TV Talk: Murderbot & Resident Alien

Jun. 15th, 2025 08:28 am
spikedluv: created by tarlan (misc: tv talk by tarlan)
[personal profile] spikedluv
Murderbot: Good ep! spoilers )


Resident Alien: Good ep! spoilers )
spikedluv: (summer: sunflowers by candi)
[personal profile] spikedluv
I hit Price Chopper, the Pharmacy and the Bakery while I was downtown. I stopped at the library on the way home to pick up a book. I made spaghetti sauce for supper when I got home. I did a load of laundry, the usual amount of hand-washing dishes, and scooped kitty litter.

For fun stuff I watched the current ep of Resident Alien and some HGTV programs, read some more Lily Adler, and sent more messages to mom. I also wrote ~550 words on a new fic.

Temps started out at 55.0(F) and reached 61.2. It was originally supposed to rain all day, but the forecast showed that the percentage was going to drop to very low after 9am, though we weren’t going to have any sun. And that’s sort of what happened; there were still sprinkles, but not a soaking rain. Still it was very chilly.


Mom Update:

Mom had been moved to the SCU when my sister, A, arrived this morning. She’s talkative and actually ‘eating’ her lunch (beef broth and Italian ice – still on liquid diet). My sister said she’s much more herself today, which is great news! She’s getting a roommate, which is not good news as we were hoping for a private room, but what can you do. They didn’t get her up to walk at all, so that must’ve been PT coming around yesterday, not just the nurse. It’s ridiculous that the patients get zero PT on the weekend. Seems like they'd lose some of the progress they made.

Trailers

Jun. 15th, 2025 09:09 am
selenak: (Demerzel and Terminus)
[personal profile] selenak
Proper Trailer for the third season of Foundation on Apple:




So looking forward to this! (Not least because of all the other depressing cancellation news.)

Teaser traiiler of season 3 of The Diplomat, featuring the next West Wing alumnus:



The Diplomat: more cynical than The West Wing, but still believing in the basic drive of people to actually work for what they see as their couintry's benefit in addition to themselves. Neither universe would allow for the poisonous cesspit currently governing not just the US.
spikedluv: (summer: sunflowers by candi)
[personal profile] spikedluv
Visited mom again at 11am. I didn’t go downtown, but did manage to get some chores and computer stuff done before I left the house.

I did a load of laundry, the usual amount of hand-washing dishes, and scooped kitty litter. I made it to the library to return and pick-up a book. I started a new book (the first Lily Adler one), watched the current ep of Murderbot, and sent mom another message. I hope she enjoys them when she’s home and sees them.

I picked up my car from the garage this morning when I dropped off Grant. I forgot to mention it in yesterday’s post, but just when I pulled out on the main road to head to the hospital it started acting up. (Thank goodness I leave early to make sure I can find parking. And thank goodness Pip has a used car he can lend me.) It bucked and sent the dreaded ‘reduced engine power’ message, along with the ‘service stabilitrak’ and ‘service traction control’ messages I’ve gotten before. This time Pip replaced the gas pedal, of all things. He said there are two sensors in the gas pedal and they weren’t lining up. It drove well today, so hopefully that’s the fix.

I also haven’t mentioned that a bird, a killdeer, built a nest in our driveway. At first we spotted the male dancing around trying to attract a female. Then the male chased Pip one day and we joked that he might have a nest nearby. Then we saw the female sitting in our driveway forever, and it turns out, they did have a nest in the driveway. Seems like a weird place to build a nest, especially with cats and dogs living here, but what do I know, nature is weird. I got photos of the female and the eggs when she was off the nest one time.


Photos
~*~


Additionally! On the drive to the hospital I pass a house that has a bunch of irises on their front lawn. Solid dark purple and solid pale yellow. They’re gorgeous and they look so pretty together.

Temps started out at 54.1(F) and reached 73.6. It was hazy most of the day. We’re supposed to have more rain tomorrow.


Mom Update:

Mom was much better today. not long, but cutting for those who don’t want to read it )
settiai: (Kes -- settiai (TriaElf9))
[personal profile] settiai
In tonight's game, the rest under a cut for those who don't care. )

And that's where we left off.

Freedom, sweet freedom.

Jun. 13th, 2025 10:04 pm
settiai: (Washington D.C. -- miggy)
[personal profile] settiai
Okay, the work week is finally over. I took a nap after work, because I slept like crap last night, and I'm feeling much more like a human being again even though I'm still tired. My brain's definitely not in a great place, but overall today was much better than earlier this week. So that's a big step in the right direction at least.

It's, uh, been a week. Such a week. 🙃

My plan is to not leave the hotel at all tomorrow or Sunday, and if I'm lucky I might be able to avoid all human interaction if I'm careful. I'm hoping to get up relatively early tomorrow to get a load of clothes washed and some cleaning done in the suite, and then I'm going to spend the rest of the day playing video games which I haven't done in ages despite my multiple attempts to do so.

Books Again

Jun. 13th, 2025 01:15 pm
olivermoss: (Default)
[personal profile] olivermoss
Because I had a big cleaning day, I finally finished the audiobook I was on.

* Blood Trail by Tanya Huff - Choices were made by the author. Spoilers )

* Heated Rivalry by Rachel Reid - This is actually the second book in a series called Game Changers. I'd heard that it can be read as a standalone so I did, but then I found out that book 6 in the series continues their story. To understand book 6, you need to have read 2, 3 and 5 so... yeah, take stand-alone claims with a grain of salt. I expect that the show will include some of the plot of 6. Also, I want to be able to look at Heated Rivalry tags and fan spaces, and those will likely have talk of the pairing's full story. So yeah, should have stuck to my 'read series in order' policy.

You know how romantasy and some other romance books have such a rep for being just smut, and then when people try them they get confused that it is mostly plot? This is the opposite situation. How the hell are they going to adapt this? Most of the character arc progression happen during the sex scenes. Also, Ilya has trouble expressing himself in English so he mostly expresses himself, or tries to, by touch. There's not a ton of dialogue. I doubled checked like five times that this is the right book. Adapting this is going to have some challenges. That's part of why I suspect that the series will include material from other books like book 6.

The book was fantastic, and I'd never have touched this sub-genre if it wasn't for the upcoming show. Spoilers )
spikedluv: (summer: sunflowers by candi)
[personal profile] spikedluv
Again, I had some time before I had to drive to the hospital, so I got some chores and computer stuff done.

I did a load of laundry, the usual amount of hand-washing dishes, and scooped kitty litter. I finished System Collapse, watched an HGTV program, and sent my mom some more messages.

Temps started out at 67.8(F) and reached 77.7. It was so nice out this morning, I got in a walk before I left to go visit mom.


Mom Update:

Mom was miserable today. more back here )

Today just keeps on giving...

Jun. 12th, 2025 06:32 pm
settiai: (Hughes -- psychodragon82)
[personal profile] settiai
Welp. This is certainly a day. The fire alarm went off again this afternoon. And this time? It was an actual fire. 🙃

They managed to get it put out fairly quickly at least, and from the time the fire alarm went off to the fire trucks arriving was, like, less than two minutes. So good on them for a great response time.

Long story short, the laundry room that the hotel staff uses to wash sheets, towels, etc. caught on fire. I'm guessing it was one of the industrial dryers in there based on what I saw. There's currently a hole in the wall leading into the laundry room, firemen still running around, and a shit ton of smoke in the hallways, but they've let everyone back inside. And my suite is about as far as you can get from where the fire was, so there's at least no smoke in here as long as I keep the door shut.

Garrus is already back to normal, but Keyleth has hidden herself under the bed and probably won't be coming back out for at least a few hours. Minimum.

June is, uh, certainly shaping up to be a month. That's for sure.

Y'all

Jun. 12th, 2025 10:23 am
olivermoss: (Default)
[personal profile] olivermoss


Took a minute, but we are finally getting Spaceballs 2: The Search For More Money
spikedluv: (summer: sunflowers by candi)
[personal profile] spikedluv
I did not go to visit my mom. My sisters took it in turns today so I could get some stuff done. I’ll take my turn again tomorrow morning.

I had a chiropractic appointment this morning. I hit Walmart while I was downtown and got in a longer walk around the park. I also stopped in at the Feed Bag to pick up the suet Pip forgot (and to reserve two large metal garbage cans for Pip to pick up on Monday; he got one when he got birdseed this past Monday (the task fell to him since I was a tad busy) and decided he wanted more. They’re big enough that I can’t take them in my car. As it turns out, he doesn’t have any more in stock so will have to order them.)

I hit Stewart’s on the way home, returned a book to the library, stopped to check mom’s mail, visited my aunt (since I won’t be available to do so tomorrow; and complained to the social worker about how they do her hair – it’s such a minor thing, but it would be so easy to keep her hair in curls instead of straight and straggly by not using a hairbrush on the curls and I’d like her to look nice, at least, because she has so little dignity left, you know?), and stopped at Sunnycrest again to check on the beef stick status. If you guessed they ~still don’t have them, you’d be right. I’m going to be annoyed if I found something Pip likes and they won’t carry them anymore, or at least regularly.

I did a load of laundry, ran a load in the dishwasher and emptied it, the usual amount of hand-washing dishes, and scooped kitty litter. I baked chicken for the dogs’ meals and fed Pip leftover pulled pork (yes, from the big b-day do a couple weeks ago; mom put it in the freezer) for supper. I did get fresh strawberries at Sunnycrest, so I made biscuits. I had strawberry shortcake for my supper; Pip prefers his biscuits with peach jelly because that’s how his mom used to do it.

