solarcat | Reading

Daughter of Luck (2467 words) by Settiai
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Characters: Original Half-Elf Character(s) (Dungeons & Dragons), Original Human Character(s) (Dungeons & Dragons)
Additional Tags: Background Poly, Dungeons & Dragons Character Backstory, Family, Illegitimacy, Loss, Mother-Daughter Relationship, One Shot
Summary: Siân Valinta might be what half the city called her, a good half of them mockingly, but Siân Breyer was who she was and who she always would be.

Current Mood: accomplished

archaeologist_d

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settiai

To add to a previous post, my cleric, Siân, has had a really bad couple of weeks in-game. Over the course of the last two-and-a-half weeks or so, she has:

( A list of bad things under the cut. )

Poor Siân is well on her way towards a complete and total mental breakdown at the rate she's going.

Current Mood: amused

settiai

In tonight's game, ( the rest under a cut for those who don't care. )

And that's where we left off.

Current Mood: surprised

lannamichaels

I figured out how to hack simchas torah and the needing to eat lunch at a reasonable time problem: pack a lunch and eat it during, after, and on the way home.

Anyway anyone want anything? Drabble, dvd commentary, meta, etc?

These posts don't expire.

I also just typed "these posts don't exist", so good night, night vale, good night.

senmut

will be scarce here

celli

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james

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james

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james

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settiai

Well, we're definitely moving into exchange season.

The Dragon Age Poly Exchange already has assignments out, the Joining Exchange (a Dragon Age exchange focusing on Wardens) just opened sign-ups, Yuletide sign-ups are almost upon us, and Holly Poly has made a few posts implying it's coming up soon. Plus it's not really an exchange, but the Dragon Age Reverse Bang's deadline is at the end of the month as well.

And those are just the ones I'm probably participating in. I'm sure there are plenty of others, including some that might catch my attention.

Let's see if at least a few of them will properly kick my muse into gear... 🤞🏻

Current Mood: thoughtful

james

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ride_4ever

Today is the official Canadian Thanksgiving Day, but every day is a good day to be thankful for the existence of Canada!

Watch on YouTube

Current Mood: thankful for Canada
Current Location: near the lake they call Michigan

ride_4ever

In Canada and all around the world, people STAND ON GUARD FOR CANADA!

Happy Thanksgiving Day and Happy Indigenous Peoples Day to Canadians and all fans of Canada!

Watch on YouTube

Current Mood: thankful for Canada
Current Location: near the lake they call Michigan

hannah

In looking at the amount of peanut butter I have, and in looking at the internet's suggestions of what to do with it, the best idea comes with a minor concern - namely, that peanut butter bread doesn't work with natural and organic peanut butters on account of the emulsifiers being necessary for the bread's crumb to effectively hold together. It doesn't seem possible to add in anything at home, whether it's another kind of vegetable oil or some extra egg whites, that'd address and fix the specific problem.

There's a few recipes I've found which are designed around natural peanut butters, and none of those look quite as much fun as the others - some of them even seem a bit finicky. They don't come across as something simple to make and stick in the freezer for quick snacks in the future. I've got more than enough of the peanut butter and not quite enough of the everything else to experiment, at least not more than two or three times, and I'm loathe to waste flour like that. I guess there's always noodles.

Current Mood: lazy
Current Music: nothing now

trobadora in

sid_guardian

Zhao Yunlan sprawled on a couch, grinning at his phone. The background shows a purple sky with stars. Text reads, "Slo-Mo Rewatch. Guardian - half an episode per week @ sid_guardian.dreamwidth.org"

Hi, welcome to this week's instalment of the Guardian drama Slo-Mo Rewatch! Watch half an episode a week, and then come and chat about it here in comments. Or you can just jump into the comments without rewatching, of course!

Here is last week's half-episode. On to the second half!

