Introduction to Computer Science

Books
Reading Danny Lavery's Something That May Shock And Discredit You. Unsure whether I have read it before or if it's just familiar because he published some of these essays online. Discovered that the pages from 84 to 101 of this (library) copy are missing. Not torn out, it's a misprint, they are replaced with earlier pages from the same book, printed blurry. Irritating. I suspect Unprecedented Times may be at fault: the publication date was 2020.

Comics
Dumbing of Age: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. (I wrote that a few days ago.) Live Sarah Reaction. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. (That one was today.)

Fandom
More betaing, and also I signed up for a fanfic bingo event that the Nine Worlds fandom server I'm on is doing.

Games
Played Toby's Nose, an interactive fiction game in which the player character is Sherlock Holmes' dog Toby. (A lot less unforgiving than the average IF game, but just as intricately detailed.)

Slay the Spire: still spending more time playing it than I should. Since last post I unlocked Ascension 6 for everyone, and Ascension 7 for Ironclad and the Silent and the Defect. It took me eleven tries to get the Silent through Ascension level 6. The eleventh time I had a shiv build with, among other things, Wrist Blade, Phantasmal Killer, two Accuracy+ and one Accuracy, Terror, Burst, Clockwork Souvenir, and a Flex potion. And, of course, Infinite Blades and Blade Dance+ and Blade Dance. So on my first turn I drank the Flex potion and let Clockwork Souvenir counteract the part where it wears off after one turn. Wrist Blade adds 4 damage to zero energy attacks, Accuracy+ adds 6 damage to shivs, Accuracy adds 4 damage to shivs, Terror gives the enemy vulnerability (attacks do 50% more damage) for 99 turns or until it cures the status effect, and Phantasmal Killer makes the next turn's attacks do double damage. That's a lot of setup, but you get shivs that a serious amount of damage. So of course my act 3 boss was Timmy. (The good news: he doesn't get stronger from power cards. The bad news: he gets stronger from you playing twelve cards period, and rudely interrupts you in the middle of your turn every twelve cards you play. And Burst's "play the next skill card twice" effect counts as playing the next card twice, not once.) I beat him in six turns. I had a Fairy in a Bottle potion, but I didn't need it. (I did use my Ghost Jar.) I also discovered a beautiful synergy between the Hovering Kite and Eviscerate, which didn't help me that much with Tim but was very helpful with hallway encounters. Eviscerate is 7x3 damage for 3 energy, one less energy for every card discarded this round. So even if you still only have three energy, if you block with Survivor and discard a card, that reduces Eviscerate to two energy and gives you one extra energy to play an Accuracy or whatever. The Defect, after that, just took two tries.

Crafts
I made another linoprint, my biggest and most complicated one to date (nearly A5, and not very complicated.) Yes, I'll post photos one of these days.

Also I dyed some flannel sheets and pillowcases a very dark bluish/purplish grey. It was my first attempt at overdyeing: dyeing fabric which already has a pattern printed on it. It was green and white gingham checks, and I hoped I'd get dark grey on darker grey checks. This indeed proved to be the case, although they mostly only show in direct sunlight. What I wanted most, though, was just warm winter sheets in a colour that went with my other sheets and blankets, without having to pay postage from another country, and, success!

Tech
Still configuring laptop a little bit at a time. Most recently, used Themix to install an unbelievably lurid desktop theme. I will get tired of it and need to change to something less garish within five hours of using my laptop again, probably definitely.

Links

• It's that time of year again: Gender Census! (This year with a little disclaimer about AI. It said what I hoped it would say, and I'm relieved but sad it's necessary.)


• Alive, Sane and Alone: Social Control and Responsibility in “What Happens Next” (Only recommended for people who've read Max Graves' webcomic What Happens Next, but it's interesting if you have. It's a (long) analysis of the comic through a biopolitics lens.)


• Australia urged to move on from ‘moral panic’ over video games after Disco Elysium banned. This happened over four years ago, but I only heard about it recently. When it was banned, I hadn't played Disco Elysium yet, but had already bought it on Steam.


• More recent context for the above: this bullshit. And no, it's not about "the sexualisation of women and girls", don't piss up my leg and tell me it's raining.


• And see also face age and ID checks, in Australia and the UK. I'm finding it hard to talk about this stuff because it is so important to me and it upsets me so much and at the same time people around the world are facing so much worse things right now (even though the rights to privacy and anonymity are very much a part of those fights too.)


• In memory of Tom Lehrer, this story about a paper he published while working for the NSA during the Korean War


• Congratulations: it plays Doom. (Courtesy of the same search spiral: finally, a good use for an elliptical machine.)

Nature
Roo sighting! Not in my backyard this time. A much smaller one, maybe a jill or a joey (are they still joeys when they're too big for the pouch but not full-sized yet?) or maybe a wallaby not a roo after all.

It was crossing the road, presumably to get to the other side. It kindly gave me enough time to brake comfortably. For the next stretch of road (maybe ten metres?) it hopped along the side of the road, parallel with my car, until I got fast enough that it couldn't keep up.

Cats
They've been making their presence known when I'm at the computer, especially on video calls.