Almost a month since my last post
Sep. 6th, 2025 10:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Update Chez Ruric:
I had 2 weeks off at the end of August where I had plans to achieve things but did nothing because I was mentally and physically exhausted. Then I looked back at the end of 2024 and saw a similar kind of entry and things must change in late 2025/26. So I am making adjustments.
#project65days is plodding along - things are very slowly being sorted. I've started tackling my main Gmail account which at the beginning of the year had some 26,000 archived emails. I've had the account for 15 plus years and there's important stuff to keep in there along with everything else. I'm down to 16,500 stored emails and feeling quite proud of my progress! I mentally lighter with every 100 deletions.
Flat - between #project65days and the current round of #orjenise100 which has just started things are improving. I've started chipping away at the chaos in my bedroom, have bought a load of new houseplants as Lidl had large and medium sized pants at good prices which will make things feel greener. The ex is away mid September which means I can commandeer his washing machine and catch up on a backlog of washing.
Front garden - I got my act together last week and tidied the tiny front garden and pruned the roses. And I resolved not to try and do all my autumn window box and basket planting in one hit - which stresses me out and takes all the fun out of it - but rather space it out and do a few things at a time. So far I've planted a pot of pinks, a hanging basket, a window box of pinks for outside the kitchen window, bought and potted a new hebe.
Still to plant - 2 window boxes and 2 pots and sort out the raised bed in the front garden, 3 window boxes for in front of the living room windows, 2 window boxes and 4 large pots for the porch roof.
Winter prep still to do - sand and varnishing the exterior of the stable door into the garden, sand and paint the front gate and front door, touch up the White paint in the porch exterior and interior.
Back garden - so much pruning and sorting to do. Not worrying about that until October!
Allotment - harvesting and winter prep. I'll be down there for what's left of today, all day tomorrow and Tuesday.
Right - off to make coffee and then down to the lottie.
Getting things done!
Sep. 1st, 2025 08:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
( Productive weekends! )
Code deploy happening shortly
Aug. 31st, 2025 07:37 pm![[staff profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user_staff.png)
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Per the dw_news post regarding the MS/TN blocks, we are doing a small code push shortly in order to get the code live. As per usual, please let us know if you see anything wonky.
There is some code cleanup we've been doing that is going out with this push but I don't think there is any new/reworked functionality, so it should be pretty invisible if all goes well.
Mississippi site block, plus a small restriction on Tennessee new accounts
Aug. 31st, 2025 12:28 pm![[staff profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user_staff.png)
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A reminder to everyone that starting tomorrow, we are being forced to block access to any IP address that geolocates to the state of Mississippi for legal reasons while we and Netchoice continue fighting the law in court. People whose IP addresses geolocate to Mississippi will only be able to access a page that explains the issue and lets them know that we'll be back to offer them service as soon as the legal risk to us is less existential.
The block page will include the apology but I'll repeat it here: we don't do geolocation ourselves, so we're limited to the geolocation ability of our network provider. Our anti-spam geolocation blocks have shown us that their geolocation database has a number of mistakes in it. If one of your friends who doesn't live in Mississippi gets the block message, there is nothing we can do on our end to adjust the block, because we don't control it. The only way to fix a mistaken block is to change your IP address to one that doesn't register as being in Mississippi, either by disconnecting your internet connection and reconnecting it (if you don't have a static IP address) or using a VPN.
In related news, the judge in our challenge to Tennessee's social media age verification, parental consent, and parental surveillance law (which we are also part of the fight against!) ruled last month that we had not met the threshold for a temporary injunction preventing the state from enforcing the law while the court case proceeds.
The Tennesee law is less onerous than the Mississippi law and the fines for violating it are slightly less ruinous (slightly), but it's still a risk to us. While the fight goes on, we've decided to prevent any new account signups from anyone under 18 in Tennessee to protect ourselves against risk. We do not need to block access from the whole state: this only applies to new account creation.
Because we don't do any geolocation on our users and our network provider's geolocation services only apply to blocking access to the site entirely, the way we're implementing this is a new mandatory question on the account creation form asking if you live in Tennessee. If you do, you'll be unable to register an account if you're under 18, not just the under 13 restriction mandated by COPPA. Like the restrictions on the state of Mississippi, we absolutely hate having to do this, we're sorry, and we hope we'll be able to undo it as soon as possible.
Finally, I'd like to thank every one of you who's commented with a message of support for this fight or who's bought paid time to help keep us running. The fact we're entirely user-supported and you all genuinely understand why this fight is so important for everyone is a huge part of why we can continue to do this work. I've also sent a lot of your comments to the lawyers who are fighting the actual battles in court, and they find your wholehearted support just as encouraging and motivating as I do. Thank you all once again for being the best users any social media site could ever hope for. You make me proud and even more determined to yell at state attorneys general on your behalf.
August, illustrated
Aug. 26th, 2025 11:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
( You know what to do... )