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Elf Herself

@elfherself.bsky.social
441 followers 231 following 4.5K posts

I'm here for: Fanfic talk, lawsplainers, social media meta, paganism, scifi fandom, ttrpgs, indie publishing, and doc formatting. The doc formatting community is especially weak but I have hopes.

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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Well that's… special. "Tell me you have never worked in a field that required accurate data without" etc. But what can you expect from someone whose next most recent article says "citations serve a gate-keeping role?" (Tell me you don't work in the legal field without etc. etc.)
Paragraph about how AI has grown tremendously in the last few years, with highlighted line

practical claims regarding the superiority of human thought, on grounds such as hallucinations or bias, increasingly appear to me like rearguard defence.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
This is one of my favorites. I even made a tiny version of it (and a few other solo games) that fits in an Altoids tin.
Altoids tin with three tiny game books
A Fool's Errand, With These Phantom Hands, and My Welcomed GuestA page from the tiny version of A Fool's Errand showing how to select the king and the goal of the conspiracy against him.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Everyone smoked. Everywhere. Restaurants. Movie theatres. Airplanes. Hospitals. You technically had to be 18… but restaurants often had cigarette vending machines; anyone could buy cigarettes. www.facebook.com/groups/10748...
A smiling nurse sells a pack of cigarettes to a patient in a hospital bed.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
"Tell me you've never played Fate without telling me you've never played Fate."
Should the PCs mainly overcome challenges through mastery and skillful use of the rules, or through lateral thinking and in-fiction problem solving? 
Ranked 1 to 5, with lower numbers being closer to rules and higher ones being in-fiction problem solving
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Lan Wangji, yes; Wei Wuxian, no… but before he succumbed to his inevitable doom, he'd subvert it to give Sauron nightmares and take over the Nazgûl and make them fight the orc armies. Except for the one that decides to become a turnip farmer.
Promo pic for The Untamed showing Lan Wangji in white back to back with Wei Wuxian holding his flute
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
From Word: Use "Save a Copy" or "Save as." Then select "PDF" from the dropdown menu. Set your options for accessibility; this gets the best tagging results. This is NOT the same as "Save as PDF." (Sorry. There are at least 4 ways to convert Word to PDF & they all get different results.)
Word to PDF options with accessibility features selected
Publish what: Document
Include non-printing information: Create bookmarks using headings
Document properties
Document structure tags for accessibility
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Quote by Henry Jenkins, Director of Media studies at MIT in 1997. (Author of "Textual Poachers," an academic book about fanfic.) Humans have always engaged in fanfic. It's only recently that it's come under hostile legal attention.
Fanfiction is a way of the culture repairing the damage done in a system where contemporary myths are owned by corporations instead of owned by the folk - Henry Jenkins quote
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
This post? (Originally from Tumblr.)
Tumblr post from exigencelost
I'm getting really tired of the wise serene pacifist trope in fiction. Every committed pacifist, prison abolitionist, antiwar activist, etc I've ever met in real life has been vibrating with compressed rage at all times. Do you know what it's like to believe deeply in your heart that doing harm to others is wrong and the goal of society should be to alleviate suffering for all people and live in the United States of America? IT'S NOT FUN. Show Us The Pissed-Off Pacifists.

Dude there might be a word for the emotion that is forged when someone's deep abiding love and compassion for all people and living things welds itself into decades of built-up foaming fury at how those people been treated their whole life by those in power to create a sort of alloyed super-commitment to a set of ethical principles but i
promise you 'tranquility" is not that fucking word
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
"How did people survive?" …They didn't. A whole lot of them died. Theoden's line about "no parent should have to bury their child" wasn't in the book because the concept was unknown to Tolkien - not every parent had a child who died, but every parent knew someone who did.
Chart showing infant mortality in the US per 1000 live births, by year, from 1915 through 1995. It starts at 100, tapers slowly to about 30 in the late 40s where it plateaus, and then drops dramatically from 25 or so in 1965 to under 10, with the fast drop at the end coinciding with the release of infant vaccinations.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
We are using monster in the sense that it's applied in the Harkness Test - a shape that is definitely not human; amount of sentience not implied by the shape. We also use "monster" to differentiate from "looks human but has cat ears and a fox tail."
So you want to fuck a fictional creature? Give it the Harkness test first! 

