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Posted by Amanda

Workspace with computer, journal, books, coffee, and glasses.Welcome back!

We’ve made it to Wednesday. Congratulations!

I have personal training on Wednesdays, so most of my day is a sense of dread up until my appointment. However, I’m always glad I went when the session is done. Even if my trainer kicks my ass. I’ve been attending sessions since July and I think I just need to come to terms that I will never be a gym person.

Are any of you the same away?

There’s a Kickstarter for a romantasy board game. I think the concept is interesting, but I think there should really be a solo gameplay version. It has roughly three weeks left and has raised $8k out of their $20k goal.

Over on Threads, people were sharing their mom/daughter glamor shots. I loved this. Did you ever take any? I know my mom had some of just her. I had some childhood photos taken at Olan Mills, but I wouldn’t call them glamor shots.

A new audiobook project was just announced and it aims to “stand against the exploitation of artists–by platforms, corporations and AI alike.” A lot of well-known women and non-binary voice actors from popular video games have signed on to the project.

Boston has a Goodnight Moon themed hotel room! I’m living vicariously through this reel.

Don’t forget to share what cool or interesting things you’ve seen, read, or listened to this week! And if you have anything you think we’d like to post on a future Wednesday Links, send it my way!

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Posted by Amanda

The Ornithologist’s Field Guide to Love

The Ornithologist’s Field Guide to Love by India Holton is $1.99! This is a Kindle Daily Deal. Snap it up while you can! It’s the first book in Holton’s Love’s Academic series.

Rival ornithologists hunt through England for a rare magical bird in this historical-fantasy rom-com reminiscent of Indiana Jones but with manners, tea, and helicopter parasols.

Beth Pickering is on the verge of finally capturing the rare deathwhistler bird when Professor Devon Lockley swoops in, capturing both her bird and her imagination like a villain. Albeit a handsome and charming villain, but that’s beside the point. As someone highly educated in the ruthless discipline of ornithology, Beth knows trouble when she sees it, and she is determined to keep her distance from Devon.

For his part, Devon has never been more smitten than when he first set eyes on Professor Beth Pickering. She’s so pretty, so polite, so capable of bringing down a fiery, deadly bird using only her wits. In other words, an angel. Devon understands he must not get close to her, however, since they’re professional rivals.

When a competition to become Birder of the Year by capturing an endangered caladrius bird is announced, Beth and Devon are forced to team up to have any chance of winning. Now keeping their distance becomes a question of one bed or two. But they must take the risk, because fowl play is afoot, and they can’t trust anyone else—for all may be fair in love and war, but this is ornithology.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

 

 

 

Swept Away

Swept Away by Beth O’Leary is $2.99! I believe this is O’Leary’s latest release and it came out in the spring. I feel like O’Leary’s romances are a bit hit or miss. Do you have a favorite?

Two strangers find themselves stranded at sea together in this epic new love story by bestselling author Beth O’Leary.

What if you were lost at sea…with your one-night stand?

Zeke and Lexi thought it would just be a night of fun. They had no intentions of seeing each other again. Zeke is only in town for the weekend to buy back his late father’s houseboat. Lexi has no time for dating when she needs to help take care of her best friend’s daughter.

Going back home with a stranger seems like a perfect escape from their problems. But a miscommunication in the dark, foggy night means no one tied the houseboat to the dock. The next morning, Zeke and Lexi realize all they can see is miles and miles of water.

With just a few provisions on the idle boat, Zeke and Lexi must figure out how to get back home. But aside from their survival, they’re facing another challenge. Because when you’re stuck together for days on end, it gives you a lot of time to get to know someone—and to fall in love with them.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

 

 

 

Order of Swans

Order of Swans by Jude Deveraux is $1.99! This came out in January and is book one in a contemporary fantasy duology. I’ve heard mixed things about this one, so I’d love to know what you thought if you picked this one up.

In this spellbinding, fantasy-rich novel, a woman is swept into a world where she has the power to alter fairy tales, and change a kingdom’s destiny…

To Kaley Arens, a PhD student and expert in folklore, fairy stories have always had a power and an allure beyond mere entertainment.

