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5-falsehoods-phonated · 3 years

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Overgrown Metal

Series Summary: Almost two decades ago, the fae rose up from beyond the veil with technology far surpassing the human race, quickly taking over after laying waste to nearly everything in their wake. Now eight paths cross to right the wrongs on both ends, working to uncover secrets that would have rather stayed hidden

Chapter 6: In Search of a Market

Tws: brief mention of panic, if there are others to tag please let me know!

WC: 2766

General taglist (ask to be added or removed): @im-an-anxious-wreck @logans-library @janus-is-an-adorable-snek-boi

Leaning his cane carefully against the outer wall of the building Hyden settled down on the ground slowly and began arranging the sticks he had been picking up into a pile. Logan followed not far behind, sighing in relief as he slid off the heavy pack and gently placed it beside him on even ground. The last thing he needed was for it to tip and have to rearrange everything if his samples shifted around.

Hyden looked up from his work to eye the pack in annoyance. “We’d go a lot faster if you hadn’t brought your entire barn with you.”

“We’d also go faster if-” Logan cut himself off from snapping something he’d regret, cranky and tired as he was throwing insults about something no one could change was not a line he would cross.

Hyden, stubborn ass that he was, decided to dig. “If what Logan?”

“Don’t.” He reached forward to place his hand on the pile, moisture collecting around it that was ficked into a container before he placed a finger near the pile again. There was a muted snapping sound as a single spark crackled in front of the shriveled wood, immediately catching and spreading to make a small fire for the night. It was hardly even dark yet but it was always good to stop early if there was a good resting spot to be had, especially with how unpredictable things could be the farther from the forest they ventured.

“I’m not stupid, Logan. But-” He held his hand up to cut the other off from whatever he was to planning to retort with. “I understand. Even if it is still an ungodly amount you took the bare minimum to continue your research. I’m only concerned about being caught out here, either by guards or beasts.”

They were both tired and on edge, running away from both the forest and avoiding whatever mech beasts they could until they found a better way to carry Logan’s portable, hashed together lab. It had been a few days since they had left and they had done nothing but walk, taking as little breaks as possible to cover as much ground as quickly as they could and they were both starting to feel the effects of it, Janus because of his leg and Logan because he simply wasn’t used to travel. He had stayed in the farmhouse for so long, becoming complacent in its relative safety that the thought hadn’t even crossed his mind to be ready to pick up and leave at any given moment. He only hoped he truly had grabbed everything he would need and wouldn’t be missing anything later when they needed it. Speaking of which-

“It isn’t what you're used to but this should hold you over until we can get somewhere that I can make more salve.” Passing a bottle of arthritic tylenol to the other he made a mental note to keep an eye out for the herbs he would need; he had been going to go on a trip soon to replenish his stock but they had left before he got a chance. Hopefully whatever he could scrounge up would be enough for now.

“Thank you.” They sat in silence, just staring into the dancing flames. Logan wanted to say something but really didn’t want to bring up another argument, content enough to wait for them to warm up before pulling anything out for dinner. They couldn’t cook anything for fear of the smell attracting anyone who might be close if they fire didn’t do it already, but preserved bread and some nuts were just as good...for now.

Hyden shifted into a more comfortable position, wincing slightly before settling his chin in his hand. “Either you start talking or I do and I’m willing to bet the last thing you want is news from the Court right now.”

Logan shuddered to think of the chaos it had most likely dissolved into by now, considering the state he had left it in. No, he definitely did not want to know what they had been doing all this time- for now at least. It was always best not to talk too openly about the affairs of the fae out in the open. “No, I was mostly wondering where we could go to stock up our supplies. We’ll need to soon depending on how far out we need to go before we’re safe.”

“Logan.” He looked up to see Hyden’s confused expression. “You do realize we’ll most likely never be able to stop right? Unless you want to go back and gain freedom somehow with brute force, but they aren’t going to stop looking just because you moved out of the forest. Your research isn’t exactly...encouraged.”

“It never was.” Logan mumbled, idly throwing a small stone into the fire to watch as the dirt it was covered in flared before soot began to coat it instead, pointedly ignoring the look he was getting.

“You don’t even know that you’ll find what you’re looking for.”

“I know enough to suspect and with the way things- Hyden those things were dead. They were hastily constructed, poorly made machines that could barely imitate the wobble of a toddler if left to their own devices. And then all of the sudden they were up and running and attacking like it was instinctual! We hadn’t even programmed that in yet.” Logan ran a frustrated hand through his hair. “It needs to make sense and my hypothesis is the only one I can think of-”

“You honestly think animals are running in little hamster wheels inside them to make them do things?’ Hyden smirked at the deadpan stare he received.

“That is not what I said and you know it.”

“Isn’t that why when they attack they still eat? To feed the animal inside?”

“Hyden-”

“I’ll stop.” He chuckled at the scientist's sour expression. “But honestly, animals being preserved inside for energy? I don’t think they’d be capable of such a thing in such a short time span.”

“At the level of desperation they were at before I left I wouldn’t put it past them. The beasts have the instinct to hunt and fight just like any other animal would- the only difference is they have specific targets in mind when they do it. I can’t fathom what else they could have done unless they were working on a secret program that I had no idea about- which is highly unlikely considering how high up in the project I was.” Sniffing indignantly Logan passed a few pieces of the crunchy bread to his companion, already missing his usual meals and wishing more than anything they were far enough out that they could catch and cook something.

“In answer to your earlier question,” Logan flushed with the realization he had forgotten what they had been originally talking about. “There’s a few settlements underground- some quite impressive- that we might be able to find to get more nonperishable items to have until we can get far enough away that trapping and cooking wouldn’t be an issue. We just need to find a river.”

“A river?”

Hyden nodded. “They’re used somehow to power the city. They’re humans, but they can be clever at times.”

“They’re just as smart as anyone else, we just beat them to the stupidity of ruining the planet.” Finishing his dinner Logan sighed. “The sooner we figure out how the beasts work, the sooner we can shut them off and lower the Court’s defenses. They weren’t relying on anything else when I was there.”

“That’s your plan? Shut down whatever gets in the way and just waltz your way back in?” Hyden snorted. “I’m sure they’ll all adore the scientist that abandoned his post coming back to give them a stern lecture on the importance of ethical science.”

“I’ll have you know I have a bit more tact now that I’ve spent some time away.”

“Oh honey, I love you so much but you blew holes straight through buildings and ran in a straight line through the forest to escape.”

Flushing, Logan looked away as the other laughed quietly. “It was a flight response and I didn’t think pulling the emergency evacuation switch had actually worked!”

“It was cute. Very subtle and very you. Though I do wish you would have waited for me, I would have loved to see you running through snap explosions like a dragon learning its magic for the first time.”

“It was a straight line!”

“Logan a building fell over sideways because you blew through an entire support wall.” Hyden’s eyes crinkled with a fond smile. “That pout definitely helps your case.”

Hurrying to unfold his arms he took a few seconds to move oxygen away from the fire, letting Hyden rearrange the sticks so they’d stay as lit embers to keep them warm until they fell asleep. He yelped as his blanket was thrown in his face, taken out of god knows where just to spite him. Shooting the other a withering look he didn’t end up seeing he curled onto his side and sighed. Another night spent outside and another day spent walking in a random direction. Hopefully they’d come across a town soon.

He really hated the dry bread.

-----

“Wait Roman, is that it?” Virgil pointed to a spot in the middle of the river they had been following. The subtle line of foam could easily be missed if you weren’t looking hard enough but he and Roman had spent almost their whole lives learning to look for these subtle hints a town was nearby.

