everyday life

“101 Things to Do When Bored at Home”

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The other day I was browsing a random blog. Seeing a post title “101 Things to Do When Bored at Home” or something to that effect, I turned to Erik and said: “I don’t understand the concept.”

I truly don’t, not for my part!

We’re both introverts who love our home. Home is where our books are. Where we can watch tv in comfort. Play games. Craft, sew, write. Go nap or lie down with a blanket to think about things. Heck, even clean or mend things—it’s something to do, and we do enjoy a well-functioning home (even if cleaning and mending aren’t favorite pastimes themselves).

I literally can’t remember the last time I’ve been bored at home.

I can—and do—give my brain rest breaks. Idling is important to creativity, which is important to all of life, if you ask me. But boredom…? Nope. It just doesn’t happen, there’s so much to do.

I’m actually looking forward to the time when I’m old enough to need less sleep—more time to enjoy being conscious! 🙂

Here there be opinions!

A Peek into Color Gothic Aesthetics

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I was browsing a ren faire board the other day for research. Someone there was asking for inspiration and advice, saying they usually dress “quite gothic”, which I somehow misread as “white gothic”.

That would be really interesting, I thought, and wanted to check whether it’s a thing… And of course it is! Known as white goth or ice goth: instead of the ubiquitous black, dressing only (or mostly) in white, but spiky or moody, sometimes puffy or lacy or ruffly, too.

Then I poked around some more. I already knew that various flavors of goth aesthetic exist, of course, but I was specifically interested in color-based ones. Apart from red and purple goth, less immediately obvious colors such as pastel goth (especially pink goth looks big), blue, and green goth do seem to exist. Yellow, orange, and brown goth seem marginal (with varying levels of recognition), but there doesn’t seem to be gold, silver, or bronze goth, per se.

Color Goth Styles Mashup

The most intriguing find, I think, emerged from my yellow goth search. There seems to be some interest in dressing styles inspired by bugs, including bees. One seller on Etsy even used both the word bee and goth in their sweater description. (Personally, I couldn’t call that sweater goth style, but you do you.) Below is a bee-inspired ensemble by EJ on Pinterest that the user labeled as “yellow Y2K goth outfit”:

Pinterest EJ Yellow Y2K Goth Outfit

So, there’s bee goth now? Bee core? (Buzz core???)

Live and learn!

Images: Mashup by Eppu Jensen: red and black outfits by hystericb0y on Tumblr; purple goth by sabikuma on tiktok, found via peri on Pinterest; blue goth by dogmaz on Tumblr; green goth via Yasmin on Pinterest; white goth via Mabel Manley on Pinterest. Yellow Y2K goth outfit (bee goth) by EJ on Pinterest.

Out There highlights intriguing art, places, phenomena, flora, and fauna.

Quotes: A Life Was Built on the Back of Firsts

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For fiction to work, it has to balance a certain amount of realism with the fictional. A shared experience between the writer and reader is needed to make sense of the invented. Too much of the latter, and the text becomes gibberish; too much of the mundane, and the spark goes out.

Most published writers manage it well, but now and then you find a detail that practically smacks you in the face with suspension of disbelief, but not necessarily through any fault of the author.

Take this section of a sci-fi novel, for instance:

“Everyone remembered firsts. Your first love, first kiss, the birth of your first child, or the sight of your first snowfall. A life was built on the back of firsts. Shining moments, pins in the timeline, holding who you were together.”

–Acaelus Mercator in The Blighted Stars by Megan E. O’Keefe

Current Reading The Blighted Stars

I have to confess that the first snowfall had me laughing out loud, and long and heartily, too! Not because it’s an unreasonable first to remember per se. (I gather there are a lot of people for whom it was indeed a remarkable moment to witness!) I laughed because this is a case of inadvertent but nevertheless a complete and a total case of nooope.

My first snow would be extremely unlikely for me to remember, having grown up two hours south of the Arctic Circle. As unusual as remembering your first rain for the Irish, maybe, or your first mountain for someone who grew up in the Rockies.

