thefourthvine | Reading

runpunkrun posting in

Fandom: Stranger Things
Pairings/Characters: Robin Buckley & Mike Wheeler
Rating: Teen
Length: 3,407 words
Creator Link:

ottermo
Theme: Just Like Canon, Canon LGBTQ+ Characters, Gen

Summary: Robin and Mike have a talk.

It's tough when someone you love falls in love with you.

Reccer's Notes: Robinnnnnnnnn. Also Miiiiike. This is such a sweet conversation. These two barely—if ever?—talked in canon, but I feel like if they had, if Mike had asked Robin for help, it would have gone just like this. It's part of a series, but can totally be read alone.

Fanwork Link: the same boat

runpunkrun

Second book in The Captive's War trilogy. Still feels like an Adrian Tchaikovsky knock off, and the characters are nowhere near as memorable or engaging as those in the authors' own Expanse series, but for a follow up to a long, dense book that came out two years ago that I barely remember, this was surprisingly readable. As long as you're reading for world building and plot. It does have that middle book problem where it's mainly just moving people around on the board to get them into place for the third book, but at least it doesn't drag it out.

Contains: genocide, violence, gore; a crop of babies grown in artificial incubators from stolen genetic material; two unwanted surprise erections under almost identical circumstances (being spooned by the erectioneer).

runpunkrun posting in

fancake

omens

Pet Behaviour Nightly Rating: Nico - C, Sunny - B (not bad!!!! we slept in until 6:30) and yesterday's chipotle pork burgers with avocado were A+++. I'd bought a can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce bc I see it come up in recipes from time to time but never in one I was actually making, so I bought a can a month ago just to have on hand in case I fell across a recipe again, and then I'd be READY. We used it in the pork burgers twice and the rest in chili - definitely will become a pantry staple :D

Kelly is off all day kissin dolls (aka first aid training) and I managed garbage day all by myself in the nick of time!

Have written 4k in four days, we'll see how day 5 goes today but I still don't want do anything else so seems like it'll be pretty good (RIP Spanish)

I have to work myself up to calling my drs office, ideally today, but I do not know if it will happen.

I really have nothing going on and I'm bored. I thought maybe something would spring to mind when posting but lol

PS the bacon poutine fifa chips just taste like saltier bbq, unimpressed

Current Music: absolute chill time with kortez's sold out album

dine

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torachan

1. Tuxie is a quiet eater, so when I hear a plate clattering outside I know that it's someone other than him eating. During the day, it's crows (especially when it's baby season; they love to feed their babies with cat food) and during the night it's usually possums. Of course since it's dark outside, I hardly ever get a good view of the possums, but last night I heard a clattering plate and I had left it right on the back porch and had the door closed, so I turned on the outside light and looked out the door's window and was able to watch the possum as it ate. I don't know why some people say possums aren't cute. I love them!

That reminded me that I also recently heard a noise right outside my bedroom window in the middle of the night and one of the cats was watching very intently out, so I peered out my window and saw the shadowy shapes of a bunch of possums walking along the top of the fence about two feet from my window.

My dream is to one day see a mama possum with all her babies on her, but so far I have not had the chance.

2. As I mentioned the other day, I got the new shelf set up in the garage, so this morning I took some pictures. It looks like I took pics around this time last year and you can see we've added several more pieces of furniture since then.

( Read more... )

3. People always use the hashtag Tongue Out Tuesday for cats on bluesky, but I guess Jasper got confused and thought it was Tail Out Tuesday.

musesfool

Things, and also, stuff:

= Work remains hectic but hopefully I will be able to send out my board package tomorrow and then finally write up several committees' worth of minutes, which I have not been able to do because every time I start, I get interrupted.

= I've been making chicken bacon ranch wraps for lunch this week and they are so good! I made bacon on Sunday morning, and bought the Perdue shortcuts grilled chicken, so I heat some of the chicken and 2 strips of bacon up in a frying pan and then lay a couple of slices of mozzarella on top to melt. In the center of a whole wheat wrap, I add some arugula (though you could use whatever lettuce or spinach you prefer), and then lay the warmed up meat and cheese on top of it, add a few squirts of ranch dressing, and roll it up. Delicious and filling!

= I stumbled upon a recipe for whipped lemonade that sounded good in theory but then it had both sugar and sweetened condensed milk in it and that sounds way too sweet to me. I get why the sugar is there - you rub the zest into it to really capture the lemon flavor, in addition to using juice, but just thinking about adding sugar to sweetened condensed milk makes my teeth hurt. I wonder if subbing whipping cream for the condensed milk would work? Or would it curdle from the lemon? Inquiring minds want to know. (I do have a recipe for lemon buttermilk sherbet somewhere, and of course, lemon sour cream ice cream is one of my faves to make, so I can kind of get there in other ways. Hmm...)

= I got interrupted by work and now it's 3 hours later and I can't remember what else I was going to say but in the meantime, I did get a laugh out of the fact that VGK and Torts have parted ways.

*

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Pepper = Butthole Surfers

china_shop

I saw this article in my local paper and thought it was a great summation of a worrying situation (although it comes down on the side of social media bans for teens, which I oppose for privacy & practicality reasons):

Our children are growing up in a world controlled by technology, not democracy (Web archive link)

As I’ve previously argued, democracy does not reproduce itself automatically. It depends on citizens with attention, judgement and some command over their impulses. It needs the ideas of virtue and honour. A society that cannot form such citizens will still hold elections, but it will struggle to sustain democratic life.

twistedchick

Background: I discovered that the county-run swim center nearest to me has deepwater running times open when I'm available. My swimsuits are ancient and the elastic in them is dying.

So I decided to drive to the Lands End outlet to try on what they have, get something to wear.

