vik_thor | Network

Do we think this trip is doomed already???

My best friend Kady and I are planning a backpacking trip around south-east Asia in a few months and I have proposed the idea of us getting matching tattoos:

We’re both 20, and I think we’ll look back on them when we’re older and remember what a fun life we’ve lived. Tattoos are a reminder of a particular time, and I want to cherish our youth. I’ve found a cool tattoo parlour in northern Thailand, where we’ll be staying. I’ve seen videos of people having great experiences there and the tattoo artist is really talented.... It’s not like I want to get a random tattoo. I’m quite creative and have already started sketching ideas that represent who Kady and I are.

You're 20, duckie....

***

In other gruesome news, okay, it is not one bloke spreading his seed to 100s, but I'm not actually sure that 'a worldwide limit of 75 families for each sperm donor' as applied by the European Sperm Bank isn't somewhat on the high side, even when it doesn't turn out further down the line with more sophisticated testing that a donor has a rare cancer-causing mutation.

***

And this is sad, rather than gruesome, and makes me wonder about the whole marketing of the 'freezing eggs' thing as 'a groundbreaking act of empowerment', especially as it hasn't turned out like that:

I did not anticipate the emotional landscape that I would face a decade later, as a scientific intervention became a personal meditation on time, money, and unfulfilled dreams.

shipperslist

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

spikedluv

The Last of Us: I haven’t been able to bring myself to watch this ep yet. If you’ve seen it, please tell me how gutted I am going to be by it.

Leverage: Redemption: Good ep! ( spoilers )

Murderbot: Good ep! ( spoilers )

stevenpiziks

This came up on a friend's thread and I thought I'd mention it here.

Disney shares your data with EVERYBODY. Their privacy policy doesn't really do anything to protect your privacy. It's more of an invasion of privacy policy. I looked it up just now and found this nugget:

"We, certain service providers operating on our behalf, and third parties may collect information about your activity, or activity on devices associated with you, on our sites and applications and third-party sites and applications using tracking technologies such as cookies, pixels, tags, software development kits, application program interfaces, and Web beacons. We may collect information whether or not you are logged in or registered, and may associate this tracking data with your registration account (if you have one)."

In other words, the moment you visit a Disney-operated anything, they sell all your usage data with your name attached to it to anyone with a debit card.

You =can= opt out, but you have to opt out of each web site, account, or service individually. So you have to fill out a separate opt-out request for Disney+, Hulu, your amusement park account, the Disney park app, and so on. If you have a Disney app on your phone, it tracks everything you do all the time, even if you're not logged in.

They're very upfront about it, as long as you go look: https://privacy.thewaltdisneycompany.com/en/privacy-controls/online-tracking-and-advertising/

Disney is as bad as Meta and Google.

oursin

Happy birthday,

catlinyemaker,

heleninwales and

ruudboy!

kitarella_imagines

I had a funny memory today. When I was a child and teenager in the 1970s and 80s, a number of people told me there were two actors called Lewis Collins. One who played Gavin in The Cuckoo Waltz and one who played Bodie in The Professionals. They were not the same person, they just happened to have the same name.

So I wonder if a lot of people thought this in the 70s and 80s? And that was why they only saw Lewis as Bodie and didn't realize his broad range as an actor? I am talking about people who were casual viewers of the shows and not dedicated fans, who of course realised there was only one Lewis. If people were only vaguely interested in The Cuckoo Waltz and The Professionals, they would just accept that there were two actors with the same name.

And of course the shows had totally different audiences! Cuckoo was a light hearted comedy, Professionals was a fast moving crime drama- why would viewers make the connection between these 'two different actors'?

Especially as back then, we weren't drowning in information as we are in the 21st Century. Information was hard to find in the 1970s and 80s, it was only in the daily newspaper, magazines etc. People couldn't just 'Google an actor' like we can now days.

Lewis certainly looked and acted totally differently as Gavin to how he did as Bodie, so the confusion is understandable. They didn't look like they were the same person!

Current Mood: curious

spikedluv

(This is a test of ~~the Emergency Alert System~~ daily posting.)