Episode 3, from 23:25

Summary: Zhao Yunlan goes to Shen Wei to confirm the identity of the third student involved in what happened to Zhang Ruonan. (Which involves gesturing with a letter opener, because Zhao Yunlan. :D) He arrives back just in time to find Wang Yike killing Liu Yidong. Oops. Zhang Ruonan physically tackles Zhao Yunlan and confesses to the murders herself to stop him from catching Wang Yike. Meanwhile Wang Yike has decided Shen Wei is suspicious (well ...), and the SID arrives just in time to intervene in her attack in him. Zhang Ruonan accidentally touches Wang Yike's bare hand and has most of her life energy drained. They have a tearful goodbye, and everyone is very affected. Afterwards, we discover that someone secretly neutralised Wang Yike's power, and that despite being taken away by the Envoy, Shen Wei nonetheless brought her to reunite with Zhang Ruonan.

And then we start a new case! There's a series of murders where the victims' faces are turned completely blank. Zhao Yunlan et al. are investigating. (Lin Jing and Zhu Hong both seem to be mostly complaining. :p) Meanwhile Shen Wei is searching for the Hallows, and encounters Zhu Jiu for the first time. Following screams, the SID finds a cowering woman, and ... Shen Wei.

Quote:

Let me just offer you two contrasting quotes, because damn, the range:

"Professor Shen said a stolen life is hard to maintain, but a promise can remain constant for thousands of years. Chief says such a relationship is called 'Guarding'. It's even more passionate than love and greater than familial love. I hope I can stay at the SID and become someone who can guard everyone."

"Ever seen a snake who likes to walk?"

Detail:

Lin Jing's map when he's tracking Wang Yike's phone shows the location of the university within Dragon City, on the northern side of the river. This aligns with Zhu Hong saying in episode 4 that the university is in the north!

Questions:

What's your favourite moment in this part of the episode? Did anything stand out to you as coming from the novel?

What was Zhao Yunlan thinking, leaving Zhang Ruonan with Liu Yadong unguarded, when he already suspected Liu Yadong? Is this the first time Zhao Yunlan has sympathised with a Dixingren? How often does the Envoy secretly let people go? How did Zhang Ruonan know about Dixing? Do you ship Zhang Ruonan and Wang Yike? When did Shen Wei decide to move closer to Zhao Yunlan?

For the start of the next case, why are Shen Wei, Zhu Jiu and the SID all in the same area? And finally, have you ever seen a snake who likes to walk? *g*

(These are all just conversation starters - feel free to answer all, some, or none, and to say as much or as little as you like! You don't have to be keeping up with the rewatch to join in!)

And here is our schedule - please do sign up to host a post if you can!

facethestrange in

sid_guardian

I'm not sure if sharing what I made for

guardian_wishlist is a thing (since the collection itself was already shared to the comm), but I can't add all these links to a regular post because there were 10 of them revealed on the same day. :D (Normally I include 4-5 in one post.) So here they are, under a cut this time. :)

5 ficlets (all dramaverse):
2x Weilan
1x Zhu Hong & Shen Wei
1x Ye Zun/Lin Jing
1x Ye Zun & Sang Zan

( click )

5 drawings:
3x drama Weilan (one with Da Qing)
2x Zhubai (one in novelverse AU)

( click )

settiai

Ever since I moved into the hotel, I've felt about watching television too late at night because I know from personal experience that sound carries. When I watch something after 10pm or so, I've turned it down low, which means I miss things. And that's been a big pain especially when it comes to Critical Role since it doesn't even start airing until 10pm, so if I want to watch live then I end up missing things because I have to keep it quiet unless I want to be an asshole.

As I mentioned in my most recent Critical Role post, though, I finally figured out an alternative that seems to be working well. It doesn't work for anything that I'm watching on the hotel's cable, but since most of what I'm watching in the evening/night is streaming, that means I use my Fire Stick. And my Fire Stick has the ability to connect to Bluetooth devices. Such as the ear buds that I usually keep in my purse for when I'm out and about, which I realized earlier in the week.

