davis_square | Member Posts

tl;dr still waiting for things

The latest on that inherited IRA is that I got two email messages from Fidelity today, one saying that I needed to do something [unspecified] to transfer the money from BNY, and one saying specifically that BNY had told Fidelity that they, BNY, needed to talk to me.

So, I called BNY, and after various annoyances with their phone tree, talked to someone. He told me that they had no record yet of receiving the form I sent by next-day mail, but that if the form had arrived late Wednesday they might not be scanned until late today or even Monday. Also that once the form is scanned into the BNY system, it may take a few days before they actually transfer the money into my name, which would be necessary in order to move it to Fidelity.

So, I can (and probably will) call Monday to check that the form was in fact been received, but he thinks I should call later in the week, maybe Wednesday, maybe as late as Friday, and ask for my brand-new account number. Once I have that number, I have to fill out appropriate paperwork with Fidelity. *sigh*

I am both annoyed that even paying for next-day delivery, this is taking several days, and thinking that if I hadn’t paid for faster delivery I would be a few days further behind.

The man also said that once the funds are transferred, they will send me an acknowledgement by mail, including the new account number. However, waiting for that to arrive (rather than getting the information by phone) does not seem prudent, given the IRS deadline for the 2025 required minimum distribution.

minoanmiss

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Current Mood: accomplished

psocoptera

What Stalks the Deep, T. Kingfisher, 2025 novella. Damn this one was good; I did not intend to finish it last night but I couldn't put it down. I had some mixed feelings about the second one and I liked this one better as a sequel to the first one, so, I would not abandon the series at two, is my recommendation! Spoilers: ( Read more... )

psocoptera

I haven't been standing still, I've been lying in wait? Or something? Anyways, paid off a couple of days of prep work going through stuff today by taking a) ten more books to the library booksale, b) an outgrown kid's raincoat, hat, and a barely used hat/muffler/glove set to the library children's resale shop, and c) four bags of ripped bottom sheets and worn-out pants and such to textile recycling.

(I know, I know, visible mending, but my pants inevitably wear through in the seat and crotch and I just don't want visible mending there. I can however report that after years of indulgently buying new sheet sets when the bottom sheets got too ragged to use, we have made a new commitment to only buying individual bottom sheets for awhile to get more use out of all these perfectly fine tops. Also knit bottom sheets (like modal or cotton jersey) really do not hold up as well as woven, fyi. Also I'd been holding on to most of these bottom sheets for many years thinking they were big pieces of fabric I might want for a kid costume or craft situation, but the baby's class is touring the high school this morning (!) and the big one is thinking about college visits, so I think that whole phase of my life is winding down, and also in fact nobody has wanted any homemade costuming in a decade or so either.)

One of the things that sucked and continues to suck about the fire (yes I am still sorting through fire stuff, it's an enormous emotionally-fraught job and also the situation keeps evolving as the kids age and become more able to remember to wash their hands) was/is the loss of the opportunity to dispose of things as we would want them disposed of. We've thrown out hundreds of books because we didn't feel good donating them anywhere with smoke contamination, and while we were able to recover a lot of clothing and linens (for professional cleaning) we were paying by the pound and we threw out a lot as well (and some, like the packed-away kid's clothes in the eaves, I just didn't have time to do more with than frantically hunt through for some favorites). Which is all fine - safety always wins, and it's totally fair to optimize for time or money sometimes rather than minimizing waste - but one of the things I like about disadvent-type work is getting to dispose of stuff deliberately rather than waiting for some disaster (or, like, the decisions of others, if my own ownership was suddenly not in the picture) to force some sub-optimal path.

psocoptera

A Mouthful of Dust, Nghi Vo, 2025 fantasy novella, the sixth in the Singing Hills series. I like this series and I thought this was a good installment. Spoilers: ( Read more... )

Also, because we're now up to six of these novellas, the series as a whole might now be within 10% of the 240,000 word minimum to be considered for Hugo Best Series. My personal guess is that it might still be a little short, but that seems like a job for the committee to figure out and not me, so it will be on my nominating ballot. If it doesn't make it, there's another one coming out next May (2026) and we can try again then.

