merrileemakes | Network

I can see a little, so I do care a lot about light and contrast and things, so I'm not in the exact situation that a Blind online acquaintance describes here, but so much of this resonates with me. Especially as we're under increasing pressure to have cameras-on internal meetings at work.

"I am an unwilling cameraman, shooting an obscure documentary about my own face" resonated so hard with me!

My own parents are the even worse about this, though. As per entries passim, I talk to them every week. The only comment I've heard them make about my visual appearance is excessively unkind to say the least if not overtly transphobic, so it's not as if I'm motivated to share my face with them. Yet recently when my webcam was broken for a couple of weeks, my mom could barely carry on a conversation because of how distracted she was by this.

And her language is so telling. It's not "We can't see you" it's "We don't have you." It makes me feel so trapped -- pinned, like a bug in a collection.

It's the same as Robert describes his friend: ""Oh, You're gone! Where did you go?" I don't go anywhere! My mom says "Are you there???" even while I'm already talking. Like he says, " I didn’t go anywhere. I am right here. I did not teleport. I am still in the same spot I was just a few seconds ago."

My new webcam is a nightmare. It doesn't even show my whole head on the screen if I have the monitor as close to me as I otherwise went it. It has way too high a resolution: I've never seen all my facial features this sharply, and I'm very distressed to start now!

Being able to see a little means I am aware of how I look, and you know how people hate the sound of their own voice on recordings because that's not how it sounds to them? I feel like that about seeing myself on video calls. (I actually mostly love the way my voice sounds on recordings, heh.)

princessofgeeks

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has marked as possibly inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18. )

Vibes: tired

twistedchick

I've come to a small turning in the road, metaphorically speaking. I've decided to quit newsblogging on Facebook, possibly permanently.

I am worn down by dealing with so much bad news all the time. When I worked long hours at newspapers, there was always something good in the mix, but now it's getting hard to find. And with the overflowing river of news these days, some days I work longer than I did at the papers, just to get through it and try to understand it all.

But there's more. In the last three months I have lost six people, some I've known for 30+ years, others all my life. A beloved older cousin, a talented and kind aunt, a teacher whom I will continue to learn from every time I open one of her books, two friends who always encouraged me (separately, in different ways) to be creative and innovative, and a third friend who challenged me to be as uniquely myself as she was uniquely herself. None of them were under 50, and all had rich full lives -- but the gaps they leave in the world are enormous, not just for me but for many others. And each death's loss and sadness get added to that which was here before, even if for some it was a relief at the end of long illness.

That's a lot. It would be a lot at any time, but it feels like more, now, because of all the horribleness going on -- ICE, the war with Iran, the Epstein entanglements and the many cruelties of this regime.

Also, nobody's paying me to newsblog. Not one no-longer-available cent. I've been doing it because it feeds my newsjunkieness, the reporter's need to know what's happening and tell others. It also ate my day, usually about six hours of it or more.

Enough.

I will still forward relevant articles (as long as I have arms and hands to type) but I'm not going to do the intense drop down into the zone any more, with multiple subject-categorized posts. I'd like to have a bit more life in my life than can be found behind a keyboard -- and have it be my own life, not one I'm looking at from the sidelines. I'll still write the Substack column, but leave it at that.

I will still be there, as I am here, just not as much every day.

And getting away from the keyboard serves my other life goal, which is to outlive the regime and the Occupant and his ilk (great non-swear-word for them) and have a good life doing it.

mdehners

I was heading over this am on my usual Sunday trip to visit Chuck when I noticed a deer half out of the woods beside the highway watching traffic, watching ME. Kept eyes on me the whole time as I passed. I didn't figure out why I'd felt so unsettled till I realised that it had been watching me head on and deer don't do that since their eyes are on the side of their heads. This one's eyes, while far apart were facing forward.
Creepy.....
Troth,
Patrick Thomas Duffy

Vibes: uncomfortable
Where: Lenoir City(Nevermore;>!)
Tunes: Andrews Sisters Radio

leanwellback

tugging on our red
string of fate to move you like
a puppet master

*

it's the 50th anniversary of interview with the vampire so I'm thinking about my beautiful toxic codependent vampires, but also it's been a long day of travel so a haiku's all I've got in me.

paradiseandcola posting in

holmestice

Name: paradiseandcola
Contact email: paradiseandcola34 (at) gmail.com
AO3 username: paradiseandcola
Treat preference: Yes, please!

