2026-01-09 20:16:00
“Oooh, nooo!!”
And then, a loud noise.
This happened yesterday. I was sitting at a quiet café, working on the Bearming theme. All of a sudden, the calm was replaced by a yell and pure chaos.
It turned out an old man had fainted. The scream came from the woman he pulled down with him when he fell.
Moments later, ambulances and paramedics arrived.
They took good care of both people. The man spoke incoherently and seemed to drift in and out of consciousness. The woman had either broken or badly sprained her leg, so they had to stabilize it.
Half an hour later, the sirens faded away and everything was back to normal.
Once again, I was struck by a humbling reminder of life’s unpredictability. Everything can change in a split second. You never really know.
I find myself reflecting on this more and more as I get older. Probably because I’m getting closer and closer to death. Most likely, I’ve already lived more years than I have left.
But I also think it has to do with the fragility that comes with aging, and I don’t mean the body. I’m talking about another shell. It’s like the strong shell of identity you often carry when you’re young starts to crack open.
You become more receptive to your surroundings. The environment, other people, the atmosphere.
The shell breaks apart, and life breaks through.
2026-01-09 17:31:00
this morning, i went to bear's discovery feed as part of my morning routine and stumbled upon this entry: BRING BACK EMAILS AS A FORM OF COMMUNICATION (hi peige!). reading it makes me want to scream: I MISS THE OLD TIMES SO MUCH.
i remember being in elementary school and having two things: bad english, and the privilege of occasional internet access. i don't even remember how i found out about the existence of websites that allow you to find pen pals and connect with them, but i did, and i still think it was one of the best things i did during my childhood. didn't matter that my english sucked and i couldn't form one sentence without messing up the grammar - i TALKED to people and found joy in it.
being able to connect with people worldwide when i was just a kid who lived in a third-world country with few friends was a huge thing for me! i would have never imagined that i could talk to people, get to know someone who lived in australia, and have lovely conversations with them about nothing and everything. (hi jason, if you're reading this, i hope you're doing well. thank you for sharing those songs you made and the stories on your end of the world. it was a truly memorable experience for me. i have no idea how you're doing these days but i hope things are going well for you.)
i really miss talking to people in great length about random things. we're all too used to texting now, and while it can be convenient, but it just isn't the same. nothing can replace the feeling of actually taking the time to sit down, composing an elaborate email to a friend, receiving an email back, reading it and thinking about what their reply means to you and how you can add to the conversation, and so on. what an experience! i miss it so much. it just feels much more genuine and thoughtful in a way that texting can't really replicate.
all this to say that i think we should all start sending emails to people! taking the time to sit down and really think about what you want to write is fun, folks. i'm quite sure my real-life friends would look at me weird, but here in bear, people seem to welcome this form of communication, and so i will start from here.
if you're reading this, i would love to be pen pals with you! feel free to say hi and i promise i'll do my best to write you back soon. we can talk about anything, really; i'd love to hear about what you're currently interested about (i love hearing people geek out about things they're passionate about!), any current events in your life that you'd like to share, or anything about you. alternatively, you could also see this list of random things i enjoy and start from there.
looking forward to chat with you and i hope you're having a lovely day!
💌 [email protected]
2026-01-09 12:59:00
==NB: I accidentally deleted this post at 1:52pm ET on January 9. I was able to reconstitute and repost it now (2:09pm ET on January 9) because the homie FS had it open in a tab. TL:DR this is repost, but nothing has been changed from the original post. Rest assured I am still angry at myself for being clumsy and stupid earlier. —dj==
It was unseasonably warm in Toronto today and it was a workday and it was a Thursday and I had a million things to do and errands to run and yet I spent most of today trying not to read or think or talk about the fact that ICE agents in Minnesota straight-up murdered a lady in broad daylight yesterday or that moments later, prominent people in the current administration lied vigorously about the incident (there's video) and then literally blamed her for getting murdered.
Sidebar: Ronny was good on the Daily Show tonight.
You might think I'm winding up for a rant here but I'm not. There's nothing more to say. There's nothing that hasn't been said before. There's nothing just over the horizon. It's just like this now. It's just always like this now.
Despite my long-held position that the United States is (and has long been) a dystopian failed state run by the literal worst people alive, I know, like, and love a lot of Americans. I talk to Americans every day and largely enjoy the experience (shout out to PM whom I sent over 8,000 Discord messages to in 2025). I think that Americans (mostly my friends and colleagues but also, like, Sarah Squirm and Keyonte George) deserve a country that makes sense and functions properly instead of the one that's been spoiling for Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo for around 150 years.
I don't have a rant because there's no point. I know what I think and know and feel and so do you. As such I do not think I have the capacity to be up in arms about anything that happens in contemporary America anymore. Like, real talk? I have no scintilla of belief or hope left. There is no low I cannot conceive of or imagine, and when you are relatively sure that the president could kill a puppy with a ball peen hammer on national television and face no consequences for it, you have to ask yourself what the point of being shocked even is and wen the cruelty is the point, why bother pointing out the cruelty.
They know.
They're doing it on purpose.
We know they're doing it on purpose.
I wish I felt better about things. I wish I weren't low-key celebrating going numb about stuff. But at some point you have to just see things as they are. America isn't coming back from this. Sure, maybe someone sane ends up in the White House in 2028, but there's just no way to come back from what we've seen, what we've been seeing. It's almost impressive how quickly and efficiently this ridiculous clusterfuck of totally uncool jokers (shout out Barbara Kruger) turned the United States into the worst version of itself. Say what you want about the bad guys, but they understand something essential about the country and the people in it. They know the tunes to play to get folks to line up to get fed to the woodchipper.
