muninnhuginn | Network

Things I thought would be fine: continuing to use the coffee table as an ersatz bench while I try to source a proper one at less-than-new prices.

THINGS THAT WERE NOT FINE: guess.

(I am unharmed! The coffee table is... not. The previous session was fine!!! ... the previous session was 10-20lb lower in terms of what I was lifting.)

( special interest within )

flemmings

Well, if Armageddon returns, I at least have my minor pleasures. Like a gas bill in the minus numbers and a tax refund that's only slightly less than last year. And it's less thanks to the dental plan which is still a win. Then I was pleased to see the Folio Society has an illustrated Howl's Moving Castle available. Either my eyesight was acting up or someone miscoded the webpage because I saw the price-- $1000-- and was hell no. Only it's actually $100, which is more like. Maybe see how expenses go this month-- I have a crown that insurance won't pay for and a tree trimming on the 20th-- but perhaps after that...

Finished nothing but a Dr Priestley or two this week. Tiktok is all I'm up for in these antsy latter days.

sage

gnu MinoanMiss/RubyNye's Online Memorial
Go here to sign up & get the zoom link to Ny's Memorial for this Sunday, April 12th at 1pm EDT. I'll be there & I hope you will, too.

books
The Oil Kings: How the U.S., Iran, and Saudi Arabia Changed the Balance of Power in the Middle East by Andrew Scott Cooper. 2011. Edition with the 2015 preface. Not great, but some interesting details of the Nixon-Ford years.

The Fall of Heaven: The Pahlavis and the Final Days of Imperial Iran by Andrew Scott Cooper. 2016. Utterly misleading title. By and large, this is NOT HISTORY. This is a fawning, one-sided biography of the Pahlavi family. I mean, I'm sympathetic to Farah and the kids, but there's no need to write an apologia for the shah's actions. :(((

Decoding Iran’s Foreign Policy: Strategic Interests, Power and Influence by Ross Harrison. 2025. I'm just sitting here wondering what it would be like to have a president who's smart enough to read books like this one. It's been a while.

currently reading: Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq by Stephen Kinzer. 2006. Imperialism is so gross.

yarning
Made the mushroom. Got the blue bunny put together and both in the mail. Waiting for more sales. Need to resume social media self-plugging. Here's something cute: Kitten Academy kittens doing a Statler & Waldorf on their mother's kickbunny:

healthcrap
Had Botox for migraines Friday. Usual doc wasn't there, and I couldn't recall the alterations we make to the standard protocol, so we'll see how this round works in their absence. Major cold front with torrential rain came in Friday night and knocked me flat for days. Had a much belated allergy shot Monday, which knocked me flat again.

#resist
I am utterly furious at the orange menace, Netanyahu, and their toadies.
May 1: No Kings 4 + general strike.

#astrology
Mars enters Aries on May 10, completing a major traffic jam of planets in Aries, sign of war, which has me exceptionally worried. Praying for peace.

I hope all of y'all are doing well and staying safe and sane and healthy. <333

myjetpack_feed

https://myjetpack.tumblr.com/post/813346656493977600

Panel 1 A delivery bot on a suburban path says “You don’t always end up where you expect” Panel 2 “It’s silly but I saw myself beside an astronaut rolling across a strange new world” it says as it continues down the path. An alert reads “50m to destination” Panel 3 A had has opened the lid of the bot and taken out a paper bag. “I like to feel useful. Nobody likes a cold hamburger” Panel 4 It continues “So I give every mission my all” The alert says “mission complete” Panel 5 The sun is setting. The bot looks tired. The alert says it’s power is 3% Panel 6 Night. Stars twinkle. The bot is parked in a lot with three others, it has its eyes closed and says “in my dock I dream of space”

My latest for New Scientist

https://myjetpack.tumblr.com/post/813346656493977600

oursin

What I read

Finished Never Had It So Good, and while I am less whelmed than I was on first reading it 50 years ago (aaarrgh), and consider that as panoramic social novel of provincial life, does not quite reach the level of South Riding, yet, that is the comparison one thinks of. I also mark up Mr Jones in contrast to The Angry Young Men who were his contemporaries over a whole range of issues.

Finished Considering The Female Man by Joanna Russ, or, As the Bear Swore, which was fascinating, and very readable, but has not somehow inspired me to rush off and do a re-read.

Then thought I should really read Adania Shibli, Minor Detail (2017), for forthcoming in-person book group.

In hopes of a change from that - it's grim - read Marion Keyes, The Mystery of Mercy Close (Walsh Family, #5) (2012), a recent Kobo deal, which was itself not entirely the most cheerful read.

On the go

Amazon helpfully alerted me to Kindle-only publication of Alexis Hall, Never After, currently in progress, also not really bringing the delicious froth - opium-addicted Victorian rent-boy rescued from homelessness on the streets by clergyman (unexpected and unwanted 3rd son in aristo family, put him into the church) with his own backstory baggage.

Up next

There's a new Literary Review.

Also I had a mad binge on Kobo the other day, mostly Dick Francises which had come down to promotional prices, but I also finally succumbed to the most recent Edward St Aubyn which has been tempting me. The previous one was so much less gruesome than the Melrose sequence that perhaps this will be the change of pace I'm looking for?

susandennis

I had my appointment with my doctor yesterday. When last we met, she said that the Medicare coverage of Wegovy was looking like April. Almost immediately that changed to July and now she's saying maybe Januaray and it's based on your BMI. BUT, they are planning on using your BMI as it was when you first started on the drug so if/when it ever happens, I'll be qualified. $350 to $50 will be a nice change but until then, I'm thinking of it like a car payment.

I can get a faster car for the same payment so she's going to increase the dosage for the next go round. I'm still several weeks away from the next go round so I thought I'd go back to tracking my calories for a while. Apparently she has lots of Wegovy patients. During our call, once we decided on dosage, my phone text beeped. Without thinking, I looked down. She said "Oh, that will be me - or my prescription rather." and it was. She said she's done enough of this that she now has a rhythm to how it all goes. I do like that she has good experience with the whole experience! She wants me to exercise more which I assured her was not going to happen. We'll meet again in July.

And so today I start the tracking - new app - Journable. This one really only tracks what you eat. It also can track exercise and weight but it's easy to ignore those bits. Very simple, and easy. The photograph nailed my breakfast.

I noticed yesterday that the Google Play Store has a new feature - AI ask a question about this app. I've been asking "how much does using this app in the US cost?" - it's a lot better than downloading, installing and then digging around for what happens when the trial is done or your xx free times are over, etc. Also it tells you if there is a way around the stupid video ads. Quite nice.

I put the laundry in before I went to swim. And now between swimming, breakfasting, cutting Biggie's nails and generally futzing around, I have 13 minutes til it's time to hang and fold.

The baseball game is at 11 today. The Mariners have lost way more than they have won so far this year. Not pretty. The Food and Beverage meeting is at 2.

james_davis_nicoll

Beatings to continue until CPC morale improves

pauraque posting in

booknook

It's Wednesday! What are you reading?

nanila

Keiki and his espresso.

Girl and pengie by the harbour.

Kings of Trieste

Low sun on the water.

There was a jellyfish bloom in the harbour. Mostly barrels, but some moon jellies and others.

Wine is a good way to end the day yes yes.

lirazel

Trying to bring this back!

What I finished:

+ Disciples of White Jesus: The Radicalization of American Boyhood by Angela Denker. This was not exactly what I expected, which was a more sociological exploration of the way that white Christian boys are being taught white supremacist/Christian nationalist beliefs. Instead, it was a very personal journalistic exploration that drew on sociological data. Denker did things like travel to Columbia, SC to meet the pastor of the young man who murdered worshipers at Mother Emanuel church in Charleston, talked to pastor teaching confirmation classes in rural Midwestern communities, and drew on her own work as a pastor to get an angle on what white Christian boys are being taught about masculinity.

This is very much a book for Christians; it is written from a progressive Christian perspective and as such would probably be annoying to people who are progressive but not Christian. Still, I don't regret listening to it and I am glad this resource is out there for Christians who are trying to combat extremism within the church.

What I'm reading:

+ Orlando by Virginia Woolf for book club. I'm about 1/3 of the way through, and I am glad this wasn't my first Woolf. The language and the flashing insights are gorgeous, of course, and I actually love how deeply weird it is with things like time--it's absolutely written on a mythic scale which I think is very cool--but I think if this was my first Woolf I would be more wtf??? about it. The casual racism is a lot!

I don't know that I will ever love this like I do Mrs. Dalloway, but it's certainly an interesting reading experience and I am enjoying myself! We'll see how I feel when I'm done.

+ The Magician's Daughter by H.G. Parry. Despite my intense annoyance at books about female protagonists whose titles frame them in relationship to a man, I checked this one out on a whim. It has the energy of an old-school YA fantasy novel (complimentary) and I'm enjoying it! It doesn't feel formulaic or as simplistic as most YA does today, even if it doesn't quite have the richness of my old faves.

I was taken from the beginning; the story starts out with a teenage girl who's been raised on a magical island in a crumbling castle, knowing nothing about the rest of the world except what she's read through books. Classic Lauren-bait, 11/10, no notes. Once we leave the island, things don't hit quite as hard for me, though I'm reserving my judgement until I finish it.

It turns out it's one of those "magic is disappearing!" books, which I think is an overdone trope, but this is certainly one of the better versions of that story I've read. The worldbuilding is quite fun, even if it isn't very innovative. There's no romance, the main relationship is between the protagonist and the man who raised her, which is well done. Hopefully we'll get some real emotional oomph in the last third of the book and I will be able to unabashedly recommend this to people who are looking for a light but not insubstantial read.

+ "You Just Need to Lose Weight" and 19 Other Myths About Fat People by Aubrey Gordon. I just needed an audiobook to listen to while I was cooking on Sunday, and I was like, "Wait! Aubrey from my beloved Maintenance Phase podcast has books! I can just listen to her read them!"

I knew a lot of this stuff already, but Aubrey is such a great person to hang out with--funny, compassionate, uncompromising when she needs to be. The work of fat advocacy she does must be exhausting considering the everything of our current culture (for a while there in the 2010s I really did think we were making strides on the topic of bodies, and then the one-two punch of Covid and weight loss drugs happened and now we're right back to heroin chic and it's so awful), but I admire her so much for doing it.

james_davis_nicoll

Coco and chums have an innovative cure for the monster currently rampaging through town... an innovative cure from which a diligent cop is determined to protect society.

Witch Hat Atelier, volume 14 by Kamome Shirahama

calimac

I've heard a lot from the Catalyst Quartet at SF Performances in recent years. A while ago they did a whole series of concerts of the work of Black composers, for instance.

Tuesday's was kind of different. The main item on the program was the song cycle Sea Pictures by the canonical Englishman, Edward Elgar, with the original orchestral accompaniment arranged for piano quintet. Terrence Wilson at the keyboard joined the Quartet. The singer was Nikola Printz, whose dark mezzo unleashed a lot of power when Elgar called for it, but pompous grandeur and drama are not the highlights of this cycle. Elgar was at his best being coy and charming in the two best settings in the bunch, "In Haven" and "Where Corals Lie," where Printz's voice could be surprisingly intimate.

Now watch the chain of connections (not the order in which the pieces were played in the concert). A suite for quartet, Fantasiestücke by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, something of a protégé of Elgar's. Coleridge-Taylor was Black, and when he visited the U.S. he met with Henry Burleigh, the Black pupil of Antonín Dvořák who introduced Dvořák to Afro-American spirituals, which inspired the Largo of Dvořák's New World Symphony. So we got Printz singing a setting of "Going Home," the spiritual that was later made out of the theme of that Largo, and (for quartet) the Sorrow Song and Jubilee by the contemporary Libby Larsen, a tribute to Burleigh and Dvořák incorporating fragments from another spiritual, "Swing Low Sweet Chariot." From her program notes, Larsen evidently thinks Dvořák incorporated "Going Home" into his symphony rather than the other way around.

It was a bit of a challenge in my current state going up to the City for a concert (and I have five more in the next week, so I'd better gird myself), but this one for all its oddity turned out to be worthwhile.

sabotabby

Well looks like this sorry, battered world is still there, at least this part of the world, so here's what I'm reading I guess.

Just finished: The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones. This whipped. Blood-soaked historical fiction set in the early 1900s as a Pikuni vampire tangles with a Lutheran minister in the wake of a horrific massacre. All of the trigger warnings, obviously as it's quite literally visceral, which is not the most upsetting thing about it. Jones is really quite a brilliant writer.

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz. This is not the kind of thing that I normally like but works well as a chaser to the previous book, in that it's low-stakes, cozy, and fun. It's about a group of emancipated sentient robots, a car (also sentient), and a human who take over a ghost kitchen in the aftermath of a war between California and the rest of the US. If they don't pay off their debts, they'll be re-sold into slavery, but this is not the kind of book where that happens. It works for me largely because of the descriptions of the biang biang noodles, but it's also about the big theme of the year, which is who counts as a person.

Currently reading: About to start The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar.

poliphilo

I envy the cat his ability to go to sleep any place any time.

The older us humans get the more sleep eludes us- or so it seems.

Talking about about the effects of ageing, I seem to have lost my hips. My body now stretches, straight as a die from torso to thigh, with the consequence that my belt no longer serves to hold my trousers up.

So I'm going to be trying braces......

daily_otter_feed

Posted by Daily Otter

https://dailyotter.org/posts/2026/4/8/things-are-going-otterly-swimmingly

Via Aquarium of the Pacific

https://dailyotter.org/posts/2026/4/8/things-are-going-otterly-swimmingly

goodbyebird posting in

3weeks4dreamwidth

Hey all,
We're in April already! I figured I'd check to see if there's interest in running 3 Weeks For Dreamwidth again this year, and also ask if anybody would like to host some activities in their journals or communities.

Also a good time to start thinking of posts you might want to make, for your hobbies or fandoms or those book reviews you've been meaning to make. After all, the whole point of the fest is to get more activity on DW.

Feel free to sound off and idea storm in the comments :)

Three Weeks For Dreamwidth banner feat. cuteness

Three Weeks For Dreamwidth banner feat. cuteness

Current Music: RAYE - Joy.

goodbyebird

ECLIPSE. April 6, 2026. Totality, beyond Earth. From lunar orbit, the Moon eclipses the Sun, revealing a view few in human history have ever witnessed.

First photo from the far side of the Moon. Captured from Orion as Earth dips beyond the lunar horizon

Following the current Artemis mission + rolling around in art and nature photography is keeping me going atm. Slingshotting in space!

+ The seagulls are napping and grooming on our windowsills a lot and it's been a treat. I often find myself watching Bird TV. With the stains on the glass they don't seem to notice us there, so you get a wild animal puffing up and resting 30cm from your face. Always a delight.

+ If like me you're still enamored with Project Hail Mary and need images to make icons from,

theskyisnew's got you covered 👎

+ Sad Starfleet Academy got cancelled, though I strongly suspected that would be the case. What I didn't expect was that they'd already finished shooting season 2. So that's something. Probably a cliffhanger nightmare but I'll take it.

( Letter from Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau. )

+ Already considering rewarding myself with a purchase after the trip. The Embodied Ecosystems TarOracle is looking like a strong contender, both for the art/theming, and the chunky guidebook it comes with. But then there's the fanmade X-Files tarot I spotted that's calling to me. Hmm. (I finished season 1 btw. Mulder didn't know lycanthropy transferred through bites/scratches?? Press x-files to doubt. S2 will have Scully revert back to not believing in aliens, huh? I remember being extremely annoyed back in the day and surely that can't have been based off s1. Mulder's hot takes have been deserving of a defenestration sometimes multiple times per episode.)

+

3weeks4dreamwidth is coming up, but I honestly feel there's not enough interest to make it work. I'm going to have to give it a think.

+ I'll be home in two and a half weeks so I'll just cling to that for now.

Current Music: Anjimile- Like You Really Mean It

dewline

I know Nicholas Brandon has a History of Being an Unpleasant Human Being. Earned.

By way of how his death happened, he's also apparently part of a larger story about how governments and industries are still trying to push aside the consequences of COVID-19 before the Pandemic itself is truly over and done.

Current Mood: sore

flemmings

Well, if we're heading towards the apocalypse at least we're doing it on a sunny day. A cold sunny day, mind: snow on the rooftops when I got out of bed at an unwonted 9:30. Vanished in the April sun when I eventually went out to catch the 4 pm opening of Sushi on Bloor. Had a bento, very pleasant except for the guy who came in and plonked himself down two tables from me. He'd been smoking before he came in and reeked of it. Had to put sanitizer on my upper lip to kill the smell. I know most people don't smell most things, and smokers certainly can't, but it's a misery for those of us who do. I suppose it's like those with perfect pitch who have to listen to rock singers who definitely don't.

Otherwise sun and snow do make a change from the chronic rain showers and also what was probably thundersnow last night. Whether it's the rain or whether it's a new stage of decrepitude, but my wrists are now catching and panging arthritically in the fashion of my April elbows. Last month I could skip acupuncture no problem, but having missed last week's session was clearly a bad idea. Have also ballooned with water weight as my ankles and scale inform me, alas. Time to drop the vodka coolers and reintroduce the 1.5 litres of water again.

Profile

muninnhuginn

April 2026

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Page Summary

kaberett - ... whoops
flemmings - (no subject)
sage - What I'm Doing Wednesday
myjetpack_feed - My latest for New Scientist
oursin - Wednesday saw the return of the heron, catching A FROG
susandennis - Calorie-orama
james_davis_nicoll - Conservative MP Marilyn Gladu crosses floor to Liberals
pauraque in booknook - RIP (Read In Progress) Wednesday
nanila - Some photos from Day 1 in Trieste
lirazel - what i'm reading wednesday 8/4/2026
james_davis_nicoll - Witch Hat Atelier, volume 14 by Kamome Shirahama
calimac - concert review: Catalyst Quartet and friends
sabotabby - Reading Wednesday
poliphilo - The Effects Of Ageing
andrewducker - Interesting Links for 08-04-2026
daily_otter_feed - Things Are Going Otterly Swimmingly
goodbyebird in 3weeks4dreamwidth - Interest check
goodbyebird - Moon's haunted.
dewline - Celebrity Deaths and a Pandemic Not Yet Done
flemmings - (no subject)

Style Credit

Base style: Crisped by timeasmymeasure
Theme: Alice Blue Blossoms by forests_of_fire
Resources: ColourLovers pattern by amethystfirefly and thirdbreakfast

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Page generated Apr. 8th, 2026 10:21 pm

Between blotch and blok

twa corbies making a mane

Network

... whoops

(no subject)

What I'm Doing Wednesday

My latest for New Scientist

Wednesday saw the return of the heron, catching A FROG

Calorie-orama

Conservative MP Marilyn Gladu crosses floor to Liberals

RIP (Read In Progress) Wednesday

Some photos from Day 1 in Trieste

what i'm reading wednesday 8/4/2026

Witch Hat Atelier, volume 14 by Kamome Shirahama

concert review: Catalyst Quartet and friends

Reading Wednesday

The Effects Of Ageing

Interesting Links for 08-04-2026

Things Are Going Otterly Swimmingly

Interest check

Moon's haunted.

Celebrity Deaths and a Pandemic Not Yet Done