(no subject)

* "How murder, kidnappings and a miscalculation set off Hong Kong revolt:" https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/hongkong-protests-extradition-narrative/

* "Ethiopia's surveillance network crumbles, meaning less fear and less control:" https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ethiopia-politics-surveillance-insigh/ethiopias-surveillance-network-crumbles-meaning-less-fear-and-less-control-idUSKBN1YL1C2

* "Here's what happens when you quit the Chinese military:" https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/15/asia/china-military-recruit-quit-intl-hnk-scli/index.html

* "A Surveillance Net Blankets China’s Cities, Giving Police Vast Powers:" https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/technology/china-surveillance.html

* "My family are among those protesting. It shows how much Indians value secularism:" https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/28/indians-protesting-secularism-modi-muslims

* "India’s Prime Minister facing severe backlash over anti-Muslim citizenship law:" http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/india-s-prime-minister-facing-severe-backlash-over-anti-muslim-citizenship-law-75733573718

* "Netanyahu: Requesting immunity from prosecution isn't avoiding trial:" https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/.premium-netanyahu-even-if-i-request-immunity-from-prosecution-i-wouldn-t-be-avoiding-trial-1.8323732

* "At Japan’s Most Elite University, Just 1 in 5 Students Is a Woman:" https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/08/world/asia/tokyo-university-women-japan.html

* "Australia bushfire volunteers to get compensation:" https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-50932729

* "U.S. considers cyber-retaliation against 2020 Russian intrusion:" http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/u-s-considers-cyber-retaliation-against-2020-russian-intrusion-75736133911

* 45 called the troops to rub it in that they are in a war zone for Christmas while he's playing at his golf club in Florida.

* "Trump gets back to 'work' at golf club resort:" http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-gets-back-to-work-at-golf-club-resort-75739717520

* "Fellow Navy SEALs call Edward Gallagher "toxic" and "evil" in never-before-seen interviews:" https://www.cbsnews.com/news/edward-gallagher-members-of-navy-seal-team-7-say-chief-committed-war-crimes-in-interviews-with-investigators/

* "Shocking testimony about SEAL pardoned by Trump leaked to NYT:" http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/shocking-testimony-about-seal-pardoned-by-trump-leaked-to-nyt-75777093830

* "‘The guy was toxic:’ Navy SEALs called out accused war criminal, new video reveals:" http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/-the-guy-was-toxic-navy-seals-spoke-against-accused-war-criminal-new-video-reveals-75775557598

* "Evangelicals and Trump: Facing a final split?:" http://www.msnbc.com/am-joy/watch/trump-evangelicals-split-discussed-by-rev-dr-william-barber-75799109704

* "Former Sen. on McConnell: Trial approach ‘fundamentally wrong’:" http://www.msnbc.com/am-joy/watch/trump-touts-the-economy-amid-his-impeachment-but-will-voters-75794501996

* "Are Republicans afraid of Trump? Hell, no — he's destroying democracy and they love it:" https://www.salon.com/2019/12/17/are-republicans-afraid-of-trump-hell-no-hes-destroying-democracy-and-they-love-it/

* "Moderate GOP senator 'disturbed' by McConnell's coordination with White House:" https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/25/politics/lisa-murkowski-senate-impeachment-trial/index.html

* "Chris Hayes on Mitch McConnell’s ‘big tactical error’:" http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/chris-hayes-on-mitch-mcconnell-s-big-tactical-error-75735109830

* "Can some senators be swayed to support Trump impeachment trial?:" http://www.msnbc.com/am-joy/watch/mcconnell-vows-total-coordination-with-white-house-on-trump-trial-75794501711

* "Trump bullying, scapegoating is decimating U.S. foreign service:" http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-bullying-scapegoating-is-decimating-u-s-foreign-service-75733573937

* "Democratic primary could come down to Biden, Sanders:" http://www.msnbc.com/am-joy/watch/biden-sanders-lead-2020-democratic-presidential-contenders-75797061924

* "Andrew Yang on his place in the Democratic Party:" http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/andrew-yang-on-his-place-in-the-democratic-party-75775557744

* "Andrew Yang explains his healthcare plan:" http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/andrew-yang-explains-his-healthcare-plan-75775557755

* "Chicago shooting incidents down sharply:" http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/chicago-shooting-incidents-down-sharply-75775045795

