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まるさんが使いやすいかなと思って買った、大きな猫トイレ。 出入り口の高さが低くて、大きなまるさんも中で方向転換しやすそうなサイズ感。 I bought this large cat litter box because […]
It would be premature to say that Saja the kitten rules the roost around here, but it is true that he very quickly became extremely comfortable with his position in the house, flopping onto the floor wherever he feels like flopping and making routing around him everyone else’s problem. This lounging position very well exemplifies his attitude: Why not let it all hang out? If someone want to complain, that’s a them issue, isn’t it?
This does delight me; I like a kitten with attitude, and also I don’t mind launching him across the floorboard like a furry curling stone if he’s in my way. When I do, he usually looks up at me like, you win this round, human, and then tries eating my face at 3am. Again, I don’t hate this. A little feline attitude goes a long way with me.
— JS
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⌈ Secret Post #6904 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
01.
( More! )
Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 30 secrets from Secret Submission Post #986.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
There's really no such thing as a "typical" wedding cake anymore.
So today, we're going to give in to our dark sides a little.
We have to start with classic black, right?
(By Hey There Cupcake, California)
Stunning, hand-painted black.
Of course, there are a lot of dark choices beyond black. How about this gorgeous teal number?
(By Have+Some+Cake, United Kingdom)
The rich color, offset tier, and hand-painting really put this one over the top.
Or maybe you'd prefer a forest that isn't at all forbidding.
(By Immaculate Confections, United Kingdom)
In fact, I'd call it enchanting.
This red cake was inspired by Melisandre, the Red Priestess from "Game of Thrones."
(By Candytuft Cakes, Ireland)
It doesn't need to cast a glamour to be beautiful. Wow.
Then there are the times you just want to burst onto the scene and yell, "Ta da!"
(By Kuchen Diva, Switzerland)
Ta da!
The "origami" is edible wafer paper. So clever.
This purple cake isn't exactly a shrinking violet:
(By Dolce Lusso Cakes, United Kingdom)
Those are handmade sugar orchids; I like how the gold leaf really makes them pop.
And look at all the different textures on this stunner:
(By Foxtail Bakeshop, Oregon)
Quick. Somebody knit me this cake!
The baker went for a crumpled metal effect on this steampunk-inspired cake, very funky cool:
(By Sylwia Sobiegraj The Cake Designer, Ireland)
Plus it took me a second to realize only two of the roses are sculpted; the middle one is hand-painted.
Proving yet again that steampunk doesn't have to be brown!
Not that there's anything wrong with brown, of course...
(By Cove Cake Design, Ireland)
Mmm. Do you think that's chocolate? I think it's chocolate. Does anyone have a fork so I can check? And maybe some milk?
But I digress...
Let's end with a splash of deep, dark color:
(By The Cocoa Cakery, Canada)
I think I'm in love.
These cakes certainly prove there's no reason to be afraid of the dark.
Isn't that Sweet?
*****
And from my other blog, Epbot:
Look! I remembered to post before December started this year!
Nov. 30th, 2025 02:42 am![[staff profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user_staff.png){kind=small}
denise posting in ![[site community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/comm_staff.png){kind=small}
dw_newsHello, friends! It's about to be December again, and you know what that means: the fact I am posting this actually before December 1 means karzilla reminded me about the existence of linear time again. Wait, no -- well, yes, but also -- okay, look, let me back up and start again: it's almost December, and that means it's time for our annual December holiday points bonus.
The standard explanation: For the entire month of December, all orders made in the Shop of points and paid time, either for you or as a gift for a friend, will have 10% of your completed cart total sent to you in points when you finish the transaction. For instance, if you buy an order of 12 months of paid time for $35 (350 points), you'll get 35 points when the order is complete, to use on a future purchase.
( The fine print and much more behind this cut! )
Thank you, in short, for being the best possible users any social media site could possibly ever hope for. I'm probably in danger of crossing the Sappiness Line if I haven't already, but you all make everything worth it.
