Definitely is, which is why I hoard a standing fan, because I can’t sleep without at least my comfort blanket and I’d perish from overheating otherwise, lol. (And in the winter, why I have a really heavy top blanket to layer with.)
3 Likes
The first night back, there wasn’t anything much by the way of groceries, so I sat down and ate a very strange meal. It works because it’s using the same flavour profile as a really yummy dish, but the textures are optimized for silly kitty enjoyment and could be kind of offputting to people who don’t normally think of combining the items. It’s one of those foods that’re a ‘guilty pleasure’ because you know it’s probably not all that great for you, but it’s delicious on the rare occasion you start craving it.
As far as I know, my da doesn’t know that I eat this because I’ve never put it together in front of him before and it’s not really come up before. I was really surprised, but also amused, when he texted me a picture of his breakfast and it was the same damn thing, through sheer coincidence. I didn’t know he ate this either. I guess we both organically came to the same conclusions that it should probably work, and found that it did? I always like finding things that we have in common- I look up to my dad a lot, and he’s one of the most important people in my life.
Anyways, it’s always nice to hear from daddy. He ribbed me gently about being up surprisingly early by Sophie loafing around on holiday standards, and told me mock-sternly to get plenty of rest because I’ve been a little physically fucked up (lots of bands of bruising, I’m a Monet of subdermal bleeding.) I’m never one to turn down curling up and relaxing in bed- I don’t nap, not because I don’t want to, I just find it incredibly difficult to sleep at the best of times, so conking out for funsies is off of the table- but laying down beneath the covers and just relaxing is nice, to enjoy the weight of the blankets and the softness of my silk pillowcase and snuggle up with the stuffed animals (of which I have basically like, an armada.) Reunited at last with my Gund plushie of a little polar-bear with wings, his name is Michael- he has a bell inside of him and he jingles if you shake him, like I showed Pinkz and Joey today.
5 Likes
We’re back to drinking good coffee (not right now, but I do so adore my French press) and I’ve just realized I completely cut adding sugar to it, since I haven’t felt the need to. There’s coconut milk in the house, which is what I’ve been adding instead of the usual lactose-free dairy milk, since it’s a huge carton and otherwise it’d never get finished, and it’s surprisingly nice. I was worried it might be kind of gross (almond milk is disgusting in coffee, but oat or soy milk is perfectly fine) and am pleased that it’s not icky.
4 Likes
After final projects, and final exams, and grading people’s final projects and final exams, and then dealing with my body failing in particular ways due to stress…now at last I’m free!
Time to go continue the Let’s Play, and catch up on the best of the Seedcomp and Spring Thing games I’ve missed (I want to definitely play any games that used my seeds and that parkour game), and finally brush the dust off my IFComp WIP.
7 Likes
Yes, and then you’re left with a cloth-covered blank enigma of a book like the red one in the top right corner.
When I’m browsing second-hand bookshops, I’m always drawn to these.
4 Likes
The red book is one of the books in the Bartimaeus Sequence! Really snarky, somewhat cynical, experienced and older djinn is dragged along adventures with a young magician who summons him. The worldbuilding and how they handle their magic system is really awesome, and in the later books Kitty is a fun character. Also the set of books that inspired my love of footnotes, as Bartimaeus often adds historical anecdotes from his own (very long) life or references hysterical frat boy-esque antics.
3 Likes
One of the blank books I found was The Hotel by Arthur Hailey.
Weird use of commas and semicolons, which only added to my slow reading of he book.
Another was Cecilia Holland’s Pillar of the Sky. It jumped out at me with a drab green cover and rewarded me with a great story of coming of age (subverted…)
4 Likes
I’ve read “The hotel” decades ago and I liked it very much.
I know Bartimaeus, too. At least the first book. It’s very funny and exciting. Unfortunately it was hard to read for me, me having concentration problems with some texts.
I wonder which title is sophia’s blue book very left in the third row, I think. In the third picture, under the ice bear. It’s visibly very much used. Either you got the book from someone else or you’ve read it very often.
4 Likes
That one is the Night Circus! It’s actually sort of falling apart, as the spine was worn down to the soft cardboard beneath and the front hinges off to expose the glue and threads.