I hit Walmart and Price Chopper while I was downtown yesterday. (The Walmart stop was to get a different wrist brace to try as the one I purchased previously I think would work better while I’m actually using my laptop rather than sleeping.) I hit Stewart’s (for gas and milk) and the library (to return a book) on the way home.

I did two loads of laundry, a load in the dishwasher, and paid a bill online. I baked chicken for the dogs' meals and made corned beef for supper. (It was awful. The corn beef tasted odd – enough that Pip was okay with me tossing the leftovers because he didn’t want to eat any more of it – and even the boiled potatoes went funky. The potato came off the skin and turned to mush, basically. I have no idea what happened.

Fun stuff! I watched the current ep of Leverage: Redemption and some recorded HGTV programs, took a nap (I’m blaming the weather for how many naps I’ve had to take lately), and read some fanfic. I also talked to my mom on the phone before my shower. (We generally talk every night, just telling each other about our days, no matter how little we did or how boring they were. *g*)

Temps started out at 42.3(F) and reached 53.8. It rained all day, though it was mostly drizzles and sprinkles. Still enough to make it impossible to do anything. Plus the overcast sky is soooo depressing.

Will today be better? As the Magic-8 Ball says, Don't count on it.

ETA: It was my niece L's birthday! She turned 35.

leecetheartist posting in

drawesome

Title: Quick merman

Artist:

leecetheartist

Rating: Merdude

Fandom: N/A
Characters/Pairings: n/a

Summary: Just a merbloke with a big tail

Content Notes: I like big fins and I cannot lie! I'm super busy today, so just a quick Merdude done in the Pelikan Golden Lapis and Rose Quartz.

twistedchick

I discovered a few years ago that when I put substances on my skin I can taste them within 30 seconds, with a few exceptions. That led to not wearing foundation, or most makeup (various flavors of odd), sunscreen (nasty burning plastic flavor, and no, I can't explain why burning), and lipstick (fermented plastic flavor). I can wear eyeliner and some concealers, and that's about it. I can use Burt's Bees plain lipbalm, which has mint oil.

Sunscreen is the problem, though. Since I can't use the chemical stuff, I have been trying to find a natural oil that has a decent SPF. Olive oil is about SPF 4-8, which is something but not enough. I heard that avocado oil is higher than SPF 15, so I swiped some from the kitchen and tried it. Unfortunately, it does not behave like olive oil, which eventually sinks in a little and dulls. The avocado stays shiny and oily looking, enough that someone asked me how hot it was outdoors since she thought it was sweat. Um. not good.

Any thoughts on this? I've tried the light powder sunscreen and it's not enough screen for me.

senmut

*\o/*	Word Count	Step Count	Headache?
Daily	607	9,470	yes
Monthly	14,022	212,968	8 days

Current Music: "Open Your Eyes" - Snow Patrol

sadge posting in

dreamcodes

( find it here )

musesfool

I'm so tired of people blowing their deadlines and making it my problem. But at the super last minute, it did finally come together so I was able to log off at 3 pm (it's the first Summer Friday of 2025, and we get to sign off at 2:30 until Labor Day).

My sister is having a birthday bbq tomorrow for my oldest and youngest nieces, who share a birthday, and one requested Smitten Kitchen confetti cookies (even though I told her I found them too sweet) and the other requested brownies (which is why I asked about brownie recipes yesterday - I don't make them often anymore so I don't have a go-to recipe). I couldn't lay hands on dutched cocoa for love or money today, but it turns out that the King Arthur "triple cocoa" or whatever it's called, works in recipes calling for dutched cocoa, and I have that. *hands* But like, nobody even has Hershey's special dark! I was surprised by that. Anyway I ended up making these King Arthur Fudge Brownies and they smell fantastic, though next time I will probably try the microwave to melt the butter instead of doing it on the stove - I did it in a pot on the stove and even on low heat, it got so hot that I had to wait like 30 minutes for it to cool to the temperature required by the recipe (110° - 120°F), so it took a lot longer than I planned for. Other than that, the recipe is really easy. I guess because you beat the cocoa into the eggs, you don't have to worry about the hot butter/sugar mixture scrambling them (you laugh, but that happened to me once with the old mascarpone brownies recipe when I added the melted butter!).

I hope they both enjoy them!

