nightonficmountain | Member Posts

Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat, by Julian Walker, Matthew Remski & Derek Beres

The central idea of this book is that the underlying principles of New Age philosophy and consipracy theories are very similar: Karma = "nothing happens by accident"; Illusion = "nothing is at it seems" and Interdependance = "everything is connected". An interesting and well-argued read.

I read this book early in 2025, at roughly the same time as The Gospel of Wellness: Gyms, Gurus, Goop, and the False Promise of Self-Care, by Rina Raphael (it was fine) so I'm not sure which of the two -- or even the Decoding the Gurus podcast I was bingeing at the time -- had this additional tidbit: part of the appeal of alternative medicine is the personalised aspect of it. You're not special, getting the same vaccine as everyone else, but this homeopathy is tailored to you specifically/this diet aligns with your astrological chart/etc.

yhlee

The keyboard's legit great but I replaced some of the keycaps (the black ones that let the glow shine through) because I cannot find the hecking function keys in the dark reliably; I don't often use them outside of music production, the lighting in this room sucks, and I have a horrifying number of typing keyboards where the function key locations are just enough offset to throw off touch-typing.

custom keycaps and space bar

I'm unreasonably happy with the space bar! The seller will 3D print custom images/text if you send an image so I made a design for hilarity. :)

isis

What I've recently finished reading:

The Bear and the Serpent, the second book of the Echoes of the Fall series by Adrian Tchaikovsky. As with most books that have multiple storylines and POVs, there were parts I liked better than others; I was more interested in Loud Thunder's adventures as reluctant war leader (and Lone Mountain's journey to the coast) than I was in the goings-on of the River Lords. However, I really liked the bits of cultural worldbuilding there as well, particularly the Wolf priest and the Snake priest(ess) coming to an understanding, and the uneasy relationship of Asmander and Asman which sort of echoed that between Maniye and Akrit Stone River.

Toward the end, it became clear that this series ties into the Shadows of the Apt series, which I had read the first book of (Empire in Black and Gold) a while back, but didn't really feel inclined to continue. So when I finished, I grabbed book 2, Dragonfly Falling, but it only took me a few chapters before I had the "yeah, nah" feeling again, so I guess I won't read that series.

What I'm reading now:

I was about to buy book 3 but then my library hold on Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo came in unexpectedly quickly (

wychwood had reviewed it and it sounded up my alley) so I'm reading that now - hey, it's got people who turn into animals too!

What I've recently finished watching:

S2 of The Empress, which was really enjoyable. The setting of a great power in decline desperately trying to hold onto its glory through ill-advised military ventures is great escapism from...oh, never mind. They do have more magnificent dresses, though!

Actually one thing that struck me about this series is that although the women are formally valued only in their ability to produce boy babies, the narrative highlights their strength, the way they are the iron rods stapling things together. They may be swaddled in yards of cloth that make it difficult to run through the forest, but Elisabeth goes out and looks the people in the eye and talks to them, Sophie has a place at the council table, Charlotte gives Maximilian advice (and he listens) - well, they all give men advice, and the men ignore them at their peril.

What I'm playing now:

Still Ghost of Tsushima. Getting close to the end of the first part, I think!

lebateleur

I managed to finish two books this week despite the competing pressures of work, gaming, and other socializing, and aim to have a few more honkers wrapped up within the next few days.

What I Finished Reading This Week

Internet Security Fundamentals - Nick Ioannou
This self-published freemium book covers exactly what the title suggests it will. Because it's free and frequently updated, the editing is atrocious: typos, omitted words, garbled sentences, and occasionally mistakes that utterly change the meaning of what Ioannou surely meant to say (e.g., the equivalent of accidentally omitting the word "never" from the following sentence: "The absolute most important thing you can do is to never leave your doors unlocked when you go out.") That said, this book is free, it's frequently updated, and the information is solid and presented in a fashion that won't overwhelm readers who need an introductory explanation of these concepts and practices; if you're looking for a book that does just that, you could do far worse than this one.

After the Forest – Kell Woods
This book was excellent and I will eagerly read anything else Woods writes. Set in 16th century Germany against a backdrop of interstate conflict, witch trials, and religious intolerance, it tells the story of the folktale Hansel and Gretel's titular characters (Greta and Hans here) after the woods; that is, as adults, post-witch and -oven, and -gingerbread house. The setting is fantastic, the descriptive language is fantastic. The blend of historical fact and fairy tale elements is fantastic. The pacing is fantastic. The characterizations are wonderful and strike the difficult balance of depicting characters with believable strengths and weaknesses without slipping into caricature or melodrama, and desires and agency without relying on anachronism or unrealistic motivations or capabilities. This is a definite winner, and I will read it again.

