smokingboot: (dreams)
[personal profile] smokingboot
And there it was. If you want to know your own heart with clarity, if you want to know what’s making you awkward and anxious pay attention to your sleep. It’ll tell you what’s going on , albeit incomprehensibly to begin with.

Mine began with me standing in a row of men who all had to take their trousers and underwear off and stand in a line. For some reason I was with them, wearing a long tee-shirt which I pulled down and used to cover myself. Then there was the bizarre sight of Boris Johnson, ex PM, totally naked and corpulent slamming himself up and down on a dead chicken repeatedly. It didn’t look like sexual congress though the act was hard to categorise as anything else. A giant chute appeared and Boris was dragged down into it, trying to cling on by his fingernails.

Then came the real dream after all the bizarre juxtapositions of an exhausted mind. A stern looking nurse told me the cancer had returned. She even pointed out where it was. There’s the real nightmare, once seen and known to be put in its place among the phantoms, the what-the-hells and the maybe/nevers.

I am awake ready for coffee.
[syndicated profile] opinionatedgamers_feed

Posted by Dale Yu

Alison Brennan: Game Snapshots – 2025 (Part 13) Carrying on from the last article, Mistwind (which I write up below) became a 3-bathroomer as well. Everyone started with one air-whale and most bought the extra two, making turns more and … Continue reading
tamaranth: me, in the sun (Default)
[personal profile] tamaranth
2025/087: How to Survive in Ancient Greece — Robert Garland
Greek religion does not promote morality. Piety towards the gods and the dead, not good behaviour, is its central aim. [loc. 350]

Read in fits and starts between other books, mostly for the fascinating factoids and descriptions of legal process in classical Greece. Presented as a handbook for time-travellers, How to Survive in Ancient Greece is good at highlighting some key differences: the improbability of growing old, the more equitable distribution of wealth (1% really wealthy, 1% really poor, 'the majority of Athenians are very poor by our standards'), the less equitable treatment of women. Entertaining, engaging, informative.

Another Week, Trapped

Jun. 9th, 2025 02:51 pm
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[personal profile] arcadiamoon
Missed my weekly and weekend-ly update last week. Work's been so busy, and I've been putting way too many hours past midnight into overtime. Not that this week will be any better, or the coming month. That's the curse of this industry, I think. And I think the sooner I get out of here, the better, because it's eating into my very soul.

Things at home and in my personal life have been rough, too. There's a huge storm brewing on every single aspect of my life, and I'm just standing here without a raincoat.

Met up with an old friend from school over the weekend. We had lunch, and even though she's in a far more successful career field, she feels the exact way I do: jaded about the world, tired, and wanting to escape the rat race for good. Funny, our adult lives have just begun, and yet we all want it to be over.

The world today isn't sustainable, and I'm not even sure how long I can struggle beneath the yoke of capitalism.

I haven't been reading much, or managed to get anywhere with it or the HWQS jam project I have cooking. Like I said, my job doesn't leave much time for me to do anything else. I have basically two hours a day to myself, minus all the normal chores, travel time, trying to put myself into a relaxed state of mind, and every day I have to choose what those two precious hours could be used for.

So, yeah, it's hard. And I'm trying my best to keep everything in my life in perfect order, or at least put in substantial contribution into all aspects to appear like a functioning human being.

Most of the time, I just want to cry, and most of the time I just do. Morning and night, like clockwork. And when I'm not crying, I'm angry as hell: at this broken world, at this horrible system we've all tied ourselves to, at my life, at the luck of the life I've been born into.

Sure, things could be worst. But, shit, they could be a hell of a lot better, too.

I don't know. I'm just really tired and my mental health is in the shitter right now, so there's that. 
viridian5: photo-manipulated kaRIN, singer of Collide, on the cover of their Chasing the Ghost album (Collide (kaRIN))
[personal profile] viridian5
HBO has a 3-episode documentary series called The Mortician. Episode 1 has some horrifying events and you think you know the basic shape of how things will get worse and who's involved. Episode 2? Mwahahaha. Surprise! I'm curious to see how the final episode goes.

Otherwise, I'm enjoying today's birthday gifts: a top, 3 CDs (Death Cab for Cutie's Transatlanticism and Plans, and Jack's Mannequin's The Glass Passenger) and this keychain.

[syndicated profile] daily_illuminator_feed
Paper Dreams: A History of Play-by-Mail Gaming Graph paper. #2 pencils. Floppy disks. Paper instruction manuals. It was a different world when play-by-mail games were everywhere.