I drove over this afternoon. It wasn't there. In place of Lands End, in the plaza, was a Gap Outlet (no swimsuits.) I went a little further down the plaza to Athletica. No swimsuits.

Oookay, I will try to order one when I get home.

On the way home I noticed that the Chico's, which used to be across the street from another mall where I worked when they had a Borders Books, is gone. It's an empty site with a backhoe.

Another couple of miles, I turned left and headed toward the private Catholic girls' school that had so much traffic coming from it that it had its own dedicated cop to handle directing traffic. This time -- no cop. And no school. The rolling green lawn is not green but mostly paved and out of it have sprung enormous townhouses -- if a townhouse is four stories -- or flats, or something. Dozens of them.

I also noticed that the road I was driving on had changed names. It had been Knowles; now it is Strathmore, possibly in connection with the arts center and entertainment venue at the end of it.

Did I suddenly switch timelines or something? I do remember the county talking about housing and construction, but I don't recall anything about this.

runpunkrun posting in

fancake

Poll #34738 round 188 theme poll

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: Just the Poll Creator, participants: 70

Pick the next theme of fancake:

Fannish Non-Fiction
18 (25.7%)

In Denial
22 (31.4%)

Unreliable Narrator
30 (42.9%)

omens

We were both awake this morning at five and couldn't go back to sleep despite a decent night of pet behaviour (Rated Nico: D, Sunny: C) so I lazed and thought about my wip and very important emotional scenes and what do I remember now that I'm at my keyboard??? Uhhhhhhhhh. Someone cried??? Maybe it'll come back to me.

Writing still coming along, laundry still coming along (like four loads yesterday with all our sheets and blankets, and today is human clothes and towels), I think it's the only chore I can stand right now. That and meal prep, I guess. Making good use of my vacuum sealer >>:D today I have to make more dog fooood. Kelly is bbqing like three different dinners this week, which is great for me. Today I'm making the burgers (chipotle pork???) and it will be a delicious team effort.

Yesterday Kelly had to do weapons training (which is supposed to be every couple years but usually ends up being closer to a decade, at least for nerds) because the military got a new handgun that ✨isn't from ww2✨ He said it was weird and plastic and doesn't have a safety. (The old one was very inaccurate and very heavy.) Today he is in the gas hut doing tricks while being teargassed all morning, but at least he gets to wfh the rest of the day.

I tried the cheese souffle fifa chips and they are not bad. Very buttery.

Current Music: the used on a carousel, basically

mific posting in

fancake

Fandom: Heated Rivalry
Characters/Pairings: Ilya Rozanov & Scott Hunter (background Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, Scott Hunter/Kip Grady)
Rating: Teen
Length: 2426
Content Notes: no AO3 warnings apply
Creator Links: milominderbinder on AO3
Themes: Just like canon, Canon LGBTQ+ characters, Missing scene, Friendship

Summary: "I did. After MLH awards, in June. Oh, I did not tell him about Shane and me. But what he did, it was important. It changed things. For me, at least - maybe for us."

On the night of the MLH awards, Ilya corners Scott Hunter on a quiet balcony.

Reccer's Notes: A nice missing scene that fills out the brief mention in canon. Ilya has a quiet word with Scott Hunter - seems like it would be the start of their friendship. Very much 'just like canon', and with great characterisation.

Fanwork Links: nobody knows (and nobody gives a damn, either way)

mific posting in

fanart_recs

Fandom:
Characters/Pairing/Other Subject: Ryland Grace, Rocky
Content Notes/Warnings: none
Medium: digital art
Artist on DW/LJ: n/a
Artist Website/Gallery: cjbee on tumblr
Why this piece is awesome: A big, sweeping piece encompassing several key moments in the movie. Nice design and flow.
Link: Red string of fate, backup link here

cimorene

I was intrigued (though not all that excited) to learn that Christopher Nolan is filming The Odyssey. I always expect to enjoy film portraying ancient history, but I also always expect to be annoyed. I appreciate Nolan's direction, but I'm not a huge fan of his, either.

As readers may remember, I'm not an Odyssey fan, exactly. I only read the Odyssey and the Iliad in Emily Wilson's translations a couple of years ago. I did go through a period of being in Greek Mythology fandom as a child, and hence accumulated a store of trivia about them, but I was young and it never occurred to me at that time that one could read translations of original texts. People just kept giving me different books that basically were retelling the same things from the same sources.

After the Iliad and Odyssey, I also read a bunch of Greek tragedies; I was going to read some Roman tragedies too, because one of the books I bought to get a Wilson translation of a Greek tragedy had some of both, but I didn't actually read any of the Roman ones. I'll probably get around to it at some point.

But I have been thinking I wanted to reread the Iliad and Odyssey already in the last few months, even before news of this adaptation, and then the other day I stumbled upon a video on YouTube where the classicist Mary Beard touted her podcast, Instant Classics, and said they were going to be hosting or... doing?... a reading-the-Odyssey series and talking about it soon, and I thought that sounded neat. Maybe I'll look at some of the older podcast episodes as well.

dine

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twistedchick

On the benefits of wearing earplugs, especially at concerts as well as loud workplaces.

torachan

1. The new car has black interior, including the NFC wireless charger, which was getting so hot that it was causing my phone to overheat and shut off in the middle of my drive home, so today when I got to work I parked under one of the solar panels and wow, that really kept my car cool! I figured it would help to be in the shade but I didn't think it would be that drastic. I'm definitely going to try and park somewhere covered from now on.

2. Speaking of the car, I was finally able to get Bluelink set up today, so now I can set the charger on a timer and stuff like that. Also the car will stop bugging me to set up Bluelink lol. I wanted to! But the purchase still hadn't been fully processed, I guess, because it kept saying there was no car associated with my account, but today I got an email from Hyundai saying I could set it up now. It also lets me see the remaining charge and stuff like that from the app, which is handy.

