lnr | Reading

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260301.html

How does the Moon's appearance change during a total lunar eclipse?

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260301.html

... is a placeholder; apparently getting the bus to a hospital appointment today ate my entire brain, and I need to be up early tomorrow morning for a different medical appointment for a different body part in a different place. (Why am I being sent to get an ultrasound four stops down the Piccadilly line instead of five minutes up the road? A MYSTERY.)

( Read more... )

chickenfeet

https://operaramblings.blog/2026/03/01/toronto-summer-music-2026/

rmc28

Books on pre-order:

Platform Decay (Murderbot 8) by Martha Wells (5 May)
Radiant Star (Imperial Radch) by Ann Leckie (12 May)
Unrivaled (Game Changers 7) by Rachel Reid (1 Jun 2027)

The release of the third Heated Rivalry book - which was only announced in January after the TV adaptation got wildly popular - is pushed back by eight months. I'm assuming this is to allow Rachel Reid more time to finish it and/or engage with the adaptation of the second book, The Long Game.

Books acquired in February: none (wow)

Borrowed books read in February:

The Hidden Oracle (Trials of Apollo 1) by Rick Riordan [3]
Camp Half-Blood Confidential by Rick Riordan [3]
The Dark Prophecy (Trials of Apollo 2) by Rick Riordan [3]
The Burning Maze (Trials of Apollo 3) by Rick Riordan [3]
The Tyrant's Tomb (Trials of Apollo 4) by Rick Riordan [3]
Camp Jupiter Confidential by Rick Riordan [3]
The Tower of Nero (Trials of Apollo 5) by Rick Riordan [3]
The Singer of Apollo (Percy Jackson and the Olympians 5.5) by Rick Riordan

It's been a really intense month, mostly with ice hockey commitments, so what reading I have managed has been entirely the ongoing Riordan read-through. Trials of Apollo successfully grows Apollo from intensely irritating in the first few chapters of the first book to someone I cried over in the last book. Plus I have now watched both seasons of the Disney+ adaptation of Percy Jackson and the Olympians and oh boy do I have Opinions, especially on the second season. They get a lot of details right, the casting is excellent, and yet they get the heart of the story so so wrong. (Will I still watch season 3 when it comes out? Probably! Maybe they won't mess it up as badly?)

Anyway. Onward into March.

[3] Physical book

apod_feed

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260228.html

Lunar Occultation of Mercury

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260228.html

rmc28

Both finals ended up being USA-Canada. Both finals I expected USA were more likely to win, actually wanted Canada to win, felt it was possible Canada might actually win for a majority of the game, only to have USA win in 3v3 OT. I didn't manage to watch either game entirely conventionally.

The women's final was on at the same time as Women's Blues "strength and conditioning" at the university sports centre. (The team gets an hour a week in term time in the Team Training Room, supervised by a personal trainer who's developed a programme for us to follow that's tailored to the needs of ice hockey. I love it, it's such a great perk of playing for the university.) My friend C and I arrived early and asked Will the PT to get the game up on the big screen, so we could follow it while we trained, and it was very exciting. A hardcore of about six of us then watched the last five minutes or so of the second period on a laptop at the end of the room, and then scattered at speed to bike to our respective destinations before the third period started.

The men's final took place while I was driving a large vehicle full of Kodiaks to Bristol (nine people: eight players with kits, one coach). My phone was paired to the car sound system, and I had the iPlayer coverage playing through it from our last pickup point (because obviously I didn't want to be messing with my phone while on the motorway). We had about half an hour of curling commentary that we only half-listened to, and then I turned up the volume for the game itself. With excellent timing, the game-winning goal was scored when we were a few minutes away from arriving at Bristol ice rink. I would still like to watch back at least the highlights of the game and actually see the bits of skating that had the commentators get especially excited.

