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hannah

Between the train being a while and the train being delayed, I arrived just in time to be fashionably late: I walked into the party just as the guest of honor was being introduced. The woman of the hour, a newly published author, a friend of the people whose library I was hired to organize who decided to invite me to the book party as a parting gift. I was the last person to arrive and comfortably below the average age of the guests, and even recognized a handful of people from overlapping social Jewish circles. I felt nervous about being there until the man who was introducing the author talked about how her memoir was both nostalgic and sad, not a combination that comes up - and I waved my hand to get his attention, because I knew exactly what to say.

I quoted Anya Von Bremzen to say the phrase she used for that sensation was poisoned Madeline.

When I say the host, author, and room were suitably pleased and impressed at the phrase, that also says a lot about the rest of the guests at the party.

What's even better is that my interjection wasn't my high point of the party. As much fun as it was to be invited to that kind of thing, as deeply as I enjoyed putting some goat cheese inside dates for an amazing snack, I mostly attended to network. I knew my clients, I knew who their friends would be, and I worked that as much as I could. I introduced myself and said, "I'm the librarian." I explained how I'd come to be at the party. I hobbed, I nobbed, I was suitably impressive. I said, "My card," and handed over a business card. I commented to one of the hosts that if all that came out of it was being able to say I'd said "My card" it was worth the evening. It was an amazing feeling to do that. So very grown up.

I wore one of my nicer dresses, and it definitely helped me feel like I belonged there. After a while, the feeling simply settled in. I chatted about fiction, about the philosophy of library science and the psychology of letting go of books, about cakes and baking, about public transportation. I said cabs were the luxury of the people and that they were union. I joked about wanting to show off my party trick but since the party was over, too bad. I nibbled and had some wine, and took some grapes home at the hosts' insistence, though they didn't have to try very hard. I took a bike back instead of using the subway or walking, and it was the best way to come down from the elevated state. Not all the way down, though - it'll be with me for a while longer, and I'm doing what I can to savor it for as long as it lasts.

Current Mood: touched
Current Music: nothing now

primeideal

Again, not really saying anything new here, just trying to articulate part of the problem that makes lots of sense in my head but maybe isn't obvious to everyone else...

( Read more... )

kaberett

inCompleted White Puzzle!!! We were right about That One Piece being the missing one, and now that I'm not worried about spoilers I have poked the internet and it (mostly in the form of reddit) confirms that Those Are The Missing Bit.
one (1) orchid flower is all the way open!
supermarket had discount fancy croissant, so we are most of the way to prepped for Fancy Breakfast tomorrow morning :)

astrogirl

tardis_remix is running again this year, so once again I went and threw my fez into the ring for anybody who might feel like remixing one of my stories. Not sure yet if I'll write one myself, since this is a prompt-based thingy, rather than an exchange. I did enjoy doing it last year, but it'll depend on time, motivation, and whether anything leaps out and grabs me by the throat yelling, "Remix Me!"

Man, I still miss the old multi-fandom Remix (or Remix Redux, or any of the other names it went by), though. I think I'm constantly holding out hope somewhere in the back of my mind that one day it'll be back. Not enough to step forward and offer to run it myself, obviously. But still.

Current Mood: busy

pauraque

This is part two of my book club notes on The Black Fantastic. (Part one is here.)

"Sanford and Sun" by Dawolu Jabari Anderson (2015)

( Sun Ra makes a guest appearance on the 1970s sitcom Sanford and Son. )

"A Song for You" by Jennifer Marie Brissett (2015)

( A girl finds the disembodied head of a singing android who lived out the legend of Orpheus during wartime. )

"Tender" by Sofia Samatar (2015)

( A woman who wrecked her life as a human undergoes a cyborg transformation so she can monitor a radioactive waste disposal site. )

"The Malady of Need" by Kiini Ibura Salaam (2016)

( This is the second time I've read this story and I still don't know what happens in it. )

violsva

So my wife (!!) was here for a week, which was lovely, but limited the amount of time I was willing to spend in front of a laptop. So my

candyheartsex reveals post is slightly belated.

