Malazan Empire: Mentalist - Viewing Profile - Malazan Empire

Went to pick up "The Trouble With Peace" yesterday, and predictably, in my local store, that book (Vol 2) is missing, while, Volumes 1 and 3 were sitting on the shelf, mocking me.

So I picked up The Lost Metal, the the new Wax & Wayne book. Read the blurb in the back, and realized I'll need to re-read the previous books to clue myself back into it.

Also, biked to the next store 7 klicks over today, and did pick up "The Trouble with Peace" to take as my vacation read. I've got until end of Thursday to finish "A little hatred" now.

God, I've missed a good UKI dance party. Haven't been to one since one of my friends got married during covid, either 3 or 4 years ago.

feeling slightly buzzed, but overall just happy. Since the war stated there's been a sort of soft ban on major "fun" events in the community. But sometime in the fall last year I realized that in order for me to keep my sanity and be able to continue contributing to the war effort effectively, I need to get back to having a social life as part of the work-life balance. So this was a very good thing to happen.

Once I'm back from vacation 2 weeks from now, there's a whole social life roadmap ahead of me, which is a nice feeling to have. Catching up with a lot of PPL since the double-whammy of covid and the war had me largely revert to my undergrad social isolation behavior patterns feels good. Feeling a bit like a fresh start after the last 4 years of my life were just a social write-off

There was another prisoner swap yesterday, so about 155 prisoners (mostly conscripts) from the Kursk op being swapped for, among others, about 40 "Azov" servicemen whom the orcs have been demonizing and so are very reluctant to release.

Also, CentroBank raised interest rate in Muscovy to 19% yesterday. Feels like they wanna avoid the number 20 as long as possible.

Voenkors are in mild panic about UAF's flanking strike onto the "counterattack" originating from the Glushkovo pocket. Some reports put UAF in Veseloye, about 6 km from Glushkovo. Getting there would effectively bisect the pocket S of the Seym and put the would-be counterattackers in a really bad spot. We'll have to see how this pans out.

The push on Pokrovsk axis continues, but without any new disasters. Apparently, one of the post effective drone recons ran afoul of a particularly egomaniacal orc colonel, so he ordered the whole bunch into a frontal assault - which they did after leaving a farewell video decrying him for an incompetent, and surrounded by traitors and drug dealers. Z-heads are now outraged (after the expereincedd drone unit predictably got splattered as attacking frontline infantry are wont to be), and posting that this practice is disturbingly common and "something MUST be done!"

TIFF cancels screening of the Russian propaganda dog and pony show due to "threats of violence". Not, y'know, war crimes. And they wanna show it "when it's safe to do so".
Meanwhile, TVO (the ones who sponsored the film) said they won't broadcast it. But TIFF knows better.

I wonder why Hollywood wasn't screening any movies in 1942 depicting the hardships of simple Wermacht boys in the streets of Stalingrad.

We are expected to believe that the woman that used to work for Russia Today Documentaries (the people who brought us such nonbiased and politically neutral exposes as "Ukraine shot down MH17") was *checks notes* secretly embedded with an active duty frontline unit of the occupying forces for 6 months... and no one in the government at any level knew about it* And then listen to her prattle on about how the people who've been killing and levelling another country for the past 2.5 years "deserve to have their story told".

No, I'm sorry, but until they surrender, or leave the territory they're unlawfully occupying, they absolutely do not get a say. I don't care how many fucking micro-credits they have, how many sick relatives they have to provide for, what brain rot about the "Greatness of Russia" they've contacted from State TV, or how scared they were to go to jail for dodging mobilization summons. As long as you wear an occupier's uniform, carry a weapon, and don't turn it against your superior officer and make every effort to GTFO from a place you should never have been in, the only thing you deserve is to become just another number in the daily inflicted casualties list of the UAF HQ. And I certainly do not want a single cent of my taxes to be going towards the world hearing your sob story.

The irony is that one of the Norils'k kids is the son of a convict who volunteered to go fight in UA instead of doing time.
The kids were caught cuz they suffered burns and went to a hospital.

I swear, you can't make this stuff up.

The orcs have apparently tried to counterattack in Kursk Oblast after massing good bunch of VDV and Marine infantry.
Reports on the UA side vary from "this is shocking" to "this is actually part of the plan as we expected them to try to do this sooner". There were also a few orc TG posts suggesting the UAF has meanwhile attempted another border crossing essentially in the rear of one of the counter-attacking brigades, essentially trying to trap it. So the situation's confusing to say the least.

Blinken and Lemmy were in Kyiv. The buzz was that Blinken would let Zelensky know long range strikes are greenlit, but when asked about it, Blinken said "I will take UA's proposals back to the White House", indicating there's no final decision (that we would know of). Ideally, we find out soonish, with a lot of lovely explosions happening (especially in Krasnodar Krai, that place is full of airbases and it's had little attention since spring).

In the meantime, it's a slow grind in the East, the orcs trying to consolidate their flanks before trying any pushes on more dense urban build-ups. Still too early to tell if they've got enough to make any significant gains for the remainder of the season.