#AND I really actually need to work on my real time operating systems stuff

[bytebun]

hm… although i more or less stopped progressing (purposefully) in my technical art skill, id reached a point where i could easily “see” ways to improve - like if i wanted to work on any particular aspect (perspective, anatomy, style, comic pacing, etc.) i’d know exactly how to go about it

I’d… like to reach a place like that with my other abilities - programming or engineering or design are all just so big that i don’t even know how to identify what i should be pursuing. the sort of stuff i’d really like more experience with (firmware & hardware development) only seem accessible through doing actual jobs involving those skills. i cant see the ”path” to improvement; i dont know what resources i can access (most of the stuff online seems too basic, aka for complete beginners, or too expert level)

but like, ”art” is also such a broad category of skill… maybe its because i know what i want from my art, and not at all from my tech skills…

[moonlit-tulip]

Recently, for the first time in about two-and-a-half years, I've been playing around on this one gamified-fiction-writing site—4thewords—which I first discovered back in 2018. During the 2018-2021 era, it was the single most useful tool I'd found with which to get myself to Actually Write; but now, after I've done a bunch of hacking to find it easier to get myself to write via pure internal motivation without the need for extrinsic deadlines of the sort it uses... it's still the most useful tool I've found with which to get myself to Actually Write, and has accelerated my progress at writing my current short-story-in-progress from maybe a few hundred to a thousandish words a week up to a few hundred to a couple thousand a day. Because, apparently, even if I'm way ahead of where I was a few years ago internal-writing-motivation-wise, I'm still not so high up that external motivation can't serve as a very high-powered force-multiplier.

This is interesting, because the vast majority of the gamified-productivity platforms out there just sort of straightforwardly don't work for me.

After a bit of introspection, I realized that the big important differentiating factor is: 4thewords, unlike almost every gamified-productivity tool I've tried to use, has actually-vaguely-complex gameplay. It's not, like, actively good, as a game; it's not something I'd play if playing it didn't produce writing as a byproduct; but it has any depth as opposed to no depth. It has, like, monsters which can be fought (by writing a certain number of words within a certain time-limit) and will drop items when defeated, and quests to fight monsters and/or retrieve items, and equipment which increases the effectiveness with which one can engage in this process via multiple different stats and is attainable via a mix of buying-from-shops and crafting-from-materials and getting-from-quest-rewards, and so forth. Plus the more-standard stuff, a daily-streak system and an XP system and a character-portrait-onto-which-one-can-equip-cosmetic-gear and so forth; but none of those things did anything for me on Duolingo, so I don't think they're the active ingredient, more of a side-benefit. But overall: moderately-many interlocking systems, as well-made games tend to have.

And that got me thinking... 4thewords is really not much of an RPG. Its story-writing is unmemorable (to the point where I literally do not remember anything about the plot, after my two-and-a-half year break), its gameplay leans grindy, et cetera. And it's still miles ahead of the more-traditional gamified-productivity platforms—it's the only one that's ever worked for me—just on the basis of trying at all, not entirely phoning things in with a superficial dress of game-themed-ness over an utter lack of functioning gameplay-loop.

And that, in turn, has me thinking: if that's really the operative ingredient, then there's a huge market-niche sitting there just waiting to be taken advantage of. Other, less-specifically-writing-centric, gamified-productivity tools along similar lines, building real gameplay into their gamification rather than just "look, here's an XP meter and a daily streak system, isn't this motivating?".

Possibly there's some reason I'm missing why writing would be particularly amenable to this and extrapolating it to other sorts of productivity-which-people-might-want-to-gamify wouldn't work. Or possibly there are other gamified-productivity tools with real gameplay in this manner, even if I myself have failed to discover them. But, if not, this seems like a very good opportunity, one which I'm even almost tempted to try to pick up myself despite this being in fact probably unwise with how many other higher-priority todos I've got piled up.

[salted-caramel-tea]

ok lets get into the creator league stuff (local essay andy is back)

I mean first and foremost what Is the creator league

its an esports tournament ran by eFuse and presented by Mr Beast. its designed as this kind of interactive league allowing fans to play with and for their favourite creators. their trailers on instagram claim that theres gonna be a full years worth of content, however Mr Beasts recent video claims the event will happen across a 10 month time frame.

so the ting that makes this event 'special' is that the creators are not listed as players in the event but as 'team managers'- which is where the creator pass comes in. Each creator has a 'pass' that allows you as a fan and viewer to join their team and participate in the league events. Each pass costs around $20 and from what ive read I believe you can only sign up to participate on behalf of one player.

obviously for reasons of fairness, not everyone who buys a pass will be able to officially compete- there is a limited number of spaces on each team and the places are won via an open qualifier Fortnite tournament where they will also be competing for a $50 k prize- although im yet to find any comment from creator league or any articles on how this money is split. But don't worry even if you don't qualify youre still entitled to a free box of mr beasts chocolate should you buy a pass before September 9th. yey.

so what's the problem with this.

I mean first of all. creators arent even required to play. they can fully just let their team do all the work in every event which might work for people like Vinnie Hacker I guess. This might be a way to try and 'even the playing field' by not giving creators with gaming backgrounds any advantage, however it makes the marketing of 'playing with your favourite creator' a little meh. also as a viewer, id be more interested in watching an event that my creator was an active participant in than just watching my streamer watch other people play on their behalf.

the other huge thing that everyone is really waiting to hear about in this post is the nft situation. so recently the narrator of the creator league announcement video, brycent, conformed that the passes are nfts to be minted on the blockchain operating system Near Protocol. so obviously people are extremely concerned about this discovered involvement in NFTs and crypto currency.

so I went to investigate the website to see what its looks like when you purchase a creator pass and unsurprisingly there is no mention on nfts anywhere. The passes are sold on mynt.gg , which according to their faqs is a 'first of its kind marketplace looking to evaluate esports through community' just have a look actually

so no mention of the passes actually being nft purchase here's . if we go to the check out as well this is what we see for the descriptors

so . people who are purchasing this have no way of actually knowing they are purchasing an nft. you also need an account to add a pass to your basket and im not willing to make an account so im unaware if at any time during the payment process people are made aware of what they are purchasing. its listed and discussed more like a membership than anything, and in a way it is there are benefits to it, however with no information as to what people are actually buying its extremely sketchy and a literally misleading purchase perhaps a scam even . since the fact that they've just purchased an not isn't listed anywhere on mynt.gg prior to purchase. and after going through a few more articles .

so theyre definitely trying to hide it from you. as mentioned you need an account to purchase anything. and you only get to know what youre purchasing if you go through the TOC, which most people don't read lets be real.

it's worth noting as well creator league is the only collection available on mynt.gg at the minute, it seems like this entire business was started FOR creator league.

after reading through the faqs again I want to correct myself and say that yes you can buy more than one pass, but only for one creator. so this seems to me like a pay to win scheme.

im not going to go super in depth into this bit bc its a topic that has already been discussed in detail but obviously a lot of people are not happy with the inclusion of nfts because of their environmental impact, the secrecy and dedication to hiding this fact that the company is involving crypto in the event itself is a little weird if u ask me. oh yeah theres been reports on twitter too that they have been blocking and deleting replies to their posts that accuse them on using crypto.

so theyre lying to you as the viewer about what they are and what youre purchasing. but it seems like theyre lying to the creators too.

again. crypto and nfts is not mentioned anywhere at all. not in the trailer, not on the website not in any announcements . only discovered when people were paying for passes bc they wanted to support their fave creators.

recently one of the listed creators Connor CDawgVA released a twitter statement conforming that he was completely blindsided by the fact that there was cryptocurrency involved in the event- if u haven't seen his tweet here

so this raises the question were creators told about their involvement with Near, or was it written using jargon that people unfamiliar with crypto would not pick up on.

CEO of TAMU Esports Dylan Liu also weighed in on the creator league misleading their creators as well here's his statements too

this isn't everything Dylan has had to say hes done a lot of discussions with people on blockchains and of the event itself as someone who has known about the event for a while, id recommend checking out his twitter if you have time he goes into depth about how much funding theyre getting from near and way more issues with creator league than I have time to explore rn .

but it really does seem that the Creator League and eFuse have gone out of their way to try and hide the fact that they are using cryptocurrency from everyone possible. This is a marketing scheme to try and trick people into buying into their market- and if you google Near Protocol right now you see that they are declining so they actively need more people to buy into their schemes.

investors are leaving Near right now. Theyre tricking people into buying into their organisation. At least thats my understanding of it im not hugely knowledgeable about crypto.

I have a headache lets just wrap this up

this is super sketchy . as of right now CDawgVA is the only creator to have withdrawn from the event, but I hope a lot of creators follow suit. its unknown to us the details of their contracts but from what we know of the event they have done everything to hide the genuine content of creator pass purchases from the viewers- making a lot of people rightfully angry that the event is trying to pull the wool over fans eyes. hiding tweets and refusing to acknowledge their involvement in crypto programmes to the point where its unclear if people like Mr Beast and any of the participating creators are aware of it is super suspicious activity. Especially with how vague their promotions have been on the event, very little information has been available on their instagram and I think it was yesterday that we actually got some kind of timeline of the event. its supposed to start like next week and so many people are still so unsure of what is actually happening in the event or what prizes theyre actually getting if they participate. there has been no redeeming quality in the way that this event has been conceived and executed and I really do hope to see that the event is cancelled or that creators start to speak out against the way that the event is being run and support the fans who feel cheated and blindsided by the organisers . I will say I do not believe any of the creators willingly involved themselves in a cryptocurrency scheme, it's all just too sketchy . and no I did not proofread this nor can I be bothered to .

[c-53]

WARNING: LONG ASK INCOMING

For hobby electronics there’s two major kinds of processors: Microcomputers and Microcontrollers. Microcomputers are small full computer systems like the Raspberry Pi, they typically run a general-purpose OS (typically some flavor of Linux) and are useful for the kinds of projects that require basically a full computer to function, but not necessarily individual sensors. They’re a great place to start for people who don’t know a whole ton about programming or working with individual components because they typically can output a true GUI to a screen and have the capabilities of a regular desktop computer. They have a main processor, true RAM, and either large on-board storage space or a way to read a storage device, like an SD card.

Microcontrollers are less complicated (component wise) than microcomputers, but as a result are more difficult for total beginners to begin working with. They’re typically primarily a SoC (System on a Chip) processor without discrete RAM modules and a very small EEPROM (on-ship storage space) and need to have components wired and configured to them to be able to do much more than being a fancy calculator. They’re used for when you need something to carry out electronic functions or get sensor readings, but not necessarily a full operating system, so they’re best suited for small/integrated applications. Your helmet uses a microcontroller to control the LEDs you used in the Cunt Machine post.

I build high-power model rockets as a hobby and with my university team, so I work with both kinds of processor as part of designing payload systems. I typically prefer microcontrollers in these as most of what we do doesn’t need an actual OS to run, and they’re smaller/lighter than microcomputers. One of the advantages of a microcontroller is that it runs a Real-Time OS (RTOS) which forgoes all the user-friendliness of things like windows and linux to instead be the bare minimum backend necessary to run code uploaded into the processor. 

