The Friday Five on a Sunday

Apr. 12th, 2026 05:26 pm
nanila: me (Default)
[personal profile] nanila
  1. What was the last book you read (or are currently reading)?

    Jan Morris’ Trieste and the meaning of nowhere, for what I feel are obvious reasons. It is a very romantic, forgiving view of the city.

  2. What was the last movie you watched?

    We caught a bit of the Minions movie dubbed into Italian last night. It was (perhaps unsurprisingly?) easy to follow in another language.

  3. What television series are you currently watching?

    Nothing at the moment. We finished a few things before the Easter holiday (new series of Death in Paradise, Small Prophets).

  4. What are some of your favorite blogs or communities online?

    I really only read DW and LJ these days. That's enough for me.

  5. What social media do you belong to and check often?

    I still have accounts on the usual platforms but I haven't checked any of them since January 2025 when I removed all the apps from my phone. I vaguely miss contact with a few people but it has generally been a good move. I spend more time communicating directly through messaging or email, or more diffusely but in greater depth here on DW & LJ.

The case of the missing notifications

Apr. 11th, 2026 11:58 pm
denise: Image: Me, facing away from camera, on top of the Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome (Default)
[staff profile] denise posting in [site community profile] dw_maintenance

I keep forgetting to post about this: we've been troubleshooting the "missing notifications" problem for the past few days. (Well, I say "we", really I mean Mark and Robby; I'm just the amanuensis.) It's been one of those annoying loops of "find a logical explanation for what could be causing the problem, fix that thing, observe that the problem gets better for some people but doesn't go away completely, go back to step one and start again", sigh.

Mark is hauling out the heavy debugging ordinance to try to find the root cause. Once he's done building all the extra logging tools he needs, he'll comment to this entry. After he does, if you find a comment that should have gone to your inbox and sent an email notification but didn't, leave him a link to the comment that should have sent the notification, as long as the comment itself was made after Mark says he's collecting them. (I'd wait and post this after he gets the debug code in but I need to go to sleep and he's not sure how long it will take!)

We're sorry about the hassle! Irregular/sporadic issues like this are really hard to troubleshoot because it's impossible to know if they're fixed or if they're just not happening while you're looking. With luck, this will give us enough information to figure out the root cause for real this time.

nanila: me (Default)
[personal profile] nanila
After breakfast, we got on the bus to the museum at San Sabba, the rice factory that served as a concentration camp in WWII. As expected, it was quite harrowing, especially walking into the middle square where the Nazis had torched the crematorium before fleeing. The hole where the chimney had been ripped out has a small plaque and flower vase in front of it. I am not at all superstitious. However, the feeling you get walking in from the entrance is one of tremendously bad juju. The dank cells with the wooden doors and too-small bunks may be the only physical remains of the instruments of torment, but the walls are permeated with it. We did not take any photos. We read through all the exhibition materials in the museum. Keiki insisted we leave a donation to ensure all is preserved so no one forgets.

Our bus ride back to town was quiet, and at the end of the journey we walked to a gelateria. Everyone practiced ordering in Italian. We must have done reasonably well as the server smiled at us a great deal and our single scoop cones wobbled under the weight of gelato piled in.

Much of the rest of the day was spent walking, punctuated by stops for refreshments and a bit of shopping. We visited the Cattedrale di San Giusto Martire (photos in a separate post), and we watched the sunset from the harbour’s edge.

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Random garden with large wisteria vines in full flower.

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The drive leading up to the castle.

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WWI monument.

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Aperol, crisps and beer. Very acceptable.

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Triestian sunset.

Grotta Gigante

Apr. 9th, 2026 01:26 pm
nanila: wrong side of the mirror (me: wrong side of the mirror)
[personal profile] nanila
One of the Trieste trip activities selected by Keiki was the Grotta Gigante. Accordingly we booked timed entry tickets, and headed out on the bus on Day 2.

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Spoiler alert: It is a gigantic cave. You have to descend 500 damp, steep, slippery steps bounded by damp, slippery metal handrails. As a person with acrophobia, I should have realised beforehand that this was going to test me, but somehow I managed to completely miss that despite it the access parameters being pretty clearly stated on the web site. I am quite proud that through much deep breathing and tight management of the pointing direction of my vision, I was able to cope with the descent and appreciate the visit.

Many cave photos )

THE END.

Some photos from Day 1 in Trieste

Apr. 8th, 2026 02:37 pm
nanila: wrong side of the mirror (me: wrong side of the mirror)
[personal profile] nanila
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Keiki and his espresso.

+4 photos )
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