Will Tell Stories For Food

Yuletide Recs

2024-12-31T04:31:56Z

I received a really delightful gift on the prompt, "Chalion worldbuilding, modern AU," basically: Saints Support Group and Coffee Hour.

Some other fics I read and enjoyed:

Scholomance

Better Solutions. I love a villain origin story where they clearly see themselves as the hero -- this story starts with an Ophelia who's already ruthless and willing to do whatever it takes to survive, and then you see the series of moral compromises she makes over the course of many years. One of the things I absolutely love about the Scholomance series is the incredibly complicated, tangled ethical dilemmas the world poses, and this story dives straight into the heart of them.

KAOS

Ariadne's Thread. Excellent characterizations, and a crafting theme that fits seamlessly; apparently this was something the recipient mentioned really liking, and the author did an amazing job with it. I really wish I could have more of this show, so I went looking for fanfics, and particularly liked this one.

Chalion

Seasonal Labor. A set of short fics about a range of characters from the Chalion stories, set post-canon.

A Little Princess

The First Morning. A perfectly written missing scene from the end of the book in which Becky wakes the next morning and is invited next door to be Sara's companion. Nails the voice.

Dearer Than a Sister. AU where Ralph Crewe loses his fortune but doesn't die.

Valdemar

A Bit of Horseplay. I quit reading Valdemar stories over 25 years ago but this story reminded me why I was a fan. Absolutely true to canon, and if you ever read Tarma and Kethry stories you'll remember everything you need to know to enjoy this.

A Sorceress Comes to Call

The Twelve Days by Any Other Name. The next few years of Cordelia's life with Hester and the Squire.

The Pairing (by Casey McQuiston)

Guess Who. Someone Theo knew in high school shows up at the restaurant, and it's just lovely, note-perfect, PROFOUNDLY relatable moment.

Twelfth Night

What's to Come is Still Unsure. Reset in the 1920s, told by Cesario.

Little Women (Gerwig movie)

A Small Amount of Affection. This may be the all time funniest surprise crossover.

FAQ: The Snake Fight Portion Of Your Thesis Defense
Snake Fight Grad Student Advice Meeting (AKA how to survive the second worst part of your defense) Notes. Like so much of the best fic of this piece, I strongly suspect this was written by a graduate student.

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A random question I'm wondering

2024-04-08T00:50:14Z

If you are on Dreamwidth, how do you use it?

1. Do you post?

2. Do you read other people's posts?

3. Do you comment on other people's posts?

I mainly read, rarely comment, and almost never post. (Obviously it's not NEVER never: behold, a post.) What I'm kind of wondering about is how many of the people whose posts I read post, but do not read. (Of course, they probably won't reply to this!)

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security frustrations

2023-03-06T03:07:56Z

Back in January, in response to a post from someone (probably Synecdochic but possibly over on Twitter), I changed my Dreamwidth password. I used the "how would you like me to generate a password for you, don't worry, you won't have to remember it" autogeneration dealio from my browser. I use Firefox these days for browsing on my laptop, but Chrome on my phone.

My phone doesn't seem to know the new password. No problem, I figured, surely I can dig up the password on my computer and painstakingly type it in and then my phone will also know it? Well, neither Firefox nor Google want to admit to knowing the new password; they're showing the old one. The Dreamwidth site autofills it for me but won't tell me what it is, unless I'm missing something. I am probably going to have to change my password AGAIN.

I am in favor of autogenerated passwords in theory (more secure) and strongly in favor of browsers or Google or whatever remembering them for me (because if I have to type it in, I'm not going to choose a secure one) and god almighty it would be nice if all this tech actually resulted in me being able to get into my accounts, lolsob.

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5 Questions Meme

2022-11-23T05:05:19Z

I got five questions from Julian. If you want five questions from me you can reply and I'll try to think of some good ones!

1) How're the kids?