Sometimes, despite your best efforts, your audience just completely bounces off your writing. And that’s fine, because at best it’s how we discover the remarkable in our everyday.

O’Keefe, Megan E. The Blighted Stars. London: Orbit, 2023, p. 180.

Image by Eppu Jensen

Serving exactly what it sounds like, the Quotes feature excerpts other people’s thoughts.

Quotes: Online, I Can Be in My Head and with Interesting People

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In an older article about disclosure when writing online, author Roxane Gay includes the following explanation of what being an introvert online means for her:

“For me, one of the biggest draws of the Internet has always been how I can be alone and yet find connection with other people. I am an introvert. I can fake extroversion, but it is exhausting. I prefer quiet, even when I am happily around other people. I spend an inordinate amount of time in my head. Online, I can be in my head and with interesting people. I can be alone but feel less lonely.”

A fantastic explanation—which, of course, means that it lines up with my experience of the world, heh heh. 🙂

I’m sure if you’re reading this you know that in general introverts do not hate people—that would be misanthropy—nor do they fear social encounters—that’s shyness. (Well, of course they can, but it’s not baked into every introvert.) It seems there’s now more understanding in general that introversion is about social energy, and that introverts recharge by being alone.

I’ve come to realize that alone time is just a part of how my introversion manifests itself. I feel enormously better, for example, if my home is in a corner instead of the middle. Text-based communication is better than voice. Listening before leaping is a better strategy at meetings or gatherings. And sometimes, when I want to be around people but don’t have the energy to actually engage, it’s enough to hang out in a library or a less-busy corner of a mall, or go out to eat, or spend time browsing in a brick-and-mortar store.

Life is so much easier when you know what makes yourself tick. 🙂

Gay, Roxane. “The Danger of Disclosure.” Creative Nonfiction 49, https://creativenonfiction.org/writing/the-danger-of-disclosure/

Serving exactly what it sounds like, the Quotes feature excerpts other people’s thoughts.

The Fascinating Art of Fridgescaping

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Have you heard of fridgescaping? The phenomenon apparently started on TikTok, and in a nutshell comes from “landscaping” your fridge.

Sounds like some people got into it during the covid lockdowns. There are various approaches to decorating the inside of your refrigerator, and ways to organize are, of course, as varied as the creators.

Some are more pragmatic, others kinda outlandish. There is practical with pastels, like Samantha Klein (samswhurld) prefers…

Instagram Samantha Klein Freshly Cleaned

…or rustic and earthy, as for instance the styling by Amira Youssef (dusk2illdawn):

Instagram Amira Youssef Fridge Organization

Others favor bright and colorful arrangements, like Tânia Lourenço (homganize):

Instagram Tania Lourenco Greens Yellows

All of the above are still mainstream. Lynzi Judish (lynziliving) takes fridgescaping to another level. Hers designs are very pretty, lushly styled, and themed. There is, for instance, a Beetlejuice…

Instagram Lynzi Judish Beetlejuice

…and a Hobbit project:

Instagram Lynzi Judish Hobbit

If you prefer, you can see Judish’s Hobbit fridgescape as a video. She’s also posted photos of a fall-themed project (with a cute squirrel mug) and a Bridgerton fridgescape. (Ha! There’s a hastag #fridgerton! 😀 )

The themed fridges are, I admit, kinda fun.

However: I have A LOT of questions! I’m not on Instagram or TikTok, and plan not to begin just to do a bit of research. But, like—

  • I see a lot of snack-type produce. Where do the fridgescapers store their actual food? Food food, the cooked food? (Surely they do cook warm meals…?) Or leftovers?
  • Are the containers food safe? Please tell me they all are!
  • Are they ruining the books or photos or decorative boxes placed in the fridge?
  • Why does everything need to be decanted? (Yes, I know why—it’s the look. However, all those themed empty containers are just more clutter to store elsewhere and more $$$ down the drain.)
  • How do they keep re-arranging their fridges without wasting an inordinate amount of energy?

