reading through the darkness

@ardentreader

Dog lover, amateur chef, bento enthusiast, science fiction nerd. I work in tech and use words for a living.

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reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jul 17

10:30am for me.

A picture of distant Mount San Bruno from the back of a house in San Francisco, taken in September 2020. The sky is a dark, clouded, impenetrable orange from wildfire smoke.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jun 26

I'm pretty pessimistic by nature, so I'm a bit surprised by the low doomer score, but otherwise this seems about right. britmonkey.com/2020s-politi...

The results of a political compass quiz that scores me as 78% woke / 22% chud, 50% each techbro and neo-luddite, 63% hopepilled / 37% doomer, and 80% Davos / 20% Dubai.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jun 16

Booyah! Someone brought Indian snacks into the office today.

A small paper bowl with a variety of Indian snacks in it.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· May 28

Have nonpartisan jungle primaries, they said. The result will be electoral nirvana, they said.

The 2026 California gubernatorial primary ballot, which has about 300 candidates on it, most of them obscure whackjobs.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· May 15

I feel like Wilco answered this question a long time ago but that Jeff Tweedy and Kaiser Permanente probably have really different takes.

Screenshot of a subject line from a Kaiser Permanente member advice email that includes the words "how to fight loneliness."

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· May 14

Cross-stitching keeps me from murdering people at work and is an excellent thing to do while watching TV.

A partially-completed cross-stitch project of an Art Nouveau-style floral panel with decorative designs, a panel of moths and flowers, and red and yellow poppies, plus a million attached threads on bobbins and needles because I park like a maniac.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Apr 29

Okay, evidence is pointing to me being a spreadsheet weirdo. (In my defense, I've had archives disappear on me before and tend to save stuff. It's hard to navigate a bunch of saved PDFs and ePUBs without some type of key.)

Screenshot of three lines of my possibly overly obsessive fanfic tracking spreadsheet.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Apr 27

I was somewhat derailed from admiring the adorable baby bats by learning that Australia doesn't just have ticks, it has paralysis ticks. PARALYSIS TICKS.

Map of Australia where the land is all green and the ocean is blue. The map legend says that the green area is "Areas where things on land can kill you" and the blue is "Areas where things in the sea can kill you."

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Apr 8

There's a similar issue with Japan (compounded by the opposite-side driving).

Meme of two men arguing, with Japanese subtitles. One is urging the other to buy American cars, regardless of tariffs, and the other is arguing back repeatedly that they're just too big.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jan 3

Clearly, they are Martians.

Screenshot from the classic "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up" episode of the Twilight Zone, where a man who has revealed himself to be a Martian is lighting a cigarette with 3 hands, because it is the 50s and even the aliens smoke, I guess.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Dec 13

Yes! The enclosed design is bonkers for an urban shopping center. And it's also a stressful driving experience because it's surrounded on 3 sides by one-way streets, one of which is the outlet of a freeway offramp, and the parking garage is cramped, narrow, and hard to turn in.

Satellite view of the 555 9th St. shopping center in San Francisco, showing a two-story, three-sided shopping center that faces inward towards the parking, and is surrounded on all sides by multi-lane streets one of which is the outlet to a freeway offramp.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Dec 12

One of the reasons I like this one is that I can apply it to so many situations at work.

A Far Side cartoon by Gary Larson that shows firemen holding a device for catching jumping people at ground level between two burning high-rises. A woman who has clearly jumped from the building on the left is shown being bounced from the device and disappearing into one of the windows of the building on the right.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Dec 5

I just got served this ad and it's time to dive down a hole and then pull the opening of the hole in after me. I am going to have nightmares for DAYS.

An ad with four pictures of cat-related apparel. It starts out innocently enough, if very tackily, with two pink sweater dresses that have textured flowers on the sleeves, shoulders, and around the giant fluffy cats that occupy most of the torso. But things to really off the rails with the leggings on the bottom, which are also covered with textured flower motifs and as well as two extremely haunted cat heads/faces staring at you from the tops of the thighs like they are going to visit you in the night to eat your dreams through your eye sockets. The designs are 3D, which makes it all extra-disturbing.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Nov 3

IANAL but it feels like we're well into this territory:

Lionel Hutz, the ambulance chasing lawyer from The Simpsons, telling the judge, "I move for a bad court thingy."

