lol. Talking about turn-of-the-century webcomic shit always feels like I'm a li'l French grandma in the nursing home, the grandkids ask me what I was like as a girl, and I talk about the Nazis I used to lure into the wheat fields by flashing my panties so the neighbor boys could slash their throats

OpenAI: We’re burning money like the Joker. A miracle needs to happen for us to turn a profit

Microsoft: Please please use our AI systems, we’re teetering on the edge here

Anthropic: I wonder what’ll kill us first: lawsuits, regulations or model collapse

Media and universities: AI is here to stay

At a con a teen asked me if my webcomic Sorcery 101 did well on Webtoon. And I explained that Sorcery 101 began and ended before Webtoon existed.

I went to the beach today and sat in the shade and watched four small children running up to the frothy edges of the waves, screaming joyously, and running back the way they came over and over again, so yes, actually, I DO believe there is still hope in this world.

Is it weird if I go house hunting in a new city by first searching for a FLGS with good vibes and then investing in that neighborhood?

Because that's been my approach so far.

Huh. According to all the 부동산 I talked to today, in Busan hardly anything is available for rent, but it's all available to buy at remarkably reasonable prices.

That... Sounds fake? But also plausible?

They are also all very unenthusiastic about my cat, which wouldn't be an issue if I were buying.

Right, so I have learned a valuable lesson about booking train tickets ahead of time, and will now be spending today in Busan house hunting instead of going up to Seoul to pick up my new ARC.

I don't think I want to consider how much it would cost to ship ice cream internationally...

Can we quit sincerely telling people that having their works plagiarized is flattering? It's a violation.

hbomberguy nailed it when he broke down how plagiarism is not done out of admiration, it's driven by disrespect. Nothing flattering about that.

I cannot tell you how profoundly I just got hit with a wave of homesickness.

I have homemade Cincinnati chili thawing in the fridge, even in the vacation rental mid-move because I planned ahead, so some hometown flavors are still readily available... but I miss Graeter's so much.

Anyway. Busan is like a fun cross between Chicago and Pittsburgh in terms of vibes so far, and TECHNICALLY the vacation rental has an ocean view if one squints. I have to head back to Seoul on Friday to pick up my ARC, and then on Monday we start house hunting in Busan in earnest!

The duffel is in no way as nefarious as it sounds. It's just that it contains the box with Michael's ashes, and the box containing mementos and a small relic from my best friend, as well as external hard drive backups of all of Michael's work. It was thus very heavy and nerve-wracking to transport.

He had the most stressful day after the most stressful month of his entire fuzzy little existence, and he was incredibly chill about it. I expected urine accidents in the cage, or endless yowling, but aside from a few objections to jostling or abandonment, he was a sweetheart the whole time.

After a grueling day of supervising movers, dealing with the realtor and new owners for our old place, and finally bringing a cat and way too many heavy suitcases on the train (including my "duffel full of dead guys"), the housemate and I arrived in Busan late last night.

Ollie was SO GOOD all day.

About to head back to Seoul for what I thought was a silly true crime reenactment on a famously cheesy tv show, and learning that through a series of wacky mistranslations, I had misunderstood my part. I actually have a speaking role in the sequel to one of the biggest films in Korean history.

The movers have performed some sort of arcane trickery whereby my moderately sized apartment full of relatively organized stuff has somehow filled with multiplying boxes that occupy all the formerly empty volume of the apartment.

I did not get to watch them pack the comics because I was busy babysitting Ollie and I am FEARFUL about it.

It's not their fault, I just have some extreme control issues when stressed and this is extremely stressful so I want to watch it all, and I simply cannot.

It's cherry blossom day outside our apartment, and I am sitting on the floor of the spare room babysitting Ollie while like ten movers zerg rush our entire apartment simultaneously.

The sheer chaos that has descended is not chaotic at all for the perpetrators, but it sure feels overwhelming for me.

I didn't do the math until I was trying to figure out how to insure them, but like... It's a couple thousand pages which we used to sell for $100 a piece. All sitting neatly filed in one massive cabinet.

I cannot afford to insure that, and I'm told the insurance wouldn't pay out anyhow.

It turns out that when you move 25 years worth of original comics pages at the last minute, you have to do it effectively uninsured.

I am going to be getting nightmares from anxiety the entire time those boxes are in storage. They are THE thing that remains of my husband, his literal life's work.

Aaaaagh! We are moving out of the apartment where Poe and I lived for the last 9 years in about 8 hours and I am NOT ready.

The housemate and I are in for an all-nighter finishing up the pre-pack cleaning. Ollie will probably snooze through the whole thing.

Ah. Have you considered Becoming An Obstacle such that they become more organized in sheer self-defense? XD

...I still don't know what to do about Poe's character in our DnD game. I'm the DM, so it's up to me how to handle it in more ways than one, but I'm trying to figure out what would be most respectful but also the most fun for the other players.

Character death as plot hook/unsolved mystery, maybe?

Are you the DM or a fellow player?

Either way the answer is yes but the consequences may differ.

Re: my last reposts

“Do not put money in the pocket of a woman who has sworn publicly to use it to disenfranchise vulnerable populations” is the smallest ask imaginable. It’s not oxygen, it’s not food. It’s television. You can do without. There are thousands of other shows for you to watch.

The landlord sold the place out from under us back in November, we were lucky to even get to March 31. Michael mentioned that the pending move felt like a deadline to him, but I did try to encourage him not to make it one. New brain metastasis made it unavoidable though.

It's been so long since the FPL, but I still remember bits of it. I'm glad to hear from you, though sorry that Poe missed the chance. We actually talked about the FPL a bit in passing the last week or so that he was awake, so I know he'd have been glad to hear from you.

At minimum, explicit naming of the offense and statement that it is wrong and why. Ideally, if it is something within their purview to do anything about, corrective action. I don't expect them to condemn or correct for anything outside their purview, though, and won't ask for it.

I am doing a not very good job of getting ready for the movers.

I spent most of today stressed, distracted, or crying. I did not go through Michael's office. I did not finish sorting out my craft cabinet. I found very few videos of Michael and all of them were of him interacting with the cats.

It's weird being older.

The obvious solution to the TSA lines is to abolish it. We did without that security theater for ages. It's been demonstrated OVER AND OVER to do nothing. It just funnels more money to bullshit.

ICE and TSA were created wholecloth in 2003 and 2001 respectively.