Firstly, I received this wonderful fic, with lots of worldbuilding and people trying to sort out cross-cultural relationships and hair petting.

paradise (2522 words) by WolffyLuna
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Original Work
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Original Female Character(s)/Original Male Character(s), Male Drow Used To Being A Disappointment/His Female Captor Who Thinks He's Pretty Great (OW)
Characters: Original Female Character(s), Original Male Character(s)
Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Past Abuse, Age Difference, hair petting, Hugs, Elves, Fantasy setting
Summary:

Rhoklan looked down at the woven liana floor, and held his hands out, palm up.
Every time he apologised, he did that. Real error, false error, something that had nothing to do with him, he always stood like that, hands held out as an offering while he hid his face behind a curtain of white hair.
Suppressed irritation rattled in her chest. The problem was that she could not get angry with him for the habit without him doing it more.
It had taken her a month to work out why. The idea that it would even come up only angered her more. Even if she was purely a heartless pragmatist, why would she strike her secretary’s hands? He needed those to write!

And I wrote for

firecat for the excellent prompt "Fairy Prince/Noir Detective", which I used as an excuse to experiment with contrasting prose styles.

Fae Fatale (524 words) by Violsva
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Original Work
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Original Male Character/Original Male Character, Fairy Prince/Noir Detective
Additional Tags: Pre-Slash, Pastiche, First Meetings, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Candy Hearts Exchange 2026
Summary:

It had been a slow afternoon. There had been a lot of slow afternoons lately.

Excellent exchange experience, as usual.

Now I am considering the Single Syllable Smut Challenge, reveals date April 1st. It would be nice if I could manage Phantom Tollbooth or Alice in Wonderland or some other fandom where it would be thematic, but I'm not sure I'm up to that.

gremdark

Milestone! I've finally recovered enough from my big abdominal incision five months ago that the cat can knead my stomach again.

I'm home sick today with a cold (negative flu and covid tests) and it's reminding me what good chronic pain flare company he used to be. I'd wake up from pain naps to find him curled into my side to share the warmth of my heating pad. All of which is to say that someone's earned himself a go with his treat puzzle. Or will, once he gets bored of purring in my lap.

sovay

In the wake of the blizzard, the temperature rose a degree above freezing in the blue-and-white brilliance of sun and the local topography of snow-walls to shoulder-height compressed and calved like ice shelves. I had the impulse to visit the Robbins Cemetery on Mass. Ave. while out running errands and was prevented by absolutely nobody having shoveled within a block of the gates. I took a picture of a leftover slam-dunk of snow instead.

Tickets have hiked considerably in price since the last production of theirs I attended, but I am intrigued that the Apollinaire Theatre Company is currently doing Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge—I assume it was proposed last season because of the topical-political of the undocumented immigrant angle which has only gone Mach 10 in relevance since. I have never seen the play; I read it in 2016 because Van Heflin originated the role of Eddie Carbone in the original 1955 one-act version. I am wondering how I convince their box office that I am actively pursuing a professional arts career.

Current Music: The Pack a.d., "Seasick"

olivermoss

Watch on YouTube

Way later than expected, but the Backrooms film from A24 is finally coming!

wychwood

Last week was all choir all the time (concert went well, but the Concerts Without A Funny Turn card goes back down to zero, annoyingly) and then I went straight into a weekend of Extreme Socialising because

shreena and

quizcustodet came up for a visit. Friday night I went out with

shreena and A for dinner, delicious food at a Vietnamese restaurant (the marmite-and-peanut-butter-coated cauliflower was especially good!).

Saturday was my birthday treat; the Lego Discovery Centre only lets you in if you have children with you, so

shreena and

quizcustodet donated me their children and bought me a ticket to go with them *g*. I really enjoyed it; there's a mix of rides (and a big soft-play area) and a little 3D film and also a big open area where you can, you know, play with Lego. There were stations for building specific models, stations that were just buckets of Lego for you to play with, a tiny zipline where you could build little machines and see if they could make it the whole way along, a car-building area with test track, etc etc. I spent probably half an hour or so building a tiny house (with contributions from

shreena and their older son J), which was extremely soothing.

