fred_mouse

minimal (health) update

2026-04-25T14:07:06Z

last update was a week ago. At some point I'll have the energy to get back to the posting frequency I was happy with. Probably not until the con is over though.

healing: I thought the peeling was done - nope, skin on nipple is not shedding correctly and builds up. Fine if I notice before it itches, but has to be manually removed. However, nipple and general breast soreness is enough better that I'm wearing a regular rather than surgical recovery bra without the protective ring, so I'm calling that a win. Fatigue continues to hit sooner and harder than I expect.

medication: I have now been on the hormone suppressant for a week and a bit. I'm not noticing mood effects, but it is mucking with my sleep to the point that I'm back trying melatonin so that I can fall asleep before 2am. As side effects go, this is manageable, especially if the melatonin works to get me back into a sensible cycle, because if it works as previous I can get the sleep pattern back on track in a couple of weeks.

Beyond that, I have achieved bugger all today, and I'm so tired, but not in a 'could fall asleep' so not attempting other updates.

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Book acquisition

2026-04-24T15:00:03Z

I've been doing a lot of staring at bookshelves (bookshops, libraries), online library catalogues, publishers websites, book recommendation sites, online book retail sites and a range of other places that seemed like a good idea at the time. I have not completed the full systematic search I want to have done, but I'm allowing that some of that is going to happen during the writing phase, because I do not actually expect to find the kinds of books I'm after in most of those places.

My spreadsheet of books now has over 150 entries. Quite a lot fail one or more of the inclusion criteria, and some of those are duplicates because I'm attempting to capture the sources as well (will I analyse that? no, probably not. Am I capturing it anyway because I think it will have the potential for me to talk about? yes). Several I've already started reading. I'm most excited about Attack of the Smart Speakers, which I'm halfway through, and as I'm writing my reading notes I keep writing enthusiastic commentary. This one is a bit frustrating because it is a library copy, and so I'm writing more than I would if I could just mark up my copy -- I've now ordered a me copy to annotate.

I'm also really happy with Orion Lost, although I'm not sure how much that one is going to fall in a heap in terms of getting done, because the next set of plot beats have the potential to go places I'm not comfortable following. Yes, it is middle grade fiction, and it will be resolved, but some of where it has already gone has required a few breaks. (I'm aware that these are me specific emotional land mines and that they aren't affecting my interpretation, just how fast I can cope with it). Plus, I put it aside to deal with library books that are due next week (I found three possibles of which two are yeses).

Which brings me to my evening -- I have spent some hours on The Nile and Fishpond websites looking for books that might suit my parameters. On The Nile, I found searching for 'AI' and then filtering to books / fiction / children and young adult did a reasonable job; on Fishpond I found no search that was useful. And then at the end of that I looked through my spreadsheet, picked what was reasonably priced and high in my priority rankings and was a variety of options, and ordered Slightly Too Many Books. Including one co-authored by Farah Mendelsohn, which was has been in my wishlist for multiple years and was about half the price I remember it being (Farah is going to be the GUFF delegate to the local con this year, so I'm extra motivated. Will I take everything I own of theirs to be signed? probably not. But I'm not ruling out the possibility).

And now I have to wait. The original delivery date range when I looked was mid May, and when I checked out it was early to mid June, so who knows when I'll get any of them. I have no shortage of things to be getting on with, but I'm presenting my initial findings at the end of May!

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Exercise

2026-04-19T13:33:56Z

I've been struggling both with energy and motivation for exercise. At some point, I opened a browser tab to Darabee and it has sat there since (best guess: since last year).

Today, I'm browsing it and thinking about options. It has programmes for people with very low fitness, and my intention is to start there. I've decided to look at the options in 'monthly' programs, and filtered only to the lowest difficulty, which gives me 8 options. Which is too many, can't do decisions.

Fortunately! Only looking closer, the Recovery: Post Cold, flu or covid option is 15 days while everything else is 30 days, and committing to the bare minimum feels about where I'm at. Also, I find the title reassuring. So that was a 'eh, pick the easiest' kind of decision making. It lists the exercises as being 'yoga, breathing, stretching', which sure, that sounds like a place to start.

Will I stick with it? Historically no. But the exercise I do any of is better than the exercise I do none of. I .. might remember to check back in?

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minimal update

2026-04-18T02:43:50Z

last update was 25th March and I'm not going to attempt to remember everything done.

