#I've done my troubleshooting... It's not on my end

[northwestofinsanity]

Ray-rah, CSC Serviceworks, your laundry management app absolutely sucks. (And that's the PG version of my opinion)

Sincerely, a tired veterinary student with a final exam coming up, who is now in a sketchy Laundromat across town paying extra to do laundry, and trying to study, because your app declined my credit card five times (despite the fact that it is fully paid off and doesn't expire in two years, despite that I've used it before, and oh, by the way, I called the company and they said they approved it on their end, and your system is reverting it), so now I can't add to my account to start machines in the laundry facility at my apartment... This when it's already a game to find out if your network will be up so I can scan a machine to start every week. God only knows why my HOA switched their system to yours when you're ranked an F by the Better Business Bureau, according to my online searches. Your online chat is useless, and my attempts are telling me that the reviews saying your call line puts people on hold for over an hour to go nowhere are accurate.

[macabr3-barbi3]

CTRL ALT DELETE- Task Manager (Vox/Reader)

Something's up with Vox and you offer to help troubleshoot- it both does and does not go how you're expecting it to.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/54688282

The least serious thing I've ever written: inspired by the time i started a timer in class one day to see how long my teacher talked about her son instead of teaching us; i ended up realizing 4 months later that i never stopped the timer and it was just running in the background and making my shit slow that entire time lmao there's a screenshot in the ao3 notes

Tags: Stress Relief, Sexual Tension, Chair Sex, Vaginal Fingering, Begging, Computers. Dirty Talk, very basic knowledge of computers

<3<3<3<3<3<3

Your new boss seemed stressed. 

Not in the usual way that he was stressed, either- the note from the assistant you had replaced was that usually when Vox was having an off day he would call for Valentino or have you pull a list of low earners for the month, banishing you from the room in either case. But he hadn’t spent any time with Val in months, basically the entire time that you’d been working with him as a personal assistant after getting promoted from a stage grunt for the news channel.

You had thought for a bit that he might make a move- that maybe that was why he promoted you, that he was charmed enough by you to end the on/off thing he had going on with Val, which made sense based on the timing. But when you tested that theory recently- made double entendres, brushed your hands against his arms or leg or back, blatantly invited him out for dinner and drinks- he didn’t seem interested. He declined your invite, allowed you to touch him without being overcome with lust, and the sex jokes just seemed to go whoosh. 

Right over his head. 

He was on edge and twitchy. He took longer to respond to things than he normally did, his processors slow, occasionally getting a ‘buffering’ message that flashed across his screen when someone asked a question. His hypnotic eye seemed to be suffering as well, the swirls having slowed down now to the point that they were no more mesmerizing than watching paint dry. It was frustrating and enraging him, and in turn frustrating you- he was fucking hot when he was angry, which didn’t help your attraction to him that he was ignoring. 

He was sitting at his desk in the control room when you entered, head in his hands as he stared at a piece of paper on his desk. The monitors were all lit behind him, showing recorded footage of the Tower throughout the day- you spotted a short recording of yourself talking to some of the marketing team a few hours ago. Like a Valentino caricature he read the paper, blinked his eyes a couple times, read it again. Picked it up and pulled it closer to his face like that would help, and his screen scrolled the words along the bottom like his internal system was trying to transcribe it so something he could understand. He finally dropped the paper with a groan, letting it flutter to the floor where it slipped under his chair and stopped just before you. 

“Are you okay, sir?” The question is out before you can stop it, and as was the normal recently it took a few minutes for him to answer. 

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” he muttered, swiveling around to look at you. He clutched the sides of his screen, eyes narrowed and mouth delayed in its movements as he spoke. “I feel like I can’t focus on anything. I can’t process anything. My- just, fucking everything is slow and useless in my head right now! How am I supposed to be a master media manipulator when I can’t fucking concentrate for more than two minutes at a time?”

“You have seemed more… stressed than usual,” you agree. “Are none of your usual relaxing activities helping? Or have you done any troubleshooting?”

He raises an eyebrow. “Pardon?”

“Troubleshooting,” you say again, and at his blank stare you chuckle a little. “You know, doing a couple ‘quick fix’ things to see if that’s what’s causing the problem. Do you have like, a cache or something that you have to clear? An archive dump to get rid of old files?” You let your eyes track his body from top to bottom. “I’m not super familiar with how your… anatomy works?”

God, but you wanted to be.

He blinks a couple times. “I think I used to have someone that did that for me,” he says. “Years ago. I fired them because it didn’t seem necessary, I was running perfectly fine.”

“Yeah, well, that might be what the problem is.” You offer him a soft smile. “Sometimes stuff will work in sub-optimal conditions for a while before it starts causing issues. I used to do programming customer support when I was alive- it’s been a while but I could take a look if you want?”

His mouth twists in a frown. “I guess so,” he agrees. “I’m desperate enough to try anything. I need to be able to fucking concentrate if the Vees are gonna stay on top, everyone fucking knows that Val is hopeless with the business aspect of everything.” He gets the buffering symbol on his screen for a few seconds, groaning and shaking his head as he clears. “What do you need access to?”

“Do you have a way to access your… system? Externally,” you clarify. “I’m not a surgeon- I don’t plan on cutting into you to get to anything.”

Vox gestures behind him. “I can hook up to the monitors,” he says, “but we’ll have to be pretty close, doll. I have to be sitting here to be hooked up, and since this is the only chair, looks like this will have to be your seat.” He pats a hand on his thighs, not so much an invitation as a statement.

You fucking wished. You know this isn’t him trying to initiate anything though- you’d been trying for long enough that you’re ready to give it up and just accept that your hot, overlord boss didn’t want to fuck you. Helping him out felt more important than that anyway, so you would do your best.

“You got it,” you say, and cross the remaining space to perch yourself gracefully on his lap. You push the inappropriate thoughts about how firm his muscles are underneath you- how exactly did this man’s body work? Was it really just his head that was not organic matter?- and let him rotate the chair back to face the monitors.

The sight is intimidating, as is the position- you’re surrounded by reflections of yourself from every angle, Vox’s lithe frame seated behind you. This is where he does most of his business, the background site of everything that VoxTec handles. And he’s trusting you to help him fix whatever is wrong with him so he can get back to handling all of that, free of distraction.

You watch as thick wires come up from the floor to plug into the back of his head, the sharp hiss making you wonder if it was painful or intrusive. You won’t ask though, not when you’re getting ready to try to restore him to his usual ruthless self; he might consider that to be prying.

He pulls something up on the main monitor, the one that sits directly across from you, and waves a hand to it. A little keyboard and mouse emerge from the desk as the monitor powers on, and when you glance back you can see the same thing reflected on his face. “Have at it,” you hear him say, even though you can’t see his mouth moving.

