redbird | Network

https://phys.org/news/2025-06-scientists-cyanobacteria-toxins-st-louis.html

Researchers studying harmful algal blooms in the St. Louis River Estuary that separates Minnesota and Wisconsin have made a breakthrough discovery: for the first time, they've linked a known cyanotoxin directly to a specific cyanobacteria species, Microcystis aeruginosa, in the Duluth-Superior harbor.

https://phys.org/news/2025-06-scientists-cyanobacteria-toxins-st-louis.html

https://phys.org/news/2025-06-technologies-wood-stoves-efficiently.html

Oregon State University researchers are gaining a more detailed understanding of emissions from wood-burning stoves and developing technologies that allow stoves to operate much more cleanly and safely, potentially limiting particulate matter pollution by 95%.

https://phys.org/news/2025-06-technologies-wood-stoves-efficiently.html

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

Tags:

The recent "only one bed" meme (which I still haven't finished, as per usual) led to only-one-bed thoughts and this missing scene for B5 5x16.

One Safe Harbor (also on Ao3 - G'Kar/Londo, 2300 words, explicit)
Missing scene on the flight from Babylon 5 to Centauri Prime in 5x16. Two people in a very small sleeping space. Also, some feelings are had.

( One Safe Harbor - 2300 wds )

Tags:

fanfic:babylon 5

https://phys.org/news/2025-06-hundreds-evacuated-guatemalan-volcano-erupts.html

Guatemalan authorities said Thursday they were evacuating more than 500 people after Central America's most active volcano spewed gas and ash.

https://phys.org/news/2025-06-hundreds-evacuated-guatemalan-volcano-erupts.html

Blind skateboarder creates 'world-first' adaptive skatepark: 'I've never had a place where I can skate with full confidence'

About seven years ago, he started dreaming of creating the world’s first adaptive skatepark right in his hometown of Detroit, Michigan.

Finally, the park is a reality.

Called “The Ranch,” the 5,000-square-foot skatepark is completely accessible, allowing both seasoned low-vision boarders to take it for a spin and newcomers to the sport to feel welcome.

Everyone should have access to opportunities for physical activity and creativity.

Current Mood: busy

Tags:

I keep leaving these journal entries until late in the evening, and so I'm very rushed and stressed when I write them, which sort of defeats the purpose. I'm going to try to write them earlier in the day, starting tomorrow. Today I was quite down during the day, so I didn't accomplish much of anything. Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

I wanted to write about yesterday's session with my therapist. For example, we talked about what's holding me back from learning the ukulele, and then Shannon and I talked about it more while we were walking on the levee in Hanapepe tonight, and I'm going to try to get started again, with Shannon's help. It's something I've been wanting to do, and it would also give me potential social stuff I (we) could do locally.

Tomorrow I'm going to the YMCA to attend the water exercise class I used to go to, though this is their deep water version. I think a deep water exercise class would be good for me, because it would give me fewer opportunities to put any strain on my knee. We'll see how it goes. If I don't like it, I can always just walk in the pool instead. But right now I'm looking forward to it. It's been quite a while since I was able to go out and do something like this, since the digestive problems from the mast cell activation syndrome kept me mostly stuck at home! For much of the past year!

I hope Paratransit doesn't strand me at the pool like they have sometimes in the past, because I have a lesson scheduled with my Korean tutor afterward. I've sent her a message to ask if we can shift our lesson a half an hour later, just in case Paratransit runs late, but it's short notice, so I'm not sure if it will be possible.

Shannon and I are also planning to go to the pride parade in Lihue on Saturday. It's such a relief to be able to leave the house again! 다행이다! (Means something like "Thank goodness!")

Current Mood: busy

Tags:

Alexander Skarsgård getting pushed and pulled into his costume each day! On tumblr

Tags:

murderbot

The Beeb are repeating a 1970s adaptation of Sense and Sensibility, and based on Part 1: Farewell to Norlan, it’s not really threatening the supremacy of the early 90s Ang Lee & Emma Thompson film. But, you know, there’s enough of Austen there to enjoy.

