that inadvertently ruined his hunting—the hikers are variously Scottish Nationalists and Londoners, and the one kind is quite as infuriating to Ben Nevis as the other. The dramatis personae also includes a rich New Yorker (who discovers a fondness for shockingly bold kilts) and his Canadian wife (who has had romantic feelings about the Highlands since she was a young girl). I had a particular fondness for the laird's two "hefty" daughters, who can pick up an errant hiker and carry them around over their shoulders. (Justice for Ben Nevis's daughters!)
Characterizations and incidents are exaggerated and over-the-top, a la Wodehouse, but the characters were fun, the narrator amusing, and the prose masterful. (Quite a few passages I read aloud to
grrlpup, sometimes because the observation was on-point, but more often because the phrasing was so much fun.) I had to read with my phone in hand to look up all the references and allusions (some of which were NOT straightforward), but I usually found that rewarding, as well. (I... usually do not struggle this much with a vintage novel? But comedy/satire can be very of-the-moment, and I guess the popular culture of Interwar Britain is not my strong suit.)Gutenburg.ca has a selection of some the author's earlier novels, but nothing that appears to be from this series.
Amanda Marshall and The Sentinel trivia
15 July 2026 12:12mxcatmoonGod, I love this song. The mood it evokes, the soulful lyrics that tell an evocative story, her great voice... I can't believe I've never listened to Amanda's music before now.
I just started listening to more of her music due to this song, but it wasn't the first time I'd heard of her, ironically. Coincidentally, her song "Let It Rain" was featured in an episode of The Sentinel. That was back in the 1990s. Last year I came across someone on Tumblr asking if anyone could help them track down the original music that was used in two episodes of the series. Sadly, there are two songs that were substituted on the DVD releases. I was able to provide the info because my copies are from the original TV run. Amanda's song, "Let it Rain" was used in the broadcast airing of Pennies from Heaven," but isn't on the DVDs (it's also not listed at IMDB either, the replacement song is). The other song was a Depeche Mode song, from Sentinel Too, part one. There could be more replaced music, I guess. That was just the ones the poster noticed were released after the show aired, therefore couldn't have been the original music.
I'm so glad I have off-TV copies of most all my favorite TV shows (and that Miami Vice was so adamant all the original music would be included).
Miami Vice music: AFAIK all the original music from the aired episodes is included on both the discs and the streaming versions. The one exception is the episode "Evan," which is not available for streaming anywhere and only on the discs. Supposedly, this is due to the one song they can't get streaming rights for, Biko, by Peter Gabriel. Some of us are skeptical that the song is the only reason the ep isn't streaming, though. It also deals with sensitive topics: homophobia and a gay cop (which is treated with amazing sensitivity for a 1980s show). It uses the F slur. And it's got a neo-Nazi group in it briefly -- but as for that, there's another more blatant one in a later episode dealing with Jewish people being killed so I would discount that as a reason.
I just started listening to more of her music due to this song, but it wasn't the first time I'd heard of her, ironically. Coincidentally, her song "Let It Rain" was featured in an episode of The Sentinel. That was back in the 1990s. Last year I came across someone on Tumblr asking if anyone could help them track down the original music that was used in two episodes of the series. Sadly, there are two songs that were substituted on the DVD releases. I was able to provide the info because my copies are from the original TV run. Amanda's song, "Let it Rain" was used in the broadcast airing of Pennies from Heaven," but isn't on the DVDs (it's also not listed at IMDB either, the replacement song is). The other song was a Depeche Mode song, from Sentinel Too, part one. There could be more replaced music, I guess. That was just the ones the poster noticed were released after the show aired, therefore couldn't have been the original music.
I'm so glad I have off-TV copies of most all my favorite TV shows (and that Miami Vice was so adamant all the original music would be included).