I really loved the use of first person in some brief transitionary chapters- but I also deeply related to Cecelia’s troubled upbringing and her fraught relationship with independence and her biological father. There’s this one scene where he crushes her hand and forces her to heal it on her own under the pretence of teaching her self discipline, (which is said to be a somewhat frequent thing happening) and her despair and fury resonated with my own experiences. A lot of the physical confrontations between the two were very familiar- but especially the intermingled sorrow and anger at feeling too small for your rage against someone with entirely too much control over your public persona and private self.
I also love the chapters with Poppet and her twin- they’re the cat trainers, but they’re quite young, so they teach kittens and cats tricks, while their parents teach the big cats like leopards and lions to jump through hoops and such. The kittens are so cute! And it was a lot of fun reading about them being silly and climbing the tree and squirrelling away the little trinkets and tokens of childhood that look like rubbish to adults but are magical and wonderful when you’re that young.
I bought it new- but just read it to death because I loved the book so much.
6 Likes
The rain-tank isn’t potable water, is it? Used for washing but not drinking?
4 Likes
Now that the semester’s over, the university libraries have reduced hours, but it seems they’re not always rigorous about locking the doors. I found an unlocked side door just when the sun was starting to set, returned my books, then spent a while just enjoying the ambience: everything absolutely silent, no footsteps or voices to be heard, all the lights out, just the deep gold sunlight coming in through the high windows.
8 Likes
Yes, it’s our drinking water, too. It’s got a million filters and UV lights and newfangled gizmos that make it super clean. It’s so clean that it has no taste at all.
5 Likes
I was going to ask how you deal with bird poo in the tank. 
2 Likes
I guess a good thing that happened today is that I kept from completely losing it while replying to Seagate support today.
I have a bad NVME drive that I need to return, but the “support” guy is insisting I send him screenshots of Windows device manager and disk management before he’ll allow the return. This is despite the fact I’ve told him twice that the computer will not boot as the drive isn’t recognized at all and it is the OS drive. Nevermind the fact I’m not running Windows, which would sail right over his head.
5 Likes
It was really cool to see that the IF Magazine that some meowmeows on the forums had been talking about coming together to make, was launched. I’m pretty curious to read the articles- though I don’t really have any ideas of what I would pitch to them in terms of submitting anything myself… Maybe something about Goncharov, but like, there are better people for that (Autumn comes to mind, since she was the organizer of the jam and is giving a talk at Narrascope about the whole experience.) Still, exciting to see! I was really happy to see some familiar names on there- people I’ve come to really admire for their way with the written word and analysis already.
5 Likes
That was my very first question to the rain tank people! It’s a closed tank, sealed up. We have a metal roof on the house, and the water picks up poop and pollen and all that, goes through a fine mesh into the gutters (the mesh has to be replaced every so often) and goes down the downspouts to underground pipes and is then pumped up through a bunch of filters into the tank, where it routinely is filtered through the filter and UV system. A couple of times a day it whooshes on and sounds like the ocean as the water is filtered through the tank. Then it runs through more filters when it comes out of the tank into the house. It’s way cleaner than tap water.
9 Likes
Jinx and I have been writing away at our collaborative game for the Anti-Romance jam, and I’ve been having a delightful time writing the love letters between the Imperial Triad as supplemental content to intersperse between the main correspondence between Enoch and Esme. Also, writing Enoch is so funny, because he has a scathing sense of humour, while being incredibly awkward and shy about other things.
It’s been really fun alluding to the relationship dynamics between Enoch, Andrey, and Nicholas, (they are in a polyamorous relationship) and how they differ in approaching love letters. Enoch being so factual and leaning more on direct observations, Andrey being more forthcoming and flirty, and Nicholas focusing on how thoroughly his life is permeated with reminders of the men he loves… They’re just meowmeows in love, your honor.
6 Likes
Things Esme wishes were applicable to her (or maybe weren’t?). 
This collaborative game has been really fun to work on - my first collab project! - as we bounce ideas off each other and keysmash at each other’s sections.
I’ve also done some experimenting away from my usual style for the UI and I’m really pleased with how it’s turned out!
6 Likes
It will become extra positive once it’s in my stomach, because the wait is currently torture:
(I shared the recipe of my pissaladière, a traditional dish of Provence in the Recipe Exchange thread)
It smells so good I can’t cope… but can’t eat it before friends are there eitherr 
7 Likes