I also bought a banana squishmallow for Baby Miss L, because her response to them has been A++ hilarious every time.

Hopefully the weather tomorrow cooperates. It has rained here so much. Today it rained all morning and then the sun came out late in the afternoon, and then...it poured while the sun was out for a while, and the temperature has lingered in the low 60s. I mean, I'll take the cooler temps for sure, especially at night, but I'm really tired of the rain.

In other news, last night I fell asleep on the couch when I was trying to read, so when I woke up, I decided to just go to bed, and for once, couch sleepy did translate to bed sleepy and I ended up sleeping for almost 10 hours last night! It was glorious! But I don't think I can realistically make myself go to bed at 10:15 every night. *glances at clock* I mean...¯\_(ツ)_/¯

*

Current Mood: accomplished
Current Music: Mets vs Dodgers on tv

senmut

Oooh, 1987? I vaguely remember that year. 3 schools, since I left MS in the last term of 6th grade, finished it at a new one in FL, and started 7th grade down there (before moving back in the winter to finish back in MS). Let's see how many tabs I open. Hey only 22 catching my full attention. Let's narrow that down. hmm, 13? Let's do this.

( length, and mention of reproductive choices )

china_shop posting in

sid_guardian

I picked up a Guardian pinch hit for

unsent_letters_exchange. I had two ideas for it, so when reveals were delayed, I wrote the other one as a treat. The first is set over three successive nights before and during the Hanga arc, and the second one is established relationship, with Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei passing notes during a state meeting in Dixing, in handwavy everyone-lives post-canon.

Title: a pocketful of change (4771 words) [General Audiences]
Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV 2018)
Relationships: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan
Additional Tags: Missing Scene, Set before and during the Hanga arc (episodes 9 to 11), unsent letter, Pre-Relationship, Mutual Pining, SID politics, Epistolatory format: Letter

Summary: Lost in the past, Shen Wei shoved his hands into his jacket pockets. His fingers met small hard balls on smooth sticks and recognised them instantly. Heart clenching, he withdrew the pocket’s entire contents: three lollipops, a little ziplock bag filled with dried fish, and a wad of pages torn from a notebook and roughly folded. The outside of the paper was unmarked, but its surface texture bore evidence of the handwriting within.

He was still wearing Zhao Yunlan’s jacket. Whatever was written on these pages wasn’t meant for his eyes.

Title: A Passing Grade in Diplomacy (4062 words) [Teen and Up]
Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV 2018)
Relationships: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan
Additional Tags: Post-Canon, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Politics, meetings, Established Relationship, Banter, passing notes, Warning: internalised slut-shaming, just briefly tho

Summary: Next time, bring lollipops! Zhao Yunlan jotted in a spare corner of his page. He underlined it twice and went back to doodling more leaves on his tree, which was bushy and verdant like the new plantings in the streets near the Dragon Gate. He was experimenting with vines and curling tendrils when characters appeared out of nowhere, beneath his reminder.

Check your right-hand jacket pocket.

infinitum_noctem posting in

fan_flashworks

Title: Demands Are Not Welcome Here, Turn and Walk Away
Fandom: The Legend of Korra
Pairings: Korra/Asami Sato
Characters: Mako, Tenzin
Rating: G
Length: 80 words
Summary: 3 sentence fic. The Avatar finds a moment of peace with the ones she loves.

( Read more... )

petra

Rudest tag I have seen in a month of Sundays:
( Life on Mars (UK) spoiler for the finale )

Compare with ( The Untamed spoiler for the first episode )

Which is kinda like ( Shakespeare spoiler )

When it could've been ( Bigger Shakespeare spoiler )

( Greek myth spoiler )

Current Mood: silly
Current Music: Every language easy, easy as the recipe for making Jell-O

shadowhive

Black Is The New Black
Pairing: Matt Davies-Kreye, Lucas Woodland
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Rubber, mindbreak
Notes: So I had hoped, as always, to get one of the main WIPs out. Indeed it was an intent to get a prompt fic out. However between a certain someone reading through the rubber fics and giving me a suggestion I’m back with a whole new fic (as if I needed more!) but I’d always intended to do more of the ‘rubber verse’ although this wasn’t what I thought I would do.
This is set late 2023 (and I really need to find a pic of Matt but can’t find one quickly). A companion fic is coming too and will probably be the next thing before I go back to the prompts
( Read more... )

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Seapeekay stream

hrj

But first, a word from our garden...