The main advantage of using a microcontroller is really that they’re typically a lot cheaper than microcomputers are and are plenty powerful for really embedded applications. They also make other parts of whatever system is being built cheaper/easier to integrate because they require less overhead to function - the raspberry pi needs a minimum of 5 volts of power to work, while a chip like an ESP32-PICO can run at 1.8V. 

The main way you make sensors/buttons/peripherals work with a microcontroller is via digital communication busses. There’s a few protocols, the most common being I2C, SPI, and UART. I’ll talk about I2C since that’s generally the most common. With I2C each component is assigned a 2-byte “address” that they’re identified by. When the controller sends a request signal on the I2C data bus, every sensor along the line will return their own signal, marked with their address so that they can be identified. It allows for a large number of devices to be put on the same lines and you can daisy-chain them through each other to the microcontroller.

I’ll be honest I really can’t think of a good way to say much more on the subject as like a starting message because I’ve been working with computers so long all the tech stuff for me is second nature, but if you have any questions ask away I can probably answer them or google them.

.

[cool-person-yey]

TMAGP NOTES PART 2 : THE HORRORS ARE AT IT AGAIN

tmagp show notes for episode 2!

again, this will contain spoilers for tmagp episode two and it is tagged with " tmagp spoilers"

if there are any confusing misspellings please tell me so I can fix them

anyways, here it is yall

• I've said this before and I'll say it again OMINOUS MUSIC

• making adjustments huh

• * more office noises*

• will this be an actual office drama

• more of the... interesting filing system I suppose

• Blasphemy? maybe ?

• "we aren't here to decide the system" oh cmon!!! let the guy try

• "unpack that ominous silence later" Alice I'd die for you

• "time isn't real "fuck yes. preach

• ohhh already at a doctor's office?

• court ordered ? ohhhh

• still on the body dismorphya theme suppose ?

• fuck instagram

• oohhh

• I don't understand anything about tattoos so idk really

• not the dugstep

• influencer-"style" stuff just sets me off for some reason idk.

• if a stranger asks me about my personal life you can bet I'm runnin outta here

• " The artist becomes the canvas"

• STARTED A LIVESTREAM????WTF

• WHAT

• WHAT???

• THAT SEEMS SO PAINFUL

• BLOODY LIKE. ACTUALLY BLOODY OR JUST

• what

• wait what

• I mean?? at least you didn't have to pay I suppose???

• damn instant tattoo

• the random motivation at late nights and the mess that ir creates is a mood

• falling asleep while drawing too lmao

• don't stare at it too much. do not. you will starting seeing Things That You Did Not See Before and you will cry

• yes. ignore al the pain and fatigue to continue your work. that's extremely healthy

•"just a small tweak" yeah right

• WAIT WHAT??? THE KNIFE SCRAPED BONE ? WDYM???

• YES YOU SHOULD'VE. GO OUTSIDE STARE AT A TREE WATHEVER DONT DO WHAT YOURE DOING PLEASE

• OH MY GOD

• "nothing much" yea right

• the tatto is leaking??? oh no

• that's an artist's life. you think you finished up a piece and guess what? another 35 details it would be cool to add and another 157 mistakes you need to fix

• eventually you just gotta say " fuck it" and leave it be

• she has a roommate??? oh my god is she not recognizing the other?

• " perfect" but not usable or healthy if I understood it correctly(???)

• acid? oh boy

• Alice being dramatic again love her <3

• * more little noises *

• honestly the Gwen-Alice friendship ( or frienemiship???) is just gold

•"expanding external operations" huh

• wait who you're talking to Alice

• OHHH SISTER???

• play an instrument? we got a musician over here

• yeah Alice does give big older sister vibes

• so Alice's sibling is an aspiring rockstar huh

• ok so his name is Luke

• last time someone had a brother in a Rusty quill podcast it didn't end very well for them

• the band names .just. the the band names.

• I will actually use The Box In The Incinerator Method from now on

• Alice being serious oh dang

• * more ominous music*

[fruttymoment]

Whoa linux user

Do you have a guide on how to switch to it? I have zero coding knowledge (i think that's required) and I trust you with my life

I perfectly understand the "linux is scary and requires very big brain and coding its too hard to use!" thought coming from a Windows/Mac guy, i really do! But in the end, a linux distro is just a computer kernel that also has a desktop environment and just does what you want it to do like an operating system

Coding on linux is not required. Linux has so many distros at this point that designed to be beginner friendly, requiring "no knowledge but TO gain knowledge while using it"

The linux terminal is the thing that scares most of the users, but trust me once you get used to it you'll realize how efficent it is to operate your computer and do certain tasks from THE terminal instead! In the end, the cold looking white text with black background terminals are the REAL face of computers. Desktop environment is made so EVERYONE can use computers!

The terminal of gnu/linux uses the bash language. In a nutshell, it is pretty easy to learn basic commands actually!

Super beginner friendly linux distros are designed for people (YOUU) who has no experience whatsoever with linux! They are designed and engineered so you dont have to use the terminal much! For example, Linux Mint is the best distro you should start with. It looks and feels like Windows, even! And Mint does not require much terminal usage. That is also their mission, to make an linux distro friendly enough that no terminal usage is needed!

As easy as this sounds, i actually do not recommend staying this far away from the linux terminal. Please start with Linux Mint if you gonna, its just the best for beginners, but also please dont avoid the terminal much! The linux terminal is important to learn because it also teaches you how a computer really works, and certain operations are much more efficent to do via terminal anyway!

Push yourself to interact with the terminal, even. Learn very basic commands like "shutdown now" , and the "sudo" privilege and how it works (linux always asks your password while doing stuff and you also cant do muc without the sudo privileges!)

"sudo" is the command that gives you the REAL admin privileges to do ANYTHING. With your password and sudo, you can even delete your bootloader lol. Linux wont stop you

This means to be extremely careful while using sudo, though! You can do ANYTHING with sudo privileges, and that also contains accidently trashing your computer! Unlike Windows, that doesnt even let you uninstall Edge, linux has no boundries. Its like "we are gonna assume you know what you are doing."

Of course, friendly distros DO warn you on certain stuff, so dont worry too much!

So ye. U can use linux with no coding knowledge, but i dont recommend staying like that. After starting to use linux, you GOTTA let it teach you stuff!

And to the "switching to linux for the first time" part;

I recommend not deleting your main Windows, actually. For first time using linux i heavily recommend the "dual booting" , which simply means booting operating systems more than one in an computer! You can use BOTH linux and windows in thay way! Although, you need to shudown your pc if you want to switch between them and do it in the booting menu

This is because if something goes wrong, or you get very confused, just let Windows be ready in there. Only make the switch the moment when you feel you can operate linux with no issues and easily!

Dual booting basically slices your disk and creates partitions for operating systems. For example if you have an 512GB SSD, in dual booting you can slice it and make Windows use 256GB and Linux use 256GB too! Ofc u can change the numbers here (linux mimt will help u,.)

Before completely switching to linux; be aware that its a bit of a different world. Sure, very popular softwares exists in linux too but some softwares may not suppor linux. Adobe products dont support linux, for example! You can of course just emulate them with Wine software heh, but that would be a bit of a work!

Another problem will be certain online games. Online games does not like linux becuse how easy it is to manipulate the system, so they just either dont run on linux or they ban/kick you when you try to emulate it on linux

An example is Valorant. Valorant does not tun on linux!

And any online game that has a cheap anticheat system will be a problem!

With that being said, linux now supports every single game from Steam, with the Proton software. Just be careful about them online ones! If an online game natively supports linux (TF2, for example!) , it wont be a problem! Check the steam game's info thingy for it!

Oh and official Minecraft works in linux lol

Discord, Spotify etc. popular softwares also work on linux!

Linux in fact has an "app manager" software in their distros, making you install stuff with no terminal whatsoever! Think like Google Play Store but on le pc!

Anyways hehe thats it fo me bascallya! If u wanna switch to linux with no experience, start with the Linux Mint distro i say and explore it well! Tamper everything before fully installing it, dont worry about it! Linux is free. Linux does not care if you want to kill the entire system, even. Linux is freedom

Also please research the dual booting! You'll gonna be needing an 4GB+ USB for it, and a software like Rufus!

The site of Linux Mint has everything you need in detail, step by step ^^ good luck!

[its-the-cat-queen]

*flutters down on iridescent wings*

It is me! The Infodump Fairy! I have come to cast a spell upon you that will cause you to ramble for way too long about Trolls! Please, o’ talented one, tell me why this series has captivated you so!

(Ok but seriously I’ve seen your stuff for it (which fucking SLAPS btw) and this is a series I’ve never really been very interested in, so I’m very curious about what draws you to it! Only if you want to share, of course! As you can see, I am not a real fairy and my spells are fake lol)

Oh dear Infodump Fairy! Your spell is taking its effects!

Asfdhgd seriously though, believe me, I have no problem rambling about Trolls all day jvjfjhf. This is not gonna be very coherent, so sorry in advance. 😅 (Also, thank you, I'm so glad you like my work! <3)

Okay so. I've actually been here since the trailer for the first movie came out (I wasn't very active in the fandom back then, though). I was already invested from that moment on, specifically in the two main characters, Poppy and Branch, and their dynamic, who I took one look at and said, "yeah, I ship that" hfjhf. I think what mostly got to me was the characters, the designs, the fact that it's such a fun and colorful world, and of course, the music. The songs are so good! Like, all of them. Yes, they are mostly just covers of already popular songs with some word changes here and there, but my GOD, are they good covers! But anyway, love me a musical with fun characters! Personally, I think all of the characters have deeper issues about them than what you can see on the surface and what you would expect from a children's movie franchise. Like, Branch has so much trauma it really just feels like in every movie they are just trying to give him more and more problems hdkhdjd. Which of course, makes him a pretty compelling character altogether. Do other characters have as deep issues as him? Some of them. But like, they don't really have that much screentime, sadly. While Poppy and Branch are equally important characters in the first movie (and well, in all of the movies, imo), the second movie is what I would dub as "Poppy's Character Development - The Movie" jgkjfjfj. While the first movie operates with the whole "happiness is inside of all of us, we just need someone to help us find it" kinda message (which doesn't fully stick the landing but oh well), the second goes for stuff like differences, equality (of sorts), and tbh some kind of colonialism metaphor?? It also widens the world of trolls as we've known it, as we learn of other tribes of trolls, who are all connected through different kinds of music. So the whole worldbuilding here just makes things even more interesting.

