Network

Current Mood: frustrated

Entry tags:

Climate Change

March heat in the U.S. was the largest temperature anomaly ever recorded

Heat usually doesn’t define March, a month that still carries a hint of winter’s last breath. This year, it felt more like a preview of late spring, and sometimes even early summer.

Across the United States, temperatures didn’t just creep up. They jumped far beyond what anyone would expect for that time of year.

The numbers tell a blunt story. The average temperature for March hit 50.85 degrees Fahrenheit. That is 9.35 degrees higher than the 20th-century average.

It is not just a record for March. It is the largest jump above normal for any month ever recorded in the Lower 48 states.

Daytime highs pushed even further, running 11.4 degrees above average, nearly matching what people usually feel in April.

Ya THINK? It hit 89 fucking degrees here in central Illinois. REPEATEDLY. We're also in drought conditions. I've had to water things already planted so they don't die, in what should be the wettest time of year. >_< I really don't want this to be another year of eight months watering.

Entry tags:

poetry

Poetry: The Hero's Journey, by Tony Hoagland

( The Hero's Journey, by Tony Hoagland )

[ SECRET POST #7040 ]

⌈ Secret Post #7040 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.

( More! )

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 12 secrets from Secret Submission Post #1005.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

prompt: 911, Chim died, Bobby lived

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Current Mood: tired

Entry tags:

reading

Reading

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Current Mood: busy

Entry tags:

Birdfeeding

Today is cloudy and mild. It has been spitting a few drops of water now and then, but the promised storms have not arrived. :/

I fed the birds. I've seen a few sparrows and house finches.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 4/15/26 -- While we were out at Whiteside Garden, I picked up a generous clump of wild ginger. :D I also saw a red-headed woodpecker.

We stopped at Home Depot and bought 12 concrete blocks, the kind with two holes, and water sealer. I'm going to make a planting bench with the solid-top pallet that we obtained earlier.

EDIT 4/15/26 -- I planted the clump of wild ginger at the east end of the savanna where moss is growing. I'm going to try establishing a woodland garden there.

EDIT 4/15/26 -- I did some work around the patio.

.

Entry tags:

Wednesday, April 15 - Book Titles

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RIP (Read in Progress) Wednesday

It's Wednesday! What are you reading?

Entry tags:

Reader Rabbit (1984) · Writer Rabbit (1986)

As a kid I never played any of The Learning Company's dozens of Reader Rabbit games, so today we'll be correcting this surprising gap in my edutainment knowledge.

zorealis suggested the first game in the series, 1984's Reader Rabbit, aka Reader Rabbit and the Fabulous Word Factory. The alternate title sounds suspiciously Oompa-Loompaish to me, so fingers crossed that we will not meet with any gruesome poetic justice.

The game's menu offers nine options: Sorter, Labeler, Word Train, and six different Matchup Games. In Sorter you get a series of words, and you have to decide whether each one matches a given letter in either the first, second, or third position. If it matches, you move it over to the side, but if it doesn't you throw it in the garbage. (This obviously predates the 1990s eco-tainment craze, or else we'd be recycling.)

player chooses to save the word cod or throw it away

player chooses to save the word cod or throw it away

( More on Reader Rabbit )

Reader Rabbit was wildly popular and led to a slew of sequels and spinoffs. I had never heard of 1986's Writer Rabbit until

delphi brought it to my attention. Now, I'm not saying that playing this game will make you as good of a writer as

delphi is... but I'm not not saying that.

While Reader Rabbit offers a solid but fairly staid selection of spelling exercises, Writer Rabbit is far more wacky. After punching out from a week of back-breaking labor at the Word Factory, it's time to attend Writer Rabbit's Sentence Party and cut loose with a mix of games mashing up sentence diagramming and Mad Libs. In the Ice Cream Game, you are given a phrase and have to identify it as either WHO, WHAT, DID WHAT, WHEN, WHERE, WHY, or HOW.

game asks what part of a sentence the phrase 'with style' is

game asks what part of a sentence the phrase 'with style' is

( More on Writer Rabbit )

You can play Reader Rabbit and Writer Rabbit on the Internet Archive, for the finest in lapine-themed edutainment. Did anyone else play a game from this series? There are a million of them!