On behalf of Mark, Jen, Robby, and our team of awesome volunteers, and to each and every one of you, whether you've been with us on this wild ride since the beginning or just signed up last week, I'm wishing you all a very happy set of end-of-year holidays, whichever ones you celebrate, and hoping for all of you that your 2026 is full of kindness, determination, empathy, and a hell of a lot more luck than we've all had lately. Let's go.
karzilla reminded me about the existence of linear time again. Wait, no -- well, yes, but also -- okay, look, let me back up and start again: it's almost December, and that means it's time for our annual December holiday points bonus.The standard explanation: For the entire month of December, all orders made in the Shop of points and paid time, either for you or as a gift for a friend, will have 10% of your completed cart total sent to you in points when you finish the transaction. For instance, if you buy an order of 12 months of paid time for $35 (350 points), you'll get 35 points when the order is complete, to use on a future purchase.
( The fine print and much more behind this cut! )
Thank you, in short, for being the best possible users any social media site could possibly ever hope for. I'm probably in danger of crossing the Sappiness Line if I haven't already, but you all make everything worth it.
On behalf of Mark, Jen, Robby, and our team of awesome volunteers, and to each and every one of you, whether you've been with us on this wild ride since the beginning or just signed up last week, I'm wishing you all a very happy set of end-of-year holidays, whichever ones you celebrate, and hoping for all of you that your 2026 is full of kindness, determination, empathy, and a hell of a lot more luck than we've all had lately. Let's go.
秋の庭で木登りを満喫するみり。-Miri enjoys climbing trees in the autumn garden.-（動画）
Nov. 30th, 2025 04:28 am![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png){kind=small}
maru_feed秋の庭で木登りを満喫するみり！ 秋晴れで気持ちが良かったのか、いつもより高いところまで登っていました。 Miri enjoys climbing trees in the autumn garden! She was c […]
⌈ Secret Post #6903 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
01.
( More! )
Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 36 secrets from Secret Submission Post #986.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
[ SECRET SUBMISSIONS POST #987 ]
The first secret from this batch will be posted on December 6th.
The first secret from this batch will be posted on December 6th.
| RULES: 1. One secret link per comment. 2. 750x750 px or smaller. 3. Link directly to the image. More details on how to send a secret in! Optional: If you would like your secret's fandom to be noted in the main post along with the secret itself, please put it in the comment along with your secret. If your secret makes the fandom obvious, there's no need to do this. If your fandom is obscure, you should probably tell me what it is. Optional #2: If you would like WARNINGS (such as spoilers or common triggers -- list of some common ones here) to be noted in the main post before the secret itself, please put it in the comment along with your secret. Optional #3: If you would like a transcript to be posted along with your secret, put it along with the link in the comment! |
She takes a pretty great photo, if you ask me. I acknowledge I am biased.
Also, here she is in her natural environment, which is to say, with a big damn sword:
Where does one get a big damn sword? Friend, you’re asking too many questions.
— JS
NGC 6888, also known as the Crescent Nebula, is a
⌈ Secret Post #6902 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
01.
( More! )
Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #985.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
Every year as the holiday season begins we’ve run a gift guide for the holidays, and over the years it’s been quite successful: Lots of people have found out about excellent books and crafts and charities and what have you, making for excellent gift-giving opportunities during the holiday season. We’ve decided to do it again this year.
So: Starting Monday, December 1, the Whatever Holiday Gift Guide returns! If you’re a writer or other creator, this will be an excellent time to promote your work on a site which gets tens of thousands of viewers daily, almost all of whom will be interested in stuff for the holidays. If you’re someone looking to give gifts, you’ll see lots of excellent ideas. And you’ll also have a day to suggest stuff from other folks too. Everybody wins!
To give you all time to prepare, here’s the schedule of what will be promoted on which days:
Monday, December 1: Traditionally Published Authors — If your work is being published by a publisher a) who is not you and b) gets your books into actual, physical bookstores on a returnable basis, this is your day to tell people about your books. This includes comics/graphic novels and audiobooks.