And then on Sunday we went to ( Cadbury World )

All-in-all a pretty good weekend, but an inevitably exhausting one. I am now attempting to live a deeply regulated life to try and get back to normal and untrash my sleep cycle, etc etc, so we'll see how that goes...

acari

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goodbyebird posting in

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01-04 the x-files
05-12 starfleet academy
13-16 st voyager + discovery
17-20 sw prequel movies + mandalorian
21-26 fallout
27-31 comics
32-36 misc tv
37-40 movies (eileen, inside out, batman returns)

H E R E

Current Music: Ane Brun - Fingerprints

ysabetwordsmith

Space lasers reveal oceans rising faster than ever

A new 30-year analysis reveals that melting land ice is now the main force behind rising global sea levels. Researchers discovered that oceans rose about 90 millimeters since 1993, with most of the increase coming from added water mass rather than just warming expansion. Ice loss from Greenland and mountain glaciers accounts for the vast majority of this gain. Even more concerning, the rate of sea-level rise is accelerating.

Current Mood: busy

ysabetwordsmith

This is an advance announcement for the Tuesday, March 3, 2026. Poetry Fishbowl. This time the theme will be "World Cuisine." I'll be soliciting ideas for cooks, fusion chefs, immigrant cooks, eaters, farmers, foragers, food scientists, inventors, recipe writers, famous figures in food history, cooks of disadvantaged groups who should have become famous, superheroes, supervillains, failure analysts, ethicists, activists, rebels, other people active in the food world, cooking, gardening, harvesting, foraging, preserving, writing recipes, discovering things, decolonizing diets, building or using kitchen equipment, conducting experiments, observation changing experiments, troubleshooting, improvising, adapting, cooperating, bartering, taking over in an emergency, discovering yourself, studying others, testing boundaries, coming of age, learning what you can (and can't) do, sharing, fixing what's broke, upsetting the status quo, changing the world, accomplishing the impossible, recovering from setbacks, kitchens, restaurants, food trucks or carts, campfires, barbecue sites, laboratories, makerspaces, nonhuman accommodations and adaptations, picnics, grocery stores, farmer's markets, roadside fruit stands, U-pick farms, gardens, food forests, other places where people make food, world cuisine, ethnic cuisines, cookbooks, online recipe archives, permaculture, heritage diets, climatarian diet, traditional foodways, culinary archaeology, food sovereignty, drought-resistant crops, trial and error, ethnic spice sets, weird food, fusion food, secret ingredients, supplements that turn out to be metagenic, new ideas in cuisine, alternate agriculture, lab conditions are not field conditions, ethics of food, innovation, problems that can't be solved by hitting, teamwork, found family, complementary strengths and weaknesses, personal growth, and poetic forms in particular.

Among my more relevant series for the main theme:

An Army of One has to figure out how to feed a diverse, far-flung group of people who sometimes have special dietary needs.

The Bear Tunnels introduces modern principles to people in the past, including some aspects of food science.

A Conflagration of Dragons has the Six Races (plus the dragons) who all have different diets. This often poses challenges for the refugees.

Daughters of the Apocalypse has people trying to find and prepare enough food to survive, when city libraries are out of reach.

Fiorenza the Wisewoman uses herbs and healing foods to care for her village.

Frankenstein's Family features two scientists running a valley in historic Romania. Igor enjoys cooking and has gotten at least one of the werewolves curious about cooking the human way.

Hart's Farm is a community with food used as one of the popular bonding methods.

Peculiar Obligations combines Quakers and pirates in the Caribbean, among other groups and places, leading to a wide variety of foods.

Polychrome Heroics has ordinary humans, supernaries, blue-plate specials, superheroes, supervillains, primal and animal soups all of whom need to eat. Primal soups and high-burn soups often have special dietary needs. Comfort food and healing food are also very popular here. The Rutledge thread includes Kardal and his food truck Syrian Foods, along with references to Vermont, French, and hippie cuisines. Pain's Gray, Shiv, and the Finns are all fond of cooking too.

Or you can ask for something new.

Linkbacks reveal a verse of any open linkback poem.

If you're interested, mark the date on your calendar, and please hold actual prompts until the "Poetry Fishbowl Open" post next week. (If you're not available that day, or you live in a time zone that makes it hard to reach me, you can leave advance prompts. I am now.) Meanwhile, if you want to help with promotion, please feel free to link back here or repost this on your blog.

