Wearer of many hats. TTRPG, video game, and fiction writer & editor. Co-editor of Strategy Strikes Back, War Stories, co-founder of Falstaff Books & Project Lodestar, etc. No kings. Abolish ICE.
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America heartbroken to discover president somehow still alive
Excellent, thank you! I tend to forget how close the two WWs were.
True. That was a massive help in 2020, too, especially against the PMCs who tried to go undercover.
I think it helps a lot that we're a bloody-minded lot. I would also love to see someone (maybe @wolvendamien.bsky.social or @davidforbes.bsky.social?) examine the impact of modern superhero culture on the resistance. I think films like Capt America were well timed.
Sand batteries are literally just silos of sand that retain heat exceptionally well -- so well that they can be tied to heat exchange systems to serve as proxy *electrical* batteries. Finland's new model can store enough power (100 MWh) to heat an entire town for a week. newatlas.com/energy/large...
The City of Atlanta is opening its first municipal grocery store today. The city is spending $3.5 million in partnership with a neighborhood grocery chain in an effort to eliminate a downtown food desert. www.wsbtv.com/news/local/a...
I know all this is frequently compared to Nazi Germany, but I wonder if brownshirts were as gleefully, aggressively hated as ICE and our cut-rate goosesteppers are. Reporting locations, driving them out of hotels, outing them, blocking them into buildings...there is a lot of resistance.
With news of a reported settlement with Anthropic I went back to check the class action form and it now allows authors outside the US to input their address, so it may be worth adding your known pirated titles (from the LibGen pirate database) www.lieffcabraser.com/anthropic-au...
Of course. Because it learns from what we already do
Yay!!! Very happy to hear that.
Like, AI can spot cancer early and help understand growth patterns to mitigate climate change. Why are we so determined to dismiss the incredible in favor of the mundane?
"Search across documents!" Had that. "Check your spelling!" Had that. "Summarize documents!" I work in tech. Summarizing documents means shit doesn't get made. "Create projects!" I can do that in 5 minutes. "Generate content!" I assure you I'm better at that than you are. Fucking useless.
But Eric, Microsoft AI wants to write your letters for you.
I think the worst thing about AI is that it has such staggering potential but all the uses most people are excited about either already existed or are knock offs of what one moderately competent person can do.
...I haven't run into that one yet...
Meanwhile, when was the last time you heard that there are still protests in front of the ICE building in Portland?
Now that I am home, here are my post-completion thoughts on the #Zcavengerhunt. First off: it was much more fun than I thought it would be, and that was largely due to how well it was organized, how it encouraged participants to talk to each other, and the spirit of the event.
activists please paint four other crosswalks rainbow colors. every site they watch should provoke four new sites
It is astounding how much time I spent declining genAI services right now. No, I don't want you to summarize this novel for me. No, I don't want you to compose a message to my mom. No, I don't want you to create a picture for me. Fuck. Off.
That delightful feeling when you check out a business in your small town - which has a lot of conservatives - and the staff all have their pronouns listed. Also, it's ten minutes from my house.
Confluence just ate 30 lines of laborious copy-paste data and I take back every remotely positive thing I have ever said about it.
I'm in a position to potentially get some very useful people in some very big companies to think more critically about AI if I can be smart and subtle enough, which feels amazing.
In a small but significant bright spot: my boss and I had a long talk about AI today bc our execs are very excited about it. When we started the conversation last year, she was dismissive of my concerns. Today, she *got* it, and went away with a lot of tools to help mitigate uninformed excitement.
MIT’s NANDA initiative found that 95% of generative AI deployments fail after interviewing 150 execs, surveying 350 workers, and analyzing 300 projects. The real “productivity gains” seem to come from layoffs and squeezing more work from fewer people not AI.
And finally, @senossoff had yet another win against Trump. This time federal funding for a foster kids program was restored. He sounded the alarm several times over the last few months through pressers and round tables, and made it happen. 7/
My massage therapist made an awful lot of distressed sounds as she worked on me today.