3. Look at Ollie multitasking! Yawning and stretching at the same time!

dine

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rydra_wong

Watch on YouTube

Saw this at Sheffield DocFest yesterday and stumbled out into the afternoon light afterwards with shellshock.

Found out afterwards that Dogwoof bought the rights and it's getting a UK cinema release in July (and apparently a "Oscar-qualifying run" in the US in the autumn).

We got an unscheduled bonus Q&A from the directors/stars (Janay Boulos and Abd Alkader Habak) and gave them a standing ovation, which British people do not give lightly.

The Q&A (in a screening room so small they didn't even need to hand a mike around) was intense and vulnerable and occasionally hilarious.

One of the people in the film, Habak's doctor friend Hamza, turned out to be in the fucking audience, and put his hand up to ask a thoughtful question and then troll gleefully: "So, that Dr Hamza, what a great character ..."

While the rest of the audience were like JESUS FUCK DUDE WE JUST WATCHED YOU IN AL-QUDS HOSPITAL TRYING TO TREAT PATIENTS WHILE BEING BOMBED.

(Habak like: "I MADE YOU LOOK THAT GOOD.")

And then the people in the front row of the audience were like "So, we're film-makers from Ukraine ..." and didn't even need to explain why it was so meaningful to them.

omens

The go go go did not last. The entire last week was sluglife. Just tired, always. Things that happened:

(I have to get out my phone and see if there are photos, to jog my memory lol)

(Ok there are no photos except the loblaws deal of "if Canada wins we will give you two (2) chicken fingies!!!!" and a picture of two sad and lonely mid fingies. This cracked my shit up and my friend was like, "well, Canada tied, so does that mean you get 1??" Loblaws loves to do this giveaway shit from time to time and it is always insultingly cheap and never actually useful. I give you no benefit of the doubt, loblaws. None.)

- basically I've done nothing, but the last two days I've written like 3k. Which is insane. There has been much, much ranting and frothing about comics timelines (oh how deeply I hate war games). And done none Spanish, naturally. Hobbies: pick One

- we had a very thundering and raining day yesterday. Pansies are very pleased. I was very pleased about not having to water!

- we didn't even leave the house this weekend (though we sat out on the deck and enjoyed the storms a fair amount) so we have no good groceries!

- have some tiny bags of chips with weird soccer flavours, though, which I never would have bought bc I see a fifa logo and I get a rage (like the olympics rage, very similar) but Kelly knows (ofc) that I have food fomo and a deep love of weird flavours. I have only tried the steak chimichurri so far and they are pretty much the exact flavour of bret's côte de boeuf grillée (I miss bret's) crossed with the lay's Quick burger chips (which is to say: burned meat with a lil something), so I liked them but I only ate a handful and Liam ate the rest in the night (works for me lol)

- (parentheses)

But anyway, today I'm back at it. Got laundry and vacuuming to do, got podcasts to listen to. Got writing to keep tinkering with.

dine

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torachan

1. Carla bought some peaches the other day and I was ready to be disappointed with them as I have been with all the other stone fruit I've tried so far this year but these were actually good! Nice flavor and texture. So hopefully that means we're properly into stone fruit season now.

2. The other day Carla heard about this upscale international market called Epicurious Gourmet that's in North Hollywood, so we went and checked it out today. It is indeed very high end and fancy, but they had a lot of neat stuff and we did buy a few things.

3. They open at eleven, so we were there right around lunchtime and I figured I'd look around and see what was nearby that we might want for lunch and found a place that was shown on the map with a pizza symbol, but when I clicked on it turned out to be an Armenian place that sells both shawarma and similar stuff like that as well as regular American style pizza, but they also have an Armenian flatbread that is sort of pizza like, with lots of cheese and two runny eggs on top and the picture hooked me so we went there. Carla got a shawarma and I got the flatbread and both were delicious (though each was a meal for two, so we have lots of leftovers).

That's a pat of butter melting on there!

3. I finally got that new Ikea shelf finished today and rearranged some furniture in the garage to make room for it. Now Carla has a proper record shelf, but we also have more shelves for other stuff, as it's way more space than she needs for records now (and hopefully ever lol). There's still room for maybe one more shelf in there, as well as a corner shelf between the CD shelves, but it's really coming together. I also moved a standing lamp from the living room out there since we never use it in the living room since getting the overhead lamp put in and Carla would like a standing lamp for reading rather than turning the full room lights on (especially since they are prone to flickering).

4. We had some frozen already cooked hamburger patties from a time a while back when Carla grilled up a bunch of burgers and then froze them for easy meals. These ones turned out to be really small after cooking and kind of got a bit overdone, so they've been sitting in the freezer and not getting eaten, but Carla had the idea of using them to make chopped cheese sandwiches, so that's what we did for dinner and it worked so well! We still have enough patties to make a couple more sandwiches later this week, too, and I'm looking forward to that.

5. Molly's hard at work getting her fur all over the sheet after I just changed it lol.

New shelf

petra

( Yelling (positive) )

Current Mood: charmed
Current Music: I tried to write you the prettiest song in the world

petra

Outrageous Fortune (2333 words) by ThisAintBC
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Slings & Arrows, due South
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Darren Nichols, Ellen Fanshaw, Maria (Slings & Arrows)
Additional Tags: Crossovers & Fandom Fusions
Summary:

Most people stare at Darren as if he is the abyss, or perhaps a modern art installation, which is as things should be and all in all very gratifying. Maria, unfortunately, stares at Darren as if he is a misbehaving toy poodle.

New Burbage takes on a familiar tale.

*

Somehow I missed this when it was posted, despite having beta-read its inspiration. That's okay, I suppose, because it meant I could die laughing today instead of two years ago. Absolutely flipping glorious Darren Nichols voice, perfectly comprehensible if you don't know Slings & Arrows as long as you know who Martha Burns is, in due South context, and that she plays Ellen Fanshaw.