And, well, it's working great. The last few nights I've been able to watch movies late at night without accidentally disturbing anyone in the rooms next to me or above me. The video is playing on the shiny new TV that the hotel gave me, but the audio is entirely in my ears and not bothering anyone else nearby. For example, right now I'm finishing up watching The Martian, but it's essentially silent in my room because the sound's playing on my ear buds.

Now if only I had thought to do something like this ages ago...

Current Mood: amused

lannamichaels

Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson (2023): DNF. Not unenjoyable but also not gripping. His prose here was more engaging than the last Sanderson I tried to read, which actually isn't saying much. Also it was short enough that it didn't physically hurt to try to read it, which is another point in its favor. It had a strange tone, not quite funny, not quite satirical. Despite having nothing in common with Princess Bride The Book, it strangely felt like it was trying to be Princess Bride The Book.

Then after DNFing, I flipped to the end to see that, yes, it was trying to riff on the tone of Princess Bride The Book, so I guess it did it well enough that I could be like "...is this trying to be Princess Bride without understanding what makes Princess Bride funny/satirical?" But hey, the intention came through.

The Latke Who Couldn't Stop Screaming: A Christmas Story by Lemony Snicket (2007): Excellent, hilarious book about a latke that jumps out of the pan while being fried and deals with the fact that that family are the only Jews in the picturesque village full of people celebrating Christmas. Then the latke is eaten. A++, no notes.

I Am Anne Frank by Brad Meltzer (2020): internets, I read this book for content for a 4 year old. I don't even believe in doing that, but here I am. The 4 year old is a big fan of this series, and Somehow, both me and his parents, when getting books from this series out of the library for him, and seeing all the books that there are in the catalog, have not gotten him this one. Then one day he went to the library and picked it out himself. And a lot of the time, he treats getting out books as the joy is just getting them out, not reading them, so I was going to just return this one unread on the logic that he wouldn't remember, and let this problem be his parents problem, but okay, fine, let's read this book and see how bad this would be to read this to him.

I went in fully expecting this to be a Saint Anne book and I was 100% correct. But it's worse than that. Now, this book series, it focuses a lot on the famous person as a kid (because of the target audience), then goes into them doing what makes them famous, and stops before death, and ends with a lovely heartwarming moral lesson for the target audience. This is a problem with Anne Frank, who never did anything notable in her life, because she never had the opportunity, because she was Jewish. There is no "and then I grew up and did the thing that made me famous". There is no "and then I did anything". She has no accomplishments. This already doesn't fit in at all with the other books in the series: those books are about triumphing over adversity, about working hard and accomplishing great things. Anne Frank did not do any of that.

So what can Anne Frank do? Well, you see, she dies and thus teaches you a moral lesson. That's how these books end: they have the person do what makes them famous and then it has a moral lesson for the target audience. The moral lesson of a dead Jewish girl is, *checks notes*, help other people and be kind. The last line of the book is "I am Anne Frank and I believe that people are truly good at heart." Okay. Well, I suspect if you go back in time and ask her in the concentration camp, you may get a different answer. But no one wants to hear that. They want to know that a tragic victim forgave them for it even as she died. No hard feelings!

I've made a metric I call "do they expect any X to read this book/attend this training/watch this video about X". Applicable to many things! Does this book about disability expect anyone with this disability to read it? Does this presentation about mental health problems expect anyone in the audience to have any mental health problems? Does this book about a Jew expect any Jews to read it?

This book is a bit meh on that. (I know the author is Jewish. That's irrelevant to the intended audience.)

But, hey, I had no great expectations anyway.

Anne Frank by Clémentine V. Baron, translated by Catherine Nolan (2018): Gotten out by an older kid at the same time, so the reading for content was less severe, although months ago this kid DNFed the I Survived the Nazi Invasion book really early on because it was too sad (which we were glad of; when she picked it up, we were all like, uh, let us know if you want to talk about it, and then she read for a bit and asked if something really happened, we said yes, and she put the book down), and has complained of nightmares from certain things, so, like, there was some checking the content, but I skimmed it more. On the whole, better than the above book. I think it did a much better job of not flinching at the end. I'd rather read this book to the 4 year old.