I'm browsing cookbooks to get some meal ideas, and I love that David Tanis's Market Cooking includes this line: "If your butcher doesn't have hangar steak, ask her to recommend..." It's a little thing. But it's lovely. (Also, this cookbook is lovely.)
I spent all weekend outside with horses and their people (most of whom also swing swords) and it was great and I didn't look at the news, which was even better.
1. This morning, California Governor said he was in "complete alignment" with anti-LGBTQ+ hate-influencer Charlie Kirk of TPUSA on transgender sports. He also conceded on trans inmates and gender affirming care for youth. It's so much worse than being reported. Subscribe to support my journalism.
To be clear, the US and UK broke that promise. We have not defended Ukraine, and Russia has murdered scores of people, destroyed whole towns, and abducted children. Ukraine has fought like hell for years now. Trump wants to make it worse. But we haven't kept our word for a single day.
To summarize -waves are not seasonal -vaccines are waning -people are getting long covid -it’s still not an endemic disease -very young kids are at increased risk because they didn’t go through the initial vaccine series Oh and it turns out, Covid Cautious people have been right the whole time.
I can't open my window to listen to the rain because I'm too tired to turn the sprinklers off and don't want to wake up via cold shower. My plants will be very well watered tomorrow.
A good part of my mental bandwidth this week has gone to co-creating the bare bones of a lighthearted improv LARP for a bunch of professional performers. I love running improv games, and this group is so willing to commit to the part and has great chemistry. Super excited to facilitate on Sat.
This is not a massive decision or any kind of change. Costco has never carried mifepristone in its pharmacies. An anti-abortion group is taking credit for something that didn't happen, possibly to generate disingenuous left-wing ire against one of the few corporations that hasn't gone MAGA.
Piece of shit ICE fascists are swarming Little Tokyo. Posted up outside the Japanese American Museum threatening people with internment. Impossible to overstate how disgusting these people are.
These are adorable.
Some days are productive. Other days, you're on the phone all day bc your hvac company seems to be trying to rip you off, and the doctor forgot to put a referral through.
*The prep I should be doing for the weekend is writing a bunch of curses and spells on little slips of paper for the freeform mystery larp we do as a break from the classes, which doesn't suck, but approximately 3 brain cells survived today's heat.
I have about 9 hours of driving between tomorrow and Thursday, and then three days of co-running a training event for the local jousting/combat group, so I'm spending my night updating various playlists, which is definitely not the prep I should be doing* for the weekend.
I'm like "I'm not that stressed" and then I start singing along to something and yawn ten times in a row.
My feet are a bit cold this evening, so I wedged them under Magni's ribs, up to my ankles, after dragging him bodily across the bed so I could, you know, even get in the bed, and he's just like "sure, whatever." This dog is 50% absolute chaos and 50% the chillest creature on Earth.
If you're in the US and following me, there is a 100% chance you are a person who cares about comics or movies or video games or books or whatever--as a creator, as a reader, as a fan. These bills are seeking to limit free speech and expression. To censor both the country and the world.
in case you think this is just about porn, authors have obscenity clauses in their US contracts and if they broaden the definition of obscenity, guess what happens to queer romances? we should fight for porn regardless, but don’t be fooled into thinking this was about anything but erasing queerness
The comment sections lately have become a lot more "find the fuck out, fash", and it feels like more of the non-MAGA conservatives are starting to realize they're going to go down with the ship if they don't wake up.
We're heading into a mini heat wave, followed by rain...forecast to hit squarely on top of an event I'm managing. Outdoors. I have mixed feelings about the weather right now. LAST year, we had a lightning storm and so much wind there was a dust devil in the arena, so maybe this event is cursed.
In delightful news, I've heard donkeys braying near us a few times and finally found them a few days ago, a lovely soft gray pair on a property near us.
Oh yes. Fireworks at midnight on a random Friday in August. Fabulous.
It is an absolutely perfect Pacific NW summer day at the barn: low 70s, medium humidity, a good breeze, completely blue sky. Meanwhile, the sky across the freeway, poling up against the mountains, is absolutely black. So my views of the weather are v. different depending on which way I face.
