I thought it was a good idea at the time...

Today is partly cloudy and cool.

I fed the birds. I've seen a few sparrows.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 1/7/26 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 1/7/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

EDIT 1/7/26 -- I gathered the raked leaves from the ritual meadow, enough to fill the trolley twice, which I dumped on the daffodil bed. (That should have been done in fall, but better late than never.) One quarter around the firepit equaled two trolleys and covered the daffodil bed completely. The tulip bed will need at least twice that much.

I startled several cardinals and the great-horned owl in the ritual meadow.

EDIT 1/7/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

I filled a trolley with sticks from the brushpile beside the driveway, then dumped that in the firepit.

EDIT 1/7/26 -- I filled another trolley with sticks, then dumped that in the firepit.

There's not much left of the brushpile now, mostly pieces too big for me to break down.

It's 5:05 PM. The western sky is still twilight, the east considerably darker.

I am done for the night.

Recreating an Ancient Pump (with no moving parts)

This historic pump uses a mixture of flowing water and air bubbles to lift water high above its original level. While not as efficient as some other methods, it has two tremendous advantages: 1) It requires no electricity, fuel, or animal power. 2) With no moving parts, it avoids the problems of wear and clogs that threaten more complex pumps. Given the increasing issue of climate change, there is great value in any useful technology that runs entirely on renewable energy and doesn't need repair or replacement at all often.  

This poem is from today's fishbowl. It was inspired and sponsored by fuzzyred. It belongs to the Pain's Gray thread of the Polychrome Heroics series.


"Done to Perfection"
-- a cinquain


Pain's Gray
bakes French pastries --
beignets and petits fours,
choux à la crème and tartes des Alpes --
exquis.

* * *

Notes:

Read about the cinquain form.

French pastries include beignets, choux à la crème, petits fours, and tartes des Alpes.

exquis
French: delightful, delicious

Nearly all women in STEM secretly feel like impostors

A striking 97.5% of women pursuing graduate degrees in STEM report moderate or higher levels of impostorism.

Nearly all women in STEM graduate programs report feeling like impostors, despite strong evidence of success. This mindset leads many to dismiss their achievements as luck and fear being “found out.” Research links impostorism to worse mental health, higher burnout, and increased thoughts of dropping out. Supportive environments and shifting beliefs about intelligence may help break the cycle.


That's probably because 97.5% of their male coworkers are misogynistic assholes, and so are a lot of people even outside of STEM.

After decades of being told that girls are bad at math, go play with dolls, harassment as soon as their breasts start growing, male students being put in charge of groups, professors stealing their work, getting lower grades than they deserve, struggling to find a job, their name being left off papers or awards, promotions going to less-qualified males, fighting for funds ... of course women realize that they are aren't wanted, aren't welcome, and nobody likes them.

The last 2.5% of women in STEM? They don't give a shit if people like them, and they aren't there to stroke anyone's ego or penis. Shut up and work. Impostor syndrome? It can be beaten to death with facts.

This is today's freebie, inspired by a prompt from jake67jake.


Maduro kidnapped --
he was quite unpopular,
but it was still wrong



* * *

Notes:

Read a discussion of Venezuela politics.

The Poetry Fishbowl is now CLOSED. Thank you all for your time and attention.

Starting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "short forms." I will be checking this page periodically throughout the day. When people make suggestions, I'll pick some and weave them together into a poem ... and then another ... and so on. I'm hoping to get a lot of ideas and a lot of poems.

I'll be soliciting poetic forms of 60 lines or less, so basically below my epic range rather than only the short-short length of 10 lines or less. Free verse below the length limit is also fine. Here are 15 short forms with descriptions. Among my favorite short forms not listed there: hexaduad, indriso, sestina, villanelle. This list of 168 forms is alphabetical. Poets Garrett has my favorite list of forms, including a list of repeating-interlocking forms. Their main page has links to poetic forms of 3-10 lines. Plus a few of my own: A darrow poem is a short, haiku-like musing by dark elves. A khazal is a Whispering Sands desert poem in couplets. A moose track is a repeating-interlocking form. A tweet wire is a tiny 10-line poem designed for Twitter. Some short forms, like haiku and tanka, work well as verses in a longer poem. I have The New Book of Forms by Lewis Turco so most forms should be in there. You can also prompt with a link to any exotic form you find; I collect these things.

In addition to forms, I also need topical prompts. One-word or short-phrase framing will assist in keeping them small enough to fit within the theme. Here is a huge list of common themes. This page of idioms has alphabetical and topical listings. I love writing poems about an individual word; see The Phrontistery (WARNING! Black hole caliber time sink ahead!) for glossaries. Have an orientation that is not well represented in literature? Ask for a sexual, romantic, or other orientation! If it's not on any of my lists, just include a description or link to one. I also list gender identities and my characters with disabilities. Want to help me play with my bookshelf? :D I have The Conflict Thesaurus, The Conflict Thesaurus Volume 2, The Occupation Thesaurus, The Emotional Wound Thesaurus, The Urban Setting Thesaurus, The Rural Setting Thesaurus, The Emotion Thesaurus, The Positive Trait Thesaurus, The Negative Trait Thesaurus, and The Emotion Amplifier Thesaurus. Simply click "Read Sample" and view the table of contents for a list of cool ideas. You can prompt a sestina with six end words; I usually pick 5 short flexible words and one long exotic word, but I'll work with whatever I get. Favorite characters, threads, series, settings, etc. are also fair game but this is NOT the time for long plotty prompts. Consider combining a name or title with a short form, theme, or idiom. If you like to prompt with photos, this is a great opportunity for that. Just type in a topic (see above for possibilities) and click the Image link in your favorite search engine.

( Read more... )