Current Mood: howling with laughter
Current Music: I am Darren Nichols. Deal with THAT.

celli

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petra

Eight o'clock: TV hour (400 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Project Hail Mary (2026), Project Hail Mary - Andy Weir
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Ryland Grace
Additional Tags: The Rachel Maddow Show - Freeform, Fuck Her Or Be Her?, All The Colors of the German Rainbow
Summary:

Dr. Ryland Grace, in academic disgrace, mopes and watches TV. It helps.

Current Mood: wistful
Current Music: Bull pucky!

musesfool

It was very exciting to watch the Knicks win the NBA championship last night with another wild 4th quarter comeback! My brother's kids went to one of the watch parties and put me on alert that if they couldn't get home, they were planning to come here to sleep, and I said of course! And then I did not hear from them again, so at 2 am, I went to bed.

I woke up this morning and texted to make sure they got home all right, and when they didn't respond, I checked in with my brother, who told me that the subways had been shut down (I had not read or heard the news), so they ended up going to one of my nephew's friend's apartment to sleep before getting home this morning. But they said they had a good time and it looked like people were mostly being cool while celebrating from what I saw.

The parade is on Thursday! I am no longer one to stand in a crowd for several hours, so I have no intention of going, but I think it's gonna be super cool.

In other news, I was doing one of my every-so-often checks to see if there was a publishing date for Alecto the Ninth yet and I ended up on the Locked Tomb subreddit, which is fine - there is some cool meta there - but I have tried to consciously repress that Muir was in Homestuck fandom, and posts there always remind me, and I do not wish to know anything more about Homestuck than I already do, which is almost nothing. And there is still no release date for AtN. Sigh.

*

Current Mood: lazy
Current Music: Landslide - Fleetwood Mac

petra

Kashyyyk Kennel Club-Certified Humans (1198 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Chewbacca & Han Solo, Leia Organa/Luke Skywalker/Han Solo, Leia Organa/Han Solo
Characters: Chewbacca, Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Leia Organa, Lando Calrissian
Additional Tags: Han Solo is Chewbacca's Dog (Star Wars), Crack, Star Wars Holiday Special References, Ignores Solo: A Star Wars Story
Summary:

Chewbacca does his best to be responsible for Han's care and feeding, but the Human needs some serious obedience training, and it's hard to be a disciplinarian all the time. Maybe the princess can be a good influence.

Current Mood: woof
Current Music: I want the moon to make me howl

wychwood

We trekked up to Manchester with choir yesterday, which is always an interesting experience. The BBC Phil is very different from our orchestra, and because they exist primarily to perform for radio broadcasts rather than making their income by selling concert tickets, the hall is often pretty empty - but not yesterday, which was about 90% full, I think.

The vast majority of our concerts are with our own orchestra, and the BBC Phil is the only other one we work with regularly enough to start to get to know them a bit by sight. Their lead cello has always been rather Byronic; he's now rather less so than formerly, partly because his hair is thinning and therefore less dramatically swoopy, but I did leave the building to find him outside smoking in a leather jacket, so he's clearly still fully committed to the bad boy lifestyle.

( orchestra demographics )

The audience was very enthusiastic! which is always nice. We got a bigger cheer than the orchestra or the soloists, which always seems a bit mean when the orchestra play for ninety minutes and we only sing for ten, but it's true that we get the best bits of the piece, so... And now back to work and next weekend is very nearly free, except for (nooooo) my reaudition for choir, the highlight of every two-year period.

petra

[Podfic] There once was a princess from Alderaan (3 words) by pezzax_shenanigans
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Star Wars - All Media Types
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Amilyn Holdo/Leia Organa/Rey/Rose Tico
Characters: Amilyn Holdo, Leia Organa, Rey (Star Wars), Rose Tico
Additional Tags: Limericks, Podfic, Podfic Length: 0-10 Minutes
Summary:

Podfic of There once was a princess from Alderaan by Petra:
A limerick of sapphic persuasion.

*

Short, speedy, charming as hell.

*****

[Podfic] The man with the katanas (37 words) by Ravin_Pods
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Welcome to Night Vale, Deadpool (Movieverse)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Cecil Palmer/Wade Wilson, Carlos/Cecil Palmer
Characters: Cecil Palmer, Wade Wilson
Additional Tags: Double Drabble, Stolen Kiss, Podfic, Podfic Length: 0-10 Minutes, Audio Format: MP3, Audio Format: Streaming
Summary:

Cecil's broadcast from your average cancelled Thursday.

Podfic of The man with the katanas by Petra.

*

The sound effects really make it, and I adore this podficcer's radio voice.

Current Mood: drowned in moonlight
Current Music: Or, as they say in Limerick

torachan

It was hot and sunny yesterday so we went down for dinner instead of breakfast/lunch. Unfortunately it was still pretty warm and sunny when we got there, though at least the sun was going down. But even once the sun was no longer blazing, it was still super muggy. Bleh.

( But we did have a nice dinner! )

dine

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torachan

1. The other day I noticed a new Vietnamese coffee shop had opened nearby and this morning I rode my bike over there to try it out. They are famous for their banana coffee, which was sort of a frappuccino style drink, so I got that. It was super delicious, but they had only drinks, no food, and I wanted some sort of pastry or something. There's a bakery a couple doors down that is suuuuuuper trendy and has a line down the block all the time so although I would love to try them, I didn't want to wait in a line so long my drink would be gone by the time I got my food.

