vital functions
Jun. 21st, 2020 11:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kaberettReading. John Scalzi, The Last Emperox. I did indeed settle in to it! And enjoyed it a lot, particularly the wry reference to Old Man's War. I was quite surprised by how much I did not expect the shape of what happened, and also by how nicely some of the Thematic Parallelism was set up.
Martha Wells, All Systems Red. I. I am so glad I got to this. I am so glad you all encouraged me. I am trying desperately to not just dive straight into the entire rest of the series as thesis-displacement. THE MURDERBOT IS AUTISTIC AND I LOVE IT.
Martha Wells, Artificial Condition. I'm apparently buying these one at a time after I think I've done "enough" work for a bit, because if I eke them out like this I might ever get anything else at all done for the duration, whoops. This one I loved less, and felt generally more unsettled by, for reasons I'm struggling to articulate, but I think most of it is that I'm abruptly wary of the tech: the first novella felt like a reasonable and entirely acceptable-to-me level of handwave, where this second perhaps felt like it was trying to make the tech more load-bearing while also using it as a magic plot device that didn't quite work for me? My questions include: what makes our Murderbot's media cache of actual interest to transport bots? Particularly ones that aren't as "advanced" as Our Friend The ART? (Why can't they just get shit off the feeds themselves if they're interested?) What are the ART's actual capabilites and limitations? (Murderbot has enough processing power to monitor a single shuttle flight, or two sets of interaction plus one set of hacking simultaneously; the ART has vastly more processing power but... doesn't have attention to spare for Murderbot while it's monitoring the flight of a small shuttle?) How does hacking-the-governor-module actually work in relation to all of the other tech?
Alix E Harrow, A Witch’s Guide to Escape: A Practical Compendium of Portal Fantasies. Just started, finally, and taking it slowly.
Ibram X. Kendi, How To Be An Anti-Racist. Started this week; I have a lot of thoughts so far but they might end up being a post of their own, at this rate.
Watching. Planet Earth: the future. This is the "saving species" extra, and did a whole bunch of talking about conservation work, and sustainable conservation work, featuring actually lots of talking by BIPoC. Still a... significantly smaller proportion of the people interviewed than might be considered reasonable, and still strikingly better than the extras that came with Blue Planet.
There was a lot of talking about the emotional impact on the filming crews of engaging with so many endangered species. I was pleased to discover that David Attenborough's eyebrows do exactly what it sounds like.
Basically a whistlestop tour of issues of charismatic species, ecosystem diversity, captive breeding programs and DNA preservation and their issues, through the lens (ha) of shots featured in the series and comparison with wildlife series shot by the BBC 15 years prior.
Listening. TMA 172. Goodness but that was an effective use of a laugh track (in place! of static! maybe I should listen to the whole thing again and work out how I think it all fits together!) I am sort of charmed by the extent to which all the tiny interconnecting theatres are... the Edinburgh Fringe! And I am deeply amused by Jonny Is Bad At Names.
Up to episode 45 of the relisten. I note with delight that the violent clown of 44, dressed in white with purple polka dots, is of course a match for the attire of the "spooky clown doll" (thank you, Basira, episode 43) we meet in episode 24. Though, also, why is it surprising that violence-and-death are less likely following Denikin leaving the circus? Is it because of the organ? Should I... I should probably do a search of the subreddit, shouldn't I.
Cooking. Sourdough of note: 50% wholemeal with figs and hazelnuts (I'm a massive fan, especially with goats' cheese; A is dubious about both the goats' cheese and the bread-additives); 10% dark rye with caraway, which was also very good but at these proportions I can't tell the difference between the light and dark rye flours.
Sweet potato & chickpea salad.
Two quiche cases, one cheese-and-onion quiche, and one tiny apple-and-blackberry pie. Also pretty pleased with the potato wedges that went with for the first evening.
