December 2025

M T W T F S S
1234567
891011 121314
15 1617 18192021
22 232425262728
293031    

Style Credit

Wednesday, December 24th, 2025 08:45
I think I'm starting to get it out of my system. Maybe. Not at all eyeing the manga volumes for a reread. This will be fine. I'm fine. We're cool.


Oversight | K-9 | Fujimaru Jin/Hizuki Ren/Kagari Yukito/Oboro Yuushirou | 1.4k words | rated T

Summary: Ren has never questioned where Oboro lives, until now.

Read it on Dreamwidth or AO3.
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 19:58
In August 2024, I got a heat pump and switched my heat source from gas to electric.

PG&E has an arcane cost structure where not only do they charge more for electricity between certain hours (4-9pm for my rate plan) but they also have a baseline allowance and charge significantly more for usage over baseline. Neither the contractor nor my neighbor with a heat pump advised me that I needed to call PG&E and tell them I had changed heat sources to change my baselines, so I overpaid a lot for electricity last winter.

I was aware that I was paying a lot even though the heat pump wasn't maintaining temperature. I asked the contractor. I asked my neighbor. Neither mentioned the baseline amounts.

PG&E sent me a message earlier this fall saying I might pay less on a different rate plan, and when I called them (Oct 9, for my records), I found out about notifying them I now had electric heat. One agent told me the was refundable as much as 3 years retroactively, but it turns out he was blowing smoke, and it isn't. :-(

The new rate plan is even more complicated and I still had a really high bill this month despite not keeping the place very warm (and I have double pane windows and everything!), so I spent a long time on the phone with an agent today digging into the numbers and figured out the new rate plan is actually slightly more expensive than just having the right baseline amount, so I'm switching back.

*sigh*. I guess some lessons are just expensive. Looks like they instituted this whole baseline thing right around when I moved back in May 2022, which explains why I wasn't aware of it before, and maybe I missed both the existing customer education and the new customer education.

Last year's missing baseline credits )

I'm continuing to send updates to the contractor who installed the heat pump system, which is under warranty for 3 years. At the end of last winter, he replaced the thermostat, and a control board in the downstairs indoor unit where he cut a jumper that it didn't make sense to cut. Now he says he's going to replace the whole indoor unit, and install one that's more powerful. It's supposed to arrive early-mid January. We'll see if that fixes the problem. He will also have to replace all the coolant, so if he had the wrong amount in there, that will also fix that problem. I suppose if that doesn't help then he replaces the outdoor unit. One step at a time...
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 20:30
The Odyssey (2026)
[ official trailer ]


[ here @ [community profile] axisandallies ]
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 20:27
1. I got my hair cut this morning. My original appointment was for yesterday, but a meeting got scheduled that conflicted with it. Thankfully there was still enough time to change the appointment, but the only slot left was at 11:45am today, and I really prefer to get it done earlier in the morning so I can get on with my day. But it worked out okay. I didn't have anything time sensitive at work until two meetings later in the afternoon, which is good because the person ahead of me went over by half an hour. Not sure if the guy was late to his appointment or if his just took longer than anticipated. I could definitely see it being the latter because he had a long grey beard that he was getting died in a rainbow (this is a queer salon so the site of an older bald guy with a rainbow beard was not at all out of the ordinary, but it was a very cool choice on his part).

2. The rain started today but so far did not significantly interfere with my day. Rained lightly on the way to the salon, but had stopped by the time I got there (very good because I had to park around the block) and was still dry when I left and also when I arrived at work. Very light sprinkling when I left work, but not bad. And it was still dry when I got home, so we were able to take our evening walk. Tomorrow is supposed to be the worst of it, so I've decided not to go in to work tomorrow. I have nothing that really needs me to be there and the only reason I was planning to go in to begin with is because I also need to pick up my Christmas cake at the nearby bakery. So I do still have to drive down there, but I was able to move the pickup time to early in the morning and I'll just pop down and get it and hopefully not get too wet and then relax the rest of the day indoors.

3. We got an extension on the work project until mid February and I think we can meet that deadline. The company who is customizing the software for us said that is the hard deadline really for real this time to keep the go live date of spring 2027, and upper management really does not want to move that date, so fingers crossed. Based on where we are now, though, it does seem very doable.

4. Only a kitty would be comfy half hanging off the sofa lol.

Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 22:18

Character: Squall Leonhart
Fandom: Final Fantasy VIII
Theme set: Gamma
Rating: G to Mature (various)
Warnings: Light drug use, mentions of torture or aftermath of torture, sexually implicit themes, trauma, mentions of bullying, memory loss and probably other things I forgot (I'll update this).

I currently have it solely on my Notion page right here, but I will upload it Dreamwidth and Tumblr later (I'm just so sleepy).

Ignore how I have it set up to have updated word counts, since I was running late, I don't have each and every entry the way I initially formatted it.

Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 13:32
There are all kinds of nature challenges and goals that people like to do. Some are individual, others are group events. Some are all year, others shorter. Some have activist themes, others are ordinary. They span a great many different formats including but not limited to art en plein air, birdwatching, environmental projects, gardening, nature writing, outdoor activities, and spending time in nature. Here are some for your inspiration. On Dreamwidth, see [community profile] birdfeeding, [community profile] common_nature, [community profile] gardening, and other Nature communities.