Also: While I do enjoy a (thoughtfully) decorated space, for me, function has to come first. It absolutely must; I cannot live otherwise. I have to have a home that works; if it looks good, too, that’s great! But I must be able to use things I need when I need them, not after five minutes of digging or setup. (Which is also why I must have a dedicated sewing room with the machine on a table, ready to go at a moment’s notice.) If a space or area isn’t useable, it’s a source of frustration for me, which isn’t worth it, especially not for everyday functions like the fridge.

(Apparently, the scaping fad is spreading: there is now also talk about pantryscaping, deskscaping, and doorscaping. Good grief—it feels almost like another (insert-your-term-here)core is on the loose!)

Verdict: there’s something appealing in the idea, but ultimately it’s not for me. You should do you, though. 🙂

Images: Freshly cleaned & stocked by Samantha Klein on Instagram. Fridge organization by Amira Youssef on Instagram. Greens and yellows by Tânia Lourenço on Instagram. Beetlejuice and Hobbit by Lynzi Judish on Instagram.

In Here highlights interesting spaces created by our fellow geeks all over the world.

This Is What I Want an AI to Do

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One of the most prominent topics currently is artificial intelligence. Of course everyone knows—or should know—it’s not real intelligence as we generally understand it. The term seems to have some real staying power, though.

Regardless of what one wants to call the current iterations, machine learning or algorithm-based systems appear to be here to stay. People are starting to figure out what they could be used for in everyday life, not just at the office or lab.

One popular sentiment among creatives goes along the lines of: I want AI to do the dishes for me so I can create, I don’t want AI to create for me so I can do the dishes. I hear you, fellow creatives, and agree! This post talks about what I’d want those systems to do for me. (Eventually. We still must solve several issues, e.g. how to program them without egregious copyright breaches, to mention just one.)

(Please also note: I do realize that computing takes a lot of energy and materials, and that energy production and extraction of minerals aren’t unproblematic processes. Also, the ethics of the current generative models need serious attention; I’m still fuming over Meta’s massive book pirating as revealed by The Atlantic. The point of my post is not to dwell on the problems, however. This is basically just a random, long-winded wish list.)

TL;DR: My preferences boil to complex tasks, specificity instead of generic sludge, and effective analysis of massive amounts of data.

Below is a non-comprehensive list of some specific tasks I want done better, whether by “AI” or not, in no particular order.

Continue reading →

Everyday Outfits Inspired by Middle Earth

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On Instagram, Alice as catinawitchhat styled a series of everyday outfits inspired by Middle-Earth. (She also pulled all the outfits together for a slideshow for those who prefer moving image.)

My favorite of Alice’s four collages is the first. It shows her versions of the Shire, Gandalf, and Erebor:

Instagram catinawitchhat Tolkien-Inspired1

The Lonely Mountain Dwarf ensemble is fantastic: the little touches of fur in her boots and the edges of the vest, the embroidery on the tunic, the warm-looking leggings, the knit armwarmers and chunky cardigan, they all contribute. Add to those the puffy shorts (or skirt?) plus the fairly simple leather accessories with brass-colored metal accents and visible, chunky topstitching. Very nice!

The third mashup is also very neat, with the three principal human cultures of the Lord of the Rings—the rangers, Rohan, and Gondor:

Instagram catinawitchhat Tolkien-Inspired3

Gondor is perfect, so austere and bleak. Her version of the rangers I find too dark for my liking—not a fan of black, even if it has its uses—but the profile I agree with.

Alice reminds the readers that her outfits aren’t cosplays, but her styling the contents of her wardrobe. And why not, if you can do it this well! While at times I don’t have exactly the same readings of the various Middle Earth cultures as she does, I do appreciate the combinations of elements from our mundane world and the suggestions she’s able to create through the careful selection of details. Makes me want to look at my closet with a new eye. 🙂

For more detail, visit the individual outfits in their own posts: The Shire. Gandalf. Erebor. Rivendell. Mirkwood. Lothlorien. The Dúnedain. Rohan. Gondor. Rhûn (Easterlings). Harad (Southrons). Mordor.

