kat_lair | Network

kaberett

Breakfast dal. This experiment continues to work extremely well.
I have definitely reached the point with the Incomplete White Puzzle where it's speeding up significantly on account of enough pieces are in place to significantly reduce the number of possible combinations that need checking. Today's decision was to start filling in from the bottom edge, where I still had a chunk that was just edge and no middles, because I think that up in the top left (interior) corner I've identified The Missing Piece, and will get annoyed if I wind up with non-contiguous gaps...
Today alternating Locate One Puzzle Piece with Do One Useful Job has been nice and smooth and easy. I have got Several things done. Is pleased.
Really really enjoying my ridiculous washi tape collection. Today I self-indulgently Added More Week Dividers, including replacing some pre-existing ones that I was Not Enjoying, Actually.
( Exercise & embodiment. )

case in

fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #6986 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

Everything has spoiler or content warnings today!

( More! )

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #997.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

lilly_c in

fic_rush_48

*weakly heaves the anchor over the side*

we have reached the zero hour! anything to report? likely won't be much more for me today, it's getting quite late where I am.

settiai

Expert Opinions (2502 words) by Settiai
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age - All Media Types
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Merrill & Solas (Dragon Age)
Characters: Female Lavellan (Dragon Age), Merrill (Dragon Age), Solas (Dragon Age)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Complicated Relationships, Dragon Age: The Platonic Ideal Gift Exchange, One Shot, Temple of Mythal (Dragon Age)
Summary: Solas was nothing like Merrill expected. She wasn't certain if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

Current Mood: artistic

settiai

All Our Lives We Feel This Young (1400 words) by Settiai
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age - All Media Types
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Female Brosca & Rica Brosca
Characters: Female Brosca (Dragon Age), Rica Brosca
Additional Tags: Bittersweet, Dragon Age: The Platonic Ideal Gift Exchange, Grey Wardens (Dragon Age), One Shot, Post-Canon, Sisters, Sister-Sister Relationship, Slice of Life, Terminal Illnesses
Summary: Jelsi Brosca might not have all that much time left, but she'd already made up her mind how to spend it. She'd missed her sister. They couldn't make up for lost time, not really, but they could try.

Current Mood: creative

sweeticedtea in

fandom_icons

Shawn Hatosy as Jack Abbot in The Pitt (s1 & s2e7 / 15 each)

more here! @

sweeticedtea

lilly_c in

fic_rush_48

anything to report?

my research got distracted by rugby league.

modzilla in

pinchhits

Event: Five Figure Fanwork Exchange - multifandom gift exchange for 5k+ fanfic and 20+ panel comic-style fanart
Event link:

fffx / https://fffx.dreamwidth.org
Pinch hit link: https://fffx.dreamwidth.org/tag/pinch+hits
Due date: 11:59pm EDT, Sunday 8 March

Five Figure Fanwork Exchange is seeking pinch hitters who can create a story of at least 5,000 words or a comic of at least 20 panels. We've already delayed once and we'd be very grateful if pinch hitters could help us avoid delaying again!

Pinch hits are available to pick up in the following fandoms with the following minimum requirements:

ART
( Fandoms available to fulfil with art - 40-panel comic or 20-panel comic needed )

( Fandoms available to fulfil with art - 20-panel comic only needed )

FIC
( Fandoms available to fulfil with fic - 10k fic needed )

( Fandoms available to fulfil with fic - 10k fic or 5k fic needed )

( Fandoms available to fulfil with fic - 5k fic only needed )

pauraque

Opening in the days of the Harlem Renaissance, the first page of this novel states the culmination of its story: A door-to-door cosmetics salesman shot his eighteen-year-old mistress, and then the salesman's wife crashed the funeral to try to stab the girl's corpse. Why? The reader wants to know, and so do many of the characters. The book offers answers only indirectly, taking a sprawling path into the characters' pasts, where their families came from, and the intergenerational trauma of the slavery era that's still in living memory at this time.

The prose style of this book really worked for me and did a lot of the heavy lifting of drawing me into the story. It's lyrical and artistic without ever sacrificing readability. If there's a bit you don't understand, you will understand it in time, but first we have to go back to the beginning of another character's story and circle back around to connect to the main plot—and it does always connect. I think this is the meaning of the title; the book is not about jazz music, but it has the shape of jazz in the way it can state a melody, wander off and explore for a while until you've almost forgotten what song it is, and then return very satisfyingly before passing it off to another player in the ensemble.

I found this book in a free box and then it sat on my shelf for years (shout-out to

lebateleur, my read-books-we-already-own accountability buddy!). It has a lot of underlining, highlighting, and marginal notes from whoever had it before, pointing out themes of dehumanization, rehumanization, and the necessity of deep context for understanding. They highlighted the line "Something else you have to figure in before you figure it out" and also wrote it in pen on the title page. On several pages they wrote "Jazzonia" in the margin, by which I assume they meant the Langston Hughes poem.

Jazzonia (1926)

Oh, silver tree!
Oh, shining rivers of the soul!

In a Harlem cabaret
Six long-headed jazzers play.
A dancing girl whose eyes are bold
Lifts high a dress of silken gold.

Oh, singing tree!
Oh, shining rivers of the soul!

Were Eve’s eyes
In the first garden
Just a bit too bold?
Was Cleopatra gorgeous
In a gown of gold?

Oh, shining tree!
Oh, silver rivers of the soul!

In a whirling cabaret
Six long-headed jazzers play.

watersword

Uh, so, I have a weird Jew-y dilemna.

I volunteer with my neighborhood "snow brigade", which shovels for folks who need help. We're due to get some gross "wintry mix" and "icy sleet" overnight, although maybe not much accumulation.

The couple I got assigned to emailed to say — well, here: "Hopefully there will be NO snow on Friday night and Saturday since for religious reasons we are not able to shovel. If it's not much we can deal with it Saturday night."

I emailed back to say that I don't consider helping a neighbor in need to violate shomer Shabbat and I would be happy to come by and make sure their sidewalks and steps are clear.

They said, "It would be our sin to have another Jew do any work for us on Shabbos. We very much appreciate your kind thoughts to help us. But if we can't do it, you can't do it for us either."

Uhhhhhhhhhh. I am not sure how to respond to this. I don't think this is a sin! I try to observe Shabbat in the sense of resting and renewing myself, but very much not in a traditional way — like, spending a couple of hours mending and embroidering might be part of Shabbat for me because it fills my cup and I don't always get the chance to during the week! Going to the farmer's market and spending half my paycheck and cooking something elaborate on Saturday is a profoundly Shabbosdik thing for me! I don't want to tell them "your theology is wrong" and I don't want to upset them by doing something they have told me not to do (and would apparently feel guilty about????), but ... I can't just leave an elderly couple trapped in their house with icy sidewalks for a day!

*pinches bridge of nose*

I gotta get in touch with the snow brigade coordinator and tell her what's going on so she can try to find a substitute, I guess. I wish I hadn't made it so obvious I am also Jewish, just said something cheerful about being happy to shovel in the morning, but it truly did not occur to me that their observance would mean this. My bad. Ugh.

This is gonna be a real fun conversation with the snow brigade coordinator.

linky

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has marked as possibly inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18. )

Current Mood: calm

goddess47 in

romancingmcshep

Title: Any Excuse for a Party
Author:

goddess47
Character(s): John Sheppard, Rodney McKay
Pairing(s): John Sheppard/Rodney McKay
Rating: PG
Length: 125 words
Warnings: none

Notes:

For

mcsheplets prompt #139 - holiday

For

romancingmcshep 2026

For Fluffbruary 2026 prompt day 20 - apples

Summary:

John had lost track of the holidays, but he suspected this was another Harvest festival of some sort.

Any Excuse for a Party on AO3

goddess47

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

lyr in

thisfinecrew

If you have a bit of time to spare, you can help Ultraviolet with the whack-a-mole fun of reporting GoFundMe pages trying to raise money for the killers of Pretti and Good in MN. I have been doing the reporting side of things, and there's just something soothing about watching the pages come down.

Here is a link to a round-up of the pages spotters have collected which handily also includes a link to instructions on how to report: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PqG-bKig3Z8BbHMN7HTrYwWrIoPkQbrM6QboRP_z4mg/edit?gid=86617038#gid=86617038

witchpoetdreamer

Once upon a time, I had a Medium account. Once upon a time, I had a Substack. The former actually brought in some money before I deleted my account (75$, definitely a really good amount for only 2 posts, like what??), the latter I deleted after an hour trying to figure it out to realize it's not for me (it's also weirdly fascist nowadays apparently).

The reason why I made those account was because, well, isn't being able to sell your writing any writers dream and desire? Isn't it the thing writers should do when they want to be known? Aren't writers supposed to be out there at all, growing their audience for their upcoming novel or collection of essay or something? Truth is, seeing that money appear in my account felt... off. Partly because I felt I didn't deserve that much for two posts I wrote in less than 3 hours (which, why am I like this? XD), partly because that money felt like it came with strings attached. Suddenly, I would need to post regularly to maintain and grow followers, I would need to keep writing things that would get people hooked and interested, I would need to play the social media game. But I don't like the social media game. I don't like feeling pressured to create following a specific schedule or in a way that is pleasing to the algorithm. I'm not opposed to eventually sell what I write, but I also want to do it in a way that feels organic to me. I don't really know yet what that's like, but I have images of an art convention booth, or something of the likes, in my late 40's, 50's, 60's, offering stories and poems and artworks and home made notebooks and possibly spells and tarot readings, and business cards that lead people to my own indie website and this space too if it still exists and just. The way I approach writing in general and art as a whole is something closer to an personal exchange between people rather than numbers on social media or on a paycheck. It definitely makes me feel like I'm not quite built for the way the world works nowadays, but I don't think it means I'll never find my audience because of it. I think quite the opposite in fact. Because one day, there will be people who enjoy what I make all the more for me not being online much, or online following my own rules. And I think that will make for a wonderful life experience.

Current Mood: pensive

desertvixen in

fic_rush_48

Escaping from work temporarily but Responsibilities still lurk.

I shall keep seeking the words, however!

ribirdnerd

Friday 2/20/26

The never ending winter... this snow pile is still left from the January storm. The birds and critters have been very hungry with all the snow cover.

Here's a hungry squirrel in my work parking lot

smallhobbit in

allbingo

Title: A Fortunate Meeting
Fandoms: Miss Marple
Ratings: G
Pairings: Miss Marple, Lucy Eyelesbarrow/Dermot Craddock
Prompts from the Romantic section: Love at first sight, Taking it slow, Dinner for two, Dancing

A Fortunate Meeting on AO3