paradoox

It's the cold and dark of winter and I made the daily challenge on my discord be "Screaming", because it's sorta how everything has felt. In revenge, I had to have an annoying conversation with my boss about some (uncompensated, non-contract) responsibilities I hold have been slipping, and had one of my cabinets literally collapse in the middle of proctoring a serious standardized test. It was very dramatic, luckily it was just me and one student to be very badly startled.

Also luckily, my anti-Nemesis (comrade? buddy? hero?) was able to quickly swing by, and as he always does, he made my life demonstrably better. Huzzah! Now, when can we have a building that doesn't use the cheapest possible materials? We have not been present long enough for things to be literally falling apart.

Before the mild disaster, I managed to do a bunch of what my therapist yesterday called "productive avoidance". Genuinely good things! Things that need done! I checked some serious stuff off my todo list! None of it was the stuff that's the highest priority right now, which not surprisingly, is also the stuff that's stressing me out right now. Maybe tomorrow I will finally do some grading? Hahahah oh god.

I dunno man, it's the cold and dark of winter and also it's the cold and dark of fascism. I should probably be texting a lot more often with my sister who's currently in a city overrun by government thugs. I hope she's okay. I hope she stays okay. I hope we all stay okay. That's not just sisters, I hope we all stay okay.

***

I wrote all the above during the department meeting, when I was still kinda sad and frustrated, but then Geometry PLC was quite good, and Clayton and I were able to walk home together and that was _excellent_. It's always pretty good, it's so _so_ valuable to have people I genuinely like to work with, but this time was also especially fun because he was filling me in his theory that Moby Dick is just an anime. It's very charming when he gets into things like that!

This evening has been...not terrible? Not amazing. Played a lot of video games, which is sometimes very good, and sometimes very avoidant. It wanted to be the really big push for packing for Arisia, since tomorrow night is dance class and I will be less inclined to do any packing work then. I did a non-zero amount of packing! It's nowhere near complete, but it was good progress! I also, critically, did all the laundry, so I'm actually set _up_ to do more good packing tomorrow.

And I helped Rey buzz her hair short which was quite fun --I always like a chance to play with the clippers! And I washed all the dishes, which is good --I've been only an intermittent dish fairy these past few weeks, so it felt good to do it proper.

I still need to update my dailies list, which I'm trying to pay better attention to this year than last. I think I sussed out it was ~130 days that I actually logged things last year? Which is...not great. I'd like to do better this year, I'd like to see if I can at least get 2/3rds of the days gone. Using Habitica too, helps. Having the double things to log is actually quite nice, they scratch similar but not-quite-the-same itches.

I hope you are well and happy and stay that way.

~Sor
MOOP!

Yesterday I was in a bad mood after my meeting, and also I'm a little sleep-deprived and I've been in a weird mood for a couple days anyways. Also, the band Seeming, who I'd just gotten pretty into one of their albums¹ right before winter break, did a "all our pre-2025 music free" as a special, and it felt prudent to nab it².

Sometimes we can do things the right way though, and so instead of playing mindless phone games, I just put the song du jour on repeat, and got my sketchbook, and drew a picture:



Write the song you need to hear. And draw it, I suppose.

( art process babbling under here )

Anyways, that's what I did last night, and I'm pleased about it! Maybe I will draw other things sometime this year, I would like that.

~Sor
MOOP!

1: Specifically, Madness and Extinction. BDan recommended it, on one of the times I was looking for Bandcamp Friday recs. After the third time of tossing it into the "after school album rotation" and being all "damn this is really good I should go tell BDan", I finally took actual notice.

2: Technically I did pay-what-you-will at a dollar per album, since that way they get put into my Bandcamp account and I can stream them, instead of just being emailed the mp3s. I really like this set-up! And I went ahead and put the 2025 stuff into my cart to nab at above-cost on the next Bandcamp Friday.

(I appreciate so much that Bandcamp hasn't fully enshittified yet.)

3: Different fun fact! "The Earth is radiantly suicidal" is written three times because it was too off-kilter when I inked it once, and so I wanted to rebalance the picture. I sorta wish I had stuck with twice, since that's how they do repetitions of it in the song, but it's fine.

LB asked a few days ago, because I never did elaborate about Kale Pudding in here during the actual summer. So here is a story from Pinewoods this past July!

***

The Kale Pudding was a Pinewoods adventure, and I'm surprised about the part where I didn't give details any time this year, except of course I didn't, I have been _so shit_ at updating Dreamwidth. Oh well.

The shortlong version: At Pinewoods dance camp Scottish Sessions, we have a big auction to raise money for camp. Because we raise fucktons of $$ (like, basically always five figures, this year was a record in the ~27,000 range), the crew of Pinewoods are often willing to donate various goods and services that they don't really offer to other sessions which split their $s between camp and the parent orgs (or don't donate to camp at all). One of these services, for several years, has been "the head cook will let you choose what the dessert for the last night of camp is".

