Another foggy week (Learning Things: July 3, 2023)

The New Blood Kickstarter is in the final stretch! (It ends this coming Sunday, 7/9, at 8:08 am.) If you want to support two new, queer paranormal TV shows and get some cool rewards, now's your chance!

I'm still low-energy and vaguely sickly (and the wildfire smoke sure didn't help), so aside from that, it's been a quiet week for me and my projects. Here's what I've been up to:

Paranormal research

I just have a few small research updates this time:

1. I added/updated notes in my digital garden
2. been reading some scientific papers/studies about nostalgia (expect to hear more about those as I sift through 'em)
3. read/took notes on the first issue of John Keel's Anomaly newsletter. I've flipped through the issues at random, but have been meaning to go through and read 'em individually cover to cover, so . . . one down, 11.5 to go. I'm sure I'll end up blogging about it (but in the meantime, if you're curious, some of my notes are in my digital garden)
4. in case you missed it, I dropped a podcast episode about some of the hauntings of Denton, Texas on Friday, which you can listen to on your favorite podcatcher

Tech and/or DIY paranormal gear

I fiddled around some more with the code for the biodata sonification device. Still stuck in an annoying debugging cycle. Hopefully I'll be able to load it up soon.

Unrelated, I've had really good luck with my Framework laptop this week. It's been turning on and running just fine, and most days the time and date have even been correct! I've had it plugged into a cheap USB-C cord instead of the high-quality PD charger that came with the laptop. Weird, but seems to be working for now. Mentioning it for anyone else dealing with the known mainboard RTC battery issue. Hopefully this lucky streak keeps up!

I was able to edit my podcast episode and write my blog posts this week on my laptop, which was a delight since I've still been a bit under the weather and it helped to be able to do work on my laptop while lying down versus being stuck with my PC at my standing desk. That sounds like a complaint, maybe, but it isn't. I'm happy about this!

Art and paranormal investigation

No progress here, sadly.

Writing

This week ended up being unexpectedly busy, so . . . yes, I got some writing done, but no, it wasn't much.

Outro

I don't mention most of the (many) books that I read, but this week, I read a novella called Heart, Haunt, Havoc by Freydís Moon that feels particularly on theme. (To the extent that anything that I talk about here has a theme.) It's gothic horror/contemporary romance with a trans exorcist as the POV character, and there's lots of Catholic mysticism. The writing is real beautiful, and it's a quick read, so I very much recommend it if that feels up your alley! I can't wait for the sequel, which comes out in September.