Current Mood: impressed
Current Music: Who's Sorry Now - Isa Briones

Entry tags:

i am the throat of the mountains

I knew Isa Briones was on Broadway, but I had never heard her actually sing until yesterday when I saw this on tumblr: Isa Briones sings "Who's Sorry Now" from JUST IN TIME | Now on Broadway. What a set of pipes!

*

Today's poem:

Fire

a woman can't survive
by her own breath
alone
she must know
the voices of mountains
she must recognize
the foreverness of blue sky
she must flow
with the elusive
bodies
of night winds
who will take her
into herself

look at me
i am not a separate woman
i am the continuance
of blue sky
i am the throat
of the mountains
a night wind
who burns
with every breath
she takes

—Joy Harjo

*

Entry tags:

quotes

Out of brain juice

It's kinda funny, this morning I saw someone say

The most important "productivity hack" I have learned is to recognize when my brain is out of juice for the day. It has a very distinct feeling to it. Once that happens, no work of quality or substance will get done, no matter how long I bang my head against it. So, I might as well go home and rest.

And then I proceeded to have a day at work of just that kind, but sadly I didn't feel able to go and rest until about four o'clock.

It's such a miserable way to spend the day, absolutely knowing that I'm wasting my time for the sake of presenteeism. I'm not sick, I'm not even particularly tired, I'm not struggling in any obvious way, I just...need to rest, and think, and maybe read for myself. Nothing work-related feels possible.

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Fanfiction: Breaking the Closet (The Goes Wrong Show, Robert/Chris)

Thank you to

wolfy_writing for inspiring the concept of Robert trying to help Chris accept his sexuality! I had a great time writing this.

Title: Breaking the Closet
Fandom: The Goes Wrong Show
Rating: G
Pairing: Robert/Chris
Wordcount: 2,200
Summary: “Left to his own devices,” Robert says, “Chris will simply continue to repress his homosexuality. We have a duty to help.”

( Breaking the Closet )

Entry tags:

Dreadnought, by April Daniels

Danny is a 15-year-old closeted trans girl in a world where superheroes are real. She's across town from her home and her transphobic abusive father, hiding in an alley and painting her toenails with polish bought in a shop as far from her home as she can manage, when America's strongest superhero, Dreadnought, gets in a fight with a supervillain, crashes at her feet, and passes on his powers to her, since she's the only one there to receive them, before dying.

His powers automatically reshape her body into her mental ideal. So now she's physically a very pretty, very strong girl with superpowers... who now has to explain this to her abusive transphobic parents, everyone at her school, and the local superheroes, one of whom is a TERF. Not to mention that the supervillain who killed Dreadnought is still out there...

This is basically exactly what it sounds like: a superhero origin story for persecuted trans teenagers. It's very earnest and has absolutely no subtext. My favorite parts were the bits where Danny gets her gender affirmed by new friends and a sympathetic superhero, which are genuinely very sweet, and when Danny finally proclaims herself the new Dreadnought, which is a great stand up and cheer moment . But overall, I'm too old to be its ideal reader.

Content notes: A LOT of transphobia and transphobic slurs.

Current Music: the Turtles

(no subject)

Had some PG tips. I had a lot of fun with my friends last night at skeptics in the pub. Even the one guy I'm not crazy about mostly kept his mouth shut. Also in a good mood because some other friends invited me to a new restaurant day after tomorrow.

(no subject)

Three short takes -- comments on the decreasing Republicans in the House, the end of an alcoholic era, and people objecting to that inappropriate AI rendering of Trump.

(no subject)

I woke up just before 4:15 this morning and by 4:20 decided I wasn't going to go back to sleep so I got up. After a nice quiet couple of hours (son in law left for work before 6 and everybody else was still in bed) I went for a run around 6:15, immediately after sunrise. It was pleasant outside although humid, but not as nice as it was yesterday morning, I think because it was a bit cloudy rather than completely clear. Often when I'm out walking or running I exchange greetings with other people doing the same, but this morning I was sitting outside on the side steps cooling down after my run when a passing walker called out good morning to me. I thought this was slightly strange although I was in clear view of course. It's just that I thought there was an unwritten law that people sitting in their yards or on their front verandahs are invisible to passers by. I wasn't offended, just surprised, and I returned her greeting.