( Read more... )

Tags:

1. Have you ever been to summer camp?

No. But 'summer camp' is not a thing here in Australia the way it seems to have been in the USA. There were camps, yes, but they were very directly related to school - a week is the longest that I remember and I was 12. After that, it was school excusions, yes, or band camps, and a couple of times Beach Mission (yes, literally, Christian mission in the middle of summer at a beach).

2. Have you ever made a s'more?

Yes! Back visiting some friends in upstate NY in the early 2000s when their sons were just born. Her family had a holiday house on a lake and we went and stayed there, and they taught me about making s'mores.

3. Have you ever slept under the stars (no tent/tarp)?

Possibly, depending on how you take it. I've slept on a wooden porch, huddled up with a bunch of other people. We were doing an "all nighter" purely for the sake of doing it. It wasn't fun.

Actually, wait yes, I have slept under the stars. At a 'B&S' (Bachelors' and Spinsters' ball) out west, in the tray of a utility truck. We'd tossed a bunch of mattresses in, and there were about a half-dozen of us all sprawled out to sleep after the ball. It wasn't terrible. We were young, and that makes a difference!

4. Have you ever had a member of the opposite sex sleep over at your house?

Only after I became an adult. House-sharing in Sydney means you have housemates who have all sorts of people staying over.

5. What type of bed do you have (queen, twin, bunk, etc.)?

Twin. I had a queen-size at our last house (and had a queen-size pretty much since I was 24) but when we moved out into this place, there wasn't space for a queen-sized bed, so I downsized to an IKEA twin with an under-bed storage space. And, as it turns out, the queen-mattress fitted sheets fit on the twin-size when you have a super-thick mattress.

Tags:

friday five

It's challenge time!

Comment with Just One Thing you've accomplished in the last 24 hours or so. It doesn't have to be a hard thing, or even a thing that you think is particularly awesome. Just a thing that you did.

Feel free to share more than one thing if you're feeling particularly accomplished! Extra credit: find someone in the comments and give them props for what they achieved!

Nothing is too big, too small, too strange or too cryptic. And in case you'd rather do this in private, anonymous comments are screened. I will only unscreen if you ask me to.

Go!

Tags:

just one thing

Name: Karmen

Age: 30s

I mostly post about: personal growth, trauma unpacking, character analysis, neurodivergence, identity, memory, and the messiness of being human. Sometimes it’s raw introspection. Sometimes it’s writing projects. Sometimes it’s emotional archaeology. Expect depth, questions, and occasional chaos.

My hobbies are: Writing, reading, exploring psychological patterns, long drives with curated playlists, casually reverse-engineering tech, helping others make sense of complex systems, data analysis, and overanalyzing fictional characters as a form of therapy.

My fandoms are: Buffy, Doctor Who, Veronica Mars, iZombie, Epic: The Musical, Star Trek, The Martian/Project Hail Mary universe, and anything weird, genre-bending, or emotionally resonant. I also have a soft spot for nostalgic emo vibes and anything that blends humor with existential dread.

I'm looking to meet people who: Think deeply, love honestly, write messily, and aren’t afraid of intensity. Neurodivergent folks, artists, writers, and anyone else who thrives in the liminal spaces between structure and chaos - let’s connect.

My posting schedule tends to be: sporadic but meaningful. If I post, it’s because I have something to say, not because an algorithm demands it.

When I add people, my dealbreakers are: Bigotry of any kind or cruelty masked as honesty. If you can’t be kind (or at least curious), I’m not your people.

Before adding me, you should know: I’m someone who craves depth over small talk. I’m working on showing up without needing to perform. I write honestly, even when it’s messy. I hold space for contradiction, growth, and grief. If you’re here for realness, reflection, and weird little moments of connection, welcome.

Got any Follow Friday-related posts to share this week? Comment here with the link(s).

Here's the plan: every Friday, let's recommend some people and/or communities to follow on Dreamwidth. That's it. No complicated rules, no "pass this on to 7.328 friends or your cat will die".

Current Mood: busy

Tags:

followfriday

These are active communities in Dreamwidth from Spring 2025 . They include things I've posted, but only the active ones; the thematic posts also list dormant communities of interest. This list includes some communities that I've found and saved but haven't made it into thematic posts yet. This post covers J-Z.

See my Follow Friday Master Post for more topics.

( Read more... )

Current Mood: busy

Tags:

ooooooookay so

loooooong time ago I did a lot of work on a CSS overlay for Dreamwidth’s Neutral Good/Evil styles to make them work properly on mobile devices as well as Desktop. If you apply the CSS as Custom CSS to your journal, it keeps working on desktop and starts working right on mobile. All the nightmare noise from Dreamwidth’s old mobile-ish style went away, it got way more information dense, and most of all

goddamn

horizontal

scrolling

ever.

Not even with the navbar turned on. It’s stupidly tall, but it no longer scrolls.

(That was some work.)

I handed off that code to Dreamwidth ages ago, but they’ve got a tiny staff and I don’t know how important it ever was to them or even how much made it into the codebase.

Turns out tho’… seems people are still using mine? And I just got an issue report. And I have an edit that fixes it on my machine. And I fixed a subject line issue while I was at it.

sooooo uhhhhhhhh

I guess I’m dropping a new release!

Anybody want to test Version 0.85 before I make it official?

Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.

Tags:

coexistence alpha

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

Tags:

This week I watched Dept. Q (2025) on Netflix. Set in Edinburgh, it stars Matthew Goode as a detective who is assigned to a newly formed cold case unit.

It was pretty good. (Spoilers)

It's based on a novel series and felt like it, not necessarily in a bad way. It had a bit more graphic violence & gore than I wanted to see, and a major part of the mystery they're investigating is highly disturbing, especially if you have claustrophobia.

Matthew Goode's character falls into the "brilliant asshole" type of detective, which I'm bored with, but Goode played it well and there were signs that he cares a little beneath his assholish exterior. I liked the rest of the team: Rose, Hardy, but especially Akram. I loved Akram!

Good to see Mark Bonnar again. :D

Mystery-wise? Meh. I think I'm too jaded. I had the whodunnit figured out early and could guess at why they did it, despite some major details kept until the final reveals. I'm always bothered by elaborate revenge schemes that involve sizable infrastructure and investment, and though the show leaned heavily into the disturbing atmosphere of it, I could never shake my feeling of "oh puhlease." At least there was some explanation for how they happened to have such things lying around, but I kept wondering about their electricity bills... But the thing that bugged me the most was that it took 4 years for Merritt to figure it out. Really? When she had literally nothing else to do?

Mehness about the mystery aside... I'd watch another season of it should there be one. Mainly for Akram. But also because I'm curious about the unsolved shooting that is probably going to lead to a major corruption scandal because these things usually do. And it was fun to see Edinburgh.

For something completely different in tone, I started watching the Japanese series Inheritance Detective | 相続探偵 (2025), also on Netflix, because it stars Akaso Eiji, who played Adachi in Cherry Magic. I've only watched one episode so far but I enjoyed it enough to keep watching. It has the adapted-from-a-manga style and feel, but I'm kind of used to that by now.

After a groupwatch of it, I'm rewatching the Korean BL Love Tractor | 트랙터는 사랑을 싣고 (2023). It's short (8 episodes of ~25 minutes each) and sweet, with humor and the right amount of seriousness. Great for escapist distraction.

New promo pics are out for upcoming The Truth 3 Bai Yu costumes. (Don't ask me. But compare it to Liu Yuning's look for the same case.) (IDEK) I feel like this season the show figured out half of the fun for the audience is seeing them dressed up in outlandish costumes and decided to run with it. (I don't think anything will top the pirate look, though.)

