Philosophical Questions: Money

Aug. 30th, 2025 12:01 am
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
People have expressed interest in deep topics, so this list focuses on philosophical questions.


What would happen if a maximum income of was implemented?

Read more... )
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Our theme this month was "Books and Learning." I wrote from 1 PM to 4 AM, so about 13 hours, accounting for breaks. I wrote 2 poems on Tuesday and another 5 later in the week.

Participation was about the same, with 7 comments on LiveJournal and another 23 on Dreamwidth. A total of 9 people sent prompts.


Read Some Poetry!
The following poems from the August 5, 2025 Poetry Fishbowl have been posted:
"He Who Whispers"
"An Inkling of Things to Come"
"To Allow in More Light"


Buy some poetry!
If you plan to sponsor some poetry but haven't made up your mind yet, see the unsold poetry list from August 5. That includes the title, length, price, and the original thumbnail description for the poems still available.

This month's donors include: [personal profile] janetmiles and [personal profile] fuzzyred. All sponsored poems from this fishbowl have been posted. There are 0 tallies toward a bonus fishbowl.


The Poetry Fishbowl has a landing page.

Today's Cooking

Aug. 29th, 2025 10:53 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Tonight I am making Ginger Gold Apple Pie.  :D  I've added 1/2 teaspoon of tapioca starch in hopes of thickening the filling a bit, but otherwise it's the same as before.   If you see any, grab them -- these apples only appear for 2-3 weeks, usually in August.

8/29/25 -- Done!  it's delicious.  The tapioca starch helped, but I should've used a whole teaspoon.
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
The following poems from the August 5, 2025 Poetry Fishbowl are currently available. Poems may be sponsored via PayPal -- there's a permanent donation button on my Dreamwidth profile page -- or you can write to me and discuss other methods. There are still verses left in the linkback poems "Delight in Another," "A Sense of Weather Changes," "Ouroboros Insects," "The Loving Embrace of Night," "Generations of Cooks Past," "Homefree and Clear, " "One Bite at a Time," "Stars and Diamonds," "Mishpocha," "Changing Your Nature," and "Besa."


"The Most Prestigious Heritage"
Story Date: Sunday, July 12, 2015
Summary: Syrian families create a language nest in Rutledge.
447 lines, Buy It Now = $224

Sabra Mamoud loved working
at 'Aswat Saghira, or in English,
the Little Voices Language Nest.



These poems form a triptych, to be posted in order:

"Where You Find Light"
Story Date: Early June, 2016
Summary: Josué and Aidan set up a house for earthquake refugees, complete with books.
422 lines, Buy It Now = $211

As soon as Aidan recovered
from the Big One flattening him
with the weight of so many deaths
and disruptions all at once, he
began looking for ways to help.



"When You Learn to Read"
Story Date: Monday, June 13, 2016
Summary: Josué reads aloud to refugee children.
286 lines, Buy It Now = $143

Josué parked his bike and
then bounded up the steps
of the big, bright pink house,
already looking forward to
the afternoon's activities.



"No Faster or Firmer Friendships"
Story Date: Monday, June 13, 2016
Summary: Josué and Maria-Vera read together.
515 lines, Buy It Now = $258

Once they finished putting away
all the groceries, the children
and a few adults drifted back
into the living room area.

Indigenous People

Aug. 29th, 2025 08:14 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Cherokee, Osage, and the Indigenous North American Type Collection

After five years of community-partnered research with First Nations and Inuit communities in Canada and the United States, Typotheque is proud to announce the release of new Cherokee and Osage script fonts. Accompanying these is the Indigenous North American Type Collection, a large set of fonts that support the Indigenous communities in North America and their unique writing systems, in terms of digital access, use, and local typographic needs.


Speak it. Write it. Read it. Live it. Remember it.

"Helium Miner's Song" by Catamariner

Aug. 29th, 2025 08:02 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
"Helium Miner's Song" by [personal profile] catamariner  is up for a Pegasus Award.

The Meeting (part 1 of 1, complete)

Aug. 29th, 2025 07:32 pm
dialecticdreamer: My work (Default)
[personal profile] dialecticdreamer
The Meeting
By Dialecticdreamer/Sarah Williams
Part 1 of 1, complete
Word count (story only): 1797
[End of March 179-]


:: The detour ends with an unexpected obstacle, but Lazlo faces an even bigger surprise. Part of the “Lost Son” story arc in the Frankenstein’s Family universe. ::


:: Pay Special Attention: Laszlo expresses some internalized ableism. It’s clearly things that he’s heard from strangers or remote acquaintances, not part of his family upbringing. I hope to show decisions that supported his needs to balance that out. ::




The road carried them high in the hills, on a wide ridge still blurred with tall trees and undergrowth. They traveled southeast, until Trokhym patted Laszlo’s arm. “That crossroads goes back to Cluj-Napoca, but makes its way through the poorest edge of the city, near the rag- and bone-pickers and the handful of tanneries. Most people avoid the road for that reason, and take the better-tended, better-traveled route that you were on.