Ignoring his open programs for the time being in case he needs any of them, the first thing you do is go in and clear his archived files. He’s got entire terabytes of useless information; employee records for people that have been dead or fired for decades; funny videos that he saved; resources for old news stories that are no longer relevant. Some of it you help him upload to a cloud server- after explaining to him what a cloud server is- and create files to designate for actual important shit.

You find the internal browser that he uses to pull information on the fly and help him clear the cache and cookies.

You help him sort security footage from Vee Tower and get rid of stuff that wasn’t actually necessary, like the short bits of static and dead air that happened whenever he used the cameras to teleport around the building. Everything that he has saved about mentions of that fucking radio demon also goes into the garbage. There are some files you can’t access, things like his memories and day to day recordings of conversations and things that he personally is part of. 

You delete what you can and empty the recycling bin.

As the process has gone on, Vox has relaxed more and more behind you. “I still don’t feel completely back to normal,” he murmurs, “but this is already loads better. It’s like a massage directly on my brain. You know, if I still physically had one.”

You hit the keys to open his task manager- CTRL ALT DELETE. “Unholy fuck- Jesus, sir, if you thought that was good this is gonna feel orgasmic,” you say absently, scrolling through the opens apps and programs that he has running. Has this man ever closed anything? You hadn’t realized a person or device could even have so many things going at once. “Do you just leave everything open in the background?”

He peers around your shoulder, bracing his hands on your hips as he sits up a little straighter. The movement causes your stomach to drop, arousal threatening to make itself known, but you push the notion down as he sets his hands back on the arms of the chair. “I guess so?” He watches you scroll through the extensive list. “I guess it just never occurred to me to close them. Opening the programs to use is just like my stream of consciousness I suppose.”

“Kay, well, that’s stopping now.” You click on the first item on the list- VoxtaGram. “I recommend closing non-essential stuff out at least once a month. More, if you have the time to go through everything. For now, just in case, there is something important we’re gonna go through some of the more recently opened things, set them up to open automatically when you start up, before we reboot your system- wait, can we reboot your system entirely without killing you?”

“No worries there, dear. I can, I just haven’t done it in years because it can take a while to start back up afterwards.” He sneers at the social media page. “You can close that shit. Any of Velvette’s crap she can handle on her own. Same with any of the fucking games that Val loads up when he’s bored- can I delete those entirely? Or block them? Fucking moth and his blue-light addiction…”

You get through a lot of the list, Vox kind of dozing off and only passively participating in the process. You’ve got the gist of it; things like his news sources, contacts list and phone, and the notes app are staying open and set to automatically launch when he does reboot and start back up. Pretty much everything else is closed out, things he pulled up for two seconds weeks ago to check on something or another before abandoning it. You’re making excellent progress when the next thing on the list gives you pause.

“Vox? Why is this- oh my god.” You can’t help it- you start laughing, throwing your head back to rest on his shoulder as you look at what’s now displayed on the screen.

A stopwatch had apparently been started and never stopped. The elapsed time was over three thousand hours, which came out to something like four months if your mental math was correct. He had had this running constantly in the background since you had started working for him, possibly even before. “I think I found the problem,” you chuckled, and his eyes were narrowed as he looked at the timer continuing to tick. “What is this?”

“What the actual fuck?” He buffers for a second- and you’re pleased to note that it’s already much faster than it has been lately- before you hear a dinging sound coming from him. ‘Fucking Hell, I should have known this was all Valentino’s fault.” He drags a clawed hand down his screen in an imitation of a facepalm. “I was timing him. He was fucking ranting about Angel Dust again while we were in a strategy meeting with Velvette- I had the stopwatch going to see how much of the hour session he wasted talking about that whore. I must have forgotten to turn it off.” He barks out a laugh, throwing his head back with the force of it while you look at him with amusement. “I’m gonna owe you big time for this, doll, you’re a lifesaver.”

You close the app out with a smile. “Just trying to help,” you say. “I think that was probably the worst of it- do you want to just try rebooting now?”

He lets out a groan when the app closes, and the sound shoots through your body straight to your core. “Go for it, hun,” he says, eyes closed as he leans back against the chair. “I think I’m good to go now, but it can’t hurt. You were right, sorting this shit out feeling fucking good.”

You’re suddenly very aware of the dampness of your panties as you bypass ‘kinda horny’ straight to ‘fuck me on this desk.’ You scold yourself mentally: Don’t jump your boss. He’s trusting you to help him right now- do not take advantage of that. Do not ride his leg like you very clearly want to because his voice is fucking hot. Fucking focus.

You clear your throat, closing out the task manager and hitting the button to restart him. “See you in a bit, sir.”

You stay seated on his lap just in case- he might still have something he wants you to do when he comes back online, some settings you could apply to close out things that are used for more than a week or so. It’s definitely not because you like the feeling of his strong thigh underneath you, tantalizingly close to your cunt if you, by chance, decided to tilt your hips forward and start grinding down on him. 

After just a few minutes get a message on the main monitor telling you to wait a moment- things start popping up on the other screens surrounding the central one, and it takes you a moment to recognize the pattern.

Its all videos of you- shot from Vox’s perspective, and a mortifying blush takes over your face. They’re all the moments that you had tried coming onto him. The innuendos and subtle entendres, the times that you touched him, pressed yourself against him in a tight space despite having another way to get to the copy machine, when you had invited him out for dinner. There’s also videos where he had just been watching you, apparently, taken from a distance as you spoke with Velvette or passed instructions along to a member of the team or discreetly tried to hide behind a vending machine when you noticed  Val coming into a room. 

There’s a satisfied grumble behind you, and before you can turn to look at him Vox has settled his claws onto either side of your waist and shifted you over a bit, to rest directly on the erection straining his pants. 

Which is a surprise, albeit a pleasant one.

“Thanks for the reset, doll,” he says, and his voice is a quiet growl as he lets his hands wander from your waist to your hips and back again, claw tipped fingers catching on the fabric. “I got a chance to look at some files while I was under and found quite the treat in your logs.”

This could either be very bad or very, very good. “Sir-”

“You know, I’m usually pretty good at picking up what a woman is putting down. Imagine my surprise when I realize you’ve been coming onto me for weeks and my shit was so fucked up and bogged down that I didn’t even notice. Like that?” He uses one hand to point to a screen in the far left of the central monitor, while he snaked his other hand down to rest on your thigh, his hand large enough to encompass the muscle at the edge of your skirt. On the screen, you had come to his office to drop off meeting notes for something you attended on his behalf. You had dropped the stack as you came around his side of the desk, and got down fully on your knees to pick them up, glancing up at him through your lashes. You blush watching it now- it had seemed obvious to you even then, but watching it now, the way that Vox had seen it? When he didn’t say anything about you being face level with his prick you had used a hand on his thigh to brace yourself to stand up, letting your fingers run along the inner seam of his trousers when you rose back to standing. Still no reaction, and you had left his office equal parts turned on and irritated with yourself. Him not having acted on it had been the final nail in the coffin cementing the fact that he was not interested in the slightest.

