Quote...

Sep. 4th, 2025 12:22 am
fairyniamh: (EyeSlash)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quote:

"There is something inexpressibly beautiful in the unused day, something beautiful in the fact that it is still untouched, unsoiled; and town and country share alike in this loveliness."

"I love the sea with its impenetrable fathoms, its wash and undertow, and rasp of shingle sucked anew."

~ Margaret E. Barber

And then there's this

Sep. 3rd, 2025 04:20 pm
twistedchick: watercolor painting of coffee cup on wood table (Default)
[personal profile] twistedchick
I sent copies of my exchanges with my former aunt to my cousin Susan, the only one on that side of the family whom I'm in contact with. She told me in response that she nearly snorted her coffee when reading them. She hasn't gotten along with that aunt for decades, and manages to avoid dealing with her by being the youngest of her sibs (the aunt likes the two older ones.)

She and I are now the Two Black Sheep of the family, which makes me happy.
twistedchick: watercolor painting of coffee cup on wood table (Default)
[personal profile] twistedchick
I seem to live between odd dichotomies these days.

It's hard to go to sleep, in part because of lack of noise. I have just enough tinitis that when I can't hear the traffic it's hard to sleep; think of permanent mosquito in your ear. I found a technique in FB reels for tapping hard on the bone behind the ear that gets rid of the worst of it, but it doesn't always work. So I use an app called Calm, which has 'soundscapes' including things like six different kinds of rainfall, waterfalls, forests of various kinds and white, pink and brown noises, find whatever works for me that night and leave it on all night. That helps. Or I could stay awake till nearly 4, when the noise from the Capital Beltway a quarter mile south of me cranks up to its general daily roar.

A friend suggested that I get a night light for the bathroom in the shape of a capybara, or in her words, 'an imperturbable capybara'. So I did get it, and have it set to the lowest level of light, but I am not yet used to any light there. Normally I have my Kindle nearby, and when I need to get to the bathroom I flip the cover open and use it as a night light. Last night, the capybara was sitting imperturbably on my toothbrush holder, but its light shone out on a wall that I'm not used to having lit, so I had to remind myself that I had a friendly and non-aggressive critter there shining the light (I need reminders when I'm almost asleep but my body discerns something different.)

That meant that I slept on my left side last night, with my face away from the lit wall. Which, for most other people, would not be a problem, but I have all my life had a slightly curved spine, leaning to the left. (During the 2000s, I was doing deepwater running twice a week and the supported floating combined with gravity straightened my spine out, but I have not done it in several years now bcC (because Covid) and it is leaning a little. When I sleep on that side it leans more. As a remedy my husband put up a bar in one of the doorways that I can reach up and grab and dangle myself from, and my own weight straightens my back out painlessly. A side effect of the bar is that my grip strength has increased a bit, so I could do better at pulling out vines yesterday.

Much more of this balancing and I may start thinking of Philippe Petit balancing on the rope between the Two Towers, long ago.

Quote...

Sep. 3rd, 2025 12:34 am
fairyniamh: (Candle)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quote:

"It is impossible to go through life without trust: that is to be imprisoned in the worst cell of all, oneself."

"Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose or paint can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation."

~RIP: Graham Greene (June 22, 1952 – September 1, 2025)

Quote...

Sep. 2nd, 2025 12:05 am
fairyniamh: Unknown creator (Sasuke dance)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quote:

"Growing up, I looked up to real women. I didn't go in for hero worship and I still don't. Everybody has feet of clay."

"At first, being a female role model really terrified me. But it hasn't turned out to be an awful burden. I get a lot of letters from women who tell me that, after watching Xena, they have bought the Harley-Davidson they always wanted or left an abusive relationship."

~ Lucy Lawless

Quote...

Sep. 1st, 2025 12:21 am
fairyniamh: (EyeSlash)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quote:

"One of the commonest ailments of the present day is the premature formation of opinion."

"I'm sorry to inform you that your 50 year warranty has expired on your back, knees, and memory. Luckily your lifetime warranty on your heart is still in effect. Of course, that becomes void and expires when you do."

~ Kin Hubbard

Code deploy happening shortly

Aug. 31st, 2025 07:37 pm
mark: A photo of Mark kneeling on top of the Taal Volcano in the Philippines. It was a long hike. (Default)
[staff profile] mark posting in [site community profile] dw_maintenance

Per the [site community profile] dw_news post regarding the MS/TN blocks, we are doing a small code push shortly in order to get the code live. As per usual, please let us know if you see anything wonky.

There is some code cleanup we've been doing that is going out with this push but I don't think there is any new/reworked functionality, so it should be pretty invisible if all goes well.

denise: Image: Me, facing away from camera, on top of the Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome (Default)
[staff profile] denise posting in [site community profile] dw_news

A reminder to everyone that starting tomorrow, we are being forced to block access to any IP address that geolocates to the state of Mississippi for legal reasons while we and Netchoice continue fighting the law in court. People whose IP addresses geolocate to Mississippi will only be able to access a page that explains the issue and lets them know that we'll be back to offer them service as soon as the legal risk to us is less existential.