You can pick whichever challenge(s) you want to set as a goal in 2026 and reply with a comment. Below the list of challenges is a short form for listing which you have chosen. Make a post in your blog like "I signed up for the Nature challenge in [community profile] goals_on_dw" -- or list the specific challenge if you're doing an official one somewhere else instead of a personal one here. Then make a tag for it like "Nature Challenge" and put that on the post; it should stick that way. Check your Interests page to see if you have Birdwatching, Environment, Gardening, Nature, Outdoors, Wildlife, etc. listed there, which helps people find you. You don't have to sign up to participate, it just helps spread the word and attract more readers.

There is a Bingo Card Generator if you want to make your own using premade lists or whatever prompts you want to paste in. Various sizes and styles are available.

See also the Arts and Crafts, Community Thursdays, Fannish 50, Reading, and Writing challenges. If you want to write a naturalist's guide to an exoplanet, grow a Hobbit garden, paint the architecture of an alien arboretum, or review every nature book you read all year, go for it. You can even double-count anything that applies to two or more goals, e.g. [community profile] inkingitout and 1000 Hours Outside.

Do you know of any other nature challenges in 2026? Share a link so they can be added to the list of options.

Read more... )
Wednesday, December 24th, 2025 14:50

. . . okay I have done it. I have become a Plex Bitch.

Leave a comment.+

Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 21:12

(don't forget to kill the auto-dub)
I enjoyed what I read of the manga! Very excited to see this get an adaptation.
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 20:19
my clip zip has a fucked up sd card reader. doestn read any sd cards at all. at least some of the dead pixels were fixed. welp. TIME TO MAXIMIZE THOSE 4 GIGS bc i love this thing now
Tags:
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 17:30
The Department of Shameless Self-Promotion announces that I will be telling a story as part of this year’s New Year’s Story Blowout put on by Artists Standing Strong Together (ASST).

ASST.New Year's Story Blowout 2024 - 2

Voices in the Glen has the 7:00 p.m. EST slot. The tellers will be Jane Dorfman, Joan Leotta, Lauren Martino, Tim Livengood, and me (Miriam Nadel). For free tickets (and a link to donate to ASST) see the ASST website
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 22:08
I shall be working tomorrow (Christmas Eve) and need to leave the house at about 8.30am on Christmas Day, so I don't have a lot of time for preparation... but there's always time to squeeze in a little writing with a notebook balanced on top of the saucepan while preparing sprouts and packet noodles for supper, as I have just demonstrated :-P
(Admittedly it was about a sentence and a half, but I do intend to finish that sentence tonight, honest guv...)

Does genius burn for you today, Jos and Joes?
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 16:46
Oy, I forgot to post this last night.

For several years, I’ve posted a Chanukah song to Facebook every day of the holiday. Here is what I found for this year:

Night 1: We Are Lights. This is Cantor Avi Schwartz of Park Avenue Synagogue and Mira Davis, with the New York Children’s Chorus. The song was written by Stephen Schwartz, who wrote the songs for Wicked among other things.

Night 2: I am a big fan of Ari Lesser, a Chasidic rapper. I was amused by his piece, Hanukkah Diet.

Night 3: There are several Jewish a cappella groups who do Chanukah songs every year. The Maccabeats are one of the best known. This year’s selection features a K-pop Demon Hunters medley. There’s another version with video, but it was a bit AI-dominated so I chose the version with the lyrics.

Night 4: Nani Vazana is an amazing singer, who sings primarily in Ladino. Ocho Kandelikas, written by Flory Jagoda is probably the best known Ladino Chanukah song.

Night 5: We’re back to another a cappella group who also chose K-pop Demon Hunters for their Chanukah song this year. Here’s Six13 with Golden

Night 6: I had to include a Yiddish song. Unfortunately, I couldn’t figure out who the singer is from the Facebook reel. It’s from a facebook group called Yiddish music lovers.

Night 7: This took me to the late great Ofra Haza with a 1974 song about Hannah and her seven sons.

Night 8: The last of the a cappella groups this year was Y-Studs, who used the Jonas Brothers as their inspiration for A Very Jonas Hanukkah.

Bonus song: I couldn’t resist including this bit from Couplet Comedy. Here's a medley about what would happen if Chanukah had weirdly sexual songs like Christmas.
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 12:44
Tuesday, December 23, 2025

Reindeer (noun)
rein·deer [reyn-deer]


noun
1. any of several large deer of the genus Rangifer, of northern and arctic regions of Europe, Asia, and North America, both male and female of which have antlers.

Compare meaning
How does reindeer compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

reindeer vs. deer
caribou vs. reindeer

Origin: First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English raynder(e), from Old Norse hreindȳri, equivalent to hreinn “reindeer” + dȳr “animal” (cognate with deer )

Example Sentences
It's also got a proper tree with decorations, there's a Rudolf reindeer toy and they've put some thought into all the splashes of red.
From BBC

"The trip meant so much to us. Leighton loved Lapland and enjoyed all the activities like visiting Santa's post office, Mrs Claus' house and seeing the reindeer," he added.
From BBC

Animal activists are calling for a ban on live reindeer events this Christmas, claiming their evidence shows serious welfare concerns.
From BBC

Let the reindeer chow cool before serving — or packing.
From Salon

A sign states that “Santa is feeding the reindeer.”
From Los Angeles Times
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 20:07
It seems I forgot to post the Reading Bingo that I finished in June! So here it is!

This way... )
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 14:12
The Pitt: I have now watched eps 1.04 – 1.09. My comments contain spoilers for all of those eps. spoilers )