You can read about this "underdog" genre – popular in decades past and still with a heartbeat – in Paper Dreams: A History of Play-by-Mail Gaming, now available. I was a fan of PBM and was happy to contribute the foreword.

And don't just read it to hear more about our own (free!) PBModem game UltraCorps (www.ultracorps.com). Dig in to reminisce about the classics of yesteryear. Explore games ranging from space operas like Starweb (a favorite of mine and still playable today), fantasy RPGs, wargames, sports games, games of intrigue and crime, and many others. But it's not just a book of lists. The author, Dave Spencer, tells us about the strange and controversial angles of PBM . . . pub brawls, blackmail and mail fraud, the moral panic of the times, obsessive players, the "adult" side, and more.

Check it out on Amazon. Reminisce. Maybe even try one of the classic PBM games still available today.

Steve Jackson

Warehouse 23 News: The City Never Sleeps Because Of All The Action

There are a million stories in the city, and they're all exciting! GURPS Action 9: The City shows how you can add GURPS City Stats to your GURPS Action campaigns. It also features six sample cities to use with your own action-packed adventures. Download it today from Warehouse 23!
[syndicated profile] askamanager_feed

Posted by Ask a Manager

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. I got scolded for “eavesdropping” when I asked about a task that would involve me

I work in an office with an open floor plan in an older building. Part of my job is to be the front desk receptionist with tasks like making appointments for our clients and greeting them when they arrive. Very few people have actual offices in this space, and if they do, they are right behind my desk. It’s like a weird amphitheatre: I’m up front, the offices are directly behind me in a line with the doors facing my back, and everything behind them is just open cubicles. However, even with office doors shut, I can still very clearly hear my office-holder colleagues, especially if they are in a Zoom meeting and increase their volume.

To avoid overhearing sensitive information which is often discussed at these meetings (and for my own sanity), I have brought in earbuds and headphones to listen to music during lulls. This was preapproved after I brought up the issue in a discussion with my manager when I first started. But I was the subject of scrutiny when I initially started using them. Office holders would bang open their doors after meetings and try to look over my shoulder to make sure I was doing my work. I also received some offhand comments about professionalism, but I always mentioned that our manager approved it. My manager, when questioned publicly, would throw up her hands and say, “That’s how the younger generation is” (I’m in my late 20s) and “Well, at least the work gets done.” Privately, I’ve checked in and she says that she has no feedback and I’m doing great.

Recently, I forgot to bring my headphones and was trying to focus on my work when I heard my name. I overheard one office holder, “Dinah,” mention my name during her meeting, along with telling someone to make an appointment with me. This was all I heard, as I then left my desk for some water. At the end of our lunch break, I thought I could approach the subject by saying, “Sorry Dinah, I didn’t mean to eavesdrop but I overheard my name during a lull in the office and that someone may need to make an appointment. Can you tell me some more information?”

Dinah chastised me loudly, saying that she knew a younger colleague (who just happened to be sitting nearby and had no part in this) and I had been regularly eavesdropping on her and that we were to stop. My manager, who was standing by, chimed in saying, “We shouldn’t listen in case we hear something we don’t want to hear.” I wanted to argue back, but they’re both my superiors so I basically clammed up and accepted the scolding.

I know I shouldn’t have brought up overhearing the comment but at the time I figured it pertained to my work and that at worst, she would gently shut me down, especially with how I couched my language. I’m tired of being in this weird limbo. Would HR be able to help here? Or should I give up and start the job hunt?

Your office sounds horrible! People were so outraged by you using headphones that they tried to check that you were really working and made snarky asides about professionalism? And your manager insults you in public but is nice to you one-on-one? The issue sounds like it’s your entire office culture, which isn’t something HR will be able to solve. I’d just work on getting out.

For what it’s worth, though, what you said to Dinah shouldn’t have been a big deal. It’s normal to overhear things in an office that sound like they might affect you and ask about them, particularly when they don’t sound particularly sensitive. It’s not “eavesdropping”; it’s the nature of working in a space where you can hear other people.

Something is very rotten in your office (and it’s not you).

Related:
I can hear everything my staff says — should I pretend I don’t?

2. Should I give up on having a federal career?

My question is one I’ve been seriously struggling with and would love external expert input on: do I give up on having a federal career and my home in D.C. and start over elsewhere?

I grew up seeing friends and family impacted by the 2007 crash in Michigan (loss of homes, jobs, finances, you name it) and now find myself staring at the top of that same cliff and don’t know what to do. I was maybe five years in to my federal HR career before my contract was illegally defunded and it’s already been four months with no job prospects.

