purplecat

For a tech person, I’m pretty old school when it comes to certain things. For example, I don’t subscribe to any of the streaming music services (although I do have YouTube Music as part of my YouTube Premium subscription). Apple Music is especially problematic as Apple actually removes your own copies of music from the Apple Music app and replaces those songs with its own master copies – whether you like it or not. It’s possible to lose unique or special versions of songs in your library.

So I’ll never subscribe to Apple Music – and I manage my music library the way I always have since the days of ripping CDs and filling my iPod. I have too much music to download it all to my iPhone, so I sync only selected playlists and albums.

Years ago my playlists started getting corrupted. The songs were correct and played properly – but some (maybe half?) of the song/album cover artwork got randomly replaced by cover art from a different song in my library. It was super annoying – it’s been super annoying for years. But the music played fine, and I largely ignored it.

I had made a couple attempts to research a fix, the what I was told to do seemed like a horrid and dangerous pain – so I didn’t even make the attempt.

Today, though, I decided to research the situation again. I was a little more confident now that I’m armed with Kagi. I did a search for iphone music showing wrong album cover, and the top three results were immediately informative and useful.

So on my iPhone I went into Settings > General > iPhone Storage > Music > Edit > All Songs and deleted all the songs. Then I connected the iPhone to my Mac and resync’d all of my playlists – twice. (I’ve learned that I need to activate the SYNC action two times, and it’s the second time the app Syncs that the music gets transferred.) The Music app informed me that it was downloading 2000 songs to my iPhone.

When that was done, I checked my phone – and all album covers are correct! I’m very happy about this!

A Playlist on My iPhone 13 mini

I’m pretty happy with Kagi, too.

aurumcalendula

I've been curious about early (VCR era) femslash fanvids and it just occurred to me to see if anything's on ebay. I found a VHS of Xena fanvids, so here's hoping it arrives safely and cooperates with my VCR player!

pedanther

Fiction books
Hazel Gaynor. Before Dorothy (e)
Andy Weir. Project Hail Mary (e)

In progress
Stephen Fry. Mythos (e)
EW Hornung. The Amateur Cracksman (e)

Non-fiction books
Ben Crystal, David Crystal. You Say Potato: The Story of English Accents (e)
James W Loewen. Lies My Teacher Told Me (e)
Jason Morningstar. Fiasco (re-read)

In progress
Simon Lamb. Devil in the Mountain: A Search for the Origin of the Andes (e)
Keri Smith. Wreck This Journal Everywhere

( short, screen, and stage )
( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Caroline Stevermer. When the King Comes Home (e)

magnavox_23

Title: "Yellow Brick Road"
Artist:

magnavox_23
Character/Pairing: Team
Rating: G

(click to embiggen)

(alt here)

2x11 Tok'ra I

hannah

Someone moving out of their apartment's always cause for investigation, and sometimes, I get lucky: a couple folding baskets for my closet that replace the cardboard boxes that had been there since I moved in. I'd never gotten around to replacing them with anything, and after a while, just adjusted to their presence and got attached to them.

I'm trying to ask myself why I'm unwilling to let go of certain things I'm not using, like old pajamas. It's an unpleasant inertia. They're not even particularly nostalgic. I think some of it's just me bristling at the idea of getting rid of things, even though I know better. At least a little is there not being good places for fabric to go. If there were some, knowing that would certainly help a bit with conceptualizing not having them anymore.

Current Mood: discontent
Current Music: nothing now

ysabetwordsmith

March's book is The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher over at

bookclub_dw.

Current Mood: busy

princessofgeeks

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has marked as possibly inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18. )

Current Mood: enthralled

astrogirl

Looky, I've finally finished with my

genprompt_bingo card for last round! Maybe eventually I'll even manage to start on the current one. And perhaps that will involve less of me writing about things like eating spiders or fantasizing about killing children, but, hey, I also wrote about baking cookies and a girl and her uncle being sweater buddies and watching Shrek, so, eh. It all evens out, right?

Title: Some Children to Make into Corpses
Fandom: Gravity Falls
Characters/Relationships: Bill Cipher, Bill's hatred for Dipper and Mabel
Rating/Warnings: Teen. I've used "Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings" on this one, because I feel like not giving it a "Major Character Death' warning would be wrong, but giving it one would be misleading. But this does feature deaths of alternate versions of the kids, as well as versions in Bill's imagination, and while it's not super gory, if children dying horribly isn't something you want in your psyche at all, now's the time to bail out.
Tags: Bill Cipher in the Theraprism, POV Bill Cipher, Bill's All-Seeing Eye, The Multiverse, Bill hates those kids, Descriptions of violence against children, Descriptions of child death
Length: ~1100 words
Summary: There aren't any universes where he wins.
Author's Notes: This was written for Gen Prompt Bingo, for the prompt "child endangerment." The prompt got me thinking about that page in TBOB where Bill declares that there's only one universe in which the kids survived the summer, and the question of whether that's true or not... which led me to further questions I've pondered about the nature of the multiverse in GF and Bill's place in it, which in turn led to this. Whatever this is.