“Finally! Okay keep going this way, you circle back the way we came and look.” So saying Roman hurried over to where the line was and began walking out to the surrounding field while Virgil turned to look out from where they had already passed.

There wasn’t a clear agreement on what kind of settlement was better: one that was above ground with tall, thick walls to try and hold back the forest and mechs, or ones made underground that people hoped the forest would grow right over- and seeing how the mechs had never been seen digging into the ground there was little fear of it being destroyed. Underground settlements however, obviously didn’t see the sun like the ones above did, so they used water instead. The little line of foam signaled that water from the river was being redirected to a system of water wheels for hydroelectric power for the city. To keep it from flooding or corroding, the system was often just beside the river on the other side, where there would be a subtle exit for water to escape if the system failed. On the other side was the actual entrance, another hidden passage that would lead underground to the levels of the city beneath it. All they had to do was locate and identify the passageways and they’d be able to get in, get to the market to trade and get back out hopefully without too much hassle. It was a system that after years of traveling together they had perfected, however rocky their beginning had been.

He heard a shout from Roman as he was poking around in some grass, sighing in relief when he saw them waving him over. Readjusting the heavy pack he walked up to where there was a bump in the grass, almost like the ground had a pimple. Toeing around the edges however he could feel a thin seam that when lifted revealed a ladder about a foot away from the top.

“The entrance on the first try!” Roman declared triumphantly.

“Yeah now I won’t have to hear you complain about wet boots and pants the entire time we’re here.” Virgil teased. If they were unlucky enough to find the exit first, where there was just a straight drop to the water systems, they’d have to cross the river to find the entrance instead. The past few times had been like this with Roman complaining about being wet and both of them shivering miserably through the market the entire time. These trips weren’t fun to begin with but it added another layer when their clothes stuck fast and the cool air of the caves did nothing to dry them faster. Ignoring Roman’s pout he dropped down and began to descend.

The air immediately cooled as he surrounded himself with earth Roman shimmying down above him and shutting the entrance, encasing them in darkness. Taking a steadying breath he made his way down carefully, counting softly as he went so Roman would know when to step down. He was always very grateful the holes were wide enough to fit both them and their bags since dropping them down first wasn’t an option. The tunnel began to lighten the further down they went and Virgil let out a breath as his feet finally touched solid earth, reaching a hand out to steady Roman as they made it the rest of the way down as well. Gripping Roman’s hand tight to his so they wouldn’t get separated he squared his shoulders and narrowed his eyes into the meanest glare he could muster, tugging up his hood and mask and stepping forward towards the light.

In most underground cities the main markets were on the first level. A seemingly endless amount of stalls and shacks set up advertising a variety of goods and services. Further to the sides had buildings for general maintenance where workers that handled the waterwheels and power lived...as well as other services that required walls to pay for. The second level was mostly housing with buildings set in place for doctors offices and more formal stores if you had something to pay the price with. There were also the occasional restaurant and place of worship and even a school if the city had resources and time for it. If and when these kinds of settlements had a third level- most didn’t for the sake of time and integrity- it would be where more housing and the darker market was set up. Typically normal people wouldn’t be carrying around mech parts to sell, as being a Hunter wasn’t exactly the safest job to have. To make sure civilian numbers didn’t dwindle since they were low enough as it was, selling mech beast parts was typically banned, though no one would question you if you just happened to have them and weren’t trying to sell them.

They had heard a while back about a settlement further out with a thriving black market that used the metal and gears from the mechs to make prosthetics and sometimes weapons. Since mass production of anything was a no-go with the way the world was, this person was absolutely flourishing in their business, even if it was kept on the down low so as to only attract the attention of people who would be buying and selling rather than investigating. This is where they were headed to sell the parts they had been able to gather, eager to finally get a good price for everything and get enough provisions to get back on the road. Weaving their way through a sea of people and following the shotty directions they had been given a few weeks back they finally stopped at a building tucked innocently in a far corner of the marketplace, a small sign out front advertising medical care. Virgil looked to Roman and nodded, moving behind them as they approached to keep an eye on the surrounding area. Being this deep in the city was dangerous; if they were recognized here they’d be hard pressed to get out in time before they were caught, the thought of which had Virgil’s heart hammering in his chest as Roman gave a few sharp raps to the door.

He shifted his pack as footsteps were heard banging up to the door that opened moments later to reveal a tall, rather lanky man with wild curly hair and a neatly kept mustache. The shop owner opened his mouth to speak but stopped before he let a word out, squinting his eyes and staring at Roman hard. Virgil felt his heart beginning to beat faster, muscles tense and ready to run as his eyes darted from the man to Roman back again, half tempted to punch him out and run regardless of what his intentions were. Blood rushed in his ears as the others’ eyes widened, Roman standing frozen in front of him as he finally spoke.

“Roman?”

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I have a lot to expand upo in regards to how magic works in this worked, which we'll definitely be exploring in later chapters. For now if you have any questions about, feel free to ask either here or head over to @5-falsehoods-phonated on tumblr. Anon is always on and I'd be delighted to answer any and all questions provided the answer wouldn't be a spoiler. Thanks for reading ^-^

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#false writes #overgrown metal #fantasy au #sandrs sides fic #sanders sides #roman sanders #virgil snaders #logan sanders #janus sanders #qpp lociet

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mr-entj · 5 years

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Brain-Based Descriptions of the 8 Jungian “Types”

A piece my former professor published on MBTI, cognitive functions, and his study I participated in 10 years ago.

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By Dario Nardi

This is based on the blue “Brain Basics” foldout by Radiance House. (Www.RadianceHouse.com)

In his seminal work, Psychological Types, Dr. C.G. Jung described 2 attitudes (Extraverting and Introverting) and 4 “mental functions”: Sensing, Intuiting, Thinking, and Feeling. Together, they give what he called 8 “Types”. Today, we can use more appropriate terms like functional patterns or cognitive processes. Notice the terms are verbs. His is a process model, not a trait model. Since then, people have offered many variant definitions and created assessments, most of which are peculiar to the creator, speculative, and not research based. In my own work since 2006, I have correlated the Jungian processes to biases and patterns in neocortical (brain) activity using EEG technology. Subjects complete a 1-hour protocol of 20 diverse tasks (meditating, math, memory, etc) while monitored by EEG. And of course, we do our best to confirm their best-fit personality profile using common definitions. Here is an overview of the neocortex and definitions of the 8 cognitive processes.

BRAIN BASICS

Your brain consists of many small modules linked in networks. Each module is a neural circuit that helps you do a task. Some tasks are concrete, such as recognizing faces, hearing voice tone, and moving a hand. Other tasks are abstract, such as evaluating ethics, adjusting to others’ feedback, and mentally rehearsing a future action. There are easily five-dozen modules just in the neocortex, which is the brain’s outermost, thick layer and seat of consciousness. The big figure below is a bird’s eye view of the neocortex. It highlights key modules. We each prefer some modules over others. We differ by the tasks we enjoy and how well we do them. You might take a moment to explore the big figure to identify aspects of yourself.

We enjoy different competencies. For each of us, modules activate with a different degree of stimulus, competence, motivation, and energy level. If we look at the average brain activity of two people over an hour, you may see that their favorite modules are similar, near opposites, or somewhere in between! When different, those people’s personality profile, behaviors, and self-experience differ greatly too. In fact, we can dig deeper to look at underlying brain networks (using computer-aided analysis of EEG data), and confirm the biases are longterm rather than a result of just a 1-hour protocol.