Laszlo nodded absently. “People warned me, especially when there was a storm building overhead. “Why pause here, though?”
Read more... )

Climate Change

Aug. 29th, 2025 05:06 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
New tech makes it easier to cool communities sweltering in urban heat islands

Take two streets in Boston at 4:30 p.m. on a recent day, as an example. Standing in the sun on Lewis Place, the temperature was 94 degrees Fahrenheit (34.6 degrees Celsius). On Dudley Common, it was 103 F (39.2 C).

Both streets were hot, but the temperature on one was much more dangerous for people’s health and well-being.

The kicker is that those two streets are only a few blocks apart. The difference epitomizes the urban heat island effect, created as pavement and buildings absorb and trap heat, making some parts of the city hotter
.

Read more... )
musesfool: Olivia Dunham, PI (there are blondes and blondes)
[personal profile] musesfool
All day on Wednesday, I thought it was Thursday, and all day yesterday, I thought it was today. But it was not! So I do have some Wednesday books posting to do, now on Friday!

What I've just finished
The Oleander Sword and The Lotus Empire by Tasha Suri, the second and third books in her Burning Kingdoms trilogy. Overall, I thought these two were much more engaging than the first book, and I wanted to know what happened next, but I wasn't blown away by them like I was by her Books of Ambha duology (which I highly recommend!).

Also I've read both Into the Riverlands and Mammoths at the Gate by Nghi Vo. I enjoy these novellas quite a bit and these two were wonderful. I especially liked the martial arts references in Riverlands and how Mammoths was about grief and stories, two of my favorite topics to read about!

What I'm reading now
The Brides of High Hill, the next Singing Hills Cycle novella by Nghi Vo. I've just started it but I'm enjoying it so far.

What I'm reading next
I am just happy to be reading at all so I cannot say! I thought the next Craft Wars book was out in September, but it looks like it's not until the end of October, so I guess we'll see!

Speaking of books, though, last night I watched the Netflix adaptation of The Thursday Murder Club and I enjoyed it - the casting is A++ for the most part (Helen Mirren is perfect as Elizabeth and Ben Kingsley is great as Ibrahim. And Pierce Brosnan remains ridiculously handsome.) - and I think 95% of the streamlining they did was fine, because there were a few two many twists and turns in the book, but spoiler for both book and movie ) I haven't read any of the other books in the series, though I'm sure I will eventually, but I hope it does well enough that they can make a few more movies with this set of actors.

Now I have to go take my strawberry summer cake out of the oven. I was invited to a cookout tomorrow at my sister's at the last moment, so I have to have a cake to bring!

*
[syndicated profile] bruce_schneier_feed

Posted by Bruce Schneier

First-person account of someone accidentally catching several Humboldt squid on a fishing line. No photos, though.

As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered.

Blog moderation policy.

Dear self (and partial to-do list)

Aug. 30th, 2025 09:41 am
china_shop: Guo Changcheng writing in his notebook (Guardian - rookie taking notes)
[personal profile] china_shop
Dear self,
You are not allowed to post any more discussion posts or similar until you've answered the majority of outstanding comments. (Great to see your corner of Dreamwidth being so active, though! Wheee! <3)
Love, me

Partial to-do list:
  1. [community profile] guardian_wishlist signup
  2. outstanding comments on the Guardian readalong, [community profile] fan_writers discussion and intro posts, and Guardian drama polls
  3. a fill for this round of [community profile] fan_flashworks
  4. behind-the-scenes FFW stuff & mod post draft
  5. write to MP and mayoral candidate; submit on All The Things
  6. finish my DNW-kink WIP ASAP
  7. finish my other WIP after that, and prepare for my annual Wishlist writing frenzy *fingers crossed, knock on wood*
  8. close a bunch of tabs, seriously
  9. rest my arms.

Venn Diagram

Aug. 29th, 2025 02:16 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
You are here.

Birdfeeding

Aug. 29th, 2025 02:10 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Today is mostly sunny and mild.

I fed the birds. I've seen a few sparrows and house finches.

EDIT 8/29/25 -- I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 8/29/25 -- I cut brush under the maple tree.

EDIT 8/29/25 -- I planted 2 Red Masterpiece irises under the maple tree and 2 Twist of Sheree purple-and-white irises in the purple-and-white garden.

EDIT 8/29/25 -- I watered the irises.

EDIT 8/29/25 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

I watered the old picnic table, patio plants, and house yard plants.

I picked 6 groundcherries and 1 yellow pear tomato.

EDIT 8/29/25 -- I did more work around the patio.