Every time when I write my sign-up post I start with examining how many new adaptations I've become familiar with in the last six months, so I could add them to the list. This time I'm sad to say I don't have anything new to add. I am making my way through Elementary (and enjoying it tremendously!) but it's a very slow watchthrough so I can't call myself too familiar with the show yet.
( Read more... )

Vibes: good

olivermoss

One the Kraken's baby goalies got their first NHL start last night and I need to talk about it

* He won, with a .963% save average. He had a bit of a softball opponent, but that's a good thing for a first game. He made some insane glove saves, stopped play by throwing himself at the puck. He's still cooking, but that was a splashy debut.

* He made a lot of solid passes to our Ds, very active goalie.

* Kokko passed to Kakko. Our announcers had to mention both Kaapo Kakko and Nikke Kokko in the same sentence repeatedly, and man I've wanted that all season.

* Other team pulled their goalie, so Kokko went for it, he took a shot on goal in his debut. He didn't get it, but it was a solid try. Then...

* In his post game interview was like "I tried to score before Joey, that was it" Joey is our main goalie, who famously regularly practices shooting in full goalie gear because he wants a goalie goal. He has the most NHL points of any goalie, and has taken multiple shots in the same game. And the kid make a stab at beating him to the punch.

He got the start, the win, first star, fish yeet and the helmet. And then teased the face of the franchise. He had an insane night.

The other thing that is nuts is why *neither* of our goalies for yesterday's game had a single NHL start before last night. They are both call ups. The Kraken roster 3 goalies, which is unusual. We got criticized for it a lot at the start of the year, but people quickly shut up. Between it being an Olympic year, everything about the state of the goalie market and one of our goalies getting a serious injury and being out most of the season, it was clearly shown to be a good move. Other teams have had some drama and ongoing problems with their netminders.

But it gets worse. We've got an usual amount of contracted goalies overall, not just on our NHL team. Last night our AHL team had to dress one of their goalie coaches for the game. We've gone from an overflow of goalies to nabbing people from the support staff. It's not any one thing. Murray has an undisclosed family situation. LaFountaine is sick. Gru took an on-ice injury and got pulled mid-game and is still out. Joey took an on-ice injury and played through the pain to a win, but is now recovering from that.

Goalie is a very specialized position. Ds and Fs are in much larger pools, and you can always run one less D or make a D play F. 4 out across the franchise is insane. We aren't the only franchise with goalie problems right now, but in our case it's just... shit happens. And the good news is that the chaos lead to a goalie having an amazing debut. The assumption that Nikke will replace Gru in a few years, he's being developed to help anchor an NHL team. So, that debut and running an all-rookie line was a look at where things are headed.

senmut

The Cat's Perspective (1979) (2743 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Alien (Original Movies 1979-1997), Alien Series
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jones the Cat & Xenomorph Characters (Alien Series)
Characters: Jones the Cat (Alien Series), Xenomorph Characters (Alien Series), Ellen Ripley
Additional Tags: POV Jones the Cat (Alien Series), Cats, Retelling
Summary:

Jones comes from a long line of hunters.

And there is a new prey on the ship.

This? Is fantastic.

musesfool

I feel like I've probably oversold this post as well-put-together meta when it is mostly a lot of bullet points with me going "WTF? WTF?," which I guess is basically the Dungeon Crawler Carl experience in a nutshell. Anyway! It's a month until Parade of Horribles comes out, so I figured I'd better post before the post was obsolete. *g*

This is mostly stuff that I've picked up on in reading/rereading and am wondering what will be resolved (and when, given that there's supposedly 3 more books, and ( spoiler ) I also wanted to do a little speculation about endings. Because despite people on reddit being very vocal about Dinniman being a horror writer and how it's not going to end happily and everyone will die, I don't believe that to be the case, necessarily, based on my reading of the books. (I mean, is it likely? Sure. Do I want that ending? Nope!)