They are both now officially grown-ass adults. The older one is 23 and is working for Americorps doing college-admissions-help stuff for kids at a Minneapolis high school. Living at home because Americorps pay is Not Great but really enjoying the work. The younger one is 19 and getting over a bout of the flu (only the second time in her life she's had it, I think? the first time was H1N1, every other year the vaccine worked). She's a college freshman and seems to be mostly enjoying college with the notable exception of DEEPLY missing home cooking. Anyway, in general: they're both doing very well, I am really delighted by the adult people they have become, and I'm excited to see what they do next.

2) What did you want to Do With Your Life when you were 16 or so?

By sixteen, I'd decided I wanted to be a writer. I'd spent some time in earlier years as a theater kid, thinking I wanted to be an actor, but by 16 I was more focused on writing and had started submitting stories to magazines. (They were all rejected.) I had also put in some thought about earning a living and I can't remember if at that point I was thinking doctor, lawyer, or something else.

3) What do you find beautiful?

A lot of the same things as everyone else, probably. Sunsets, fall colors, lovely scenic vistas, the faces of my children.

4) Do you do religion/spirituality? How, if so?

Boy, that's a complicated question. I'm Jewish but not very observant. I'm also really interested in religions in general and always have been (I majored in Religious Studies in college in part because I found religion, as a thing people do, so broadly interesting). I have participated in other people's religious rites and experimented with belief systems and practices in various ways and fundamentally I believe in something transcendent, I have both affection for and deep frustration with the overall Jewish community, and I hit up St. Anthony of Padua whenever I've misplaced something, which is definitely not a Jewish tradition. Also we have a Christmas tree. (I'm intermarried.)

5) When was the last time you said "Oh, no, not again," and why?

Oh, this one's easy. Earlier today, when I attempted to google "Envy apples" from the grocery store (to see if they were tart or sweet) and my phone data didn't work. Back in October my phone data just randomly stopped working. I did hours of troubleshooting with Google Fi and hours of troubleshooting with Motorola and then shipped the phone off to Motorola (because it was under warranty) and they said it wasn't broken and shipped it back to me and it STILL DID NOT WORK and after another go-round with phone support I sent it to them AGAIN and this time they were supposed to just send me a replacement and instead they sat on it for a week and various people insisted that no, it really was working just fine, there had to be something wrong with my SIM card (which worked fine in my backup phone) and oh. my. god. Anyway they finally sent me a replacement phone. Which immediately worked FINE. But then today it stopped working again and yeah, I just could not even face the prospect of calling customer service again. Either customer service.

I complained about it over dinner tonight and Ed said, "Have you done the system upgrade? Android 12?"

It has been nagging me to upgrade it and I've ignored it because I just got the phone and was thinking "ehhh maybe tomorrow..." Ed had been doing the same -- and then his phone stopped talking to data, and started working again when he upgraded. Anyway. I upgraded the system and now it's talking to the data network again! THANK GOODNESS.

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California geography

2022-01-13T02:27:20Z

I am writing a near-future short story set in Silicon Valley and need some help figuring out where everything goes.

The specifics:

1. The protagonist works for a tiny Silicon-Valley-based biotech company with a lab where they do 3D printing of animals (basically). Where are some likely locations for a lab? (Do people put the actual labs in San Jose or do they put them somewhere further out and therefore cheaper?)

2. Her business partner has a house (and mostly telecommutes). He's not rich; he lives somewhere that he can get to Silicon Valley if he needs to, but far enough away to be affordable. I'm guessing that the obvious place for a house is Modesto?

3. Someone later develops a creature that escapes the lab and winds up roaming somewhere that's trees/natural stuff/parkland, rather than houses. It gets called "the [Location] Hippogriff." I went with the Saratoga Hippogriff because Saratoga on the map looks like it's bordering a bunch of park land. Does that seem plausible? Or is there a location that would be better? (The main thing is, it needs to be somewhere that a cryptid could plausibly hide, and where the protagonist can hike in, find it, and lure it back to the parking lot. The original lab it escapes from can be pretty much wherever, because it's run/financed by a tech bro with lots of money and zero sense.)

Thanks to anyone with input!