You let out a weak exhale as the Vox sitting under you gets his other hand in the same position as the first, using his grip to ever so slightly spread your legs on his lap. He lets his fingers skim your inner thighs and you shake with the effort of not begging him to just touch you. This was delicious, agonizing torture.

“Had I been in my right mind for that display, baby, I would have fucking ṛ̣̬̫̍͌ͩ͟ụ̴̴̾̀͟͡i̧̻̻͉̜͑ͪ̾͟n̫̫̘̗͕̲̲̎ͥḛ̡̰̳��̥ͬ͋ͪͧd̶̵̯̯̼̘ͨ̓ y͙͙̪̰ͫ͌́o͙͙̙̘̙ͤͫ͞ụ̴̴̾̀͟͡.” His voice crackles and glitches on the last words, and the sound of it forces a moan from your throat as you let your head fall back. You clutch your hands to the arms of the chair as his tongue- and who even really knew he had a tongue, what the fuck?- licks down the side of your jaw and at your exposed neck. “I would have had you choking on my cock before getting a taste of that sweet cunt and fucking you into the desk for hours.”

One hand finally slips under the edge of your skirt and you shiver when his fingers make contact with your soaked core. “Is that what you want now, babygirl? You want me to give you my cock as thanks for helping to set me straight? To make up for lost time?” He slides a finger under the thin material of your panties, groaning in your ear at how slick he finds you. “That’s what I want, doll. I want you to ride me so hard you go stupid with the feeling, and you never feel whole without some part of me in your cunt for the rest of for-fucking- ḛ̡̰̳͓̥ͬ͋ͪͧv̹̹̘̼̞̻͆ͩ̓ͪ͢ḛ̡̰̳͓̥ͬ͋ͪͧṛ̣̬̫̍͌ͩ͟.”

“Fuck, please,” you gasp out, the word devolving into a cry as Vox finally slides a finger into you, mindful of the claws as he pushes in and quickly follows the first with a second. He uses his free hand to hold your hips still as you try to grind into his digits, keeps you held firmly against his erection as you squirm in pleasure.

His sharp fingertips angle to prod gently at a spot inside of you that has you seeing stars; your eyes are clenched shut as you ride the feeling, so close to the edge you feel like you’re going to implode with the force of it when you finally tip over. “Fuck, sir, please, so c-close,” you mumble, and his tongue is back to licking at whatever parts of your skin it can reach.

“You wanna come like this, sweetheart?” The main monitor in front of you glitches out, and when it comes back into focus you see yourself on the screen- like a mirror, you’re reflected, and you can see Vox’s grinning face behind you. Your skin is flushed, sweat dripping down your face, the hint of tears along your lashline as your mouth drops open when he adds a third finger. “Look fuckin’ beautiful, baby, you were made for this- maybe we give Valentino a call, he could-”

“No!” You release the arms of the chair to grab onto his wrists where his hands meet your body. “No one- no one but you, sir. Vox, please, l- let me come. Please?” You let a little whine into your voice, and you can see the way his mouth goes lax and his eyes laser-focus on where you’re grabbing at his hands.

“I didn’t mean to join us, dollface, just to record- but you’re right, you’re right.” He pulls his fingers from your pussy, slicing the center of your panties in the process before he brings his digits to his mouth- you watch on the screen as he curls his tongue around each one, licks the flavor of you from his skin and glitches out at the taste. “How could I possibly share such a fucking vision with anyone else?

He shifts you to one side so he can get his dick out, and the sight of it in the monitor, his own arousal beading at the top and rock hard, has you whimpering before it’s even inside of you. He carried himself like a man with a big cock, but Christ.

“Hope you like what you see, hun, cause it’s all yours.” He scoots forward in the seat, tilts his hips forward for the right angle, and moves you back into your previous position with ease- this time, the tip of him is pushing inside you, and you watch in the monitor as you sink inch by glorious inch onto him.

Once you’re fully seated, Vox seems to lose capability for rational thought. “Fuck me, you’re perfect,” he moans, bracing his feet more firmly on the ground to thrust up into you, getting a firm grasp on your hips to pull you down into it. The result is a beautiful stab at that sweet spot inside of you that makes you clench and cry out, watching Vox’s hypnotic eye start spiraling at its normal speed on the screen, and you can see backwards scrolling text of his stream of thoughts- a bunch of nonsensical letters and cuss words interspersed with your name. “I want to fucking- chain you to my desk so I can have this perfect pussy whenever I want it. Fuck, I can’t believe we- we could have been doing this for weeks.” He punctuates his sentence with a hard thrust.

“A-all the more reason to regularly clear your task manager, sir,” you say, so caught up in the feeling of him railing you from below that you can hardly believe you formed a coherent thought. He feels so fucking good and you’re a hair trigger away from collapsing and wringing him for all he’s got.

With one quick movement he’s shifted, and there’s a hand on your throat arching you backwards at the same time that he gets a couple clawed fingers rubbing at your clit. The shock of the combination makes you flutter around his length, a choked noise escaping your throat before he tightens his grip- not enough to really cut off your air supply, but enough that your brain starts going soft and mushy and the vice grip your cunt has on his cock gets impossibly tighter. You can see the shine of your slick arousal coating him every time he pulls out to rut back into you, and the sights and sounds are threatening to rip you into the chasm of ecstasy that you’re flirting with. 

“Vox,” you whine, “please, I’m so fucking- please please please-“ 

“Christ, babygirl, whatever you fucking want.” His eyes are wide and frantic as they watch the place you’re joined, his mouth set in a snarl as he fucks into your pliant body. The cry you release is nothing short of agonized- it’s so fucking close you can taste it, nearly overwhelmed with the tension.

“You wanna fucking cum on my cock? Do it, angel, let me see it- come on, baby, cum for me-“

Your walls clench down hard as you reach your orgasm, Vox’s grip on your throat making your vision and mind go fuzzy with the force of it as you choke on a moan that tries to escape your tensed muscles. You’re distantly aware of Vox thrusting hard into you, more praise and curses falling from his lips as he hits his peak as well, pressing his screen to the side of your face when he relinquishes his handle on your throat to clutch at your hips and grind into your cunt as he spills inside of you. The aftershocks of your release leave you twitching, milking his cock of everything he has to offer before he collapses into the chair behind you, a boneless pile of a man now simply running his hands over any bit of skin he could reach. 

It’s truly a testament to how helpful the reset and reboot had been that Vox’s system doesn’t simply crash. “Fucking Hell, I haven’t felt this good in decades,” he mutters in your ear, and you shiver at the feeling of his tongue brushing the sensitive skin.

“Ha, you think that’s the reboot or the mind-melting orgasms?”