The first, less salient, point in my favor is that the books open with Carl telling the story in a way that sounds like he's looking back on it, that he's been through it and lived to tell the tale. This is typical in novels written in first person past tense; however, ( spoilers )

The second, more important, point, to me, is the theme of the story that's being told – one of resistance and revolution, anti-capitalism and anti-imperialism – and having that be snuffed out in favor of late stage capitalism and status quo antebellum being restored is just...I don't see it (especially not now). I guess even if everyone dies, the changes Carl et al. have forced on the galaxy will linger, at least for a while, but I am not sure anymore that even Carl dies at the end (I would have said 98% yes he does, but I read some interesting meta on tumblr that made me wonder if he will in fact survive and why, rooted in his own past trauma to make it make sense).

I do think a lot of our favorites will die, probably horribly, but I also think Donut will make it out alive. I cannot imagine killing the cat at this point. It would be interesting and somewhat surprising to make Carl live in the new world too. (I am not just saying this because he's my blorbo, but that might be a major factor in it.) Though how – given his primal race – could be as something new and different (or its own horror, given the givens), which might as well be death in some ways? Metamorphosis, at least. Idk.

Anyway, I've wrestled with how to organize this – by character? by theme? – and decided to go with *drumroll* location! It seemed to make the most sense to me, anyway.

There's spoilers for all 7 books (I am not a member of the Patreon so I haven't read any excerpts from book 8 or the extra material from the print versions of the books) from here on out.

We'll start wide with ( the galaxy )

Which brings us to ( earth's surface )

And then, the most important location, ( the dungeon )

I'm sure there are things I've forgotten/missed/am making too much or too little of, but there is just so much going on that I needed to track it all somehow, and so here we are. If you've read the books, what do you think?

*I said this on tumblr, but I do hope someone makes a Carl vid to Springsteen's Trapped - it's definitely #1 on the Carl playlist I did not actually make but which lives in my head while I contemplate inchoate fic ideas I will never write.

***

Vibes: thoughtful
Tunes: Mets vs A's on tv

redbird

I just attended part of the online memorial for

minoanmiss. While I was there, a couple of people talked about Ny, and read poetry. I disconnected after listening to one song, because listening to people sing over Zoom feels thin. There were some great photos of Ny, smiling.

Also, yesterday I went to shul with Adrian to say kaddish for my mother. Most of the service, including the singing, was in Hebrew, but I felt more of a connection there, I think because I was in a room full of people, not looking at boxes in a Zoom window.

carenejeans

Quote of the Day:

(Another quote from Elizabeth McCracken, because it's what I'm reading and because I ran out of quotations and don't have time to look for more elsewhere. I really recommend her book; it's weird and contradictory and funny. Before the quote below she's actually arguing against having to feel like you have to write every day, heh.)

"And yet I persist in believing that I’m a real writer. I’ve never doubted that I am. My work, yes, I have doubted. My work ethic, and my reputation. Not my identity. I write; I am a writer. My qualifications are that I say so."

— Elizabeth McCracken, A Long Game: Notes on Writing Fiction (HarperCollins, 2025).

My Check-In:

A good chunk of the Neverending project.

Today there is no adulting! I insist!

Tally
( Days 1-10 )

Day 11:

badly_knitted,

carenejeans,

cornerofmadness,

dswdiane,

goddess47,

sanguinity,

sylvanwitch,

the_siobhan,

trobadora

Let me know if I missed you, or if you wrote but didn't check in yet. And remember, you can join in at any time!

snickfic

Assorted items:
+

seasonsofdrabbles spring round signups close today!

+ Having posted the fic below, I seem to have gotten all my Oasis feelings out for the moment, or maybe just all my writing feelings. I spent the last couple of weekends going to art museums, and I've also finally found the brain space and desire to read again. It feels really good. I've finished two books in the past week! Amazing!

