(no subject)

Jun. 3rd, 2026 10:46 pm
flemmings: (Default)
[personal profile] flemmings
I will eventually learn to read all the info provided before buying clothes. Old Navy's cotton tops are distressingly thin for autumn or winter wear but, I thought, might do well in summer. My tanktops are all thick cotton and I have to wear them with something that covers my arms,  which is generally another thick cotton something, and so I sweat in TO's summer humidity. The (palest pink and easily stainable) tee I bought earlier is certainly thinner than my other ones, so maybe they'd actually be cooler than tanktops? Men's t-shirts of course, and they're on sale in colours men don't often wear, like burgundy and saffron, that don't show splashes nearly as much.

They arrived yesterday and were indeed lightweight. Wore one today in the humid sun and thought them a little unbreathing. Yeah, is because they're 97% polyester. When you buy cotton t-shirts, make sure they're really cotton. But they'll do for actual t-shirt weather, I suppose. I have two cotton tees that are useless because they have Japanese logos on them and can't be worn to any of my Korean-run restaurants. Shall gift them to some clothes depot probably, to make room for the new ones. 

Meanwhile my final property tax bill arrives. I know the second bill has included increases in the past, only  these last few years the final installments have been lower than the first half. But not usually $110 a month lower, which was an extremely pleasant surprise.

Memory goes with heat, so I only know I've finished a couple of Dr. Priestleys this week, and The Eagle of the Ninth, which I finished today. Still rereading System Collapse and Platform Decay, the former as hard to envisage as ever, the latter making much more sense. No idea what I'll go on with: summer is line of least resistance when it comes to reading, and I'm pretty much all out of Cecil Street and his various avatars.

Good news

Jun. 3rd, 2026 10:35 pm
cornerofmadness: (Default)
[personal profile] cornerofmadness
Not only did I get the you're fine see you in six months go-ahead from my cancer doctor, I also lost those 10 pounds I gained and my BP was 112/57.

Now considering I ate a lot last week I'm surprised and I think there is something to what's been knocking in my head. My increasing weight and blood pressure might be related to stress and cortisol levels. This isn't something we really test for often (more when we suspect adrenal tumors) now I'm off work a couple weeks and everything is going back to normal (for me)

I wasn't going to go to the mall since I'll be back on Saturday (the theater is at the mall) but my appointment was at 1 and I was back in my car at 140. I hit the comic book store and finally walked to this Chinese restaurant I've been wanting to go to for years (no parking but I always have to park in the garage and it was a good day to walk). And....it was closed for the week. Sigh. I went to the German place instead but it's still not even 3 pm so I go to the mall to Home Goods and now I have to take something back on Saturday. The clearance body butter. I assumed that was packing tape on it. No, I got it open (which is weird because I wasn't going to open it. I don't usually need it unless the heaters are on) and someone had broken the seal and dug a finger's worth out of the cream. Yep, no thanks.

On my drive home that cardiologist I don't like called me. This is the second time his office has done this. Last time it was his NP, this time it was him, just checking in with me. It was unexpected. How are you feeling? Did you know your holter monitor study was normal (yes we already talked about this but obviously you didn't put it in your note) When will you be coming back to see me? August (unless I change that)

What I Just Finished Reading:
The Faraway Inn - a cozy fantasy (portal) set in Vermont. a really sweet YA cozy fantasy. I enjoyed it to pieces


The Gay Disaster Detective Agency - one of my arcs. I usually like Lev AC Rosen but this isn't working for me. Yeah there are better gay books out there for Pride month. Go read Rosen's Evander Mills series instead (but it is post WWII so it's not exactly happy gay stuff)


The Kindness of Strangers - another arc that wasn't for me


What I am Currently Reading:


Our Sisters Keeper - a very weird own voices black magic setting in the 1920s, has some serious creepy vibes



The Death Card - currently struggling to get into it




What I Plan to Read Next: some of my looming arcs


May's Reads - I didn't read as much as I would have liked to. But as always if you want to talk about any of them, please let's do it.