Tuesday, December 2: Non-Traditionally Published Authors — Self-published? Electronically published? Or other? This is your day. This also includes comics/graphic novels and audiobooks.
Wednesday, December 3: Other Creators — Artists, knitters, jewelers, musicians, and anyone who has cool stuff to sell this holiday season, this will be the day to show off your creations.
Thursday, December 4: Fan Favorite Day — Not an author/artist/musician/other creator but know about some really cool stuff you think people will want to know about for the holidays? Share! Share with the crowd!
Friday, December 5: Charities — If you are involved in a charity, or have a favorite charity you’d like to let people know about, this is the day to do it.
If you have questions about how all of this will work, go ahead and ask them in the comment thread (Don’t start promoting your stuff today — it’s not time yet), although I will note that specific instructions for each day will appear on that day. Don’t worry, it’ll be pretty easy. Thanks and feel free to share this post with creative folks who will have things to sell this holiday season.
— JS
The YouTube video above fascinates me, because it details how people making $500,000 a year — economically fortunate by any sane measure — are still frequently living paycheck to paycheck. One signal reason for this is the issue of lifestyle comparison, and the fact that income disparity in the 1% is vastly wider than the income disparity within other segments of American life.
Huh? Well, as an example, let’s look at the third quintile of income in the US. In 2023 that third quintile had incomes roughly between $61,000 and $98,000, according to the US Census. Everyone within that quintile was within $37,000 dollars of each other in yearly income, more or less. That disparity is not nothing, obviously, but it’s all within economic hailing distance. In the one percent, the income range was between about $560,000 and, well, more than a billion dollars (this is reported income, not unrealized, illiquid wealth in things like stocks and real estate). Someone on the lowest rung of the 1% is vastly economically closer to someone in abject poverty than they are to that billionaire.
Thing is, if you are in the 1%, you’re not comparing your lifestyle to someone living in a tarpaper shack, you’re comparing your lifestyle to other people in the 1%. This often means comparing yourself to people who have ten or a hundred times more income than you do, with similar inequalities in overall wealth. Your lifestyle costs more, and because it costs more, the temptation of the “lower rung rich” to financially overextend themselves to keep up appearances is real — and also, in the world of the upper classes, things just cost more, because companies catering to rich people know their customers don’t want to be seen counting their coins. The person in the market for a BMW 7 series is a fundamentally different economic entity than the person in the market for a Honda Accord. This person is shopping at Erewhon, not Aldi. In the 1%, apparently, you are who you appear to be, or at least, who you appear to be to your neighbors and co-workers.
(Mind you, shit’s getting more expensive for everyone everywhere, it’s not just the 1% feeling the inflationary pinch. But as the video points out, businesses and economists are aware that most people in lower four quintiles are as squeezed as they’re going to get; any new growth in sales/revenues are going to come from the top end, which makes them ripe for price increases on goods and services directed to them specifically.)
“Well, Scalzi, you’re bougie as fuck and yet you don’t seem to be living paycheck to paycheck,” I hear you say. And it’s true! There are reasons for that. One, I’m a writer, and my “paychecks” — advances, royalties, the occasional film/TV option — arrive so sporadically that if we tried to budget around their arrival we would be screwed. Early on, when I was still a freelancer (and, to be clear, with the help of Krissy having a more regular income) we built up a “buffer account” to make sure our paying of bills was not dependent on waiting for any one particular check of mine to arrive. That buffer account still exists, just a little more padded out.
Two, we’ve largely avoided the comparison trap. We live in rural Ohio, a location not exactly swimming with people whose income we directly index our own against, and not a place where shops cater to the higher end of incomes. I’m a writer, which means the professional community I am part of does not generally have the same incomes as, say, neurosurgeons or finance dudes. The highly sporadic nature of writer income also means I am aware the income is not reliable, and watching the careers of other writers through the years means I know one can’t just assume everything will be golden forever. Also, you know. Krissy and I both grew up with periods of our lives where we experienced, shall we say, a deficit of money. This has made each of us relatively conservative with what we do with our money, both individually and together. We’re not going to spend money to impress other people. We’re sure as hell not going to pile up debt to do it.