chickenfeet

https://operaramblings.blog/2026/02/28/44096/

apod_feed

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260227.html

Normally faint and elusive, the Jellyfish Nebula is caught in

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260227.html

kaberett

Got libgourou working ~~(link to follow)~~, with thanks to simont for bringing it to my attention and me_and for making sympathetic and encouraging noises while I stared muzzily at the documentation this evening. Happy to report that I have successfully downloaded Adobe DRMed ebooks from my command line without any Windows install or emulators at all.
I am enjoying A Physical Education so much - SO much - that I have gone out and bought a book it recommends (Starting Strength; very wordy descriptions of which muscles one should be using for what, apparently, i.e. exactly my kind of thing). Acquiring my own copy once I've given the library's back is a definite possibility. It's really interesting in terms of both the pain Project (memoir about embodiment!) and in terms of my own movement-related special interests (e.g. the gulf between my experience of largely self-led Pilates vs the version available via mainstream contemporary classes embedded in diet culture). Lots of content notes but I'm really really liking it. Gratitude to buttonsbeadslace for posting about it ~~(... link to follow...)~~
Stupid Little Walk yielded both very cheap pistachio croissants (MORE BREAKFAST NONSENSE) and a very cheap "cinnamon danish with vanilla fondant icing" I've been vaguely eyeing up but was also very suspicious of. I am glad to have tried it and probably won't get it again, even if it is only 19p.
This evening's tofu was particularly cooperative with being cooked. (Thanks be to evilsusan for the specific combination of courgettes, tofu and garlic that I still make regularly lo these many years later )
I hit refresh on Oxfam Online and discovered that the rotating sale has migrated back around to "30% off 3+ books". Thus now on their way to me I have: the first edition of Explain Pain for an astonishingly reasonable price (I want to do the deeply nerdy thing of a side-by-side comparison with the second edition, and also to revisit its structure while the second edition is on loan to a physio friend...); a book entitled Science of Pilates, which I'd previously eyed up but that time it sold before I got around to it; a book about allotments and cooking; and a probably questionable out-of-print 1980s cookbook...

xkcd_feed

https://xkcd.com/3213/

I mean, half of these are undefined. And your multiplication dots are too low; they look like decimal points.

https://xkcd.com/3213/

chickenfeet

https://operaramblings.blog/2026/02/27/teresa-tucci-at-metropolitan-united/

rmc28

for your latest work: Not Pounded By This T-Rex On The USA Men’s Hockey Team Because It Turns Out He’s A MAGA Dork

(I had a full body "you go here TOO?" reaction when I saw that title, haha)

If you've managed to avoid being aware of the latest way men's hockey has been highly disappointing, please continue in blissful ignorance and/or consider watching a PWHL game this weekend, but I'll take this moment of crossover fandom for the comfort it is.

apod_feed

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260226.html

What does the universe look like through

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260226.html

kaberett

Ridiculous indulgent breakfast situation (though having now looked up Culinary Strata because A asked, I am extremely unconvinced that pistachio croissants with raspberries)... counts.
Therapy session, spent entirely talking about One Thing (with tendrils), has left me feeling distinctly more settled.
Today's primary Make Numbers Go Down project has been working my way through some of the short fiction I've had open in tabs since [mumble]. Highlight thus far is Naomi Kritzer's The Thing About Ghost Stories (cn parental death, dementia).
The other New Thing I started consuming today is A Physical Education, which is extremely and often graphically about diet culture and disordered eating, but which 11% of the way through the audio file I am Very Much Enjoying. Further updates to follow. (The library only has audio, I apparently put a hold on it seven weeks ago though I can't at this point remember where I came across it, and The First Headphones I Have Ever Tolerated remain excellent. Shokz OpenRun Pro.)
The Child liked the replacement mock cherries; spring flowers are excellent (we are firmly heading into daffodils now); Routine Dinner tonight DID work even though the app initially Frightened Me by claiming first available pickup was tomorrow morning.

siderea

Canonical link: https://siderea.dreamwidth.org/1897060.html

[Content Advisory: info that may be US government classified and controlled unclassified info leaked to news outlets, within. Actual status is unclear to me.]

Cuba has been effectively under siege by the US since at least January.

The US has cut off all Cuba's access to fuel imports. The situation is getting increasingly desperate. And a bunch of things just happened today. Yesterday, by the time I post this.

The US seized Venezuela January 3. Venezuela had been one of Cuba's two primary sources of oil, and once the US had control of Venezuela, the US halted shipments of Venezuelan oil to Cuba. Cuba's other main supplier of oil was Mexico, and on Jan 27, Mexico announced it was suspending oil shipments to Cuba. The Mexican president was evasive when asked point blank if the Trump administration was pressuring them into it, but Mexico has a critical trade deal with the US coming due for renegotiating, and dare not antagonize Trump.

Two days later, Jan 29, Trump issued an EO threatening any country that ships oil to Cuba with tariffs.

Apparently, there has been, since around that time, an undeclared US naval blockade of Cuba, to prevent oil shipments from getting through. The Trump administration hasn't admitted it, but Jan 23, Politico published a report that three anonymous sources in the Trump administration said that the administration was considering a "total blockade on oil imports" to Cuba, and a few days ago the NY Times published an analysis of ship movements in the Carribean indicating that there was indeed a naval blockade.

Cuba has received no foreign oil since its last shipment from Mexico Jan 9th.

