![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hurtcomfortexmod posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
hurtcomfortexqueervanilla posting in drawesomequeervanilla 
paradoxcase posting in rainbowficrolanniWhat went before Thursday: So, I bought a stability ball today -- also known as a Giant Yoga Ball -- on suggestion of PT, and by doing so I learned several things.
Thing One. I had to go to Wal*Mart to obtain this item. Now, I haven't been in a Wal*Mart for at least 8 years, and at that time, I was in the Augusta Marketplace store and it was filthy and ill-kept, misfiled, and nerve-wracking to be in -- you know, like all the stores are now. The Waterville store, today, was -- spacious and well-lit, the shelves were stocked appropriately, signage (with a notable exception, which I will share) plentiful and easy to see. The gentleman in the red vest and ID tags who I stopped to ask where I should look for a Giant Yoga Ball told me that I would be going to the back of the store, to the Sports section, and then he used his phone to tell me that Giant Yoga Balls could be found in Aisle I-15.
Thing Two. Being as I had to walk to the furthest corner of the store to find Sports, I did have plentiful opportunity to look about me, and discover those things reported in Thing One. When I got to Sports, however, I found I-14 and I-17, but not Aisle I-15, which would be my luck. I asked a young lady who was stocking shelves, and whose face immediately said she didn't want to have anything to do with me why there was no Aisle I-15, and the young man who was her partner said, "Oh, no, I'll show you," which he did (I-15 is, in the Waterville Wal*Mart, where they file the bicycles), and when I said, "There are no Giant Yoga Balls here," led me to the exact shelf, which is where I learned Thing Three, which is!
You have to inflate the Giant Yoga Ball when you get it home. It comes with a cheap, plastic, manual air squeeze, and it will, conservatively, take me three days to inflate this thing. However! I have the ball in house, and have started on the inflation project, and I'm calling that progress.
I am now needing to get to my backlogged email.
Tomorrow Sarah comes in the morning to do the cleaning, and I believe I will be blocking out the rest of the day, which will give me 4.5 days to concentrate on reading/writing until I'm next needed elsewhere. I may, in fact, make a weekend of it, and order in, so I can keep focused on the WIP, with short breaks to blow up the stability ball.
So! I have what passes for A Plan. I note that this Plan may mean that I will be not much around the Internets. It's OK; I'll be working.
#
Friday. Cold and intermittently sunny. Sarah changed her hours to Saturday.
Woke up at 5:30, got up at 6, sat with the Happy Lite, ate breakfast and was reading the WIP before 8. Read 200 pages, did a couple loads of laundry, broke for lunch -- chicken Alfredo from ... I have no idea, actually. Pasta Americana? It was good and I have leftovers, which is also good.
The story is not nearly as terrible as I had feared. In fact, it's pretty good. So that's a relief. I have 68 days until I have to hand it in, and even though I have to Really End It, excise those 9,000 words, and probably write ... two? more fill-out scenes, I should be able to make that deadline.
Beta Readers! If you are still reading, do not despair! My Method is to do my read, then read your comments, once I have the story in my head in its present shape. You are, in a word, Still Relevant -- very much so! -- and I look forward to your notes with anticipation.
The stability ball has been inflated, and the cats are of the opinion that nobody needs a ball that big.
Dead River, after assuring me yesterday that my delivery was scheduled for today -- has not yet delivered. I'm in no danger, but I would very much like to know why it's suddenly become difficult to deliver oil to this address.
I still need to finish my Remarks and choose something(s) to read for my Event on the 21st.
The missing 1099-MISC arrived today, which would be my luck, because I wrote to the issuing party regarding its whereabouts yesterday. I now have to block out the better part of a day to enter everything into the accountant's portal, because the thing is purposefully designed to force you to fill it in All At Once. In former years, when I was working from paper, I would have been filling the forms in as columns were added, and paperwork arrived, and the manifesting of the last 1099 would mean that I filled in one final line, reviewed, and took the whole packet down to Oakland on Monday morning.
Stoopid portal.