Now the third movie. In the words of youtuber Mann of 1000 Thoughts, it "gives no fucks in all the right ways". Tbh the Trolls timeline has already been questionable, as is, with the Netflix tv shows that came out after the first and second movies, but this just throws another ranch in the system, and says fuck you to the timeline altogether jckbfh. Like, I managed to make it work once I dedicated a good half hour figuring out how Branch's secret long lost brothers who he was in a band with when he was a baby fit into the picture, but it's not perfect even then. There would definitely still be plotholes gkfhfgf. But at this point you just gotta turn your suspension of disbelief on and just go along with it, cuz it is SUCH a fun experience besides all that. (This goes for all the movies btw. Turn your brain off, you're gonna have a great time jfkhf.) Ngl this is the movie that really got me to jump right back into the fandom with full force, and now I'm back to thinking about all of the previous movies as well and appreciating all of the characters. Tbh when I watched the trailer for the third movie, I thought that the whole long lost brothers storyline was the worst idea they have ever come up with, and then I watched the movie and I was like, "fuck this is the best thing ever" gjfgdhd. Idk, we learn enough about Branch's brothers for them to be compelling characters of their own, while we also have a 20 year old gap in which we can pretty much imagine anything into, cuz we don't actually know all the details about how they got to where they are today after the band broke up. Idk, it's like a sandbox you can play in. And that is so much fun. Also, yeah. The music in the third movie also SLAPS! I listened to the soundtrack on loop for a week after watching it jfkhfh.

The humor is also great in all of the movies, in my opinion. I think my humor operates on Trolls standards at this point, which everyone can decide for themselves if it is good or not hkfjfj. I'm having fun so that's all that matters to me.

But yeah, it's just. Idk. It's difficult to pinpoint something very specific that lured me in. Although, I did mention quite some stuff altogether jfkjjf. It's all about the experience for me. The movies are just filled with so much energy, which I love, and they are, in my opinion, the perfect combination of that energy and emotional impact. Are they perfect movies? Absolutely not. But I'm enjoying myself immensely while watching them, and that's l that matters. Soooo yeah. That's about it for now, I've already been talking too long hkfhfjf

Hope some of this made sense, at least jkfjfj. Thank you for the ask <3 You sadly had no idea about the beast you would unleash fjdgdhd.

[blookmallow]

recently been looking into poppy playtime (it’s…. ok) and its like. theres some good concepts in here and the designs are pretty good but i feel like the lore falls apart immediately if you look too closely at it and maybe im missing something since i havent actually played it (i watched markiplier play it and then dug through the internet for the rest of the information until i lost interest) but ok

i like the biological elements to the monsters - love something bleeding when it Should Not Have Blood. i really dont think you can fit that many organs in a little dinosaur toy though. the big ones sure but that one guy who got put in a toy size dinosaur? and why did they just leave him in with the other experiments if he was a staff person who Agreed to this

anyway my main question is What Is The Motive Here

- if they’re seeking immortality, that just. feels like a really bizarre plot for a toy company? unless the idea is that the toy company was a front for the real operation all along but if you’re really trying to make bodies for humans to inhabit why not focus on, y’know, humanoid things, rather than whatever the hell huggy wuggy is. nobody wants to be that guy forever. and the monster toys still can die anyway, so

- it seems more likely that the purpose was to build worker/slaves, productivity and marketing over ethics and employee well being (kind of an ironic message coming from a developer who puts so much emphasis on marketing and also, the whole NFT thing, but whatever) we know huggy is intended to be security and mommy is intended to be the host for the games, but if that’s the reason - is it really that beneficial to squish people into monster toys? they already have a foster care system providing them with children they’re using as test subjects. this company clearly doesn’t give a shit about ethics, so why not just take advantage of the child labor they have access to rather than spending ungodly amounts of time and money on all these testing procedures and mutilating children into toy slaves. extremely traumatized workers forced into fucked up toy bodies are not going to be as efficient. they can still be killed and still need to eat (evidently More than a child would normally anyway, ) so what exactly is the benefit here. and like. ok mommy has some clear advantages but huggy’s really floppy. we see kissy flop her noodly arm helplessly trying to pull one lever - as cute and funny as that moment was, its clear this creature would not be a great factory worker

- if the point is that they intend to sell the toy monsters, theres just no benefit there whatsoever, even if the ethics of shoving frightened orphans into toys doesn’t bother you, even if you do fix the extreme aggression problem, you’re still gonna get lawsuits from parents when their kids’ toys start wandering off and crying in the corner. also toys get broken, kids tear things open, modders take things apart, people are going to figure out real fast that there’s, y’know, organs in there

which brings me to my major question of WHY is there a commercial for poppy? it seems like the poppy we find in the case is The Only poppy, she’s the only experiment that worked properly, she’s the ideal “toy that can talk to you like a person! (because she is one)” but they’ve never been able to replicate that success - how were they able to sell these dolls with the promise of the Real Girl Intelligence if they only had one (which clearly wasn’t sold since she’s still there)? or did they film the commercial after their success intending to make more dolls and never released it when things went wrong? poppy’s on a lot of the advertisements and stuff so she seems to be a recognized character in the brand. did they at one time manage to recreate her and just sold a bunch of little orphan girls trapped in dolls? is that what I’m supposed to be taking from this?

[nellie-elizabeth]

The Handmaid's Tale: Allegiance (5x09)

Oh goodness. I can't believe there's just one more episode of this season. Lots to discuss.

Cons:

I could have predicted that something was going to go wrong with the planned Hannah rescue, but I have to admit I'm a little disappointed in this less than creative outcome. Is Hannah's rescue going to be the last thing that happens in this show? Are we not going to actually see the aftermath of that, or are we going to drag out this family separation for all of season six as well? I guess I'm just getting a little frustrated. I would have at least liked something a bit more thrilling than all the Americans getting shot down and killed, essentially offscreen, while June and Luke just worry and wait.

So, the thing is, seeing June and Nick interact is just... it immediately sucks all the air out of the room. They have such good good chemistry that you just root for them to start smooching at every second. This is good, for the most part, but there are two problems. One, it just re-emphasizes how underwhelming Luke and June's connection is, by contrast. And for two... we've seen similar scenes for June and Nick so many times. So many fraught goodbyes, so many situations in which there's an unavoidable reason why they just can't be together. Every time, I don't know if I'm meant to believe a door is firmly closed, or if it's still cracked open in some way. So I'm left more flummoxed than I am moved. Nick's excuse for not being able to come to Canada feels a bit weak. Yes, Rose is pregnant, and yes, "Gilead is Rose's home", but come on, Nick. Obviously you have far more power to change your life circumstances than June does.

There are things that have happened in this season, and, honestly, throughout the whole history of the show, where in isolation I loved the moment, it was so cool and felt like it was propelling the story forward... only to learn that we're just going to reset the status quo and repeat ourselves a few episodes down the road. So, for example: I loved all the stuff with Serena in this episode, but as she flees with baby Noah in her arms, I'm thinking about how a few episodes ago, Serena was making a daring escape with June. Then she got put back into her same cage, and now she's escaping it again. I'm getting early-season flashbacks, when June would get free and then return to the Waterfords and the Handmaids system, again and again and again. Will Serena be apprehended by the Wheelers again? Will she, inexplicably, be allowed to remain with Noah for a third time? Will there be real forward motion? I hope so!

Similarly, Commander Lawrence and June having tense conversations that are at cross-purposes. Nick and June's merry-go-round. Tuello failing to deliver on his promises. It's all stuff we've seen before, and I'm finding myself glad that this show is ending after one more season, despite still thinking the quality is very high. There's just a lot of repetition!

Pros:

A lot of my "cons" this week are also "pros", in a weird way. Like I said, June and Nick's scene was electric. The look on her face when Nick said that Rose was pregnant... oof. The "I love you"s, the way June called out to him after he'd started to walk away... you can just sense how badly these two want to be holding each other at all times. It's intensely compelling. I also love the way Lawrence knew to dangle Nick over June's head, promising them the opportunity to be in each other's lives. It's heartbreaking that you can tell it's legitimately tempting to them both, but they still feel they can't say yes.

The scene with Hannah, where we see these little snippets of the life she's living, contrasted with June in Canada waiting for the rescue operation, worked really well. It was a tease, a promise of something they really need to deliver on, and despite my frustration, I am still really compelled by the building tension.

Looks like we've got wedding bells in the air, for the most bizarre of new potential spouses: Commander Lawrence and the recently widowed Mrs. Putnam. This is such a bizarre scenario, and really highlights the grim tensions of Gilead. This woman, who, to be clear, is part of an evil system and who I don't have a ton of sympathy for, is basically being forced into marrying her husband's murderer, very, very shortly after the death of said husband. And much like when Commander Lawrence was forced to undergo the ceremony with June and with his wife, this is a situation where no party is consenting. Yes, Lawrence has more power than Mrs. Putnam, but this is still something he's being pressured to do, and the threat if he does not could very well be serious indeed.

The Wheelers, especially Mrs. Wheeler, are some of the most interesting villains this show has ever produced, which is such a refreshing sign, so late in the game! The way Mrs. Wheeler makes calls about Noah specifically because it goes against what Serena wants to do, the lack of respect, and also the clear lack of real affection for Noah as a person in need of care... it's chilling. I don't know what Serena is going to do from here, but I hope she can stay away from a woman who hits her and wants to keep her away from her baby.

I think my favorite moment of the episode might actually have been June and Commander Lawrence's phone call. The amount of shit these two have been through, the strange twisted, warped series of loyalties and betrayals between them... it's so intense. When June realizes that Lawrence isn't going to help her get Hannah out of Gilead, she turns on the offensive, and basically says that Lawrence's dead wife hated him, was disgusted by the man she'd once loved. Would rather die than stay with him. Lawrence receives these words as the punishment they're meant to be, then says his wife would still want him to help June, and help Gilead to be a better place. June is a victim of so much, but she has learned to be incredibly cruel.

I want to wait to reserve judgment on how things turn out with the big dramatic ending of this episode, with a gunman shooting into a crowd of mourners trying to honor the dead American soldiers. The Canadian protesters who want the Americans to leave seem to be responsible for the action, but it's yet to be seen how much damage has been done. Obviously it was horrifying and difficult to watch, and I can't quite decide yet how I feel about its placement thematically in the season.

I'll stop there. Next week, the finale of the penultimate season of this excellent show. I have my complaints, but the quality is still undeniable!

8/10

[yournightowl]

Your NightOwl #004

What am i actually gonna do when i grow up?

My parents gen had it lucky. They could choose between state operative, corporate operative, or purged political dissident. i’ve got a lot less to choose from. Basically any service industry job i can think of, an automated dependent can do it better and cheaper than I ever could.

So i’m putting together a list. Based on current trends and also just my guesses, i’ll list all the jobs that could still exist by the time I’m old enough to apply. Here goes:

Translator

Pros: Ads haven’t gotten much better at translating in years- even bigshots like Ashur have barely made progress on it. Almost all of them can speak multiple languages, but asking them to take one person’s intent and convey it in another person’s tongue is just like playing the telephone game with only lip-reading- it just doesn’t work. Even if they improve, there’ll still be a need for dependable translators in high-stakes corporate and state conversations.