Dungeons and Danger cozy mystery

That Which Feeds Us Sapphic horror (set in Hawai'i)


Hooked on Murder cozy mystery

The Colour Out of Space Horror manga (Lovecraftian)

We Burned So Bright dystopian (with mature gay couple)


Death al Dente mystery


Lumine Volume One fantasy graphic novel

Impure Blood Volume 1 steampunk graphic novel

Links: The doing is the point

Jun. 3rd, 2026 07:48 pm
sonia: Quilted wall-hanging (Default)
[personal profile] sonia
The machines are fine. I'm worried about us. by Minas Karamanis.
Alice can now do things. She can open a paper she's never seen before and, with effort, follow the argument. She can write a likelihood function from scratch. She can stare at a plot and know, before checking, that something is wrong with the normalization. She spent a year building a structure inside her own head, and that structure is hers now, permanently, portable, independent of any tool or subscription. Bob has none of this. Take away the agent, and Bob is still a first-year student who hasn't started yet. The year happened around him but not inside him. He shipped a product, but he didn't learn a trade.


Appearing Productive in The Workplace from No One's Happy.
The reckoning will not be subtle. The firms still doing the work properly will be in a position to charge for it. The firms that have hollowed themselves out will discover that what they hollowed out was the thing the client was paying for.


The AI Bubble from No One's Happy.
The reason none of them can stop is that the investment, the revenue, and the justification for the next investment are the same transaction. If Microsoft reduces its OpenAI commitment, it loses one of Azure’s largest customers, the AI revenue line that justifies $192 billion in capex, and the earnings growth that holds its stock price — all at once. The same logic binds Alphabet and Amazon to Anthropic: the equity position and the cloud contract are the same bet, and unwinding one unwinds both.


Funny but serious, Chieng issues an AI warning to grads by Liz Mineo, Harvard Staff Writer.
He continued, “Whatever your chosen profession is, please don’t let AI rob you of the fun part of it. Your generation’s upcoming battle won’t be humans against AI; that’s at least two months away. … It’s going to be people with substance versus people with shallow knowledge. It’s going to be mastery versus faking it. It’s going to be people with good taste versus tacky. I trust you will put in the work necessary to be on the right side of those battles.”


Quality in the Age of Slop by Sinclair Target.
This blog post is very long and almost entirely about the 1974 bestseller Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig. It is also about AI—there will be some juicy takes, pinky swear—but those familiar with ZAMM should consider themselves warned. [...]

Quality is related to caring because once you care, once you are interested, you have a vantage point from which to make Quality judgments. These Quality judgments (e.g. "Is this good code?") are based in part on the romantic mode of understanding and so within the classical mode alone aren't defensible. But they are necessary, because in the moment-to-moment work on the machine, there are thousands of facts you could consider, thousands of alternative threads you could follow, all equally valid in the classical mode, and the only way to make any sense of it all is to apply a Quality-focused version of Occam's Razor.

Update

Jun. 4th, 2026 12:54 pm
mergatrude: a gang gang cockatoo eating red berries. underneath is "mergatrude" in red text (merg_gang gang)
[personal profile] mergatrude
Reading: I finished my roughly biennial reread of Above-Ground Swimming Pools, [personal profile] china_shop's Architect!Hugh Dillon/Builder!Callum Keith Rennie RPF epic. Still love it as much as ever. Each time I read it I seem to focus on a different aspect, and this time it was the women and their friendships which gave me a warm frisson of joy. \o/

I've listened to Project Hail Mary, read by Ray Porter, TWICE now. I mean to buy it when it comes out on disc, because I'm fascinated by the differences between the book and the film.

I'm currently rereading The Murderbot Diaries, because I bought the set from Humble Bundle earlier in the year and have been uploading them into my tablet. I've just begun Rogue Protocol and am preemptively mourning Mikki.

Watching: Randomly watched The Friend (2024) on TV, in which Naomi Watts and a Great Dane mourn Bill Murray. Dude has convinced me to go back to watching The Flash, mostly succeeding because I can sit there and knit without paying too much attention. While the CGI is amazing I find the interpersonal relationships excruciating. I really don't watch much TV any more. There are a few movies coming soon that I'd like to see, and of course the dude wants me to go and see Toy Story 5 with him.

Gaming: I bought Monument Valley III on Steam and it is just as gorgeous as its predecessors. I've finished the main game and am doing the extras.

Making: I had to undo a chunk of sleeve on my brother's fair isle sweater. Just gotten the motivation back to continue with it - I did promise him it would be ready by Christmas. I've been doing some spinning; some White-faced Woodland fleece I blended with ramie, and I dyed some merino with an old jar of pale blue-purple with interesting results that I'm now planning on turning into a crepe yarn. I also went to the Wool Fest at the Old Bus Depot Markets with my friend Sam (a great enabler) and bought three interesting bumps of reclaimed roving (fibre waste from the milling process).