In addition to favorite brain regions and networks, there are whole-brain patterns. For example, the brain can get into a state of “ﬂow” where all modules are in synch. Or it might show a chaotic brainstorm. There are more patterns, and we human beings are pretty diverse. Situations may prompt everyone’s brain differently. Take a moment to reﬂect, when do you get into your “zone”? What is it like when you are at your most creative and productive?

To meet our needs, the brain’s elements work in concert. As an analogy, if a module is a musical instrument, then the brain is a symphony orchestra that affords complex performances. Research suggests eight ways the brain (specifically, the neocortex) works in concert. These eight are highly effective and sustainable, though we necessarily come to rely on some more than others. You will find descriptions of these 8 below.

FOUR EXECUTIVE STYLES

Before we get into details about all 8 cognitive processes, let’s break things down more simply into 4 executive styles.

Two Processing Circuits: To start, there are 2 circuits in the brain to process incoming stimuli. One circuit is faster. It sends sensory data directly to the front of the brain, our executive centers, to quickly act on the data. This is a more extroverted style. A second circuit is slower. It sends sensory data to the back of the brain, to link with memory and information processing centers, to compare, contemplate, and collate the data before moving it on to the executives. This is a more introverted style. There are other ways extroverts and introverts different, such as high versus low gain: Given a certain environment, an extrovert may easily find it too quiet and want to “dial up” the stimuli, whereas an introvert may easily find it too noisy and want to “dial down” the stimuli. Suffice to say, everyone uses both fast and slow circuits, and Jung himself described each person has having 2 functions in awareness, one for extroverting and a second for introverting, to make a well-rounded adult.

Two Executive Centers: We have 2 main executive centers: a “goal-focused” left pre-frontal cortex and an “open-ended” right pre-frontal cortex. Different activities light up these regions. For example, when you make a decision, craft an explanation, or focus to shut out distractions, the left goal-focused executive gets active. Or, when you engage in brainstorming, monitor a process, or reflect on yourself, the right open-ended executive gets active. Very nicely, these two executives correlate well to Jung’s functions. Jung described Thinking and Feeling as “rational” or “judging” functions, which definitionally fit well with our left goal-focused executive. And Jung described Sensing and Intuiting (aka “iNtuiting”) as “a-rational” or “perceiving” functions that definitionally fit well with our right open-ended executive. In his framework, Jung viewed balanced adults as having both kinds of functions, just as all people use both their left and right pre-frontal cortex, and their left and right hands, but invariably with some bias for one over the other.

Now we can bring together Extraverting-Introverting and Left-Right pre-frontal bias to get 4 executive styles:

Expedite Decision-making: Proactively meet goals. Often look sure and conﬁdent. Organize and ﬁx to get positive results soon. (More goal-focused, more extraverting.)

Refine Decision-making: Clarify what’s universal, true or worthwhile. Often look quietly receptive. Trust their own judgments. (More goal-focused, more introverting.)

Energize the Process: Seek out stimuli. Often look random, emergent, and enthusiastic. Attend to the here and now. (More open-ended, more extraverting.)

Monitor the Process: Reﬂect on data and perceptions. Often look focused and preoccupied. Attend to reference points. (More open-ended, more introverting.)

You might take a moment to consider which style is more like you, and more like a spouse, colleague, or boss. Remember these are about habitual biases, not boxes, so feel free RANK the styles 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th rather than pick one.

EIGHT COGNITIVE PROCESSES

We can get more detailed. People’s brains tend to differ in two more ways: people versus thing preference, and abstract versus concrete preference. These are not absolute, simply biases.

For example, there is a module that aids us in identifying stuff in our environment. Some people invest more in identifying lots of people’s faces and emotional expressions, whereas other people invest more in identifying makes and models of cars, computers, or other objects. Of course, everyone does both. But like handedness, where we use both hands, there is bias and have a preferred hand that plays a lead role in many activities like writing.

For as a second example, there is a module that is home to lots of “mirror neurons”. This module tends to get active when we do something concrete like observe and mimic a person’s actions, perhaps to learn a skill. It also can get active when we do get abstract and imagine if we were another creature in a galaxy far far away. Everyone can do both, but we have biases that are likely do due a combination of genetic tendency and habits from culture and physical environment.

There are many other examples. We don’t need to go into them here. Suffice to say, there is evidence to support the kinds of variations and biases that Jung observed among people.

Without further ado, let’s look at the 8 processes. As you explore, keep in mind you likely have preferred one or two from an early age, and may now be reasonably proficient with as many as 5 or 6 as an adult, at least enough to keep up in society, in relationships, and on the job. I have numbered the processes for convenient reference. They do not actually come in any particular order! Each comes with a name like “Active Adapting” and a broad cognitive process such as “Immersing in the present context”. Finally, each comes with a code such as “Se” (meaning extroverted Sensing) that links to Jung’s framework in Psychological Types.

1. Active Adapting (“Se”): Immerse in the present context.

Act quickly and smoothly to handle whatever comes up in the moment. Excited by motion, action, and nature. Adept at physical multitasking with a video game-like mind primed for action. Often in touch with body sensations. Trust your senses and gut instincts. Bored when sitting with a mental/rote task. Good memory for relevant details. Tend to be relaxed, varying things a little and scanning the environment, until an urgent situation or exciting option pops up. Then you quickly get “in the zone” and use your whole mind to handle whatever is happening. Tend to test limits and take risks for big rewards. May be impatient to ﬁnish.

2. Cautious Protecting (“Si”): Stabilize with a predictable standard.

Review and practice to specialize and meet group needs. Constant practice “burns in” how-to knowledge and helps build your storehouse. Specialization helps you reliably ﬁll roles and tasks. Improve when following a role-model or example. Easily track where you are in a task. Often review the past and can relive events as if you are there again. Carefully compare a situation to the customary ways you’ve come to rely. In touch with body sensations. Strong memory for kinship and details. Rely on repetition. Check what’s familiar, comforting, and useful. Tend to stabilize a situation and invest for future security. May over-rely on authority for guidance.

3. Timely Building (“Te”): Measure and construct for progress.

Make decisions objectively based on measures and the evidence before you. Focus on word content, ﬁgures, clock units, and visual data. Find that “facts speak for themselves”. Tend to check whether things are functioning properly. Can usually provide convincing, decisive explanations. Value time, and highly efﬁcient at managing resources. Tend to utilize mental resources only when extra thinking is truly demanded. Otherwise, use what’s at hand for a “good enough” result that works. Easily compartmentalize problems. Like to apply procedures to control events and achieve goals. May display high conﬁdence even when wrong.

4. Skillful Sleuthing (“Ti”): Gain leverage using a framework.

Study a situation from different angles and ﬁt it to a theory, framework, or principle. This often involves reasoning multiple ways to objectively and accurately analyze problems. Rely on complex/subtle logical reasoning. Adept at deductive thinking, deﬁning and categorizing, weighing odds and risks, and/or naming and navigating. Notice points to apply leverage and subtle inﬂuence. Value consistency of thought. Can shut out the senses and “go deep” to think, and separate body from mind to become objective when arguing or analyzing. Tend to backtrack to clarify thoughts and withhold deciding in favor of thorough examination. May quickly stop listening.