+ Currently actively reading:
- In the Forests of Serre by Patricia McKillip
- It's Not a Cult by Joey Batey (thanks to

troisoiseaux, who passed their copy on to me <3)
- The Beginning Comes After the End by Rebecca Solnit

I wrote a fic! Not even for an exchange!

doughnut hips (6511 words) by Snickfic
Fandom: Oasis (Band)
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Liam Gallagher/Noel Gallagher
Additional Tags: Chubby Kink, sensory play, Light CBT, Light BDSM, Anal Sex, Porn with Feelings, Oasis Reunion (Band), Sibling Incest, Crying, Weight Gain, Kissing
Summary:
Liam settled his hands on Noel’s hips and then wondered if he shouldn’t, but there weren’t a lot of places for him to touch Noel that weren’t softer than they’d been sixteen years ago.
Noel cleared his throat. “I didn’t think you’d care if—you know. If I put on a few pounds.”

This was supposed to be a quick kink-focused one-shot, but it almost immediately grew a bunch of reunion feelings and became a lot more emotionally dense than I planned, and it ended up taking me about five months to write (across 19 days of writing). It was really satisfying to finish, and I feel like I did all the things I set out to do.

On the theme of "every kink applies to Gallaghercest," this has my first ever CBT and sensory deprivation. I've never had even the faintest inclination to write those before, did not go in planning to write them here, and yet: here they are.

I'm calling this a fill for

crackthewip, which makes it the first fic I've finished for that event, despite having run it for three years (and then passed it on to

chacusha). Yay.

This fic really filled a niche, apparently, because I got the most feedback on this that I've ever gotten in the first week of posting an Oasis fic (not counting the one last year that I was posting in daily installments). It's so gratifying to write things that people want to read. ;______;

forestofglory

Back in January I said I was going to make “comfort” my media theme for the first quarter of the year and then think about if I wanted to change. The first quarter of 2026 has been over for a bit. I’ve been having an amazing reading year so far! Other media not so much – I’ve been watching things only with other people, but that’s fine. Honestly I’ve not been thinking about my media theme much. So I guess it's going fine? I don’t see any need to change it anyways.

But now that I am thinking about my theme I kinda want to watch another crossdressing girl drama – those are so fun and comforting.

And now for some thoughts on recent media. It’s been a bit because I was busy and sick – but I’m doing better now.

NewsPrints by Ru Xu —Sometimes I read a thing that it seems like I should be really into and I'm just like "This is nice" That's how I feel about this book. It's got a crossdressing girl, cool diesel punk tech, found family! I'm not sure why I don't love it. (I started reading the squeal but it was somewhat darker and I didn’t really want to deal with that.)

Justice Society of America vol 1 and 2 by Geoff Johns, Mikel Janín et al. —I ended up reading this for convoluted reasons: I read Stargirl and the Lost Children because it had an appearance by a minor character that I was curious about, and then I wanted to know what happened next, which is told here. I would have liked even more lost children. But really the problem with this is that its too much story for the space, everything happens very fast and there is not enough time to get to know the characters. Probably I’m expected to come in already knowing and caring about some of them, but since I didn’t it really just felt like no one got much space to be interesting.

I Shall Never Fall in Love by Hari Conner—This queer regency romance is billed as “inspired by Jane Austen and queer history” but you could just as easily call it “a queer retelling of Emma”. I enjoyed it! I love how expressive the faces are. Also I really appreciated the facts and references in the back. And It’s super cool that all of the clothing is based on existing surviving garments or historical fashion plates!

The Unbeatable Squirrel Girlvol 1-2 by Ryan North, Erica Henderson, et al— this continues to be very fun! Featuring such delights as dinosaurs and a zine issues!

Nezha (2019)— I watched this Chinese animated movie with my group watch discord. So I generally I write up notes on each item for these posts a day or two after finishing it so it will be fresh in my mind (Then I wait until I have several things so I can post them all together) But this time I had to run off after watching Nezha and now its been a week so I don’t remember this as well as I’d like. It was fun though.
Content Note traumatic childbirth, gross bodily fluids

hrj

Thursday evening I figured out I was coming down with a cold (after a day of thinking it was allergies). This conveniently coincided with a three-day rain front so it was a cue to hunker down in rest-and-relax mode without being tempted to attempt to use my body or brain much.