Since the weather has taken a warmer turn I decided I should put away some of my heavier winter clothes because I'm sure I won't be needing them again for several more months, so I moved them to my large suitcase and brought out some shorts and sandals. I've still left out some lightweight long pants and some long sleeved shirts because it's supposed to be cooler again by the weekend.

The girls keep wanting to go swimming since it's so warm this week, but the pool doesn't open until the end of May so they've been playing under the hose in the backyard instead.

My daughter brought me a bar of chocolate from New York, a most delicious variety from some Scandinavian country, mint flavoured with lovely crunchy bits of toffee. I very sadly ate the last squares this morning.

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward - Another Brick

Entry tags:

😴

"Awake in the Night" icon during the day? What?

So last night, right before bed,

sashagee took Laila's temperature and found that it was above the 38.6°C threshold for us to call into the hospital and so we did. After some deliberation on their end, they asked us to come in, so we hauled Laila out of bed and brought her to the Lurie's Children's Hospital emergency room.

At 8:45 p.m. we checked in.
At 10:30 p.m. they took her vitals and a respiratory illness swab.
At 11:45 p.m. they took us back to a room.
At 12:15 a.m. a doctor came and asked us what the problem was.
At 12:30 a.m. they took her vitals again
At 1:30 a.m. they they took a blood sample and a more comprehensive respiratory swab
At 1:45 a.m. she fell asleep.
at 3:00 a.m. a doctor came back and told us based on the blood sample and the swab...she had a cold and needed rest and fluids.

Emoji Psyduck

So we all went home and went to sleep, and

sashagee woke up early to let me get extra sleep. Once I woke up, I tagged in and she went back to sleep...and so did Laila so here I am sitting and writing this. Laila has felt perfectly fine since around 10 p.m. last night and other than being tired, doesn't seem sick at all. I was skeptical before we went in that it would be anything, and it wasn't, but you really don't want to mess around with any infection on your head so it was worth getting checked out. But I'm definitely tired.

Entry tags:

Went to a concert

( Read more )

Ok, let's try this

I'm over watching calories. I learned that if I eat what I want when I want, I'm at or under what I need to lose/maintain. And I'm still eating way less than I was before Wegovy and I'm still fine with it. So I'm back to whatever. I will say, after 3 full months, the other bits of me that have actually shrunk any are still my wrists. Not on my top 35 body places to lose inches but then I didn't really specify originally.

Also, here's a fun old lady situation. My left wrist is way smaller than my right. My right ankle is way smaller than my left.

The Mariners, turns out, have a tough time winning unless they are playing a team that sucks worse than they do. It's going to be a looooooooong Summer at this rate.

Today is the monthly public Food & Beverage meeting.

Oh, I before the other meeting yesterday, the CEO dropped out so I ended up not going at all. Nice.

The CEO sent out a letter yesterday saying that the head of Maintenance left as of last Friday. As in the corporate world, when you leave a company on good terms, it's generally with a few weeks of goodbye and a little reception. When you are fired or Take This Job And Shove it, your departure is announced after the fact. The last two major departures here - Food and Beverage Director and Facilities Director - have been after the fact. This time there won't be a lot of tears. He had issues. But he had been here a fairly long time.

I ran into Jim Down The Hall yesterday. First time since he and his girlfriend got back from their multi week road trip. He said it was a good trip. I said 'can't wait to hear about it at elbow coffee on Saturday'. Then he told me they were leaving tomorrow for a long weekend in Oregon. Holy fuck, man. Time to stay home and do laundry!! He is 90 and she is 85.

I need my hair cut in the back but my brother is not coming back until June and Bonny is sick. I may have to mangle it myself.

Entry tags:

word game wednesday

word game: kind

This week's word is...
kind

How to play: Find the word in any WIP and comment with the sentence containing it. Just the one, ideally! The less context, the more hilarious & interesting it can be.

Rules:
- All fandoms, all ships, all writers welcome
- Give a head's up for disturbing/distressing content
- If you share a sentence, please read some left by other writers and drop at least one person a comment. (If you leave the first comment, thanks for starting us off and please stop back later!)