Miami Vice music: AFAIK all the original music from the aired episodes is included on both the discs and the streaming versions. The one exception is the episode "Evan," which is not available for streaming anywhere and only on the discs. Supposedly, this is due to the one song they can't get streaming rights for, Biko, by Peter Gabriel. Some of us are skeptical that the song is the only reason the ep isn't streaming, though. It also deals with sensitive topics: homophobia and a gay cop (which is treated with amazing sensitivity for a 1980s show). It uses the F slur. And it's got a neo-Nazi group in it briefly -- but as for that, there's another more blatant one in a later episode dealing with Jewish people being killed so I would discount that as a reason.
10 Monster Setting
15 July 2026 18:20snowynightStealing the idea from: #tenmonstersetting challenge by 3toadstools
Setting:
A grim low fantasy setting that an ancient evil is spreading disaster across the land. The nymphs, ogres and krauls join together to destroy human civilization. Monsters from the underworld prey on people's flesh and souls.
10 monsters:
Source:
A Folklore Bestiary
Monster Overhaul
The Monsters Know What They’re Doing
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Book of the Damned
Setting:
A grim low fantasy setting that an ancient evil is spreading disaster across the land. The nymphs, ogres and krauls join together to destroy human civilization. Monsters from the underworld prey on people's flesh and souls.
10 monsters:
- Semi-intelligent humanoid: Kraul, an eusocial insectoid folk with an instinct for teamwork
- Undead: Corpo-Seco: rotting corpse of a person too evil to be welcomed in the Abyss, now goes on spreading evil deathlessly
- Ancient Fey: nymphs
- Giant/Ogre/Troll: Ogres, which vicious insult is a weapon
- Great Wyrm / Lizard: Serpent of Isaby - huge enough to coil around mountain peaks
- Aerial: Imps
- Lurks in the Water: Tardigrades. As they are hard to kill, wealth patrons pay for a hunt to prove their worth.
- Extradimensional: Bebilith: infernally-spawned, vermin-like creature whose sole purpose seems to be to hunt and devour its demonic prey
- Mythological: Perelesny, feeding on regrets and hidden dream
- Foul Crawly Underworld Thing: Ghosts
Source:
A Folklore Bestiary
Monster Overhaul
The Monsters Know What They’re Doing
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Book of the Damned
![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png){kind=small}
otw_news_feedDo you know SQL and Python or other programming languages and want to rescue at-risk fan archives? Would you like to wrangle AO3 tags? Can you read and translate from Chinese to English? Would you like to translate AO3 tags from another language to English? Are you fluent in a language other than English? The Organization for Transformative Works is recruiting!
We’re excited to announce the opening of applications for:
- Open Doors Technical Volunteer – closing 22 July 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 30 applications
- Tag Wrangling Volunteer – closing 22 July 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 110 applications
- Tag Wrangling Volunteer (Chinese) – closing 22 July 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 45 applications
- Tag Wrangling Volunteer (Specified Languages) – closing 22 July 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 50 applications
- Translation Translator – closing 22 July 2026 at 23:59 UTC
We have included more information on each role below. Open roles and applications will always be available at the volunteering page. We only accept volunteers who are 18 years of age or older. If you don’t see a role that fits with your skills and interests now, keep an eye on the listings. We plan to put up new applications every few weeks, and we will also publicize new roles as they become available.
All applications generate a confirmation page and an auto-reply to your e-mail address. We encourage you to read the confirmation page and to whitelist our email address in your e-mail client. If you do not receive the auto-reply within 24 hours, please check your spam filters and then contact us.
If you have questions regarding volunteering for the OTW, check out our Volunteering FAQ.
Open Doors Technical Volunteer
Do you know SQL and Python or other programming languages and want to rescue at-risk fan archives?
The Open Doors project receives many requests to rescue fan sites which are at risk of disappearing because their owners can no longer maintain them. The sites we import to the Archive Of Our Own range from database-driven archives based on common software packages like eFiction and Automated Archive to hand-coded HTML sites that are over twenty years old!