I watered the new picnic table, septic garden, telephone pole garden, and a few savanna seedlings.

Cicadas and crickets are singing.

As it is now dark, I am done for the night.
jesse_the_k: Scrabble triple-value badge reading "triple nerd score" (word nerd)
[personal profile] jesse_the_k

@etymologynerd on TikTok[youtube.com profile] etymology_nerd on YouTube (note underscore)

My first fandom is language. Let me enthuse about the Etymology Nerd Adam Aleksic. He's a short-form video presenter, essayist, and recently-published author. He started on Reddit, but attained fame on TikTok, and his YouTube is 90% shorts (but not every TikTok has made it to YouTube). It's important that his videos are accurately captioned, cause he speaks faster than an auctioneer on meth. No video description and his hand-held camera means flashing and shaking images. The videos reward multiple views.

six links to short videos, accurately captioned without video description )

Three Essays to Read

If you prefer prose, his Substack newsletter offers RSS at https://etymology.substack.com/feed or luck into one of his maybe-monthly essays here via [syndicated profile] etymologynerd_feed (DW feeds only go back two weeks).

Want more? My first internet #lingcomm crush interviewed Aleksic on Lingthusiasm podcast 105—both audio and transcript there, with insights into best practices in vertical video and why it feels different than old-style horizontals.

Any linguistic communicators making you happy?

marthawells: Murderbot with helmet (Default)
[personal profile] marthawells
If you missed the live recording of the Murderbot interview episode at WorldCon, you can watch it here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-JRHSABM24

This includes the special message to me that the show's cast sent, which was awesome.


***


I'm still sick, but getting better bit by bit.

Writing

Aug. 29th, 2025 01:00 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
How I, a non-developer, read the tutorial you, a developer, wrote for me, a beginner

“Hello! I am a developer. Here is my relevant experience: I code in Hoobijag and sometimes jabbernocks and of course ABCDE++++ (but never ABCDE+/^+ are you kidding? ha!) and I like working with Shoobababoo and occasionally kleptomitrons. I’ve gotten to work for Company1 doing Shoobaboo-ing code things and that’s what led me to the Snarfus. So, let’s dive in!

Read more... )

… so I’m playing Dark Souls

Aug. 29th, 2025 05:53 pm
rydra_wong: Lee Miller photo showing two women wearing metal fire masks in England during WWII. (Default)
[personal profile] rydra_wong
That is a thing that is happening.

My standard joke here is that any game involving reflexes and coordination is going to be an excruciating experience of innumerable repeated failures for me, so I might as well play one where that's the point. This is only partly a joke.

Necessary context for anyone who has not met me IRL: I am dyspraxic as fuck. I was in my late twenties at least, possibly thirties, before I could catch an object being gently thrown to me across a short distance. My coordination, reflexes and ability to react to multiple inputs in real-time are so bad that I can't drive (or cycle on the road) because it would be OBVIOUSLY WILDLY DANGEROUS for me to even try (people would die). I have to buy special shatterproof crockery because otherwise my plate turnover is so high.

It was only with climbing that I learned that I can actually acquire motor skills, some of them, slowly, if I have unlimited time to practice them on my own terms.

Further necessary context: I'd been looking wistfully at the Soulsbornes for ages -- having seen videos such as Jonny Sims's Bloodborne streams -- as something that I'd probably love if I only had any coordination or ability at all to cope with having to react to multiple rapid inputs in real-time.

One of my climber friends has argued that Soulslike games are basically the same as working on a hard boulder project: you fail and fail and fail and fail and that's the process, each time you try to learn a bit more or try something new, and gradually you make progress, and eventually, hopefully, you don't fail.

And that's a process that I fucking love, and that works very well for my brain. Perverse stubbornness is my jam.

But when I look at something like Bloodborne -- the combat exchange is over before I can even track who's where and what's happened.

So I was thinking grumpily/wistfully and in secret about how what I really wanted was not an "easy mode," but a Soulsborne game that I could adjust the speed on (maybe set it all to 20-30% slower!), just so I could get my foot in the door, just so I could begin to maybe try.

And I watched more videos of other games, and somewhere along the way I watched people figuring out and/or being coached on how to get through the fight with the Asylum Demon at the end of the tutorial* in Dark Souls 1.

(I also read that Dark Souls 1 has the slowest and, in some people's eyes, "clunkiest" combat of the Souls games — not necessarily the easiest, but more tactical, less fast-twitch.)

And I thought, "... huh, I wonder, if I really worked at it, maybe I could beat the Asylum Demon? That would be kind of cool."

To be clear: I bought the game with the goal of seeing if I could beat the tutorial.

Cut for length )

Profile

sigerson: (Default)
sigerson

July 2019

S M T W T F S
  123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031   

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Aug. 30th, 2025 05:33 am
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios