ysabetwordsmith: Damask smiling over their shoulder (polychrome)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
This was previously published on LiveJournal December 19, 2020.


This poem is spillover from the July 2, 2019 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by prompts from Dreamwidth users Dialecticdreamer and Siliconshaman. It also fills the "Just Friends" square in my 7-1-19 card for the Winterfest in July Bingo. This poem belongs to the Shiv thread of the Polychrome Heroics series.

Warning: This poem features detailed discussion of kink, so please consider your tastes and headspace before reading onward.

This microfunded poem is being posted one verse at a time, as donations come in to cover them. The rate is $0.25/line, so $5 will reveal 20 new lines, and so forth. There is a permanent donation button on my profile page, or you can contact me for other arrangements. You can also ask me about the number of lines per verse, if you want to fund a certain number of verses.
So far sponsors include: [personal profile] ng_moonmoth, [personal profile] technoshaman, [personal profile] fuzzyred, [personal profile] bairnsidhe, general fund

FULLY FUNDED
1132 lines, Buy It Now = $141.50
Amount donated = $110
Verses posted = 118 of 325

Amount remaining to fund fully = $31.50
Amount needed to fund next verse = $0.25
Amount needed to fund the verse after that = $0.50


Read more... )
fayanora: Steph book (Steph book)
[personal profile] fayanora
I have been having issues reading for the last year or so, you might be aware. Only thing I had been reading during that time had been audiobooks, and even then sometimes I wasn't able to finish them. Well I finally managed to read something that wasn't an audiobook. It was a novella, but still...

A few weeks ago I bought "What Stalks The Deep" by T. Kingfisher on Kobo because I had signed up for a Kobo account to get books through them instead of on Amazon, and this one was on sale some weeks ago so I bought it and it languished there for a while, until I got bored enough to start reading it. I was mildly annoyed that I had missed the fact it wasn't an audiobook, but I soldiered on ahead anyway. And in just like, two or three days, I read the whole thing! Helps that it's a novella, but still... progress. Also mildly annoyed it's number three in a series, but the little bits of spoilers in the book for book 1 and 2 just has me all the more excited to read those.

Here's the review I wrote on GoodReads about it:

An excellent book filled with a mix of horror, Westerns, humor, and sci-fi. I love the casual LGBT representation done without stereotypes. All the characters are just ordinary people, ultimately, like in the real world. Yes, the era the books take place in is well before most modern terminology, but the books reflect that, everything feeling organic to the setting and the times.

An aspect of that is that one of the LGBT representations in this book was such a slow burn that it took the main character -- who by today's terminology in the West would be "non-binary, presenting male, assigned female at birth" -- half the book to suspect what was going on, and took even longer for that to be confirmed.

The main character's culture and gender is fascinating, too. Alex is Galacian, and in that culture apparently they have half a dozen different sets of pronouns, the one Alex uses is the set for soldiers: ka/kan. But they also have pronouns for men, women, children, priests, rocks, and God. And because the Galacian culture is a real world culture (in what is currently part of Spain), that just makes it all the more fascinating.

I was also deeply fascinated with the biology of this book's monster, and it is making me deeply eager to read the other books in the series. Because yes, I didn't realize this was the third book in the series when I bought it, and so I need to go back and read books one and two. But while this book does have some spoilers for those first two books, I don't think I'm really losing out on much by reading them out of order.


-- https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7650697029?book_show_action=false

Food

Feb. 16th, 2026 05:54 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
This planet friendly diet could cut your risk of early death by 23%

A planet-friendly Nordic diet may slash your risk of early death by nearly 25%.

A major new study suggests that eating the Nordic way could help you live significantly longer—while also helping the planet. Researchers from Aarhus University found that people who closely followed the 2023 Nordic dietary guidelines had a 23% lower risk of death compared to those who didn’t
.

Compare with other healthy and/or eco-friendly diets.  Notice the confluence of eating less red meat and more whole plant foods.

Climatarian

Flexitarian

Mediterranean

Vegetarian

Half-Price Sale in Not Quite Kansas

Feb. 16th, 2026 04:10 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
This week, the poetry of Not Quite Kansas is on sale for half price from Monday, February 16 through Sunday, February 22. This series is dark fantasy with angels and demons. It features themes of spirituality, cosmology, coming of age, identity, family of choice, friendship, and magic. Sale prices range from $89 to $146.50, so hopefully there will be something for everyone.

Prices on open epics are locked at the time of opening; however, if anyone wants to donate to open epics and buy poetry, spending $100 will get you the quarter-price rate on the new poems, regardless of the rate on the open epic(s) you support. There are no open epics at present, so you may open one if you wish.

We are repeating the special discount for purchases of $100 or more, in which you get poetry at 25% of its original price instead of 50%. (Note that this increases the amount of poetry you get, rather than reducing the amount of money spent; the point is to get this stuff off of my desk. Yes, I can afford it.) That size of donation also makes you a k-fan which comes with some other perks, like a year-end collection of a poetic series. If several folks want to bundle their orders to make the $100 threshold and have one person send it all, that's okay; you'll get the discount and I'll list all your names as donors, but you'll have to decide amongst you who gets the k-fan credit. If you host a pool, please close it the day before the sale closes, so you have time to collect funds and turn them in on time.

Some of the poems are in sequence of related action, so in places there are prerequisites before a poem can be published. They can be sponsored at any time, just might have to wait for publication until something else gets posted first. Those are marked accordingly. I have also made lists of poems which unlock sequels, and poems which have prerequisites.

Linkback perk: The following poems have verses left to reveal. Boost the signal for this half-price sale and tell me which poem you want to extend.
"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,"
"Besa."




Read more... )

(no subject)

Feb. 16th, 2026 02:29 pm
harpers_child: melaka fray reading from "Tales of the Slayers". (Default)
[personal profile] harpers_child
Shout out to the jackass rider in Thoth who threw my sister a roofied shot of fireball. (It was factory sealed. We don't know how it was spiked.) ((Smallest sister usually wouldn't accept random booze from a stranger, but had just received news that her PHD project had passed a committee and was going to the ethics review board. In the moment YOLO feelings were strong.))

Smallest sister is okay. She threw up and had a not great evening, but didn't even feel particularly hungover this morning.

If you ever suspect you've been drugged via a drink, throw up as soon as you can. Getting the drugs out of your stomach before they're fully absorbed will make things less bad.

Smallest sister will be contacting the Krewe and reporting the jackass when she's less mad.
jadelennox: Bad ass TOS Uhura, glaring daggers after being struck by Kahn. (uhura)
[personal profile] jadelennox

Maura Healey on state agreements with ICE: “I support them” (via [syndicated profile] the_mass_dump_feed):

At her January press conference, Healey said she was “prohibiting state agencies from entering into any new 287(g) agreements unless there is a clear and imminent public safety need.” But that part of her executive order contains so many caveats as to be completely meaningless. By only prohibiting new agreements, Healey is keeping the existing one.

“I actually support that agreement,” she said. “When you’re incarcerated under … the custody of the Department of Correction, that means you’ve done something pretty bad.”

The whole post is worth reading. It's a complex situation for activists to respond to because the current situation is an improvement over the pre executive order status quo, and the activist groups need to encourage the governor to do more. And yet also, what an absolute trash human.

All my reactions to "when you’re incarcerated under the custody of the Department of Correction, that means you’ve done something pretty bad" (eg. "no it doesn't oh my god" and "as a society we've agree upon a term of incarceration for certain crimes and when that term of incarceration is over we consider the person to have paid their debt to society" and "the DOC operates multiple minimum security facilities where people work in town and there aren't even walls" and "this is what happens when your governor was the attorney general" and "I guess that's why you don't care about the deaths of Ayesha Johnson and Shacoby Kenny who were only in the county jail" and "ugh the worst east Arlington lesbian is the worst") but mostly my reaction is just flames on the side of my face and also I know you all can say it better than I can.

So, you know. If I were a good person I'd get involved in the fuckery of the Massachusetts Democratic Party but I ain't got the juice. (Tarik Samman is running against Katherine Clark, at least.)

Anyway, support BIJAN, Maura Healey sucks.

Birdfeeding

Feb. 16th, 2026 01:54 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Today is partly sunny and cool.

I fed the birds.  I've seen a flock of sparrows, a starling, a male cardinal, a male house finch, and a fox squirrel.  There are probably other house finches mixed in with the sparrows.  The fox squirrel was eating from the hopper feeder at first, then went up the tree to forage among the branches -- I think it was eating the buds off the twigs.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 2/16/26 -- I took some pictures around the yard.

EDIT 2/16/26 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 2/16/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

I put out a fresh cake of peanut suet and a corncob.

EDIT 2/16/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

I am done for the night.
jadelennox: its the story of an ice cube but every time he feels happy it make him melt a little bit more (story of an ice cube)
[personal profile] jadelennox

one of my more annoying traits is that if I wouldn't like something that I know other people enjoy, I find it very difficult to do for the person who'd enjoy it because it feels rude to me. I wouldn't like it, after all, so why should I do it to someone else?

I know is this is messed up, especially because I often dislike being asked about my day, or being thanked, or receiving presents, or receiving any but very specific forms of recognition. (The Mortifying Agony of Being Seen is a real bugger.)


Apropos of nothing, [personal profile] james makes absolutely gorgeous crafts.

Monday Update 2-16-26

Feb. 16th, 2026 12:11 am
ysabetwordsmith: Artwork of the wordsmith typing. (typing)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
These are some posts from the later part of last week in case you missed them:
Safety
Artificial Intelligence
Science
Birdfeeding
Activism
Books
Poem: "If You Don't Fall Down"
Birdfeeding
Moment of Silence: Spikedluv
Space Exploration
Creative Jam
Philosophical Questions: Emotions
Pinetree Garden Seeds Order
Poetry Fishbowl Report for February 3, 2026
Unsold Poems for the February 3, 2026 Poetry Fishbowl
Vocabulary: Dinkus
Poem: "An Inkling of Things to Come"
Climate Change
Birdfeeding
Follow Friday 2-13-26: Lord of the Rings
Read "Forelsket"
Poem: "Stones and Woods"
Extinction
Birdfeeding
Community Thursdays
Website Updates
Poem: "The Tranquility and Beauty of the Winter Landscape"
Birdfeeding
Good News

Safety has 44 comments. Food has 45 comments. Wildlife has 37 comments. Food has 65 comments. Robotics has 136 comments.


There will be a half-price sale in Not Quite Kansas from February 16-22.


The 2026 Rose and Bay Awards are now open for excellence in crowdfunding. It's time to vote for your favorite projects!

The award period for eligible activities spans January 1-December 31, 2025.
The nomination period spans January 1-January 31, 2026.
The voting period spans February 1-February 28, 2026.

These are the handlers for the 2026 award season:
Art: [personal profile] gs_silva Nominate art! Vote for art!
Fiction: [personal profile] fuzzyred Nominate fiction! Vote for fiction!
Poetry: [personal profile] gs_silva Nominate poetry! Vote for poetry!
Webcomic: [personal profile] curiosity Nominate webcomics! Vote for webcomics!
Other Project: [personal profile] curiosity Nominate other projects! Vote for other projects!
Patron: [personal profile] fuzzyred Nominate patrons! Vote for patrons!

The weather has been cool here, and it rained a little on Saturday. Seen at the birdfeeders this week: a large flock of sparrows, several starlings, a mourning dove, and a male cardinal. I saw a honeybee in the forest garden, and when I went out to the bee tree, I saw a bee flying into it. This is way too early for them to be out; there is liquid water but absolutely no food.

Safety

Feb. 15th, 2026 09:53 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Say it again: Abortion bans don't stop abortion. They only cause women and infants to die.

The Society of Family Planning, a reproductive-rights nonprofit, compiles a report called #WeCount that tracks the number of abortions in the United States. The report goes back to 2022, and the most recent data covers the first half of 2025.

Its data shows that the abortion rate hasn't gone down at all since the end of Roe. It's gone up.


Read more... )

vital functions

Feb. 15th, 2026 10:56 pm
kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett

Reading. A Variety of books with the Child, including One Fish, Two Fish and A Squeeze and a Squash.

For my own purposes I have been continuing with The Rose Field, Philip Pullman, and I do indeed continue unimpressed. Not enough to stop! But.

I also picked up What Is Queer Food? (John Birdsall) from the library when I was having an insomnia; I have made it most of the way through the introduction but I am not yet grabbed.

Writing. Words... increase.

Listening. More Hidden Almanac catch-up! "While doing the laundry" or indeed "weeding" continues to work quite well.

Playing. Puzzle progresses! I am not calculating current %age but Significant Progress.

I think we did a leeeeettle bit more of our current run of Inkulinati? But it is petering out.

Cooking. Pineapple upside-down banana bread! This time with some ground almond in it. Otherwise I think... very little of note.

Eating. I was very excited to get to try a Neuhaus dark chocolate poppy seed praline, which on the one hand was not actually quite as dark as I would like and on the other has given me Ideas.

Growing. I got some broad beans in the ground?

Artificial Intelligence

Feb. 15th, 2026 04:44 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Another AI Post -- on Assumptions and the Future

A discussion with a knowledgeable friend on this triggered the following post, which will cover a number of elements of both the technology and, perhaps more importantly, its uses and impacts.


AI would be a useful tool if used responsibly, but mostly it is used so people can hurt each other.

+cries in knitter+

Feb. 15th, 2026 02:24 pm
althea_valara: Icon captioned "a woman bracing herself." (bracing)
[personal profile] althea_valara
So Final Fantasy XIV has these fan fests every few years, right? I cannot afford to go to one, BUT they run a fan art contest alongside it.

I entered the contest two fan fests ago, with a very poor crocheted rendition of the Fat Cat minion. Looks like I don't have record of it on Ravelry. Needless to say, I was not at all surprised when I wasn't even a finalist, let alone a winner.

I entered the 2023 contest with a feverishly-knitted doll, and am STILL thrilled at being a finalist for it. For those that don't feel like clicking through to see the picture: the doll is wearing the Valentione dress that was so popular from several events ago.

It is now 2026, we're gearing up for another Fan Fest, which means the fan art contest is ON. Deadline is March 2nd.

I had a great idea for it, but there was NO way I could get it done in time, so even though I ordered yarn, I reluctantly put that idea to the side. Still gonna do it someday, but not when I'm under deadline.

I had another tentative idea for it, but it would have required lots and lots of counting, and fiber artists aren't that great at counting. Plus, that idea was big enough that I wasn't sure I'd have time to finish it, either.

So I fell back to my third idea, which is really one that I had last year but didn't do. Am working on it today, after not touching it for five days (yikes!).

Said in a discord:


12:21pm
so here I am, working on my fanfest entry. I am designing it myself and there's multiple pieces to it. I have proof of concept that two pieces fit correctly together, HUZZAH! but now I have to knit the other four pieces... aka, the fun part is done and now it's just work work work and blah. send me strength!

12:43 PM
it is a universal truth that knitters can't count to small digits. I was wrong, I do not have four pieces left, I have FIVE. and that's just on [redacted]. After this, I still need to do [redacted] and [redacted], oof


I have finished the first of the five pieces I have left on this portion. It took an hour. Each of the remaining four pieces will take about an hour each. And that's not including [redacted 1] and [redacted 2], which are both rather big portions themselves and will take time. I know how to do [redacted 1] already, and have ideas for [redacted 2], but the actual work of knitting is.... well, WORK.

I'm not sure I can finish before the deadline. But I am going to try. It will mean knitting most of the rest of the day, and touching it every day until deadline.
rydra_wong: Lee Miller photo showing two women wearing metal fire masks in England during WWII. (Default)
[personal profile] rydra_wong
https://www.scenemag.co.uk/lancaster-university-launches-national-consultation-to-shape-future-of-adult-gender-healthcare/

https://wp.lancs.ac.uk/transadultspsp/

The focus is identifying priorities for future research, specifically related to "non-surgical, transition-related healthcare for people aged 18 and over", and they're starting with a survey.

Funded by Gendered Intelligence, led by a steering group which is half people with lived experience (in fact more than half, as some of the healthcare professional members also ID as trans), one of the two co-leads is a trans woman, and they're partnered with TransActual and GIRES, so this looks like real genuine co-production.

Science

Feb. 15th, 2026 01:52 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
An Ionic Gelation Powder for Ultrafast Hemostasis and Accelerated Wound Healing

Rapid and effective bleeding control remains a clinical priority, particularly for deep or irregular wounds where conventional dressings are inadequate. Here, an ionically responsive, powder-based hemostatic system (AGCL) composed of alginate, gellan gum, chitosan, and a glutaraldehyde crosslinker is presented. Upon contact with calcium ions in blood, AGCL rapidly forms an adhesive hydrogel network within ≈1 s, enabling ultrafast gelation and a high blood uptake ratio (≈725%). The powder exhibits strong bioadhesion (>40 kPa), excellent sealing under mixed-mode loading, and robust storage stability for up to 24 months under ambient conditions. In vitro assays confirm minimal hemolysis (<3%), high cytocompatibility, and greater than 99% antibacterial efficacy.

See a much more detailed explanation with illustrations here.

Read more... )

Birdfeeding

Feb. 15th, 2026 01:36 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
Today is partly sunny and cool.

I fed the birds.  I've seen a few sparrows.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 2/15/26 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

I refilled the hopper feeder.  I've seen a sparrow.

I also saw a honeybee in the forest garden!  I went to the bee tree and saw a honeybee fly into it.  This is waaayyy too early for bees. There is liquid water, but absolutely nothing to eat. :(  Use to be, the bees only appeared after the last frost.  It's months too soon for that.

EDIT 2/15/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

EDIT 2/15/26 -- I spread a bucket of mulch under the golden rain tree.

I am done for the night.

Activism

Feb. 15th, 2026 12:47 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
The key to defeating Trump? Mass non-cooperation

The extraordinary level of grassroots solidarity and creative resistance in anti-ICE protests in Minnesota has given people a new appreciation for the power that mass non-cooperation can have in resisting the Trump administration’s drive toward authoritarianism. And it has created an awareness of why such action is clearly needed.

Read more... )

Done Since 2026-02-08

Feb. 15th, 2026 01:08 pm
mdlbear: blue fractal bear with text "since 2002" (Default)
[personal profile] mdlbear

Well, happy cheap-filled-chocolates-in-heart-shaped-boxes day, for those in a position to take advantage of it. And I hope that any of you who celebrated yesterday had a good Valentine's day, and that the rest of us got through it okay. It isn't a good day for the bereft. The last few days haven't been all that good for my back, either -- no idea what I did to cause muscle spasms, but I wish I hadn't.

I did accomplish a few things last week: getting my legs wrapped in elastic ("Ace") bandages to reduce the swelling, setting up a trip to the US next month (in time to renew my driver's license), taking three walks (not all that good, but something at least), and one guitar practice session (also not all that good, but something).

For those folks affected, or soon to be affected, by Discord's new age checks, or worried about further enshittification over the next year or three, there are some lists of alternatives under the cut for your edification. Almost all on Friday, along with some more commentary. A couple on Tuesday. Tl;dr: there isn't an obvious drop-in replacement, but Stoat comes close and is under active development.

Also of note: A legendary golden fabric lost for 2,000 years has been brought back: it's made from pen shell byssus, which was previously discarded as waste. The color is non-fading because it's structural. Other good news, EU Parliament 🇪🇺 votes to accept a report, that calls for "the full recognition of trans women as women".

Notes & links, as usual )

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