* "Early reports warned migrant kids suffered from separations. Trump ramped up practice anyway.:" https://publicintegrity.org/inequality-poverty-opportunity/immigration/migrant-children-family-separations/

* "A tale of 2 migrations: Before and after new Trump policies:" https://apnews.com/2a272a9a517747ab37777999e2ff5749

* "Texans on southern border promise to fight Trump’s efforts to take their homes for border wall:" https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/texans-on-southern-border-vow-to-fight-trumps-efforts-to-take-their-homes-for-border-wall/2019/12/06/ef7c1fa8-1525-11ea-a659-7d69641c6ff7_story.html?arc404=true

* "Texas landowners fear losing property to Trump’s border wall:" http://www.msnbc.com/am-joy/watch/trump-administration-to-take-private-land-for-border-wall-75798597771

* "‘It is beyond cruel’: Ice refuses to reunite girl with the only family she has left:" https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/21/it-is-beyond-cruel-ice-refuses-to-reunite-girl-with-the-only-family-she-has-left

* "Immigration judges quit in response to administration policies:" https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/27/politics/immigration-judges-resign/index.html

* "Houses of worship attacked with deadly frequency in 2019:" https://apnews.com/bab315d2e6851d2c118b838e0b1d1382

* "When A Prisoner Returns Home With A Brain Injury, Freedom Isn't So Free:" https://www.npr.org/2019/12/17/788824775/when-a-prisoner-returns-home-with-a-brain-injury-freedom-isnt-so-free

* "‘We are sending more foster kids to prison than college’:" https://www.kansascity.com/news/special-reports/article238206754.html

* TW: Pedophilia. He pardoned a man who repeatedly raped two girls under the age of ten because he doesn't believe in science and like most republican politicians doesn't consider pedophilia a real crime unless it's extremely violent. "Former Kentucky Gov. Bevin pardoned a child rapist. One of his reasons: The 9-year-old victim's hymen was intact:" https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/20/us/former-kentucky-governor-matt-bevin-child-rapist-pardon-trnd/index.html

* "FBI looking into pardons by ex-Kentucky Gov. Bevin: report:" http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/fbi-looking-into-pardons-by-ex-kentucky-gov-bevin-report-75734085960

* "The film about gay love shaking up Georgia:" https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-50821544

* TW: Sexual Assault "Study finds homophobic teasing is the most common ‘violent behaviour’ among teenage boys:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/27/study-finds-homophobic-teasing-is-the-most-common-violent-behaviour-among-teenage-boys/

* "More than 150 people have sought compensation from UK military after being fired for their sexuality:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/27/more-than-150-people-have-sought-compensation-from-uk-military-after-being-fired-for-their-sexuality/

* "We regret to inform you that there is a person who thinks eating meat-free burgers ‘will make you female’:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/29/burger-king-impossible-whopper-plant-trans/

* "Why LGBTQ People Should Vote in Their Home State:" https://www.advocate.com/exclusives/2019/12/27/why-lgbtq-people-should-vote-their-home-state

* "This White House official took a free trip to an anti-LGBT ‘hate group’ summit:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/27/white-house-official-free-trip-anti-lgbt-hate-group-summit-donald-trump-jennifer-lichter-alliance-defending-freedom/

* "‘Straight’ men discuss their secret sexual relationships with other men:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/25/straight-men-discuss-secret-sexual-relationships-with-other-men/

* TW: Hate Speech "This homophobic pastor would rather smear s**t over himself than see his son marry a man:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/25/homophobic-pastor-smear-st-son-marry-man-gay-kevin-swanson/

* "Trans kids are as sure of their gender as cis kids at a young age, according to science:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/27/transgender-children-study-gender-identity-cis-children-washington-university/

* "Gay couple beaten and one left in a concussion by gang of men for holding hands:" https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/12/29/gay-couple-hands-taco-truck-beaten-gang-pasco-washington/

* CW: Pictures of snakes. "How to save a country from snakebite:" https://mosaicscience.com/story/snakebite-venom-indonesia-viper-cobra-bite-poison-snake/

* "One Million Cannibal Ants Trapped in Soviet Nuclear Bunker Have Escaped:" https://www.newsweek.com/cannibal-ants-soviet-nuclear-bunker-1469573?amp=1

* "The climate-change secrets of 19th century ship's logbooks:" https://www.reuters.com/article/us-climate-change-ice-shiplogs-specialre/special-report-icebound-the-climate-change-secrets-of-19th-century-ships-logbooks-idUSKBN1YF1Q7

* "The Tweety Bird Test :" https://daily.jstor.org/the-tweety-bird-test/

* "Inside Documents Show How Amazon Chose Speed Over Safety in Building Its Delivery Network:" https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-documents-show-how-amazon-chose-speed-over-safety-in-building-its-delivery-network

* "Alicia Keys Recaps 2019 w/ Her Piano:"

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* "Harry Styles Performs a Crosswalk Concert:"

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* Friday I spent more than n hour anda halfdealing with that thing where it feels like someone is poking me in the right eye, plus lots of extra AS trouble. The AS is really ramping up on me this Autumn/Winter. I made it out to forage anyway just in time and even found parking on the second pass. Problem was the line was very long and they moved the seating away in a key area so it was a whole lot of extra standing. By the time I was done my right foot was doing the little mermaid walking on knives thing and I could barely put weight on it.

I am forgetting the name of the diagnosis for the Little Mermaid foot thing. I know I had it bad the summer I was still working in the Public Library just before coming North for my advanced degree. It legitimately felt like my feet were broken that time. It mostly stopped being a problem after I retired because i no longer have to spend long hours on my feet, which is that causes the incidents. There is no cure, cure. There are techniques to help it along, but really, you just stay off them and keep them propped.

It had been so long I had mostly forgot this was a thing. I mostly focus on the constant and frequent intermittent pain sources.

I did the library run anyway and I hobbled around in extreme pain from the AS and the foot ganging up, trying to put away forage and deal with the inevitable messes that appear while I'm asleep. Feeding myself is a nightmare under these conditions, but forage was decent which helped. I'm still short on veg, but I have things I can make reasonably quickly around. I should probably make protein, but every second standing is a nightmare, so...makeshift foraged foods I can heat up in a couple minutes.

Tavy managed to blurp in the middle of my bed between me dropping off bedside water and coming back from brushing my teeth. Which meant stripping and changing the bed in the condition I was in. Oh gods the pain!

We did not migrate the fish today. It was probably just as well as the AS and foot thing are still tag team kicking my ass. Bonus headache on top of it was just icing, really.

I still haven't touched the bureaucracy and the clock is tic tic ticking away. Fuck! I simply couldn't bring myself to start under current conditions. I'm using all my will power up on things like the hobble to the bathroom.

I really need to medicine finger the Imperial couple, but catching them is a struggle on a good day. *facepalm*

* I am always behind on figure Skating. This is because the broadcast season starts in October when I am way too busy to spend much time on the sofa staring at the screen. That’s he reality I also like watching things in order, so instead of skipping ahead, I watch when I can.

A Figure Skating fter the Olympics, I decided I’d try watching pair skating again, which slowed me way down. It seems I still have an eye for it, which helped, and I identified some couples I liked, but I just couldn’t get that into it. Trying to watch made me further behind not only because I was adding an extra 4ish hours of taping for every event, but because I’d get bogged down and reluctant to watch even with me fast forwarding over routines that weren’t working for me and most of the fillers.

IDK, I may watch the big events like the grand Prix final I taped or World’s in the spring.

The result is I’m currently up to Men’s Free skates in the Russian Grand Prix event. (Seriously, no spoilers).

Someone needs to tell the people running cameras for this event and Cup of China that this is NOT Synchro. Look, I unironically love synchro (Go Marigold Ice Unity!), but they choreography is really different. In a synchro event, it totally makes sense to shoot from above sometimes to show what the patterns look like. You know were it 100% is the opposite of helpful? In single skating when the athlete is doing spins. Single skate spins look like nothing from the top. They are meant to be watched from the side. That’s how they look most beautiful and if you cut to the top you can’t see the position changes properly and that’s something people who are watching ice skating because they like watching ice skating are going to want to see, IE: the spin positions. Um, Duh! Who thought this was a good idea? Did they run it past anyone who’d seen ice skating before? It’s annoying and frustrating. I noticed they were doing it less in Russia, so lets hope it stops.

It was good to see Shoma Uno on an upward trajectory again. he really is one of the world’s best when his shit is together and that think in france absolutely made me weep for him. He’s still not together all the way, but he looks to be on the way.

