defiantly-geeky

[defiantly-geeky]

So, NS is in the midst of a severe to extreme drought, no rain since late june/early july...thus....

We're getting many wildfires here in NS--there's currently one burning just outside of Halifax and several more all over--including one that is about a 20 min drive (20 KM by road, not sure as the crow flies) south west of where i live--some areas are getting the smoke from that fire (not where I live currently but where sis and I both work in town).

Now an immediate evac alert has been issued for that area where the fire is--it IS remote, in the woods, but some people do live out there, others have cottages.

And the gov't banned travel in the woods. Some asshole in Cape Breton purposefully got himself issued a ticket/fine so he can fight the ban in court b/c all he's doing is wlaking his dog, so that's not a probelm. Mother fucking selfish SOB--so what, we post folks at the entrance to every woodland everywhere in the province and believe everyone when they're saying they're just walking their dog? And this guy will be the first one to complain when his house is destroyed by wildfire--I was just up in the CB highlands--man, if a fire ever started out in the middle of the woods out there (ie via a lightning strike) that would be an almost impossible fire to fight--first high eleveation no roads into the deepest areas.

As someone commented on fb: if you want to go into the woods so bad, go join a volunteer fire department. B/c outside of Halifax Reg. Muncipality (and maybe Sydney) almost ALL of the fire departments in our province ARE VOLUNTEERS. That's who's fighting the fire near me.

Mother fucking entitled assholes that want to go in the woods....grow the fuck up, grow some brains and think about someone other than yourself.

[defiantly-geeky]

I have Amazon prime, b/c it's easy access to a lot of shows, basic music and, yes, free shipping. (I do try to buy most things locally/canada, but sometimes, being rural...amazon's the least expensive choice).

Anyhow, my priime renewal was supposed to go through on Aug 10 on my debit card (my debit was already my default, but I'd also set Prime to use it as my defualt)--I'd set reminders for myself and made sure the money was there.

Except the charge still wasn't showing up today. So I check the receipt--they charged it to my mum's card (I have her card on my account b/c I sometimes place orders for her--ususally rare books she can't get anywhere else, and I have prime so it gets free shipping). So I get into a chat with support--first person drops me, second person looks into it for me and said MY card got declined b/c it was over my limit. ME: wtf? I have more than a 113$ limit.

I was told my mum's card was my back up card--I didn't SET a b/u card cus if I had it'd've been my visa, not hers. Anyhow. I'm disputing the dude's claims about what happened.

So, i'd already called mum, told her what happened and instead of disputing the payment and all that bullshit, I just etransferred her the money to pay it. I decide, while support dude is checking things out for me (I wanted PROOF my card'd been declined), I decide to call my bank--and I got through right away. I explained what had happened (she saw the e-transfer--I explained about not wanting to do all the BS involved in reversing charges), she then tells me that there was NO ATTEMPT at amazon trying to charge my debit card (and that mine wasn't the first call she'd gotten like that). I thanked her and went back to the chat.

Told support dude I knew they were lying (but that I also knew amazon told him what to say, etc, I've been a cc lackey). Offers to cancel prime for a refund a nd I'm like no, I want ti keep Prime. So he offers 50% refund but keep my sub, so I agreed. It's been an hour, haven't seen hide nor hair of the refund, but I'll give it til tomorrow--and of course I didn't screen shot the chat.

I then went and found where one sets back up cards and unclicked my mum's and sister's cards (again, cus I have prime). If they fuck it up again, I'll just remove mum's card totally.

Just admit y'all fucked up, amazon. I mean really.

Anyhow, we'll see if I get that refund....

[defiantly-geeky]

Has anyone figured out what’s so viscerally wrong with this woman yet

[defiantly-geeky]

The other night husband and I were watching a documentary about the yeti where they were doing DNA analysis of samples of supposed yeti fur, and every one of them came back as bears.

Anyway, the next night we watched a thing about some pig man who is supposed to live in Vermont. People said it had claws and a pig nose but walked upright like a man. Now, I happen to know that sideshows used to shave bears and present them as pig men. So every piece of evidence they gave of this monster sounds to me like a bear with mange.

So now the running joke in our house is that everything is bears. Aliens? Bears. Loch Ness monster? Bear. Every cryptozoological mystery is just a very crafty bear.

Bears. They’re everywhere. Be wary. Anyone or anything could be a bear.

[defiantly-geeky]

I just walked into the house after walking the dog and my mom says to me, in the same cheerful voice she uses to send me to go pick up the groceries, "I need you to recrucify Jesus."

Turned out one of the wall crucifixes lost a nail and the J man was getting himself off the cross but that is a hell of an instruction to come home to.

So now I gotta like... cruci fix this.