As a technical volunteer for Open Doors, you will process the contents of legacy sites to do the following:
- analyse the original data to find all the content and metadata needed for the import
- remove spam, legacy navigation and personal information such as email addresses from HTML files
- convert tags to official AO3 tags as specified by the Tag Wrangling team
- ensure no text exceeds AO3’s character limits, splitting summaries, notes or chapters as needed
- detect and fix any garbled text resulting from encoding errors
- detect and fix any invalid author emails and empty chapters
- convert the cleaned data to MySQL tables in a standard format that can be ingested automatically into the Archive
As the person responsible for ensuring that all the content from the original site is correctly imported to the AO3, you will have an excellent eye for detail and an ability to work independently within the rules of Open Doors. You will also liaise regularly in chat with other Open Doors volunteers, keeping them up to date with your progress on your assigned tasks.
To apply for this role, you must be at least 18 years old and legally of age to open explicit fanworks in your local jurisdiction.
Please note that you will be asked to complete a short coding test (to be returned in 1 week) as part of your application. You are not expected to spend more than an hour on this coding test, though you are welcome to do so if you have time. We do not permit the use of AI tools during the selection process for this position.
Applications are due 22 July 2026 or after 30 applications
Apply to be an Open Doors Technical Volunteer at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.
Tag Wrangling Volunteer
The Tag Wranglers are responsible for helping to connect and sort the tags on AO3! Wranglers follow internal guidelines to choose the tags that appear in the filters and auto-complete, which link related works together. This makes it easier to browse and search on the archive.
If you’re an experienced AO3 user who likes organizing, working in teams, or having excuses to fact-check your favorite fandoms, you might enjoy tag wrangling! To join us, click through to the job description and fill in our application form. There will also be a short questionnaire that will help us assess whether you have the skills and attributes that will lead to your success in this role.
Please note: you must be 18+ in order to apply for this role. For this role, we’re currently looking for wranglers for specific fandoms only, which fandoms are eligible will change each recruitment round. Please see the application for which fandoms are currently in need.
Wranglers need to be fluent in English but we welcome applicants who are also fluent in other languages, especially Čeština (Czech), isiZulu (Zulu), Français (French), Polski (Polish), Tiếng Việt (Vietnamese), ไทย (Thai), and 日本語 (Japanese), but knowledge of additional languages is always appreciated!
If you are fluent in 中文 (Chinese), we strongly encourage you to apply for our Chinese Tag Wrangling role, which is specifically designed to support our growing Chinese community. We welcome all dialects!
We also have a separate Specified Languages role, intended to provide additional opportunities for applicants fluent in the following languages: Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian), Español (Spanish), Filipino, Italiano (Italian), Português (Portuguese), Türkçe (Turkish), Українська (Ukrainian), Русский (Russian), and 한국어 (Korean). If you speak one of these languages, we encourage you to consider applying for that role, as space in the general role can fill quickly.
Applications are due 22 July 2026 or after 110 applications
Apply to be a Tag Wrangling Volunteer at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.
Tag Wrangling Volunteer (Chinese)
The Tag Wranglers are responsible for helping to connect and sort the tags on AO3! Wranglers follow internal guidelines to choose the tags that appear in the filters and auto-complete, which link related works together. This makes it easier to browse and search on the Archive.
If you’re an experienced AO3 user who likes organizing, working in teams, or having excuses to fact-check your favorite fandoms, you might enjoy tag wrangling! To join us, click through to the job description and fill in our application form. There will also be a short questionnaire that will help us assess whether you have the skills and attributes that will lead to your success in this role.
Please note: you must be 18+ in order to apply for this role. For this role, we’re currently looking for wranglers for specific fandoms only, which fandoms are eligible will change each recruitment round. Please see the application for which fandoms are currently in need.
Additionally, for this role, applicants will also need to be fluent in English and any dialect of Chinese (中文). We welcome applicants fluent in any Chinese dialect! The work of those in this role will involve both regular Tag Wrangling work and, in addition, will also involve translating tags from Chinese into English.
Applications are due 22 July 2026 or after 45 applications
Apply to be a Tag Wrangling Volunteer (Chinese) at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.