5. Friendly Hosting (“Fe”): Nurture trust in giving relationships.

Evaluate and communicate values to build trust and enhance relationships. Like to promote social / interpersonal cohesion. Attend keenly to how others judge you. Quickly adjust your behavior for social harmony. Often rely on a favorite way to reason, with an emphasis on words. Prefer to stay positive, supportive, and optimistic. Empathically respond to others’ needs and feelings, and may take on others’ needs as your own. Need respect and trust. Easily embarrassed. Like using adjectives to convey values. Enjoy hosting. May hold back the true degree of your emotional response about morals/ethics, regarding talk as more effective. May try too hard to please.

6. Quiet Crusading (“Fi”): Stay true to who you really are.

Listen with your whole self to locate and support what’s important. Often evaluate importance along a spectrum from love/like to dislike/hate. Patient and good at listening for identity, values, and what resonates, though may tune out when “done” listening. Value loyalty and belief in oneself and others. Attentive and curious for what is not said. Focus on word choice, voice tone, and facial expressions to detect intent. Check with your conscience before acting. Choose behavior congruent with what’s important, your personal identity, and beliefs. Hard to embarrass. Can respond strongly to speciﬁc, high-value words or false data. May not utilize feedback.

7. Excited Brainstorming ("Ne"): Explore the emerging patterns.

Perceive and play with ideas and relationships. Wonder about patterns of interaction across various situations. Keep up a high-energy mode that helps you notice and engage potential possibilities. Think analogically: Stimuli are springboards to generate inferences, analogies, metaphors, jokes, and more new ideas. Easily guess details. Adept at “what if?” scenarios, mirroring others, and even role-playing. Can shift a situation’s dynamics and trust what emerges. Mental activity tends to feel chaotic, with many highs and lows at once, like an ever-changing “Christmas tree” of ﬂashing lights. Often entertain multiple meanings at once. May ﬁnd it hard to stay on-task.

8. Keen Foreseeing (Ni): Transform with a meta-perspective.

Withdraw from the world and tap your whole mind to receive an insight. Can enter a brief trance to respond to a challenge, foresee the future, or answer a philosophical issue. Avoid specializing and rely instead on timely “ah-ha” moments or a holistic “zen state” to tackle novel tasks, which may look like creative expertise. Manage your own mental processes and stay aware of where you are in an open-ended task. May use an action or symbol to focus. Sensitive to the unknown. Ruminate on ways to improve. Look for synergy. Might try out a realization to transform yourself or how you think. May over-rely on the unconscious.

Further Exploration

You can read more in the following references: “Neuroscience of Personality: Brain-Savvy Insights for All Types of People”, “Our Brains in Color”, and “8 Keys to Self-Leadership”. Or if you prefer a free online 1-hour video, you can find it here:

https://vimeo.com/user40810588/review/143815719/c69a1060ef

Here is an assessment built around the Jungian functions, validated on 3000 people:

http://www.keys2cognition.com/explore.htm

You can find a complete list of references to my neuroscience of personality work here:

https://www.facebook.com/notes/dario-nardi/neuroscience-of-personality-resources/10155730683011216/

#mbti #myers briggs #cognitive functions #intp #infp #intj #infj #entj #enfj #entp #enfp #estj #istj #estp #istp #esfj #isfj #esfp #isfp #te #ti #se #si #ne #ni #fe #fi #mine

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dat-town · 4 years

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CODE Z3RO | CODE 07

characters: BTS & Red Velvet genre: thriller, futuristic au warning: nothing really summary: The twelve most ambitious and promising university students are welcomed in Choego, the world’s first entirely artificial intelligence-driven city, to compete for five job contracts that could change their life. But what if something goes wrong? What if they get trapped? What if the city suddenly turns against them? Can they find a way out before the countdown reaches zero? words: 4K tagged: @philosopher-of-fandoms

➼ Chapter Index

Empathy towards others had been a foreign phenomen to Jeon Jungkook. Caring about others’ loss had never been his forte. He lived as if life was a zero-sum game: what he won was the cost of the other party and what he lost was the reward for someone else. He didn’t believe in win-win situations, he thought of them as sugar coated lies of enthusiastic believers of fairness and ethics. However, life was - just as it had always been - a game of survival, the natural selection of the fittest, whether it be the strongest, the most cunning or the smartest.

It was his ambition that brought him here, that he stamped over those who were worse than him because that was the only way of living he knew. Otherwise he would have been backstabbed, used and left behind. He had no luxury to let himself lose. Apart from his own monster-like ambition he had mouths to feed, younger siblings and his sick mother. However he lacked the usual brotherly instincts as he spent all his time studying and working under the weight of responsibility.

So given he had no previous experience in such field, Jungkook didn't know what to say, let alone do when Yerim's shoulders once again shook from the force of her silent sobs. She tried her best to contain them, the nasty, salty tears but whenever her brother's face appeared in front of her or anybody mentioned anything concerning death, she broke down. Hoseok on the verge of a mental breakdown didn't help her case at all.

Logically speaking Jungkook shouldn't have felt guilt. It hadn't been his job or task to take care of the young girl. She was here after all, she was qualified enough, at least on paper, so basic survival skills shouldn't have meant trouble for her. But apparently there was no academics that could prepare them for a situation like this, even Seokjin's crisis management education was in vain in the end. It didn't save him when he would have needed it but oh a selfless sacrifice what a noble, stupid thing. He must have loved his sister a lot but now, she had to deal with the grief and handle responsibility he’d had put onto her shoulders by saving her.

Although there was something... maybe about Yerim and her strange fascination with him, or maybe it was rather about what Miss Raina had said about team work but Jungkook stayed by the broken girl's side when Wendy asked him to.

"You take really good pictures," was what he said in the end to break the awkward silence burying them. It was just as bad as silent but at least it dragged the girl out of her dark thoughts and that was also something.

"Thank you," she murmured, head snapped towards him in surprise and she even had enough presence of mind to blush at the compliment. Seeing the pearl-like dried tears on her cheeks, Jungkook decided to keep it up, drag out the conversation even if on any other occasion he wouldn't have cared. But maybe his own troubled heart needed something other than his thoughts too.

"How long have you been taking photos?" He asked even though he didn't even really care about the answer but the glitters in Yerim's eyes that now resembled the starry sky instead of a black hole. Her orbs didn't hold any hatred or blame towards him and somehow it did feel a little bit like salvation, too. Even if he wasn't religious, he didn't want bloody eyes to haunt him in his nightmares. So he listened patiently as the girl went on about the camera being a Christmas gift and that she used to be on the school journal in high school and for a blissful moment it was all normal. But in this simulation of theirs, something like this couldn't last long and it seemed to be the IT guy's responsibility to remind them that they had a task at hands to finish… If they wanted to survive in this deadly city apparently.

“Let's get going, we can't let ourselves rest while we don't know for sure what's going on,” he looked over the rest of them seemingly taken over the leader's position after Kim Seokjin’s tragic end. However, not everybody was overzealous about giving him authority.

“You think we will just follow you wherever? That you can tell us what to do just like this? We saw where his big mouth took the Selfless Brother, so for your own sake it would be better to control your tongue, Mr. I-Hacked-Into-The-System,” the marketing major muttered under his breath black-heartedly as he parted his ways from the psychology major girl. Up until now they have been quite invested in their own conversation away from the others. It was kind of surprising taken that Taehyung didn't seem to get on well with anyone, not even the quiet and cold Joohyun. He probably thought she was weak just because she needed insulin for her diabetes. He most likely didn't look at her as a real rival. So then why did it look like he was seeking for an ally? Or maybe he threatened her based on the terrified look on her face.

Yoongi didn't waste his time nor energy to question it. They had a much more alarming issue on their hands.