Since I recently swapped my Peacock subscription (since the Olympics are over) for Britbox, I decided to spend multiple days binging Sharpe's Rifles and knitting. (I know the title is actually "Sharpe" but I figured that might be insufficient data for identification.) I rather enjoyed the series except for two plot-requirement aspects.

Most importantly, so much of Sharpe's troubles could have been forestalled by being willing to just outright shoot a nemesis the first time. (I tried to word that sentence with the plural of nemesis, but none of my attempts looked right.) I mean, the whole point of his character is that he's a rough-and-ready, up-from-the-ranks scrapper, not a silly honor-above-all officer-class type. So the insistence on one-on-one sword duels and letting a nemesis escape isn't really in character. (Ok, he has his own brand of honor, but I still think there's a problem here.)

The second plot point is that Jane's betrayal feels utterly contrived. I don't believe a woman who has been through her experiences and had the fortitude to help with field surgery and nursing is going to be so easily led astray. It's like they tossed out her established character because they needed to introduce a new girlfriend. Her later behavior isn't the same person.

But I got a bunch of knitting done.

vivdunstan

Continuing our weekly rewatch of 1990 BBC Narnia TV series “The Silver Chair”, and wryly amused at episode 4’s quasi reunion of Blackadder’s Nursie and Captain Rum. “Potato” is my all time favourite episode of Blackadder.

snickfic

Exit 8 (2026). A man who has just found out his ex-girlfriend is pregnant gets lost in a seemingly infinite subway tunnel.

This is a Japanese movie based on a Japanese video game that was apparently a huge hit a few years ago. It's also the second movie this year based on an essentially non-narrative video game with long stretches of "yup, this sure feels like I'm watching someone play a video game." Like Iron Lung, they really have to work here to stretch their premise to a 90-minute runtime with an actual story. Things get pretty repetitive after a while, since the tunnel acts essentially as a spacial time loop (as elegantly depicted by the movie poster).

That said, I mostly enjoyed the experience, in large part because of the lead actor Kazunari Ninomiya, who is great. I've learned he was a beloved Jpop idol 20+ years ago, and I believe it, because he has loads of charisma while acting basically alone for the first 2/3 of the film. I would absolutely watch him in more things.

The movie is also occasionally really stylish. The opening scenes are IMO the best part of the film from a filmmaking perspective, starting with our guy on a crowded train listening to Bolero to the camera-eye POV first loop through the subway tunnel (as a nod to the game being a walking simulator).

However, I think my favorite part of the movie is the interlude where we see the backstory for the other recurring character in the subway tunnel, a man walking robotically with a briefcase. That's easily the best horror material in the film.

--

Forbidden Fruits (2026). Three women named after fruits who work in a mall fashion boutique tentatively welcome a new member into their girl-power coven.

This movie is kind of all over the place. It leans a bit too hard into satire, which loses me sometimes, while also not seeming to have a clear idea what it's trying to say about female relationships. In my opinion Lili Reinhart as the coven leader is one of the weak links, although I've seen a lot of people say the opposite. On the other hand, Victoria Pedretti as the airhead recovering alcoholic stole the show for me. I didn't even recognize her at first because Cherry is so different from the Mike Flanagan characters I've seen her play, but she's hilarious and heartbreaking.

The movie is also very stylish, and the fashion is incredible, like truly impossible to describe, you have to experience it for yourself. Each of the four gets their own consistent look: glam seductress, gothy femme, girl next door, sexy baby.

The movie also, after an hour and fifteen minutes of campy satire, suddenly goes extremely hard. It gets gnarly, you guys. It fucking commits. It must have been a real challenge to market this film, because if you're watching it as a horror movie, it takes over an hour to get there, but if you're not into horror, you are in for a nasty surprise at the end.

Put this on the list of "wasn't quite for me, not mad I saw it, happy it exists." It had style and ambition, and that goes a long way with me. (Typing that out, I realize it has a ton in common with last movie's football horror movie Him, with a lot of the same strengths and weaknesses. So if you were into that, try this.)

galadhir

So, it was Louise's hafla last night, aka the 'Hob al Raqs' Hafla. I wonder if I can get a copy of the running list up here? Hm... but it's very big, so here is a link to the pdf instead.