What else? The now-called Business Office, formerly Sharon's Office, looks like a bomb hit it again. I used to write and do business in here, and . . . I can't figure out how I did -- oh, no, I do know. By this time in the Proceedings, the manuscript would have taken over the living room, and Steve would be reading it while I did the taxes, and I would have been able to keep up better with the day-to-day paperwork because Steve would have picked up the laundry and the cooking and the dishwashing, because he would rather do those things than the taxes.
deep breath
Nope. Still Not Preferring this timeline.
Last night, I collapsed into bed earlyish and asked the Boox to read Cuckoo's Egg to me. Now, I have read Cuckoo's Egg manyManyMANY times. It is, in fact, one of my favorite books. I know this story. But listening to it is a Whole Nother Experience. I have not had this particular sensation of . . . newness . . . with the other books -- all old favorites, because I'm still learning -- I've listened to, so that's interesting.
And that I think catches us up. I'm going to take some time to excavate my desk.
Ah. Today's blog post title brought to you by Rocky and Bullwinkle.
![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png){kind=small}
bruce_schneier_feedThis is a video of advice for squid fishing in Puget Sound.
As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered.
scalziwhatever_feed
It’s February, again, and look! The groundhog brought a bunch of books with him! What here would you like to keep with you during the coldest part of the year? Share in the comments!
— JS
bruce_schneier_feedOnce. Someone named “Vincenzo lozzo” wrote to Epstein in email, in 2016: “I wouldn’t pay too much attention to this, Schneier has a long tradition of dramatizing and misunderstanding things.” The topic of the email is DDoS attacks, and it is unclear what I am dramatizing and misunderstanding.
Rabbi Schneier is also mentioned, also incidentally, also once. As far as either of us know, we are not related.
EDITED TO ADD (2/7): There is more context on the Justice.gov website version.
pegkerr
lydamorehouse
cosmolinguistToday's Teddywalk took us a slightly unusual way -- I let him choose, within reason. He didn't spend as long sniffing the grass triangle as before, and afterward when I wanted to drag him more directly back toward his house he scampered off the other way. This took us to a tree-lined residential street where he decided to poop next to one of the trees just as a man parked his land barge just behind us and the kids that got out of it were entertained by this free show.
This route also took us past a school where, even though it was nearing 5 o'clock, kids were going toward the school, with their grownups. They kinda looked like they were wearing pajamas? Some were in bathrobes or oodies. Some seemed to carry pillows or soft toys. One was almost hidden behind a Stitch that must have been fully half her size. It was adorable.
I had a pretty good day otherwise too.
Work was oddly satisfying.
A bunch of things happened to coincide today: I presented my new train report twice, first to a panel of subject-matter experts and accessibility advocates that I'm on, where people were very kind about it (especially as it was at the end of an hour and a half meeting that some people had to leave early and/or thought was only an hour long; one made sure to apologize for leaving halfway through but told me he'd read the report and it was good, which was very sweet).
Then in the afternoon I presented it to a group of lived-experience campaigners, a group I attended back when I was a volunteer who didn't have this job yet. They did their usual thing of wanting to vent their spleens on any tangentially-related topic, but I'm used to that and I kinda love it. Afterward, my colleague who runs these meetings messaged me to thank me and say she appreciates that I always handle the questions so well. I didn't think I'd done anything special! But despite that (or actually because of it!) this was really nice to hear.
And as well as feeling particularly competent with the different audiences my work is for, I also had a quick one-to-one(ish) with my manager which indirectly addressed the stuff I've been stressing about lately and where seemed much happier than I'm used to hearing with the work that I have done in the last year and the stuff that's coming up this year.
It's funny because the other day, on our way to the theater, D pointed out where transgym yoga had moved to: one of those "not actually far away but hard for me to find/get to on a bus" places. So I actually looked at yoga on the transgym website and not only was it on this Friday (it's every other week), but it was back at its old location! My hips are so much happier now, and it'll be good for my brain too.
And now, after a week that was really truly about a month long, it's the weekend! We have basically no plans, and the fascists aren't even yelling at the hotel this Sunday!
So many good things.
dorchadas![[instagram.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/profile_icons/instagram.png){kind=icon}
sashagee checked, I had a fever. So I spent the next couple days recovering and not accomplishing any of things I wanted to get done while Laila was out of town, spent yesterday and today working from home, and now when my nose has finally stopped running my throat is hurting and it's not from too much coughing. Sigh. 
adore
andrewduckerthewayneoursinDo I need to ask, guess the critic, given the headline on this review of the Gwen John exhibition: In a superb, mystical retrospective, the painter sheds social trappings – and her clothes – as she uses her enormous intelligence to paint purely. JJ, go and take a cold shower!