==Also also also:==
==Also also:==
==Also:==
As I've mentioned a few times, I've gotten back into board and card games in a real way lately. Part of that is that I now (read: once again) sign up for email updates for games that are launching via Kickstarter (or wherever). All of this is an overlong prologue to get to this update about a game called Lodge that I am intrigued by.
🌲 gonna
🌼 go
🌱 touch back to watching
🌳 grass AJ Dybantsa highlights
🌷 now
Be good to yourself.
==If you enjoyed this post, click the little up arrow chevron thinger below the tags to help it rank in Bear's Discovery feed and maybe consider sharing it with a friend or on your socials.==
2026-01-09 05:11:00
I work for a Japanese company. I’ve studied Japanese arts for years. My wife lived in Tokyo for nearly a decade and speaks the language, and through her I have in‑laws there. I’m not fluent, and I haven’t lived there, but I do have a deeper-than-average sense of the culture. So when I see Japanese concepts flattened into corporate buzzwords, I cringe hard. And “ikigai” is one of the worst offenders.
Yes, ikigai literally translates to “reason for living,” but that doesn’t mean it belongs in a slide deck about optimizing your potential. The Westernized four‑circle Venn diagram — passion, mission, vocation, profession — is catchy, but it has almost nothing to do with the Japanese idea.
Ikigai is quiet. Personal. Often small. It’s the thing that brings you joy and gives your life texture. It’s not a product or profit center. It’s not a decision matrix. And it’s certainly not something you can “unlock” by attending a corporate training webinar.
If you want to align your work with your core values, that’s great — and it can be a useful exercise... within very clear limits. But let’s be honest: most of us are being paid to fulfill someone else’s dreams, not our own. That’s the nature of employment. There can be dignity in that, especially for the sacrifice you make for your family — but that’s not ikigai.
Your ikigai lives somewhere else. It's in your routines, your relationships, in the things you do because they matter to you.
Please, let's retire the Venn diagram and let ikigai be what it actually is: a private, human reason to get up in the morning — not corporate KPI dressed in kanji.
2026-01-09 05:01:00
If you've been paying attention to the news you probably are aware of the murder of Renee Good at the hands of ICE.
And unfortunately, this is where the useless apathetic takes come out. The useless commentary of people who want nothing more than to self-aggrandize on how little of an opinion they have.
It must be nice being so damn obtuse to the situation at hand that you can sit in a nice place of privilege and arrogantly try and claim both sides as just as bad.
Both sides aren't killing people, both sides aren't violently harassing citizens, both sides aren't justifying lethal use of force from the state.
If all you're gonna do is stick that fence post firmly up your ass and "both sides" the situation to death, then your best course of action is to shut the fuck up, because your "commentary" is about as useful as a broken refrigerator.
If you have nothing intelligent to offer besides surface-level observations, your opinion has already been done to death by mainstream news outlets.
Your apathy is at best cowardice, and at worst evil. If you're the type of person to think how Renee was "insignificant" and thus you don't care. Let this be a reminder that you are a piece of shit. How many people need to die before you realize you're just a sociopath masquerading as an intellectual?
You're not enlightened for being a "centrist". If you're ignorant of the situation, that's fine, but don't go trying to act like both sides are equally bad in this situation.
If you watched a woman getting murdered in her car trying to escape a bunch of fascist-backed thugs and think "bOtH sIdEs" you need to find a proctologist to have your head surgically removed from your own ass.
2026-01-09 04:00:00
I check the recent discovery feed often, sometimes several times a day. I really enjoy seeing the variety of posts and knowing that most people blogging here are regular people sharing insights into their daily lives or throwing their thoughts and feelings into the void.
I frequently upvote posts that I find interesting as my (small) way of saying thank you for sharing. I wish I could see a history of what I upvoted, because unless I bookmark a post, I quickly forget which ones were most interesting. If there’s a way of doing this, please let me know!
If a site has a layout or theme I find attractive, I’m more likely to look around a bit. Yes, I’m tempted by pretty things.
I gravitate towards certain themes - I usually click links that contain the following:
I’m more likely to click on posts that are clearly titled so I have an idea what I’ll be reading about. That’s not to say I don’t click on ones that don’t, but if I’m short on time or not in the mood for reading much, I’ll be more likely to pass over them.
There’s a few topics I almost never click on - there’s nothing wrong with any of these, they just aren’t my cup of tea.
I don’t look at the Trending tab very often. Because posts can stay there for a few days, it’s not necessary. However, I do like to browse a few pages in and discover posts that have had a few upvotes which I missed on the Recent tab.
I’d love to know what interests other Bear bloggers have and how you like to browse the Discovery feed. Feel free to comment in my guestbook, reply with your own post or just pop me an email if you want to keep it private.
Carlos commented via the Contact page:
Hey Becky,
I just read your post "Navigating Bear's Discovery Feed" and enjoyed it. My initial thought on seeing your bookmarking question was that a potential solution could be a postroll.
I wrote a brief note about your piece and mentioned that, but realized my notes are not discoverable by default and wanted to drop in and send you that link and potential solution!
Creating An Automatic Postroll With Bear's Powerful Embed Feature
Take care!