After having been sick with nerves and dreading it for two days prior, the nerves cleared up on the day, and I gradually got ready by ironing my veil (for the Nawwarat group dance) and practicing putting on a dramatic blue eye make up look from YouTube.

(Did you know that you can use cellotape on your face to get a sharp wing to your eyeshadow? I didn't. But I do now.)( Read more... )

DH of course, who turned up with two huge cameras, (one for video and one for stills) was very popular and everyone wanted to pose and show off their sparkling outfits. There will be much excitement when he posts the finished photos to a friends-locked group on the web. I'm looking forward to that too. He is a treasure and everyone knows it :)

PS. The other lady from my class who said she might do a solo did not in fact do a solo despite being objectively much better than me. I don't understand - surely the point of practicing a dance is to perform it?

PPS. I wonder when I will feel as though I have the right to use the dance name I picked out? I mean I'm not good and I'm certainly not professional, but I am up there performing. Does that make me a dancer yet or is there another trial you have to pass first?

delphi

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

susandennis

My mp3's are all mixed together and I just dump a random group onto my player for swimming. It could be country, it could be Beatles, it could be The Big Bopper, it could be gospel or even a Sousa March. There is no order, whatever one is next, is next. It's a playlist with a neurological disorder.

In our family, we sang a lot. We took a lot of road trips and singing was required. Plus just around the house. Sometimes real songs and sometimes made up songs. A family favorite was What a Friend We Have in Mother. Well, maybe not the whole family but Mom loved it and burst it out often. Another one that I have no idea why or when we sang often and in jest was Love Lifted Me.

This morning, in the middle of my swim, just after a Bob Dylan song, I got Love Lifted Me.

It is very hard to swim and LOL at the same time.

The Mariners and Houston played horribly last night. Houston cannot pitch and the Mariners have no offense so it's pretty hilarious. BUT finally Houston ran out of time and the Mariners won in the bottom of the 9th. a walk off by my favorite player so I wasn't too made about having to stay up late.

Jim and Gayle - that's Jim Down the Hall and his girlfriend who lives on the other side of the Timber Ridge complex - got back last night from their very long road trip. Jim was born and raised within true spitting distance of where my brother lives now and that was a spot on their trip so they had lunch with my brother while they were there. I haven't seen either of them yet, I hope the whole trip was fun.

On down the hall a couple of more doors is Jan and Dick. They moved into Myna's apartment. They walk a mile every day. Last Thursday, on their walk, Jan tripped over a curb and seriously fractured her right arm. It's now stabilized until it can be surgically repaired. The soonest they can get in to see a surgeon is Thursday. Massive Ugh. And she's right handed. And they have a huge important trip to see family graduate on the east coast planned for the end of this month and she has been so looking forward to it.

At the end of the hall is Bonny who is getting a new hip on May 4. She has everything planned - help coming in and stuff - and I sure hope it goes easily.

All of the above was in case anyone wants to know what's new in my 'hood.

Today I will be glued to my knitting needles in front of the TV. First is Tia Watson's (YouTube) update on her house renovation, then CBS Sunday morning, then the Mariner game. BUSY day.

I tried the safety eyes on my mini monsters and Love them! But, then they didn't seem so monstery so I went with a smile instead of monster teeth. There will be more like this.

kat_lair

***

Kat Reads Books

Hildur by Satu Rämö - Hildur is the only detective in the sparsely populated western fjords of Iceland, busy dealing with childhood trauma (a mysterious disappearance of her little sisters) by surfing in the freezing waves of the Atlantic and having a casual no strings attached thing with a neighbouring P.E. teacher. Then a local drug dealer and child abuser is killed and Jakob, a police trainee from Finland arrives on a Nordic exchange programme. This was the first of the series that's proven super popular in Finland, and other Nordics I think. No idea if it's been translated to English yet but if you like 'Nordic noir' that isn't actually that dark, then I would recommend. The case is interesting, the characters are all very real, and the book does a really good job at weaving in information about Icelandic society and mythology without slipping into info dumping.