What I Am Currently Reading

Mannaz – Malene Sølvsten
I've got just about 100 pages to go and can't wait to see how the trilogy concludes.

Freya the Deer – Meg Richman
There I was, calmly reading the prologue, when Richman casually dropped a sentence that came out of nowhere like a blow to the face. "Gripped me from the very first page" is a cliche in book reviews, but the first page of this volume delivers a mean jolt, and so far Richman has the chops to keep the momentum going.

The Disabled Tyrant's Beloved Pet Fish vol. 1 – Xue Shan Fei Hu
Mannaz, After the Woods, and Freya the Deer were all affecting my nightmares, so this has become my bedtime reading, a job to which its unapologetically, gleefully over-the-top premise is perfectly suited.

What I’m Reading Next

I acquired no new books this week.

これで以上です。

evewithanapple

Watch on Vimeo

Vid: House
Music: House - Charli XCX feat. John Cale
Fandom: The Black Phone (Movies - Derrickson)
Summary: ". . . other houses, the lights were dim, and with some houses they were almost out and I didn’t know the people who lived there. I’d get a feeling from these houses of stuff going on that wasn’t happy. I didn’t dwell on it, but I knew there were things going on behind those doors and windows." - David Lynch
Warnings: Canon-typical abuse and violence against children; suicide by hanging
Links: On AO3 | On Tumblr

summerstorm

I'm happy to do more top 10s in this post, especially if they have to do with TTRPGs tbh, I forgot I love listing D&D things.

These past few days have been really stressful due to a combination of my sister hogging the washing machine, lack of money, PMS, and yet another delivery that was marked as received when it wasn't, which meant I had to call the store I ordered from yesterday to see if they can do something about that. I would have done it sooner but my brain was not cooperating in the slightest.

Today is -- extremely weird, to be honest, but I did get good news in the form of my mom's request for financial aid being approved and a date for when she'll get the first payment, which is a huge weight off my chest. We just need to survive until March 1, which is... fine? Probably? (Any help is extremely appreciated.)

But holy shit my brain is so confused, y'all. I do not get it. I don't get anything is how confused I am. Who am I. What do I do with my life. I have lists! I have Finch! I have a planner! I have a Trello with multiple possibilities of things to do! I have a page on my planner for stuff I want to watch/read/try! What is wrong with me. (It's my brain recalibrating, I assume. I've had to push down so much anxiety I've had nightmares every fucking day since last Monday. I don't not get it, logically. But feeling it is disconcerting.)

beatrice_otter

so why. why why why. Do I so often come across fic where the author clearly a) doesn't have any idea how far apart two places are, or how to get from one to the other, and b) never thought to check google maps?

Just read a fic where one character is thinking that "it's only an 8-hour plane ride!"

and. I have driven basically between those two places.

It's a 6-hour drive unless traffic is really bad. if you hit the most congested bits exactly at rush hour, it might take you 8 hours. to drive.

Flying? Well, if you were starting at a small regional airport and needed to make a connection, it might take you four hours.

I actually mind this shit more than the big stuff. The big stuff is hard to research. Google Maps is really really quick and easy.

thisbluespirit

Hello, I am still recovering, etc. Quite nicely as these things go, but still not up to doing all my usual little things.

Anyway, thought of something fannish and fun I could do if anyone wanted it - I made a personalised bingo card for

theseatheseatheopensea once, which was fun, and I do always love doing that kind of thing. So...

... if anyone else would find a custom-made bingo card (for writing/creating prompts) fun/useful/inspiring, comment here and I will have a go at making you one!

(I'll use the Bingo Generator, so it's very easy, and if I fail and include some rubbish prompts, a new card without such prompts can magically be re-generated with no trouble. Will do any size from 2x2 to 5x5.)

So just comment here if you'd like one & say what size card you'd prefer. You can also point me to/away from any fandoms/prompt types etc if you'd like, but no need. (If I'm really stuck for some reason, I'll just ask you for some pointers!)

summerstorm

I've been meaning to post all month, but Snowflake didn't appeal to me all that much, plus there's a lot of history there for me, even if I wasn't directly involved with the drama.

However, one thing I will be taking from Snowflake is the top 10 lists, outsourced. Ask me for any and I'll answer in the comments!