So I decided to leave my bike parked there and walk a few blocks down to Randy's Donuts, which is a famous LA donut shop that started opening new locations in recent years after having just been a single location for ages. I've never actually been to the one in Santa Monica. As I was walking, I saw there was a Dunkin Donuts across the street just one block down and was briefly tempted to just go there, but I knew Randy's would be better so I continued on and I'm so glad I did because they had a Pride donut and also a mango tajin one and both were so good. Their donuts are big and I really only should have gotten one, but I wanted both lol. The mango one had mango tajin frosting and a delicious mango filling. The Pride one was just a frosted glazed donut with rainbow stripes, but even for a basic donut it was really tasty. I was very full afterwards but it was such good breakfast.

2. It was still hot today so we went to Disneyland for dinner instead of going earlier in the day. Sadly it was warmer than I would prefer even at 6pm when we got there, and super muggy. But we did have a delicious dinner.

3. Tuxie's fur has been growing back on his forehead. I don't think you can really even see where the wound was anymore. So handsome!

musesfool

The New York Knicks are your 2026 NBA Champs!!! Jalen Brunson scored half the points the Knicks had! MVP!

*

Current Mood: ecstatic
Current Music: Knicks post-game show

petra

The comment read, "I’d gladly read other limerick stories."

At which point I realized that, while my limericks are tagged on AO3, my limerick cycles hadn't been.

So I indexed them for the person, and then I tagged them all with Limerick Cycle, which should shortly be a canonical tag.

Current Mood: i think i'm funny
Current Music: There once was a fan from the Great Lakes

watersword

A friend gave me her old aircon, I lugged it up three flights and got it set up, and ...it turns on and does nothing. I'll take the filter out and clean it tomorrow (UGH) but if that doesn't work, I am out of ideas. (Yes, I looked for the manual online. The troubleshooting tips are not helpful.)

Semi-relatedly, I still need to sort out repairing the oven and the dishwasher, which are both, separately, fucked up. Physical reality is the worst.

marina

1. I seem to have, tragically, read all the alpha/beta/omega fics that exist on AO3 for The Pitt. Or at least, all the fics that are within my reading parameters. Note, this is not ship-specific! I'm ship agnostic when it comes to this show. Anyway, this is a tragedy, I am very sad. It makes me want to write my own fic (other than the ones I've already written) just so there's more of that shit in the world.

2. I wrote a short story recently, for the first time since... many years. Definitely for the first time since 2019, probably more than that. But I sent it in to a local anthology and it got accepted. So it will be published, in print, later this year. I don't know where that puts me in relation to finding my way back to my own voice when it comes to original fiction, but it is happening. And it is nice.

Another thing that's nice is that I wrote this story in about 2 writing sessions, across 2 different days during the same week. Before, short stories used to take me on average 6 months. They were the woooorst. The shortest it ever took me, for a story I needed to submit purely for a technicality and that I knew I could "slack off" on, took about 2 weeks. That story will never see the light of day, and I'm totally OK with that lol.

So, mostly this feels like a huge achievement for me as a writer, that I've done so much practice with my original work that I'm now able to produce something "high quality" enough to get published within such a short time. It didn't start out this way! Despite being a born anxious pessimist reality keeps annoyingly proving to me that things can improve if you invest the time and effort.

3. They're having an actual Heated Rivalry party here this week - by which I mean, a nightclub is hosting a Heated Rivalry night - and I am actually considering going lol. The party starts at 11pm, which is normal! Except I'm 16-23 anymore, which is the age range when I was going to nightclubs in that format lolol It's just so rare to have a fandom event IRL like this, that is a draw. It's also nice that I told some coworkers about it lol. Like I don't know if any of us will come, but it's nice to have coworkers I can share this with.

4. Work is... in kind of a holding pattern. ( work )

5. I've watched so much TV lately, but of course my schedule is currently ruled by The Vampite Lestat. The absolute MASTERPIECE. I'm obsessed with this show and I've read zero fic for this show, which tells you all you need to know about how good the canon is. And I've been reading fic for this universe since I was a teenager!

( spoilers for 3x01 )

petra

Petrova Truthers: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) (3804 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Project Hail Mary - Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary (2026), Last Week Tonight With John Oliver (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Ryland Grace & Eva Stratt
Characters: John Oliver, Ryland Grace
Additional Tags: Parody of Satire, late night television, Nobel Prize Nominee, in-universe media
Series: Part 2 of Last Week Tonight parodies by Petra
Summary:

John Oliver discusses people who think that the Sun is not getting dimmer, why everyone else on the planet is #HotForStratt, and what you — yes, you — can do to save the world.

Current Mood: i'm gonna sing the doom song
Current Music: Last Week Tonight theme song

petra

Item the first:

I have about 4K words of the Last Week Tonight: Petrova Truthers draft fanfic. It’s Project Hail Mary book canon but should make plenty of sense to people with only movie canon knowledge. I would love to bounce it off of at least one person who’s read the book before posting.

It’s gen, in the sense that John Oliver is of course hot for the hotties involved in PHM, but it’s unrequited and he doesn’t do anything but flirt shamelessly.

~~Hit me up with an email and I’ll invite you to the Ellipsus doc! It’s ad-free, it’s not the Google hegemony, and it’s pretty darn user-friendly.~~ ETA: The story is here and complete. Enjoy.

*

Items the Second through Sixth:

I offered to write for Three Weeks for Dreamwidth and promptly flaked out, but I got to the prompts today! And then I prompted Katarik for inspiration, and ze wanted Darren Nichols. I love me some Darren Nichols.

*

There was an outlaw in Bolivia (30 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Harry Longabaugh | Sundance Kid/Robert Parker | Butch Cassidy
Characters: Robert Parker | Butch Cassidy, Harry Longabaugh | Sundance Kid
Additional Tags: Limericks, Poetry
Summary:

A limerick for Butch and Sundance.

*

There once was a witch from steep Lancre (32 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Nanny Ogg
Additional Tags: Limericks, Poetry
Summary:

Nanny sings.