Mostly I wanted to write about Nam Nguyen, who I never paid that much attention to before, but this year is starting to turn into a real Canadian style figure skater and I love it. He’s not where he needs to be yet, but he found the thing he was missing: his artistic voice. I actually guessed he’d been working with Kurt Browning before I heard them say it. He doesn’t skate like Kurt Browning, but the thing Browning was brilliant at besides technical excellence was speaking to the audience in his performances. There was always a lot of personality in his performances. The transformation is not as extreme as Jason Brown’s was last year, but it is of a similar type. Suddenly Mr. Nguyen skates like he’s enjoying it and he wants us to enjoy watching him. Suddenly there is something of himself in his skating. He’s still a little awkward and could use some dance training, but oh man, does he have a chance to be Amazing next year if he keeps at it. I very much hope he does, because I am interested in seeing what he can do.

I do have opinions about the three Russian teenagers doing quads on the women’s side, but I’m honestly trying to figure out how to explain them. I definitely have a favorite already, and one i don’t much care for based entirely on skating style, but explaining why is beyond me just now.

* "Are We Really Going to Pretend the Gay Kiss in The Rise of Skywalker Matters?:" https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/12/are-we-really-going-to-pretend-the-gay-kiss-in-the-rise-of-skywalker-matters

* Glorious deadpan nonsense: https://magnesiumflare.tumblr.com/post/189893626505/jenroses-facts-i-just-made-up-robo-libra

* Disturbing Neural Network Carols: https://aiweirdness.com/post/189845472982/the-ais-carol

*****
* Full list of Resistance and charity links has been migrated to my profile as it was getting out of hand.

* A small, cheap thing to help climate change if you have little money to spare: https://onetreeplanted.org/products/amazon-rainforest-peru

* How to donate to Rainbow Road: https://www.rainbowrailroad.com/donate

* Here are a bunch of state level links to help people in immigrant detention: https://taibhsearachd.tumblr.com/post/186058182962/woundability-this-4th-of-july-celebrate-the

* Angry about the concentration camps on our Southern Border? Here is a list of useful things you can do: https://medium.com/@togetherandfree/feel-helpless-amidst-the-horrific-immigration-news-youre-not-how-you-can-make-difference-today-108dc42de88e

* "More Organizations to Support Helping Kids in Concentration Camps:" https://thisfinecrew.dreamwidth.org/201920.html

* Here is a massive list of things you can do to help refugees inside and outside of the Camps: https://s-leary.tumblr.com/post/185783586806/so-youve-probably-seen-the-post-going-around

* A list of organizations to help you run for office: http://lovingmyselfishard.tumblr.com/post/167330144634/psst-hey

* The Indivisble guide exists to help you organize effective resistance: https://indivisible.org/

* Want to support Christy Smith in the primary for Katie Hill's seat?: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/dw_ca25

* Want to get rid of Mitch McConnell? Help Amy McGrath: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/am-website?refcode=website-nav

* Want to get rid of Lindsey Graham? Help Jaime Harrison: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/ms_harrison_fr_q12019_jaime-a?refcode=MS_AD_D-DD_2019.03.08_X_GG_KW__X__eyJjcmVhdGl2ZSI6IkFkZCBEb25hdGlvbiBOb3ciLCJhdWRpZW5jZSI6IkphaW1lSGFycmlzb24ifQ&recurring=TRUE&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIn4a_583I5gIVC8RkCh0MowFeEAAYASAAEgIXZfD_BwE

* Have something you want to tell your Congress Critters? If you can not protest in person, here are some other options:

Call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to the representative of your choice.

This App phones your rep for you: http://takeastance.us/

Here is one that will send your reps a fax: https://resistbot.io/

* Some RL friends of mine who were barely scraping by just lost one of the part time jobs they collectively hold and it's really fucking things up for them. These are good people, who do so much for others. Want to help? https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-a-gig-worker-get-through-the-winter/share

* HorrorMux is currently running a Max Mad type thing. Available Archetypes are here. I'm Martyr if you want to find me.: http://horrormu.com/index.php/Available

* Help pay for cat food, litter, meds, medical copays: Paypal Lethran@gmail.com or paypal.me/Gwydion

* If you are interested in helping, right now the Cat thing we need most is:
https://www.chewy.com/wellness-core-signature-selects/dp/147047

The dry food I was going to try (less urgent) is this one: https://www.chewy.com/blue-buffalo-wilderness-flatland/dp/176663

Or possibly this: https://www.chewy.com/instinct-by-natures-variety-limited/dp/44654

* Birthday/Solstice master list: https://gwydion.dreamwidth.org/2108835.html