I am also going to make a little wishlist, much smaller than the one for Christmas. This is stuff that would make me happy:

Jigsaw puzzles
PS5 gift cards
Subscriptions to my ko-fi, which I'm planning to turn into a place to share all my TTRPG card, homebrew, merch and map designs
4. Art of my PCs from the TTRPG campaigns I play in

-

It's been a pretty stressful month, money-wise. We've managed, but it is what it is. Doesn't help that it's cold and that I'm the only person in this house who's capable of not taking things out on other people. I've been doing jigsaw puzzles and deleting photos from my backlog and trying to figure out a permanent set-up for my day-a-page planner, which I keep meaning to post about to

journalsandplanners. I took pics and everything.

One upside that's been keeping me sane is the soft light my friend Nate got me, which I use to get selfies even when it's too dark because winter. It helps my self-esteem a lot, even if I'm more aware of the way my skin keeps breaking out. I figure most of that is coming from the same place as the daily nightmares.

lebateleur

Last week was a pretty good one for leisure media and entertainment.

Games: Gaming group this week! We met at an inconvenient (1+ hour drive) but favorite tavern since there was also a birthday to celebrate. Alas, the games we'd planned to try out (including some recced during

snowflake_challenge) were unavailable, so we played First to Worst and King of Tokyo, and had a great time.

The first is a familiar standard; we mixed things up by eschewing scoring entirely and having the ranker draw only four cards from the deck while the rest of the players collectively tried to correctly order the ranker's preferences, to sometimes hilarious results (one player's partner insisting that they disliked "gift giving" much more than the other three, trivial options, or shocked disbelief at another player's—correct—insistence that their partner genuinely preferred pickles and journaling over ice cream sundaes).

The second, is a familiar group standard but one I had personally yet to play (on account of generally playing Betrayal in the House on the Hill or such instead). The setup is that the players are a group of kaiju battling to level Tokyo. It strikes me as a very Munchkin -or MtG-esque game in that the first several players who look like they have a chance at winning will invariably be leveled by the other players. My low-and-slow strategy got me one victory point away from winning the game, but a bad role ultimately gave the GC the win. Still, not bad for a first playthrough.

And now, a brief digression so I can ( gripe about AI. )

We also played more Hive and picked up copies of Betrayal, Everdell Farshore, and Witchcraft, the latter of which I am about to try out very shortly here.

Music: We had a very excellent house session on Monday, after which one of the players used some fancy software to transcribe my playing of some of the tunes. It's pretty cool to see what I'm actually doing set down in notation.

Podcasts/Articles: No podcasts, as I just haven't been in a longform audio mood for the last several months. I did read one longform article: Irish Gothic, however.

Roleplaying: Nothing this week, although there are noises about starting up Oldest D&D Group's homebrew campaign back up.

Television: Late days at work last week + the full slate of extracurriculars meant the GC and I weren't up for much aside from cute animal videos this week, but we did watch Max Headroom S2 Ep 3 today. The main plot was another variation of the "how channels try to corrupt the elections" storyline, and was convoluted with several gaping holes, but one of the subplots is ( among my favorites in the series. )

Video Games: I'm still playing Pentiment and Ultima IV, and started Machinarium; we also got Ghost of Yotei.

In other news, ( I wander in the wilderness no more. )

これで以上です。

angenoir

Challenge #5:

In your own space, create a list of at least three things you'd love to receive, a wishlist of sorts.

( Read more... )

angenoir

Challenge #4: Rec The Contents Of Your Last Page

Any website that you like, be it fanfiction, art, social media, or something a bit more eccentric!

( Read more... )

yhlee

Catlin(s) (from CJ Cherryh's Cyteen)

for

ilyena_sylph

digital fanart: Catlin I & II from CJ Cherryh's Cyteen

shadaras

threesentenceficathon began yesterday! I've posted... more fills than I think so far. xD I started listing them and then went HM OKAY THAT'S A BUNCH ACTUALLY:
Leverage ot3 fluff
Obi-Wan/Asajj post-PT AU [also on ao3 because it got away from me a bit xD]
Julien's unrequited feels for Aranessa (CR Araman)
Silt Verses, godsummoning
Olruggio/Qifrey angst (WHA)
Kara/Lee (the thin line between fighting and fucking) (BSG 2003)
Thimble+Occtis reunion (CR Araman)
Jyn/Cassian, after the war (I wanna clean this up into a proper fic xD)
Jyn/Cassian, nightmares
LHoD, Genly Ai+Estraven, nightfall
Hal+Bolaire, theater (CR Araman)
Obi-Wan/Padme, "love is stronger than hate"
Sophie/Howl, "I've never done anything wrong in my life"
Teor/Wicander, nonhuman cocks/first time (CR Araman)

I also posted some prompts. They're hiding in there somewhere. But mostly the fun is in making little ficlets, for me.