As one of over half a million (and growing) unemployed around D.C. with available jobs in all sectors being actively destroyed every week, I’m terrified that if I don’t cut and run fast enough then I’ll lose my home, my car, any finances I do still have … just … everything. But I dont want to just give up my home either. Any advice?

Right now, the safest assumption is that the chances of being hired into a federal job will be extremely low for the remainder of this administration. That could change (for one thing, they’ve realized they cut too many jobs and are now trying to hire people back; also, in an interesting twist, DOGE staffers themselves now fear getting DOGE’d), but you’ve got to plan based on what we’re seeing right now, and right now trying to get or keep federal employment is not a good prospect. That doesn’t mean that will be the situation forever — it almost definitely won’t be — but it’s the landscape right now.

If you know for sure that federal employment was off the table for the next few years, what would you want to do instead? That’s where I’d focus.

3. I’m not a woman but I keep getting invited to speak at women’s events

I’m in tech, which is quite low on women so there are a bunch of “women in tech” panels and articles and so forth. That’s great! However, I am not a woman and get a lot of invites to speak as a woman — especially as I’m a VP and the pool is small. I’m happy to speak as a non-binary person, but not as a woman so I say, “It looks like you’re looking for a woman here and I’m non-binary, so no thank you.” This almost always fails to work. I get a reply starting with, “Oh, we don’t care” or my personal non-favorite, “In a spirit of inclusion…” which strongly imply that they see me as a woman so are happy to include me, though they likely wouldn’t include a non-binary colleague with a beard.

Any scripts for this one? No one I know has come up with a good one yet.

My guess is that they’re thinking that if you’re perceived as/treated as a woman, you’re likely to face a lot of the same issues as women in tech do. But if that’s the case, they should spell that out and see if you’d be interested through that lens. Instead they’re just kind of blowing off what you said / not engaging with it in a real way, and acting as if they see you as sufficiently “women-adjacent” that it shouldn’t matter.

You could reply this way: “If a future event is specifically advertised as including non-binary people as well, please feel free to check with me again! However, since I’m not a woman or woman-adjacent, I am not interested in speaking on this panel. I’d ask you to please respect my gender and not push the matter further.”

4. Working from bed while recovering from surgery

I am planning for an ankle surgery to take place in July. If they need to do the type of repair they expect, I will need to be completely off my feet for six weeks, then will begin gradually transitioning to weight bearing. During much of this time, I will need to keep my foot elevated. Full recovery is expected to take a year. If they don’t need to do that specific repair, then I’ll be in a boot and back on my feet in a few days. I’m assuming the former will be the case and planning accordingly.

I have a desk-based, fully remote job. All meetings are on Teams, and typically camera-off with the exception of our Friday daily touchbase (the meeting happens daily, we make a point to turn cameras on on Fridays) and 1:1s. I plan to work sitting up in bed, with my foot elevated and my laptop on a tray. Under normal circumstances, working from bed is unprofessional; given these circumstances, how much effort should I put into hiding it?

I joined a new team after coming back from maternity leave in February, so I don’t know this team very well yet. My former manager is now my grand-manager; my current manager seems very kind, flexible, and generally supportive.

If you’re typically camera-off except for your Friday meeting, it should be fine to just let your manager know that you’re going to be camera-off for that one too while you’re recovering since you’ll be bedridden.

It’s not that it would be scandalous to appear from bed under the circumstances (although I wouldn’t do it with a client unless you knew them extremely well), but you don’t need to and you should be able to easily opt out while you’re recovering.

5. Coworkers hang around after their shifts end

I work the graveyard as a security guard from 10:30 pm to 6:30 am. Both of the swing shift officers, after they clock out, stay late. One waits for the bus, while the other waits for his cousin to get off work. Sometimes it can be for an hour, and sometimes one of them will sleep in his car in the garage. Sometimes they’re hanging in the lobby, having loud speakerphone conversations, interfering with the shift change pass-down details, and distracting the patrol guard with non-work-related conversations.

My wife says not to sweat it, but honestly I don’t like it. If I tell my boss, I’ll feel like a snitch. Please can you give me some advice on this?

Some of this sounds like it’s genuinely interfering with work, and some of it isn’t. For the parts that aren’t disrupting anything (like sleeping in their car for an hour), let it go! It’s reasonable for them to need to hang out somewhere while waiting for their rides. That part is fine.

For the parts that are interfering with work (like distracting other from info exchange during the shift change), speak up in the moment: “Hey, I know you need to wait here for a bit, but doing X is making it hard for me to do Y. Can you hang out in a different area after you clock out?”  If they’re not receptive to that — or if you know them well enough to know they won’t be receptive to that — then that’s the part that you should take to your manager. That’s not “snitching”; it’s looping in your boss on a work issue that you don’t have the standing to handle on your own. Just make sure you can explain why it matters to the work (as opposed to just being personally annoyed by it).

The post I got scolded for eavesdropping, should I give up on a federal career, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

Hornet Flight - Ken Follett

Jun. 8th, 2025 08:07 pm
sholio: several WWI biplanes flying (Biggles-biplanes)
[personal profile] sholio
I like Ken Follett's books, and I like airplanes, and I like historical books, but this one was just kind of lackluster for me, unfortunately. It kept me reading, and parts of it were very engaging, but I ended up feeling kind of "That was it?" at the end. I mean, to be fair, this book is set early in WW2 and there's a lot of war still to go, but it feels like we didn't quite get the full plot or the amount of airplane that was promised by the title. The airplane-promising title manages to be a big spoiler while not actually delivering on its promise. (Although, to be fair, I guess it did get me to read the book.)

Spoilers in general )

New Music Monday - 9 June 2025

Jun. 9th, 2025 01:49 pm
paradisedinermod: (Default)
[personal profile] paradisedinermod posting in [community profile] paradisediner
The regular weekly post for us to talk about any and all of our thoughts about the week's new releases.

Doyoung - 안녕, 우주 (Memory)
Itzy - Girls Will Be Girls
Izna - BEEP
Kiss of Life - Lips Hips Kiss
QWER - Holding Back Tears
Cooing
Solar - Floating Free
Crazangel - I'm Just Me (debut)
DayChild - Click Clack
Primrose - Cinema
Double One
Ateez - Lemon Drop
ARTMS - Icarus
j-hope - Killin' It Girl (feat. GloRilla)
XLOV - 1 & Only
n.SSign

New MVs are also added to an ongoing youtube playlist.

Last week's MVs: 2 June

Feel free to add new comments in the replies for songs/MVs we missed.

[ Rec Something Wednesday | WIP Wednesday | Monthly General Chat | Comment Fest ]
dialecticdreamer: My work (Default)
[personal profile] dialecticdreamer
Location, Location, Location
By Sarah Williams
Part 2 of 3
Word count (story only): 1116
[Landing #7, day 3, 2 p.m. local time]


:: Thalassian representatives arrive to offer options to the Asher family, and Backstep recovers under their watchful eyes. Part of the Sidestep Travelers universe. ::




The dozen files roamed around the room, passed hand to hand in no particular order or direction. Eventually, Grandmama tapped one file against her knee, then laid it on the coffee table. Wrinkled hands aligned the file perfectly parallel to the edges of the table, then nudged it an inch to the left to put it in the exact center of the surface. “I’ve already got opinions and preferences. Why don’t we each pick a location that we’re interested in, which will cut the list in half, at most. If more than one person really likes the look of a property, it jumps to the top of the list.”

Zipper ambled into the living room, carrying an oval wicker bread basket full of bread, kept warm under a red and white dishtowel with a narrow plaid. “Are you ready for a proper snack, Backstep?”

She beamed. “You sneaked off to get me aish baladi?” One hand automatically reached for the basket.
Read more... )

Dream surrealism

Jun. 8th, 2025 10:47 pm
kiya: (akhet)
[personal profile] kiya
Last night's sleep was Bad in complex ways (I woke up at 6, tried to get back to sleep and did not until after 7, and then had to be up at 8:30 for church service). But that meant I woke up in the middle of a dream and thus remember some bits of it.

Just a few remembered snippets, mostly because I remember them from telling KJ this morning. )

listening, watching

Jun. 8th, 2025 08:58 pm
chazzbanner: (wisdom sign)
[personal profile] chazzbanner
j-wat is officially in SW Minnesota, Upper Minnesota River Valley -- Redwood Falls. (There are falls, but no official redwoods.) He texted me photos of Fort Ridgeley, his dinner site (patio), and the spooky stairs to his room.

Now that I have, you know, the i-n-t-er... you know, again, I can listen to the dozen or so 'new to me' albums left on my list, since I do this on YouTube. Today I listened to Liege & Lief, by Fairport Convention.

This afternoon I listened to Messiah on my CD player. I can amend the 'teary' report: I start getting goosebumps at "The kingdom of this world..."

My reason for listening to it is that I just finished the book Every Valley: The Desperate Lives and Troubled Times That Made Handel's Messiah.

On the DVD front, I watched North & South (Gaskell novel) last week, and have started watching Firefly.

-

random, almost instant news

Jun. 8th, 2025 09:30 pm
lauradi7dw: me wearing a straw hat and gray mask (anniversary)
[personal profile] lauradi7dw
Israeli forces have boarded the freedom flotilla
https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/08/middleeast/freedom-flotilla-gaza-aid-ship-thunberg-intl-hnk

Worthy people have won Tonys.

People are wrong (as well as lying) on the internet. And wrong and lying *about* the internet. And weirdly enough, the clearest online guide (in terms of ease of use) to next Saturday's protests is on Richard Stallman's website, for crying out loud.
https://stallman.org/no-kings.html

So much stuff

Jun. 8th, 2025 09:07 pm
johnridley: (Default)
[personal profile] johnridley
Wow it's been a while since I posted an update.
The motorcycle that I had just acquired in the last post is running, but not well. It needs some work. Either a valve or a ring job. I'll be getting to that in a few weeks probably. I did a TON of stuff to it; there are photos and writeups on dragonflydiy.com though I doubt anyone cares.
This is concert week for Out Loud Chorus which I sing in. Monday is band rehearsal, plus load out of the risers from our rehearsal space and a bass sectional, so quite busy (and a late night) for me.
Those risers need to get out of my trailer sometime that week because I need the trailer for something else Saturday/Sunday (the church's rummage sale will finish Saturday and the leftovers need to be dispersed to Goodwill or whatever). That's not scheduled but will probably have to happen during the day at some point. Saturday morning may very well be the only chance since most people will be unable to do it during the day and evenings are full.
Tuesday evening is a going-away party for a former coworker-then-boss who is taking a new job.
Wednesday is tech rehearsal with the choir, which is usually a long slog.
Thursday is dress rehearsal, then Friday and Saturday are concert evenings.
Sunday is a lawn mowing day (I HOPE it doesn't rain) because on Monday I drive, picking up some friends, to Albany where we will overnight then start the 380 miles of the Erie Canal bike path. We're expecting to spend 8 days on that.
I have been doing SOME training on the bike, though probably not enough. I'm not concerned though, we're only shooting for 50 mile days and I'm confident I can hammer those out for 8 days. If not, this time we will have my truck tagging along in case someone has a bad day or an injury.
Things around the house are ticking along. Of course there's always a bunch of stuff to do, a bunch that doesn't get done, etc. I have some deck projects that I need to get to. We have been doing some plant moving, since the removal of the giant cottonwood trees a couple of years ago really rearranged what parts of the yard get sun, so some plants do worse, but also some plants that had not been doing all that well can now be moved to sunnier areas.
astrogirl: (Donna)
[personal profile] astrogirl
Still working on my old bingo card. I'm determined to get it finished before I tackle the newer one. Only one more square to go, now! If only I had any faintest idea what to do with it, other than what I did with it the last time the prompt came up on one of these cards. Anybody have any suggestions for what you might like to see me write for "We're Surrounded!" that don't involve writing a lot of action or plot? I mean, I don't know what the odds of me taking any suggestions are, but at this point anything to get the ol' creative juices flowing is probably welcome.

Anyway, here's the penultimate one:

Title: Meanwhile, Donna
Fandom: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Characters/Relationships: Donna Noble & Rose Noble
Rating: General Audiences
Summary: She's forgotten something important. Again.
Tags: Episode Related, Wish World, Drabble
Length: 100 words
Author's Notes: Written for Gen Prompt Bingo, for the prompt "May morning." I have to say, I found "The Reality War" very disappointing, but I did love "Wish World" taken on its own, and how could I not write something involving it for that prompt? So, here's a drabble.

Meanwhile, Donna

Pride Month

Jun. 8th, 2025 07:39 pm
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
[personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
31 Ideas To Take Action & Celebrate Pride Month In 2025

June is Pride Month! This month-long celebration is an opportunity to celebrate the very human and very beautiful spectrum of gender and sexuality, all while coming together to fight for widespread equality and justice in the LGBTQ+ community.


yuerstruly: (rose)
[personal profile] yuerstruly posting in [community profile] baihe_media

Welcome to the read-along for Miss Forensics by Jiu Nuan Chun Shen! As previously stated, we will be reading FIVE (5) chapters a week, so a new read-along post will go up every 2 weeks. Each chapter summary will be posted and serve as parent threads for each chapter, so please do your best to keep your comments under the correct ones!

One chapter will go up per day, Monday through Friday, and I will do my best to slip them in before it's evening in Asia. Of course, if you are up for it, please feel free to post the chapter summaries to get the read-along going!

The link to the novel on JJWXC can be found here.

You can also follow the novel through the audiobook on Himalaya, though there may be slight changes and ommissions from the original.

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