Notices by Derek Caelin is writing a book (derek@social.coop)

@Ailantd love it

@nholzschuch congrats! And I love the three panel soul reference... Haven't seen in ages.

@redoak it comes for us all

@Sheril great read. Enjoy!

"What I intend to say is this: I cannot substantially alter the thing. I have finished it, it is 'off my mind': the labour has been colossal; and it must stand or fall, practically as it is."

Letters of JRR Tolkien, 1951

By a series of fumbling clicks and button presses I somehow found myself listening to #zotero read aloud "The Letters of J.R.R. #Tolkien" and #65daysofstatic and, tbh, there have been worse mashups.

A lesson the U.S. tends to forget every administration or so...

"We generally do a pretty good job of the breaking things and killing people at the inception of the wars," said Peter Bergen. He's the author of a new book, All The Presidents' Wars, which looks at U.S. conflicts over the past quarter-century. Bergen, a national security analyst at CNN, said the U.S. keeps falling short when it comes to ending wars.

"We, the United States, tend to not plan for the day after — the peace that follows the war," said Bergen.

Why is it so hard for the U.S. to win wars?
https://www.npr.org/2026/07/18/g-s1-134037/why-is-it-so-hard-for-the-u-s-to-win-wars

#uspol

Warping up the loom! All with homespun yarn.

#weaving #spinning #yarn.

RE: https://fosstodon.org/@terraso/116924371999469652

Not everyone has access to a 3M-branded Canary-Yellow Post-it note, but many more of us have a color reference somewhere!

@acm_redfox it's giving "Dubious Food" vibes for sure

Made a #dropspindle!

Best Translation of The Divine Comedy: A 2026 Reader's Guide - Classics Retold
https://classicsretold.com/2026/04/29/best-translation-the-divine-comedy/

Hell yes.

Farmers Finally Get a John Deere Right to Repair Agreement That Doesn’t Screw Them Over
https://www.404media.co/farmers-finally-get-a-john-deere-right-to-repair-agreement-that-doesnt-screw-them-over/

#rightorepair

A risk-averse video game industry is failing marginalised devs
https://www.gamedeveloper.com/production/the-game-industry-is-failing-marginalized-developers

Constantly refreshing browser taps to see if there's news of layoffs at #ObsidianEntertainment. My buddy works there, hope he's not one of the 3,200 to lose their job as Microsoft cuts the Xbox workforce. https://variety.com/2026/gaming/news/xbox-layoffs-3200-4-studios-sold-1236802326/

This woman is so impressive. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJYmbEj2_KY&t=814

@DMakarios I feel like the only advantages with a drop spindle are portability and cost... still, might be fun to make one.

Mmm gonna look into this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKAJTKvl0nE

I made #bread. Hamburger buns!

"[Simple minds] do not perceive the complexity of any given situation in Time, in which an absolute ideal is enmeshed. They tend to forget that strange element in the World that we call Pity or Mercy, which is also an absolute requirement in moral judgement (since it is present in the Divine nature). In its highest exercise it belongs to God. For finite judges of imperfect knowledge it must lead to the use of two different scales of 'morality'. To ourselves we must present the absolute ideal without compromise, for ...if we do not aim at the highest we shall certainly fall short of the utmost that we could achieve. To others, in any case of which we know enough to make a judgement, we must apply a scale tempered by 'mercy': that is, since we can with good will do this without the bias inevitable in judgements of ourselves, we must estimate the limits of another's strength and weigh this against the force of particular circumstances."

@Roots