It’s only when Kaley accompanies her lifelong friend Jobi on a visit to his home that she realizes how much she still has to learn. Bellis isn’t the remote island that she believed it to be. It’s another world—a stunningly beautiful and seductive one, with its own royalty, its own rules, and inhabitants who breathe life into the tales she was taught were fiction.

Kaley’s presence is no simple holiday. She has a mysterious connection with Jobi and with Bellis, and abilities that may help determine this world’s fate. Tasked with locating a lost prince, Kaley and her companions—the enigmatic Tanek, a member of the Order of Swans, and Sojee, Kaley’s colossal bodyguard—journey through a land both thrilling and terrifying, where the uncanny and the familiar go hand in hand.

But in fairy tales, heroes and villains are easy to discern. Here, nothing is quite as it seems. And though Kaley is discovering that she can change the outcome of the fairy tales she knows so well, her own story is unfolding in ways impossible to predict, with a destiny she could never have foretold…

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

 

 

 

The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland

The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland by Rachael Herron is $2.99! I mentioned this in an August Hide Your Wallet because it sounded like something the Bitchery might be interested in for the fall season.

Most visitors to Skerry Island see only its lush greenery, picturesque cemetery, and quaint downtown. Yet generations of local women know that on Skerry, their benevolent witchcraft is at its most powerful.

Beatrice Barnard doesn’t believe in magic. She definitely doesn’t believe the predictions of the celebrity psychic who claims that she will experience seven miracles and soon after she will die. When she discovers her husband is cheating on her, Bea flees to Skerry Island, off the Pacific Northwest coast, in desperate need of solitude—taking her husband’s birthday vacation by herself. Immediately upon arrival, she finds her life on the line as a rogue woodchopper blade almost kills her. Her survival feels like a miracle.

And then things get more miraculous when she discovers her twin sister, Cordelia, whom she never knew about, and her mother Astrid, who supposedly died when Beatrice was two years old. Astrid and Cordelia reveal that Beatrice (given name Beatrix) is an immensely powerful witch who can commune with the dead, like all the local Holland family witches. When their twin magic is joined, it shines like a beacon to the Velamen family, whose malevolent spirits are locked in an age-old struggle for magical dominance over the Hollands.

Beatrice doesn’t know what to believe, but she begins to fear that the seven predicted miracles may occur, and that her imminent death will rip her away from her rediscovered family. Beatrice resolves to learn everything she can about her own power, in the hope of saving herself. But when her niece, Minna, goes missing, Bea’s own life suddenly seems much less important. Beatrice must join her mother and her sister to save Minna even if she dies in the process.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

 

 

 

spikedluv: (summer: sunflowers by candi)
[personal profile] spikedluv
I hit Walmart and Agway while I was downtown. At home I did a load of laundry, hand-washed dishes, emptied the dishwasher and ran another load, went for several walks with Pip and the dogs, baked chicken for the dogs’ meals, cut up chicken for the dogs' meals, scooped kitty litter, and showered.

I pulled spaghetti sauce out of the freezer for supper and also browned ground beef to make the base of ~something for the coming cold days (I'm thinking our family version of goulash, which is nothing like actual goulash, which I found out when I ordered it out once and was like, wtf is this?!! o_O).

I finished the Hallmark Christmas movie I started last night and watched another. I think the light snow was making me feel seasonal-ish.

Temps started out at 26.6(F) (forecasted to be 23) and reached 34.5 (forecasted to be 30). Both the low and high temps were slightly higher than forecasted. Today is supposed to be the coldest day of the week, and I hope that holds. There was a coating of snow on the ground when I left the house this morning, but the main roads were pretty good. It snowed all day, but so light you could barely see it, and it melted as soon as it hit the ground, thankfully. It was very windy for most of the afternoon and I had to dress very warmly (aka, so many layers) on our walks.

Tumblr-speak has made it into my everyday language. When I let Ti out this afternoon I asked him if he was sure he wanted to go outside because it was awfully ‘wimdy’ out.


Mom Update:

Mom sounded good today when I called her. more back here )

Babylon 5 fic: To Your Health

Nov. 11th, 2025 11:41 pm
sholio: (B5-station)
[personal profile] sholio
Fixits will continue until morale improves.

To Your Health (Babylon 5, 4500 wds)
The dinner party on Minbar in 5x21: Objects At Rest goes a little differently. Canon-divergent AU.
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Posted by SB Sarah

It’s time for another edition of Stuff We Like, AND the first of our Holiday Gift Guides!

In this edition: Elyse shares patterns for knitting projects she’s making as gifts, and I share some cross stitch patterns suitable for holiday projects.

And if you have requests for your holiday shopping, please let us know!

Take a look:

Stuff We Like - Knitting and Stitching Gifts - a hat with cats, genre cross stitch, and coffee drink fingerless gloves

Want to see? Just click that image above or click right here, and come shop with us!

And if you’d like to browse some more, we have a complete Stuff We Like archive, including past Gift Guides and other posts of our favorite items.

brithistorian: (Default)
[personal profile] brithistorian

You can see them here. They look really great, and you can pre-order them by 9AM PST on 12 November 2025, for delivery in October 2026. Unfortunately, you can only order them as a set of three for $150, which seems a bit excessive to me. I'm sure they'll set a bunch of them, but not to me.

I even double-checked to be sure this wasn't just another example of "prices going up while I wasn't looking," and it wasn't — $50 per doll is 4-5 times the price of a regular Barbie doll, which just strikes me as excessive. I could see twice the price of a regular Barbie, and at that price I'd think about it. But that at this price. At this price I look at the page and immediately nope right out.

brightknightie: Midna, in imp form, and Link grin at each other (Zelda)
[personal profile] brightknightie
([personal profile] batdina, this is to your address. ~grin~)

I realized today that when I started engaging with The Legend of Zelda (TLOZ) in a fanfic kind of way, and mentioning it here, I did it with no overview or explanation, as if you all either necessarily already knew or wouldn't care to know. Please let me remedy that now! :-D

The Legend of Zelda is a Tolkien-inspired Japanese RPG video game franchise with 21 main-series games and many spin-offs since it appeared in 1986. I played the first game on a relative's console in, I think, '89. A live-action movie is coming in 2026; I'm anxious. (At least it must be better than the regretted '89 cartoon.)

The different games tell different tales. They combine puzzle-solving, combat, and exploration gameplay to unfold a story and theme. To grotesquely and unfairly oversimplify, Ocarina of Time is about nostalgia and loss and consequences; Majora's Mask is about fate and loss and meaning; Tears of the Kingdom is about community and loss and rebuilding; Twilight Princess is about identity and loss and choice; Link's Awakening is about reality and loss and truth...

The usual setting is the kingdom of Hyrule and its surrounds. The usual leads are Link, the hero, representing courage; Zelda, the princess, representing wisdom; and Ganondorf, the villain, representing power. The most important macguffins are the Master Sword, aka the sword that seals the darkness, and the Triforce, a sacred embodiment of the energy of divine creation balanced as courage, wisdom, and power. Most Hyruleans are ordinary humans, if usually with pointy ears, dividing themselves into sub-groups by region or culture. There are also several other sentient species. This universe has technology, magic, divinities, and demons.

While some of the games are direct sequels to others, most happen hundreds or even thousands of years apart, and so are both fully-functional standalone stories and intricate parts of a complex canon web. The games have not come out in chronological order. The timeline is controversial; it begins in unison, splits into three AU lines, and then those three lines eventually reunify.

The various Links, Zeldas, and Ganondorfs -- and other recurring characters -- throughout the games may or may not be reincarnations or descendants of each other even within the same timeline. All Zeldas are descendants of the goddess Hylia (Skyward Sword). We have had blonde, brunette, and red-haired Zeldas. Only one Link is known to be a descendant of another Link (Twilight Princess); we know of once that there were two Links alive at the same time (The Minish Cap). We have had blond and brunet, tall and short, child and adult Links. Every Ganondorf so far has been born to the Gerudo people, at least one century apart, with a similar build and coloring.

All* mainline TLOZ games are well-regarded in the gaming community, nominated for or winning awards as well as usually selling well. A few are universally considered masterpieces. These days, most fanficcy fans are into Breath of the Wild, its sequel Tears of the Kingdom, and their two non-mainline spin-offs, Age of Calamity and Age of Imprisonment, which wrap non-TLOZ gameplay around TLOZ story cores.

Thank you for joining me on this tour. I appreciate it! :-D

* Okay, okay, maybe not so much Tri Force Heroes, Four Swords Adventures, Spirit Tracks, and Phantom Hourglass. But I think that Spirit Tracks is underrated.

(no subject)

Nov. 11th, 2025 04:50 pm
ursamajor: strumming to find a melody for two (one chord into another)
[personal profile] ursamajor
And then suddenly, it became tech week for Verdi.

We borrowed Valerie Sainte-Agathe from SF Girls' Choir in preparation for this performance. Valerie breaks things down differently from Ash, but I like how she pushes us in certain ways that make us realize we know things better than we think we do; it's a confidence builder. Of course, that's a double-edged sword when it's the case where you actually don't know things as well as you know you need to, but I think overall most of us are benefiting from that presumption of a musical capability baseline, that we can read notes and lyrics at the same time and don't always have to start with one or the other. The occasional singing in mixed formation; the times when she tells us to just put the sheet music down and trust our memory.

We did a "retreat" a couple of weekends ago to basically cram in the equivalent of two additional rehearsals, and I think it helped to just run almost everything in order, to realize that yes, we actually have touched on all of the sections where we sing, and now it's just a matter of linking them together into one performance. (And, um, warming up sufficiently; some of my sopranos have definitely not been feeling warmed up enough for some of the high notes we've got in the Verdi; apparently the tenors have a similar plaint.)

Rehearsals Wednesday and Thursday; performance Friday night, along with a world premiere from Cava Menzies to open the show. I believe there are still tickets available for anyone local and interested. Guess I'd better dig out the concert blacks soon and make sure they're clean :) And figure out a lighter-weight folder for the Verdi, lord is the new edition heavy, but it still needs to be in a black music folder to blend in!

(Note to self: obviously it won't arrive in time for Verdi, but if you're thinking about trying to find a lighter-weight concert top before Break Bread, look at Blackstrad? Occasionally, the algorithm deposits actually relevant things in my feed. I'm currently intrigued by their Vesper top and their Elektra top, though I suspect given dress code the Vesper's a better option. There's even a petite section!)

And Break Bread will be upon us faster than a blink: rehearsal next week, break for Thanksgiving, two more regular rehearsals, and then dress rehearsal and performance all on Sunday, December 15. I'd better hurry up and order my music for our February concert, haven't done that yet, naughty section leader!
github: shadowy octopus with the head of a robot, emblazoned with the Dreamwidth swirl (Default)
[personal profile] github posting in [site community profile] changelog

Branch: refs/heads/main Home: https://github.com/dreamwidth/dreamwidth Commit: c8775ee9513aa01967abae3932ccaa537ccf8f00 https://github.com/dreamwidth/dreamwidth/commit/c8775ee9513aa01967abae3932ccaa537ccf8f00 Author: Mark Smith mark@dreamwidth.org Date: 2025-11-11 (Tue, 11 Nov 2025)

Changed paths: R .github/workflows/tasks/worker-search-constraints-service.json R .github/workflows/tasks/worker-search-lookup-service.json R .github/workflows/tasks/worker-search-updater-service.json M .github/workflows/update-workflows.pl M .github/workflows/worker-deploy.yml

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AKICIDW: Regional grocery shopping

Nov. 11th, 2025 01:24 pm
brithistorian: (Default)
[personal profile] brithistorian

I've been intrigued by the idea of Cincinnati chili since I first learned about it, but I never wanted to go through the trouble of cooking it from scratch so that I could experience it. The other night, when it made a repeat appearance in one of my fics, it occurred to me that they probably make canned Cincinnati chili. A quick web search revealed that not only do they, but that Skyline Chili, which is the particular Cincinnati chili restaurant that I've heard the most about, makes canned Cincinnati chili. I was prepared to order a can, only to discover that I could only order it in multipacks (4, 6, 8, or 12), which was not something I was willing to commit to with a food that I didn't know if I liked it.