He hums contentedly. “Jury’s out on that, doll. Guess we’ll have to do a re-run on both and see how it stacks up to this one.”

“I’ll make sure to schedule some time out for it,” you chuckle before fixing him with a stern glare through the monitor. “I’m serious about clearing your apps and shit more frequently though. Christ, you had decades of backed up shit open-“

“Don’t berate me while my dick is still inside you, fuck.” He leans you forward far enough to pull out, and you grimace at the feeling of his cum starting to spill back out of you. He notices the expression though- “Whoops, sorry,” he says, and after a quick second during which he tucks his softening prick away he scoops you into his arms, standing from the chair and stepping away from the desk. “Let’s get you cleaned up at the penthouse, angel, what do you say?”

“If you’re carrying me then lead the way.” You gesture towards the door out of the control room. “Just don’t start any timers to see how long it takes to get there or anything and we should be good.”

The glare he fixes you with shouldn’t be hot, but it fucking is. “Hardy har,” he deadpans, and rolls his eyes while he stalks towards the elevator, control room door closing behind you; but there’s a small smile on his screen despite his ire and he’s functioning normally, and when you see the little stopwatch icon pop up in the bottom right corner of his face and start counting, you can’t help but laugh.

[wanderingaldecaldo]

WIP Wheneversday

Tagged in the recent-ish past by @aceghosts @shimmer-like-agirl @merge-conflict @luvwich (twice lol) @streetkid-named-desire @nananarc.

Tagging with the usual no pressure caveat: tagbacks on all the above who tagged me :3, @sweetmage @theviridianbunny @newnamesamecharlotte @lemonlilactea @slayerdurge @blackrevell @sailorskunk @olath124 @ghostoffuturespast and anyone else who wants to share what they're working on! Art, writing, VP, modding... whatever! Do it and tag me!

Tiny Mike Modding

Tonight I am deep in the guts of this man, Scorpion Tiny Mike, trying to help out some fiends friends by giving him a torso. Just one small thing to fix.

Love Wolvenkit's new experimental feature helping troubleshoot.

Wait, what

Writing

I said I wasn't going to do another WIP Whenever until the Presidential PWP was published, but it's like. 99% of the way there. I need like three sentences max before it's Done done, so whatever, here we are. 🤷

I've had a hankering to get back to the corpo AU, and I started a lil prequel with Val and her old friend Akira. I can't share anything yet because it only exists in meatspace, so I'll settle for something I probably haven't shared from the thousands upon thousands of words written for the longfic.

Putting it after the break bc this is getting long...

For those who aren't familiar, the corpo AU takes place some time after The Sun ending. Val gets a lead on a huge corpo gig, but she'll need a partner to go undercover and guess who her best candidate is?! It's Mitch, it's always Mitch.

This WIP has been a very big challenge for multiple reasons:

I have never written the fake relationship trope

it's a slow burn and I am not known for my patience

I am not posting it until it's complete, and has been revised

#3 is the really big pain, because I want that dopamine, but also because after it's done, I want to possibly rip it up and redo it.

It’s early when Val lets herself into the Afterlife. Claire won’t be in for a few hours so she should have the place to herself. She needs to write up protocols for Crispin on handling gigs and mercs while she’s away. While she will still be reachable in an emergency, there is no reason to risk that call being intercepted and blowing their cover. The faint sound of thumping bass and scratchy synths grows louder as she approaches the back of the bar, and light seeps into the hallway from Nix’s office. The netrunner dances at his desk, tapping away at keys while his shoulders, hips, and legs keep time to the beats.  Val leans against the door frame and crosses her arms. “You here early or late?” Without turning, Nix answers, “I’m late and you are way too early, Boss Lady. Looking for my report?” “Among other things.” “I’ll email the full findings, but short of it is the identities are clean solid. Took the liberty of digging up some photos of your man Mitch. Cleaned him up and ran him through the deaging filter, slapped a suit on him. Not too shabby for an old Nomad.” At that Nix turns to look at her, and she steps into the office, joining him at the desk and peering over his shoulder. Young Mitch stares back—full head of mussed black hair, twinkling blue eyes, unlined and unscarred face. Handsome. “Huh. Nice work. Need anything from me?” “Nope, already took care of yours. Easy enough to find pics of Night City’s most famous living merc.” He grins at her and she rolls her eyes.  “Just so long as they don’t connect my face to the name.” “Speaking of names, the identities are blank. You have names you want to use?” She rests her hand on her fist as she thinks. “What are the chances we can just use Mitch’s name? That eliminates the issue of him forgetting and not responding.” Nix turns back to the terminal and clacks away at the keys as he pulls up Mitch’s files. “Aside from the obvious issue of two Mitch Andersons with the same face, it shouldn’t be a problem. The name is common enough.” “So how do we get around that? In case someone decides they want to know more about him.” Standing, Nix hums and mirrors her posture. “If they’re just doing a search on the local Data Pool, there shouldn’t be any problem. Anything deeper,” he trails off. “Got an idea. Let me do a little more digging and I’ll let you know what I find.”

[contritecactite]

Since @fandomtrumpshate starts up again soon, I thought I would babble a bit about my experience last year! Specifically, let's chat about podficcing. A nice and arbitrary 9 reasons to do the thing below the cut!

Thing 1: It's so much fun! I am bouncing up and down at the prospect of doing it again. In fact, I am planning to offer a slot for any fandom this year rather than just ones I'm familiar with!

Thing 2: Nobody was bothered by how amateurish my readings are, how basic my recordings were, or by the extra whistle and sibilance and mouth sounds that sneaked in. Nobody was annoyed that I don't do accents or intense voicework/character voices. It's something I want to improve in the future, but it's really not necessary—reading a fanwork aloud is first and foremost about making it accessible in a new format. Anything else is just icing!

Thing 3: People who want their works read are going to be communicative! The folks I worked with last year were happy to go back and forth until we decided which works were the best fit for me, and they were happy to answer my questions about how to read/interpret certain lines, etc. It was so much fun to toss around idea with them (even if we didn't end up using them all)!

Thing 4: This is a zero-entry-cost hobby (assuming you already have a device of some sort to read fic in the first place). You don't need fancy equipment and software. You can get the job done with an inbuilt audio recording app on your phone, and if you're in a quiet and non-echoey place, it can sound just as good as something made with a dedicated mic and such. Don't let "but I don't have a recording space" hold you back! Sit in your favorite chair and put your phone by your face while you read me a story. That's really all you gotta do.

Thing 5: In direct contrast... it is a good excuse to dip a toe into gear and software. There are lots of fairly cheap suitable microphones, and Audacity is free. I recorded one short fic via three different methods just to troubleshoot for fun!

Thing 6: You don't have to get it right the first time! (Or second or third or...) I save outtakes (profanity warning!) for the creators whose work I read. Sometimes a cat walked in and told me a mournful tale at top volume. Sometimes the neighbors turned on a leaf blower. You can even get silly with it on purpose if you need to warm yourself up! I do a lot of yelling "this is so silly and I am so embarrassed!" into the mic before I try a serious read.