Making & mending. ALLOTMENT INFRASTRUCTURE. In particular: finally all the parts for redoing my greenhouse staging arrived, so I spent a good chunk of Tuesday and Wednesday working on that. I got some of these kits (hurrah birthday-presents-to-self) plus a three-tiered shelving unit and the greenhouse is so much tidier and more pleasant to exist in; it is great.
At home: I've started actually cataloguing all the photography gear we hauled up from Cornwall on our last trip, and badgered A into helping me bring all of the Kenwood Chef... bits... in. So far he's got my stand mixer working again after we burned something in it out last week (by just swapping out a working motor unit from a chassis with some broken exterior parts), and done an audit of which chassis actually work. I have been beginning the catalogue of what all attachments we have, and also cleaning them some more -- I did give them all a scrub down before we removed them from the Mouldering Ancestral Pile but they've since sat untouched in our garage for... some time... and need yet more clean-up. Progress, though.
Growing. It... continues growing season.
At home, germinating: most of the quinoa have now come up and are producing true leaves; some mangetout Sugar Magnolia that I did not expect to be viable are coming up so I've got some more of them to plant out; marigolds continue in remarkably small numbers; salad leaves doing pretty well; leeks starting to be visible; some of the root veg... clearly thinking about whether they want to exist.
At the plot, meanwhile...: planted out the one remaining Pattison Blanc squash, and the two comedy onions, and the remaining maize.
Harvested all of the garlic, in the hopes that even if white rot (which is my best guess) is what's causing the foliage to fall over, maybe the actual bulbs will be edible if dried out rapidly enough, so we're working on that. Ate the first of the Sugar Magnolia pods (very purple, all the way through) raw, and there's lots more coming along as needs eating. Got in as many of the cherries as we're going to; the price per kilo doesn't bear thinking about but Adam's enjoying them a great deal and I am at the point in the rehabilitation process where I don't automatically consider them not-food. One large tub of redcurrants picked and into the freezer, also. Oh! And ate a shallot in salad, and several jostaberries (starting to get properly ripe) straight off the bush, and some underripe raspberries (of which I am very fond).
What else what else. Tomatoes getting visibly larger as we go along, with a ludicrous number of flowers on them as are in the greenhouse. Fruit starting to set outside, even. Shallots and onions carrying merrily on; Sugar Magnolia producing lots of pods; lettuces doing well; Greek Gigantes finally established (approx. 5 of them) enough to be climbing up their beanpoles; the two Pattison Blanc already planted out also looking a bit more convincing; both Tromboncini and courgette plants have been producing flowers; gooseberries are starting to get some colour to them; grape vine... continues a grape vine.
Observing. Lots of bat, and occasional giant moth. There's also been a fair old bit of the back garden fox trotting around the place, even during daylight. Some I-think-tree-sparrows having dust-baths in the track down to the allotments, before all the rain happened. Some excellent beetles.
Playing. Mrrf. Another round of frustrated-with-horn-playing, though at least there's a fairly clear causal link between practising less and losing clarity of tone etc on the high range, though it does also help to remember that pointing the bell out into the room instead of just sort of back at a desk and some chairs makes a much nicer noise.
PoGo: research-job 100% IV Sandslash and Starly, what am I going to dooooooooo with them, whyyyyyyy. Wild-caught 96% IV Machop, which is nice! Managed to get two Zekrom (new legendary) during raid hour on Wednesday, from my sofa; very pleased to have a Darumaka from the special research; pretty charmed by the Galarian Farfetch'd. At the other end of the scale, I also caught a 0% IV Shuckle, and I treasure it. I am, however, sulking a bit at the "Battle another Trainer 15 times" job o' the Special Research; settling in with the League is clearly in my future, s i g h.
Martha Wells, All Systems Red. I. I am so glad I got to this. I am so glad you all encouraged me. I am trying desperately to not just dive straight into the entire rest of the series as thesis-displacement. THE MURDERBOT IS AUTISTIC AND I LOVE IT.
Martha Wells, Artificial Condition. I'm apparently buying these one at a time after I think I've done "enough" work for a bit, because if I eke them out like this I might ever get anything else at all done for the duration, whoops. This one I loved less, and felt generally more unsettled by, for reasons I'm struggling to articulate, but I think most of it is that I'm abruptly wary of the tech: the first novella felt like a reasonable and entirely acceptable-to-me level of handwave, where this second perhaps felt like it was trying to make the tech more load-bearing while also using it as a magic plot device that didn't quite work for me? My questions include: what makes our Murderbot's media cache of actual interest to transport bots? Particularly ones that aren't as "advanced" as Our Friend The ART? (Why can't they just get shit off the feeds themselves if they're interested?) What are the ART's actual capabilites and limitations? (Murderbot has enough processing power to monitor a single shuttle flight, or two sets of interaction plus one set of hacking simultaneously; the ART has vastly more processing power but... doesn't have attention to spare for Murderbot while it's monitoring the flight of a small shuttle?) How does hacking-the-governor-module actually work in relation to all of the other tech?
Alix E Harrow, A Witch’s Guide to Escape: A Practical Compendium of Portal Fantasies. Just started, finally, and taking it slowly.
Ibram X. Kendi, How To Be An Anti-Racist. Started this week; I have a lot of thoughts so far but they might end up being a post of their own, at this rate.
Watching. Planet Earth: the future. This is the "saving species" extra, and did a whole bunch of talking about conservation work, and sustainable conservation work, featuring actually lots of talking by BIPoC. Still a... significantly smaller proportion of the people interviewed than might be considered reasonable, and still strikingly better than the extras that came with Blue Planet.
There was a lot of talking about the emotional impact on the filming crews of engaging with so many endangered species. I was pleased to discover that David Attenborough's eyebrows do exactly what it sounds like.
Basically a whistlestop tour of issues of charismatic species, ecosystem diversity, captive breeding programs and DNA preservation and their issues, through the lens (ha) of shots featured in the series and comparison with wildlife series shot by the BBC 15 years prior.
Listening. TMA 172. Goodness but that was an effective use of a laugh track (in place! of static! maybe I should listen to the whole thing again and work out how I think it all fits together!) I am sort of charmed by the extent to which all the tiny interconnecting theatres are... the Edinburgh Fringe! And I am deeply amused by Jonny Is Bad At Names.
Up to episode 45 of the relisten. I note with delight that the violent clown of 44, dressed in white with purple polka dots, is of course a match for the attire of the "spooky clown doll" (thank you, Basira, episode 43) we meet in episode 24. Though, also, why is it surprising that violence-and-death are less likely following Denikin leaving the circus? Is it because of the organ? Should I... I should probably do a search of the subreddit, shouldn't I.
Cooking. Sourdough of note: 50% wholemeal with figs and hazelnuts (I'm a massive fan, especially with goats' cheese; A is dubious about both the goats' cheese and the bread-additives); 10% dark rye with caraway, which was also very good but at these proportions I can't tell the difference between the light and dark rye flours.
Sweet potato & chickpea salad.
Two quiche cases, one cheese-and-onion quiche, and one tiny apple-and-blackberry pie. Also pretty pleased with the potato wedges that went with for the first evening.
Making & mending. ALLOTMENT INFRASTRUCTURE. In particular: finally all the parts for redoing my greenhouse staging arrived, so I spent a good chunk of Tuesday and Wednesday working on that. I got some of these kits (hurrah birthday-presents-to-self) plus a three-tiered shelving unit and the greenhouse is so much tidier and more pleasant to exist in; it is great.
At home: I've started actually cataloguing all the photography gear we hauled up from Cornwall on our last trip, and badgered A into helping me bring all of the Kenwood Chef... bits... in. So far he's got my stand mixer working again after we burned something in it out last week (by just swapping out a working motor unit from a chassis with some broken exterior parts), and done an audit of which chassis actually work. I have been beginning the catalogue of what all attachments we have, and also cleaning them some more -- I did give them all a scrub down before we removed them from the Mouldering Ancestral Pile but they've since sat untouched in our garage for... some time... and need yet more clean-up. Progress, though.