[eta: I'm adding to this list as I go, mostly for my own records/ability to find them again later]

2.
I've watched through s3e3 of Star Trek: Discovery, and I adore Starfleet Honor but also every time Georgiou is on screen making snarky comments and beating people up and looking at Michael with maternal pride I care naught for Starfleet Honor because I'm too busy thinking about how much Georgiou is delighted to see Michael get rougher around the edges after her time alone in the future.

This also means I have just met Adira Tal, who I know will become a major character and who is also going to come out as nonbinary once we get more into that story, and I am curious about how that'll unfold considering that Adira has a Trill symbiote and I have some feelings (mostly sighs) about nonbinary characters and the plurality aspects of such an arrangement. But hey, can't really have proper opinions on it until I see how it plays out in the show, you know?

3.
Testing at my dojo went very well! Love to see two people take very good tests perfectly appropriate to their level! Love also to see one of them have a worse randori than usual simply because he was clearly exhausted by the time he reached it, but hey even that was still perfectly reasonable for the level the test expects; I just know what he's capable of.

It was also like "HUH OKAY" seeing him do one technique (hanmi handachi shomenuchi iriminage) because I saw my own technique in how he did it. I get it! I know why! I did it with him a bunch when he was learning it! I just!

I do not think of myself as One Of The Sensei despite it being pretty clear that a lot of the white belts absolutely do think of me that way. This is mostly because I don't teach regularly, and so nobody calls me sensei on the regular.

4.
This weekend has been full of CLASSIC WINTER SNOW. After testing yesterday I detoured to the local state park and spent an hour walking a path that was very covered in snow and also icy beneath said snow. There were a couple other people out in the closer bits of this path, but once I turned onto the loop fewer people tend to go on anyway, it was clear that nobody had been there for at least a hour, so it was all FRESH CLEAR SNOW and that was gorgeous and really peaceful to spend time in.

I know intellectually how relaxing and restorative it is for me to spend time in the woods, especially if I can find woods where I won't hear/see other humans, but it's always a bit of an oh! right! feeling when I experience it again. Shall try and hold on to it, but it's always easier to go out into the woods during the beautiful times than when winter fades once more into dreary slushy/icy grayness instead of this perfect high-contrast fresh new fluffy snow.

Pictures under the cut! I took way more than this but I didn't feel like uploading all of them and I think these are nicely representative!

( four photos from a snowy walk in the woods )

lebateleur

Challenge #9

Talk about your favorite tropes in media or transformative works. (Feel free to substitute in theme/motif/cliche if "trope" doesn't resonate with you.)

I don't know if there's already a trope and/or term for this, but I'm a huge sucker for what I'm going to call ( house voyeurism. )

Snowflake Challenge promotional banner featuring an image of a wrapped giftbox with a snowflake on the gift tag. Text: Snowflake Challenge January 1-31.

これで以上です。

lebateleur

Challenge #8

Talk about your creative process.

Swoopers write a story quickly, higgledy-piggledy, crinkum-crankum, any which way. Then they go over it again painstakingly, fixing everything that is just plain awful or doesn’t work. Bashers go one sentence at a time, getting it exactly right before they go on to the next one. When they’re done, they’re done.” — Kurt Vonnegut

I am a hopeless basher.

Challenge #6

Top 10 Challenge. Post your answer to today’s challenge in your own space and leave a comment in this post saying you did it.

Let's do something a little different and talk about my ( favorite recordings of the slip jig Elizabeth Kelly's Delight. )

Snowflake Challenge: A flatlay of a snowflake shaped shortbread cake, a mug with coffee, and a string of holiday lights on top of a rustic napkin.

これで以上です。

dhampyresa

Prompt 8 for this year is "Talk about your creative process." which made me realise it's been a while since I've had a Story Song. Usually when I have a story I'm working on I have a song that goes with it, that echoes some aspect of the plot, setting or character (dynamics) and yet lately... Nothing. Maybe that's why everything has been feeling so empty and been so hard to write?

ANYWAY all this is a long-winded way to ask for music recs.

yhlee

By way of

sovay: Stand with Minnesota, appears to be locally vetted. I've made a modest donation to one of the listed organizations.

(Still buried under health + family + work + school stuff as well, sorry - if I'm not responding or late to respond, that's why.)

shadaras

Sometimes adulthood is going "oh wow for once I don't have anything I need to do once I get off work" and promptly going and doing an errand and then washing dishes and doing laundry once getting home.

Assorted brief notes:

1.
My dojo is doing kyu testing this coming Saturday, which will be delightful. The two people testing are more than ready for these tests. (There's another person who we've been trying to get to test for years and it's just a matter of "please come consistently for a few months and take this test already!" at this point.)