mindstalk

Let's post something so I don't fall totally behind... last 3 days were mostly spent exploring the area on foot. 10th, I wandered down Rte 467, and over into Shinbayashi Park, which is properly large, and also has lot of steps in one place. Many more steps than I realized. And I didn't even get a good view at the top, just some TV/cell towers surrounded by shrubbery. And then I got to see if I could go down deep steps without injuring myself. Yes, but it felt fraught... apparent safety rope was often too far from the steps to hold! ( Read more... )

siderea

So, I, uh, got my RSI/ergonomics debugged!* I then promptly lost two days to bad sleep due to another new mechanical failure of the balky meat mecha and also a medical appointment in re two previous malfunctions. But I seem back in business now. The new keyboard is great.

Patrons, I've got three Siderea Posts out so far this month and it's only the 12th. I have two more Posts I am hoping to get out in the next three days. Also about health insurance. We'll see if it actually happens, but it's not impossible. I have written a lot of words. (I really like my new keyboard.)

Anyways, if you weren't planning on sponsoring five posts (or – who knows? – even more) this month, adjust your pledge limits accordingly.

* It was my bra strap. It was doing something funky to how my shoulder blade moved or something. It is both surprising to me that so little pressure made so much ergonomic difference, and not surprising because previously an even lighter pressure on my kneecap from wearing long underwear made my knee malfunction spectacularly. Apparently this is how my body mechanics just are.

siderea

Canonical link: https://siderea.dreamwidth.org/1890494.html

0.

Hey Americans (and other people stuck in the American healthcare system)! Shopping for a health plan on your state marketplace? Boy, do I have some information for you that you should have and probably don't. There's been an important legal change affecting your choices that has gotten almost no press.

Effective with plan year 2026 all bronze level and catastrophic plans are statutorily now HDHPs and thus HSA compatible. You may get and self-fund an HSA if you have any bronze or catastrophic plan, as well as any plan of any level designated a HDHP.

2025 Dec 9: IRS.gov: "Treasury, IRS provide guidance on new tax benefits for health savings account participants under the One, Big, Beautiful Bill"

Bronze and Catastrophic Plans Treated as HDHPs: As of Jan. 1, 2026, bronze and catastrophic plans available through an Exchange are considered HSA-compatible, regardless of whether the plans satisfy the general definition of an HDHP. This expands the ability of people enrolled in these plans to contribute to HSAs, which they generally have not been able to do in the past. Notice 2026-05 clarifies that bronze and catastrophic plans do not have to be purchased through an Exchange to qualify for the new relief.

If you are shopping plans right now (or thought you were done), you should probably be aware of this. Especially if you are planning on getting a bronze plan, a catastrophic plan, or any plan with the acronym "HSA" in the name or otherwise designated "HSA compatible".

The Trump administration doing this is tacit admission that all bronze plans have become such bad deals that they're the economic equivalent of what used to be considered a HDHP back when that concept was invented, and so should come with legal permission to protect yourself from them with an HSA.

Effective immediately, you should consider a bronze plan half an insurance plan.

( Read more [3,340 words] )

This post brought to you by the 221 readers who funded my writing it – thank you all so much! You can see who they are at my Patreon page. If you're not one of them, and would be willing to chip in so I can write more things like this, please do so there.

Please leave comments on the Comment Catcher comment, instead of the main body of the post – unless you are commenting to get a copy of the post sent to you in email through the notification system, then go ahead and comment on it directly. Thanks!

minoanmiss

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Current Mood: exhausted

sovay

At this point if I have a circadian rhythm it seems to be measured in days, but last night after two doctor's appointments and an evening of virtual seminars through the euphemistically designated career center, I fell over for something like a cumulative thirteen hours and still got through this afternoon's calendar of calling more doctors and the next stage of the career center in time to run out into a cold pastel sunset out of which the occasional flake of snow drifted with insulting singularity. I am delighted by the rediscovery of silent Holmes and also by my camera's cooperation when trying again for the beautiful fungi I had spotted on an earlier walk, clustered on the stump of what used to be a sidewalk tree and has now pivoted to Richard Dadd. I dreamed intensely and have no idea what Alex Horne was doing in there.