Healing: nipple is still very sore, still using the rubber (teething) rings inside my bra to keep the fabric off it (it is still noticeably swollen compared to the other). The rest of the skin has healed, and I think I've finally finished peeling. Most of my armpit is bald, which as a texture experience feels different from having shaved. I continue to have reasonable and exhausted days and have not correctly balanced how much I can get away with doing.

study: I've got lots of good books that meet my criteria, and I've been poking through them. Other parts of the project are going slower. I am frustrated by my inability to buckle down on one, but I am also aware that I'm working through the tasks that I said I was going to need to do to do it properly. I got an email from the ethics board about corrections, so that will be Monday's task.

weather: there has been a startling amount of rain. There was a cyclone that didn't get this far south, but did push a front through. Jandakot recorded 77.4mm on one day, which is a 51 year maximum for March*, and a total of 87.6mm in the five days of rain. Plus we got 16.2mm to 9amm Wednesday, and 6.8 mm to 9am this morning.

music: I missed the last rehearsals of term for the Monday night group, and that goes back this coming week. I have not practiced anything, not least because bowing was painful for a while. I have made it to two of the Wednesday night rehearsals - one to discover it was the end of term open practice / concert, and one where it was a greatest hits and I didn't get access to the music before the rehearsal, and so sight read everything (I did try a practice on the night before). I failed to go to the sunday recorder group last weekend because apparently when I updated my calendar to the new alternating fortnight I didn't do it right, and I'd been successfully doing it from memory up until now.

con: we are at not enough week's before the con. I have been dropping the ball more than I like and I have to find a solution. I have one I would like, but I don't know whether anyone will take it on. We have some fabulous guests. Plus we have both GUFF and DUFF winners attending. I know Farah Mendelsohn is one, but I can't pull the name of the other out of my head. I'm presenting in the academic stream, and at this point I don't have enough to say. argh.

*I use an aggregator site for my rain information, rather than the BOM, so they are going off their data set; they claim this as 'probably a record maximum'. They report 17.0mm as the March average (1973-2026), the previous monthly maximum as 83.6mm in 1992, and the previous daily maximum as 37.8mm, also in 1992. At the opposite end, 2011 had no rain in March -- that would be the year of the big hail storm, if I remember correctly.

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Tyop du jour

2026-04-06T10:40:15Z

Giordano Bruno was also burned at the steak by The Inquisition

.. oh. umm. I have no words for the image this presented.

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[lost drafts] reading lists (2025-10...)

2026-04-06T06:05:35Z

October

I've had some of these hanging around for a startlingly long period of time. I'm in a bit of a grump, which makes this the perfect time to look at a book list. I don't have a lot of energy to deal with interfaces, and I'm less likely to be interested in All! The! Books!

75 Notable Translations 2023 from World Literature Today (limited free pages) - the introductory section was interesting reading, but the list was text, with title, author, translator, publisher, and no info, and I didn't care to click through. I scanned through to see if anything caught my attention namewise, but wasn't really expecting much. I spotted Ten Planets by Yuri Herrera and Dragon Palace by Hiromi Kawakami to click through, and both sound sufficiently interesting I've added them to the list.

Tor.com Reviewers’ Choice: The Best Books of 2023 hypothetically this should be a list I'll find a lot on. But! I was at least somewhat on top of my reading last year, so before looking at the list, I'm taking a guess that some of the interesting ones I'll already have read. I do like the format, where each reviewer talks about their picks, and writes some number of paragraphs with the books discussed collectively. I was right that there are some books I very much enjoyed on that list. There were some that I don't remember ever hearing of (although at least one that looked interesting was already on the wishlist; I didn't check them all). And a surprising number that I started and bounced out of to 'finish after Hugo reading season' because I knew they weren't going to be my number one Hugo vote. Most of which I still haven't gone back to.

November

Locus Magazine 2023 Recommended Reading List - this page managed to annoy me before I'd read anything by popping an ad up over the 'reject tracking' button, so that I ended up clicking on the ad instead of the reject. This provides a long list of who provides the recommendations, and many of those I recognised are people whose suggestions I have previously bounced off, so I wasn't actually all that optimistic. And then I started skimming, and realised that I just don't care enough to click through, and title plus author doesn't give me enough to latch on to. I was interested to note that the most recent Greg Egan is self-published, and I'd be interested in knowing what the story is there -- although not interested enough that I allowed myself to be distracted from task Close! All! Tabs! I spotted an Octavia Cade collection that I didn't know about, so that went on the list. I was very bemused to see a collection by Tom Reamy, but again, did not go down the rabbit hole of finding out what was going on there (assumption: reprint?).

I could have gone looking at the short stories, and decided against it. Similarly the next tab I had open was a long list of short story links that I decided to just close. I do like short stories, I just don't need these lists sitting there being Tasks.