Thing 7: You get to spend so much time with a work and its characters! You're gonna read that thing so many times to make decisions and to alert yourself to what's coming next. You'll be able to recite it around a campfire and it'll feel cozy and familiar (or, you know, extra painful if it's heavily angsty).

Thing 8: If you play things back and tweak them as often as I did, it goes a long way toward getting past hating the sound of your own voice or feeling disconnected from recordings of yourself. I've always been so so shy and hesitant to speak aloud in real-life conversations. I won't claim that I'm completely over any of those things, but spending time getting familiar with what I sound like in an objective, task-oriented setting has helped me learn to listen for my own vocal cues when I'm feeling too overwhelmed to process other kinds of feedback. I'm much more aware of what my uncertainty sounds like, for example, and am better able to cover for it now.

Thing 9: If you're also a writer as I am, it helps you look at your own writing through a new lens! I have been known to write 50+-word sentences, but now I (sometimes) stop to consider the punctuation breaks. How readable is this paragraph? Where would I take a breath if I were reading? Where would the emphasis naturally end up and how do I change that of it's not what I wanted?

I think people who are Better At Things might not necessarily have all the same experiences I shared here, but personally, I'm grateful for the opportunity, and I look forward to doing it again!

Here are the works I read for FTH last year:

Evil Plans by Sodium_Azide

The Night The World Didn't End by Aethelflaed

and the one that belongs to the earlier outtakes:

It Came Upon a Midnight Clear by my dear friend QuothTheMaiden, who still seems to like me just fine even though there's a terrible whine behind the whole thing (this was the troubleshooting fic btw. Software updated and defaulted to the wrong device, but I picked the better read over the better sound quality in the end).

[midnight-mourning]

cannot BELIEVE I forgot my ass was shadowbanned 😭😭

like I deadass remember it being an issue when I first started the blog, looked into it, realized I'm probably just screwed, and forgot about it

shout out to @luckyyyduckyyy for unintentionally reminding me of the issue, just sent a report to tumblr so maybe there's hope??

anyway, if you DO end up seeing this post I guess this is a PSA that you may just have to check my blog actively if you want to see stuff from me?? that's probably annoying but I'm sorry y'all I don't know what else to do, I think I've done all other troubleshooting :')

[shunin-gumis]

Nagi initial SSR Story

A Taste of Happiness (Part 1)

Please note that this story has some spoilers on Nagi's background (about his luck) that's related to the L4mps main story!

I've used Momiji as MC's name, Chief is their title.

Any notes with a * are at the end of the post.

Location - Flower Laundry

Momiji: It's a good thing we had our meeting near 'Flower Laundry'. This coffee stain should come off easily.

Momiji: I should check on Yachiyo-kun tomorrow, he apologized so many times he almost made a dent in the ground grovelling.

Momiji: Good morning Nagi-ku-

Nagi: Welcome...

Momiji: Huh!?

Momiji: Wha- you're clearly not ok, how did this happen!?

Nagi: I was just working as usual.

Nagi: But earlier, one of the customers I made a flower arrangement for gave me some sweets as thanks, so I was about to take a break, but all of a sudden a hamster was running towards me.... ah, it's not just any hamster, it's probably Machiko, the one that the kindergarten nearby takes care of.

Nagi: Anyways, I tried my best to get out of Machiko's way, but then I noticed the trampoline that Akuta's group had left here...

Nagi: I ended up landing on it and bounced back all the way up through the ceiling for a homerun.

Momiji: I think I got the gist... I'll get you down now!

Nagi: Phew... you saved me, I owe you my life.

Sonia: You also saved our ceiling! Thank you very mush~

Momiji: Don't mention it, I got the coffee stain off cleanly thanks to you.

Nagi: I'm glad if I was able to help you in any way.

Nagi: I'm sorry that I can't keep you company any longer though, Chief.

Nagi: The deliveries and other work I was supposed to get done got delayed, so I should head out soon...

Momiji: If you don't mind, I could help you out? I drove the company van here.

Momiji: I'm all done with my work today, it should be ok as long as I just shoot Kafka a message.

Nagi: Are you sure?

Nagi: Ah, but there's been a warning for a weather bomb since morning. You might get dragged into a lot of trouble because of my unlucky predisposition*

Momiji: Haha, that's not a problem at all! In fact, it'll probably give me a lot of practice for future troubleshooting. Bring it on!

Nagi: ...Thank you. Then, I'll take you up on your kind offer.

Nagi: Can I ask you to help with the deliveries first-

A scary person: Hey you!! Pay back your debt already!!

Nagi: I'm terribly sorry, I'll pay back the interest first, how much is it?

Momiji: Wait! Don't take out your wallet!!

----------------------

Momiji: ...The delivery ended safely. But Nagi-kun's trouble encounter rate really is impressive.

Momiji: First it was the loan shark who came to collect a debt at the wrong place-

Momoji: Everything's loaded. Where do we have to take them?

Nagi: The shopping mall is up first.

Nagi: There's several new stores opening soon, so they requested the deliveries. We can split up the load once we get there.

------------------

Construction worker: Sorry, there's construction underway here, please take a detour.

Momiji: We literally just passed through here earlier though!?

-----------------

Momiji: Then we'd been forced to take a detour because of sudden construction work, and after that...

Momiji: A random elementary school student challenged us to a race, pizza crusts came flying at us out of nowhere, I barely had time to catch my breath with everything going on.

Momiji: It must be really difficult if he has to go through this every time a weather bomb happens....

Nagi: ..............

Nagi: .....Chief, we should go stock up on flowers next.

Nagi: The weather app shows that the atmospheric pressure has stabilized now, so nothing bad should happen like before, it should be smooth sailing from here. Let's go on my bike.

Nagi: Here's a helmet, wear it tight.

Sonia: Nagi-shan, Chief-shan, pleash be careful.

Sonia: I've packed the usual tools in your bag, pleash take it with you!

Nagi: Thank you, Sonia... We'll be back.

*Nagi has a predisposition that makes him attract misfortune whenever he's feels happy.

Nagi uses the weather app to track sudden changes in atmospheric pressure/weather bombs because that's his way of knowing he's going through a "luck rebound"

Part 2

[flagellant]

Uhhh the first one because your writing is beautiful and hearing the process and history behind it would be really cool

I've been writing and reading for p much as long as I can remember to the extent that basically all my memories of childhood and early teenagedom is just doing that. I started taking writing poetry much more seriously several years ago--I'd done it casually on occasion since about middle school (I'm hitting 30 soon) but it just became sort of a therapeutic thing. Communication has, ironically, always been my biggest struggle, because I so rarely know how to understand what I'm feeling.

