mark: A photo of Mark kneeling on top of the Taal Volcano in the Philippines. It was a long hike. (Default)
Mark Smith ([staff profile] mark) wrote in [site community profile] dw_maintenance2026-02-03 10:25 pm

Minor operations; testing new serving path

Hi all!

I'm doing some minor operational work tonight. It should be transparent, but there's always a chance that something goes wrong. The main thing I'm touching is testing a replacement for Apache2 (our web server software) in one area of the site.

Thank you!

mneme: (Default)
Joshua Kronengold ([personal profile] mneme) wrote2026-02-02 11:45 pm

Still between jobs

I've been getting some feelers and at least one interview opportunity which seemed to vanish re-appeared, but I'm also widening my net -- it's so easy to try to use only the job sites and particularly LinkedIn, but in fact so many companies only post their jobs on their internal web site so if there are placed you'd love to work I guess it's best to look directly there to see if they have openings.

In other news, the larp (re-run for the first time in 15 years ago! Written 17 years ago! Yeah, there's a lot to unpack here) is coming together; we'll send out the casting hints tomorrow (HOPING) and then do some edits on the character sheets for the next two weeks before things get busy again (with Dreamation and then Intercon in quick succession!).

We went out to NOLA two weeks ago for a friends thing (and to see Chwebaccus) and then our plane got delayed for four days (it was originally going to come back on Sunday). So, we HAD to spend the week in NOLA (oh, no!) for an extra four days, finishing out the week; I can't really complain; it gave us some time to reflect and in which we couldn't keep our existing patterns (and also some extra days to enjoy NOLA nightlife, including a Fusion Dance thing that was apparently their revival of the local scene; I mostly danced with [personal profile] drcpunk but did also get dances with around 4 other dancers which was nice. The venue was in the back of a clothing shop, which gave nice speakeasy vibes (although since it didn't occur to me to buy soda from the store, I got rather parched and we headed out after 2ish hours when the band finished their set).

Before that, we did Arisia, which was small (for an Arisia, anyway) but rather pleasant.

I've also gotten back into reading Wyrm (which I had previously paused after reading chapter 21). I have to prioritize working on the larp, but it's pretty nice.
siderea: (Default)
Siderea ([personal profile] siderea) wrote2026-01-28 03:33 am
Entry tags:

Terminology [curr ev]

Overheard on Reddit, u/Itsyademonboi:
Sorry, Nazis are from Germany under Adolf Hitler, what we have here is Sparkling Fascists.
dorchadas: (Cowboy Bebop Space Cowboy)
dorchadas ([personal profile] dorchadas) wrote2026-01-18 10:31 am

Anime Chicago Winter Sampler

Looks like I haven't been to one of these in two years, and this time both [instagram.com profile] sashagee and I got to go! We did arrive late and miss the first two shows, but here's what I thought about the ones we did see:

List of shows behind the cut )
The shows were categorized by another person in the group as follows:

  1. Handholding Sakuga - (You and I are Polar Opposites)

  2. “See, the Oligarchy DOES Care”-ass Propaganda - (Noble Reincarnation: Born Blessed, So I'll Obtain Ultimate Power)

  3. Family (Selectively) Matters - (Journal with Witch)

  4. Monkey See, Monkey School - (The Darwin Incident)

  5. F/ACE Turn: I Can Fix Him - (Tamon’s B-Side)

  6. Not All Heroes Worship Goddesses - (Sentenced to be a Hero)

  7. Conquer Them With Cuteness - (The Demon King’s Daughter is Too Kind)

  8. No Game, No Interest - (Shiboyugi: Playing Death Games to Put Food on the Table)

  9. The Lover Formerly Known As Prince - (In the Clear Moonlit Dusk)

  10. New US War Just Dropped - (Fate/strange Fake)
The first two shows there are the ones we missed. People really seem to like You and I are Polar Opposites, including [instagram.com profile] sashagee--she's already watched a bunch of it.

I say I'll watch some of these, but I'm very bad at watching anime lately. We'll see if it happens.
dorchadas: (Office Space)
dorchadas ([personal profile] dorchadas) wrote2026-01-22 04:24 am

New rig came

Almost a week early. I thought, oh, cool, I'll just open it up now and help set it up, since I took the day off anyway since [instagram.com profile] sashagee wasn't feeling well and I needed to watch Laila.

Well, I cracked open the packaging, asked [instagram.com profile] sashagee to help me a bit since Laila's at school and get it out of the casing, and when I pulled it out I noticed there was condensation on the case. Oh, that's a bad sign, I said, and then when I opened up the case to take out the packaging they put on the inside I noticed there was condensation on the inside of the case, which is a really bad sign.

It did not post, of course. The CPU and RAM lights were both on on the motherboard, and when reseating the RAM didn't work I figured that if they can't send me a working computer I'll request a refund, so that's what I did. Just annoying that I have to walk through the snow with a 40 lb computer to the UPS store to ship it back.
siderea: (Default)
Siderea ([personal profile] siderea) wrote2026-01-23 11:11 pm
Entry tags:

Ice storm advice [meteo]

For those of you in the parts of the US for whom an ice storm is predicted and who have no idea of what that is except that it means it will be cold:

1) If you have an ice scraper to clean the ice off your car, have it inside with you, not in the car. Because at a sufficient level of ice coating, leaving your ice scraper in the car is like leaving your car keys in the car.

1a) Honestly, at a certain level of ice coating, it's more like having one's car coated in concrete, and you shouldn't waste your energy and body warmth whaling futilely at it. One of the failure modes is you succeed in getting the ice off but take the windshield with it.

2) You probably associate winter storms and coldness with grey-overcast skies and darkness. But once it is done coming down, often the arctic winds that drove the storm will blow the clouds away, the skies clear and the sun will come up. I cannot begin to describe how bright it gets when the sun is shining and the whole world is made of glass. If you packed your sunglasses away for the winter, go get them out. If you store them in your glove compartment of your car, again, maybe go get them and have them inside with you so you can see what you're doing when you are trying to get the ice off the car.

3) All that said, maybe just don't be worrying about leaving home. A fundamental clue is that an ice storm is not done when the storm is done raging. For as long as there's a thick glaze of ice on everything, the crisis is not over. Your life experience has given you an intuition of physics that says ice forms where water pools and is therefore mostly something flat. But in an ice storm, you get ice coating absolutely everything including sloped and vertical surfaces. YouTube is willing to show you endless videos of people attempting and failing to walk up quite gentle slopes covered with ice and cars slowly and majestically sliding down hills. Driving and walking can be unbelievably dangerous after an ice storm. Try to ride it out by sheltering in place and don't try to go out in it if you can at all avoid it. Remember, it's not about how good a driver you are, it's about how good a driver everybody else on the road isn't.

4) Snow and ice falling off buildings can kill you. Yes, I know snow looks fluffy, but it is made of water and can compact to be quite solid and if it attains free fall it can build up quite a bit of momentum. Icicles are basically spears. If you endeavor to try to knock snow or ice off from a roof or other high structure, be real careful how you position yourself relative to it.

5) Now and until this is over is absolutely not the time to do anything that entails any unnecessary risk. Any activity that is at all discretionary that has even a remote likelihood of occasioning an ER trip is to be avoided. Boredom, I know, makes people find their own fun. Resist the urge.