Nebula reading list - I'm assuming that this is a generic link, and what is on the page changes each year. Which means I was probably meant to be looking at 2024's list, but I'm looking at works published in 2025. After a bit of a look at the novels (which was a much shorter list than I was expecting) I decided to skip. At this point in time my focus is kids books, and there aren't any.

Esquire: The 30 Best Sci-Fi Books of 2024 - this one gives lovely potted summaries of why they are recommended, and it was so nice to engage with. I did end up adding books to the wishlist that i would otherwise have missed. Long, but interesting.

From the New York Public Library Best Books for Teens 2024 - this has an itty bitty drop down that would allow for selection of other years. As I'm in 'close all the tabs' mode I have chosen to not go down the rabbit hole. This shows me covers, with title and author as text; there are an assortment of filters available. Oh! and a potted summary for each. I didn't find anything very inspiring, but I did realise that I can use this as a list for my uni book search, because there is a kids books section.

December

Unusually, a video: The Top 10 Science Fiction Books Published in 2023 - I hadn't heard of most of these; there were two that I have on the wishlist, but I didn't have the motivation to add any of the rest to said wishlist, not least because several were subsequent books in a series. I skipped through much of this because I wasn't that interested in the commentary, at least on the series ones.

Reactor: Readers Pick Their Favorite SFF of 2025 - this is the first one of these I'm reading today, but I'm tired and grumpy, so I suspect I won't be putting things on the wishlist. ... and this is image plus link; I don't have the oomph to go clicking through, so looking at the pretty and then closing the tab.

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Get to know you questions

2026-04-06T04:17:48Z

tagged by mabiana on tumblr to do a set of questions that overlap with the ones they answered here, so I'm combining them. I do not have the oomph to work out how to tag, please consider yourself tagged if you have the time, energy, and motivation to complete.

Have you ever been fooled by an ‘April Fool’s Day’ joke?

Almost certainly. I can't think of any examples, but I'm now very sceptical of anything I see on the relevant date and for the next couple of days. To the point that it took me a couple of days to start to believe the Kit-Kat heist might be true.

Do you prefer sweet things or savoury things to eat?tumblr version: sweet or salty)

I kind of like things that are in the overlap of sweet or salty. Some of the local east asian grocers sell various kueh lapis (translation: layer cake) and the one I love the most has a salted layer and a sweet layer. I also like very lightly sweetened breads, like brioche and hot cross buns. Other than that sweet/savoury is a very random kind of thing with me.

Do other people shorten your given name? Do you shorten your own name?

Only if they mishear it. It is not a name that really shortens sensibly. At various times over the years people have used extended versions, of which there are many, because it is the first part of a lot of compound names.

Are there opportunities to go walking where you live? Do you take advantage of that?

I'm not sure what 'opportunities to go walking are' - this is a good suburb for walking, with most roads having footpaths, shortcuts through sections of the suburb, and a few tiny bits of remnant bush. There are also lots of places I can go to walk, with a variety of parks, remnant bush, state and national parks in easy (car) reach. I don't walk as often as I ought, for energy and pain reasons.

Pineapple on a pizza – yes, or no?

eh. I did not learn to love it but I will eat it. This is because pizza pineapple comes from cans, and there is something in the older can lining materials that my body reacts very badly to, so for a long time cooked pineapple was something I couldn't eat without nausea even if it wasn't out of a can, because of the learned response.

Reading: planning to do a post on that later today

Last Series Watched: Nearly had to go ask Youngest what we watched, but realised it was the one about training working dogs--Muster Dogs.

Last film: It's so long since I watched a film, I don't know. I tried Everything Everywhere All At Once, and had to stop because of the flashing lights. Might have been one of the Benoit Blanc ones?

Last Song: Whatever the ipod was playing while I was working in the study. I think I've got it on shuffle on a playlist; I have a dock for it that means I just press a button and music happens.

coffee or tea: both. Used to be at work that I would buy a coffee on the way in, drink that slowly, and then for the 10am morning tea catch up make a cup of whatever black tea I currently had in the drawer. These days the coffee is still regular (artisanat makes a pot each morning), but the tea is less predictable. In the office at uni I do have black tea, but I also have tisane options--currently blueberry, some kind of red berry (might be currant?), rooibos, and peppermint, so the later drinks might not be tea.

working on: so many projects. actively trying to make progress on '21st' quilts for the offspring, none of whom are that young any more. three knitting projects active plus one that is waiting to be started. 'some' crochet projects. many books (reading). PhD. garden. a pile of half done craft and repairs in the sewing space.

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Typo du jour

2026-04-03T10:40:24Z

They needed someone else to bare witness to this.

Not enough to watch, but they have to be naked when doing so. Which, actually fit quite well into the scene I've stolen the quote from, but ah, not enough for me to think it was a deliberate play on words.