Summer squashes are always hit or miss with me. I plant at least one every year and then take what comes (or doesn't). Today I had two good sized squashes and picked one. (There's also a clump of volunteer squash in a bed I'm not actively using, but they're from seeds that were in the compost heap, so who knows what the genetics are!)

I'm getting a good handful of blueberries at least once a week and there will be a solid gooseberry crop in another month or so. The currents are taking the year off, but are healthy. Artichokes are done for the year. Tomatoes are setting but not yet ripe.

This week started off with spending a couple days at my dad's place to take him to a couple appointments and do some shopping. (My brother, who lives there, is currently waiting on cataract surgery and isn't driving.) He has other options for rides, but I want to get over there more often now that I have time, so it works out.

Wednesday the electrician came over and got all set up for replacing my electrical panel. The replacement happened in a single day on Thursday, and since I was off biking and having a routine medical check-up for the first half of the day, the lack of electricity wasn't as much of a bother. (There was a pre-appointment survey about my exercise habits, so it was a nice touch to show up sweaty in my biking clothes.)

Replacing the electrical panel meant temporarily moving the not-built-in-but-fastened-to-the-wall shelves on that wall where all my bins of fabric and crafting supplies live. So in addition to taking the opportunity to wipe down the shelves and bins, I'm also doing a sift-through of the contents. This is reminding me that when I moved in I did a fair amount of "let's just stuff this in a plastic tub and put it on a shelf."

I've been meaning to do a second round of "let's invite people over to take away things I'm not likely to use". The first round was SCA camping gear. The second round will be craft supplies. So I need to go through everything and identify what I want to keep, what I want to prioritize actually finishing, and what I'm happy to re-home. I can probably combine it with a little "come over and see if you want these books I'm getting rid of." My goal is to boil it down so that "tools and small supplies" will fit in the cabinet in the craft room, while "fabric and large supplies" go on the garage shelves. Part of that will be actually completing some projects that currently take up space.

cmcmck

The Church is early 14th century.

Rood screens are rare survivals and many are 19th century copies, but this one is original:

( See more: )

Current Mood: photographical
Current Location: 'ereabouts

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Vik-Thor

November 2024

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Page Summary

oursin - Down in the woodshed
shipperslist - doMAYstic 2025 #24: embarrassing gifts
spikedluv - TV Talk: Leverage: Redemption & Murderbot
stevenpiziks - Oh, Disney
oursin - (no subject)
kitarella_imagines - Two Lewis Collinses?
andrewducker - Interesting Links for 24-05-2025
spikedluv - The Day in Spikedluv (Friday, May 23)
leecetheartist in drawesome - Quick merman
twistedchick - (no subject)
senmut - Daily Check In
sadge in dreamcodes - permissions code: had i not seen the sun
musesfool - makes the one-hand catch
senmut - Fandom50: #12
china_shop in sid_guardian - Two Weilan fics for Unsent Letters Exchange
infinitum_noctem in fan_flashworks - The Legend of Korra: Fanfiction: Demands Are Not Welcome Here, Turn and Walk Away
petra - Rudest tag possible
shadowhive - Black Is The New Black
hrj - The Busy-ness Continues
cmcmck - The Church of St Mary and All Saints Conwy

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Vik-Thor's Journal

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Down in the woodshed

doMAYstic 2025 #24: embarrassing gifts

TV Talk: Leverage: Redemption & Murderbot

Oh, Disney

(no subject)

Two Lewis Collinses?

Interesting Links for 24-05-2025

The Day in Spikedluv (Friday, May 23)

Quick merman

(no subject)

Daily Check In

permissions code: had i not seen the sun

makes the one-hand catch

Fandom50: #12

Two Weilan fics for Unsent Letters Exchange

The Legend of Korra: Fanfiction: Demands Are Not Welcome Here, Turn and Walk Away

Rudest tag possible

Black Is The New Black

The Busy-ness Continues

The Church of St Mary and All Saints Conwy

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November 2024

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