*

I don't like to brag and I won't 'cause I don't have to (100 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Rome (TV 2005)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Titus Pullo (fl. 54 BCE) & Lucius Vorenus
Characters: Lucius Vorenus, Titus Pullo (fl. 54 BCE)
Additional Tags: Drabble, Linguistics
Summary:

Lucius Vorenus constantly surprises Titus Pullo.

*

Macbeth dir. D. Nichols, 2026 (100 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Slings & Arrows
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Darren Nichols & Geoffrey Tennant, Ellen Fanshaw & Geoffrey Tennant
Characters: Geoffrey Tennant, Ellen Fanshaw
Additional Tags: Implied Darren Nichols (Slings & Arrows), References to Macbeth - Shakespeare, Drabble
Summary:

Darren knows a hit trend when he hears it.

*

Josh Lyman and Leo McGarry: Limerick Fight! (195 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The West Wing
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Josh Lyman & Leo McGarry
Characters: Josh Lyman, Leo McGarry
Additional Tags: Limericks, Verbal Sparring, Poetry battle, Poetry
Summary:

Leo and Josh being irritated but fond of each other, in verse.

Current Mood: distracted myself from reality
Current Music: We're dreaming hard, we came so far, now I believe

torachan

Sunday we had non-Disney plans, so no need to get started super early in the morning, but of course I did wake up early. The laundry had piled up again, so I walked over to the other hotel to get a load started and then walked to the station to get McDonald's. Unfortunately, I'd misremembered the opening time and thought they opened at seven, but it's not until eight. All that was open was a Starbucks, another little sandwich/coffee shop whose name I don't remember and the New Days convenience store. I got pastries and coffee for myself and onigiri for Carla and took everything back to the hotel to eat.

( Togoshi Ginza, Gotanda, and Shibuya )

musesfool

So yesterday, I logged off a call with my boss and the CEO, and my internet went down again, just like it had on Wednesday, at almost exactly the same time (1:30 pm EDT). After some back and forth with Spectrum where they insisted it was a me problem and scheduled a tech visit, I got a message that there was an outage in my area but it would be fixed by 4:30 pm.

Unfortunately, instead of being done with work at 2:30 pm like a usual summer Friday, I had a board call from 3 pm - 4:30 pm (despite all of my written and verbal instructions to Assistant J, many meetings were scheduled on times and days I told him not to schedule things, like the Tuesday after a Monday holiday, or 3 pm on a summer Friday, but I hope this experience of having to work 2 extra hours on a summer Friday stays with him so he never does it again), so I had to be on by phone, because no one from IT ever answered my question about why I couldn't use my phone as a hotspot, the way I used to be able to. Until I was logged in on my phone - then Teams started blowing up with instructions and I was like, sorry, on a board call, can't talk right now. But it should work going forward if necessary. I was looking in the wrong spot (I mean, I was looking under "hotspot" instead of "wifi" so was I really wrong? I don't think so. and yet!), which they kindly told me.

I could have tried to switch in the middle of the call, but figured better to stay on and get all my notes than disconnect and not be able to reconnect. And then at about 4:35, the internet came back! And I still had to wait almost 2 more hours for one of my co-workers to finish editing her slides so I could PDF them and send to the chair for review. And then the slides were too large, even as a reduced-size PDF, to email with all the other materials, so I had to split it into 2 emails. I told my boss they need to slim that deck down, but one of the VPs is insisting on having his slides in there twice since he gave the same presentation at 2 meetings, instead of just saying, "please refer to slides A-K for this presentation." I am desperately hoping the chair dings him for that, but he probably won't. (If it were up to me, I'd have just deleted them but when I asked my boss told me the VP specifically stated he wanted them in there twice. It's just the pre-reads deck that probably nobody reads, so it probably won't matter to anyone else, but I think it is a bad way to manage your meeting materials.)

Anyway! In other news, I mentioned friend L is moving back to ATL next month, so she's coming to hang out here next weekend, so I need to get some of my clutter tucked away before that happens. I ordered some Rubbermaid bins to pile stuff in, which won't look great but will at least free up the chair from all my mixing bowls and cupcake pans. (I know, I know, but sometimes it's just easier to always have stuff out then to put it away and need to pull it out again three days later.)

I'm thinking about what to cook and I might do the white lasagna I like so much - I could send half of it home with her and still have enough leftover for dinner for a couple of days - plus the SK strawberry summer cake. And maybe breakfast tacos on Sunday? And some coffee granita? Idk, I'm still thinking.

*

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: The (Shipped) Gold Standard - Fall Out Boy

glitteryv posting in

fanart_recs

Fandom: BTS
Characters/Pairing/Other Subject: Kim Namjoon | RM, Kim Seokjin, Min Yoongi | SUGA, Jung Hoseok | J-Hope, Park Jimin, Kim Taehyung | V, and Jeon Jungkook
Content Notes/Warnings: N/A
Medium: Papercraft
Artist on DW/LJ: N/A
Artist Website/Gallery:

Guzrogal
Why this piece is awesome: Firstly, this is one of the fandom's BESTEST papercraft artists and, they never disappoint. This instance, frex, is abt celebrating 13 YEARS of BTS joy. They've chosen to portray a pic one of the members had posted on Insta.

The LEVEL OF DETAIL in this piece is amazing. This is 2026!BTS, reunited at last (after almost 4 yrs of military service), and ready to get onstage. I can't help but smile whenever I look at this fanart.

Link: our forever seven!

vass

Books
Finished T Kingfisher's Paladin's Faith, which I think was better than any of the preceding books in that series. I liked it a lot, and I hadn't really expected to, since neither of the protagonists had really appealed to me in the earlier books.