Does it have human-level or higher intelligence
Can it talk or otherwise communicate with language?
Is it of sexual maturity for its species?
If the answer to all three is yes then you can fuck iti! It's a nonhuman creature with sentience and all you need to have consentual sex with.
If you answered no to one or more, watch out! That's bestiality or possibly pedophilia! Don't fuck it! 

Also, an illustrated guide: A dragon-ish creature; one panel marked X for no, asks, Are you an adult; it replies HISS! Then, Do you want to fuck? It replies GRONK. Caption: Do not fuck this.

Other panel, marked with a green check - has what seems like the same creature, smiling, with a slight blush - asks Are you an adult? It says Certainly. Do you want to fuck? It says Of course! 
Caption: It's okay to fuck this!
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/... has it as more intense than I expected
Earthquake tracker info, saying 3.9 magnitude, 4 km north of San Leandro, CA, at 8:30 am August 13, 2026
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Tested it (at neatnik.net/steganographr) Text: Wondeful fanfic prose with clever dialogue Hidden: Generated by AI Copying & pasting into Notepad did nothing (the hidden messages were still there.) Retyping half the message fixed it. Pasting it into Word as text only got this:
Wonderful fanfic prose on one side, a long list of UTF8 boxes, followed by with clever dialogue. Spaces between the actual words aren't normal spaces.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
This was originally in the comments section of the Crooked Timber blog: crookedtimber.org/2018/03/21/l...
Screenshot of a tweet by Michel Migurksi
"Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition: 
There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.
There is nothing more or else to it, and there never has been, in any place or time"
—Frank Wilhoit
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
covidstandardtime.com
Today is Sunday, March 2345th, 2020
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
I will continue to share this around until it's no longer immediately relevant. (Until the current Republican party collapses, I suppose.)
Screenshot of a tweet by Michel Migurksi
"Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition: 
There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.
There is nothing more or else to it, and there never has been, in any place or time"
—Frank Wilhoit
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
There is value in "just reporting" - as long as they're actually reporting, and not just serving as a relay service for bigots. Reporting includes comparing quotes/opinions to facts. Sometimes that needs direct action, like getting locked up. But often it just requires checking the details.
Tweet from Sally Claire (@klujypop)
My fave tutor at uni had a great journalism 101 lesson: If someone says it's raining & another person says it's dry, it's not your job to quote them both. Your job is to look out the f**king window and find out which is true.
8:36 pm 14 July 2018
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
There are many ways to provide appropriate support to data center plans.
Poster on a telephone pole
Public service announcement
Do not plant BAMBOO near data centers (all caps)
Bamboo can spread rapidly through underground rhizomes and can be extremely difficult to remove
Please choose responsible landscaping alternatives
Thank you for your cooperation
This message has been reviewed by absolutely nobody
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
This is one of their biggest worries. They're looking for tech solutions to it because they can't comprehend the idea of "you get loyalty from friendship and shared ethics, not money." www.theguardian.com/news/2022/se...
Excerpt from an article with highlighted text
But how would he pay the guards once even his crypto was worthless? What would stop the guards from eventually choosing their own leader?