( New to the fishbowl? Read all about it! )

Current Mood: busy

redbird

I have just been out for a walk, a day after the blizzard: bright blue sky, temperature around freezing, and most but not all of the sidewalks have been cleared, so I walked down the middle of the street for a bit. The turkey flock that hangs out on Egremont Road is now up to at least 12 birds, two of which were sitting on a railing. [We got 16-18 inches of snow, I think--the official number from the airport is 16.5, which is significant, but a lot less than this storm dumped on some places.]

brithistorian

I don't expect much from Goodreads, but I was still surprised to learn that Goodreads members have named The Hunger Games as the "best book ever"!

stonepicnicking_okapi

I haven't done a proper News & Views in several weeks so here goes.

1. We got a couple of inches of snow Sunday night. I was terrified Monday morning but I made it to jazz man in one piece and it melted enough for me to take Indian lady to physical therapy. Also, in the middle of making myself sick about whether I was going to survive my commute, my body decided it would be a great time to start menstruating. WHAT?!

2. On the heels of

spikedluv's death, one of the members of my meditation circle died on Friday. She had had several rounds of chemo AND remission over the years but two weeks ago went into the hospital with severe dehydration (c-diff) and never rallied. She had a tremendous amount of energy (she was 70) and 5 young grandchildren. An amazing person.

So I am feeling my mortality. Nobody knows how much time we have, do we? I feel more urgency about some things. I want to see BTS perform in August and I want to get to 221B Baker Street as soon as I can. Also, given my work (home care for the elderly) I am sensitive to quality of life and what that means to me.

3. Speaking of quality of life, I signed up for another weight loss program (not Weight Watchers, which I've tried THREE times and not Noom, which I did once). I am not going to describe it, because I just started like 20 minutes ago but it isn't a drug (and a British lady runs it so I like her voice, this is important to me). No judgement, but those drugs scare me. We'll see how it goes.

4. Annoying things. Air force guy's family didn't cancel my session today so I drove out there suspecting they'd gone to chemo...and I was right. The door was locked. And granddaughter told me to go home. Then I talked to my sister and she insisted on mis-using pronouns for someone in a story she was telling, finally tell me (after I corrected her five times) that 'they' was plural and to use it singularly was arrogant. The co-worker my sister was talking about went MISSING. Sheesh.

5. Boys are switching from winter sports to spring sports this week and next. Winter running to track and indoor soccer to outdoor soccer. Let's hope Mother Nature cooperates.

6. I got to run outside today at the lake because of cancelled session. Yay. Now I am headed to my Alzheimer lady.

March is coming very soon!

---

( 1-23 )
24. love of animals
25. unconditional love
26. forbidden love
27. ecstasy
28. the beloved

--

Day 24: love of animals

I have known for a long time I am missing the gene (or synapses) that allows me to connect with pets but I do love animals (and wish them the best, wherever they are). And I love this series: how about frog making a valentine for toady?

Watch on YouTube

ysabetwordsmith

Today is cloudy and cold with howling wind. A beautiful day to stay indoors and write!

I fed the birds. Unsurprisingly I haven't seen any.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 2/24/24 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

A flock of sparrows is braving the wind to visit the feeders. :D

EDIT 2/24/24 -- I did more work around the patio.

I am done for the night.

Current Mood: busy

olivermoss

The cottage from Heated Rivalry is up on ABNB.

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spookykingdomstarlight in fandomcalendar - MDZS/CQL Read/Watchalong
hannah - Party time.
primeideal - this has nothing to do with anything but it could be antarctica vagueblogging, I guess
kaberett - some good things make a post
astrogirl - Remixin' In The TARDIS
pauraque - The Black Fantastic: 20 Afrofuturist Stories, ed. andré m. carrington (2025) [part 2]
violsva - Candy Hearts Reveals
gremdark - (no subject)
sovay - None of us are traitors till we are
olivermoss - Here we go, yo
wychwood - to exist in the face of suffering and death and somehow still keep singing
acari - I wrote some Heated Rivalry fics
goodbyebird in fandom_icons - multi-fandom post
ysabetwordsmith - Climate Change
ysabetwordsmith - Poetry Fishbowl on Tuesday, March 3
redbird - a nice walk, a day after the blizzard
brithistorian - Low expectations, but apparently not low enough...
stonepicnicking_okapi - February LOVE-Fest: Day 24: Love of Animals
ysabetwordsmith - Birdfeeding
olivermoss - (no subject)

Fashion's been a Passion

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