Current Music: Paul Westerberg, "Dyslexic Heart"

minoanmiss

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Current Mood: awake

sorcyress

Okay, well, it's not _done_ but my room is a damn sight _better_ and that's pretty cool.

And by "damn sight better" I actually mean "I got rid of two of the boxen that've just been sitting around taking up space all over my room since I moved in in 2020". Which is...fantastic. I'm not remotely done cleaning, either up or out, but progress is happening! That's quite grand! Someday maybe I will have everything tucked away in a place it belongs, having gotten rid of all the things that shouldn't actually be in here. What a good fantasy.

(I am being sharp and salty to cover up the fact that I am actually quite happy to have regained a little bit of space, and irritated at how long it takes me sometimes.)

I am nowhere near finished, of course. My desk is the biggest disaster area (although I've definitely made progress on it, we're like, eight inches deep of shit instead of sixteen). And there's an endless number of papers that want sorting, but that's like, a longterm plan. Not something I expect to get done anytime soon, not even if I'm procrastinating on my grading real good!

That being said, I had a point somewhere in the span of time I've lived in this room where I was trying to sort papers for about twenty minutes a day. Do that for two months and I'd have everything done, I expect. Just....you know. Consistency is hard.

The surface reason I am cleaning is that SamSam is visiting this weekend, but the real weekend is that having my room be a catastrophe is a pretty strong Blues Clue¹, and also _definitely_ one of the ones that chickeneggs² me. So, having latched onto the slight mania of "you have no idea how badly I do not want to do my grading" means actually trying to get my roomspace tolerable?

We're through the long dark November. I made a note in my calendar for November first, next year and all subsequents, telling me that my brain's about to turn into shit and I might want to do something about it. What should I do? No one knows the answer to that.

I mucked with my phone so that it goes into "focus mode" for two hours each afternoon. No games, no internet. Chat is okay, because I almost never am _mindless_ and stuck about chat. So far I haven't broken it, which means that it ~cannot be broken~. Unlike, say, the timers on my various phone games that theoretically say I can only play like 15 minutes unless I go make it longer which is very easy to do. Sigh.

And I'm trying to crawl myself out of the work hellhole --the above is theoretically helpful for this. Man though, I'm looking forward to it being solstice real bad. Arise fair sun, and slay the envious moon³

I hope you are finding the ability to do the things that bring you comfort and joy. I love you!

~Sor
MOOP!

^{1: "what idiot called them depression symptoms instead of..."

2: Did you know that you can just say things? It's ridiculous that language works in any capacity whatsoever! I say so much entirely impenetrable nonsense, and yes, lots of the time it's partly that I'm quoting things, but sometimes it's that, like, I'm just making up weird things that maybe only make sense to me.

So, instead of finding the term "negative feedback loop" my brain decided to hand me "chickenegg", as in "which came first". Am I depressed because my room is a catastrophe or is my room a catastrophe because yadda yadda

3: Case in point, this is a reference! It's a Kate Nyx song lyric.}

kitewithfish

What I’ve Read
Persuasion – Jane Austen – I was sick this week and re-watched the 1995 adaptation and, as often happens, lead to me returning to the book. The movie is wonderful, the book is wonderful, I was comforted by the world that Austen builds and writes in. I think this one is growing on me to the point it passes Pride and Prejudice now for me. I just love Anne Elliot, I love Wentworth, I love the whole stupid bunch of all the young people in a flurry of attraction and engagement bouncing off each other like superheated particles.