The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew. Or making guards wear disciplinary collars of some kind in return for their survival. Or maybe building robots to serve as guards and workers – if that technology could be developed “in time”.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
A useful pain scale, one that's not "a little bit" vs "a lot." Note: The normal, expected amount of pain is ZERO. Not 3. Definitely not 5. If your normal pain level is above 0, that's chronic pain.
0 to 10 scale of pain severity
10	Unable to Move	
I am in bed and can't move due to my pain. I need someone to take me to the emergency room to get help for my pain.
9	Severe	
My pain is all that I can think about. I can barely talk or move because of the pain.
8	Intense	
My pain is so severe that it is hard to think of anything else. Talking and listening are difficult.
7	Unmanageable	
I am in pain all the time. It keeps me from doing most activities.
6	Distressing	
I think about my pain all of the time. I give up many activities because of my pain.
5	Distracting	
I think about my pain most of the time. I cannot do some of the activities I need to do each day because of the pain.
4	Moderate	
I am constantly aware of my pain but I can continue most activities.
3	Uncomfortable	
My pain bothers me but I can ignore it most of the time.
2	Mild	
I have a low level of pain. I am aware of my pain only when I pay attention to it.
1	Minimal	
My pain is hardly noticeable.
0	No Pain	
I have no pain.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 09/07/2026
Occasional reminder; seems relevant in regards to recent political events. Elections aren't fancasts where you get to choose the perfect person for each role. If there's no great options, vote for the least-bad person.
Time to remember the best voting advice I have heard — Voting isn't marriage — it's public transport.
You are not waiting for "the one" who is absolutely perfect. You are getting the bus. And if there isn't one going exactly to your destination, you don't stay at home and sulk — you take the one going closest to where you want to be.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 06/07/2026
I love Seventh Sanctum, Fantasy Name Generators, and this tiny title generator: www.ruggenberg.nl/titels.html
List of 6 randomly generated titles
Playful Magic
The Wild Flower
Star of Twilight
The Mage's Stars
The Sex of the Sky
Memory in the Truth
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 06/07/2026
I keep it saved out to share with people to explain How Tumblr Works.
A conversation on Tumblr
drakensberg says
The reading comprehension and overall common sense on this website is piss poor
poupon replies
How dare you say we piss on the poor
birkasan2018 follows with
What's wrong with being poor you classist (angry emoji)
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 27/06/2026
They mean freedom for them. Not for women, not for minority groups, definitely not for children.
Screenshot of a tweet by Michel Migurksi quoting Frank Wilhoit
Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition: 
There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.
There is nothing more or else to it, and there never has been, in nay place or time
020
Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 16/06/2026
You might look at Wanderhome settings/expansions; the game doesn't have "stats" as such, so the descriptions of people and places don't read like game mechanics. This is from Broken Down by Andrew Aulenback: web.archive.org/web/20250730... (Archive link because itch is currently down)
The Location
Cherrywindle ferry
Natures
Road (p. 160), Bridge (p. 156), Island (p. 157)
Description
The Cherrywindle ferry is always busy, but especially so at this time of year. The Cherrywindle River is broad, deep, and swift, but the ferry links the markets that are a half-week’s travel on one side, with the farms and workshops that are a half-week’s travel on the other. A pleasant little boat-house stands on one bank, with a chimney poking out of the second story’s roof, where the large Cheerywindle family of shrews, who own and run the ferry, live. Heavy pilings support the ramp that currently leads not to the deck of the ferry barge, but simply to the surface of the river.

The Cheerywindle family is a large one, but their cozy home above the boathouse always seems to have room, and after all, at almost every hour of the day and night, some of
them are out crewing the ferry in its chronic trips back and forth carrying foxes and chickens and goods from shore to shore. Normally, at least. But not today.

Today all hands are trying to figure out how to find the ferry on the bottom of the river, fetch it ashore, and repair whatever took it to the bottom, while the crowds on either shore continue to grow, and to grow louder.