2.
Wednesday evening classes are just. Draining. I do not like needing to be at school from 5pm-8pm. I didn't even when I was in college! Now it's just like "I wake up at 4:30am because of work, why must I suffer like this."

Also next week is going to be very boring because this week was a "oh shit the guest instructor suddenly can't make it" week and so they sort of half-assed an unprepared version of what they were gonna do next week. So. You know. I understood what they were teaching from the half-assed version, the teachers know that, but since most of the cohort was like ???, next week will be them going step-by-step through it with more prep. Which will be useful, and is good pedagogy, but is also going to Bore Me.

3.
h/t to

trobadora for talking about Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, which mostly got me going back to Star Trek: Discovery, since Academy is set after Disco.

which means I am currently re-watching the first episode of s3, because I watched the first two episodes when they first aired and then fell off because... idk, it was Oct/Nov 2020 and I was running headfirst into QZGS and infinite flow cnovels...? But hey, Disco is a fun show, I'm so fond of Michael Burnham, and s3 is in some ways a soft reboot due to being right after the timeskip, so! Looking forward to actually getting to know the future timeline.

I do think that a huge amount of why I fell off is just... 2020 being 2020. Because I don't think I had nearly as much fun with this the first time I watched it, and now I'm just like "wow this is such good tropey fun, s3e1 is using so much good trope stuff to set up Michael/Book".

4.
god I feel like I had some other things. hm.

A podcast reminded me that Escaflowne exists, and that it's an anime that I probably would have been obsessed with as a teenager if I'd seen it then. Mecha and guys with wings. Normal things. xD I feel like it should be on crunchyroll but it's not? Alas. Probably for the best if I'm going to actually watch Star Trek right now, but I do want to at some point experience this show.

5.
Work is very nonsense.

...I think I was going to give examples, but, idk. just. nah. it's! a lot! and mostly not outright bad, just tiring, and takes too much time, as work does.

isis

What I've recently finished reading:

The Tiger and the Wolf by Adrian Tchaikovsky, first book in the Echoes of the Fall series. This is a fantasy Bronze-Age-ish world where tribes not only identify with an animal-god, but tribal members can shapeshift into the form of that animal at will. Interestingly, people can see at a glance which animal-tribe people are part of, seeing their "soul"; each also has its own culture which seems appropriate for the associated animal, i.e. the Wolf people are pack-oriented, aggressive, dominating, while the Bear people are big and shambling and prefer their solitary caves. The story follows a teen girl, Maniye, who has two souls and therefore two forms - that of her father, the Wolf that raised her, and that of her mother, a captured Tiger - but it's more of an adult story than YA, even though it's largely a coming-of-age narrative. There are hints of dark things coming, the return of the "Plague People" who the people of this land came here to escape; these are people who have no souls, which again is something plainly visible. I liked this a lot! So I'm reading the second book now, The Bear and the Serpent.

(I should say, I really like the major Bear character, Loud Thunder, who basically wants to sit in his cave with his dogs and sometimes go out and hunt and not be bothered by, ugh, people, but unfortunately has a Destiny, and hates it. Also the major Serpent character - the Serpents in general are super interesting, sort of the wise elders of the world.)

What I'm currently watching:

We finished S1 and are now mid-S2 of The Empress. It's oddly butting up against The Leopard now as we're getting to the Italian provinces of the Austrian Empire agitating for freedom and a united Italy, even mentioned Garibaldi. I love the history of it all, the problems of an old world inexorably moving into the modern times, rulers having to face the collisions of the privilege they love and the reality of being a good leader. Also the costumes, especially the womens' gowns, are fantastic.

What I'm currently playing:

Still Ghost of Tsushima. It's so pretty! And I appreciate that there are a number of female swordsmen and archers, even if it's not strictly historically factual.

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Night On Fic Mountain

March 2020

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Night On Fic Mountain

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Mini book review

extremely silly keyboard mod

wednesday reads and things

What Am I Reading Wednesday - January 21

Vid: "House" [The Black Phone]

(no subject)

Google Maps exists

Personalised bingo card offer

wistful sigh

Monday Media - January 19

2026 - Fandom Snowflake Challenge, Day 5

2026 — Fandom Snowflake Challenge, Day 4

[fanart] Catlin(s)

(no subject)

Snowflake Challenge #9: Tropes

Snowflake Challenge: #6 & #8 - Creative Process & Top Ten List

Not really a snowflake challenge entry

US politics

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wednesday reads and things

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March 2020

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