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Nov 1

Why do they do that? They are so weird.

A red-ticked white cattle dog sleeping half-on a dog bed, with her rear hanging out of it. Because of the angle of the picture and the way she's lying, she looks like she has a tremendous badonkadonk.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Oct 29

If you see this, I implore you to post a pic from your device without context.

A picture of a very nice dog sitting to a campaign-style lawn sign that says "Thor Michaelson says NO to vacuums. They're loud and they freak him out."

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Oct 24

Do they even make F-150s that drive on the left side? Anyway:

The arguing handlebar mustache guy meme, this time with the argument being about American cars in Japan. "Buy American cars!" "No, they're huge!" "The tariffs are too high!" "Doesn't matter, they're still huge!" "And the non-tariff barriers!" "No! They're just too big!" "Just buy them already!" "I said they're way too big!!!!"

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Sep 25

"Seraphin, himself fairly prolific on Twitter, told me that he thought Patel’s social media activity was not just unprecedented for an FBI director but 'really thirsty and desperate.'"

A picture of the "Heartbreaking: the worst person you know just made a point" guy.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Sep 8

Post a perfect album from the 90s that isn’t Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, or Alice In Chains

Yo La Tengo's I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One album cover

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Aug 22

This was in my mailbox yesterday. The campaign has already started. Republicans are going to fund in the background and let the idealistic good government types make the case. Normally I would agree with these arguments, but we passed normal in about 2016. Hopefully a lot of motivated voters agree.

One side of an election mailer urging voters to vote No on California redistricting, with blurbs from various progressive and good government useful idiots and disclosure information about funding from Protect Voters First.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jul 20

Idli sambar for breakfast today, hooray! Thank goodness for the idli batter at the Indian grocery story, because I can't grind and ferment my own to save my life. (South Indian co-workers always make a diplomatic not-pity face at me when I admit this.)

A bowl containing a soupy mixture of vegetables and lentils, red-colored from spices and tomatoes, with three round idli dumplings half-submerged.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jun 23

I was so offended by the lame mapo tofu served at the office cafeteria last week that I made my own this weekend (vegetarian version). A+, outstanding leftovers.

Mapo tofu in a pan - chunks of tofu in a red sauce with green onion tops.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jun 21

An orca with its top half above water, and the text "I came out of the ocean because you need to stop."

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· May 27

Medieval-style drawing with two men overlooking a large crowd of solders. One of the two men says, "I thought there would be less of you," and the crowd of soldiers shouts back "Fewer!" The picture is titled "The Pedants' Revolt."

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· May 6

There are businesses in Northern California that will bring out a herd of goats to graze down the brush on your hillside. I took this last week at my office park, which abuts open hills. They're great on rocky, steep terrain where mechanical equipment won't work.

A herd of goats of many different colors grazing on a steep hillside. The ones in the foreground are also going for all of the tree leaves within reach.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Apr 11

The best sign of this spring so far for me has been the discovery that it's mating season for the resident wild turkey flock at my office park, which borders on some wild hills. Look at this magnificent guy!

A magnificent turkey tom puffed up and spreading all of his dressy feathers in the shade of a tree.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Feb 5

Oh my god you guys, Susan Collins is Concerned! Yes she's a Yes on Russel Vought, so, you know. Not THAT concerned.

The Susan Collins scale of concern, which goes from green (not concerned) to green-yellow (mildly concerned) to yellow (moderately concerned) to yellow-orange (severely concerned) to orange (troubled) to red (disappointed).

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jan 25

According to this sign, people are feeding them sugar cubes?

A coyote alert sign warning passersby to not feed coyotes, keep dogs on leashes, and keep distance. The warning against feeding features an open hand scattering cube-shaped objects.

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jan 12

Fun library sandwich board promo that says "The best things in life are free" and has coupon-style squares for items like "Gratis - Zesty Mysteries," "Complimentary Sweet Storytimes" "Fresh Park Passes," "On the House Lively Wi-Fi," "Best Price Printing," and "Hot Vinyl & DVDs."

reading through the darkness@ardentreader· Jan 5

Evergreen!