The block page will include the apology but I'll repeat it here: we don't do geolocation ourselves, so we're limited to the geolocation ability of our network provider. Our anti-spam geolocation blocks have shown us that their geolocation database has a number of mistakes in it. If one of your friends who doesn't live in Mississippi gets the block message, there is nothing we can do on our end to adjust the block, because we don't control it. The only way to fix a mistaken block is to change your IP address to one that doesn't register as being in Mississippi, either by disconnecting your internet connection and reconnecting it (if you don't have a static IP address) or using a VPN.

In related news, the judge in our challenge to Tennessee's social media age verification, parental consent, and parental surveillance law (which we are also part of the fight against!) ruled last month that we had not met the threshold for a temporary injunction preventing the state from enforcing the law while the court case proceeds.

The Tennesee law is less onerous than the Mississippi law and the fines for violating it are slightly less ruinous (slightly), but it's still a risk to us. While the fight goes on, we've decided to prevent any new account signups from anyone under 18 in Tennessee to protect ourselves against risk. We do not need to block access from the whole state: this only applies to new account creation.

Because we don't do any geolocation on our users and our network provider's geolocation services only apply to blocking access to the site entirely, the way we're implementing this is a new mandatory question on the account creation form asking if you live in Tennessee. If you do, you'll be unable to register an account if you're under 18, not just the under 13 restriction mandated by COPPA. Like the restrictions on the state of Mississippi, we absolutely hate having to do this, we're sorry, and we hope we'll be able to undo it as soon as possible.

Finally, I'd like to thank every one of you who's commented with a message of support for this fight or who's bought paid time to help keep us running. The fact we're entirely user-supported and you all genuinely understand why this fight is so important for everyone is a huge part of why we can continue to do this work. I've also sent a lot of your comments to the lawyers who are fighting the actual battles in court, and they find your wholehearted support just as encouraging and motivating as I do. Thank you all once again for being the best users any social media site could ever hope for. You make me proud and even more determined to yell at state attorneys general on your behalf.

Quote...

Aug. 31st, 2025 12:03 am
fairyniamh: (Ship)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quote...

"When you say "I am," the words that follow are summoning creation with a mighty force, because you are declaring it to be fact."

"The reason visualization is so powerful is because as you create pictures in your mind of seeing yourself with what it is you want, you are generating thoughts and feelings of having it now. Visualization is simply powerfully focused thought in pictures, and it causes equally powerful feelings."

~ Rhonda Byrne

a cautionary note

Aug. 30th, 2025 06:46 pm
twistedchick: watercolor painting of coffee cup on wood table (Default)
[personal profile] twistedchick
Some years back, I was asked to spin the shed fur from a very fluffy dog so the owner could knit a coat out of it. There was definitely enough -- but the bags of fur she left me had not been washed. I carded them into rolags (outdoors) and gave them back to her, and asked her to find someone else to do it.

But in the process of doing that, I looked online and discovered that it was illegal, in the state I was living in, to sell any object or garment made from fur that could be construed as pet fur.

Why? Because nobody wanted to start having to deal with trapping pets and killing them for their fur. Never mind that it was shed fur and combed off a still-living pet. It was still illegal. I don't remember what the penalties were.

There are already enough dognappers stealing pets from hunting-type breeds to sell as 'trained hunting dogs.' One of my cousins lost a dog that way for a month, until he turned up in a neighboring town after running all the way back from the Adirondacks to Rochester, well over 100 miles. I still don't know how he survived.

So, a suggestion: check the laws in your state about this, if you plan to card and spin and knit something that isn't for yourself from Bowser's or Fifi's fur.

Quote...

Aug. 30th, 2025 12:13 am
fairyniamh: (EyeSlash)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quote...

"Eyes so transparent that through them the soul is seen."

"What I write is not for little girls."

"It is a difficult matter to gain the affection of a cat. He is a philosophical, methodical animal, tenacious of his own habits, fond of order and neatness, and disinclined to extravagant sentiment. He will be your friend, if he finds you worthy of friendship, but not your slave."

~ Theophile Gautier

Quote...

Aug. 29th, 2025 01:06 am
fairyniamh: (Candle)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quote...

"If you talk to the animals they will talk with you and you will know each other. If you do not talk to them you will not know them and what you do not know, you will fear. What one fears, one destroys."

"May the stars carry your sadness away, may the flowers fill your heart with beauty, may hope forever wipe away your tears. And, above all, may silence make you strong."

~ Chief Dan George

Quote...

Aug. 28th, 2025 12:12 am
fairyniamh: (History)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quotes:

"Why look for conspiracy when stupidity can explain so much"

"Courage is the commitment to begin without any guarantee of success."

~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Quote...

Aug. 27th, 2025 12:26 am
fairyniamh: (EyeSlash)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quotes:

"Judge nothing, you will be happy. Forgive everything, you will be happier. Love everything, you will be happiest."

"Gratitude is the sweetest thing in a seeker's life- in all human life. If there is gratitude in your heart, then there will be tremendous sweetness in your eyes."

~ Sri Chinmoy

Quote...

Aug. 26th, 2025 12:15 am
fairyniamh: Made by Me (Chill)
[personal profile] fairyniamh
Quotes:

"Gratitude helps you to grow and expand; gratitude brings joy and laughter into your life and into the lives of all those around you."

"Be very very still and allow every new experience to take place in your life without any resistance whatsoever. You do not have to do anything, you simply have to be and let things happen."

~ Eileen Caddy

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