Three, we have other advantages and strategies. Where we live means we are able to acquire property at a discount to other areas (this means we’re unlikely to sell it later at ridiculously inflated prices, as we might if we lived in a city stuffed with high-income earners, but that’s fine). We don’t have any debt, which means we don’t have to pay out of our income to service it. I am financially literate and numerate (my very first book was on finance) and I don’t like to gamble, so our overall investment strategy is very much predicated on the idea that compound interest is our friend. Whenever I feel like trying to get rich quick, I buy a lottery ticket. It has roughly the same odds as me or any other non-professional without access to advanced financial market tools successfully day trading or timing the market.
Finally, for both Krissy and me, there’s a point where the use of money has diminishing returns, and we don’t tend to spend after that bend of the curve. Last year Krissy bought a Honda CR-V hybrid. Could we have afforded something more upscale? Sure. But inasmuch as the CR-V had everything Krissy wanted and needed in a car, and going upscale from there would have meant a lot more money for only marginal improvement in utility, was it worth it to her? No. Likewise, my 2011 MINI Countryman lacks some modern technological amenities that I would like in a car, but not so many or so much that I’m going to spend for a whole new car when my own car still runs perfectly well and, frankly, sticking my phone into an eye-level holder and using an adapter to plug the thing into my car speakers will handle 90% of what I want.
(This doesn’t mean I have never done silly things with money, as my frankly over-endowed guitar collection will indicate. But I don’t get out over my skis on stuff like that. I always check in with Krissy, who is our day-day-money manager, before I make any such purchases. If she tells me “no” then it doesn’t happen.)
Krissy and I have been smart, and also we have been lucky, which should not be discounted either. There are lots of points in our lives where we could have been one bad break away from real financial problems. Beyond this, I don’t pretend I haven’t been incredibly fortunate in my own career, sometimes for reasons that have very little to do with me directly. It also doesn’t hurt that my own skills were portable, which allowed us to live somewhere housing and living costs were not ridiculously high.
At the end of the day, however, we’ve avoided so many problems by simply not worrying about how we stacked up against other people financially, and by being able to be content when things are good enough. We didn’t need to keep up with the Joneses, or the Bezoses. We’re doing well enough to be happy. And that’s the thing.
— JS
Ahhh, turkey cake wrecks. The bane-yet-blessing of my bloggy existence.
::pause::
Wanna see some more?
If there were a Vegas review starring hot dogs and/or Twinkies...uh...dangit, now I kind of wish that actually existed. Somebody get on that, will you?
The irony, it runs deep.
(For extra lolz, just imagine the little feet wiggling.)
I'm sure you've seen ads for those turkey ice cream cakes. You know, these ones?
Well, expectation, meet reality:
(Once you start seeing this as a greased pig stuck in a rabbit hole, it's pretty much all you CAN see.)
And finally, I've seen my share of disturbing turkey cakes, believe me. (BELIEVE ME.) And yet, I think this really could be the MOST disturbing turkey cake I have ever seen.
[blinking]
Turkey cake is people!
TURKEY CAKE IS PEOPLE!!
Thanks to wreckporters Beth J., Nicki B., Rebecca W., & Courtney for "working" on a holiday. Extra leftovers for you, guys!
*****
Here's a new game - at least to me - that's getting rave reviews for family game time:
Beat That! The Bonkers Battle Of Wacky Challenges
Beat That comes with a huge assortment of physical game challenges, from bouncing balls into cups to picking up dice with a pair of chopsticks, and you bet with tokens on which challenges you think you can beat inside the time limit. Looks like fast-paced, silly fun. I'm thinking of bringing it to Thanksgiving this year, to break up the post-turkey sleepy time, heh.
*****
And from my other blog, Epbot:
