redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)
Redbird ([personal profile] redbird) wrote2025-08-13 01:49 pm
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home

I came home yesterday afternoon, and spent yesterday enjoying the air conditioning and catching up on some PT that requires equipment I didn't take with me to Montreal, like a foam roller.

I woke up in time to get outside before it got too hot; conveniently, Adrian came back from a walk when I was about ready to leave, and decided to come to the store with me. I enjoyed the company, and two people can carry more groceries than one, so we now have a small watermelon, a box of lettuce, blueberries, tahini, blackberry jam, and non-dairy ice cream.

[personal profile] cattitude and I played Scrabble yesterday, and I've been doing other ordinary things like combing the long-haired cat and taking out recycling.

It's hot outside today (still), but the kitchen was cool enough at noon for me to make oatmeal for lunch. Adrian made a frittata when we got back from the store this morning, for tonight's supper.
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james_davis_nicoll ([personal profile] james_davis_nicoll) wrote2025-08-13 10:09 am
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Women Have Always Written SFF — But It Wasn’t Always Easy to Find



In the 1970s, many of the best new authors were women — the trick was finding their work.

Women Have Always Written SFF — But It Wasn’t Always Easy to Find

Yes, I know comments are not working. No, I have no control over that. Yes, I have mentioned the issue repeatedly. No, I don't know when it will be fixed.
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james_davis_nicoll ([personal profile] james_davis_nicoll) wrote2025-08-13 08:54 am

RuriDragon, volume 6 by Masaoki Shindo



Bathed in unquenchable fire, Ruri struggles to maintain her grade point average.

RuriDragon, volume 6 by Masaoki Shindo
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andrewducker ([personal profile] andrewducker) wrote2025-08-13 02:07 am
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tamaranth ([personal profile] tamaranth) wrote2025-08-13 07:55 am
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2025/126: A Haunting on the Hill — Elizabeth Hand

2025/126: A Haunting on the Hill — Elizabeth Hand
“If you’re scared, channel that into Tomasin.”
“He’s a demon. He doesn’t get scared.”
“So tap into that. You’re a demon in a big spooky house—you should feel right at home.”
“I do...That’s what scares me.” [p. 176]

This isn't exactly a sequel to The Haunting of Hill House: it's more of a tribute, with a rather different ambience. Read more... )

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tamaranth ([personal profile] tamaranth) wrote2025-08-13 07:23 am
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2025/125: The Corn King and the Spring Queen — Naomi Mitchison

2025/125: The Corn King and the Spring Queen — Naomi Mitchison
All I can say is that this is a very strange country, and that one has evidence of things occurring here which would certainly be against all the laws of Nature at home. [p. 412]

Reread, with perhaps a better understanding now of the Greek elements: I thought I'd read it quite recently, but it turns out that was in 2015 (review here).

I'd forgotten a great deal: just how murderous Erif and Tarrik are; the snake that protects Kleomenes; the death of Harn Der. And this time around, more interested in the Greek (and especially the Spartan) elements, I found Kleomenes' story fascinating. Read more... )

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james_davis_nicoll ([personal profile] james_davis_nicoll) wrote2025-08-12 08:56 am

The Four Wishes (Cheon of Weltanland, volume 1) By Charlotte Stone



War crime survivor turned expert swordswoman and student sorcerer Cheon resolves to obliterate the nation responsible, make herself queen, and find a like-minded woman to court.

The Four Wishes (Cheon of Weltanland, volume 1) by Charlotte Stone
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bibliofile ([personal profile] bibliofile) wrote2025-08-11 01:42 pm
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Univ. of Chicago Press: 75% off ebooks, Aug. 11-17

I don't know if this is limited to the US. (If you find out, please comment.)

The sale includes publishers that the University of Chicago Press distributes: Acre Books, Bard Graduate Center, Brandeis University Press, Center for the Study of Language and Information, Gingko Library, Haus Publishing, Iter Press, Karolinum Press, Charles University, Seagull Books, Swan Isle Press, and The American Meteorological Society.

Use the code EBOOK75

https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/virtualCatalog/vc106.html
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james_davis_nicoll ([personal profile] james_davis_nicoll) wrote2025-08-11 02:26 pm
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Bundle of Holding: Ironsworn-Starforged



Ironsworn, Starforged, and Sundered Isles, tabletop roleplaying games of perilous fantasy, space opera, and seafaring adventure by Tomkin Press.

Bundle of Holding: Ironsworn-Starforged
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james_davis_nicoll ([personal profile] james_davis_nicoll) wrote2025-08-11 11:18 am
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Clarke Award Finalists 2009

2009: The Horrible Histories TV show debuts, Britons are treated to a Giles-worthy winter, and police decline to investigate the cash for influence incident so that they might better focus on the custard-tossing scandal rocking the nation.

Poll #33480 Clarke Award Finalists 2009
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 31


Which 2009 Clarke Award Finalists Have You Read?

View Answers

Song of Time by Ian R. MacLeod
1 (3.2%)

Anathem by Neal Stephenson
26 (83.9%)

House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds
9 (29.0%)

Martin Martin's on the Other Side by Mark Wernham
0 (0.0%)

The Margarets by Sheri S. Tepper
6 (19.4%)

The Quiet War by Paul J. McAuley
7 (22.6%)



Bold for have read, italic for intend to read, underline for never heard of it.