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Chip (crisp) tasting

2026-03-27T12:07:30Z

New-to-me flavour of chips: Thins Potato Chips Margherita Pizza.

Soooo tasty. Strong on the fake cheese, light on the tomato, reasonable on the basil / other herbs.

(brought home by Youngest from a picnic. This might be a short term variant).

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minimal update

2026-03-25T13:19:35Z

I'm a week post radiation; I'm still very red, and I have some raw patches in my armpit / outer edge of the breast. I assume this is mostly because I did not do the same prevention there, because I did not realise I needed to.

This means I am doing a lot of going topless; it is fortunately still warm enough to be doing that (although it is down to 22°C at the moment, and even with the door shut I'm a tad cold). I ran out of the ointment the hospital gave me, then the healing gel i was using, and the replacement artisanat found isn't as good.

I have found a couple more books to fit the reading for the fiction part of my project, so I'm going gung ho on that. Am a little frustrated that I keep finding books from the USA, rather than anywhere else.

I have not been keeping up with DW. I've just opened about 20 posts and I think I'm going to end up closing them having skimmed. I have, instead, fallen face first into Heated Rivalry fandom, and very much appreciate chaosmanor sharing their sources for fic. (I have not seen the show, nor read the books. This is unlikely to change. Youngest has been reporting back on the show).

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life lived in dot points

2026-03-14T09:24:21Z

two more radiation treatments to go; I have a mild (and itchy) looks-like-sunburn across a roughly 20cm square running between my armpit and my midline
the new medication I'm supposed to start after radiation is back ordered until May. need to contact the specialist on monday
general body health alternating between 'ow' and 'fatigue'. but i'm getting some stuff done
mental health - struggling with the cognitive load of daily treatments, but mostly chill.
i have started the 'reading fiction' part of my project; the first book has a lot of details, but suffers from coming out in 2020 and thus is showing a lot of the pre chatgpt tropes surrounding AI
I am knitting a tiny fifth doctor scarf as a decorative item; it is getting less and less accurate to the pattern as I go on. I only have six of the seven colours....
reading? not much.
walking home from the hospital? did it the once. have not had the spoons since. have been using the cane more than some.
other exercise? bugger all.
garden: birds have eaten all but one pomegranate. hoping that one gets ripe enough. guava are ~2cm across; I thought i had done a good job of thinning, but nope. have not thinned the feijoa even that much so argh.
family: youngest has a job contract signed; to be starting in ?august.

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Reading notes

2026-03-05T07:01:36Z

I have not been reading all that much* lately. Since the last post I have finished three books, all of which are from the old murder mystery list -- mostly because I have them on my phone, and I've been reading them in waiting rooms. In decreasing order of how much I liked them:

The Middle Temple Murder by J.S. Fletcher. 4 stars. I didn't entirely follow the plot, and I'm not sure if I was supposed to. But it was well written and the characters were great. review
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie. 3 stars. It's a classic, I understand why it is a classic, but I also don't think it is worth reading unless you are already a Christie fan. review
The Roman Hat Mystery by Ellery Queen. 2 stars. Unlike the Fletcher book, where me not following felt like a me problem, here I felt that the author was going out of their way to make it hard to follow. Also, all the characters are dickheads. review

* not counting a bit of short fiction, a lot of Heated Rivalry fic, and chapters out of a lot of books that I haven't actually made it to the end of because it requires focus I haven't had.

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Small updates

2026-03-05T06:49:43Z

uni: sent the ethics application to supervisors on ... Tuesday. Have started setting the foundations for the next sub-project, but haven't gathered together all the notes yet. This will be hunting for kids books. I am being optimistic and also grandiose about how much I'm hoping to achieve.

annual not-goals: reading (1) and music (4) are on track; the others either I've not really done anything on or they aren't currently achievable.

medical: 7/15 treatments down; I look mildly sunburned. I'm getting the expected kinds of side effects, albeit at levels that seem higher than is warranted for such a small area of body (today I am so crashed and food is a struggle, and language is a bit wonky; I told the nurse my head was full of glue). I have found some details that help with the overstimulation: I wear non-slip socks (no shoes on the bed, no bare feet to stress the staff, no taking shoes off), I keep my eyes closed and focus on breathing except when watching the 'how much to breath' lights, I take my belt off even though I don't need to so it doesn't dig in.

craft: I have been making progress on one of the two knitting projects that I'm counting as 'active' which means that some time this year I might get to the pattern that buttonsbeadslace shared with me (which needs to be done for ... September, because b'day gift. and then a second for october, and a third for December, because I think I'm funny). No other craft has had a look in. I did do weekly drawing for a bit but didn't find the spot in the routine it fits and keep forgetting.