Other stuff: Not much to say. Work is getting busy, but I'm still with my old team for the time being. Even though they're predicting a mild winter I'm finding the cold unpleasant. Hope you're all well. *hugs*

Word: Manumit

Jun. 3rd, 2026 10:40 pm
stonepicnicking_okapi: letters (letters)
[personal profile] stonepicnicking_okapi
Wednesday's word is...

...manumit.

release from slavery; set free:

--

I came across it in Indigo by Natasha Boyd, about a young woman put in charge of her father's plantation in South Carolina and her struggles to raise the first indigo crop there, which I just finished.

The chances of Ben being manumitted by Cromwell and becoming a free man were slim, and I was sure every time Ben showed his worth, the chances grew slimmer.
shadowkat: (Default)
[personal profile] shadowkat
Beginning of the June - Question a Day Meme

1. Is anything (minor or major) irritating you at the moment?

My back is bothering me, and so is my right knee, and my shoulders are tight.

2. Have you ever used a photobooth? Are they still around where you live (where’s the nearest one?)

I don't remember? I assume so. No, they aren't in my area - they may be in New York City? But I've not seen any? I have no clue where the nearest one is? (I hate getting my picture taken - so it's not something I'd seek out?)

3. Do you still pay for things with cash? Have you been somewhere recently where they don’t take cash anymore?

Yes, depends on the place. There are some spots that tend to prefer cash. I bought a milk shake from Carnval with cash - they tend to want you to spend more for the card. Although that may have changed, I didn't ask.

Also, my hairdresser wants either cash tips or tips by Venmo, I'd prefer to give cash. I don't like Venmo.

Yes, I've been to places that don't take cash - here and there. Not many though. The MTA OMNY CARD Machines don't take cash, nor does my laundry room - we have to use a credit or debit card to renew and add funds to the laundry card. It used to be cash only, but now it's card only.

***

Wednesday Reading Meme

* Currently reading "Wydling Hall by Elizabeth Hand", Hand is an established horror and dark fantasy writer from the late 20th to early 21st Century. Notably best friends with some writer bloke who blew me off on a dating app for not having a photo that gave him that spark. I got annoyed enough - to write the interaction into the book I self-published. (I'm not positive? But I think the guy may have been horror writer Paul Trembalay, although at the time we flirted with each other on social media - he was unknown and struggling. ) I'm not a fan of professional writers - particularly horror writers, they tend to be assholes? I don't know what it is about that profession - but the ones who become successful at it (ie, can make a living at it), tend to be folks you do not want to meet in person or know? Sci-Fi writers aren't too bad - they tend to keep to themselves and don't go overboard on the marketing. Literary also not that bad, nor is urban fantasy. But Horror - damn.

But I can still enjoy their writing. I'm very good at compartmentalizing.
It's rare that I can't compartmentalize. Also, I know very little about Elizabeth Hand (by design - I don't want to know anything - the small bits shared on book jackets and in the acknowledgements - are more than I want to know). Honestly, I wish the writers would just go by pseudonyms and we learned zip about them.

I know too much about Neil Gaiman - so can't read his books any longer or watch anything adapted from them. (That's an author that I can't compartmentalize - I've tried and failed. Not helped by the fact that he is a dark fantasy horror novelist. So I got rid of the Neil Gaiman books I owned.)

Anyhow - Wylding Hall is a creepy folk horror gothic novel about a 1970s British acid-folk band, whose somewhat misguided manager sends them off to/ strands them at - an ancient, creepy isolated country house in Britain, to record their album. Much chaos ensues, a legendary album is recorded, and alas their new lead singer mysteriously disappears. Years later, a documentary is made with the surviving band members - the story is told through their fragmented interviews. (Think Daisy Jones and the Six - except as a creepy horror novel by Elizabeth Hand featuring some quirky British folk band in lieu of Fleetwood Mac.) The story unravels the dark secrets of the house and the band's tragic summer, blending folk horror, psychological suspense, and a haunting mystery.

It's compelling. Very similar to Hand's other novels - which kind of refer to the demon in the corner, without ever actually looking at the demon in the corner? You are aware it is there, what it has done, what it is about to do...but for the most part? It's left to your imagination. It's a specific style of psychological horror writing that I adore. I like the less is more approach to writing. Where the horror is more implied than actually shown. Donna Tart did it well with The Secret History. Hand shows a touch more than Tart, but not by much. And both excelled at psychological folk horror, with a gothic twist.

Oh, it's June finally. I graduated from PT for the most part. No more for the time being. Vestibular issue has been corrected. Hooray? Now, if I can just get my right knee fixed.