Read Isaac Asimov's 1957 short story 'Profession', which some website somewhere linked to as an example of Why LLMs Are Bad, but which read to me as a strikingly good fictional example of the social model of disability in action. Unfortunately, I don't think Asimov knew that was what he was writing, and I think we were supposed to agree with the historian informing the protagonist that he was the one in a gazillian very special snowflake who was smart and original enough to be worthy of the financial burden of individualised education.

Listened to the audiobook (read by Ali Stroker) of disability rights activist Judith Heumann's memoir Being Heumann, cowritten with Kristen Joiner. I'm unfamiliar with Kristen Joiner's work, but the writing style of the memoir made me think ghostwriter. The narrative voice was... well, the association in my head is "90s middle grade novel", but that might say more about me than it does about the authors. It's that in medias res, "Chapter One. Ring, ring! I awoke suddenly to the sound of the telephone. I started to get excited butterflies in my stomach. Who could be calling me at this time of night? I sat up in bed and reached for the receiver. It was 1991, and I was Claudia Kishi, secretary of the Baby-Sitters Club, and I had my own phone in my bedroom." kind of thing.

That said, nothing wrong with writing something in an easily accessible style so long as you're not leaving important parts out. Not knowing Judith Heumann's life well enough to know what I don't know, I can't speak to the facts, but I can say that the word "bullshit" appeared once in it, which wouldn't have happened in the aforementioned 90s middle grade novel. And she packed a solid amount of real, usable information about activism tactics and strategy, and real disability rights history and organising principles and also disability 101 in there, and with a minimum of inspirational glurge or undue optimism about the present political state of America (it was published in 2021, two years before her death.) It's simplistic but not trite.

Plus Judith Heumann did have a genuinely very eventful and interesting career.

Tech
I got my current self-hosting project working: I can now point my phone (or my laptop) at my RasPi and select a song from the disk attached to it and play that song through the phone or laptop's speakers. (The difficulty was that most of the guides I could find assumed I wanted to use my phone to control a RasPi with a speaker attached to it, so I could play music hosted somewhere other than on the RasPi.)

Weather
Wet and cold.

Cats
Dorian experimented with a salchow too, at least once. He also was kind enough to demonstrate for me today that he can reach the one remaining kitchen bench I thought he couldn't get up on. At least this way I know he can do that. Meanwhile, Ash has the salchow locked in, and is now innovating with other Birdie eradication methods, such as a crocodile death roll.

dine

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

china_shop

1. Got in my car on Thursday (to take a friend to lunch), and it wouldn't start. *headdesks forever* So I emailed the mechanics, they came and took it away on Friday, disconnected the stereo (it was shorting out the battery), and brought the car back, all for free. I'm assuming my troubles are now over. *knocks on every wooden surface within reach*

(I feel a bit foolish about all this. I bought a new battery a month ago because of repeated issues, and I have a trickle charger. So ot1h, I kind of did the best I could. But otoh, the stereo was making occasional weird thumping noises to the point where I had "call the mechanic" on my to-do list for weeks. I just never actually did because talking to mechanics is awkward. Doh! Anyway.)

2. Blocco 181 is a beautifully filmed Italian show about drug dealers and gangs, with three central characters who quickly get into an m/m/f relationship. The sex is Sense8 levels of explicit, and the ship is so good -- very little of the angst is about its configuration; it's all divided loyalties and "Two households [...] from ancient grudge break to new mutiny," etc. Loving it. Carefully not checking AO3 for fic, because I don't want to be spoiled for season 2.

3. Our @*%$&#$% government is trying to pass some UK-style "definition of a man and a woman" nonsense, so I went to a trans rights rally today. ( My sign. )

4. Duolingo is still eating me alive, ahhhhhhhh. (It's trying to teach me characters for real now; so satisfying.)

How are you? *waves*

torachan

1. It's been hot this week, but the evenings have been fairly cool and overcast, which is nice! (I'll be glad when the temps go back down a little next week, though.)

2. Last Friday I met a new guy at work who is taking over my supervisor's duties as my supervisor is transitioning to be more like the company vice president and will have less time for other stuff (though apparently he's still going to be my direct supervisor) and the new guy was wearing a Dodgers Pride shirt. Then today I noticed another new person, who works in my office but a different division, has an inclusive Pride flag on her desk.

3. It's the weekend! And the next three weeks are short work weeks.

4. Curling up on Carla's chair while it's pushed under the desk is just about Gemma's favorite place in the whole house. It's so secret!

torachan

Recently Finished
Everyone In the Group Chat Dies
Picked this up at the library on a whim after seeing it on the new release shelf. Told in split timelines between the present and events that happened a year ago. In the present, the MC gets a text from someone who should be dead, and as she tries to figure out what's going on, other people in the group chat get picked off one by one. The past timeline follows the events that lead up to the death of the person supposedly sending the texts in the present. Pretty standard thriller. I liked it all right, but don't feel the need to rush out and read more by the author.

Curse of the Poppy
Fifth in the Penny Green mystery series.

The Man Everybody Was Afraid Of
Fourth in the Dave Brandstetter mystery series. This was probably my least favorite so far, not for any particular reason, just felt a little boring until it got near the end.

Murder and the Missing Treasure
New Cleopatra Fox release! I'm always excited to see a new book in the series.

The Harlem Hellfighters
Graphic novel about Black soldiers in World War I. There's a mix of real and fictional characters, but overall apparently follows historical accounts fairly faithfully. Interesting reading, though I wasn't a fan of the art style.

Nodame Cantabile vol. 11-12

the_shoshanna

I haven't been very enthused about making food lately; I've felt behind on things and not interested in planning or making meals, and if I lived alone I'd probably have eaten a lot of peanut butter over the past few days.

But! Today I went for a jog in the morning after several days of being unhappily sedentary, and got pretty much everything prepped for the service I'm helping run on Sunday, and decided that by god I was going to cook some of the things that have been on my to-do list!