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Okay, Dreamwidth use question

2017-04-08T19:27:46Z

I imported my whole journal from LJ a while back. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be indexed on Google -- like, if I search site:naomikritzer.dreamwidth.org "clown car" I get no hits. I checked my preferences and I did NOT check the "try to prevent search engines from indexing my journal" box or anything else that obviously looked like it would impede indexing. Anyone know what I should do to fix this? I definitely want people who go looking for my old political posts to find them (including me, since I pretty regularly look at old posts to find stuff I need to remember about candidates.)

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So that other journaling site

2017-04-04T03:37:26Z

LiveJournal is offering up a new mandatory user agreement if you want to keep using the service and I don't think I trust this "the legal version is actually in Russian" agreement so I think I'm going to stop using LJ. Not that I was using it all that much anyway. (My political stuff is all going on my naomikritzer.com blog anymore.)

If we were friends over on LJ, please feel free to drop me a comment and we can connect here, instead. I kept meaning to go through and track everyone down on DW but so many people registered blogs here and never posted on them that it felt a little pointless.

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Ritual for Waking America to the Truth

2017-03-14T03:44:03Z

There was a proposed ritual that made the rounds last month to "bind" Trump. I was honestly a bit bothered by the airy reassurance that doing this ritual wouldn't be dangerous, and e-mailed one of my Wiccan friends to get her opinion on it. (Her take was the same as mine: presenting it as risk-free is disingenuous, as you could bind yourself to Trump by doing it. NOT IDEAL.) Another Wiccan friend noted that because it got national publicity, the Domionist Christian rallied to do a counter-spell, basically, rendering the whole exercise much less effective.

Anyway, I've found myself thinking that what's needed most, right now, is not a spell on Trump, but ritual magic directed at the entire nation (or directed at the people around us who most need to see what's going on).

Let me back up with a couple of disclaimers. I am not a Wiccan nor typically a practitioner of ritual magic. I do, however, buy into the idea of ritual magic as a thing: I think that large-scale group prayer is solidly in this category (see: the Dominionist Christian counter-spell). So I'm going to propose a ritual, but with the caveat that I'm probably leaving out elements that might be very key for you in your own tradition or practice. The idea here is to raise and direct energy toward a purpose: if it appeals to you, feel free to restructure these ideas based on your practice, traditions, etc.

If, like me, you're on social media, you've probably been seeing article after article go by about people who voted for Trump, but are going to lose their health insurance under TrumpCare. Who voted for Trump, and still truly believe he's going to bring back coal mining jobs or somehow solve all their problems. Who voted for Trump, but never thought it would be someone they knew who got hurt... etc.

And there's a lot going on here: while in some cases it's as simple as, "they're basically racist assholes," that's not true for all. Some are not paying close attention to the world. Some are in denial. Some put their trust in the Republican party years ago and haven't reconsidered whether the Republican party actually stands for anything they believe in.

This is who this ritual is trying to reach: the people who need to wake. The people who need to look at the facts rather than the propaganda. The people who need to wake to who they've become -- to look at themselves in the mirror one morning and realize that they've been walking side-by-side with white supremacists and literal Nazis. The people who need to know that they're becoming someone they've always recognized as the bad guy.

I'll note that sending out energy to "wake someone to the truth" should be inherently pretty safe, as long as you live a reasonably honest life. When it comes back to you, it might be uncomfortable, but hopefully it will not be dangerous.

Having shown this to a few friends who are more specifically expert on this stuff than me, they think that "the whole nation" is potentially too large a target, and suggest focusing more on people you know, and/or specific politicians.

Timing

Monday, March 20th, is the Spring Equinox. This strikes me as a very logical time to do this ritual, because on the Equinox, we're balanced between darkness and light, but more light is coming. That's what we're asking for: more light, even just a little more, every day, for everyone.

If it is more convenient for you to do a morning ritual on a Sunday, I think the day before the Equinox is also a perfectly reasonable time. (An astrological consultant thinks that Sunday may actually be better; he thinks the exact moment of Spring Equinox would be ideal, but missing it even by a minute or two would be less favorable. Check your schedule, I guess? Sunday morning is a nice time for a ritual, especially if you're getting a group together.)

The New Moon is March 27th. If you prefer a night ritual, the first night when a crescent will be visible also seems like a time that could work. I'll let you figure out the lunar info for your area.

Components

You will want a symbol of the U.S. (Possibilities: a flag, a picture of an eagle, a picture of a bison, a road atlas, your Hamilton album. Preferably something that is meaningful to you. If you are focusing on particular people, symbols of them would be good, as well.

You will want a pot of a hot caffeinated beverage. (Coffee or tea.)

You will want symbols of deities, saints, spirits, etc. associated with light, knowledge, wisdom, and clarity, particularly any who are especially meaningful to you.

You will want a mirror. There's a lot that's significant about mirrors: the idea of "looking at yourself and seeing the truth" is pretty culturally embedded. But here's another thing -- traditionally a vampire doesn't reflect back. By holding up a mirror to someone, we are both confronting them BUT ALSO acknowledging their humanity, the idea that they are redeemable. You wouldn't hold up a mirror to Steve Bannon.

Suggested Structure for a Morning Ritual

If you're doing a dawn ritual on the 20th, rise before dawn. Start your coffee brewing (or your tea). Sit by an eastern window. Lay out the symbols and watch for the sun.

At first light, sing a song of waking and light. (Possibilities: "Morning Has Broken," "Here Comes the Sun," the Little Birdies song from the Scouts, Reveille, Harry Belafonte's "Turn the World Around.")

Call on your deities to wake all who are willing to be woken: to the truth, to themselves, to what we're becoming, to what they've become. Call on them to remind them that it's never too late to turn around. (Resolve for yourself to accept those who DO turn around.) Don't ask for people to be woken forcefully but ask for all those who WANT the truth to receive it, to see it, to find it, to recognize it.

Look into the mirror. Ask to be shown yourself in truth. Ask that all those who are willing to be shown the truth about themselves and the world around them when they look into the mirror in the morning. If it's meaningful to you, make this a small pocket mirror you can literally carry around as a symbol of Bringing People to the Truth, and keep the mirror on your person after the ritual ends.

Thank all who came (both human and divine); pour coffee/tea. Drink. (If "cakes and ale" are part of your standard ritual practice, break bread -- possibly you'll want to lay in morning buns as one of your components, or make toast along with your coffee.) End the ritual.

If you're doing a mid-morning ritual on the 19th, especially for a group, make it a brunch.

Suggestions re a Night Ritual

Watch for the first light of the moon, rather than dawn. Brew a symbolic but non-caffeinated hot beverage; the goal is to invoke enlightenment, not insomnia.

Commitments

The whole goal of this ritual is to wake the complacent on the other side, to help them see and accept the truth about what's going on.

So take some time, as well, to think about what to say and do, if you get what you ask for. Obviously, it's going to depend on the person and your relationship with them and your history and obligations to each other. But especially if you have a particular person in mind -- someone who insists that they want to know the truth (and they're getting it from Fox News!) and believes they're educated on how things are going -- think about what THAT person needs to hear. If they come to you and say, "things aren't going how I thought they would; what do I do now?" what you can encourage them to do. (You could start by encouraging them to call their congressional rep and say, truthfully, "I am a lifelong Republican and I am horrified at what you're doing." Or letters to the editor. Encourage them to admit their past affiliation, as this makes it easier for other people who are in the same boat to do the same.)

Do not expect your generally-conservative friends to convert to full-press liberalism overnight. Most of us have made changes in our lives that required baby steps. If the only step they make is to realize what the Republican health care plan is going to do to them or people they care about, then let them focus on that. There is so much work to be done -- if they are clinging to a pro-life identity and don't want to push back on the Planned Parenthood stuff (for instance), get them pushing somewhere else (Medicaid, clean air protections, there are MANY options) and trust that time and thought and awareness have their own magic. (I want to say, though, that I'm not advocating that you martyr yourself. You're allowed to have boundaries and dealbreakers in ALL your relationships.)

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