***
I am not sure that exorcism is quite what is needed in the case, unless he starts doing manifestations in galleries of writhing and speaking in occult tongues and so on: Demand for exorcisms rises as faithful want ‘deliverance from evil’. And in fact it all sounds rather low-key:
Even when an Anglican priest does perform an exorcism, they are nothing like Hollywood horror scenes with “shouting and screaming” and demonic drama.
They are “quiet and calm” affairs where a priest prays with a troubled person, usually after consultation with a psychiatrist and safeguarding experts.
***
Knepp: Wilding from the Weald to the waves:
After inheriting the estate from his grandparents in 1983, Charles Burrell soon realised that large-scale farming was impossible on low-lying clay land. So, in 2002 he and his wife, author, and journalist Isabella Tree, embarked on what has become a pioneering rewilding project converting pasture into a patchwork of grasslands, scrub, groves, and towering oaks. Now home to storks, beavers, and nightingales, to name a few, Knepp’s ever-evolving experiment is open for all to enjoy.
***
This is a different kind of heritage: Heritage Unlocked: Birmingham’s Unique Municipal Bank:
Birmingham Municipal Bank (1919-1976) was unique as the first and only local authority savings bank in England. Unlike other savings banks (such as the Trustee Savings Banks), customers could borrow money through the House Purchase Department to buy their home. Unlocking the Vaults, has been uncovering the Bank’s history and how it helped shape Birmingham’s story. The Exchange (opposite the Library of Birmingham) was once the head office for the Municipal Bank, and it lies at the heart of this project with many projects and events taking place in the historic Vaults.
Historic black and white photo of the Birmingham Municipal Bank, showcasing its grand architecture with tall columns and detailed facade.
....
A key finding of the project has been the significance of the Municipal Bank, not only as a financial institution but also as a cornerstone of community life, with local branches established on high streets across the city between the 1920s and 1970s.
The rise of ‘low contact’ family relationships - in fact, point is made in there that perhaps what there has been is a rise of is families being all up in one another's business because of Modern Technology and tracking devices, family group chats, the ability to know where family members are and what they are up to at all hours of the night and day.
Because I would not at all describe my own family as 'low contact', we just did not live in one another's pockets and need to be constantly informed and have opinions about each other's lives. Weekly phone-calls - occasional visits- etc etc.
I'm not surprised people feel smothered and overwhelmed when I read some of the shenanigans that families do but then, am introvert to start with.
bookscorpion posting in common_nature
I took a bunch of really nice photos of the crow army today - with the light reflecting from the snow, the details of their feathers come out so beautifully. Look at how blue/purple the big feathers are, edged by black, compared to the dark black of the smaller head feathers.
This is the boldest of them. He stayed juuuust out of arm's reach but didn't mind me kneeling down and stretching my arm out at him. He miiiight be Mr Roadside Pair but I don't think so, I think he is smaller.,,,
andrewduckerhurtcomfortexmod in hurtcomfortex - Hurt/Comfort will be back in 2027queervanilla in drawesome - Romance Challengeparadoxcase in rainbowfic - Light Black #30 [The Fulcrum]likealighthouse in fandom_on_dw - Fall Out Boy Femslash February Ficathon: A multifandom eventrolanni - I gotta get another hat. . .bruce_schneier_feed - Friday Squid Blogging: Squid Fishing Tipsscalziwhatever_feed - New Books and Arcs, 2/6/26bruce_schneier_feed - I Am in the Epstein Filespegkerr - 2026 52 Card Project: Week 5: Maevelydamorehouse - News from the Midway Trenches (St. Paul)cosmolinguist - Good daydorchadas - Down with the Sicknessadore - (no subject)andrewducker - The light is risingprisca in fic_promptly - Friday, February 6 - Love Songsthewayne - RIP: The CIA World Factbookoursin - Odds and sodsbookscorpion in common_nature - Crow in the Snowjames_davis_nicoll - Fate's Bane by C. L. Clarkandrewducker - A brief history of Peter Mandelsontimeasmymeasure