Poetry, to me, is essentially a form of being able to examine myself through the act of externalizing it for a theoretical audience. It's kind of like an emotional rubber ducky troubleshooter. All of my poems and the vast majority of my writing--which honestly these days I tend to see as poetry regardless, at least I write it as such--are just written in a single sitting at once and then posted immediately. I have aphantasia and so it's very rare I know exactly where I'm going with something until I find it. The same goes with endings. Sometimes I dunno when it ends until I keep writing and then realize where the ending is. I used to feel weirdly guilty about it but these days I kinda just love the journey of it and the sense that everything I write is always at least a little bit of a mystery for me as well as any reader. We're both finding the meaning and the message and the destination as we arrive at it, yknow?

Is this an efficient or traditionally correct way to write? Absolutely not oh my god. But it's what lets me write so I'm gonna defend it :3

[allthingslinguistic]

Language Guinea Pig Diaries #2: Highlights & Troubleshooting

I'm trying to improve my skills at four languages in preparation for summer travel: Italian, Dutch, Finnish, and Estonian.

Italian and Dutch I've studied a bit a while ago and I'm now trying to "activate" so I can hopefully have a conversation or two in them, while Finnish and Estonian I'm trying to pick up some rudimentary bits in. Here's the previous post in this series describing these goals and strategies in more detail.

Highlights

I've progressed from my menu of only gelato-making videos in Italian to other recipes in general, and in particular to lots of cooking videos from this popular Italian home cooking channel which was in the recommended videos after another one I watched. Maybe I'll branch out again at some point to other speakers, but for now it's nice to be able to stumble into more videos without having to think up new keywords to search. Also, I might need to make some of these recipes now...

The Dutch podcast listening is going well (though see weird issue below) and I especially like that the podcast I chose because it's the only podcast I knew in Dutch contains a mix of adult-to-adult and adult-and-child speech, which is a fun way to mix it up.

In Estonian, so far I have learned one (1) highly useful word, "tere", which this video tells me is an all-purpose neutral greeting (neutral with respect to both formality and time of day). Ooh, I've just realized while writing this post that it's probably cognate to Finnish "terve", a greeting I learned from Duolingo! (Yes, I just looked this up, seems like they both mean something to do with health.) So I've already learned one neat thing!

I'm also recognizing a few Estonian cognates from the Finnish Duolingo lessons, especially the verb "on" (which means "is"). I'm not recognizing many other words though, and I'm wondering how much of that is differing vocab and how much of that is not having learned many common words in Finnish yet (I've been especially chafing at how few verbs we've learned yet, it would be really useful to have a word like "I want" even if it's unanalyzed because the grammar is more complicated than they want to introduce early).

Youtube's algorithm has, after about a week, adjusted to the fact that I now want to watch videos entirely in Italian, and started recommending further Italian videos on my home feed (it was already doing so at the end of previous Italian videos). Tiktok's algorithm, so far, has not done this yet, and is still recommending me stuff in English, despite me aggressively liking basically all of the Estonian videos I watch and nothing else.

Troubleshooting

I've noticed that it's been easier to remember to do the podcast listening in Dutch and the youtube videos in Italian because I already have habits related to opening those apps, whereas I don't have habits around using tiktok so I kept forgetting to open it and look at some Estonian videos. But a couple days ago I moved the tiktok app on my phone to a more visible location, and now it's getting easier to remember.

Something else very weird that I noticed about listening is that when I play the tracks on my phone fairly loudly, it's relatively easy to focus on trying to listen to them, sometimes while playing a simple visual game on my phone for something to fiddle with (I've already noticed that unfamiliar languages need to be played louder than familiar ones). But when I beam the podcast over to my speaker at a distance, suddenly I very quickly start tuning out the unfamiliar language and opening up apps that involve reading and completely ignoring it. I have no problems listening to podcasts on speakers in English; in fact, it's my preferred method when I'm at home, but for some reason this causes my brain to reclassify Dutch as background noise to be ignored, even if it's the same loudness as it would be when it's played right near me. Super weird, has anyone else ever noticed anything like this?

Previously in Language Guinea Pig Diaries:

Summer 2024 travel plans and Language Guinea Pig Diaries

[fort-of-novelty]

Just held playtest #5 of my playing card Weird West Horror game! This time, the theme is REMOVING RULES FROM YOU GAME.

oooOOOoooo spooky I know!

But don't worry, you don't need to be afraid of removing rules. On the contrary, removing rules is a design tool in of itself.

How I learned this lesson was in my quest to improve The GM tools of my game. The tool I was tweaking was this:

Threats and Horrors

As a GM Move, the GM may foreshadow the presence of a Horror (supernatural) or Threat (mundane) in the narrative. When they do, The GM may put a playing card onto a index card labeled with tha Threat or Horror. Threats have their cards placed face-up, while Horrors have their cards placed face-down. When the maximum amount of cards is placed in the pile, the cards are used in my game's conflict resolution system against the Player Characters.

There are two major problems with my original approach:

1. It Takes Too Damn Long

Because each Threat or Horror is a separate pile and which can have a maximum of 3 or 4 cards, the GM found it difficult to naturally advance their presence. Often times we would end sessions with at least 1 Threat or Horror never even reaching its maximum! This would force the GM to work outside the guidelines of the game and just introduce the Threat or Horror's next step anyway.

2. It Kills The Suspense It's Trying to Develop

The main purpose of this system is to illicit suspense. As a player, watching a meter made of face-down cards slowly build up communicates that danger is brewing, but it also doesn't give you a lot of information. But I realized that by labeling each individual Threat or Horror, I was diminishing that suspense. Because.. it's labeled. The Players aren't stupid, they know exactly which Horror or Threat is going to appear when it reaches maximum card capacity.

So What Was the Solution?

Well, the premise of this GM tool definitely works, but the system is getting in the way of the tool's purpose. So something has to go. And I think now that I've written it out it's pretty clear what parts have to go.

Firstly, Threats and Horrors are just going to be a single meter of face-down cards. I'll let the GM choose what Horror or Threat they want to use when the meter hits maximum; whatever makes the most sense in that moment. No need to hand-hold there.

Secondly, let's do away with the labels. This is kinda already done by only have one, generalized meter, but it's worth saying that now the Players will have no clue what will happen when the card meter hits max. They just know that it'll be bad for them.

Conclusion

Don't be afraid to cut away parts of your game that are getting in the way of the narrative experience! But also, don't jump the gun and completely trash a tool. Instead, try to figure out what exactly that tool is supposed to be doing, and then troubleshoot from there.

Until next time!

[bagalois]

100 days of productivity - 6/100

jan 22, 2025.