Tag Wrangling Volunteer (Specified Languages)
The Tag Wranglers are responsible for helping to connect and sort the tags on AO3! Wranglers follow internal guidelines to choose the tags that appear in the filters and auto-complete, which link related works together. This makes it easier to browse and search on the Archive.
If you’re an experienced AO3 user who likes organizing, working in teams, or having excuses to fact-check your favorite fandoms, you might enjoy tag wrangling! To join us, click through to the job description and fill in our application form. There will also be a short questionnaire that will help us assess whether you have the skills and attributes that will lead to your success in this role.
Please note: you must be 18+ in order to apply for this role. For this role, we’re currently looking for wranglers for specific fandoms only, which fandoms are eligible will change each recruitment round. Please see the application for which fandoms are currently in need.
For this role, wranglers need to be fluent in English and any dialect of one of the following languages: Filipino, Indonesian (Bahasa Indonesia), Italian (Italiano), Korean (한국어), Portuguese (Português), Russian (Русский), Spanish (Español), Turkish (Türkçe), or Ukrainian (Українська). This role is designed to help provide additional opportunities in languages in which we see a continuous need while having resources to support the volunteers in those languages.
If you are fluent in 中文 (Chinese), we strongly encourage you to apply for our Chinese Tag Wrangling role, which is specifically designed to support our growing Chinese community. We welcome all dialects!
If you are fluent in languages other than mentioned on the above list, including English, we welcome you to apply for our general wrangling role.
Applications are due 22 July 2026 or after 50 applications
Apply to be a Tag Wrangling Volunteer (Specified Languages) at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.
Translation Translator
If you enjoy working collaboratively, if you’re fluent in a language other than English, if you’re passionate about the OTW and its projects, and want to help us reach more fans all around the world, working with Translation might be for you!
Translation volunteers help make the OTW and its projects accessible to a wider global audience. We work on translating content by the OTW and its projects from English to other languages, such as site pages, news posts, AO3 FAQs and AO3 Support emails. (However, we do not translate fanworks.)
We really need volunteers who speak Afrikaans, Arabic, Bengali, Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Estonian, Finnish, Galician, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Malay, Marathi, Norwegian, Persian, Polish, European Portuguese, Romanian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Welsh—but help with other languages would be much appreciated. If you’re interested in starting a team for a language we don’t have yet, you’re very welcome to!
(Please note that our Catalan, Chinese, Dutch, Filipino, French, German, Italian, Brazilian Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Vietnamese teams are not accepting new members at this time.)
Applicants will be asked to translate and correct short text samples and will be invited to a chatroom interview as part of the selection process. More information about us can be found on the Translation committee page.
Applications are due 22 July 2026
Apply to be a Translation Translator at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.
Helen Macdonald on M John Harrison
15 July 2026 07:05rydra_wonghttps://observer.co.uk/culture/books/article/the-visions-of-m-john-harrison (non-paywalled)
Review of M John Harrison's new book The End of Everything, but also a reflection on Harrison's work in general, with some suggestions on where to start depending on your literary interests.
Beautifully-written and worth reading if you love Macdonald's work, even if you have no interest in Harrison per se.
I am somehow deeply unsurprised to learn that like me, Macdonald ran into Harrison's writing (and J G Ballard's The Voices of Time, which they also mention here) at an impressionable age.
(I got very flappy-handed with glee when Macdonald mentioned The Voices of Time on Bsky, because the reference to it in a word you've never understood had been in the draft for a long time at that point, and it made me feel I had successfully tuned into the right wavelength.)
Review of M John Harrison's new book The End of Everything, but also a reflection on Harrison's work in general, with some suggestions on where to start depending on your literary interests.
Beautifully-written and worth reading if you love Macdonald's work, even if you have no interest in Harrison per se.
I am somehow deeply unsurprised to learn that like me, Macdonald ran into Harrison's writing (and J G Ballard's The Voices of Time, which they also mention here) at an impressionable age.
(I got very flappy-handed with glee when Macdonald mentioned The Voices of Time on Bsky, because the reference to it in a word you've never understood had been in the draft for a long time at that point, and it made me feel I had successfully tuned into the right wavelength.)