Which is where you come in: If any of you live near enough to Cincinnati that you can buy canned Skyline chili at your local grocery store and you would be willing to buy a can and mail it to me, please send me a private message so I can send you my address and also arrange some way for me to pay you back, either by sending you money or by me sending you something they have in Minnesota that isn't available where you live or by some other option that would be acceptable to both of us.

*fingers crossed*

brithistorian: (Default)
[personal profile] brithistorian

Last night I dreamed that I was hanging out with Blackpink Jennie — I'm not sure if we were dating or just friends, but we knew each other very well and either option could have been a possibility. Anyway, we were at a convention that was like a combination craft fair/science fair for geology and/or conspiracy theories.[^1] While we were there, we ran into our dentist[^2] and our dentist's new business partner. Jennie and I both agreed that the new business partner was kind of strange — he was obsessed with the idea of some sort of link between diagonally opposing teeth[^4] — but we couldn't say anything about it because we didn't want to offend our dentist. Jennie and I were still trying to come up with a socially acceptable way to ditch our dentist and his partner when I woke up.

[^1] To give a better idea of what it was like, it was kind of like a dealers' room at a con: A huge room filled with tables, each table with a person behind it. Some of the people wanted to sell you something, some just wanted to tell you about their findings/theories. Some seemed to be related to geology, some to conspiracy theories, and some to both.

[^2] Not my IRL dentist, and probably not Jennie's IRL dentist either.[^3]

[^3] I don't know who Jennie's dentist is, but I'd be very, very surprised if her dentist isn't Korean, and this dentist was an elderly white man.

[^4] For example, that a problem with the left upper first molar would also cause problems in the right lower first molar.

TV Talk: 9-1-1, Matlock & Tracker

Nov. 11th, 2025 02:17 pm
spikedluv: created by tarlan (misc: tv talk by tarlan)
[personal profile] spikedluv
9-1-1: My eyeballs are still popping. spoilers )


Matlock: This ep made me uncomfortable. spoilers )


Tracker: Good ep! spoilers )
purplecat: An open book with a quill pen and a lamp. (General:Academia)
[personal profile] purplecat
I have a publication in the Agents and Robots for Reliable Engineered Autonomy (AREA) workshop. Corroborative V&V for Autonomous Systems: Integrating Evidence and Discrepancy Analysis for Safety Assurance. It should be open access, but does not appear to be. It's not a super-exciting paper. It takes the observation that, if you are doing assurance of robotic systems you will take a variety of approaches; abstract models, simulated tests, hardware tests... and then have to reconcile the results of these approaches. The paper describes the first stab at a tool for this, but it is a very early prototype.
github: shadowy octopus with the head of a robot, emblazoned with the Dreamwidth swirl (Default)
[personal profile] github posting in [site community profile] changelog

Branch: refs/heads/main Home: https://github.com/dreamwidth/dreamwidth Commit: 3ea928380a18fd593f1788eaf25816a78e953614 https://github.com/dreamwidth/dreamwidth/commit/3ea928380a18fd593f1788eaf25816a78e953614 Author: Mark Smith mark@dreamwidth.org Date: 2025-11-11 (Tue, 11 Nov 2025)

Changed paths: A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-expunge-users-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-import-eraser-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-import-eraser: idle-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-import-scheduler-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-incoming-email-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-latest-feed-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-lazy-cleanup-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-paidstatus-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-process-privacy-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-schedule-synsuck-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-search-constraints-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-search-lookup-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-search-updater-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-shop-creditcard-charge-service.json A .github/workflows/tasks/worker-support-notify-service.json M .github/workflows/update-workflows.pl M .github/workflows/worker-deploy.yml M cgi-bin/DW/Controller/Create.pm

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