✔ went to class ✔ washed my dishes ✔ meal prepped! ✔ put away groceries ✔ troubleshooted an issue with my fridge to my landlord

(more under the cut - warning for very long and kind of negative)

today's the first day of classes (where i'm a student)! i'm taking combinatorics, group theory, and algebraic topology.

the profs for algtop and group theory were... okay, i guess. i dont doubt they are very knowledgeable about their field, and the lecture content was all fine and good, but the presentation i fear was not so good. my algtop professor waffled on about inconsequential things that only made sense to him for probably half of the entire lecture (random jokes and pedantic clarifications that depend entirely on your specialty that, frankly, while i understand their place, the slight difference in convention between algebraists and geometers doesn't mean very much to me as somebody who is not that familiar with either field). and the group theory prof, he spoke too quietly and the entire class could barely read his handwriting.

also, i fear that i've come down with a cold or a fever, so even though i got a lot done, i felt pretty bad all day. i felt okay this morning but i still wore a mask. another grad student asked me why i was wearing one, and i told them i was worried i got exposed to some sickness, since i was feeling under the weather.

i was started to overheat and get overstimulated just from my combo prof's voice .-. and she was the only good lecturer i had today! straightforward, concise, and had briefly humorous moments that didn't detract from the rest of the lecture.

overall i've been feeling less than great, but getting as much as i have done today makes me feel better. posting, cleaning, cooking - all these things help ground me in some semblance of reality.

(begin cw: us politics)

it's probably because i'm sick, but i can't deny that trump's inauguration -- specifically how a lot of people are panicking about it -- is weighing on me. i really hate how little i know about anything. palestine-israel was what got me to seriously think about politics for the first time. of course i remember what i learned in high school history class, and as an ethnically han chinese person i paid attention to BLM and stop asian hate, but i didn't really think critically. my history classes didn't seem relevant when i was taking them, but of course they're relevant; the history is the context for what i'm living now.

eventually i was going to grow up and fend for myself and the people i care about in this country. i never realized that somehow. i have been so naive and ignorant.

it seems that everybody else has long understood what has been going on, with everything. but now my friends are panicking and i don't know what i'm supposed to worry about or not. when news articles and social media become untrustworthy, you need to rely on yourself - your own knowledge and critical thinking. unfortunately, i forgot to do that growing up...

(acknowledgement and disclaimer) i'm in a better position than most. the fact that i'm just worried about being informed is nothing compared to the others currently losing/have lost their homes, jobs, reproductive care access, their dignity (transgender inmates being forced to detransition), etc. so i don't mean to say all this to mean i'm genuinely panicking about living in trump's america. i just have a fever and i'm more stressed than i should be about the weight of my privilege and resulting responsibility if i want to call myself an ally/leftist/whatever.

(/end cw)

in any case.... i like to finish these things on a positive note so i'll keep writing.

i have to teach tomorrow morning at 8:30am :/ last time i barely spent any time reviewing/teaching summation notation to the class. i just showed them the anatomy of the notation and did one example, but for some it's their first time seeing that, so i should be spending more time on it.

after teaching, well, i wanted to sit in on riemannian geometry but if i still feel shitty tomorrow then i might just go home... i have textbook chapters to read and review so that'll keep me occupied while im not at school.

i'm taking a couple mg of melatonin as i'm writing this sentence. i need to rest. bye~

[catsafarithewriter]

Day 2: Library/Museum

Welcome to Ghibli Gardens You play as Baron, a librarian/museum curator in the sleepy little village of Ghibli Gardens. Life is predictable and routine, until a new farmer, Haru, moves in. Haru is different, in ways you cannot quite explain. She's spontaneous. Unpredictable. She's a jack of all trades, while everyone else keeps to their own hobbies - a farmer, a miner, a crafter, an adventurer - and somehow, there's something just that little bit more real about her. She's a mystery, and you're as curious as a cat.

It. Is. Done!

This is... something new, but something that I've wanted to try for a long time. Perhaps not this exact story, but I've certainly wanted to try creating a tcr narrative using a "Choose Your Own Adventure" format.

So: this is a text-based interactive story, but is very linear (there's only one ending) with a Stardew Valley meets the Stanley Parable vibe. Before you dive in, some things to note:

I haven't had a chance to troubleshoot it all the way through, but all the connections seem sound. That said, if you hit a real error (not just a scene masquerading as one) let me know, and I'll do my best to figure out the problem. This is my first attempt at sharing a cyoa story, so it'll be a miracle if the only errors are the occasional typo

At certain points, you will likely encounter an "error" page that requests you to "refresh." DO NOT REFRESH the page, but press the text choice for "refresh." Refreshing your browser will likely lose all progress

At certain points you may encounter a variation of "Warning: Starting a new file will override all previous data" - this again is an intended warning. Press continue

Given that this has elements of the Stanley Parable, this is not a fluffy romance piece. There will be (or should be!) a sense of eeriness to it, and the "narrator" will attempt to gaslight Baron. If that will distress you, please skip this game.

I don't know how long this will take to play, and I have no way of finding the word count. For reference, this is the scene graph.

If you do play this and enjoy it, let me know!

I'm retiring to bed now (only just succeeded for today!) so any game-breaking errors will not be fixed until tomorrow. I hope this was worth the wait!

[voidsuites]

When you troubleshoot shadowbanned bots, do you make a new bot to test it out or can you actually get it "un shadowbanned"?

Because I cannot get a shadowbanned bot to reappear at all, so I just make new ones and fix what I think was wrong. And it's exhausting because you can't even delete bots so they just sit around taking up space and I have to look at 4 different versions that just didn't stick. Another minor c.ai annoyance I guess.

Do you wish maybe c.ai was more transparent with their shadowbans or at least what triggers them? I'd much rather know exactly what's "against their policy", but also not so bad that it's banned from creation outright? (which I've also seen happen for the weirdest reasons), and change things accordingly rather than having to tinker and figure it out myself?

I'm done throwing questions at you and I hope you're having a great day!!

no i love questions, especially if they can help others figure out/fix things :)

1) for troubleshooting bots— usually i try and troubleshoot in the original bot first. in my experience, the issue/whatever is flagging the shadowban is an issue with the greeting, so i go through what i’ve written and make small edits. when i do fix the issue the bot does go back up, so you don’t have to make a new one (bless)

also in my case, c.ai tends to flag when i say things that are “violent” despite them not meaning that in my writing (e.g. “they’d be on his ass in a second” in reference to people finding out something and getting on someone’s case about it). i just don’t thing the algo can recognize nuance/it takes things literally which is annoying. like no they’re not actually jumping carmy they’re just busting his balls lol (once again another euphemism/colloquial phrase)

the bots also don’t like random variations of possessive/jealous/envious/hatred/etc. so word choice kind of matters. just try and see if you can reword what you’ve said before and update your bot

2) yes, i DO wish c.ai was more transparent about letting me and everyone else know what gets our bots shadowbanned/taken down. currently, i don’t know until someone on here tells me, and then i have to go onto another acc to view what bots are genuinely missing since i can’t see it from my voidsuites acc. a simple “hey we took this bot down bc xyz” would be great— it’s just courteous at the end of the day and wouldn’t make me want to pull my hair out (especially since i have sm bots now)

hope you’re having a good day too 💗 thank you for asking!