(no subject)

Jun. 3rd, 2026 08:45 pm
sweettartheart: Maggie Smith from Death on the Nile, on a flowered background (Default)
[personal profile] sweettartheart posting in [community profile] 100words
This is not an admin post, in the sense that it is not going into the rules. Nor is it meant to diminish anyone's enjoyment of the community. But since I am unable to respond directly to a former community member because I have no avenues to do so, I will talk about community involvement and commenting in [community profile] 100words.

Every community is different. Some people use Dreamwidth for personal journals only. Some use it to share their thoughts or creative works with others. Some come here hoping to find people to talk to and engage with. Some want to limit their involvement in very specific ways. Those are all valid choices.

In [community profile] 100words, your creative works, however you write them, are your own. But when you choose to share your work in this community, it is meant to be a communal activity. That is why AI works are not permitted here; they do not represent your words, and as the moderator I do not feel that it is fair to readers to post AI works here and pretend that they are your words.

Likewise, the communal aspect here requires that when you post here, you do not turn off comments. Perhaps I should have made that clear before, but it has never come up in the past. When it did come up today, I added it to the guidelines and made a post about it. I also did not delete any posts that transgressed a rule that had not formerly been elucidated. I attempted to reach out to relevant community members and, when that was not possible, I set a reminder for myself to give anyone who needed to change their posts 24 hours the opportunity to do so. I should have made that clear in my admin post today.

You have the choice to participate in the community. It is not a right. You never have the right to be abusive towards authors or readers here.

That being said, written communication is imperfect. Without tone of voice, without facial expressions, without the many indicators of a person's intent, and without knowing the concerns or triggers or history of the person consuming your written communication, it is impossible to perfectly transfer meaning.

Is there a perfect way to transmit meaning? Probably not. But behaving "in a civilized manner" in this particular community means accepting that when you participate here, you act politely and assume a general level of good intent. If you don't like someone's response to your creative work, perhaps you are misunderstanding their comment. Perhaps they did not express themselves well. It really does not matter as long as you all behave in a mature fashion.

As the only moderator of this community, I cannot put myself in timeout. But if you have a problem with me as a commenter, please initiate a discussion with me. Responding in an abusive way to my comment, deleting my comment and your response, turning off comments on your post, and not allowing private messages from me means that I have no ability to engage with you as a community participant in a way that can make this a safe space for everyone.

You don't have to agree with my point of view to be a member of this community. You will abide by the rules if you choose to participate.

(edited to fix a few typos)

Daily Happiness

Jun. 3rd, 2026 05:30 pm
torachan: (Default)
[personal profile] torachan
1. The week is halfway through!

2. Since we are planning on trading in our older car when we get a new car, I have decided to use that one for the next few days instead of the newer car, since the old car had just recently been refueled and I do not want to give it to them with a full tank, as it's not like they're going to give us any extra money for all that gas lol. I've got to go to Gardena tomorrow and Friday for work, and we'll go to Disneyland on Saturday, so that should get it down quite a bit and at least let me feel like I'm not totally wasting money for having filled it up.

3. Carla wanted me to stop and get her a bagel this morning on my walk, so I did, and I stopped in at the bakery nextdoor to get a pastry for myself. They have a couple fancy danishes that I've seen in the window recently and wanted to try, so I got the orange one and it was so good! The other one is chocolate strawberry (with the pastry itself being chocolate, not any sort of coating), so I will try that next time.

4. I finished a book I hated today. I wish I could just stop reading, but it really bugs me to do so, so I plodded through, and now I am finally done!

5. Look at this cutie!

Welcome, Greenfinch!

Jun. 3rd, 2026 06:28 pm
thewayne: (Default)
[personal profile] thewayne
[personal profile] greenfinch is a new DW friend to me and they live in the northwestern German state of Bremen. They spent the last 20 years living in the UK and recently returned to Germany.