Which 2009 Clarke Award Finalists Have You Read?
Song of Time by Ian R. MacLeod
Anathem by Neal Stephenson
House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds

Martin Martin's on the Other Side by Mark Wernham
The Margarets by Sheri S. Tepper
The Quiet War by Paul J. McAuley


With an * on the McAuley because it was too grim and I didn't finish it.
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andrewducker ([personal profile] andrewducker) wrote2025-08-11 03:53 pm
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Life with two kids: movements in the night

I went to the toilet at 4am a few days ago, and bumped into Gideon coming back from a toilet trip. Apparently he just takes himself if he wakes up in the night. No idea how long this has been going on for!

(Sophia comes and gets me, for company.)
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james_davis_nicoll ([personal profile] james_davis_nicoll) wrote2025-08-10 10:18 pm
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Congratulations to the 2025 Aurora Award Winners!

The winners are:

Best Novel: The Siege of Burning Grass, Premee Mohamed, Solaris
Best YA Novel: Heavenly Tyrant, Xiran Jay Zhao, Tundra Books
Best Novelette/Novella: The Butcher of the Forest, Premee Mohamed, Tordotcom
Best Short Story: “Blood and Desert Dreams“, Y.M. Pang, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Issue 408
Best Graphic Novel: Star Trek Lower Decks: Warp Your Own Way, Ryan North, art by Chris Fenoglio, IDW Publishing
Best Poem/Song “Cthulhu on the Shores of Osaka“, Y.M. Pang, Invitation: A One-shot Anthology of Speculative Fiction
Best Related Work: Year’s Best Canadian Fantasy and Science Fiction: Volume Two
Stephen Kotowych, editor, Ansible Press
Best Cover Art/Interior Illustration: Augur Magazine, Issue 7.1, cover art, Martine Nguyen
Best Fan Writing and Publication: SF&F Book Reviews, Robert Runté, Ottawa Review of Books
Best Fan Related Work: murmurstations, Sonia Urlando, Augur Society, podcast
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mdlbear ([personal profile] mdlbear) wrote2025-08-10 10:20 pm

Done Since 2025-08-03

Up and down. Ame's thirty-fifth birthday, and the atomic bombings 80 years ago. OTOH m's return from the US Wednesday, and for some reason I noticed being in a good mood shortly before bedtime. Possibly from getting out of one of my support groups early. Or it could have been something somebody said in the group. Also, my balance seems to be improving a little after finding a test that I can practice against. But I should also find some exercises.

Not exactly a good week for walking either. I skipped Tuesday because (IIRC) I was running late after helping N give Cricket her meds, and had a doctor's appointment after that. Then I did something unpleasant to my right ankle Friday morning, probably on the stairs with an excessively heavy bag of garbage. (Mostly cat litter.) I went to the end of the block and back this morning but didn't want to push my luck. I have no idea what became of my little plastic bin full of knee, ankle, and wrist braces.

On the gripping hand, I have the old household server, Nova, running again. That's notable mainly (only?) because it's still running Mint version 21.3, so it still has Python 2 installed, so I can run my Dreamwidth posting client on it. (I also have it on Raven, but N is borrowing it. When she's done with it I'll be able to upgrade it.)

Nova is headless. I could ping it, but not ssh to it, which turned out to be because it was on the wrong subnet. Fixable by widening the netmask on Nova and one laptop. That was an interesting exercise, though, because I had to do it over ssh (i.e. without a display), which meant that I had to learn the text user interface for Network Manager. Feeling mildly accomplished from that.

Also, m and I had a good rehearsal of Ship of Stone yesterday. The plan is to do one song per day to use as scratch tracks for the next album. My intended recording hardware was not cooperating -- I seem to be missing one of my large-diaphragm vocal mics. May have to fix that. Meanwhile I used my trusty old Zoom H2, which is perfectly adequate for scratch tracks.

In links, last week Mastodon was added to the Digital Public Goods Alliance’s Registry, which is pretty cool. And the World’s first Facebook museum helps users face the future after its hoped-for demise.

Notes & links, as usual )

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andrewducker ([personal profile] andrewducker) wrote2025-08-10 08:10 pm

I've taken a lot of photos.

My Dropbox Camera Uploads folder was up to 115GB and 18,000 files (dating back to 2010). So I went through and divided it into subfolders based loosely on years. Turns out that I take as many photos per year since Sophia was born as I took in the whole time from 2010 until her birth.

And that I take about 2,000 photos/videos per year, coming to about 15GB.

I also discovered that if you move 2,000 files from one Dropbox folder to another then it takes about 15 minutes to process the changes!
redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)
Redbird ([personal profile] redbird) wrote2025-08-10 01:10 pm

Too hot

It is too hot here to do much, alas. Friday was OK, but it was too hot yesterday for me to eant to go out—possibly doable, but sitting outside for lunch would have been unpleasant— and it’s not forecast to improve until after I leave.


So mostly I am sitting in the only air conditioned room in the apartment, reading. This isn’t exactly bad, but it doesn’t feel worth the trip, in terms of either dollars or the hassle of traveling.
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andrewducker ([personal profile] andrewducker) wrote2025-08-10 10:59 am
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Photo cross-post


Pretty big fire on Arthur's Seat.

(The kids were just discussing whether the volcano had erupted, which I think we're pretty safe from.)
Original is here on Pixelfed.scot.