Thalfon

Mary Simon, a Canadian citizen and an indigenous person (Inuk on her mother's side) who was chosen by Queen Elizabeth for the role on the advice of then prime minister Trudeau.

While the role has formal diplomatic ties to the monarchy, it is a Canadian who holds it and the prime minister who really selects them (in the guise of advising the crown on who to select).

Of course the monarchy has diplomatic power here (all the rich and powerful do) but the governor general isn't really an example of the crown being able to issue us orders or the like.

I sorta remember Earth: 2025 and Utopia being a bit like that. You'd generate turns over time and login once or twice a day to spend the turns. Not sure if that's exactly what you meant by BBS though, and the only ones I know offhand I think were all late 90s starts.

If anything it's more of a language thing that stuck when translated. Japanese uses their word for confession (kokuhaku) both for confessing to a crime and professing one's love/attraction. The latter is also often how people are asked out (think "I really like you, do you want to go for dinner" -- the "I really like you" bit is the "confession").

It could've been localised as asking out instead, but the more literal translation was used often enough to become normalized. So now we see "he confessed to her" instead of "he asked her out" in translations a lot when the former is a fairly typical Japanese way of saying the latter.

"It is important, when killing a nun, to ensure that you bring an army of sufficient size. For Sister Thorn of the Sweet Mercy convent Lano Tacsis brought two hundred men."

• Red Sister, Mark Lawrence.

Good book if you want something a bit like Harry Potter but aimed at a more mature audience and not funding the stripping away of human rights.

A little over a decade back, I had a laptop that came with Windows 8 but didn't actually meet the specs for it. I installed Ubuntu back then to get the thing to run reliably, and it performed really well that way.

On my home computers I kept using Windows, but with the trend toward less ability to control your system, more ads and AI nonsense being baked in, and just general bloat, when they announced the end of life for Win 10, I decided I'd switch to dual booting Linux Mint at the start of the summer. (I'm a teacher, and it seemed like the best time was when I could deal with my computer being on the fritz for a while if I messed it up.)

I set it up as dual boot because I figured here and there I'd still need to go back to Windows for some specific reason or other but that was back in early July and I've yet to encounter a reason why I really need Windows, so I genuinely haven't booted to Windows even once since the time I originally setup the dual boot and made sure it was working.

Honestly, so much of what we do these days takes place in browser windows that it barely feels different, other than it runs a little smoother and I occasionally have to run an old windows app through Lutris. (Had it installed anyway for games from GOG, and it turns out it works just as well for non-gaming apps.)

A redemption arc this late would've had to have been quietly making a great game, no big announcements in advance until it was done or nearly so and playable, and then letting it speak for itself.

For anyone who's not aware, letters to your MP (and certain other members of the federal government) are postage free, so you don't need a stamp.

https://www.canadapost-postescanada.ca/cpc/en/support/articles/government-mail-free-of-postage/overview.page

Note this doesn't apply to provincial positions, so you'd have to stamp a letter to an MLA.

I don't go in person to the library super often any more, but when I did I got in the habit of grabbing one book semi at random off the shelf. I say "semi at random" because it's probably from a section I enjoy (likely fantasy) and I'll quickly vet it as something I would at least possibly enjoy. But otherwise, just grab a random thing.

Pair that with a willingness to stop reading a book if you're not really into it, and sometimes you find gold where you'd normally not have thought to go looking. (A willingness to not be stuck with a book can go a long way toward making it easier to start one, in my experience.)

Pierre Poilievre, leader of the conservative party and our version of a Trump wannabe.

Last time I bought audiobooks I got them from Downpour which included DRM-free downloads as either MP3 or M4B files, in addition to listening through the website or app. I believe Libro.fm may also offer this. Most of my ebooks are through Kobo and are DRM free as well.

Does depend in some cases on the publisher.

It varies within the genre. Some games try hard to take steps to minimize the ability to sit around and grind, such as by a food clock or lack of respawns. Sil, which is a *band game that tries to be closer to the original style has an XP system that grants XP for seeing an enemy the first time, and the same for killing it, and then 1/n times that XP the nth time you see that same kind of enemy thereafter. Sixth orc you see is worth 1/6 the XP, so it's not worth farming an area hard, and still rewards exploring a lot. It also eventually just forces you deeper as the desire for a silmaril becomes more irresistible as you become stronger. Seeing 6 orcs and killing 2 is worth 3.95x an orc's stated XP, seeing 30 and killing them all gets up to almost 8x the stated XP.

Others like most Angband variants or Tales of Maj'eyal made the decision to just let the player grind. Many of the games in that style have more open-ended progression and aren't necessarily trying to force the player into constantly dangerous situations. The very popular Caves of Qud would fit this category.

Currently in a sci fi "Consider Phlebas" by Iain Banks, after seeing a recommendation for his books involving an optimism for the future. This was the one book available at my local library. Not far enough in to make a judgment on it, but enjoying it so far.

I have Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez also out from the library as a next up.

Recently read Rewitched by Lucy Jane Wood, which was a fun cozy urban fantasy. I think if I were to recommend such a book, I'd recommend The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches above it, or recommend Legends & Lattes or The Spellshop for cozy high fantasy choices, but if you've read all the popular ones and are looking for more it's a great choice.