Rosa ja Björk by Satu Rämö - Second in the series, named after the missing sisters, whose fate starts to unravel on the background while Hildur and Jakob get busy with a murder of a local politician. Like the first book, this does a great job at weaving multiple timelines and storylines (the case, but also Hildur's family, and Jakob's custody worries) without getting confusing. The society and landscape play almost as large a role as the actual characters. I've decided that since my own Iceland trip is almost certain for August, this book series counts as like, work related research, which is obviously why I'm moving through it at a pace.

Kat Watches Things

BTS Arirang on Gwanghwamun Square - The Netflix comeback concert which I watched at pushkin666's. It was a spectacle for sure but so lovely to see the guys back and the live performances of the new album song (damn those new choreos). Camerawork was a bit too much on the crowds at times and wasn't always following the singer quite as tightly as I would've liked to see but on the whole it was fire. Special mention from me to the sit-down performance of Like Animals (equal amounts flustering and heart-wrenching, how?)

Stray Kids: Dominate Experience - The concert itself was, as I knew from personal experience thank you very much, amazing and the sit-down mini interview sections causes me Many Feelings. Probably 75% of them are about Chan for reasons I will not be elaborating on outside fanfic fjkdagtwankfmwalnf (please, someone find his off button, I am begging).

Luca - Rewatch but still excellent. Off the coast of Italy, Luca is a seamonster boy looking for adventure. He finds it with Alberto, another seamonster boy with equal amounts of bravado and insecurities. Together they embark on a quest to win the local race with a local human girl Giulia so that they can buy a Vespa and travel the world together. Listen. You will not convince me this is not a queer love story in the making. I have AO3 receipts to prove it. Anyway, this is a love animation about acceptance and found family.

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire - Another rewatch. Well, I mostly put it in the background whilst writing. Fun and flashy, the family dynamics are cute and generally I would watch Paul Rudd read the phonebook so... Phoebie/ghost girl Melody had some potential. It was lovely to see the old crew having a blast.

Madame Webb - In the early 00s a NY paramedic Cassie dies for a bit and activates a mysterious power to see to the future, well, a few minutes only, stemming from her mother being bit by a spider in the Amazon whilst pregnant. She ends up protecting three teenagers who will grow to kill the bad guy in the future. Look. I have absolutely no idea about the Marvel canon for this character so can't comment on the adaptation. Things Iiked: found family of women kicking ass, no romantic subplots, the spider aspects not as creepy as I feared. Things that annoyed me: the logistical plotholes, like I'm sorry but do you know how long it would take to travel from NYC to deep in Peruvian jungle and how unadvisable it would be to go there with like a backpack and a sleeveless top. Also the actual motivation of the bad guy was just... not explained. Sure, he was all 'I will not lose everything I've built' and had some cool spider powers but like... Greed? Was that really it? Boring af. I will give the movie a Very Clever character backstory, which I absolutely did not get until like 15mins after the film ended and I was like '...omg CHARACTER NAME'.

The Curse of Bridge Hollow - A family moves to a small town obsessed with Halloween which suits their teenager paranormal enthusiast daughter well except for how she accidentally releases the spirit of Stingy Jack, who then makes al the Halloween decorations come to live. Yes, I absolutely clicked on this because it was Halloween themed and it provided perfect breakfast watching. Fun little family romp, plus Kelly Rowland as the mother. Very watchable.

メアリと魔女の花 | Mary to Majo no Hana | Mary and the Witch's Flower (2017) - Bored and in a new town, Mary discovers mysterious flower in the forest that gives her magical powers and leads her to a magical Endor College where she discovers dubious transmogrification experiments... And also sort of gets the local delivery boy kidnapped. Rescue mission ensues. This was a beautiful animation with suitably unsettling feel at times. The messages of 'you don't need magic to be special' and 'animal experimentation bad' weren't like, subtle, but they're good messages to deliver to the target audience so. Yes. Liked it.