Tags:

Someone mentioned efforts to increase use of offal. The much simpler way to get more people to eat organ meat is to present delicious recipes using it. This is easily accomplished by scouting cuisines that already use a lot of organ meat, such as soul food or some Asian cuisines. Use everything but the squeal!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_soul_foods_and_dishes

https://www.butterforall.com/traditional-cooking-traditional-living/category/nutrient-dense/

https://foragerchef.com/category/carnivore/offal/

Current Mood: busy

Tags:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/word-of-the-day/festoon-2025-06-06

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for June 6, 2025 is:

festoon • \fess-TOON\ • verb

Festoon usually means "to cover or decorate (something) with many small objects, pieces of paper, etc.," or "to appear here and there on the surface of." It can also mean "to hang decorative chains or strips on."

// Tiny wildflowers festooned the meadow.

// We festooned the halls with ribbons and garland.

See the entry >

Examples:

"The road was lined with ancient trees festooned with Spanish moss." — Tayari Jones, Travel + Leisure, 14 Apr. 2025

Did you know?

The noun festoon first appeared in the 1600s when it was used, as it still is today, to refer to decorative chains or strips hung between two points. (It can also refer to a carved, molded, or painted ornament representing such a chain.) After a century's worth of festoon-adorning, the verb festoon made an entrance, and people began to festoon with their festoons—that is, they draped and adorned with them. The verb form of festoon has since acquired additional, more general senses related not only to decorating, but to appearing on the surface of something, as in "a sweater festooned with unicorns." Perhaps unsurprisingly, this celebratory-sounding and party-associated word traces back (by way of French and Italian) to Latin festa, the plural of festum, meaning "festival."

https://www.merriam-webster.com/word-of-the-day/festoon-2025-06-06

It's been a long time since I posted a Purrcy pic, I've let The Horrors eat up too much of my emotional energy. Here's what I saw first thing when I woke up the other day--a little latter than I meant to, but it was *so hard* to get out of bed!

And look at those toe beans!

-----------
After an exciting session of tail!shenanigans in the empty shelf, Purrcy sat down as a rather plump loaf and stared at me with both light-green eyebeams.

----
Sometimes #Purrcy gets overstimulated and wants his playtime to involve Fierce Fighting With Mom. I'm trying to train him to go for alternatives that do NOT involve human bloodshed -- like displacement scratching, that works!
#cats #CatsOfBluesky

There was a mess-up with one of my prescriptions, and I went off one of my "minor" brain meds cold turkey this week. By today it was NOT minor, but I finally got the right pills and within 30 minutes I felt like myself again. And then had to have a nap, because mania does NOT lead to adequate sleep.

Fortunately, my family could tell what was going on and mostly refused to engage, and didn't hold it against me. But I've had enough therapy recently talking about my mother & our relationship that I can now really see why a friend who's a shrink told me years ago, "You know your mother's bipolar, right?"

I mean, I took her word for it, diagnosing people was her *job*. But I really *felt* it today, when I realized that I'd been having a (mild-medium) manic episode and I was reacting to things *just the way my mother did*.

So. I'll make sure to remember those feelings--which include a fair bit of paranoia as well as driving intensity--and know what to call them, and look first for the chemical imbalance behind them, knowing that they lie.

"Trust your feelings" yeah no, I like *data*.

Tags:

Praise then darkness, and creation unfinished

Don't mourn, organize

Scientists identify cyanobacteria behind toxins in St. Louis river estuary

New technologies help wood-burning stoves burn more efficiently, produce less smoke

(no subject)

Babylon 5 fanfic: One Safe Harbor

Hundreds evacuated as Guatemalan volcano erupts

Skate Park

I can leave the house! Hurrah!

Murderbot's morning routine

Sense and Sensibility (1971) 1/4

Friday Five - oh why not

Just One Thing (06 June 2025)

Come for the introspection, stay for the emo throwbacks

Follow Friday

Follow Friday 6-6-25: Active Communities on Dreamwidth Spring 2025 J-Z

NOT-ON-MY-BINGO-CARD TEST RELEASE: Coexistence Alpha 0.85 for Dreamwidth

fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities. truth isn't

Recently watched (not Cdramas)

Recipes

festoon

3 Purrcys, chemical adventures

About Me

A Few Useful Links

Page summary

Style credit

Expand cut tags