The Books of Magic – Neil Gaiman – Yeah, that guy. I picked this up because I had come across an article talking about the unacknowledged influences that JK Rowling (yeah, that guy) had on Harry Potter – and the dark haired working class boy with dumb glasses and a magical owl, getting introduced to the secret world of magic by a stranger, seems like it very well might have been in her mind when she started writing Harry Potter. (This series is from 1990). However, this book is largely a retrospective of magic characters in DC Comics thru the lens of a new character, Timothy Hunter, who could be “the greatest magician of his age” as he gets the guided tour from several magical trenchcoat guys from DC’s vault. It feels like themes that have been done before by better people. The charm of the comic-specific retrospective relies on Gaiman’s skill at re-working existing comic characters into the brief cameos they get in the story along with existing myths and legends. My opinion is that Gaiman did this better and more gracefully in Sandman, but, I am inclined to be far less charitable towards him because of his whole fucking shitshow of a personality. I recalled reading this book and thinking it was good – but I realize now that I was thinking of the continuing series that came after this by John Ney Rieber and Peter Gross, and that certain key moments are simply the work of other writers. (Also, I didn’t like the art in this series except for book three, so, there’s that.) I don’t feel like I can entirely rule out my suspicion that Rowling had seen or read this series before she wrote Harry Potter, but I also can’t prove it and I’m not willing to take the law suit. In short, I think it can be skipped unless you are particularly interested in DC Comics magical characters.

What I’m Reading

The Fortunate Fall – Cameron Reed – Static, due for book club next week.

Into the Drowning Deep – Mira Grant – about 70% and while I made a comparison to Michael Crichton last week, I think that was perhaps too generous. I’m not losing interest in this book so much as I get frustrated with the scene-level pacing. Multiple scenes have seemed like they are building up to punchy scientific revelations!Only to have decidedly unurgent exposition pop up in the middle and drag out the scene, taking the delicious tension with them. It ends up taking the steam out of my excitement to have it happen so often. I can’t really give details without spoilers. But, for example, our intrepid scientist who is on a mission to discover the deep sea creatures who killed her sister are real and dangerous, uses her scientific subskill (which has been described before) to discover that her ship’s about to face an immediate threat! And in the middle of that action, the narration of the book picks up on how she’s typing really hard and throws in a flashback to let the reader know that the main character has actually broken the keyboards on several of her laptops this way! Now, that detail is good character work! I like it! It just doesn’t belong in the space between the set up and payoff of her big discovery because it let the tension out of the scene like a balloon – you should have popped that balloon for a big bang, but it’s just farted it all away. I remembered this being a frustration with Mira Grant’s Newflesh book, so I feel like this is a writer/reader mismatch – she’s clearly doing all right for herself in getting her works published! She loves to tell you about how things work. But it keeps interrupting the action, and I’m getting fussed.

A Contracted Spouse for the Prizefighter by Alice Coldbreath (audiobook) – Audiobook romance by a favorite author. This is the third in a series that focuses on the lives of Victorian working class people in a variety of jobs. Our heroine, Theodora, wants to be on the stage doing the fun, risque musical hall act that she has been working on for years – but her stuffy family wants to be respectable and will not allow that kind of act in their theatre! When her sister elopes and her brother pulls her out of acting entirely to work as the family’s drudge, Theo runs off to a prizefighter turned music act manager as part of a deal -he’ll get a share in her family’s much larger theatre and she’ll get her chance on the stage!

I often find the structures of historical romances less grating to my brain than modern romances – something about the stronger patriarchal structures makes the genre less silly to me. Modern women can simply not get married and have a perfectly fine life – historical women leads have to figure this shit out and fast. (This is like monarchy – makes for a great drama, I’d rather it only appear in fiction.)

Guillermo del Toro: Cabinet of Curiosities – on hold. (This book is just obnoxiously large.)