Cons: There are only 11 languages left at this point, and there might be fewer still soon. Discounting any major geopolitical military conflict, i doubt any of them will just drop off overnight, but if they get recombined into pidgin my career could end up in the tank.

Chauffeur

Pros: Rich people will always want someone to sit in their overpriced car all day in case they feel like conducting business from traffic for 40 minutes- and the human element is key. The whole point is to make another person do it. 

Cons: Parking in the city is really intimidating.

Chef

Pros: Ads can’t cook. They can prepare food, but they can’t cook. 

Cons: Neither can i

Cyberpunk

Pros: This one’s self-explanatory. A cyberpunk fights the system and Ads are the system.

Cons: This isn’t a job, and it also isn’t real anymore. If it was, what would i study in school to prepare for it? Are there internships, or do you just have to get nepotism’d into the rebel lifestyle?

My best guess is that joining the military, getting modded and then getting really depressed would be a good start.

But my classmates joke that the military doesn’t let you get depressed anymore. 

Writer

Pros: Ads can write good copy, and they’re very good at copying writing (see what i did there?). They can write funny non-sequitur, decent smut, and really great fake news. But original stories and well-reasoned, well-researched non-fiction is beyond them, and it probably always will be.

Cons: i would have to convince my family

No luck with decoding last week’s message from the Big Bad. I think the R is important, but the cipher’s definitely more than one letter long.

I tried turning it on its side and it kind of looks like a hair pin. 

Hair pins can pick locks (in old movies and stuff).

And locks require keys.

And that’s where I ran out of ideas. See below for more details on my hitting a wall.

Dejected and tired,

your nightowl

zzzΣ(￣V￣ノ)

[unluckyuncle]

A Future Conversation \ Winterfes Drabble

What a time it had been for the duck. It seemed like it had passed so fast... to be fair he skipped several months after he left his world and came here. His mind had adjusted to the sudden change from summer to fall, and now winter. Though he couldn’t help but feel like something about his memories were off.

Those flowers had been gone for a while, but he was still struggling with himself about what he thoughts, what he felt about the truths presented to him. He needed to talk to someone, someone he knew. But he was by himself. Not alone, but certainly lonely right now.

Donald already had been to this place, he’d met his younger self with Eiden a strange clearing that created illusions of the past. They had felt so real, it was a little unnerving. He decided to go back to that place today. Maybe he could explain some stuff to himself instead. It might make him feel better, even if it was just an illusion

He thought of what he would say... it’s all going to be okay? Did it really matter, it wasn’t like he could change the past at all. His future was the only thing he could think about, and the uncertainties that came from it.

As he entered a clearing, he was surprised to not find a little duckling of himself in flannel and guitar on his back, but rather it looked like himself in his blue uniform. He was confused, what sort of illusion was this??

The illusion was looking around, and spotted Donald. It smiled a little confused but it was a familiar face. [Oh… hey, me?]

He doesn’t move a muscle, only taking a moment to rub his eyes. He wasn’t dreaming, was he? This was actually just straight up... himself. [huh!? You’re… you’re not my past self!]

[I… don’t know what that means.] The illusion retorts.

[This weird grotto… place, whatever, lets you see your past self. I saw my teenage self... my past self. But you’re as old as me... and wearing my normal uniform.]

The illusion softens his expression, shifting into something more pondering. Maybe he had some some sort of self awareness cause the blue suited Donald was fairly calm all things considered. [Well, what’s your most recent memory? I might be able to help figure this out.]

[My last memory...] Donald had to think hard. [I was… I was about to go on a cruise the family sent me on. I thought I saw the Spear of Selene and went inside… I think I hit a button and the ship launched. That’s all I’ve got]

The illusions face contorts sadly. Donald didn’t have to say much before those memories came back to him. In fact, he remember much past that. He was trapped on the moon, held prisoner and trying to get home. He got stuck on an island for a month... and everything that happened after that.

The illusion sighs. [Yeah... I remember that...If I had to guess. I’m you, but from the future.]

Donald’s mouth practically hits the ground. [The… The future??? So you can tell me what happens! Was that Della’s ship? Is. Is she home? And she’s alive?!] His excitement got the better of him as he grabs the collar of his future self. He’d had nightmares about this event and was eager to know.

[Woah there, Donald!] Future Donald pushes himself off, taking a couple of steps back. [You know I can’t just tell you about the future! You know how this time stuff works, and you don’t ever mess with the timeline.]

Donalds face falls, he grumbles under his breath. Time adventures were the worst. So many complicated rules, even if this world seemed to operate on a totally different system. [Fine… fine. Can you blame me for trying?] He couldn’t hide the anger he was feeling. The closure he practically begged for was at his fingertips and there wasn’t anything he could do. 

Future Donald simply rolled his eyes. He knew what his past self was thinking. [Donald. Knowing the future won’t help you with anything. Trying to control and predict every possible outcome isn’t healthy for you, or for our family.]

[So what?!] He snapped. [It’s not like they appreciate what I try to do anyways!] 

[Don’t say that!] His future self snapped back. It was shocking that he heard himself say those words. Whatever this version of himself had gone through here, it made his past self think about things... things that took himself much longer to realize than it should have.

[It’s true though. Right?] Donald turns his back on his future self, tears stinging at his eyes. [They don’t respect for me. Every adventure I get thrown in front of danger. I’ve always had to be what they needed me to be, The shield, the joke, the responsible one, or whatever else they need.]

Future Donald could hardly believe what he was hearing. He knew in his head he agreed with every single word his past self said. These feelings were buried for so long... it took meeting her to even get out of this mindset at all, but this Donald didn’t have that. 

He tooks a few steps closer to his past self. [We wanted their approval… His praise, her companionship. Even for the boys some level of acknowledgment of what we sacrificed for them to be happy.]

Donald sighs. [Yeah… but they’re kids. I don’t expect anything from them. But Scrooge and Della… was I ever really enough for them?] The question at hand. The question that made him toss and turn at night. Was he enough?

Future Donald placed a hand on his shoulder. [Of course you are Donald. Look. There were a lot of things that Scrooge and Della both needed to do better. Della was always chasing her own approval... and Scrooge has outdated expectations about how to express his love, among other things.]

He shook his head. [As much as we feel like the world doesn’t understand us, we aren’t exactly the best at communicating our own needs either.] 

Donald looked towards his future self. [… do we ever get better? Do they?] He wasn’t trying to control the future, he just... he just wanted to know that maybe things had changed... he needed hope in that. He couldn’t get the closure he begged for.

Future Donald smiles, nodding softly. [The best thing that ever happened to our family was that we came back together. It’s hard enough being alone to figure things out… but it seems like maybe you’ve gotten to know some people who could help you out too.]

Tears fall from both of their eyes. The two duck embrace, oh how long had it been since Donald hugged someone else. Maybe he was a bit touch starved too.

[You’re always enough, Donald.] 

Before long the illusion vanishes, leaving Donald teary-eyed and alone again, but maybe not as lonely as before. He stands there for a long time. Think about his life... the words of his future self. 

[I’m going to figure this out.... for me.] He wipes his tears before leaving the woods, ready once again to journey down a path of healing. For now all he could do was focus on himself. Besides, there were others who needed his help here too. People who reminded him every day that he is loved, and he is enough.

[greggermeister]

Some thoughts on bad programming practices

I recently read an article about the worst kind of programer. I agree with the basic idea, but want to add my own thoughts about it.

I have seen over time that developers seem really invested in learning new things for the sake of new things, rather than getting better at existing approaches. Programming is like everything else - new is not always better.

I have a Honda CRV that is not as easy to use as some cars I used to own before touch interfaces became popular. The touch screen sometimes acts like I'm pressing various places on the screen when I'm not, making beeping noises and flipping screens randomly. I have to stop and turn the car off and on to stop it. It has a config screen with every option disabled. It has bizarre logic about locking and unlocking the doors, that I have never fully figured out. I often wonder if devs who make car software actually have a drivers license.

If I tried asking 100 programmers the following question, chances are very few of them, if any, could answer it without a web search: Bob just completed programming school, and heard about MVC, but is unsure how to tell which code should be model, which code should be view, and which code should be controller. How would you explain the MVC division of code to Bob?

It's not a genius question, it's really very basic stuff. Here are some other good questions about other very basic stuff:

Why did developers decide in REST that POST is create and PUT is update?

The HTTP RFCs have always stated that PUT is create or update to a resource on the server such that a GET on that resource returns what was PUT, and that POST is basically a grab bag of whatever does not fit into other verbs. The RFCs used to say that a POST url is indicative of an operation, now they just say POST is whatever you say it is.

Developers often talk about the REST usage of POST and PUT like Jesus Christ himself dictated this usage, like there is no argument about it. I have never seen any legit reason why PUT cannot be create or update like the RFC says, and POST can be for non-CRUD stuff. Any real, complex system that is driven by customer demand for features is highly likely to have some operations that are not CRUD - integrations with other systems, calculations, searches (eg, a filter box that shows matches as you type, find results for a search based on input fields), and so on.

By reserving POST for these kinds of other operations, you can immediately identify anything that isn't CRUD. Otherwise, you wind up with two usages of POST - mostly for create, but here and there for other stuff.

2. Why do Java developers insist on Spring and JPA for absolutely every Java project without question?

Arguably, a microservice project should be, well, you know, micro. Micro is defined as an adjective that means extremely small. When Spring and JPA take up over 200MB of memory, and takes 10 seconds to fire up a near empty project that barely writes one row to a table, I'm not seeing the micro here.

Call me crazy, but maybe micro should be applied to the whole approach, not just the line count: the amount of memory, the amount of hand written code, the amount of time a new hire takes to understand how the code works, etc. You don't have to be a freak about it, trying 10 languages to see which uses the least amount of RAM, just be reasonable about it.

In this case, Spring and JPA were designed for monolithic development, where you might have problems like the following:

A constructor is referred to 100 times in the code. Adding a new field requires modifying all 100 constructor calls to provide the new field, but only one of those calls actually uses the new field. So dependency injection is useful.

There are thousands of tables, with tens of thousands of queries, that need to be supported in multiple databases (eg, Oracle and MSSQL), with uses cases like multi-tenancy and/or sharding. There comes a point where it is just too much to do some other way, and JPA is very helpful.

3. Why does every web app require heavy amounts of JS code?

When I started in this business, we used JSP (Java Server Pages), which is a type of SSR (Server Side Rendering). Basically, an HTML templating system that can fill in the slots with values that usually come from a database. It means when users click on a button, the whole page reloads, which these days is fast enough for it to be a brief sort of blink.

The bank I have used since about 2009 still uses some sort of SSR. As a customer, I don't care it's a bit blinky. It responds in about a second after each click, and I'm only going to do maybe 12 page loads in a session before logging out. I can't find any complaint on the web about it.

I saw a project "upgrade" from JSP to Angular. They had a lot of uncommented JSP code that nobody really knew how it worked, which became Angular code nobody really knew how it worked. Some people would add new business logic to Angular, some would add it to Java code, and nobody leading the project thought it was a good idea to make a decision about this.