Migration - A duck family decides to leave their safe pond and migrate to Jamaica, encounter many eccentric birds on the way and one scary chef with obsession for duck a l'orange. Adventures are had, bravery is discovered. This was a fun a fun animation, with shout outs for Danny DeVito as Uncle Dan (I see what they did there), Carol Cane as Eron the elderly heron and David Mitchell as Googoo the yogic farm duck.

Borderlands - Lilith a first grade (not scumbag) bounty hunter gets a gig to find a kidnapped teenager on her home planet of Pandora where she swore never to return, since it's mostly a shithole overrun by psychos and hopeful explorers looking for a mythical alien vault... That the teenager girl in question may just be a key for. A ragtag of people band together to fight against a greedy corporation looking to use the alien technology in the vault for nefarious purposes. Including a snarky robot. Listen, this was So Fun, just a lot of smash bang quip. A twist that I absolutely saw coming. Also, did I say Lilith is played by Cate Blanchett? In a fire red hair. MmmmHhhmmm. Also, I love Jame Lee Curtis.

Zootopia 2 - Ahhhhhhhhh. Okay, I love the first movie so much I was a little apprehensive about going into the sequel but happy to report that my heart-eyes for this franchise remain. Nick and Judy are struggling to adjust to their partnership and like Talk About Their Feelings (not like that in the movie though I would say it's Very Open To Interpretation) due to hiding them behind incessant jokes and trying to save everyone, respectively. The plot involves a stolen diary of the inventor of Zootropolis' weather wall and a hundred year conspiracy that saw reptiles banished and becoming second class citizens. The themes of differences are our strength and looking beyond stereotypes are present and accounted for and I loved all the new characters, and the old of course. BRB, off to check if the fandom on AO3 has my back because I need approximately 348290 post-canon feelings fic.

***

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Merrilee

April 2026

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Page Summary

cosmolinguist - The Hostage Negotiation of the Front-Facing Camera
princessofgeeks - Heated Rivalry recs
twistedchick - (no subject)
mdehners - Uncanny Valley....with Deer!
leanwellback - escapril 2026: #12 invisible string
paradiseandcola in holmestice - Here's to another solstice
olivermoss - Nikke Kokko
senmut - Space Swap Rec
musesfool - When the game is over, I won't walk out the loser*
redbird - memorials
carenejeans - Write Every Day April 2026 - Day 12
snickfic - Oasis fic and other fannish things
forestofglory - Media Roundup: Mini Update on Reading Goals +1 comment
hrj - Vegging (not the garden kind) +1 comment
vivdunstan - Narnia/Blackadder crossover
snickfic - Movies: Exit 8 and Forbidden Fruits +2 comments
galadhir - (no subject)
delphi - Six Sentence Sunday
susandennis - Random stuff
kat_lair - Kat Consumes Media +1 comment

AI use statement

I sometimes hand write posts on a TCL NXTPAPER tablet that uses an AI Large Language Model (LLM) to convert my handwriting to text.

I do not intentionally use generative AI in anything that I make but note that I use apps (Microsoft Office, Canva, etc) that have integrated AI. These may have hidden AI 'features' operating in the background or offer assets that may be AI generated and not labelled as such.

To the best of my knowledge any content made by other people that I use or link to does not use generative AI.

Acknowledgement

Written and published on Ngunnawal and Ngambri country.
Sovereignty was never ceded.

Style and theme derived from Hibiscus by

branchandroot

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Page generated Apr. 12th, 2026 07:52 pm

Merrilee makes

Knitting, spinning and weaving through end-stage capitalism

Network

The Hostage Negotiation of the Front-Facing Camera

Heated Rivalry recs

(no subject)

Uncanny Valley....with Deer!

escapril 2026: #12 invisible string

Here's to another solstice

Nikke Kokko

Space Swap Rec

When the game is over, I won't walk out the loser*

memorials

Write Every Day April 2026 - Day 12

Oasis fic and other fannish things

Media Roundup: Mini Update on Reading Goals

Vegging (not the garden kind)

Narnia/Blackadder crossover

Movies: Exit 8 and Forbidden Fruits