[kcscribbler]

WIP Wednesday

I'm keeping this last story arc of mine mostly secret until it's done, primarily because I want to make sure I actually close the plot holes I've left and sufficiently build up to the end.

Meanwhile, here's a conversation from the deepest depths of my WIP folder, that will likely never see the light of day.

“Be that as it may. It would do no harm for you to adopt a more cautious approach.” Mobius side-eyes him, but what might have been a sarcastic response seems to fade unspoken at the genuine worry visible in Loki’s troubled face. “Okay,” Mobius finally says with a sigh, as they pass under the archway leading to the outer corridors. “I can do that.” Loki clears his throat. “Thank you.” “But also, stop complaining. We’re burning through field teams like O.B. burns through circuit boards.” “I believe that is more a reflection on his unique methodology of, and I quote, ‘experimental live-action troubleshooting’ than accurate analysis of our field strategy.” “Yeah, well, our field strategy is getting us audited by Internal Affairs.”

No pressure tags!

@andthekitchensinkao3 @mirilyawrites @silentxsymphony @mythical-magik @thosegayoldmen

@elodiah @lokimobius @loki-is-my-kink-awakening @in-my-loki-feels @doomed-spectacles

@insert-witty-user-name-here @justabigoldnerd @thewildballyntynesgrow

@natendo-art @asoeiki @izumiyagami14 @impulsemuppet and open tag - whatcha workin' on?

[clever-and-unique-name]

Today at work we did some training on how to do EKGs and I offered to be the guinea pig for my coworker to practice on, since I've done EKGs before and really just needed a refresher on troubleshooting.

What that means is, I was at work with my chest and abdomen mostly exposed, being touched by coworkers. Which is a bit vulnerable, all things considered.

Only, I was dissociated from my body the entire time. A similar thing always happened when I was in [healthcare profession] school, which involved a lot of being physically manipulated by classmates. My body was no longer my own, simply a tool to be used. A mannequin. Something I was no longer connected to.

I suppose it's not a surprise that as a work part, Liv is exquisitely disconnected from the concept of having a body if they split off in that environment. They don't ever find it uncomfortable, more bemusing than anything. ("This body is only flesh, it's just a means to the end of interacting in physical space.")

[zeemakesthings]

To hell with Windows, hello Linux!

(Long, long 2 AM rant) I got an Alienware Area-51 Threadripper R6 from FB Marketplace last year. No, it's not my main machine, and don't hate me for it.

It was cheap, and it's nostalgic. I remember watching a bunch of tech videos growing up and this was one of my favorite computers. Did I understand any of the tech garble? No. But I thought it looked freakin' cool. So I saw it online and said why not. It'll make a good birthday present for myself, plus I can use it as a testbed of sorts for whatever computer projects I can think of.

It's treated me well despite my abuse. I've stress-tested it, done some rendering, ran some language models, and dabbled in crypto mining. One of the GPU's failed but i wasn't too surprised.

Throughout all of this, however, I've had three occasions where Windows decided to remove itself from the living realm. The first time I assume it was a driver error. I unplugged a device and it fully froze. After a restart, it would no longer boot. I'm not too worried since, it being a testbed, I don't have important stuff on it. So I reinstall Windows and move on. (Should I have had to do that in the first place, I don't think so.) The second time, it died after an update. A standard Windows update. Can't remember what exactly. But it stopped booting after the restart. This time, however, it appeared to also brick the firmware? Plugged in my installation media, turned on the computer, and I'm greeted with an empty drive list. It couldn't see the drives in my PC. Wack. Spent a few hours troubleshooting that one.

(I'm writing this at 2 AM, about to pass out, can't remember much details lol)

It's been smooth sailing for about four months. I'm having a blast, gaming, surfing, the like. I've started hosting a Minecraft server for my friends for the past two weeks. PC has been on for most of that time, with a few restarts to freshen up the system. Fast forward to yesterday (technically two days ago since it's past midnight). I do another restart, and before starting the server again I decide to check for any updated. Two pop up, I decide to let them install. Windows stopped booting. This time I'm stressed, since I'm hosting our server. I migrated it from Aternos so people can join whenever they want, so it has a months worth of progress on it.

I make an installation media (on a Macbook mind you, don't get me started on that process), and attempt to recover the windows install before I reset it. I spent four hours figuring it out on Tuesday, and couldn't even make it to the Setup screen. I gave up, hit the hay. Wednesday I got right back to it, going as far as to re-installing the BIOS. After that and some more, I finally get to the Setup screen, where I'm met with a new message: "Install driver to show hardware".

"awesome, a new challenge" the he sais to his self *he was then shot 74 times* I saw that message and knew this wasn't gonna end well. Luckily I had an NVMe adapter on hand so I could pull the server files from my drive.

Six hours were spent, wasted, on troubleshooting this error. I've gone through forums on at least half a dozen websites. Nothing worked. All hope was lost for Windows.

Then, a little penguin appeared in my head. I had to try. I've had Linux in the past, only temporarily. It's never given me any problems besides running games with anti-cheat. That's mainly why I haven't switched fully before. But developers have improved Linux support for games, and now Steam has their own Linux-based OS. So I said, why not. I created my Ubuntu flash drive, plugged it in and booted my PC. First try. It worked. Of course it would, it's Linux. It doesn't care if you install it on a literal potato fresh out of the ground. It's now Thursday midnight past, and I'm finally downloading my apps and programs.

At this very moment, I made a decision. I will never use Windows again, unless for the rare circumstance I need to run a Windows-only program. In that case, I'd rather dual-boot my machine than have it Windows-only. I've never had a bad experience with Linux. Is it challenging? Yes. Is it as user-friendly? It can be, as long as you don't need to do anything significant. But I'm fine with that. I'm willing to learn, and I have fun doing so. I'll finally rid myself of Microsoft's greedy and selfish products. And yes, I got the Minecraft server running on Linux. Only took me 15 minutes, and even that's because I've never done it before. It's a five-minute process.

[rebeccathenaturalist]

A respectable writing day in spite of its attempts to sabotage my efforts. I got in 4,220 words today, and The Everyday Naturalist manuscript sits at 62,922. I likely won't get any writing done tomorrow as I need to catch up on other things, but Thursday is set aside as another writing day.

On the bright side, the three sample fungus templates are done and I've gotten a great start on the troubleshooting chapter (to include a discussion on whether the fuzzy caterpillar above will turn into an American dagger moth or a cottonwood dagger moth.) I'm hoping to have that done by the end of the week so I can start next week with the Citizen Science chapter, and then hopefully jump into back matter before the week ends.