Nobody ever explained why this upgrade was of any benefit, or what it would do. The new features being added afterwards were no more or less complex than what was there before, so continuing to use JSP would not have posed any problems. It appeared to be an upgrade for the sake of an upgrade.

4. Why is everything new automatically so much better than older approaches?

What is wrong with the tools used 10 or 15 years ago? After all, everything else works with this way. Sure, we have cars with touch screens now, but they still use gas, tires, cloth or leather seats, a glove box, a steering wheel, glass, etc. The parts you touch daily to drive are basically the same as decades ago, with a few exceptions like the touch screen and electric engines.

Why can't we just use a simple way of mapping SQL tables to objects, like a code generator? Why can't we still use HTML templating systems for line of business apps that are mostly CRUD? Why can't we use approaches that are only as complex as actually required for the system at hand? I haven't seen any real improvements in newer languages or tooling that are significantly better in real world usage, with a few exceptions like using containers.

5. Do you think other industries work this way?

I can tell you right now if engineers built stuff like programmers do, I would never get in a car, walk under a bridge, or board an airplane. If doctors worked that way, I'd be mortally afraid every visit. So why do we do things this way? Is this really the best we can do?

I worked with a guy who asked shortly after being hired "why the f to we have a mono repo?". When I asked what is wrong with a monorepo, he was unable to give any answer, but convinced management how this has to change pronto, apparently convinced with almightly passion all microservice projects must be structured as separate repos per service. Not sure if it was him or someone else, but somehow it was determined that each project must be deployed in its own container. These decisions were detrimental to the project in the following ways:

One project was a definition of all objects to be sent over the wire. If service A object is updated to require a new field, there is no compile error anywhere to show the need to update constructor calls. If service B calls A to create objects, and nobody thinks of this, then probably only service A is updated to provide the new required field, and a subtle hard to find bug exists, that might take awhile for anyone to even notice.

Your average corporate dev box can handle maybe 15 containers before flopping over and gasping for air. So we quickly lost local development in one of those unrecoverable ways where the team would never get it back.

Every new dev would have to checkout dozens of repos.

No dependency information between repos was tracked anywhere, making it unknowable which subset of services have to be run to stand up service X to work on that one service. Combined with the inability to run all repos locally yields two equally sucktastic solutions to working on service X:

Use trial and error to figure out which subset stands up X and run it locally

Deploy every code change to a dev server

When Alex talks about programmers using hugely complex solutions of the sort he describes, it sounds to me like devs who basically jerk off to everything new and cool. This is very common in this business, every team has people like that in it. That isn't necessarily a big problem by itself, but when combined with the inability/unwillingness to ensure other devs are fully capable of maintaining the system, and possibly the arrogance of "everything I say is clearly best", and/or "only I can maintain this system", that's the killer combination that does far more harm than good.

[mysterious-prophetess]

Stuff to keep in mind for works set in previous decades

Level of Tech

For example!

1970's is when betamax was invented—1975 to be precise. VHS came along in 1976. Home releases of films were not instantaneous and, if you're going to reference a film being on TV or VHS/Betamax/Laser Disk, you might want to research when that happened.

E.G. Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back was in theaters in 1980, but wasn't on home media until 1983.

Music media was on records in the 70's for the most part, but cassettes were making a huge splash by the 80's. The 90's was all about the CD, and by the 2000's, and onward, MP3s became king.

Phones—Portable phones were like purses in the 70's (and a military item at first) or in cars. In the 80's, there were huge bricks. Like, literally.

The 90's saw stuff like Nokia's and primitive flip phones and Blackberries.

People also used pagers—which sent texts because phones coudln't really do that yet. That's right, with early cellphones, you needed a WHOLE separate device to text. (BTW it was called "Beeping" and those were also called "beepers." That's what the Kim Possible theme song was talking about with "Call me, beep me, if you wanna reach me.") PDAs were more of a later 90's early 2000's thing.

The first Smart Phone wasn't in existence until 2007, when the iPhone debuted, and you needed a special cell plan to get one AND it was AT&T exclusive.

Before that point, it was a flip/slide phone world, and if your parents didn't have data (and almost no one did on a regular basis), going online cost you extra on your phone bill.

I still remember the panic of trying to cancel accidentally hitting the browser button on one of my old flip-phones.

Minutes/Data plans—people used to only have so many minutes to call people (yeah, call people) a month. I can remember some plans only had 800 minutes. Some had less. If you called someone on the wrong network, that could eat up your minutes.

Texts, when they became a thing your cellphone could do, also cost you minutes/data. Same restrictions applied.

Public Telephones—I'm sure people have seen phone boxes, and phone banks—those were real. Payphones were real. You had to put in quarters or dimes to use them (hence "Here's a quarter, call someone who cares" is a saying that has been orphaned by time and technology advancing).

Collect calls were a thing too where you dialed and it would bill the other end's phone bill.

Of course, there was a famous commercial that had people figure out how to scam collect services.....

Computers—By far, these have advanced the most. The first personal computers were from the 70's, but they were primitive and the screens only displayed green-scale text. You had to have a boot disk, and an operating disk you PHYSICALLY inserted into drives to get a computer to run and these were clunky devices. Programs needed you to use computer commands to make them run.

Floppy disks used to be actually large and floppy.

Then came the smaller "floppy" disks that were really rigid, AKA the modern save icon.

As previously stated, the 90's was when CDs became king.

USB drives weren't common until the 2000's, and they were SMALL. We're talking megabites and not Gigabites were common and the gigabite drives were EXPENSIVE. Solid state? That's within the last decade and a half or so, and those started off as super-duper expensive.

It was also during the 90s that boot software became part of the bios, likewise with the OS, and we were given more user-friendly interfaces that didn't require the command menus.

Game consoles—

In the 70's, the Magnavox Odyssey was out and it was the first.

The late 70's /early 80's consoles were actually the second gen consoles. Those include the Atari 2600, ColecoVision, Intellivision, and Vectrex. (BTW there were handhelds in this generation too) Gen 3 is where the Sega Master System and NES/Famicom come into play.

Sony didn't get into the console wars until Gen 5 with the PS1, and Xbox didn't wade into the fray until Gen 6. We are in Gen 9 right now.

This isn't even touching on landlines, tvs, and other appliances!

So, Tl: Dr—Please do research if you're writing fanfiction for works set in any era before now because tech has evolved so rapidly.

[requiemforarainbow]

Little expansion on my last post. Under the cut too.

I don't know why I always feel this need to explain everything, but I'm gonna attempt to satisfy it. So here goes.

Regarding my Nintendo "collection": I am a packrat. Probably genetic; my mom is too. I don't like to throw things away that still work, and I still get enjoyment from this stuff. Getting rid of something I may never be able to get again just doesn't work for me. And getting a digital copy means I may lose access to that too, if the system it's on breaks, or a company decides to pull it. (Happened with Netflix; they took one of my fave shows off their service, and I only found out when I went to watch it again. I don't want the same thing to happen to a game I'm invested in, especially if I haven't finished it or transferred stuff off it.)

It would be different if a game/system breaks. If it's totally non-functional (like my cartridge copy of Silver), then I accept I may have to toss it. But I don't like it. Even busted, I still want to keep it to acknowledge I had it. I owned it. I played it.

And all these systems and games? They were purchased with my parents' sweat and blood. In my dad's case, sometimes literally.

My parents are both retired now, but when he was working, my dad was a firefighter. 30+ years, both as a volunteer and a professional (paid) one. Firefighter and paramedic, in fact. And a small business owner - he owned a gun shop. (No hate, plz. Seriously. I've heard it all. I don't need the BS.)

At one time, when I was about 8-9, he was working 3 jobs simultaneously. Firehouse, ambulance service, and the store. There was an entire YEAR when I only saw my father long enough to say "Hi, dad, love you."

That October, my dad had to sit my sister and me down and tell us we might not be able to afford Christmas. We'd still get something in our stockings, some candy maybe, but no "real" presents. I didn't care; I told my dad what I really wanted was to spend Christmas with him. That's all I wanted, and I was super serious about it.

I swear to God I think I broke his heart with that.

He ended up having to shut down the store in November (troubles with the rent and family shit), and believe it or not, we actually had enough money to afford a small Christmas that year.

This is to say that we have, for decades, survived on a civil servant's salary, and whatever my mom's job at the time brought in. (She's been a switchboard operator, a billing clerk for the same ambulance service my dad worked for, and then a billing clerk for an oral surgeon.)

I have never gotten a game or game system on launch day - except for one game. (Animal Crossing: New Horizons. I saved for it.)

I have always gotten a game or game system months or years after it was released. Traditionally for Christmas, or my birthday if backordered. Since the two are within a month of each other, if something comes out between late January and Christmas, I have to wait. And I don't mind doing so. I never have. Will people be "ahead of me" in the game? Yes. But that also means they'll have experience if I need to ask for help. What routes to take. What not to do. I may miss out on some limited-edition and time-sensitive stuff, like DLC, but that's life. I've missed out on events before because I hate leaving the house, so...nothing new.

With both my parents retired now, we literally live on my dad's pension. Considering how poorly firefighters are paid, it's sometimes tight. (He retired at captain, so it's at least a good amount. But honestly? Firefighters should be paid a SHITLOAD more than they are. But that's a rant for another time.)

What about my paycheck? Well...I'm disabled. I have 3 doctors willing to write the note to hopefully get me on SSI. But at my age (almost 36), I'll almost inevitably be rejected the first time and have to hire a lawyer to appeal. Are my parents willing to help with that? Yes. Why? Because they'd love to see me hopefully being able to support myself a little. (I've tried to mention to them that I'd still be living in poverty even with that, but...boomers.)

Is it possible for me to work at all? No. I can't sit for more than 90 minutes at a stretch. I can't stand for more than 30. I require a cane to walk now. I'm prone to migraine headaches both from overuse of a screen and from florescent lights. My mental illness also makes it damn near impossible to keep my mouth shut. I have no filter; I will call out stupid and not give a damn.

Work from home? See above re: overuse of computer screen, sitting time, and add in carpal tunnel.

Hence the doctors going "Yeah, Jordi, you're kinda fucked."

I've had 2 paying jobs in my life. One was retail, for all of 3 months. I'm pretty sure I got fired for getting injured on the job, but they couldn't actually admit that, so they called it "backtalking a supervisor." (I was TERRIFIED of confrontation back then. I would NEVER have said boo to my supervisor, so it's definite bullshit.) The other one, my first job, was as a filing clerk for...the same ambulance company my parents worked for. Best job I ever had; sit in a basement, file ambulance "run cards," not deal with people. ("Run cards" were the physical paperwork the paramedics had to fill out for every patient they transported. Name, date of birth, insurance, etc. Then they'd file it with the ambulance company billing department to bill the insurance - or the patient if no insurance - and then I'd file it away. They were required to keep them for a minimum of 7 years. Now it's all digital, so that job is, sadly, obsolete.)