What I’ll Read Next
Natural History of Dragons
The Hunger Games
The Grief of Stones
heated rivalry, since the show is all the rage

sovay

As the title indicates, "Threnody for Five Actors" is a ghost poem for its subjects and its inclusion in On Actors and Acting: Essays by Alexander Knox (ed. Anthony Slide, 1998) is maddening because it is accompanied only by the note, "This poem is from an unpublished manuscript titled Screams and Speeches. The five actors named here were all victims of the Blacklist." First of all, you can't drop the existence of an entire manuscript at the very end of a slim selected works and expect the interested reader not to scream, especially when the only copy the internet feels like telling me about seems to be held in a collection in the Library and Archives of Canada, which feels currently even less accessible than the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Secondly, and speaking as a person who has been called out for the density of allusion in their stories and poetry, this poem could have done with some notes. The editor was obviously concerned enough about name recognition to parenthesize Julie Garfield as John and Bud Bohnen as Roman, but then why not list their dates so that the reader can see for themselves that all five actors died between 1949 and 1952, mostly of heart ailments, stressed by the hounding of the FBI and HUAC, at the grandly superannuated ages between 39 and 59? If you don't know that Mady Christians originated the title role of John Van Druten's I Remember Mama (1944), then her verse will make much less sense, but catching that one makes me wonder what other references I may be missing, such as in the stage work of Canada Lee or J. Edward Bromberg. Lastly, since it's the only poem I have ever read by Alexander Knox—instantaneously in October, but it's been a rough fall—if he wrote any others I'd like to be able to read them, even if just for comparison. Slide mentions his wicked limericks in the introduction, but unforgivably includes none.

( We know by now that time does not take sides. )

With this one example to go by, he was a better playwright than poet, but except for the self-deprecation which should definitely have hit the cutting room floor, it's hard to want to edit much out of a poem with so much anger at the injustice of a country that wastes its artists in scapegoating xenophobia, besides which there's at least one good line per actor and sometimes more. He wouldn't even have been living in the United States by the time of its writing, having burned off the last of his contract with Columbia by the end of 1951. He hadn't burned off his anger. No reason he should have. I may be confused by the existence of his Hollywood career, but I'm still pissed about the politics that snapped it short. The twentieth century could stop coming around on the guitar any measure now. On Sunday, I'll be at the HFA.

Current Music: Brandi Carlile, "Human"

psocoptera

I did a bunch of going through of stuff today but none of it actually left the house yet. But I have a disadvent question: awhile ago, J's employer sent him an award certificate and a big glass trophy for - this cracks me up - Humility. The certificate is in a perfectly functional frame we can use when we have some suitable picture, but what's he supposed to do with the trophy? I mean, he's not going to put it on the mantel, right?

psocoptera

We went through a whole bunch of miscellaneous bits of hardware - plastic cups of random screws and baggies of leftover Ikea pieces - and ended up keeping almost all of it, but better organized and put away. Sometimes the disadventure is the work you do along the way and not so much the actual volume of stuff removed.

lb_lee

Rogan: It was a tie between "Old Man Yaoi" and "Cult Comix" this poll, but December is dark enough without cultery, so I exercised my blogly fiat. Besides, "Old Man Yaoi" has contextual relevance, because it's about Coming In or Staying Out, which is now officially up for sale in the violet and bubblegum pink Riso edition! $20, 24 pages, printing so pretty you'll want to rub it across your face!

Image and textual transcription behind the cut!

( Biff doesn't know what an anime is and he does not care. He liked The Wind Also Rises though. )

Current Mood: silly

minoanmiss

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minoanmiss

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minoanmiss

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Current Mood: worried

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What Stalks the Deep

Disadvent 10+11+12

A Mouthful of Dust

Fujisawa Dec 10-12

Update [me, health, Patreon]

Choosing Health Insurance: HSAs: FYI re bronze, catastrophic plans [healthcare, US, Patreon]

The Jesus Footballs

Is this your name or a doctor's eye chart?

Quick Fandom Community PSA Thing

Puttin' away boxen do doo

Wednesday Reading Meme for Dec 10 2025

And they won't thank you, they don't make awards for that

Disadvent 9

Disadvent 8

Comic: Old Man Yaoi (2025)

Of course today's most important post:

I hosted a discussion on this a few months back

Well this is horrifying

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