(reading notes, household)

Not working: the air conditioning. Still, after a visit from the heating and air team yesterday. We think the line wasn't leveled after they installed a T site for us to insert algecide tablets.

This means more trips to our (really nice and clean, wrapped in white heavy plastic) crawl space.

I spent 40 min July 4th morning morning looking for an alternative company because Christine's frustrated with the folks we use -- I think she's much more happy with impersonal corporate service where there's more process.

I'm exhausted. I did read a lot.

* Asteroid City. Focus Features, Indian Paintbrush, American Empirical Pictures, 2023.

(Not reading) Last Thursday with my siblings' families. My first theater since COVID. enjoyed.

* Janssen, Victoria, and Kalikoi Books. Dissenter Rebellion: The Rattri Extraction, 2023.

This is a back story to Janssen's Finding Refuge trilogy, which i enjoyed. I don't know how Janssen makes a rebellion action *cozy* but i love the sense awareness of the main character and seeing how she comes to connect to the others in her rebellion cell. Will read more

* Kabi, Nagata. My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness. Illustrated edition. Seven Seas, 2017.

I read three of these manga and have multiple feelings. One is a sense of being so different because of coming of age before the internet was the way it was for this author: she finds a responsive audience for her stories and that provides a thread she can hold onto in deep depression. I also wonder how different the internet experience is now for my niblings.

* Lupton, E. H. Dionysus in Wisconsin.

Very fun, look forward to more stories from this universe.

* Martine, Arkady. A Memory Called Empire.

Loved the intensity, loved the ethical challenge presented to the ambassador to the empire from a small as-yet-independent community. My main thought about sequels is that continuing to deal with imperial power is a hard slog: i hope Martine can honor the complexities of such a slog.

* Pratchett, Terry. I Shall Wear Midnight.

Fun, escaped.

Fiction from the writing prompts that had accrued (writing prompt)

June 27 - July 5

Prompts via Summersgate:

She woke and attended to her morning needs. Indelicately, she thought, "Take crap, check, brush teeth to prevent Alzheimer's, check, wash face, check, sunblock because i'm getting old fast enough as it is, check." Almost as an afterthought she took her vitamin as she walked into the living area of her small apartment. As the kettle came to a boil, she filled her travel teapot's basket with her favorite blend for summer, a nice robust black tea with grapefruit peel and juniper berries. A thought of gin, first thing in the morning. She added the tea to the basket she'd set out the night before, making sure it had her notebook and pen and then reached for her dog's harness.

With only the slightest clink of hook against buckle sounding in the quiet apartment, Miss Bee's claws tapped on the floor as she walked as briskly as a basset can manage to join Sybil at the door. They stepped out into the dim landing together, Sybil muttering a string of words that weren't swear words as she forgot the basket, and then alighting into full profanity as she made a second trip inside as she had forgotten her key.

Miss Bee strained at the leash, impatient to ascend to the grimy light at the top of the stair. They stepped out into the summer morning on the rooftop deck, a rickety addition to the old row house. As Sybil averted her gaze from Miss Bee's business, she noted the stub of the candle in a chunky pottery holder in the center of a lace tablecloth. Brooke had forgotten to collect that last night -- but at least other items had made back down to their apartment.
The candle moved to the shelf beside the door, Sybil unpacked her basket onto the small cafe table and began to write, waiting for the smell of coffee to announce her lover joining her on the deck.