We've had creme brulee. We've had sticky toffee pudding. We've had cheesecake. It's chances for the kitchen crew to flex on the fact that food at Pinewoods is _way_ outside the league of "camp food" anywhere else. And in...let's say 2021 or so? In about 2021, when the bidding started, I made a bid just to get things going and loudly announced that I was bidding on "kale pudding" for dessert. No one knew what that would, but they recognized it for the thread it sounded like, and outbid me.

Continue the running joke for several years. Cue 2024, at which point Geoffrey, who had frequently outbid me in the past, comes up to me and says "I've got $300 for you this year, I think it would be funny if you won". And so did someone else. Oh-ho-ho, with shadowbackers, I have an actual chance! Bidding gets to just over a thousand dollars before Terry says "okay, raise your hand if you'll throw in $50 for NOT kale pudding". (he then wasted it on Pot de Creme, which is a delicious chocolate treat that I just do not like and also that the kitchen like, regularly makes at camp? So it's not like you couldn't get it at Pinewoods in general? DO SOMETHING INTERESTING WITH YOUR DESSERT CHOICE, THE CREME BRULEE YEAR THE KITCHEN CREW GOT TO BORROW BLOWTORCHES THAT WAS AWESOME!)

So now I've got a challenge, a target, and a goal. And a whole bunch of people also into The Joke. At LCFD weekend, right at the start of the summer, I warn Amanda the head cook. I'm serious. I'm going to campaign. "And part of my campaign is predicated on 'I trust Amanda to make something _good_' so, uh, good luck babe". ESCape rolls around, the session immediately before Scottish, and some friends do actual campaigning for Make The Scots Eat Kale Pudding fund¹. I don't just have shadow-backers anymore, I have straight up donation-matchers. Like, more than one of them.

So at Scottish Sessions, I go ahead and start collecting a list of people I think it would be funny to get money from. A big ol' list of collaborators, and also making it clear that anyone could bid shadow-wise, and not have anybody but me know that they were in. I will be the fall guy for this BUT ALSO if anyone can make Kale Pudding taste good it's Amanda. Believe in them, you know? Auction night rolls around. Me and Geoffrey make a plan --he'll be the face guy for the ESCape part of the fund, and bid against me to make the $$ go up if necessary. We're gonna spook people, then he's gonna hit me with the "well, ESCape wants to be on the winning team" and throw in his funds so we can crush the competition.

...except no one else wants to bid on the dessert. The joke has just about hit its limits, and I have successfully either convinced everyone that Amanda is really good at their job and it'll taste good, or have intimidated them into thinking they're not going to bother. So Geoffrey and I have a (brief) screaming match of "I bid 1000...for kale pudding" "oh yeah? Well I bid 1500....for kale pudding!!!" until we reach $2500 and agree to go in together and then we gave Pinewoods camp a $5000 donation² in exchange for making the Scots eat kale pudding for their last night dessert.

Which Amanda made as "pot de brassica", a sort of violently neon green creamy pud, served with lemon curd, tasted sharp and interesting and yes like kale and delicious. Most people enjoyed it, or at least found it "good enough". Very few people didn't like it, but honestly, I don't like pot de creme which everyone else finds The Shit, so it's all normal.

And I assured a great many people that last year was the last year of the joke anyways, so it's going to be very very funny if the new kitchen head [Amanda has retired after their triumph] offers this same auction item and I bid any amount. What, I just want some lemon meringue pie!

AND THAT IS THE TALE OF THE KALE PUDDING!

~Sor

1: "Why should you care what some people a week from now eat for dessert? First off, you shouldn't. Second off, because it would be funny. And third off, because the money goes to a good cause..."

2: It is important to note that Geoffrey works in SF with computers, and we had a _lot_ of shadowbackers and donors. I did not pay anywhere near this amount myself.

Today was a day of very many games! And playing them with various people. And that's basically it. _____@

I got to see Veronicaaaaa and play games with her, which is the Best Ever. And I saw Cameron and MaccyTu and Jonny!!!!! and Tuesday and Mom and played games with all them as well! Busy day!

We played:

Pit: I did very well in general, but I always do.

Hot Streak: Several rounds, I tended to do poorly, but had a very good time because it's very stupid fun!

Agricola: I came in first! It was a hardfought, and I never quite got my engines working the way I wanted, but I did manage to frantically make a whole bunch of fences in the last possible moment.

Kingsburg: Came in solidly fourth, c'est la vie, but I did not get killed by the demons, so that's a good start!

Space Base: Came in _painfully_ last place, like, fourteen points below second last, and I ended the game with 4 (the game ends when someone crosses 40). But I had a nice time!

I think that's everything we played? I also did some rounds of knitting, and much chatting and bomping my head into my friends and occasionally eating things. Tomorrow, Tuesday and I ride a train for many many hours. I am planning to listen to music and do some knitting and maybe actually touch my day job? Grading and the like? Aaaaah!

I will have to pack up tomorrow morning, I expect. Hm. Maybe I need to actually start to get my sleep schedule back into wack, so that I can go to work on Monday. Sigh!

That's me. I hope your life is also nice and full of friends and stuff.

~Sor
MOOP!