vital functions

[kaberett]

Reading. Oh my goodness I have been reading Several Things.

Completed: Recovery, Gavin Francis (as previously discussed). Interesting wee collection of essays about the construction and conceptualisation of recovery. I was frustrated by the uncomplicated discussion of "pacing" in a work published in 2022 (for more on which topic, see...) -- but the book as a whole is very up-front about the inevitable fallibility of the author's perspective, so I'm willing to give him a pass.

The House of Shattered Wings, Aliette de Bodard. I have forty pages left (of 399, some of which were left blank for -- I presume -- dramatic effect), plus the short story bundled in at the end. I have yet to decide what I make of it.

Adventures in Human Being, Gavin Francis. Acquired from the library on the strength of having enjoyed his Recovery. I have barely started it, though, because all of a sudden...

... my hold on Decluttering at the Speed of Life (Dana K. White) -- having first been placed in June -- went from "five weeks" to "available now" this morning, so I've put everything else down and am inhaling this. So far I have felt personally called out by "procrasticlutter", which apparently failed to properly register when I was reading the blog this time last year, but which Sure Did bring to mind, at this juncture, such Things as "the pile of mending on the sofa"...

Short fiction, miscellaneous, tab closing:

• Seanan McGuire, Juice Like Wounds: meh, alas.
• SL Huang, As the Last I May Know: can absolutely see why this won awards; continue v fond of Huang's work in general.
• Marissa Lingen, Flow: unsure if Very Into. Possibly will reread in attempt to consolidate opinion.
• T. Kingfisher, Packing: adore.
• Yoon Ha Lee, The Second-Last Client: extremely fond!
• John Chu, Beyond the El: wonderful, extremely relevant to my interests, etc.

Watching. As mentioned (along with several other links), I have started making my way through the Neurosequential Network's video series on stress, distress and trauma.

An NHM members-only talk that was nominally about the history of dinosaur science and was actually, alas, much less interesting than that suggests, at least to my tastes. Nice pictures of rocks, though.

Listening. We've had another episode of the Orphan Black podcast. Tatiana Maslany continues extremely good at voices; the story continues to feel like a plot-light audiobook more than a podcast.

Frank Turner, No Thank You For The Music. Ah, I said to Adam, he's entering his Indelicates-On-The-Topic-Of-The-Music-Industry phase.

Playing. Scrabble! A game this evening. :)

Cooking. Of note: Spätzle made with a board rather than through a colander (much easier, definitely swapping over to this method for all future etc).

We Came Into Possession of the Sourdough School's Botanical Blend no. 2. After a bunch of poking around that website with intensifying Facial Expression I eventually found the recommendation to use it 1:4 with strong white flour. I think I somehow managed to oversalt it despite using only the normal amount of salt, and this not being the flour with seaweed in it? We are politely baffled. I will finish using it up, but... baffled.

Eating. PIZZA EXPRESS. I had an MRI on Friday night; an extant Pizza Express is on The Way Home From The Hospital and we had eaten most of the food in the house; ergo PIZZA.

Exploring. Poked around a little bit of the coast path near Kynance!

Making & mending. Finished darning the penultimate rip in the pair of hiking trousers I brought down with me, in the interests of wearing them on our stonk without having a needle stored inelegantly in a pocket or what-have-you (all the better to stab me with).

Comments

[shanaqui]

Hmm, Juice Like Wounds is basically part of In An Absent Dream... Maybe I'll give it a shot, there was a lot missing in that one which drove me nuts. 🤔