Hi there!
out_there: A present for my 25th birthday (SGA: Reading Rodney by Celli)
[personal profile] out_there
I can't remember who recced this to me, but I really loved it. It's 10k and does a great job of really fleshing out Meng Shi as a person, both her flaws and strengths, how her choice of keeping Meng Yao made her life worse but also gave her something to live for (beyond survival alone). It does a great job of showing Jin Guangshan at his charismatic best, showing the appeal of his confidence, rather than painting Meng Shi as naive and easily fooled. (And it was an interesting insight into Meng Yao, and has me thinking about the edges I file off his character when I write him.)

may we all be so lucky (9724 words) by umbrellabirds
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Modao Zushi - Moxiang Tongxiu & Related Fandoms
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Relationships: Meng Shi & Meng Yao | Jin Guangyao
Characters: Meng Shi (Modao Zushi), Meng Yao | Jin Guangyao, Jin Guangshan, Sisi (Modao Zushi), Anxin (Modao Zushi)
Additional Tags: One Shot, Period-Typical Sexism, Backstory, slight intimations of a lesbian love triangle
Summary:

At birth, and for the next fifteen years of her life, Meng Shi enjoyed a gift of incredible good fortune. She spent the rest of her life atoning for it.

June 3 - Inspiring Characters

Jun. 3rd, 2026 07:14 pm
senmut: 3 blue seahorse shapes of varying sizes on a dark background (General: Seahorse Triad)
[personal profile] senmut
Next up, having spoken of resonance, I'm asking:

What character has inspired you? Inspiration can be many things. To be better, to pick up a skill, to try a new food, anything.

This one is a toughie for me, because I was constantly tackling encyclopedias to learn new things introduced in books I read, but not necessarily directly because of a character. And I've inflicted several skills I tried to pick up on my original characters, but uncertain if that goes int he other direction.

Fortunately, I'd been warned about Turkish Delight. +g+

So ultimately, I think it comes to being inspired to be better. And I can't pinpoint one. Black Beauty inspired me to look for the best in others (before I became a member of the Certified Cynics). John Carter taught me that I can offer my skills, but ultimately the people around me need to sort themselves out (so don't barrel in with solutions without taking input is the way I modernized that). Moreta made me strive to face challenges with more calm (which honestly helped curb some of my temper for a time).

Daily Check-In

Jun. 3rd, 2026 05:58 pm
starwatcher: Western windmill, clouds in background, trees around base. (Default)
[personal profile] starwatcher posting in [community profile] fandom_checkin
 
This is your check-in post for today. The poll will be open from midnight Universal or Zulu Time (8pm Eastern Time) on Wednesday June 03, to midnight on Thursday, June 04. (8pm Eastern Time).

Poll #34685 Daily Check-in
Open to: Access List, detailed results viewable to: Access List, participants: 16

How are you doing?

I am OK.
13 (81.2%)

I am not OK, but don't need help right now.
3 (18.8%)

I could use some help.
0 (0.0%)

How many other humans live with you?

I am living single.
5 (31.2%)

One other person.
6 (37.5%)

More than one other person.
5 (31.2%)




Please, talk about how things are going for you in the comments, ask for advice or help if you need it, or just discuss whatever you feel like.
 

The Legend of Vox Machina

Jun. 3rd, 2026 07:52 pm
settiai: (TLoVM -- settiai)
[personal profile] settiai
The first three episodes of The Legend of Vox Machina Season 4 are available, so it's time to start watching and see just how many changes they've made from the campaign this season.

Spoilers for 4x01 under the cut. )

Spoilers for 4x02 under the cut. )

Spoilers for 4x03 under the cut. )

ADMIN: Commenting

Jun. 3rd, 2026 06:48 pm
sweettartheart: Maggie Smith from Death on the Nile, on a flowered background (Default)
[personal profile] sweettartheart posting in [community profile] 100words
Hello, all! An addendum to the rules for the community:

Commenting is welcome here. Commenting is encouraged, but not required. I'm sure you all understand how to behave with civility in public.

However, you may not post in this community and disable comments on your post. Your post will be deleted. This is a community, not a personal journal or an archive. If someone leaves you a comment that you feel is inappropriate, please bring it to the attention of the mod if it has not already been addressed.

Thanks!

Reading Wednesday

Jun. 3rd, 2026 06:29 pm
troisoiseaux: (reading 6)
[personal profile] troisoiseaux
Instead of starting one of several recently-acquired new books, or picking back up on any of my increasingly ridiculous number of books in various stages of progress, over the past couple of days I started and finished This Is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman, a novel that feels like a short story collection since each chapter focuses on a different member of an extended Jewish family scattered mostly along the East Coast and split by a feud between two elderly sisters - the family matriarchs - who had a falling out at the deathbed of their other, younger sister. Domestic but compelling; I liked that most of the individual plot points were never really - or at least not tidily - resolved, per se, leaning into the snapshot/short story feel.

