This week in squirrels…

Summary

  • Rolling back to my old DE
    • In the end, I moved back off of DankMaterialShell and rolled back to my self-rolled setup, it just wasn’t sparking joy. The fraction section delay I had in the launcher is really my own complaint. DMS is really nice overall, but I like my trim little setup.
    • Because I can’t just leave good alone I tool some of the things I liked from DMS and redesigned my waybar. I switched to Inter as my font and rearranged things a little.
  • Struggling with IPv6
    • My desire to run all IPv6 with a ULA on the internal network with SLAAC+RA has been one of these moments where there is ALWAYS something that needs to be slightly tuned.
    • This week, the way I had Nixos for static systems was broken, a minor configuration issue on the Nix side I had to hack on.
    • Also, I am STILL getting issues with disruptive IP rotations on my Linux system. NetworkManager seems absolutely atrocious on this, for reasons that are completely unclear to me.
    • It took an entire day of researching but it had nothing to do with my card or OH, and EVERYTHING to do with my Apple TV having some ultra old configuration saved in Apple Home and it was Sharing a Threads Home with an old ULA broadcasting a rogue RA that was causing network disruptions.
    • I learned so much about RA and how it can also be so disruptive when you have a rogue server.
  • Is AI speeding me up, or a toy
    • I have been trying to make it work for me. But it’s also a lot of time experimenting with a thing to do a thing. Not even experimenting with an output.
    • I love learning a force multiplier, but I am a lot more worried about the time invested vs. the gains,
  • New Anime Cour started up
    • Yay a new season! I hope this one doesn’t end up nearly as packed
  • Anxiety and stress
    • My brain has been coming at me in the worst way, but I think I am starting to move past it. Let’s keep moving forward and doing the best we can.
  • Less time with my phone
    • It’s been kind of amazing how getting a music and podcast player separate from my phone as persistently separated me from my phone. I just don’t care where it is most of them time.
    • When I do have my phone, I am quick to start flicking through apps, but when it’s nowhere nearby I don’t bother for it. I have my music player and it makes the music and podcasts.
  • Gaming
    • I normally am not that much of a video game player. Maybe more than the average person, but nowhere near “a gamer.” But lately there has been a handful of games that have me actively excited to sit down and play games. Usually one or two games a year pop up but it’s been a derth of games.
    • Maybe this is what is helping keep me a bit distracted from the mess.

Books

  • Monster-Colored Island Vol 1 ⭐⭐
    • I like a lot of the ideas and themes being explored, and the art is decent, but the choice to make the very sexy/horny sapphic romance thriller about middle schoolers is such a deal breaker. The lack of slow burn you normally see in yuri is a welcome subversion, but again feels off when you frame up 12-year-old girls like this.
    • I gave it two stars because with a reframing, it could be engaging. Also these girls are not yuri, they are gay homosexual lesbians. I give points for queer rep.
  • A Yuri Love Story That Begins with Getting Dumped in a Dream Vol 1 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
    • The “best friends being awkward and in love but neither knows” romcom genre has been a bit crowded lately, but this manga stands out due to amazing art and fantastic comedic timing. The expressions are often the punchline in the best way. This one doesn’t dance around “is this one way or both ways” and instantly sets both in the awkward flirting. The pacing is good for a volume 1, but given how much heat they have, I wonder how long we can keep this up without feeling weirdly dragged out.
  • Hope You’re Happy Lemon Vol 2 ⭐⭐
    • This book is probably a four-star to the right person, but the sketchy art and characters drowning in secrets and half-truths, even when it’s obvious to their detriment, just isn’t holding me. This is a drop but I would recommend it to anybody looking for a love triangle body swap not stuck in horny tropes.

Music

  • Xiu Xiu’s “Xiu Mother fucking Xiu.”
    • I can’t say I am normally enough of a superfan of Xiu Xiu to buy a cover album, but when I saw the track list, I knew I had to have this one. All the classic early industrial, synthpop, and early alternative electronic done in the eclectic style of Xiu Xiu
  • slowerpace 音楽’s “مشاغبون EP”
    • I can’t read Hindi, so I can’t tell you what this album is called, but this is an absolute hit. The entire time I am listening to it, I am waiting for some Front Line Assembly lyrics to come in. It seems like they do a lot of remix-style work on other productions, and while everything here felt super familiar, there was nothing that jumped out as a sample from a specific song. This artist is very prolific, so I will be watching them for more of this
  • Monasterium Imperi’s “Churchtek Files”
    • Spending more time in the ambient and chill areas, this random find reminds me of Archetect and so many other “post industrial” and witchhouse acts. It’s got the chants and the lush pads, and then all the amazing glitchy. Most of this artist’s back catalog wasn’t as glitchy or electronic, but this one is a huge hit with me.
  • Gary Numan’s “Dead Son Rising”
    • Gary Numan is one of my all time favorites since I was young. Dead Son Rising is not one of the tops that I normally go for, but I had a CRAVING. The influences from NIN’s “The Fragile” are so thick it really feels like Numan’s take on the album, and I mean that as the biggest compliment.
  • Lady Gaga’s “MAYHEM”
    • This is an album from last year that is WAY better than I give it credit for sometimes. It just doesn’t come to mind until it does and then I am stuck with the feeling of “HOLY HECK. When did she get this good?

Reads and Videos

Quote of the Week

The failure mode of clever is “asshole.”

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