Year 50 Day 161

Me standing in my office, wearing a shirt with a print of dragons flying and breathing fire. Visible behind me is a Star Trek art print, and on my desk is a silly plastic octopus skeleton Halloween decor.

Day 161: Since I was doing a presentation for a group of students that had already greatly appreciated my shirt with multicolored dinosaurs, this time I went with dragons, and it was also a hit. I’m going to have to keep track of which shirts I wear for presentations this year to keep them all interested.

📚 Guises of the Mind by Rebecca Neason

56/2023 – ⭐️⭐️⭐️

A somewhat surprisingly Catholic approach to Star Trek. Not badly done, though as other reviewers have noted, does give it a very monotheistic viewpoint; though it does note that there are other options, those definitely aren’t its focus. Given that, outside of DS9, religion isn’t often focused on in Star Trek, I found it an interesting approach, particularly the choice to focus on Tori rather than Data, the perennial outsider (though his interest is a present side thread).

Me holding Guises of the Mind

Year 50 Day 160

Me standing at the kitchen sink and doing dishes.

Day 160: I’m not much of a food-oriented person, and so have little in the way of cooking skills (though I can manage a pretty darn good take-out pizza or Kraft Mac-N-Cheese). So I make up for my limited usefulness in dinner prep by being responsible for the cleanup. It’s better than not bothering with the kitchen at all!

Year 50 Day 159

Me, with a slight smile, lit entirely in purple.

Day 159: Quite happily, I’m feeling much better today. Not quite back up to 100%, but improvements have most definitely been made. So I’m not nearly as blue as it may appear (though it was fun to play with the lights in my home office window).

Year 50 Day 157

Me outside in front of the Highline College library building, with a group of about 30 people visible behind me standing around and chatting with each other.

Day 157: Had our morning interrupted by a fire alarm! Turns out it was an unannounced drill, so no real danger or anything, but it was definitely an unexpected minor adventure.

📚 Queen Wallis by C.J. Carey

55/2023 – ⭐⭐⭐

A sequel to Widowland, one of this year’s Philip K. Dick Award-nominated books, set in an alternate-history UK where Germany won WWII, and the UK is now an allied protectorate of Germany, under the nominal reign of Queen Wallace Simpson, entirely reduced to a figurehead. Following the events of Widowland, and in anticipation of the first diplomatic visit from the United States in years, England is under even tighter control. The importance of literature and poetry are important threads again, and the book does a good job of continuing the story after the climax of Widowland, picking up threads and quite believably ratcheting up the tension. I’ll definitely be interested to see if the series continues on.

Me holding Queen Wallis

Year 50 Day 155

Me on our back porch, with lots of small orange lights strung across like a web.

Day 155: The other bit of lights we put up are these orange strings all across our back porch. Mostly only visible to us, but can just be glimpsed from the street if someone glances over at just the right time as they drive by.

Year 50 Day 153

Me in front of our house with the halloween lights I put up yesterday glowing. There are purple and orange strings along one side, and glowing green, orange, and purple spiders along another.

Day 153: Since yesterday’s shot of me putting up our Halloween lights was taken during the day, I figured one taken after sundown tonight to show them lit up was in order. Much more impressive this way!