Folklore
The year that was too busy to pull the ferry ashore for mending.
The waterstrider that raced down-stream.
The goldfish daemon and its promise.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 09/06/2026
My main complaint so far is that it's hard to read. Peach background and light-ish brown text means I keep sliding past the actual text, thinking it's side-notes or something like that. You also can't see all the tags. The "+2 more" etc aren't clickable; whatever they are, I can't get to them.
Tags from an RPG Trader game
Paranormal
Urban fantasy
Modern
+ 2 more genres
Casual
Teen / Young adult
Low prep
+ 3 more audiences
Playing cards
Journal
Coins
A4
Solo
Journaling
Rules-light
+ 1 more playstyle
Campsite
English
The parts that say +1 or +2 more are shaded differently, and they're not clickable to expand.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
It looks like she pretty much uses their logos. Unless that's a very famous mountain range silhouette, she probably needs to change her logo. (Even if it is famous, she probably needs to find a different version of it.) She probably needs to change her font, too.
Two logo images: patagonia, with a black mountain skyline silhouette with a blue-and-orange sky in the background, vs pattie gonia, with the name in the same font (no spaces between the words) and the same mountain silhouette, with a rainbow sky background.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
Patagonia™ absolutely does not have to sue Pattie Gonia; they have the option of doing what Linden Lab did with "GetAFirstLife.com": darrenbarefoot.com/2007/01/20/m... They can *grant permission* and then it's not a trademark infringement. And they can make that permission limited and revocable.
Screenshot from a blog post: Notwithstanding the foregoing, it is possible that your use of the modified eye-in-hand logo for Second Life, even as parody, requires license from Linden Lab, especially with respect to your sale of goods with the parody mark at http://www.cafepress.com/getafirstlife/. Linden Lab hereby grants you a nonexclusive, nontransferable, nonsublicenseable, revocable, limited license to use the modified eye-in-hand logo (as displayed on http://www.getafirstlife.com/ as of January 21, 2007) to identify only your goods and/or services that are sold at http://www.cafepress.com/getafirstlife/. This license may be modified, addended, or revoked at any time by Linden Lab in its sole discretion.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
Someone is unclear on the concept - this is not how #CreativeCommons works.
Screencap of a warning from Deviant art, saying,
DO NOT REPOST OR USE MY ART in all caps,
followed by image size stats, and then:
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives Works 3.0 License
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 18/05/2026
This looks fun and even though I'm starting late, I'm going to give it a try. (Which means doing several days at once.) #David'sMonthOfMusic
31 day song challenge card, with a different song prompt for each day. Examples: Day 1, with a one word title. Day 2, from this year so far. Day 3, less than 3 minutes long, etc. At the end, it says, use the hashtag #Davids Month of Music (with no spaces)
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 16/05/2026
I don't remember this being age-restricted when it was showing on MTV. I suppose teenagers are more delicate now than they were in the 80s.
Screenshot of warning - This video is age-restricted and only available on YouTube.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 14/05/2026
I got hit with the KWS ("kidswebservices," not creepy at all) "you need to verify your age" bullshit. I guess I'm done with DMs on Bsky, and a lot of the artwork. My Dreamwidth is 17 years old. Of course they won't use that to verify. They need 4 digits of an SSN. Not necessarily mine, of course.
Screenshot of KWS's 3 age verification options: Last 4 digits of SSN (via Verated), credit card charge (small fee that gets refunded, via Stripe), ID scan (via Veriff)
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 14/05/2026
Sheep is inside the box. I even made air holes for it, large enough to reach in and feed or pet the sheep.
A line-art box made in microsoft paint; it has three holes to let in air for the sheep inside. 
The sheep is not visible, but artist assures you it is in the box.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 25/04/2026
Tweet from A.R. Moxon, showing a user picture of Groucho Marx:
Meet me in the middle, says the unjust man.
You take a step toward him. He takes a step back.
Meet me in the middle, says the unjust man.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 14/04/2026
Cannot tell you how many times I've looked at a game I'm interested in, and had it tell me "???" I play dozens of hidden object games. If they don't have enough reviews, Steam refuses to acknowledge they're similar to the other ones I have *from the same publisher*.
Steam note - Is this game relevant to you?
This game doesn't look like other things you've played in the past. As such we don't have much information on whether or not you might be interested in it.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
Apparently they believe "the story" doesn't include anything outside of its main timeline.
Screencap of a search result from Quora. 
Question: "Is it possible to skip the first chapter (prologue) of a novel and still..." 
Jan 7 2024 Answer: "By definition, the prologue is what comes before the story begins, and is therefore not a part of the actual story."
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 21/03/2026
The minimum wage in the US has been $7.25 per hour since July 24, 2009. Average rent was $875. You needed 120 hours to make that - so, either 3/4 of your income, or you got a roommate and it was about 1/3 of your income. Average rent is now $1,698/month. 234 hours. A work-month is ~173 hrs.
Tweet from @babadookspinoza, Jan 17 2021:
The Fight for 15 has been going on so long that $15/hour is no longer a living wage anywhere in the US.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
Compare to the 1995 ratings. Today's top ratings are cancellation fodder 30 years ago. Today's audiences are very, very scattered. The media companies want you to believe the "top shows" are watched by "most of the US." Today's top shows are the past's "I guess I've heard of that" shows.
Nielsen Ratings newspaper clipping from February 6, 1995.