As of Feb 3, the Financial Times was reporting that a consultancy was reporting that Cuba had "15 to 20 days" of oil left. Feb 5, the UN Secretary-General spokesperson issued a statement about a humanitarian disaster looming in Cuba.

Cuba of course did what it could to ration oil, but without enough of it, things began to fall apart. They started running out of fuel for cars, public transit, trucks to ship in food, garbage trucks to take the trash, and tractors to harvest crops. Cuba primarily generates electricity from oil-burning power plants so the electrical grid started failing and they started having blackouts. People have been cooking with whatever they can burn in the streets; there is no reliable refrigeration. Of course, they are also running out of food, and have difficulty accessing water. All elective surgeries have been canceled.

Feb 8, Mexico sent a delivery of humanitarian aid – 814 tons of food and hygeine supplies – to Cuba, to arrive later that week. This doesn't violate the US sanctions. Probably.

Feb 9, Cuba notifies all airlines that fly to Cuba that Cuban airports are running out of fuel and they will no longer be able to refuel in Cuba; Air Canada announces it's suspending flights to Cuba and sending empty flights to rescue Canadians in Cuba. Canada has been the largest source of tourists to Cuba, and the tourism industry is one of Cuba's main sources of foreign currency, without which it basically can't engage in international trade.

Also Feb 9, Mexican president Sheinbaum publically called the US's sanctions on Cuba "unjust" ["muy injusto"] for how they impacted the people of Cuba and pledged to keep finding a diplomatic solution with the US to get to ship Cuba oil.

Feb 13, the Ñico López oil refinery in Havana, Cuba, had a fire. The Cuban government reports that it was swiftly contained, and that the refinery continues to function, but that an investigation was opened into its cause.

Feb 22, shipping analysis firm Windward announced that they'd detected a Russian tanker (subsequently identified as The Sea Horse by Kplr) headed from the Mediterranean to Havana, likely carrying oil, putting it on a track to directly challenge the US Navy's blockade. It is due to reach Cuba in early March.

Feb 23, Canada announced it would be sending some sort of relief supplies to Cuba, but was cagey about just of what those supplies would consist.

Today, Feb 25:

Trump announced a plan to allow US companies to sell Venezuelan oil to Cuban businesses, but not the government.

It has emerged that Marco Rubio (US Sect of State) is in talks of some sort with Raúl Castro’s grandson, Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro.

There was an exchange of gunfire between Cuban border forces and 10 heavily armed people in a speedboat with Florida tags who opened fire on them when discovered just off the shore. According to the Cuban government, the assailants were all Cuban residents of the US; four were killed, six wounded and taken for medical care. Cuban authorities have accused them of being terrorists. The commander of the Cuban vessel was also wounded in the initial attack from the speedboat.

The commenter VisualEconomik EN on YT argued today that Russia is unlikely to go to the mat for Cuba, for a variety of reasons, including that Russia is economically over-extended by its war in Ukraine; he also contends that Russia and China have no more patience for Cuban mismanagement and despite the tactical military advantage having turf within 100 miles of the US coastline, they're kind of done with dealing with Cuba's government. As to whether this is true, I can't say, but it sounded reasonable. This is good news if true, because otherwise, if either wanted to back Cuba against the US, this could be the match that sets off the powderkeg.

( News sources and further reading below, in chronological order of publication [6,690 words] )

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apod_feed

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260225.html

Ever wonder what it would look like to crack open the Sun?

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260225.html

xkcd_feed

https://xkcd.com/3212/

After a lot of analysis, I've determined that they're actually big red dots; they're just very far away.

https://xkcd.com/3212/

kaberett

Made it to the plot! Brought home more salad than we actually wanted to eat this evening! Mostly lamb's lettuce but some bonus baby beetroot and spinach leaves :)
Also, the broad beans are starting to emerge (well, the ones that didn't get partly dug up and then abandoned on the surface unmunched, anyway; those have now been reinterred).
In the course of Making An Effort to Close More Tabs I rediscovered Standard Ebooks, and downloaded a bunch of things I'd apparently been interested in for Some Time: Standard Ebooks takes ebooks from sources like Project Gutenberg, formats and typesets them using a carefully designed and professional-grade style manual, fully proofreads and corrects them, and then builds them to create a new edition that takes advantage of state-of-the-art ereader and browser technology.
I spent some of the evening doing minor crafts with supplies A acquired, to make replacement cherries for a children's board game, using red wooden beans and green cotton string. I am mildly concerned that the Child might disapprove of the string being green rather than red, but We Shall See...
Cleeeeeeeeeen hair.