We finally went to see Superman last night, and if you've ever wanted to know what it's like living with Magni, just go watch Krypto for a while.
And I am deeply sorry that I did not see this hole in my own awareness sooner. I still have a lot of indoctrination from a conservative upbringing that springs up in weird ways, and it's going to be a lifetime of listening, learning, and searching out those weak points to overcome that.
I strongly encourage everyone involved in events/community management to review your policies and, if you don't have it yet, include standards for dealing with state/federal threats, and for protecting from immigration/citizenship-based harassment and abuse.
It's easy to think that you're aware of how bad things are because you're part of a threatened community, like somehow that gives insight into dangers in other communities. But the current regime has made it clear that many of us were, sometimes willfully, ignorant of how dangerous this country is.
I've been helping create safety and conduct standards for most of my adult life. I am now including protections for immigration and citizenship status in the policies I consult on, and having a long, hard talk with myself about not having realized why this should always have been included.
For how much Google likes to claim it is THE search engine, Gmail search is *shit*.
I’m Sakher, and I’m telling you the truth they don’t show on the news. The aid that the world thinks is reaching us… never makes it to us. Most of it gets stolen before it even reaches the people. Some is sold in the black market at impossible prices…. 1/3 🙏💔 gofund.me/f116bf44
my grandmother's trusted family recipe handed down for generations five stars best results was to wash your cybertruck with saltwater and lemon juice to preserve the finish.
Fingers crossed! I have a number of people there as well.
Ocean rapidly retreating. Get away from the shore #Hawaii. #Tsunami incoming.
Fires, ICE, and tsunamis...the writers of this latest season need to give LA a break. Too many events in a season, starting to feel forced.
That feeling when you stretch juuuuust right and get a huge, much-needed series of crackles.
Also, there's nothing like the feeling of having done hard work on a hot day, knowing all the outside chores are done and you don't have anywhere to be, followed by a shower and a cool drink and just being lazy in comfy clothes.
This property is in good shape, mostly, but it's a pretty blank canvas, so it's allowed me to really make it my own space. Today, we spent a good hour+ in the heat, clearing overgrowth and opening the pond up, and I'm reminded of the happy tiredness of a tough project being *done*.
I grew up in the country, where Sundays were for big projects around the property. I got away from that in my 20s, but when the pandemic shut off a lot of my more social avenues, I found myself enjoying being outside more. I still miss a lot of pre-pandemic life, but this is pretty great, too.
(And I don't turn the lights on bc, if they have gone to bed, I get 1-3 pairs of eyes making this face at me and then get treated to a symphony of deep, accusatory groans. No, I am not the ruler of this house.)
And then walk back into the bathroom two minutes later to find Magni waiting for you, giving you the knowledge that he did, in fact, pass you in the darkness, unnoticed. Thank god the water was more interesting than making sure I'd survived being unsupervised by Shepherds.
That adrenaline-inducing moment when you walk, naked and warm from a bath, into the darkness of a room holding your clothes but maybe also 3 black dogs with cold noses, zero sense of personal space, and an urgent desire to speak to the manager about you having closed them out of a room for an HOUR.
Life with dogs: "Awww, what a cute momen--OH GOD SOMEONE FARTED."
Magni has *missed* me, so I have a very warm fur blanket under my feet tonight, as he has decided that he needs me to maintain physical contact.
Baldr is a pretty special creature, and an absolute lightweight.
Just smashed my heel on my own chair and started muttering "ow ow ow" under my breath and now Magni is judging me for waking him up. Right. Gotta keep my pain to myself.
Update: he was still a bit stoned this morning.
So far, I've been: told to go back to California, dismissed, condescended to, and mansplained. Which, granted, is relatively mild for commenting anywhere near the general public. Shoutout to the equally exhausted guy who replied with "but where's the fun in that when you have conspiracy theories?"
A string of fires broke out along the freeway near us today. Being from California, it's a pretty obvious and straightforward cause - a tow chain dragging. Happens all the time. I made the mistake of commenting on the fire department's post where people were speculating. Right. I'm an idiot.