Is it kind of embarrassing to still be reliant on my parents for money at my age? Yes. But at the same time, I know how goddamn privileged I am to be able to. How privileged I am that they didn't just kick me out at 18. That they recognize I'm disabled and actually care; not attempt to insist that I can work regardless of reality.

That being said... If I could work, I would in a heartbeat. When I was younger, I had so many volunteer positions - assistant teacher at Girls Inc. for the dance teacher, ceramics teacher, sewing teacher (who just happened to be my mom). I volunteered with political campaigns - most of which my grandmother ran. To be fair, I didn't do these things for nothing in return - my high school required at least 20 hours of community service to graduate, and all the volunteering counted. (I ended up being the 2nd highest community service holder in my class - over 1000 hours over 4 years.)

My "dream job" is to write. Novelist. Editor. Hell, Presidential Speechwriter, if I could snag such a position. (That's my only "political" goal.) I've got more WIPs than I can name. I've got a 2 TB hard drive, almost half full with writing. If I ever managed to get published, believe me, my position will not be "Oh, I did this all by myself." NOOOOOOO. Not even close.

My parents will be thanked. My grandparents. My sister. My friends. Hell, my neighbors.

I don't know why I'm so defensive sometimes. I think it's because I've heard basically everything someone can throw at me and accuse me of regarding everything I've just mentioned.

"You don't know how privileged you are!" Yes. Yes I do.

"You must be rich to have <insert whatever here>!" No, just very fucking lucky.

Stuff like that.

And man, do I know how lucky I got with the parent lottery. Supportive, fairly permissive, and just damn nice. (I have friends that, by the end of their first visit, were already calling them "mom" and "dad".)

Wanna watch that R-rated movie and you're only 9? Okay, but you have to watch it with us so we can answer your questions. (Watched Braveheart in 5th grade. Used some knowledge from that movie to answer a question in class correctly and end up with a shitload of candy. Yes, I made a lot of friends.)

Raised Catholic. Sent to Sunday school. Oh, wait, you want to quit because your teachers have completely disillusioned you are actively trying to sabotage your education? Okay, that's cool. (8th grade Sunday school teacher tried to get us to not take sex ed. Which was rolled into health class in my school. If you failed it, you had to retake it. Until you passed. And sex ed was a whole quarter. And no exemption for religious reasons - you got an F for that section if you sat it out. I got snarky, teacher got pissed, I said "fuck this.") Rejected the entire religion and became pagan? Okay, that's cool. (Yes, they wished me a Blessed Yule again this year. And every year for the last 16.)

Brought home a boyfriend? Awesome. If he breaks your heart, I break his face. (Both parents said this) Figured out you're bi? Awesome. I don't care who you date. But if they break your heart, I break their face.

Don't want biological kids? Okay. Disappointed but understandable. (Long story short, I'd have to go off some meds, and NO ONE wants that.) And adoption is a thing. To be honest...that was always my first inclination anyway.

Okay. I think that need to explain is satisfied. Sorry this is a long-ass rant again. Probably no one will read this anyway, but that annoying voice in my head is quieter now.

And I'm gonna go play Pokemon.

[dark-arts-and-crafts-universe]

A Dying Art (Chapter 11)

A Dying Art

Lorcan Verdigris is a time wizard, a misanthrope, and a single father to a household of magically-sentient furniture.

Lorcan Verdigris is not a necromancer. Anymore. But when the leader of the local necro coven comes to him with a request he really, really can’t refuse, past collides with present as he finds himself back in the world he’d tried to leave behind. Someone is trying to steal a powerful magical artifact, one whose destruction could unleash chaos upon the city. Or save it from an even greater danger. Or do nothing at all. Who knows. See, this is exactly why Lorcan stopped messing with the stuff.

Unfortunately, one way or another, Lorcan’s the one stuck dealing with it. He’d like to say this is a challenge that will take all his magic and his ingenuity to overcome, but let’s be real, stopping this threat will take something even more dire: actual effort. At least he’s getting paid this time…

Previous | Table of Contents | Next

Chapter 11: Late Night Showdown

Word Count: 4,362

Content warnings: very brief examples of minor body horror

-

Necromancy shit always started at midnight, which happened to be the exact time that Operator called for him after a long and unproductive day of staring at blurry pictures of his own hand and catching up on sleep.

“I’m up, I’m up,” he said, walking into the living room. “What’s–”

“One of Osiris’s people says she needs to talk to you,” Operator told him. They tossed him their headset (Op was a faux-1900s candlestick rotary phone plugged into Lorcan’s landline).

Someone who worked for Osiris. But sensible enough to call on a phone instead of summoning a million dead bugs–the realtor? “Hello?” Lorcan asked.

“Hello, Mr. Verdigris.” It was the realtor. “There is a situation at the Crown’s estate we need you to deal with. Intruders on the premises.”

He frowned. “And they can’t handle it because?”

“Osiris is doing a ‘nighttime inventory’ at the store. Minimizing time spent here until the security holes are patched.”

“That makes sense,” he said. “But one, I don’t have a car, it’ll be at least half an hour to get there if I’m lucky with the buses. Two, do you really expect me to fight someone that can go toe-to-toe with the Crown Osiris?”

“I’m not asking you to fight them, Mr. Verdigris. The methods of these intruders seem different from before. Less subtle. They’re angry about something.”

“Unsubtle anger doesn’t usually make a fight less likely. Guess how I know.”

“Mr. Verdigris,” the realtor said, and there was something in her voice that made him stop. “No one has broken through Osiris’s security system before. I doubt these intruders will, either. But we are the system. Do you understand that?”

Oh, he thought. The retorts died before he could get them out. She wasn’t asking him to help Osiris. She was asking him to help the poltergeists patrolling their estate. Lorcan might not survive an encounter with whoever was trying to break in. But neither would the shades. And they didn’t have a choice.

She was asking him to help.

“Do what you can to stall, I guess,” Lorcan told her. “I’ll call an Uber or something.”

He heard a pause. “Thank you.” Then she hung up.

“Are you doing the lock-and-load montage?” Vulk asked him before they headed out.

“It’s not an anything montage and there’s nothing to lock or load. I’m just checking over my supplies.”

“That’s still a lock-and-load montage. We should play some music.”

“Do not.” Lorcan sighed.

His best suspects were still Belial, Eva, and Gravelord. Lorcan didn’t know as much as he wanted to about their minions, but he could at least be prepared for them. He still had his necro gear from the night before, and a few other tricks up his sleeve.

One ghost flashlight with fresh batteries, a stained glass filter for its lens that his father had made for him. A small scalloped shell his sister imbued with some voice magic went into his pocket. Lorcan’s family always had his back.

He shoveled a spoonful of instant coffee powder into his mouth–look, it would keep him from falling asleep on the ride over, stop fucking judging him–then he and Vulk headed out.

His hand started curse-bleeding again while he locked up. He should go back inside, Lorcan thought, make sure the curse wasn’t doing something worse to him. Grab a towel to at least wipe off what looked like a very bloody handprint on his door before the neighbors noticed. The realtor could wait a little bit longer–

He stared at his hand. “Uh, Lorcan?” Vulk asked from the backpack.

The thoughts felt plausible, almost like things Lorcan would actually think. But not close enough. “It’s fine,” he told his familiar. “Let’s go. Lock and load, or whatever.”

“Lock-and-load!”

-

In the darkness that bathed Osiris’s front lawn, the shimmering, opalescent figure of the realtor stood out. Next to her were two shadows in the dark, obviously human. Lorcan squinted, then turned on his flashlight.

“Belial Blithe. Eva the Inevitable,” he announced, trying to sound casual. The two of them stood exactly at the edge of Osiris’s aquascape protections. Belial’s sleeves were rolled up with a set of pitch black garters to display hir elegant magical tattoos–classy, and yet also imposing–and Eva was tuning her haunted guitar with menace. They hadn’t attacked yet, but the threat was there. “What are you doing here?”

Not that he expected a full confession or anything, but well. If they were aiming to steal the crown, they wouldn’t be standing out in the open like this.

“We were looking for you, actually,” Belial said, turning to face Lorcan fully.

He blinked, looking at the rich green lawn around him. “So naturally,” he drawled, “you figured you’d find me at Osiris’s house.”

“Snarky,” Eva remarked. “But that smart mouth’ll do you in one of these days. How do you know this is Osiris’s place? They’re very protective of that information.”

Well, fuck him sideways, Lorcan thought. She was right.

“You knew about it last night, too. When you snuck into my concert spouting lies.”

“Alright, you don’t have to monologue,” he said. “Yes, I know where Osiris lives and yes, that’s super suspicious. And once you figured that out you, what, called up your buddies, asked if anyone else noticed me lurking around?”

“Actually, Belial called me.” Eva smiled tightly. “It’s nice to know somebody remembers old friends.”

“For a spy, you’re being quite forthcoming,” Belial said.

“If yesterday night taught me anything it’s that I’m a crap liar. And at this point, I figure there’s a real risk of you just killing me out of annoyance. I’d rather not.”

Belial scowled. “You should have thought of that before trying to burn down my tattoo parlor.”

“Wait, what?” he asked.

“Dad,” Vulk whispered (he was not supposed to be drawing attention to himself). “Did you burn down a tattoo parlor?”

“No!” he whispered back. To Belial, he said, “No. That wasn’t me.”

“You said you wouldn’t lie to us, traitor–”

“Yes, because as mentioned I am bad at it.” Lorcan let himself fidget nervously with the scorpion bracelet on his wrist. They had to have noticed it by now–it was the flashiest thing he’d brought.

So, he loosened the buckle and let it drop to the ground. Then he raised his hands to show they were empty except for the flashlight. He was trying to look open. Trustworthy. Vulnerable.

“You both saw through me last night,” he said, “and I doubt I could fool you now. You’re too dangerous for me to risk trying–there’s nothing I can do to stop either of you from killing me if you really want to. Can we start from the beginning? What did you think I was doing at your places yesterday?”

Lorcan knew necromancers. Necromancers lived and died (and re-lived, and re-died) by threat assessment. Osiris only trusted him as far as they did because Lorcan Verdigris was, fundamentally, not a threat to the Crown Osiris.

Even Belial and Eva could easily wipe the floor with him in most fights. There was a time to challenge that assumption, but not now. Being weak enough to dismiss would get him the slack he needed. He saw the look they traded at his admission of fear, and relaxed the tiniest bit.

Belial started: “Osiris has been acting cagey. Someone’s been gunning after them, and Eva thought it was you.”

“You knew about the mansion,” Eva threw in. “Either you’d show up here yourself–which, you did–or we’d have someone to sell out to Osiris once they got home.”

“Well, you’re too late, I sold you out first,” he shot back. “Look, I was contracted by Osiris. They gave me this address themself. You can ask her.” He pointed at the realtor.

“It’s true,” she confirmed. “The details of his task are confidential, but he is no threat to the Crown.”