music: I have played some of the Hanon's exercises roughly once a week. Monday group (viola) is going well; Wednesday (violin) I've made it to more than I've missed and alternating Sundays (recorder) are also good although there is less music happening there than would be my preference (P's house guest is in the final throes of writing a PhD thesis in mathematics; P does not do math; ariaflame and I have tangentially relevant knowledge, house guest take the opportunity to talk about their maths)

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fred_mouse @ 2026-03-02T14:01:00

2026-03-02T06:07:03Z

Over the last two months, I've been opening all the dreamwidth posts I intend to read (at length) or reply to, and then not having the oomph to do so. At the beginning of the weekend, I have over 450 tabs open in this window. I ... am not going to read all of those. I'm slowly closing them. I'm reading bits of them, but I'm not commenting.

so, one generic post: To all those who have been through surgery / medical bullshit, I hope you are recovering well. To those who have lost loved ones, I'm sorry for your loss, my condolences. To those posting about weather: I'm very much appreciating it. Also those posting small details of lives, reading, gaming, music, etc. To those sharing your creative endeavours, congrats! (and I'm sorry: if it is writing I have no spoons to go read).

If there is something you want me to know about, comment here or DM me please

(This post comes with the soundtrack of Youngest asking "If You were the tax act, what word would you use for tips?" and then complaining that 'gratuities' isn't in section ten, but there is something about grape vines).

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short fiction - january & February 2026

2026-02-28T07:59:59Z

The Stars You Can't See by Looking Directly by Samantha Murray* - Complicated story about infertility, and parenthood, and bigotry. 4 stars

Arbitrium By Anjali Scahdeva - this one has quite the summary, which I think I found detracted from the story. I also found the story very clunky, with a lot of world-building passages that I didn't find particularly engaging. The main character is quite reserved, and it is very much relevant to the story, but it means that I needed some other way for the story to grab me, and it didn't. 3 stars

India World by Amit Gupta - there was a formatting glitch here, by which one is suddenly in a different scene with no transition, which threw me out of the story repeatedly. Slow moving coming of age about what love of home means when one is part of a diaspora. I really liked the ending, which is more a pause in the progression of scenes that the reader is invited into. 4 stars.

Grow by Carrie Vaughn (from 2022) - DNF I found I did not care to learn about the origin story of a teenage 'ace' (wildcard, one presumes, given that it is part of the Wild Cards universe, which I've bounced off each time I've gone near it)

Porgee’s Boar - Jonathan Carroll (from 2022) - quite chilling story at multiple levels, about art, and the power of art to show people what is inside their own head. 4.5 stars

D.I.Y. by John Wiswell (from 2022) - this is a reread, but I already had it open and I had fond memories (although I vaguely recall it making me angry about politics and bureaucracy) so thought it worth revisiting. This is a very USian dystopia of corporate greed and lone wolf ~~scientists~~ magic users. I don't like either of those tropes a lot, but it is well done. 4 stars.

* Not sure if I was actually at uni with Sam, or if I met them through people I was at uni with. I know them well enough that I read much of the story in their voice, which very much affected my experience of the story. Often I find that soothing; here I found it distracting.

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Radiation treatment notes

2026-02-25T13:23:04Z

Today was my second radiation treatment, and it was better than the first. ... I guess I should talk about the sensory hell that the first treatment was, and the way that it completely derailed my day (the second didn't completely derail the day, but some of my choices made it less than optimal)

( this got long, and I do not have the oomph to trim/edit )

2 down, 13 to go.

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Language shift

2026-02-13T15:53:42Z

I'm reading an Ellery Queen detective novel from, hmm, the late 1920s, I think? And I was highly amused to read the following line:

“It was Friday morning and the Inspector and Ellery, garbed romantically in colorful dressing-gowns, were in high spirits.”

Methinks that 'romantically' has shifted in meaning. I can kind of work it out, but also, only at a kind of intellectual understanding rather than really getting it.

(for those not familiar, this is a parent/adult child dyad)

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Breast update

2026-02-01T02:25:36Z

not much in the way of medical TMI this time, but still, content note for cancer treatment details.

Healing (external) looking good. The scar is as long as my little finger, and quite dark (almost like a lightly faded black permanent marker). It is no longer raised or itchy. Little bit red either side, possibly because it is difficult to get the breast in a position to see the scar, and it means I was pulling on the skin. I continue treating with the scar therapy gel, in hopes that that decreases my chance of it going stiff (I have a history of cheloid scarring on my knee, which the doctor that did the surgical tidy up of the scar attributed to issues with the original stitching / treatment)
Internally I'm assuming there is still a bit of healing to go because there is infrequent discomfort, mostly if I end up in an odd position and the breast is not supported. Also noticeable last night while chopping veggies, so I may need to look at what is wrong with my posture there.
I'm still wearing the surgical recovery bras; I've now moved to not using them at night because my skin was getting quite irritated under the band. Of the four I started with, I have misplaced the good one, and one is a size too large. Fortunately, I have found an old sports bra which is appropriately soft and has no underwire to wear while the two are in the wash. A couple of times I have tried wearing one of my usual, which I think of as soft, but have underwire; in each case the surgical area has become noticeably sore. I'll keep doing that every few weeks until it isn't an issue, then transition back to my usual bras. I have decided against going to the specialist bra shop to get more, mostly because I don't have the necessary time + energy.
radiation: appointment one with the radiologist, who was all 'this is your choice, ...' and then gave info that summed up approximately to 'given your age/situation, I'd do it anyway'. Also implied, I think, was the fact that there were cancerous cells further from the cancer site ('the margins'), necessitating the second surgery; my take from that is that it was moving quickly. Thus I am skipping over the expensive test and going straight to radiation. I think if the cancer site had been elsewhere in the body, it might be different, although I did not get a feel for which way the likelihood went. But being in the breast duct, there is a lot of potential for cancer cells to have moved a long way and be starting up again. Thus, radiation of the whole breast.
Appointment two with the radiologist is Monday. They can treat me at the local public hospital (literally next door to the private one I had the first surgery at). It will be three weeks, multiple sessions. Likely noticeable side-effects are sun-burn like sensation and some other minor discomfort. Slight change in the breast tissue (ongoing) may occur, so it might feel different to the other, but as it already does, eh. And there is a slight chance that a small bit of the lungs behind will be damaged, but in a way that I am not likely to perceive.

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short fiction - november & december 2025

2026-01-25T09:46:38Z

only slightly lost in the drafts folder

The Viy by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol, Translated by Claud Field. Described as a horror novella from 1836. Uneven, didn't really get it.

Within the Wall - Patrick Kuklinski, January, 2024. This is entirely from the point of view of a rat living in a colony in the wall, but it has some interesting things to say about aspects of human society as well. 4/5

Regarding the Childhood of Morrigan, Who Was Chosen to Open the Way - by Benjamin Rosenbaum, Nov 19, 2025 - This story is doing some interesting things. I absolutely did not give a damn, and noped out, mostly because I didn’t have the brain space to track what was going on. But also because child neglect.

The person who reminds the other person to cast a spell - by Bogi Takács, December 2024 - short poem, does very interesting things with language. 4/5

The Girl That My Mother Is Leaving Me For by Cameron Reed, April 2025 - before reading: this is dystopia, so I may not make it through, but the title has me intrigued (I'm a bit hmmm about the one sentence summary though). After reading: It's clever, but at no point did I warm to the characters, and I think it would have been necessary to do so to really appreciate this. 3/5

The Specialist’s Hat by Kelly Link (undated) - this is a very clever ghost story, where exactly what happens is never made clear. 4/5

The Starlight on Idaho by Denis Johnson, 'winter' 2011 - odd epistolary fic from a person in drug and alcohol rehab; quite a lot of unreality, beautifully written. 4/5

[001: JAVELIN] - Derin Edala - this is a web serial; I'm not sure if it is finished. Far future science fiction. ... technically not short fiction, and I haven't finished it because the tab it is in keeps getting lost in the sea of open tabs

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Recipe notes: Pandan Sago pudding

2026-01-23T10:51:15Z

For reasons I don't remember, Youngest bought sago, and then we discovered that there was some still in the cupboard. In discussion about what to do with this surplus, Youngest commented that they didn't know how to make sago pudding*, so we set out to do so. This is a bit variant on what I learned as a kid, so I'm capturing it now, because this was much closer to what I want it to be than it usually is. It is to be remembered that this is a dessert that is more about texture than flavour, and I make it with more flavour than the family friends I learned it from. Next time, I'll try soaking the sago in the soy milk, and then add water after, because the taste was a little thin.

1/2 cup sago plus 2 cups of water, in bowl, put in fridge for ~30 hours (it was going to be less, but I forgot last night; the fridge is because I am not leaving wet starch out in nearly 40°C heat).

Cooking: I used a heavy bottom pot, which I vaguely remember is important, but I don't remember why. Started on the too high burner, which was good for getting it to the boil, but I had to move it to the medium heat once it came to temperature.

Soaked sago plus somewhere between 1/2 and 1 cup of soy milk, a tsp (estimate; it was what was left in the tub) pandan extract, and 2 somewhat heaped tbsp white sugar went in the pan (for slightly more flavour, use brown sugar; it will be a weird colour but it tastes fantastic). Bring to boil, turn heat down to gentle simmer, stir constantly, making sure to scrape down the sides of the pan regularly (do not be tempted by the idea of taking a break. This will burn in what feels like a moment if the heat is just a tad too high). I use a silicone spatula for this, so as to be sure to get into the corner of the pan. Check regularly for translucence - when all but one sago ball is completely translucent, and that one at least half done, I call it done, and pour into bowls to set. I have a lovely set of thin metal dessert bowls that are perfect for this, because they don't cool down too fast.

* not to be confused with sago pudding, which is a steamed pudding I vaguely recall, and have a recipe for that I've never used

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Reading notes

2026-01-22T14:19:38Z

aiii, I have gone back through my posts, and the most recent of these that I've found is from last august. I am not going to attempt to work out what I have started or progressed; I will start with 'what I've finished' and if I still have any oomph (and it is not bed time) I'll go poke at what I've abandoned. In reverse chronological order. I'm putting the list in, and then maaaaybe I'll have the cope to put a commentary. (finished today but not yet reviewed: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd - Agatha Christie)... oh, and if I notice that it is a short story, I've left it out, because I think I captured that before.

Bound by the Blood - Cecilia Tan. 4.5 stars. review - BDSM speculative erotica that is just so clever, but also very emotionally hard going.
The Quest for Corvo: An Experiment in Biography - A.J.A. Symons. 4 stars. review - presented as a biography, but it reads as a story of an obsession, and the biographical details are highlights.
The Siege of Burning Grass - Premee Mohamed. 3 stars. review - despite being well written, fantastic world building, good characterisation, passable plot I felt like I just missed the point.
The House that Horror Built - Christina Henry. 2.5 stars review - I usually love Henry's work, and yet this one just never quite gelled for me. (content note: pandemic) 5.Nest - Inga Simpson. 5 stars. review - recommended for those who like slow moving slice of life stories; each chapter is a tiny lightly sketched moment that adds to a nuanced and complicated story of getting old, making mistakes, and reconciling with your past.
Building a second brain: a proven method to organise your digital life and unlock your creative potential - Tiago Forte. 4. stars. review - some really good ideas, but dry and easy to put down and forget about it. I feel that 'less annoying than the majority of self-help books' is a low bar, but it cleared it.
Digital Sociology - Deborah Lupton. 4 stars. review - There is a lot going on with this book, looking both at how sociology as a process / research field is changed by using digital tools, and how sociology of the digital world works.
Angel of the Overpass - Seanan McGuire. 4 stars. review - very satisfying set of conclusions; well worth reading if you liked the previous ones. Possibly slightly darker horror than the last one.
The Viy - Nikolai Gogol. 3.5 stars. review - This was well written, and individual scenes are great, but I don't think I understand how the story fits together.
The Gentle Art of Fortune Hunting - KJ Charles. 4.5 stars. review - I really enjoyed this, and finished it in an afternoon.
Vertigo - Karen Herbert. 3 stars. review - I noted this as "a little thriller in a literary public service story"; I found it really hard to engage with
The Invisible Library - Genevieve Cogman. 3.5 stars. review - excessively contrived plot, adversarial workplace relationships verging on farce, well written, complex full of interesting characters.
The Coffee House Witch and the Grumpy Cat - Ariana Jade. 2 stars. review - The writing is good, but the entire thing is set up and no payoff. And for something marketed as a romance, it really isn't.
A Sorceress Comes to Call - T. Kingfisher. 4 stars. review - solidly written fantasy / horror / regency romance with a heavy emphasis on body horror and loss of control, and I don't recommend it to people who have trauma over dangerous and controlling parents
Bad Actors - Mick Herron. 2 stars. review - I listened to an interview by the author, this was the Slough House book I found in the library. Author loves their characters, but I found them so badly written.
The Sea Mystery - Freeman Wills Crofts. 4 stars. review - perfectly readable murder mystery, more thinky and less personality driven in comparison to Agatha Christie.
Once Upon a Tome: The Misadventures of a Rare Bookseller - Oliver Darkshire. 3.5 stars. review - lots of short, self-contained anecdotes. Dry and gets a bit same-old and repetitive.

Abandoned

Fly with Me by Andie Burke reason - not for me
Doing research: A new researcher's guide by Jinfa Cai, Stephen Hwang, James Hiebert, Charles Hohensee, reason - out of scope
The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness Jonathan Haidt reason - came across as disingenuous
The Pleasure of Drowning by Jean Bürlesk reason - do not share the author's sense of humour.
Unmasked: The Ultimate Guide to ADHD, Autism and Neurodivergence by Ellie Middleton reason - I kept finding myself contrasting it with Matilda Boseley's The Year I Met My Brain and finding it lacking.