(He refuses to eat a biscuit with anything other than peach jelly. It’s very frustrating. You can imagine my shock the first time I made chicken and biscuits for supper and Pip only ate the chicken and gravy and completely refused the biscuit because I didn’t have any peach jelly. Basically a bowl of soup, lol! I had no idea anyone would eat biscuits with ONLY jelly. I mean, I eat my leftover biscuits with butter and jelly, but solely?!! I know now and prepare accordingly.)

The surgeon’s office called today to schedule the removal of the node they found during Pip’s endoscopies. August 11, the day after my birthday, so one heck of a b-day pressie. *g* [I told him when he got home from work and he was like, I'm not having that removed! And I'm like, why not? Apparently he thinks it's not necessary when two different doctors think it is. *shrug* He's going to talk to the doctor himself to get it sorted. He's such a pain in my butt about this sort of thing.]

I finally started System Collapse, watched an HGTV program, and sent mom some messages she'll see when she gets home, in lieu of our usual telephone conversation.

Temps started out at 55.0(F) and reached 82.8. There was a mix of sun and clouds and a breeze, thankfully.


Mom Update:

My sister kept us informed of events as they occurred:

I did bullet points so it got long )

Boooks

Jun. 11th, 2025 05:40 pm
olivermoss: (Default)
[personal profile] olivermoss
* Salt Magic, Skin Magic by Lee Welch - It was cute! I did not guess where it was going, but once it got there it made a lot of sense. And then thinking back on other details from the book, that all clicked. There are a few moments where I wasn't sure which POV that bit was in, but that's okay.

* I am soft-DNFing Per Sanguem by Ashlyn Drewek. I do want to get back to it, but I am drowning in books and series I am trying to finish and also want to be more on top of my bookclub reads. Part of why I've put it down is that some bits read like editorial notes were left in? (I don't think they are ChatGPT prompts, tho authors putting books with their prompts hanging out has been going around.)

Overly Complicated Gorge Trip: Bingen

Jun. 11th, 2025 01:25 pm
olivermoss: (Default)
[personal profile] olivermoss
I was taking the bus over to Bingen when I saw the words 'Report Paranormal Sightings Here' out of the window. I immediately started tracking where it was in relation to where I was staying, and as luck would have it the bus loop back around and my stop was just two blocks up the slope from it.







There is a laptop on the table to type in your reports there. Also love the sign with info on the reports and the... everything.

I've never heard of the Klickitat Ape Cat and I'd be 0% surprised if they made it up themselves to add some extra flavor to the area, but I don't care. I believe in the Klickitat Ape Cat.

The place is an outdoors store, which is basically a convenience store with goods meant for people hiking or climbing in the area. They carry trail food, pack soap, etc. Theirs was also a paranormal center and pot shop. Perfect, 10/10, no notes. My 'if I win the lottery' dream has long been to open an outdoors store, but I never considered adding paranormal center into my business plan. Their actual reality outshines my dream plans.

So far I'd stayed at a perfectly maintained mid-century sprawl and a semi-basement that felt like an obscure form of punishment. And the third and final place is...





Bougie Capsule Hotel. Or you consider it like a hostel, but hostels typically operate under special rules and have exceptions to the rules hotels and inns have to follow. This had none of that stuff, so I tended to not think of it as more capsule vibes.





Way more my speed. I stayed where because my train was super early and this was right by the station and I've always wanted to stay here for a night. I thought an upscale capsule/hostel seemed amusing. I had a great time. Jury is out if I'd do it again because the bunk area is pretty packed. Things went well, but it's a risk. One couple there had a crock pot and was making a spicy bean soup and also had the door propped open to keep the smell down, but that meant the bunk area was fully open to passersby. I wasn't stressed by it because the smell did dissipate and I kept my bag with me, but it's easy to see how easily one overly entitled person can wreck everyone's stay in the bunk area. Super glad I checked that place off my list.

There are normal rooms and even private cabins with hammocks. Also, a general hammock area:


White Salmon didn't go well, Bingen was amazing. Bingen delivered.

Then my return train was actually on time and I got back to Portland.
olivermoss: (Default)
[personal profile] olivermoss
I decided to be in the Gorge for a few days, explore, stay at a place that I could work from. This did not turn out to be a great plan. The historic hotel I stayed in looked cute and had WFH areas inside and out, but my room was terrible. There is no way it was one of the original rooms. This was a converted space with no charm, 6 overhead lights controlled by 4 light switches spread around the room, the desk area was cramped, the window didn't open and the panes were covered in a thick plastic for privacy. Since it's a very sloped area, my room in the back was partially underground. It also smelled like dog. I woke up my first morning there and was like 'wtf, what am I doing? Maybe I should grab a bus back to Portland'.

On my Welches trip I stayed in a tiny converted space that was way smaller and worse than every other room there, but I'd also chosen that room and paid a lower rate. I did no such thing here, this was a regular booking. So I have no idea what why I got put in that space.

But, I'd paid for it so I stayed and made the best of it. The weather was nice, the air clear and I was in the Gorge.

View stepping out of the hotel:



View from park:



I wound up going back to Hood River for a bit the day I changed to my final hotel:



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