Top shows are the 8 pm hour:
Monday - Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (NBC), 22.4 million
Tuesday - Full House (ABC): 20.9 m
Wednesday - All Star/Bloopers (NBC): 21.0 m
Thursday - Mad About You (NBC): 22.6 m
Friday - Family Matters (ABC): 19.7 m
Saturday - Dr. Quinn (CBS): 16.9 m
Sunday, 7 pm: 60 Minutes (CBS): 24.2 million
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 04/03/2026
Had never heard of Frank's Sign, but on search... stanfordmedicine25.stanford.edu/blog/archive...
Close-up on an elderly man's right ear, showing a clear crease in the lobe extending diagonally downward from the face.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 18/02/2026
Yes. ourworldindata.org/child-mortal... Before the 1800s, about half of all children died before they turned 5. By the 1960s, that was down to 1 in 5 deaths.
Chart: World population by level of child mortality over time (1800-2013), showing global average child mortality rate of: 1800: 43.3%; 1950-1960: 19.5%; 1990: 7.4%; 2013: 3.4%
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 07/02/2026
Unfortunately not a troll.
Screencap of "Magic Mouth" power from the Neopets TTRPG beta rulebook. A highlighted section shows that it requires a bit of honeycomb and jade dust worth at least 10,000 Neopoints. A comment says, "Can we please try a little harder than just slapping D&D spells, complete with their 5e material components, straight into Neopets? The bulk of this Powers section is ripped directly from 5e and it feels bad."
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 07/02/2026
There was. Um. Some copying involved. But I'm sure the beta readers will catch all the problems.
Screencap of "Dimensional Leap" spell from the Neopots TTRPG beta rulebook; it requires a "metal rod attuned to a particular plane of existence worth at least 250,000 Neopoints." A comment points out, "Taking your spells straight from D&D 5e leads to things like this - Neopets does not have other planes!"
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 02/02/2026
You can set the tabs, but you have to manually add line breaks (which, among other issues, fucks with screen readers). If this were done with tabs, a screen reader would say: "2–6 Fail Action: +1 XP Whatever you were trying, it didn't work 7–9 Success: You Pick 2 of have done (most 4 options…"
Table with a simple breakdown of PbtA results: 2-6 as failure, 7-9 as success, 10+ as great success, with a third column showing mechanical results for each
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 31/01/2026
I made a travel kit of games for exactly this reason. (The tiny deck will fit in the box, but not with the gamebooks.) A Fool's Errand, With These Phantom Hands, & My Welcomed Guest, plus a tiny notebook. (It's better to just have a regular notebook.)
Photo of an Altoids tin with tiny D&D dice and a pencil, and four tiny gamebooks that will fit inside it, and a tiny deck of cards.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 27/01/2026
Likely the closest I'll get to playing D&D for the rest of the decade. www.idrlabs.com/dungeons-dra... …The last time I played D&D, there were no sorcerers, warlocks, or wizards; that split happened later. Apparently I have much more affinity for one of them than the others.
Bar graph results of a D&D character class test, showing 95% cleric, 90% monk, 90% wizard, and 80% paladin as the highest scores. Others are 70% rogue, 65% warlock, 60% druid, 55% ranger, 50% fighter, 40% barbarian, 30% bard, and 20% sorcerer.
000
Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 21/01/2026
Tweet from David Burr Gerard on June 8, 2020: Future historians will be asked which quarter of 2020 they majored in.
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 20/01/2026
It can, but he's already slurring words, repeating himself, and having swallowing issues. And he's very, very concerned about falling down. That famous "leaning" photo is from 2019. (The medical drawing is from 1888.) miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fi...
Trump standing in front of an array of microphones at roughly waist height. He has one hand raised, and is leaning forward in the classic "lewy lean" pose.Drawing of a man standing and leaning forward, from a medical lecture in 1888 showing an "atypical Parkinsons" (now known as FTD) patient who had no tremor and an extended posture
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 17/01/2026
My company left Salesforce… for Microsoft's ecosystem. There are a few other choices for that kind of data support, but they're all either "evil corporate empire" or "train your staff on a zillion small programs (and retrain them when they go obsolete)." Or both.
Tweet from cancela lansurby (@ gossipbabies) saying, 
Working at any office is like "Ok we're transitioning to Salarya, but payroll is still in Bullforg—did you see my Noosecock post? Submit your timecard on Fireplayce then jizz me on Smackdog. Do NOT upload to Crackerz without Yammer approval."
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 13/01/2026
Here just use this:
Trade offer meme, with "I receive: Moneys; you receive: Cool Stuff" and bottom text "We trade, yes?"
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 29/12/2025
archive.is/GV2vX Not just Linux. Anyone who's teaching programming or computer tech is running into a generation that's been trained away from understanding how computers store data. (MS & Google don't want young students noticing the difference between "on my hard drive" and "in the cloud.")
Screen cap of article title: File Not Found, with subtitle, A generation that grew up with Google is forcing professors to rethink their lesson plans.
By Monica Chin, illustrations by Micha Huigen
September 22, 2021 5 am PDT
Tags: Tech, Report, Laptops
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Elf Herself @elfherself.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
Ages ago, Sociological Images wrote about this. It included an overhead view of the distance between the bus stop & the main entrance. Anyone who can't walk more than a full block carrying all their purchases (and possibly kids) is going to need to drive. thesocietypages.org/socimages/20...
Image of a parking lot and street, with outlines around the entrance to a Target and a bus stop - all the way across a very large parking lot, more than a block's walking distance.
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