Growing. It... continues growing season.
At home, germinating: most of the quinoa have now come up and are producing true leaves; some mangetout Sugar Magnolia that I did not expect to be viable are coming up so I've got some more of them to plant out; marigolds continue in remarkably small numbers; salad leaves doing pretty well; leeks starting to be visible; some of the root veg... clearly thinking about whether they want to exist.
At the plot, meanwhile...: planted out the one remaining Pattison Blanc squash, and the two comedy onions, and the remaining maize.
Harvested all of the garlic, in the hopes that even if white rot (which is my best guess) is what's causing the foliage to fall over, maybe the actual bulbs will be edible if dried out rapidly enough, so we're working on that. Ate the first of the Sugar Magnolia pods (very purple, all the way through) raw, and there's lots more coming along as needs eating. Got in as many of the cherries as we're going to; the price per kilo doesn't bear thinking about but Adam's enjoying them a great deal and I am at the point in the rehabilitation process where I don't automatically consider them not-food. One large tub of redcurrants picked and into the freezer, also. Oh! And ate a shallot in salad, and several jostaberries (starting to get properly ripe) straight off the bush, and some underripe raspberries (of which I am very fond).
What else what else. Tomatoes getting visibly larger as we go along, with a ludicrous number of flowers on them as are in the greenhouse. Fruit starting to set outside, even. Shallots and onions carrying merrily on; Sugar Magnolia producing lots of pods; lettuces doing well; Greek Gigantes finally established (approx. 5 of them) enough to be climbing up their beanpoles; the two Pattison Blanc already planted out also looking a bit more convincing; both Tromboncini and courgette plants have been producing flowers; gooseberries are starting to get some colour to them; grape vine... continues a grape vine.
Observing. Lots of bat, and occasional giant moth. There's also been a fair old bit of the back garden fox trotting around the place, even during daylight. Some I-think-tree-sparrows having dust-baths in the track down to the allotments, before all the rain happened. Some excellent beetles.
Playing. Mrrf. Another round of frustrated-with-horn-playing, though at least there's a fairly clear causal link between practising less and losing clarity of tone etc on the high range, though it does also help to remember that pointing the bell out into the room instead of just sort of back at a desk and some chairs makes a much nicer noise.
PoGo: research-job 100% IV Sandslash and Starly, what am I going to dooooooooo with them, whyyyyyyy. Wild-caught 96% IV Machop, which is nice! Managed to get two Zekrom (new legendary) during raid hour on Wednesday, from my sofa; very pleased to have a Darumaka from the special research; pretty charmed by the Galarian Farfetch'd. At the other end of the scale, I also caught a 0% IV Shuckle, and I treasure it. I am, however, sulking a bit at the "Battle another Trainer 15 times" job o' the Special Research; settling in with the League is clearly in my future, s i g h.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-21 10:38 pm (UTC)I will refrain from addressing your other questions because I think they are explained more in subsequent installments? Although it’s also possible that the limitations of Murderbot and/or ART are "whatever is convenient for the story right now."
(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-24 04:03 pm (UTC)Ohhhh. Thank you!
Transport bots are so basic that any non-routine network traffic to the station would presumably be flagged.
In the general case? Huh. I know that we got told that the shuttle bot was super basic, and that ART was... unusual... but I hadn't registered that transport bots as a whole were that basic (or that they'd be unable, as with ART, to forge the presence of a captain...)
I will refrain from addressing your other questions because I think they are explained more in subsequent installments? Although it’s also possible that the limitations of Murderbot and/or ART are "whatever is convenient for the story right now."
Hee, thank you -- I look forward to finding out... :)
(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-22 05:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-22 05:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-22 07:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-24 04:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-22 07:16 pm (UTC)