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Today's grump: philosophy

2026-01-20T10:20:30Z

.. I'm not being grumpy at all philosophy today, although I have days when I encounter bits and I have Thoughts and Opinions that can be summed up as 'philsophy sucks'. I have not, historically, engaged very well with particular bits of philosophical thinking and/or the way it is presented.

Today, I'm struggling, because I am being too literal. And because the starting point is swan == white, and then the author is extrapolating out from that. I, however, fall over at the first hurdle, because I have to stop and parse swan==white, and spend time getting out of my comfort zone, rather than starting in my comfort zone. And I get that this is Western Australia is a niche case (and, presumably, anywhere our swans have gone and set up communities) issue.

And not only do I struggle when I encounter this damn thinking. But I get annoyed. Black swans have been known about *in Europe*---the source of most of the philosophy I try reading---for at least 150 years (the Swan River Colony was established in 1829, there were French and Dutch explorers in the vicinity before). These explanations don't start with 'let us assume that there are only white swans' or anything acknowledging this. Or at least, the ones I remember encountering don't.

I hate not being able to grasp the foundational thought on which the next n pieces are built. It makes it so hard to read. I suspect I'm going to skip this chapter and see whether the next one (different authors) is better.

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Subscription tidy up

2026-01-12T13:51:34Z

I've done my approximately-annual tidy up of dreamwidth subscriptions. I've stopped following a set of blogs that haven't updated in ~2 years, left roughly half the communities I was in, and changed a few other details. The main exceptions on keeping people who don't post are people who comment often enough that I remember; at least one of those I've left their access but unsubscribed. The other exception is people who I'm very much hoping will turn up again one day (and one who, sadly, will never be back, but whose name makes me smile to see it in the list).

If, as happens with this, I've managed to remove your access and you are someone who does actually want to see the occasional locked post, please comment on this post. I'll put a locked post up shortly; it will read 'test' or some equally inane thing.

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Catalogue check (2024) update

2026-01-12T09:07:04Z

I've managed to winkle out some of the books that didn't get spotted while I was doing the catalogue check in 2024 (which finished, for logistics reasons, in about February 2025).

And I've just looked at the number of tags that I have (>2K) and decided that is ridiculous. The first pass I'm doing is changing all the old location tags to [year] - last seen (not the 'unchecked/not yet seen' ones, those I'm going to think about some more). Because where any book was in 2021 (etc) is obviously not right, or I would have found it there in 2024. Once I've done that for all years prior to 2024, I'm going to go poke at the various 'unchecked' tags and see what is there.

other things I've noticed that I want to reorder

mythology should be mythology - [country]
awards should be awards: [name]
I have juvenile and kids and junior fiction and possibly some others, as well as a set of age: [...] categories; need to think what I want to do here.

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2025 reading wrap up

2026-01-11T03:53:30Z

hopefully this storygraph link goes to the public option, not the for me specifically option.

I'm choosing to not look at what was planned; I've already posted about my 5 star reads and some other thinking. This is me just reading through and having feelings.

The first (We Were Dreamers, Simu Liu, biography) and last (The House That Horror Built, Christina Henry, horror) sure are an interesting juxtaposition
The 'mood' graph seems weird and I wish it wasn't there
Going back to study had a noticeable effect on how much I was reading, which is not a surprise
I hate the way that storygraph does 'genre' because my top five are fantasy, science fiction, short stories, LGBTQIA+, and horror, only three of which I consider to be genres.
15 days per book as an average just shows how much my reading is an overlapping thing.
'top authors' - Katherine MacLean was 4 (that can't be right, there were 8 short stories, I must not have tracked them all), Premee Mohammed (3 stories, hmm, something odd there as well), and Dave Warner (3 books, that's a trilogy)
average rating 3.75 - probably because the DNF/0 don't get counted; I gave 11 2 star ratings, which seems more than I would have expected. Most frequent rating of 4 is also higher than I would have expected.
somehow there were 52 'new to me' authors, which is interesting because I felt like I was sticking to comfortable stuff.
DNF - 22 books; not sure if that feels high
read 24 of my books - I bet that this is an undercount, because I don't always mark books as owned, particularly if I only have them as ebook.
it is weird that my highest rated reads tend to be non-fiction, because I read so little of it

I clicked through to the more detail

most commonly applied tag is 'borrowed', applied to 21 books. 21 borrowed + 24 owned =/= the number read
I need to update the tags on some, because they don't have the -read suffix added

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