Due to assholes setting off some really loud fireworks when I had the dogs out earlier, Baldr is now on trazadone. And he is *stoned*. His pupils are totally blown and he's just staring into a happy pink fog of bunnies and snacks. He's on half a dose. He is not in this universe.
One of the best things about Magni is he genuinely needs hugs to function. One of his favorite things is to tuck his head in the crook of your elbow or shoulder while you bearhug him, and it's just the sweetest thing, this apex predator being like, no, I need to be squished for my emotional comfort.
It hasn't ended, lots of people just deluded themselves and left the rest of us permanently being gaslit, which is its own additional trauma.
Also just wrote a chapter of a project with @brandoncrilly.bsky.social. Writing documentation/training text is something I genuinely enjoy, for some reason, and I'm lucky to have gotten into fields where I can indulge that. Very soothing and cathartic. However, Magni would like me to Go To Bed.
(Meanwhile, I will continue to self-medicate by immersing myself in tiny bottles of very expensive and nuanced liquid, aka indie perfume.)
Things have just kept getting so much worse since than that we're just scrambling to survive the next thing coming at us, but y'all, 2020 was *brutal*, and I am not ready to deal with that yet, I think.
As someone who still masks relentlessly - sometimes even outside, if it's crowded - and has had a strong adjustment to my life due to the pandemic, it's something I think about fairly frequently, but not in the terms of the actual PTSD for the survivors of a mass-casualty pandemic.
I've discovered that I can't watch reality stuff that takes place in 2020. There's just still too much emotion around it. I think there isn't enough discussion about the crushing anxiety and fear we lived through and how much PTSD so many of us still must have.
I've been binging the Netflix Formula 1 series and will now and forever refer to Formula 1 as "money-laundering go-karts". (Yes yes, they're very cool, I like things that go fast, but they're go-karts driven with fancy x-box controllers.)
Ah yes, I am glad we are loudly celebrating freedom on this *checks calendar* 12th of July in a country quickly sliding into complete fascism, during a major drought and heat wave. Good going, neighbors, you set off your little booms.
That moment when you're like "my alarm doesn't go off for 9 hours, I can read for a bit!" and then it is somehow 5am.
Weird
Also, did BlueSky switch back to not auto-capping the first letter of a sentence or am I just noticing it again?
My mom is here for a few days, which means my partner and I are suddenly of little interest as they all vie for her love. Which means, currently, that SHE is the one clinging to 6 inches of bed as a 70lb Shepherd keeps wriggling closer, slowly pushing her off the edge. My bed is very peaceful.
I have no love for MyChart on the best of days, but they just tried to do an "identity verification" on me through what I'm guessing is a third-party plug-in from Experian... ...WHICH ASKED FOR MY FUCKING ASTROLOGICAL SIGN.
Right??
We have a beautiful, misty, rainy, cool day in Seattle, which just makes next week's forecast heat wave feel all the more obnoxious. I desperately miss the Seattle summers from when I first moved here.
It is impressive (in all the wrong ways) how bad Microsoft is about multiple accounts. I have one account for county arts commission, and one for a freelance thing, and every time I sign in to either, it just flips its shit.
After the terror and stress of fireworks, all three dogs are snuggled up in various spots around us, snoring their heads off.
(I am giving myself a lot of forgiveness for this year, however, in that it's mildly miraculous I'm still afloat mentally and emotionally because this year has been ten years of trouble and trauma wedged into a clown car.)
I got so lucky that my early contemporaries/writing friends were superstars on the rise, but it definitely set a high bar that conflicts badly with my natural disbelief in my own ability which also mixed with writing stuff that is very, very hard to sell to create a disaster smoothie.
Okay, gonna try AGAIN to get my brain to stick to the writing stuff. Dug out a piece I started last year and made some good progress on it and sent it off for an ass-kicking, but I keep falling off the cliff somewhere. That whole gifted kid fear of failure thing.
Ahhh
Could be. :)
It's such weird energy! Like, okay bestie, cool your shit.