"Why, do you have a better idea?" He scoffed and kept the eye contact, tensed sparks flying in the air around them. Seemingly nobody wanted to pick sides in this dispute. There was no use. Splitting into two or more groups seemed useless and more dangerous if what Hoseok claimed about Jimin's death was true. They were better off together than one by one but to keep the unit together they had to have some kind of consent above the will and want to live. That stupid fight for the five contracts didn't help their case either but instead of bringing that up Yoongi tried a different method: if he could make the one with the biggest complaining mouth shut up, he knew the others wouldn't say a word either.

"Let's go," he repeated his notice after Taehyung merely shrugged off his question with a grimace. Of course he had nothing, they were all out of ideas, this one about going to the research centre was just another excuse to not sit still and wait for their doom. Probably a lot of them wanted to leave already, but a part of them still wanted to believe that this whole thing was just a simulation and the rest, the ones who fought for the longest will be awarded dream jobs. Even if logically speaking this situation felt more drastic and serious than what they had signed up for to begin with.

The mass of people moved as one, the weeping Hoseok ending their queue with Wendy keeping a close eye on him. He seemed close to passing out but they couldn't let themselves deal with a dead weight.

They passed by a little park with a lovely fountain out of water and from there they could see the bridges above the river-width canal of sea water. From what he remembered from their walking trip to the dorms, Yoongi knew they had to cross those bridges to get off the island, so it was already a good place to start. But it would have been better if they knew what they were dealing with all these sectors shutting off one by one. They needed to know the order to survive and what everybody was afraid to ask: what happens if even the last sector is done for?

The eeriness of the place in the early morning was even scarier than some props for horror movies’ dark themes. The city that seemed to hold the future, a promise of a better world just yesterday now looked more like a dead town and Yoongi wasn't sure he would ever be able to live here after everything that happened. He probably wasn't the only one thinking that way. One glance at Hoseok's horrified or Yerim's weeping face was enough to conclude it wasn't only him who wanted to leave as soon as possible. If death was the price for those bloody contracts then he didn't want them anymore. He knew he could get a job easily with his diplome, he didn't need this fancy artificial city to make his life more whole. Unlike some others, he wasn't that desperate.

As they were getting closer and closer to the main researcher building, he also realized that this whole situation was like a dangerous Jenga game. With each sector gone, their chances of getting out became slimmer and the carefully built tower got closer to crumble turning into fine dust carried by the wind. Yoongi didn't want to be the one to pull out the piece that held the fragile structure together, so he was careful, watching every step they took as if they were walking on eggshells waiting for one of them to explode like a bomb.

"We're here," the IT guy announced as his steps came to a halt in front of tall building facing the rising Sun. He checked on the photo he took once more but yeah, they must have been at the right place. At the questioning looks he got, he nodded towards a sign ahead.

Of course, Taehyung couldn't leave it without a comment either.

"This is it? A bit too fancy to be the researchers' place, don't you think?" he scoffed when he reached the metal panel claiming they reached their destination, the headquarters of the creators of Choego.

The glass building towering above them looked just as abandoned and empty as any other on the island. If there weren't the huge sign reminding them of the purpose of the place, it wouldn't have been any more special than the others surrounding it.

However, Yoongi deeply hoped that this new visit of theirs wouldn't end up like the one in the hospital. That was shocking enough for a life, even what they found out about Sooyoung. Being here felt less and less like a competitive simulation game and more like a nightmare he wished to wake up from. Unfortunately, smart city or not, it couldn't fulfil his wishes.

"Don't forget that the whole city is built thanks to their efforts, so of course they built something like this for themselves," Namjoon spoke up staring at the huge building that made everyone feel like they were nothing but ants under the feet of gods. Maybe they were. Maybe there was someone watching over them. Someone who treated them as if they were puppets on a string. It was an unnerving thought.

"Pretentious bunch," the purple-haired guy scoffed with an ugly grin in the corner of his mouth. Yoongi rolled his eyes at his childish behaviour as all of them climbed the black marble stairs to the glass door in the front.

It was safe to say that the IT specialist hated his kind: the ones with big mouth without actually doing anything. The only thing he did was stirring up nervousness and despise between supposed-to-be allies. His presence made the group work more hectic and tensed because nobody knew when would the guy or someone else snap at them for making a honest to God mistake.

After the hospital incident everybody was a bit wary as they approached the glass entrance of the building, nobody wanted to be the one to open the gates of Hell, so Yoongi stepped forward and touched his bracelet to the metal panel next to the door.

Not authorized personnel, the machine claimed almost instantly and the guy's arm fell back by his side resignedly.

"Wait, shouldn't we have a researcher's rights? Does this place need something extra?" Joohyun voiced out the confused thoughts that must have crossed everyone's mind. She seemed like the type to remember even the smallest details anyway, especially when it was about rules. Something about it made Taehyung suppress a pleased grin in the back of the group.

"Yeah, Miss Raina told us we have similar rights as the general researchers," Namjoon nodded and with furrowed eyebrows he crouched down to get a better look at the control panel. It looked just like the ones in their dorms and the hospital. There was no sign that they would need something special permissions to enter. "Not letting us in doesn't make any sense."

"Let me try, too. Maybe something's off with your bracelet," Wendy stepped forward but the robotic voice echoed the same as before.

"Why would it have been different? Do you really think you're so special?" Taehyung snorted loudly from the back and if it wasn't for the peacemaker girl putting a soothing hand over her boyfriend, Namjoon would have been at the guy's throat in that minute. The way the corner of his mouth twitched at the ugly remark told it all, but it didn't seem like the marketing major had plans on stopping his triggering behavior anytime soon. He clearly enjoyed dancing on everyone's nerves, especially Namjoon's whose emotions were written all over his face.

"There's no harm done by trying twice," Wendy claimed calmly, not bothered by the words thrown at her like an offence. She had known better than to care about such comments.

"It's weird," Joohyun hummed touching her own bracelet as if it was more of a handcuff than the key to freedom, her dark eyes not once leaving the automatic door with no handle.

"I'm checking our permissions and try to grant the ones needed for this building," Yoongi sighed as he pulled out his notebook from his bag.

Now knowing how he could easily slip through the crack between the watching eyes of the system firewall, he logged into the database in no time, quickly checking whether their IDs had any privilege or limitation they didn't know about. Though, the more they kept going, the more he realized that all they did was walking around in the dark without any guidance. So he wasn't surprised when he saw that their bracelets were stripped off any rights as soon as they identified themselves in the hospital. Maybe that's why the lab's security system also turned on in the basement.

He quickly wrote out a few lines of SQL commands but the big red error message he got made him let out a nasty swear words.

"What?" Namjoon looked at him curiously.

"I have no permission to change the date in the database," he grimaced even though he should have known this.

Of course, it wasn't that easy. It would have been actually a huge gap in the security if the database let him update its rows without being an admin. Fuck, how could he get that? How could he trick the computer to believe he's an administrator with ultimate rights? If only he could log in as Han Raina! She most likely had every right they needed. They would only need a username and a password...

Or not.

A sarcastic chuckle escaped Yoongi's throat. It must have seemed crazy in such a situation but he didn't care. Could it be? Could they leave a hidden door just for him to find? They couldn't be so careless to leave that opportunity open just like that, not after knowing that he was doing his masters especially in cyber defence, this was his expertise field.

"I think I know how to hack into the database as an admin," he murmured under his nose at the questioning stares he got. "Does anyone remember what was the code on Miss Raina's ID card?" he pointed at his own still around his neck with his picture, name, other basic data including a bold font with his registration code yoon.gi.min.

He looked around hopeful, searching for help since he doubted Raina was the researcher's real name, it didn't really sound Korean enough. However, all he got was blank and confused stares. Sighing he knew he had no other chance than to give it a try. He could only hope that there was no lock on the system or a limit of maximum attempts of failed logins. He typed in rai.na.han into the command line after the username and added a few symbols into the password part. It was a wild guess, an almost childlike attempt.

SQL injection was one of the first and most basic web application attacking techniques he had been taught about during his years as a computer science major. He spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to hack into the data-driven application his professor had created to make his students sweat while doing their homework. SQLI was one of the biggest web application vulnerabilities, one of the greatest mistakes one could commit as a developer if they let open doors like this but maybe they were lucky.

Or not.

He sighed when the error message changed to No such username in the database. Of course, there wasn't, it would have been too good to be true.

"It was hye dot rin dot han," A girl the farthest from them said quietly, barely audible and Yoongi looked up from his computer to stare at the the long, brown haired girl with eyes that held mysteries noone has ever told. He didn't question why she hadn't said anything before, instead he typed in the name Seulgi suggested and adding the same symbol trick he pressed Enter with a hopeful heart.

Everyone looked at him in anticipation and the seconds seemed to roll by slower as they waited for the command to run. It seemed an awfully longer time than the barely 1.2ms it needed. Then Yoongi's usually stern face lit up with triumph.

"I'm in."

Jungkook and Namjoon, the fellow engineer students who had some idea about how programming worked let out an awed wow watching his work while the other let out relieved sighs and exchanged nervous smalls.

However, their small delight didn't last long.

"Fuck this shit," the IT guy groaned. "She doesn't have admin rights and apparently no one has. Which is crazy, it shouldn't be like this. Every database should have an owner."

"I think it's the city's doing. The artificial intelligence doesn't want us to leave," the younger engineer boy brushed the fringe out of his forehead as he carefully reminded them of what they feared the most: so it was really a trap. A trap with no exit? This possibility alone was enough to silence them all.

"Do you... do you think they are all dead too? Miss Raina and the others?" A small, scared voice rang like a chime of bells from behind Yoongi and those who hovered over the notebook in his lap.

Yerim's sudden question had taken all of them by surprise. The young girl looked over them like a ghost, pale and eyes hollow and red-rimmed. She might have seemed like a naive girl but everyone gets over the denial phase of grief at one point, so she could also face the truth. And that little added 'too' in her question hinted that Yerim also accepted the loss of her brother no matter how hard that must have been. Yoongi looked up at the doe eyed boy behind the girl's shoulder and Jungkook looked the most boyish and vulnerable in that moment that he had ever seen. For all his bravado, he looked quite frightened for the first time of the day. Even more so than in the computer room from where they were made to leave.

"If they stayed on the island then... they might be," the med student answered ever so diplomatic, not one for lies but not one for stabbing knives into sensitive hearts either. Unlike Taehyung who had enough of sitting around.

"Okay, so Plan A didn't work. Anyone has a Plan B instead of mourning people we don't really give a shit about?"

It was a harsh truth. No matter how shocked or empathetic they were, none of them felt too bad about the people who built this Hell that killed them in the end. They might have been good people with families but they didn't know them, so their grief was fake like the flowers in their dorm.

"Well, the building doesn't have any windows we can reach to climb in. The glass door is probably shock resistant. So our only chance is the door and this entry system," Yoongi murmured listing off the options he could come up with but it didn't look too promising.

"Actually every system like this can be hacked through good ol’ wires, too," Namjoon claimed, leaning closer to the control panel to check the perforation and the smooth edges of the box. He hummed seemingly finding a good way to open it and then he turned to his girlfriend.

"I need your makeup bag."

"What?" The girl blinked at him, confused and a bit angry at such a ridiculous request. What would he need her stuff to?

"You brought it, didn't you?" Having no time for explanations Namjoon raised a brow.

Wendy sighed and fished the small pink bag out of her luggage. Opening it her boyfriend only pulled out the metal nail file. Everybody held their breaths while the engineer guy picked the metal facet apart, using the tool instead of a screwdriver, untwisting the screws. He hovered over the insides of the panel and the multiple colourful wires that had no meaning to anyone besides him. Wordlessly, he reached for the beauty scissors and with a swift movement he cut through all of them.

"What the fuck?" Taehyung hollered bewildered when he saw what he did. Namjoon snorted at his panic.

"It's not a bomb, idiot, nothing bad will happen, I just disconnected it from the system–"

Shutting down speed doubled. Next sector shuts down in eighteen minutes. The machine voice chimed from somewhere inside, faint through the thickness of the walls but still audible.

"Oh are you so sure? Really?" the marketing major guy growled and fisting the collar of his shirt he pushed the engineer harshly to the wall.

"As if you knew better!" Namjoon said through gritted teeth, the tension between them evolving to a whole new level. Everybody tensed around them both from the fear of them tearing at each other and what the warning meant.

"Well I didn't want to go into that doomed basement either but as always no one listens to me," Taehyung clicked his tongue gripping harder on the material in his hands when prettily manicured fingers tried to pry those off.

"Because you had zero useful ideas! You can only complain!" Wendy spoke up on behalf of her boyfriend. No matter how much they fought, she deeply cared for him, it was obvious and she wasn't going to just let a big mouthed kid tell him off like that.

"Still better than getting us killed like your precious boyfriend just did," the lilac haired guy sneered at her too, coal black eyes boring into her soft brown ones like he was trying to pierce through her.

The others didn't watch the argument in silent anymore, more and more joined taking sides, trying to reason with soothing words but nothing seemed to work, not until like a breeze on a summer day, something gripping brought change into the atmosphere.

"Guys…"

A quiet voice trembled in the chaos, barely audible over the argument among the rest but miraculously every head whipped towards Seulgi standing by the door. Her hand was over the glass, leaving sweat stains on the material and the door itself was agape, leaving a slim crack between the edge and the frame. The entrance to the researchers' base was open.

They made it inside, exactly where they wanted to get and yet, it didn't taste like salvation at all. Because there was a grave price yet to pay.

#series: code zero #bts fanfic #bts thriller #red velvet fanfic #bts x red velvet #stories

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gardencityvegans · 6 years

Text

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18

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A friend of mine told me that he recently went to a conference where all of the attendees seemed to be talking about perfectionism, in spite of that fact that it wasn’t the conference theme. They were discussing it as people who had been susceptible to impossible standards in the past, but now counted themselves lucky to have let perfectionism go.

As we were talking, it occurred to me that I haven’t thought about perfectionism in a long time, though it had a hold on me for years. Even after I stopped trying to do everything “right,” perfectionism (and to some extent, being “Type A”) was a big part of my identity. I called myself a “recovering perfectionist,” which was truthful, but in retrospect I think it was also my way of continuing to identify with perfectionism and communicate it to others. I didn’t want to be subject to oppressive standards anymore, but I hadn’t yet figured out who I was without them.

In the end, perfectionism exited my life out of necessity; I untangled from it because I didn’t have a choice. Living with bouts of depression and anxiety in the last few years has meant letting go of a lot of my self-imposed notions of what constitutes productivity, success, or a day well spent.

A common experience of depression, I think, is that small, routine asks can suddenly seem insurmountable: doing laundry, cleaning up, running errands. This would have sounded unbelievable to me at one point in my life, when these kinds of to-dos were just afterthoughts, but now I know what it’s like to struggle with the everyday.

I’m thinking back to an afternoon two summers ago that illustrates this perfectly: my anxiety had been particularly bad, and I’d been paralyzed by procrastination all day. By dinnertime I was genuinely proud of myself for having gotten out of the house to pick up groceries and mail a package. This was a radically different measure of productivity than I was used to, and it didn’t matter: I was relieved to have done something, anything.

I’m in a different place now, capable of fuller days, but my perspective remains valuably altered by that experience. I don’t wake up with a fixed agenda anymore. I don’t plan on doing more than I know I can handle. If I notice that tasks remain undone everyday on my modest to-do list, I take it as a sign that I need to plan on doing less, rather than wondering why I can’t do more.

I’ve learned that my capacity for doing and my tendency to get overwhelmed ebb and flow. Sometimes they shift for reasons that I can identify, like how I’m feeling physically or whether something has made me anxious. Sometimes they change suddenly and for no apparent reason. I don’t try to bully myself out of feeling overwhelmed; rather, I ask what would make me feel calmer and more steady.

I often remind myself of a mantra that my friend Maria gave herself when her MS symptoms started keeping her from the pace and routines that had become customary: “better than before.” The origin of this mantra was an ongoing struggle to keep tidy the home she shared with her young son. As Maria’s “functional self” receded, she noticed the presence of another self, who “though less physically versatile, was stronger than I ever could have imagined from the perspective of the one who functioned’ throughout the day. She began to show me things my functional self simply missed.”

One of those things, she goes on to say,

was to be able to notice when I was completely out of energy to exert myself. This might be when something was halfway wiped, or not wiped at all, but I had somehow managed to put some things away. She would know to say that’s enough for now. And she was very clever about what would satisfy my functional self, who would never have been satisfied with that’s enough. It sobered that functional self to learn when the diagnosis of MS finally came that the “forcing” she had habituated herself to was the worst thing to do if she wanted to preserve her physical abilities. But as the saying goes, it’s really true that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. So my deeper wiser identity came up with something even more ingenious than this looming threat:

Better Than It Was.

Or, (depending on the context): Cleaner Than It Was.

These two statements became my mottos. And they still are. They allowed me to learn to pace myself while still satisfying that Functional Self that I was making what she considered progress through the daily requirements of life, even if many of them were slowed to a crawl or a downright standstill. Better Than It Was.

Maria’s story is uniquely her own, and my own sense of high functionality has shifted for reasons that are uniquely mine. But her clever motto has given me great comfort since I first read about it on her blog. So, too, does this quote from Melody Beattie: “Our best yesterday was good enough; our best today is plenty good too.”

The best thing about letting go of perfectionism is developing a capacity to recognize that “our best” can look very different from moment to moment. There’s no longer an immovable standard of output. I wish that I’d been able to pry my ego away from productivity and being busy on my own, rather than being forced to reckon with a dramatic shift in my capacities, but in the end, it doesn’t matter how I got here. What matters is that I’m learning to be grateful for what I can do, rather than fixating on what I haven’t, or can’t.

Throughout all of this, I’ve had the tremendous luxury of being able to adjust my schedule and responsibilities in a way that allowed me to create a dynamic “new normal.” Not every person has the space to do this, depending on his or her professional and personal circumstances. I recognize and respect the many men and women who go through periods of depression and anxiety while also keeping up with fixed schedules. And of course I worry sometimes about my DI year: now that I’m learning how to take gentle care in the moments when I need to, what will it be like to temporarily lose control of my schedule and workload?

I don’t have an answer, but to some degree I suspect that I don’t need one. My routine next year will be a challenge, but so long as I can do my best without succumbing to the influence of perfectionism, I know I’ll be OK. Much as I’ve made my schedule more realistic, letting go of perfectionism has been an inside job. It resides in recognizing how futile perfectionism is, how it discourages me needlessly while keeping me from recognizing the good that I can do, and maybe have done (another observation that’s prompted by Beattie).

Here’s to a week—and a month, and a summer, and a year—of doing my best and trusting that my best is enough. I wish the same for you, too. And here’s the weekly roundup of links.

Recipes

I would never think to put fruit in a tabbouleh, but I love Katie’s creative mixture of blueberries, parsley, mint, and quinoa—I’d actually love to try it as a savory breakfast dish!

A very different kind of quinoa salad, but no less delicious: a curried mixture with red cabbage, raisins, and pumpkin seeds from Melanie of Veggie Jam.

Two recipes for summer entertaining caught my eye this past week. The first is these show-stopping chipotle cauliflower nachos from my friend Jeanine of Love & Lemons.

Number two is this platter of green summer rolls with mango miso sauce from Anya of Lazy Cat Kitchen. The sauce alone is calling to me, but I also love all of the tender green veggies here (asparagus, zucchini, broccolini).

Finally, a summery vegan pasta salad with creamy avocado dressing—perfect timing, as pasta salad’s been on my mind lately (and I may just have a recipe coming soon!).

Reads

1. This article is about a month old, but it’s very on-topic for today’s post: why you should stop being so hard on yourself, via The New York Times.

2. Ed Yong’s new article on the threat of imminent global pandemics frightened me (and the blurb under the title didn’t help), but it’s an important topic, and I’m glad that it’s being written about. Yong notes the medical supply shortages that are becoming increasingly problematic in the US; hopefully greater awareness might somehow inspire solutions.

3. Reporting on the termination of a major NIH study of alcohol, heart attack, and stroke, which was shut down when conflicts of interest were identified. It’s an important examination of the ethics of funding and scientific research.

4. Dispatches from the Gulf of California, where the vaquita—now the world’s rarest marine mammal—is on the brink of extinction.

5. I was so full of appreciation and respect when I read my friend Karen’s latest post on numbers and body acceptance.

Like Karen, I went through a long period of asking to be blind weighed at the doctor’s office and not owning a scale. That time served a purpose, but nowadays I can be aware of the number without identifying with it, which I’m grateful for. I’ve had a bunch of doctor’s appointments in the last month, and getting weighed has been the last thing on my mind: feeling more at home in my body has been my only point of focus.

Karen opens up about her own recent experience with the scale and the annual physical, then reflects on why she’s committed to being transparent about what “balance” looks like for her. It’s great to witness her journey unfolding.

On that inspiring note, happy Sunday—and from a celebratory NYC, happy pride! I’ll be circling back this week with my first fruit-filled dessert of the summer.

[Read More ...] https://www.thefullhelping.com/weekend-reading-6-24-18/

#infrared #health

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oovitus · 6 years

Text

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18

One of those things, she goes on to say,

Better Than It Was.

Or, (depending on the context): Cleaner Than It Was.

Here’s to a week—and a month, and a summer, and a year—of doing my best and trusting that my best is enough. I wish the same for you, too. And here’s the weekly roundup of links.

Recipes

I would never think to put fruit in a tabbouleh, but I love Katie’s creative mixture of blueberries, parsley, mint, and quinoa—I’d actually love to try it as a savory breakfast dish!

A very different kind of quinoa salad, but no less delicious: a curried mixture with red cabbage, raisins, and pumpkin seeds from Melanie of Veggie Jam.

Two recipes for summer entertaining caught my eye this past week. The first is these show-stopping chipotle cauliflower nachos from my friend Jeanine of Love & Lemons.

Finally, a summery vegan pasta salad with creamy avocado dressing—perfect timing, as pasta salad’s been on my mind lately (and I may just have a recipe coming soon!).

Reads

1. This article is about a month old, but it’s very on-topic for today’s post: why you should stop being so hard on yourself, via The New York Times.