Probably won't get around to those unread books any time soon, because I got a "skip the line" Libby loan for Lena Dunham's new memoir, Famesick, and as I was otherwise 383rd in line for 55 copies, who am I to look a gift library book in the mouth. I've been vaguely aware of Dunham as a controversial and/or maligned pop culture figure for what seems like my entire teenage/adult life, although I don't think I've ever actually watched any of her work; I'm like 2-3 chapters in and terribly endeared by her portrait of the artist as a young dumpster fire, and also preemptively sad for that starry-eyed 20-something, who is going to go through some stuff.

[ SECRET POST #7089 ]

Jun. 3rd, 2026 06:03 pm
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[personal profile] case posting in [community profile] fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #7089 ⌋

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


01. 20.png



More! )


Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 13 secrets from Secret Submission Post #1012.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
dhampyresa: Paris coat of arms: Gules, on waves of the sea in base a ship in full sail Argent, a chief Azure semé-de-lys Or (fluctuat nec mergitur)
[personal profile] dhampyresa
The problem with this book is that I'm French.

Alix E. Harrow's The Everlasting is a novel about deconstructing a country's founding myth. Said myth is inspired by Arthuriana and, especially, Joan of Arc. I'm not against Joan of Arc motifs (hell, it's one of the things I love about Margaret Rogerson's Vespertine). I am also pro deconstructing founding myths! Including French founding myths, including Joan of Arc.

However.

However, I think if you're going to be deconstructing a country's myths it should be your own country. Whether its because the book is in English or the author is USAmerican or the fictional country is England-coded (the main narrator so far (25%) is called "Owen Mallory") or a combination but this feels particularly disrespectful. Leave Jeanne alone and go bother George Washington or something.
kaberett: Trans symbol with Swiss Army knife tools at other positions around the central circle. (Default)
[personal profile] kaberett

I am going to lead, moderately emphatically, with: this is not a recommendation for this book (which in any case I haven't finished). The strapline is "how successful couples turn conflict into connection"; it was published in 2024. As [personal profile] recessional has pointed out to me, some of what's going on is that their target audience is specifically people who are treating each other shittily but don't want to break up/divorce/etc, and do want to learn to do better, but don't have the tools for how.

I, however, am very much coming from a perspective of being much more inclined to push for, if not breakups, the idea that there exists unacceptable behaviour one gets to just nope out over, and also of the tradition of DBT workbooks where there is a heavy emphasis on explicitly acknowledging, out loud, with your words, that the shit you just did is not okay.

All of this having been said, there are two things about this book (so far) that I Must Share.

The first is about a tool the (Schwarz) Gottmans' research group uses. Their research group, for context, is called the Love Lab.

Much of the data and observations about couples in conflict in this book comes from our decades of work in the Love Lab and from other important and groundbreaking observational studies by ourselves and other researchers. But now we are getting even more sophisticated and granular information from the AI we trained with John's emotional coding system, called SPAFF, short for Specific Affect Coding System.

... the second, I say, moving swiftly on, is that a little further on in the book I have encountered a genuinely new-to-me evopsych argument: that because of evolutionary pressures it is men who get Extremely Emotional very quickly, and take a long time to calm back down and reach a point where they can engage rationally again!

... At this point: He's flooded. She's flooded. Both hearts are hammering hard; adrenaline is zinging through their veins. Stan's physiological response has ratcheted up and overwhelmed him even faster than Susan's, and he'll take a lot longer to come down from it.

Here's why: For evolutionary reasons having to do with protecting the tribe and hunting dangerous animals for food, our prehistoric male ancestors gained a survival advantage by being able to quickly mount and sustain an adrenaline-packed response to danger. Those with this rapid response were better able to fight off enemies and hunt for food, and because they were better survivors, their genes were more likely to get passed down and eventually inherited by our men today. That kind of enduring fight-or-flight response might have helped Stan's distant ancestors survive, but it isn't doing him any favors now.

tl;dr for all that I regularly kind of want to throw it across the room there are some amazing moments in this thing. I'm only about halfway through! WHO KNOWS what wonders await me!!!

Wheech

Jun. 3rd, 2026 09:43 pm
vivdunstan: Arms of King James V of Scotland with a unicorn among thistles. Above the unicorn is the blue and white saltire flag, below the unicorn the red and gold lion rampant (scotland)
[personal profile] vivdunstan
Introduced my in laws tonight to the word "wheech", a fantastic Scots word, which I had been using in recent weeks in chats to my Mum, talking about how much surgeons might remove from my tummy re gynaecological cancer. Me: "They can wheech it all out!" For more info see the DSL word of the week page for wheech.

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