Images by Alice on Instagram

In Making Stuff we share fun arts and crafts done by us and our fellow geeks and nerds.

Ancient Greek Clay Cooker for Multiple Dishes

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Look at this amazing ancient multi-tier clay cooker:

Imgur TheRainbowegoSweet007 Delos Cooker

There seems to be frustratingly little information available online. I haven’t been been able to track down full details for this apparatus, but some sources call it an anthrakia. Considering that anthrakia means ‘a heap of burning coals’ it sounds at least plausible (but as I said I don’t know). Apparently it’s from 500 BCE or so (although one source says 2nd c. BCE), and was found on the island of Delos, Greece.

Delos was one of the most sacred places of ancient Greece—claimed to be the birthplace of Artemis and Apollo—and a busy trade center for centuries if not millenia. It looks like the only images of this cooker come from the Archaeological Museum of Delos. No-one seems to have posted the associated text, though, so I still don’t know quite as much as I’d like.

Such an ingenious arrangement, though, isn’t it? The oven has space for a hand-held grill and an area at the front for raking coals into (I assume). Above the oven, there is an opening to rest a frying pan on. As if that’s not enough, above that to the back of the cooker there are tube-like stands for three cooking pots, through which the pots also have access to heat from the oven. You could have five dishes cooking at the same time. And it looks like the cooker is also portable.

It’s impressive both from the point of view of functionality and design—the oven-stove-grill combo seems to have been made as one piece. (Or possibly two pieces, if the pedestal that looks like an upside-down plant pot was made separately.)

Not bad for a 2,000+ year-old kitchen gadget, right? I can almost hear the sizzling of frying food.

With that, I’ll wish our readers in the U.S. a Happy Thanksgiving! 🙂

Image via TheRainbowegoSweet007 on Imgur

Out There highlights intriguing art, places, phenomena, flora, and fauna.

Quotes: Find Joy, Every Kind … It’s What Time Was Made For

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In a Tumblr chain earlier this year, people were sharing what they learned each decade as they got older. The exchange included this gem from user atlinmerrick:

“Find joy, every kind, it’s always worth it

“I’m talking that massive, never-ending Discord chat with your bestie? The one that makes you giggle through the day? It’s not a ‘waste of time,’ it’s what time was made for“




– atlinmerrick on Tumblr

Hear, hear!

Flickr Oliver Schmidt Joy

As much as it might frighten us some days, change is permanent and the only absolutely realiable thing in life. (Apart from the sheer impossibility of taking anything with you when it’s time to go.) Why not find happiness while you can? Why not allow yourself to feel the joy you feel? Lots of adults would be happier, I think, if they allowed more of the delight they used to feel in their childhood to remain in their lives. (Mostly talking to my Protestant forebears here…!)

Image by Oliver Schmidt on Flickr (CC BY-ND 2.0)

Serving exactly what it sounds like, the Quotes feature excerpts other people’s thoughts.

When It Rains, It Pours!

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Not even a week after Erik spotted an incoming link from a fanfic published at Archive of Our Own, we started seeing increased traffic to another post on our blog, and we couldn’t figure out why. (Good grief—when it rains, it pours!)

Turns out a link to my post on the Netflix Murderbot adaptation was shared on the Murderbot subreddit.

Thanks for the link! It’s nice to be appreciated, especially since our blogging tends to follow whims which, I’m sure, appear very opaque to outsiders. 🙂 The reddit discussion had some interesting points, so it was definitely worthwhile to poke my head in.

(What baffles me, though, is how some redditors seem to have mistaken this blog for a news site. Perhaps I’m merely getting too old to think there are enough cues in the metadata and site sections to easily discount that idea…? I am, however, experienced enough to know most people won’t read our About page where it is spelled out that this here is a hobby blog, goshdarnit! *grumble grumble*)

Here there be opinions!