Before we went away last month I made a dinner of roasted vegetable ratatouille, and we had enough left over to freeze, and it was just the right amount to top a pizza with, which I did last week. And it was great having pizza topping ready to go, only having to make the crust -- especially in the immediate aftermath of getting home and collapsing; before we left, I prepped and froze several meal bases with that in mind. So today I made a huge batch of ratatouille: five cookie sheets full of chunked eggplant and zucchini and bell pepper and onion, tossed with tomato paste, garlic, herbs, and olive oil, and that massive load of veg all roasted down into just four servings to put in the freezer. Eventually they will go on pizza, or pasta, or gnocchi, or directly into our mouths.

Also today I made a similarly huge pan of sauteed ground turkey and kale, with onion and herbs&spices; it's the base of a tomato ragù, but I froze two servings without the tomato sauce, and the third will get simmered in tomato sauce tonight (which came out of the freezer!) and go over pasta.

I had hoped to also make an apple-cheddar bread, but I'm out of time. (And energy.)

Tomorrow is Pride, and I'll be walking a lot: half an hour to the start and then another half hour home from the end of the march, plus the actual march, plus however much we wander around the post-march festival; I didn't get to see any of it last year because I had to bolt immediately as the march ended, to go perform a wedding that kept me waiting for more than four hours and ended up not even happening. I hope to convince Geoff to go for takeout burgers and fries for dinner tomorrow!

petra

I caught up with all the requests at my Donate for a Drabble post.

If you have recently donated 25 USD or the local equivalent to a food bank/pantry, the ACLU, or a Pride-related organization that includes trans-positive outreach, hit me up and I'll write for you!

I have just edited Project Hail Mary (book or movie) and The Pushcart War into my fandom list.

*

Ways to say "I love you" (100 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: due South
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski
Characters: Ray Kowalski, Benton Fraser
Additional Tags: Drabble, Headaches & Migraines
Summary:

Ray wears his sunglasses at night.

*

Real vampires don't sparkle (100 words) by Petra
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Slings & Arrows
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Darren Nichols & Geoffrey Tennant
Characters: Darren Nichols, Geoffrey Tennant
Additional Tags: Dracula References, Drabble
Summary:

Geoffrey disagrees with Darren about the cosmetic choices in his production of Dracula.

Current Mood: fulfilled
Current Music: I wear my sunglasses at night so I can see

tafadhali posting in

vidding

Additional notes and content warnings on AO3 and DW.

Title: Is It My Body?
Fandoms: Multifandom horror (Rosemary's Baby, The Exorcist, Black Christmas, The Stepford Wives, Carrie, The Omen, The Brood)
Music: "Is It My Body" by Emilie Autumn
Length: 3:30
Summary: "What have I got that makes you want to love me? Is it my body? Or someone I might be? Or something inside me?" Reproductive and domestic horror in the 1970s.

AO3 | Tumblr

Title: Oh, What a World
Fandoms: Wes Anderson films
Music: "Oh What a World" by Rufus Wainwright
Length: 4:25
Summary: "Why am I always on a plane or a fast train? / Oh, what a world my parents gave me." A tribute to Wes Anderson.

AO3 | Tumblr

Profile

Keep Hoping Machine Running

October 2025

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Page Summary

runpunkrun in fancake - Stranger Things: the same boat, by ottermo
runpunkrun - The Faith of Beasts, by James S.A. Corey
runpunkrun in fancake - Theme Reminder: Just Like Canon
omens - yawn
dine - I am tired of myself tonight. I should like to be somebody else
torachan - Daily Happiness
musesfool - Cinnamon and sugary and softly spoken lies
china_shop - (no subject)
twistedchick - The trip where things weren't there
runpunkrun in fancake - Round 188 Theme Poll
omens - (no subject)
mific in fancake - Heated Rivalry: nobody knows (and nobody gives a damn, either way) by milominderbinder
mific in fanart_recs - Red string of fate by cjbee (SFW)
cimorene - The Odyssey again
dine - the only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it
twistedchick - New Substack post
torachan - Daily Happiness
dine - Music Monday
rydra_wong - ... yeah you should probably see this
omens - ha
dine - ice ice baby
torachan - Daily Happiness
petra - Interview with the Vampire 3x2
petra - Recommendation: Outrageous Fortune - Darren Nichols puts on a due South-inspired play
celli - I am spoiled for all other travel
petra - Eight o'clock: TV hour - Project Hail Mary story, gen
musesfool - can the child within my heart rise above?
petra - Kashyyyk Kennel Club-Certified Humans - Star Wars story
wychwood - der herr der ernte geht und sammelt garben uns ein, die starben
petra - Podficced - Star Wars & Deadpool/Welcome to Night Vale
torachan - 2026 Disneyland Trip #26 (6/13/26)
dine - never try to outstubborn a cat
torachan - Daily Happiness
musesfool - he deserved it, he earned it
petra - And then someone said to me
watersword - technology was a mistake
marina - A random post appears
petra - Petrova Truthers: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) - Project Hail Mary story
petra - Drabbles & Limericks - Butch Cassidy, Discworld, Rome, Slings & Arrows, The West Wing
torachan - 2026 Japan Trip Part 6 (4/12-13)
musesfool - but i'm no good at math and besides, the dollar is down
glitteryv in fanart_recs - BTS: our forever seven! by Guzrogal (SFW)
vass - Things
dine - while history never repeats itself, political patterns do
china_shop - Offline life (wait, does Duolingo count as offline?)
torachan - Daily Happiness
torachan - Weekly Reading
the_shoshanna - cooking
petra - Let me know you've donated and I'll write for you - due South & Slings & Arrows drabbles
tafadhali in vidding - Two New Vids

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