4. Dispatches from the Gulf of California, where the vaquita—now the world’s rarest marine mammal—is on the brink of extinction.

5. I was so full of appreciation and respect when I read my friend Karen’s latest post on numbers and body acceptance.

On that inspiring note, happy Sunday—and from a celebratory NYC, happy pride! I’ll be circling back this week with my first fruit-filled dessert of the summer.

The post Weekend Reading, 6.24.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18 published first on

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inerginc · 6 years

Link

GTM Smart Grid http://ift.tt/2eJlQnQ

When hurricanes tore through the Caribbean earlier this fall, the team at Austin, Texas-based Ideal Power was finalizing a solar-plus-storage microgrid project in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

“Those hurricanes came through and stripped the PV panels right off the roof,” said Mike Barron, Ideal’s senior firmware design engineer. “It was going to be kind of a showcase for us.”

The project, which includes six of Ideal’s conversion units, now likely won’t be online for several weeks. In the meantime, the converters are increasing efficiency of some generators on the island by allowing them to run at full capacity and store extra power that’s not immediately used.

The installation in St. Croix was meant to take advantage of Ideal Power’s proprietary power packet switching architecture (PPSA), a power conversion technology that reduces the cost, size, and weight of its converters. Ideal’s cost and efficiency gains over other inverter companies, crystallized in its PPSA, has been the company’s selling point. “That’s really the basis for most of what we do,” said Barron.

The company has built up a line of two 30-kilowatt and one 125-kilowatt power conversions systems, some of which are multiport. Ideal’s power conversion systems don’t use traditional isolation transformer architecture, thus eliminating the copper wire that creates their heavy core and increasing efficiency through a high-frequency switching system. Ideal’s systems weigh 500 pounds less than a traditional 30-kilowatt converter unit.

Ideal first arrived on the scene in 2007. Back then, Barron said the company was doing a lot of work with Lockheed Martin on military contracts. As energy storage blossomed, the company focused on battery-based microgrids and commercial systems, with the help of a $1 million Texas Emergency Technology Fund grant. It became the first grantee to launch an initial public offering.

Ideal has received or applied for 80 patents over the last decade, many of which are displayed as golden plaques on a wall that stretches the length of its office.

One pending patent, for example, centers on anti-islanding technology that makes it safer for an isolated resource, like a microgrid connected-PV system, to connect back to the grid.

Earlier this month, investors worried about threats to this wealth of intellectual property after the company fired its founder and chief technologist, Bill Alexander, over financial ethics violations. But the wall of patents will stay put; Ideal retains ownership despite the departure.

Ideal’s stock plummeted after the firing, but is now recovering.

Ideal's lab space sits behind a set of double doors in a generic-looking office space -- “cubicle land,” as Lee Chantel Sarver, Ideal’s customer experience coordinator, called it -- which was the literal set for the 1999 movie "Office Space."

The lab has a grid simulator where the company can reproduce an AC grid brownout or test different load conditions. The room is full of devices: electric vehicle batteries, a PV simulator capable of imitating different lighting patterns, a variety of motors, and a complete thermal chamber used for temperature extremes between -40 and 80 C. These allow the company to do a good deal of its own UL-testing.

Barron showed off the stockpile of gizmos with pride. All of that equipment has come at a cost, however.

In 2015 and 2016, the company spent over $5 million on research and development. In 2016, the company’s revenues declined 62 percent and gross profits fell by $300,000 due to lower product sales. Some are questioning whether Ideal can deliver on the hype surrounding its products. Will it finally emerge from R&D mode after a decade of operation?

Back in the lab, though, the excitement was palpable. The lab's showpiece is a microgrid simulation that demonstrates how Ideal's conversion units interact with different types of equipment and power fluctuations while islanded from the grid.

“Switch!” Barron yelled, before flipping off the connection to the grid. Barron cut three units running at 19,000 volts each with a synchronized start. The black monitors immediately showed them splitting load. Minutes later, he turned one unit off.

“As soon as I shut down that guy, these two immediately just distributed the load and picked up the slack. The lights don’t flicker or anything else. Any equipment that would have been on this microgrid would not have noticed,” said Barron pointing to the plots blinking on his monitor. “In terms of reliability and robustness, that’s a big step forward.”

Barron turned toward the screen measuring voltage and watts. “Most of the engineers that come in here that are really fascinated with microgrid technology, they’ve got us pulling up these scope traces and they’re having us look down into the minutiae right at the point of switchover. Their jaws drop at how smoothly it happens,” he said.

“I just kind of like being able to flip the switch and go, the lights stay on, guys,” he added with a guffawing laugh.

Ideal wants its converters to be the building block for distributed energy applications, through partnerships with software companies and system integrators like Sharp, NEXTracker, and JLM Energy. According to a September GTM Research report on the energy storage inverter landscape, partnerships “will be critical to standardizing system components.”

Last year, JLM placed a 4-megawatt order for Ideal’s 30-kilowatt and 125-kilowatt systems. In 2014, Ideal secured a multi-year contract to work with Sharp on its SmartStorage system. Ideal is running a multi-million-dollar backlog that is "highly concentrated with a limited number of customers," according to the company's financials.

Ideal is also investigating partnerships in more remote locations. Barron said the company has ideas on how to build a more robust grid using its converter technology. “I think we’re going to probably start to see opportunities to partner with other groups that are looking to do things more globally,” said Barron. “Isolated villages where you don’t want to try to string power lines out to them, remote islands, those types of areas.”

A global expansion may be a tall order, since Ideal is still running at a loss a decade into its founding. But disasters like the one in Puerto Rico demonstrate an acute need for fast-responding distributed energy resources.

“One of the keys to me, that I’m seeing and hearing about, is the idea that people want to have more of a building-block granularity to their power infrastructure,” said Barron. "With these hurricanes that went through the Caribbean, people are really starting to think more about that and these backup capabilities, especially for critical load support [...]. That discussion really seems to be changing.”

#Micro-grids #GTM Smart Grid

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oovitus · 6 years

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Weekend Reading, 6.24.18

One of those things, she goes on to say,

Better Than It Was.

Or, (depending on the context): Cleaner Than It Was.

Here’s to a week—and a month, and a summer, and a year—of doing my best and trusting that my best is enough. I wish the same for you, too. And here’s the weekly roundup of links.

Recipes

I would never think to put fruit in a tabbouleh, but I love Katie’s creative mixture of blueberries, parsley, mint, and quinoa—I’d actually love to try it as a savory breakfast dish!

A very different kind of quinoa salad, but no less delicious: a curried mixture with red cabbage, raisins, and pumpkin seeds from Melanie of Veggie Jam.

Two recipes for summer entertaining caught my eye this past week. The first is these show-stopping chipotle cauliflower nachos from my friend Jeanine of Love & Lemons.

Finally, a summery vegan pasta salad with creamy avocado dressing—perfect timing, as pasta salad’s been on my mind lately (and I may just have a recipe coming soon!).

Reads

1. This article is about a month old, but it’s very on-topic for today’s post: why you should stop being so hard on yourself, via The New York Times.

4. Dispatches from the Gulf of California, where the vaquita—now the world’s rarest marine mammal—is on the brink of extinction.

5. I was so full of appreciation and respect when I read my friend Karen’s latest post on numbers and body acceptance.

On that inspiring note, happy Sunday—and from a celebratory NYC, happy pride! I’ll be circling back this week with my first fruit-filled dessert of the summer.

The post Weekend Reading, 6.24.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18 published first on https://storeseapharmacy.tumblr.com

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