Some Children to Make into Corpses

troisoiseaux

Read Home Sweet Homicide by Craig Rice, an absolutely delightful 1944 murder mystery in which the three precocious children of a widowed detective novelist go meddling in the murder investigation next door, while - as a side project - trying to set their mother up with the lead detective on the case.

Read Beowulf! I just saw a one-man show called Beowulf, A Retelling in a pop-up bar at a local arts center, which was a very good introduction to Beowulf, since it was literally just a guy telling the story in his own (conversational, compelling) words, weaving in references to modern heroes and villains* as a sort of touchstone for how parts of the story would have resonated in ye olde days and using instruments for sound effects, like a violin bow across the strings of an electric guitar for Grendel's dying screech. It was very cool! Obviously then had to actually read Beowulf (the Francis Gummere translation; it was the first one available) and I'm glad I had the crash-course version first; it helped to know the shape of the story and have something to mentally translate it back to. (Plus, if I'd had to figure out how to mentally pronounce Healfdene and Ecgtheow on my own, I think I simply would have not.) What really struck me was the sheer sense of time of it all— the oldest known Old English poem, and possibly a story that was hundreds of years old by the time it was written down, and still there were recurring mentions of "heirlooms", which might be a quirk of translation but does suggest the weight of history behind this story that's already really, really old!, and also I found myself reading/listening to it like, okay, yes, I can see what Tolkien got from this. (Is this where the idea of dragons hoarding gold comes from?)

( footnote )

Current Music: Grendel's Mother - The Mountain Goats

paradoxcase posting in

rainbowfic

Name: Communication Failure
Story: The Fulcrum
Colors: Realgar #2: Misconstrue
Styles and Supplies: Life Drawing, Novelty Beads (""And maybe someday/We'll figure all this out/Try to put an end to all our doubt/Try to find a way to make things better now and/Maybe someday we'll live our lives out loud/We'll be better off somehow/Someday." - "Someday", Rob Thomas" given here), Tempera (Daily Tarot Draw: "Three of Pentacles reversed indicates lack of quality in work performance. It suggests a lack of cooperation and coordination among team members, leading to challenges and delays in achieving desired outcomes. There may be a breakdown in communication, with different parties pulling in separate directions or failing to share their expertise effectively. This card serves as a reminder to assess the dynamics within the team, address any conflicts or issues, and focus on restoring harmony and cooperation for the successful completion of the task at hand.")
Word Count: 472
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Charcters: Setsiana, Qhoroali
In-Universe Date: 1912.5.2.6
Summary: Setsiana wonders about the dream.

( Communication Failure )

sistawendy

I knew when the news app on my phone chirped in the small hours of this morning that something bad had happened. The Wendling lost sleep last night about the brand new Iran war, and I find myself wondering if a 28-year-old with AuDHD is likely to get drafted. The Persian Princess, now living on the far side of the US from me, has mixed emotions to say the least.

And in a sign of approaching spring, the motorcycles are back on the highway near my place. Believe it or not, I like them, ss long as they're riding at reasonable hours as usual for the large groups.

Current Mood: blah
Current Location: the living room of the Devil Girl House

yourlibrarian

1) I happened to catch the Heated Rivalry episode on NPR's 1A, and they mentioned these HBO stats: "The audience on HBO went from 53% women the week of December 22 to roughly two thirds women by January." This apparently refers to viewers and not signups to the service, so it makes me wonder how they know these demographics? Also, I would have thought new signups would be the bigger success rate for a streamer.

2) When we heard this news story on Wait Wait this morning, my partner said, "So it was Llama and Order" : https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/crime-fighting-llamas-catch-thief-by-surrounding-him-in-a-field-until-cops-arrive/

3) Americans now listen to podcasts more often than talk radio, study shows

What's interesting to me about this is that for a long time I had been reading articles about "when is podcasting going to break through". The surge in 2020 is unsurprising -- it's when a lot of people discovered podcasts, but then there's an immediate drop the following year. Meanwhile radio drops in 2020 because so many people listen to it mostly while commuting, which fewer are doing. ( Read more... )

4) Apparently we'd better prepare for a large wave of dementia patients in coming decades due to early wave Covid infections.

5) Had one of my best nights of bowling, at least in terms of outcomes. Normally my goal is just to break 100. I almost did so in game 1, did 114 in game 2, and 141 in game 3. This followed a 20+ minute delay when our lanes (which had been getting balls stuck all evening), stopped altogether and wouldn't lower pins. We were eventually moved to a different set of lanes to finish game 2 and do one of the fastest game 3s I've ever played. Paid off though!

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soc_puppet

I think I may have walked five miles today in while playing Pokémon Go, and my legs are not going to be happy about it tomorrow.

I am trying desperately not to care about the shameless money-grab that is special backgrounds, but alas, it's not working very well.

Anyway, Happy Pokémon Day/Weekend/What-have-you, the trailer for Pokémon Winds and Waves also got to me more than I wanted it to, Nintendo clearly has my number on speed-dial.

Current Mood: exhausted

yourlibrarian posting in

marchmetamatterschallenge

Welcome to year 6 of the Meta Matters Challenge! I'm your moderator,

yourlibrarian.

These posts will be used for us all to check-in with one another, offer encouragement and answers to questions, and maybe tips we come up with as we copy our work to another location.

Before we begin, some reminders. Please look over the FAQ as there are some important bits for everyone to follow, namely: ( Read more... )

Remember, this account accepts anonymous comments, so if you don't have a Dreamwidth account we still want to hear from you and have you take part. Just sign your messages with your username and we'll all get to know you!

stonepicnicking_okapi

Word Count: 16550

Writing: I tried to do some drabbling with the LOVE prompts. I did not update my soap opera as often as I'd desired.

Reading: 8 books. All audiobooks! I do have a physical TBR pile, but I haven't made a dent in it. The book for the DW book club (https://bookclub-dw.dreamwidth.org) is The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher is part of it.

FYI, I am going to do the 7 Days, 7 Covers challenge in March. This is posting a photo of a book I own every day for 7 days without caption.

Crafting: I did 11 Valentines and a Chinese New Year card and a sympathy card. I did 2 spreads, for Valentine's and Chinese New Year. I tried to build a pinball machine from a kit with Minisculus but we ended up with a missing piece. I ordered a replacement from the company but it hasn't arrived yet. Also I am working on a cross stitch project, mostly on Mondays while I am waiting for my Indian lady to finish physical therapy.

Health & Fitness: I am starting a new weight loss program (at the end of the month). I did 16 sessions of Yoga with Adriene. I am trying to give up sweets for Lent but (alas) the Girl Scouts outside the library today were my downfall! Too tempting.

Personal: Survived the ups and downs of work. Air force guy has made an AMAZING recovery. They changed his Parkinson's meds and after about a week, he's a new man. Really, I don't recognize him. Talking, walking, eating. I really thought he was dying week before last, he couldn't stand, needed two of us to hold him up, but now, WOW. He and his family are moving in March out of my radius so I will lose him as a client but, really, if he continues this way, he won't need a helper. So getting the right meds at the right dosage can save your life (and your quality of life). I have seen it in action this week.

Spirituality: I don't talk about this aspect of my life, but after meditating for 30 minutes every morning for 24 years, I added a 30 minute evening meditation. It's been a challenge and I still have a long way to go on the quality of the meditation but it's a step on the spiritual journey.

All in all, February was short but interesting month, I think.

On y va!

heron61

At this point, I suspect that civil war in the US in inevitable, and may be the "best" of a series out truly terrible options, since if we don't have one, I fear that when our our side takes control of the US again, the politicians involved won't deliver the sort of serious consequences (long prison sentences and in some cases executions) to keep the fasc from trying again in less than a decade. Also, I remain haunted by a quote I saw on Facebook several weeks ago "When they write histories of this time, they'll say that the US civil war started on January 6, 2021", I have great difficulty saying this is incorrect.

heron61

In years past, I've said that if the US attacked Iran I'd purchase and fly an Iranian flag, but after the Iranian government killed so many protesters, I can't. Instead, we have three nations at war, the US and Israel vs Iran, and the absolute best outcome for the entire planet would be all three of the leaders of these three nations to die in the war asap.

minoanmiss

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olivermoss

Beer, writing and hockey at Sport's Bra last night:

Seattle Torrent sold out Climate Pledge Arena and set a new US attendance record for women's hockey, so lots of people watched them lose to Toronto. Seattle's team is stacked, and yet they are at or near the bottom of the league.

yuuago

Whoo! I'm participating in the FTH charity auction once again. Offers are open for browsing.

You can see my offers here. You can also see a list of all fandoms on offer here.

Bidding opens on March 03!

This year I'm offering up to 5k of Hetalia, Promare, or any fandom I've written in the past (such as Ex Machina, Vatican Miracle Examiner, Frozen, etc). I'm offering any characters/pairings.

If you're interested in this but don't really get how it works, I might be able to help - I've participated on both the offering on bidding ends before.

I'm really looking forward to seeing whatever the winner requests; in the past I've had asks for pairings that I normally don't write, and in the end those often turn out to be some of my best fics.

Anyway! Whoo! Let's see how this goes!

Irritation Finally Quashed

(no subject)

Fiction log - February 2026

Wallpaper: "Yellow Brick Road", Rated: G

Accumulations.

Books

Heated Rivalry rec

At Last, A Bingo!

Recent reading

Realgar #2 [The Fulcrum]

F*ck.

Successes

Tired

March Meta Matters Challenge, Check-in No. 1

The State of the Ficcery: February 2026

Civil War Musings

War Again

Indo-European Creation Myth

(no subject)

FTH Offers

Profile

February 2026

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