“Are you sure about that?” Belial asked. “We haven’t gotten the part with my shop yet.”

“I didn’t burn down your shop,” Lorcan said.

“You burned one of my amps,” Eva noted.

“Yes, and I am–” He took a deep breath. “--sorry about that. What happened with the shop?”

“One of the needle guns got a frayed wire,” ze said. “And my guns don’t fray. It had to have been–”

“A curse,” Lorcan finished. “That sounds like–something else that happened to me. Did you get hit, too?” he asked Eva. “Besides the amp. Which I’m sorry for.”

“Uh huh. We can’t afford to lose any of those, you know. We’ve already got to replace the three that lit up during the morning marathon rehearsal.”

“...was that the curse?” Lorcan asked. Behind Eva, Belial waved hir hand in a ‘sort of’ gesture.

“Well, it was more than usually crap out on us,” she said, giving hir a sour glare. “Still, didn’t think much of it until Belial called about the shop. Hir defenses are no joke, either, do you know how many health inspectors the wards have to turn away from that place?”

Lorcan thought about how easy it would apparently be to add corpse ink to the shop’s inventory. “I can imagine.”

He held up his hand–the ‘blood’ had been getting thicker the more they talked about the curse, easily visible next to the flashlight’s glow. “A cursed fire nearly got me a few nights ago,” Lorcan explained, “and there’s this. Trying to distract me, I think. I honestly figured–at your place, one of your minions drew something on me that could’ve been magic.”

“Who?”

“Uh,” Lorcan said. “I’m really trying not to rat people out to angry necromancers without evidence–”

Belial ran a finger halfway down a tattooed ulna. Both it and the tattoo along hir knuckle started to glimmer like moonlight.

“Fine, dammit, this guy named Ray? I don’t have any proof, please don’t kill him.”

But ze just snorted. The tattoos went dormant. “Ray? He wasn’t cursing you, he was flirting with you. Thirsty bitch.”

Lorcan flushed. “I know that now,” he grumbled. “So, yeah. Somebody else. Not you, I’m guessing. And not me.”

“Osiris hired you to find out who’s after them,” Eva said.

He glanced over at the realtor. ‘Confidential’, she’d said, but well…what else would Lorcan be investigating?

“Osiris thought I should look into you because you knew things about their old life,” he said. “But I didn’t tell them which of you I was investigating. I’m not going to set the Crown Osiris on someone without being sure you did the thing you’d get killed for.” He paused. “Or unless I really needed to get the heat off me.”

“How courageous.”

“But fair,” Belial said. When Eva glared at hir, ze added, “What? You threw plenty of people under the bus back when they were still Opal.”

The mention of Opal deepened her scowl. “You’re buying this pretty quickly.”

“I don’t know if I entirely believe him,” Belial told her. “But his story does add up. Besides, do you really think Osiris would be frightened of him?”

That stung, but it was accurate. He was in the same boat, anyways. None of this proved Eva or Belial’s innocence, but it didn’t make sense if they were guilty. That only left…

“So, um. While we’re trying to make sense of all this.” He paused. Had to ask. “Is the Marquis of Shadows with you, by any chance?”

“Gravelord? Of course not,” Belial said, in a dismissive tone that Lorcan did not like. “Why would he be here?”

“Because I talked to him last night, too. Did he not mention?”

“Gravelord can barely remember ritual incantations these days,” Eva spat out, “much less who’s spying on him for who. Heck, isn’t that fraternity buddy of his still selling you information?” she asked Belial, who glanced away with a guilty look.

Yay, Lorcan thought. He was right, again. That was definitely triumph he was feeling now. “I thought you were his friends,” he said.

Belial blinked. “Gravelord’s a liability. He needs watching.” Ze sounded almost defensive.

“I’m surprised you even care,” Eva told him. “Aren’t you a sad little loner who thinks everyone’s going to hurt him? Friends turn on you or they die, right?”

“I don’t care.” He did. “I’m just surprised you don’t.”

“It’s none of your business. You’re not involved in any of this.” The look on Eva’s face was stormy. Uh oh. What did Lorcan do this time? “Opal would’ve come to us, you know. We protected her from threats just like this.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” because wow was that a can of worms Lorcan knew better than to open by now. “Osiris doesn’t really trust other necromancers these days.”

“And what do you get out of this?” Belial asked.

These two didn’t know about the crown being in danger (or were at least pretending not to). They might actually be on board with Lorcan’s plan to maybe destroy the thing if he got the chance. But could he trust them? Could he trust Eva to sit still and wait until Lorcan knew breaking the crown wouldn’t blow up the city? Belial not to decide Lorcan was a liability himself?

“They paid me,” is what he said, and apparently Lorcan had not learned his lesson about Eva, because he couldn’t help adding, “Turns out rich people were always able to do that.”

“Shut the fuck up. What does Osiris even think you can do to help them anyways? You’re nothing. You couldn’t even defend yourself, let alone them.”

Eva’s words didn’t worry Lorcan. What worried him was the way she fingered the neck of her guitar as she said them.

He’d have to tread lightly. “You don’t have to understand why, but Osiris does trust in my ability to deal with this issue. Messing with me could look like…” He reached for the right phrase. “A challenge to their authority.”

“That’s only a problem if someone tells them,” Belial said, and Lorcan’s stomach dropped. “And we can take care of that easily.” Ze flicked hir eyes over towards the realtor.

“Hold on. Do you really want to do this?”

“I do.” Eva’s eyes flashed. “Maybe it’ll teach Osiris to pick a better protector.”

Well. He’d known all along this was going to end in a fight, hadn’t he? Lorcan inched his backpack off his shoulder. He handed the whole thing, with Vulcan inside, over to the realtor. Just inside Osiris’s barriers. “Keep him safe, please,” he told her.

“Yes, keep it safe, shade,” Eva said. “How’s the sorry excuse for a mage going to fight without his familiar?”

“Tough words from someone who can’t let go of a guitar haunted by someone else’s thrall,” he said.

“Hey, I don’t need it. I’ll fight you a capella if you need the reminder,” she declared, setting her guitar with care on the manicured lawn next to her. That care disappeared as she strode forward, with a raspy hum that rattled his bones.

Minus the bone-rattling, it was exactly what he was hoping to goad her into. “We don’t have to do this,” he said. He needed her to get just a little closer.

“Oh?” The word echoed in his ears, dancing in and out and in and out. He swayed on his feet–for a second it felt like the ground was bucking underneath him. “How do you plan to defend Osiris if you’re not even willing to fight?”

His heart stuttered, carried through five beats at once by that last vowel. “I was going to let Osiris handle that part, actually,” he grunted in response. “They don’t need my protection.”

“Why are you here, then? Did it finally hit the almighty Crown that they can’t just carry on as a one-gestalt army? It must have stung to need help from someone as pathetic as you.” She leaned in with a sneer.

“Osiris doesn’t need me,” Lorcan said. He pulled a bedazzled scallop shell out of his pocket with his free hand and tossed it in Eva’s direction. “And they don’t need you either!”

And Eva. Fell. Silent.

Not from his words. Because Lorcan had just used a shell enchanted by his sister’s familiar, a magical mollusc with a talent for stealing voices. The singer’s hand went to her throat. The guitar behind her, forgotten, for just a moment.

And god, if he could just get her to listen–“Look, I didn’t know Opal. But just because I have some skepticism whether she deserved your loyalty doesn’t make me the bad guy. Sometimes our friends suck. It happens.”

Eva didn’t respond, obviously. He doubted the message would sink in, but if he was really lucky she might be rattled enough to leave.

A sharp pain pierced through his outstretched arm. Ulnar nerve, Lorcan thought, and whipped his head over to Belial.

“A voice-stealing hex,” ze said, tattoo now glowing, vivid in the dark of the night.

Lorcan felt at the arm carefully. Everything from the elbow down was frozen, wouldn’t bend. He hid his concern with a casual shrug. “It’ll fade eventually.”

“You said you couldn’t win a fight against us. And that you weren’t going to lie tonight.”

Fucking hell. “I didn’t,” he said. “I can’t win a fight against you. Not my fault you assumed I wouldn’t come prepared anyways.”

“Prepared to fight against us.” And there was that threat assessment, working against Lorcan now. He’d caught them by surprise, and that wasn’t always a good thing. It meant he could do it again.

So, he did. Lorcan flipped the glass filter over the front of his flashlight, and the beam of light that came out looked brighter, healthier. The grass seemed to drink it in where it fell.

“Sunlight,” Lorcan said. “I brought it here to deal with Gravelord, but it’ll work on you, too. Let me explain: I am a time wizard. I can make anything break. How long do you think your tattoos will last in direct sunlight? The pigments dissolve. The colors fade.”

“You think you’d take me out in one attack? Your magic can’t be that strong.” Hir eyes had narrowed, uncertain. Belial didn’t know anything about Lorcan’s time magic, he’d wager.

But bluffs were a last resort. Scorched earth. It worked or you died. Tonight he had to play the long game.

“It’s not,” he admitted. “If we fought, you’d win. But I’d make you hurt for it. You two noticed Osiris slipping–how long until your rivals start wondering who else has weaknesses to exploit? Can you afford to be rusty? After all,” Lorcan added, enunciating each word, “tattoos take so much time to touch up.”

Ze took a single step back, and glanced over to Eva.

She’d picked up her guitar, mouth set in a snarl. A chord filled the air, then another. Lorcan felt his heart rate pick up, palms sweating, then two sets of skeletal finger bones formed in the air. One flew to Lorcan’s right leg and…strummed, phalanges passing straight through Lorcan’s flesh and setting every fiber of muscle in his calf to vibrate.

He kept from letting out the yelp of pain but couldn’t stop the convulsions from taking him to the ground. His focus was on the flashlight, keeping it gripped tight, which is why he didn’t notice the second set of fingers until they grabbed for his throat.

Eva made two mistakes there. First was not going after the flashlight so Belial could back her up. The second was overlooking the bone necklace tucked under Lorcan’s shirt. It reacted to the ghostly presence, coming alive to wrap around Lorcan’s throat like a protective snake. The fang of the pendant darted out, batting away the hand for a moment.

Lorcan looked back to Vulk, set on the ground just inside Osiris’s wards. He nodded.

Sometimes he and his kid had trouble communicating, Lorcan knew. But every now and then they were perfectly in sync. Vulcan’s cord whipped into the ground, his plug sinking directly into the boundary line of Osiris’s wards.

Vulk could sense magical energies like ley lines, ambient energy, and wards. And with a strong enough source of magic, he could also tap them.

The lava lamp lit up, overcharged and magically luminous. Everything inside his radius was hit all at once with the anti-necromantic energies of Osiris’s aquascape defense. It tore the ghost hands off Lorcan in an instant like leaves in a river’s rapids. The bones flew apart, losing coherence until they simply faded into the night.

Familiars one, haunted thralls zero.

Lorcan pushed himself up. Eva couldn’t use her guitar’s magic against him inside the protective radius, and Belial’s paralytic tattoo curses wouldn’t reach him either. But his left arm was still frozen, and Vulk couldn’t keep this up long. He had to take Eva out of the fight for good.

The not-bluff he used on Belial wouldn’t work on her. Eva was angry, and Lorcan knew anger could make the future seem inconsequential. No, he’d need an equally emotional target.

He stood up to his full height, raised the hand holding the flashlight to rub at his own neck. It was a perfectly natural action after nearly getting strangled. He hoped Eva didn’t notice the way he lingered on his bone necklace, stiff and lifeless inside the anti-necromantic light.

Her mouth moved. She’d really forgotten that her voice was missing, huh?

“What’s that?” Lorcan asked. He didn’t even have to try to give it just the right mocking tone to set Eva off. “I can’t hear you. Speak up.”

She stalked closer, possibly planning to beat the shit out of him with her bare hands. Lorcan was sure she could. He stepped forward, out of the light.

Like the scorpion bracelet, Lorcan’s bone necklace was magically inert until the right conditions were met. It animated when exposed to necromantic energy. The red ink of a dark curse worked well enough.

The necklace, following his mental commands, slid down his left arm and wrapped itself tight between paralyzed fingers. Lorcan launched himself at Eva.

A summoned hand passed straight through his gut, and Lorcan was definitely going to be feeling that later, but in the meantime he let the toothy pendant arc right at the guitar.

Magical objects were usually warded against serious damage, and Eva’s guitar was no exception. She should have remembered time magic ripped straight through those wards. The fang scraped across the body of the guitar with a keening screech, and Eva froze in place.

It lasted only a moment–a single strum summoned another bone hand to shove Lorcan to the ground–but even after she’d gained space Eva simply held the guitar in front of her, staring at the gash in the guitar’s perfect ivory coating.

“That’s one hit,” Lorcan said in the silence that fell after. “And if I got close once, I can do it again. You’d risk a lot to fight me, but are you willing to risk that? It is your only reminder of your dear departed friend.”

Belial let out a shocked whistle. Without a voice to speak words, Eva seemed only to be able to give Lorcan an open-mouthed stare.

“I told Belial,” was all he said. “I can make it hurt.”

Eva looked at her guitar. Rage, heartbreak, grief warring on her face. Finally, she whirled in the grass and stormed away, boots stomping heavy footprints in the grass.

As Lorcan picked himself off the ground, Belial said, “Don’t think that trick’ll work when Osiris gets tired of you. They won’t let you get close.”

“I’m aware.” He didn’t relax until both of them had disappeared, and Vulcan’s glow could finally fade.

Shoulders drooping, Lorcan turned to the realtor. “They’re not looping back around?”

“Not as far as the other shades can see,” she told him.

“Good.” He reached for his stomach, which very much wanted to hurl all over Osiris’s perfect lawn. Whether that was from the fight or the gut-scrambling, Lorcan couldn’t say. “You paid attention to the spells they cast, yeah? Did any of it look like what our mystery assailant’s been using?”

“You let yourself get cursed on purpose?”

He snorted. “Don’t give me that much credit.”

The realtor thought a moment. “No, actually. We’ve seen strange fog, cloaked figures, some sort of ghost lights. You think they’re telling the truth about not being involved?”

“I think so.” They could still be playing a long game, but, “They’d be risking a lot if they were connected somehow. Showing their faces, letting us go. Ugh,” he groaned, “I really don’t like the idea of Gravelord being my best suspect.”

“What’s wrong with Gravelord?” Vulk asked, and well. Lorcan didn’t want to talk about that with Vulcan, of all people. The kid knew way too much about the context.

“Later. Maybe,” he said, picking up the lamp. They’d have to clean the mulch out of his prongs when they got home.

“So that’s how a time wizard fights,” the realtor remarked, shaking him from his thoughts. “It’s surprisingly effective.”

Lorcan breathed in. “Time is slow,” he said. “It doesn’t break things all at once, it just grinds them down bit by bit. But it never stops.”

She nodded, giving him a studying look. “We appreciate your help tonight, Mr. Verdigris. I don’t think those two would have left us unscathed.”

And how was he supposed to reply to that? ‘No problem’? He’d only risked his life against two angry killers armed with dark magic, after all. “Call me Lorcan,” he finally said.

“Jennifer Lynn,” she told him. “But don’t take it personally if I say I hope we don’t have to meet again.”

He didn’t. He preferred it, actually. Jennifer Lynn…she was something like a spirit, in a situation that Lorcan, being a living breathing human person, couldn’t understand. She had a sense of pride that, despite it all, he did sympathize with. She was a decent person to be acquainted with.

Lorcan might not be able to solve her problems with Osiris. Not yet. But he could feel a little bit proud, himself, of what he’d done tonight. For once, he’d done something good.

[daveshevett]

Virtuscope Cyberdeck Build

New Post has been published on https://planet-geek.com/2022/08/22/stuff-n-bother/virtuscope-cyberdeck-build/

Virtuscope Cyberdeck Build

Somewhere in the 2nd year of the pandemic, I stumbled across a posting on Hackster.io about a design for a ‘Cyberdeck’.

A what now?

For those who don’t know, the term Cyberdeck was coined by William Gibson (the inventor of the terms “Cyberpunk” and “Cyberspace” by the way) to describe a piece of computing equipment used to to jack into the net in the future. These fictional machines were basically the hot rods of the grunge tech and hacker scene, able to do anything from simple education stuff all the way to allowing a talented hacker to penetrate the most well protected systems out in cyberspace. They were fast, personalized tech that marked the owner as someone serious about hacking.

BootDSC’s Original Cyberdeck Design

I’ll admit, I’ve read everything by William Gibson, Neal Stephenson (you know, the guy who actually invented the term ‘metaverse’?), Bruce Sterling, and Philip K Dick. In particular, Gibson’s portrayal of Ono-Sendai decks that could jack into and surf cyberspace are well wedged in my psyche. The idea of building and customizing my own ‘deck was too good a concept to pass up, so I took the plunge.

The Printer

There are basically 3 major components to a build like this. The case, the keyboard, and the computer. While it’s possible to build your own keyboard and computer, I wasn’t ready for all that, so I used off the shelf parts for that. The case, however, I’d manufacture myself.

The first phase of this was to get my 3d printer up and running again. I’d been doing a bunch of printing, learning the ropes as it were on how to use TinkerCAD and Cura to take a shape and turn it into a Real Live Thing. I built a healthy respect for people who operated industrial equipment. 3d printing isn’t a push a button, get an object system. It requires constant tinkering, adjusting, repair, and fiddling to keep it all working, and there’s a million small ‘tricks’ you learn in the process to keep a 3d printer running smoothly. It’s a good feeling when you can get your system dialed into the point where you can just power it up, prep the surface, and say “PRINT THIS”, and it works.

Some smooth first layer porn.

My printer (a Creality CR10) had been acting twitchy for a while. I’ve used it for a couple projects in the past, but nothing serious in the last year or two. The problem(s) turned out to be a combination of bad bed levelling, bad bed prep, and a completely horked print nozzle. Once I got those straightened out, I was printing clean, flat prints without any fiddling. I was ready!

The Design

I have to give full credit to BootDSC and the full on Virtuscope design on Thingiverse. This was my first exposure to decks, and I immediately went “I WANT ONE”. Fortunately, the Cyberdeck Cafe website had an entire build page that details all the parts needed. I set up my printer and started printing components, dove into Amazon and various websites to order the parts needed.

Printing the frame, hinges, panels, and other components took about a week. In that time, some of my components had started to arrive, most importantly the Raspberry Pi 4 that was to be the heart of the system, as well as a Geekworm X728 LIPO battery/power module. Screen, keyboard, and other componentry arrived over the next few days.

Display portion of the lid

Gluing the base panels together

This was my first decent ‘build from scratch’ project, and I learned early on I was missing a lot of build supplies. M3 screws and nuts, bolts, a good rotary tool (I had been using an old Craftsman tool I bought 30 years ago? But it died a horrible death partway through the build. The Ryobi rotary tool is excellent, though it really does sound like a dentist drill while in operation).

Eventually I had all the pieces I needed, and I could get on with the build.

I wanted to make one relatively large change – I wanted to use a touchscreen. The 7″ HDMI display I used has a ‘mouse’ function in it that connects to the Pi via USB cable. The problem though is fitting it into the lid of the deck was problematic. I ended up redesigning the lid to give it more ‘depth’ to allow the driver board and cabling to fit. Probably my first real 3d design project – I also had to redesign the component bay lid to make room for the new larger lid and hinge. Multiple prints later, it all fit together the way I wanted it to.

Bench testing the display and controller and realizing the lid needed to be deeper.

This is one of those projects that will really never end. I’m constantly modifying the design, adding new components, removing others. I found that the power connection setup on the back was really awkward, so I designed and printed a USB-C port to go in the opening. This means the whole thing can be recharged via USBC cable, or just run off a power adapter. Win!

I also ran into a problem with the touchscreen USB cable, which, as it came from the supplier, had a 6′ long cable with a ferrite core on it. I picked up a kit to allow me to truncate the cable and put a new end on it, but it turns out I got the wrong connectors. So I ended up just chopping the cable in half and soldering it into an older USB-A jack. I only need about a foot of cable, so that worked great.

The Final Product

I love how this looks. I love knowing that I built it, and there’s no other one thats just like it.

So what’s next?

There’s still stuff to do though:

The keyboard setup (a Royal Kludge RK61 USBC / Bluetooth keyboard), while fitting perfectly into the case, I find sort of difficult to work with. The ‘modifier’ keys are awkward and easy to get confused, and as it sits now, I can’t run it off USB while in the case. I have to pull it to recharge it and reconnect via USB.

The rear panel needs more love. The system is supposed to support a secondary Wifi interface to allow it to run Aircrack-NG and other tools without taking down the primary interface. I have the parts, but haven’t put it all together.

Finding the final location for the ‘stack’ (CPU and power board) is proving slightly problematic, as I need space for the USB connections and other wiring. Until that’s locked down, I really can’t mount the boards. I may jsut drill and mount them anyway to keep things from banging around.

Still need to get hte lid closures working – this can be done with a magnetic plate, but it seems a little iffy. May come up with something else.

Mouse input. Sigh. I had hoped the touch screen would work for this, but it really doesn’t. The screen is small (7″) and my finger is fat. I may explore using a stylus, but I think I’ll need some sort of trackball or thumbwheel or something.

Viewing angle – this may be the killer for me. For the lid / screen to work well, the viewing angle has to be relatively laid back. To do that, the hinge and cabling need to be very flexible, and finding that space is mighty hard. If I can’t solve the viewing angle problem, this will be likely remain a toy project, and not something I can use seriously.

Conclusions

I LOVED doing this project. It looks cool, I can say “I BUILT THAT” and I can keep tinkering and making it better. The Pi4 is enough horsepower to have fun on it, while still having decent battery life. Once I get the mobility stuff fixed up, I’ll start carting it around more.