[defiantly-geeky]

[defiantly-geeky]

AI industry groups are urging an appeals court to block what they say is the largest copyright class action ever certified. They’ve warned that a single lawsuit raised by three authors over Anthropic’s AI training now threatens to “financially ruin” the entire AI industry if up to 7 million claimants end up joining the litigation and forcing a settlement.

well…darn

[defiantly-geeky]

welp! I can’t believe it happened, but apparently, ao3 did a mass deletion of a ship tag. Idk if it’s the supposed 1 person, but seeing how the community is reacting, it’s looking like more than 1 author got their fics deleted with no warning. I’m so disappointed it happened in ao3 and I’m just waiting for response about it because the jump of fic numbers was too extreme to not be noticed. 8k to 5k man. Ship war might be a reason for it, but again, I’m just waiting to see if my support ticket gets response. Also has this happened before? Like on ao3 in particular?

--

What ship tag?

AO3 periodically puts its foot down with serial offenders who refuse to stop using AO3 to funnel people to their kofis, and non-fanwork spam gets deleted. It's unlikely that they just deleted a bunch of fanworks for no reason though.

ETA: Oh for fuck sake. Is this fucking Genshin wank?

Stop spamming the archive just so your shitty ship can "win" some war.

And/or stop believing the people who cry that PAC came after them ~out of nowhere~ when they know perfectly well what they did.

Because people still think that worthless methodology on the Top 100 Ships means something, some fuckface posted three thousand spam works just to force their ship on there. No, not the AI fics of the show for toddlers. Machine translated repeat upload drabbles for one of the ten kajillion Genshin ships. Then they orphaned half of them or made them anon or something to try to pretend that the lurkers support them in e-mail other authors posted this flood too.

Now that AO3 has gotten around to deleting their spam, they're apparently wailing about it somewhere on social media and trying to paint AO3 as censors. This is resulting in a flood of lackeys whining to AO3 about how Concerned™ they are.

You're a sucker, anon.

Either that, or you're trying to use my tumblr to spread panic.

You can tell AO3 doesn't actually believe in deletions because Genshin Impact fandom hasn't been booted off the archive for being fucking annoying.

[defiantly-geeky]

[defiantly-geeky]

what a clown

[defiantly-geeky]

Just found out they're making a tv series of Robert McCammon's book Swan Song....hopefully. The news I found was from a few months ago, wrt writer/showrunner and a director.

ANY HOW, while I haven't read it in a few years, it's always been a fave--I don't get people arguing whether it or the Stand by King is better. Both are awesome and while SS may borrow slightly from King, it's a different book and just as good.

I had to order a copy as I'd lost mine. $32 for a fucking paperback--and I checked all the local to me used book stores (even the one that almost gives me hives--it's disorganized, piles of books in front of shelves...there is some order on the shelves but as a library person, I shudder....this is probably the first time in 10-15 years I've been in there).

Anyhow got me to thinking about casting, for the "good side"--need to re-read to remember some of the nasty characters, although I"m sure the Sarsgaard brother that's in Murder Robot could play one of them...lol.

However, the one casting that can't happen but would've been absolutely perfect--Michael Duncan Clarke as the ex wrestler Josh. But...my next choice would be Mike Colter (Luke Cage, Evil), either one of the Hodge boys--Aldis or Edwin. Or maybe Mechad Brooks. Sister Creep someone mentioned Kathy Bates, and I can see it, BUT I think Margo Martindale would be absolutely fucking perfect for it--I loved her in Justified (and there was another show, but can't remember what now). My second choice would be Ann Dowd--she plays weird characters well. Then Kathy....and someone else mentioned Melissa McCarthy, I think she'd do well. But Margo or Ann....they'd blow it out of the water.

As for Swan...I don't really have an choices. I'm not familiar enough with child/teen actresses to know who might be good. Maybe an unknown for one or both. And (spoiler for a 40 year old book) given that Swan spends a goodly portion of the book with a growth on her face, the kid(s) are gonna have to have good acting chops.

I'm really, really hopeful this turns out well. Better than the Stand's versions that's for sure. I watched the first one and mostly enjoyed it although as much as I like Molly Ringwald she was NOT Frannie Goldsmith in any way, shape or form. IIRC, I couldn't even get through the first episode the new version.

Anyhow, fingers crossed and my book should be here on Tuesday--I'll be busy reading for 2 or 3 days. (I read fast). Might do a full re-read of the stand after as well.

(I hate that it's called swan song, cus Led Zepplin, some cheesey romance book have the same titles related to them. Tagging/searching is hard.)

[defiantly-geeky]

R.I.P. Loni Anderson

[defiantly-geeky]

one of my favourite linguistic phenomena/in-jokes is spanish potato chips being “ham-flavored, probably”

[defiantly-geeky]

I love the idea of Spock being super queer, highly expressive and very emotional from a Vulcan view point. Like...

What humans see:

What Vulcans see:

[defiantly-geeky]

I love the idea of Spock being super queer, highly expressive and very emotional from a Vulcan view point. Like...

What humans see:

What Vulcans see: