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reneestephen.bsky.social
Renée
@reneestephen.bsky.social
1K followers 250 following 3.5K posts
Free esprit de l'escalier.

Salty posts from a salty island.
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reneestephen.bsky.social
This you? Speaking of triggered...
November 6, 2025 at 2:17 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
To adapt a paraphrase of Emma Goldman, revolution without surfing isn't a revolution worth having.

(You seem like the kind of tiresome bore who would appreciate being educated, so here's the full sentiment in her original words:
At the dances I was one of the most untiring and gayest. One evening a cousin of Sasha, a young boy, took me aside. With a grave face, as if he were about to announce the death of a dear comrade, he whispered to me that it did not behoove an agitator to dance. Certainly not with such reckless abandon, anyway. It was undignified for one who was on the way to become a force in the anarchist movement. My frivolity would only hurt the Cause. I grew furious at the impudent interference of the boy. I told him to mind his own business. I was tired of having the Cause constantly thrown into my face. I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from convention and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to become a nun and that the movement would not be turned into a cloister. If it meant that, I did not want it. "I want freedom, the right to self-expression, everybody's right to beautiful, radiant things." Anarchism meant that to me, and I would live it in spite of the whole world — prisons, persecution, everything. Yes, even in spite of the condemnation of my own closest comrades I would live my beautiful ideal. (p. 56, Emma Goldman, 'My Disillusionment in Russia', 1923)
September 26, 2025 at 1:56 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
The Netherlands wasn't the Netherlands either. Until they were.

This is Amsterdam.
The same road in Amsterdam in the 70s vs today. The 70s road is full of smog and cars, the second road is clear and full of pedestrians and bikes.
July 30, 2025 at 10:53 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
The world is going to shit and I'm sad, so I went and bought an art about it.

This is a luxury I invest in defiantly. There is so much disposable mass market crap in our lives that's landfill bound, instead I want to leave behind beautiful things someone made with their brilliant hands.
A painting sits on a pile of old books against a deep blue wall. It depicts a goblet full of amber liquid, sitting on top of torn sheet music. In the background, curtains. The detail includes light through the goblet onto the paper, and droplets on the glass.
July 5, 2025 at 6:07 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Over on the medicine Reddit (meddit), where the posts used to be about preferred treatment protocols and professional development dilemmas, everything is fine.
A screenshot of the top posts on r/medicine: "Rural hospitals at risk", "It's a lie and politicians are modern day cowards", "Big Beautiful Bill and kidney patients," re barriers to treatment getting worse, and "US CDC accepts listed vaccine panel's recommendations for RSV, meningococcal shots." (derogatory)
July 3, 2025 at 5:11 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Sounds painful, but what flavor? Grape, strawberry, watermelon...?
June 27, 2025 at 1:06 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
He's got a Niblonian gravitas about him...
Fry from Futurama holding Nibbler. Fry says "I cleaned your poop!" And Nibbler responds with his ridiculously deep voice "Quite possible. We live long and are celebrated poopers."
June 17, 2025 at 6:34 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
I got curious about what you were saying.

Turns out it's bad. It doesn't improve service (and in fact makes it worse) and it caters to business clients on the backs of the public and workers alike.

www.academia.edu/1123987/The_...
Conclusion The liberalization of the postal sector in Europe shows what happens when public service providers are exposed to competition. Far from increasing efficiency and quality and reducing prices, the liberalization of the postal sector has led to a diver- sification of business strategies and to a fragmentation of customers, markets and services. Postal companies have introduced special schemes for large and particularly lucrative customers and, while residents in the highly populated urban centres receive mail two or three times a day, the rural areas are threatened with being cut-off from service. At the same time, some providers pursue a high-tech, high-quality delivery strategy, while others provide a low-tech, low-quality but cheap service. However, as a common trend all providers focus on business clients, and, most importantly, all providers cut labour costs by outsourcing, reducing employment, paying lower wages and using atypical and precarious forms of employment. The new competitors have paved the way by employing workers on marginal part-time contracts or as self-employed mail deliverers, but former monopolists have responded by paying lower wages to newly-hired employees or by introducing a new category of lower-paid ‘assistant’ deliverers. It is important to note that many of the new competitors are owned by foreign ex-monopolists, which means that they apply the same strategies abroad for which they criticize their competitors at home. The result is a vicious cycle of deterioration of employment and working conditions in which providers are imitating competitors’ strategies The new competitors have paved the way by employing workers on marginal part-time contracts or as self-employed mail deliverers, but former monopolists have responded by paying lower wages to newly-hired employees or by introducing a new category of lower-paid ‘assistant’ deliverers. It is important to note that many of the new competitors are owned by foreign ex-monopolists, which means that they apply the same strategies abroad for which they criticize their competitors at home. The result is a vicious cycle of deterioration of employment and working conditions in which providers are imitating competitors’ strategies. As a result, postal workers are the main losers from the liberalization process. Not only have thousands of jobs disappeared since the start of the liberalization process, the same jobs are paying significantly less and many have become precarious. Residents in rural areas have also been negatively affected by post office closures and by a reduction of other services. In the urban centres the waiting lines in the post offices have certainly not become shorter, while inexperienced workers may deliver the mail more frequently to wrong addresses. And while prices for residents have remained the same or increased, the main winners of the liberalization process are the large customers. 21 They have not only profited from lower prices and individual rebates, but also from increased choice (for some businesses, such as mail-order busi- nesses, increased delivery speed has also been an important improvement as custom- ers who order via the internet want their items to be delivered quickly). Among the winners are also some of the private shareholders, who, as in the Austrian case, have profited from repeated distribution of special dividends (whereas those states that still hold assets have to cover additional costs resulting from growing unemployment, low wages and a dwindling rural infrastructure
June 1, 2025 at 6:28 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Fastest block ever.

(Also they're wrong lol)
Screenshot of my summer tweet with the text "I hereby declare summer begun." And a one-word comment from an impudent stranger I interacted with on an unrelated thread that just says: "Began."
May 31, 2025 at 1:14 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
For those who aren't familiar with the internet's weirdest conspiracy,

www.theverge.com/2015/9/2/924...
Time Cube was a pseudoscientific personal web page set up in 1997 by Otis Eugene "Gene" Ray. It was a self-published outlet for Ray's "theory of everything", also called "Time Cube", which claims that all modern sciences are participating in a worldwide conspiracy to omit his theory, which posits that each day actually consists of four days occurring simultaneously. Ray described himself as the "wisest man on earth" and a "godlike being with superior intelligence who has absolute evidence and proof" for his views. Ray asserted repeatedly and variously that the academic world had not taken Time Cube seriously. According to Find a Grave, Ray died on 18 March 2015, and the Time Cube website registration expired in August 2015.
May 30, 2025 at 7:28 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
I hereby declare summer begun.
A garden path in the foreground, with deep blood red blooms. In the middle ground, an arbour gate with pink roses twining up it. In the background, stairs up to a cedar cottage with magenta trim. Close-up on a pinky yellow peony. Close-up on a double-bloomed dark purple clematis. Multiple arbours covered roses in the near, middle, and farground.
May 29, 2025 at 1:46 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Always something to take joy in on this amazing website.
OP's profile, showing "Writer. Historian of things Canadian."
May 28, 2025 at 2:28 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
With all those voters who love Poilievre, how could they lose?
Forty tweets from random Twitter accounts that all say some slightly different obviously templated variation of the following: "Just returned from Pierre Poilievre's rally in Kirkland Lake and the energy was electric. As a northern Ontarian, it' refreshing to see a leader who truly listens to our concerns and has a vision for our region's growth!" Forty tweets from random Twitter accounts that all say some slightly different obviously templated variation of the following: "Just returned from Pierre Poilievre's rally in Kirkland Lake and the energy was electric. As a northern Ontarian, it' refreshing to see a leader who truly listens to our concerns and has a vision for our region's growth!" Forty tweets from random Twitter accounts that all say some slightly different obviously templated variation of the following: "Just returned from Pierre Poilievre's rally in Kirkland Lake and the energy was electric. As a northern Ontarian, it' refreshing to see a leader who truly listens to our concerns and has a vision for our region's growth!" Forty tweets from random Twitter accounts that all say some slightly different obviously templated variation of the following: "Just returned from Pierre Poilievre's rally in Kirkland Lake and the energy was electric. As a northern Ontarian, it' refreshing to see a leader who truly listens to our concerns and has a vision for our region's growth!"
May 22, 2025 at 4:09 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Canadians love Pierre!
Fourty tweets from random accounts, "I just got back from a Pierre Poilievre rally in [town]" and... obviously templated bullshit. Fourty tweets from random accounts, "I just got back from a Pierre Poilievre rally in [town]" and... Fourty tweets from random accounts, "I just got back from a Pierre Poilievre rally in [town]" and... Fourty tweets from random accounts, "I just got back from a Pierre Poilievre rally in [town]" and...
May 22, 2025 at 3:54 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Follow-up: Graph goes backwards! I have discovered perpetual motion, the world is saved!!
A net consumption power graph with the Y-axis going from 0 to 60, showing several days of negative power usage, Friday through Thusday (kWh): -39, -23, -28, -40, -34, -2, -21
May 15, 2025 at 10:06 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
After I got COVID two years ago last month, I was unable to garden. Last year was a bit improved, but I just managed to turn the irrigation on and not much else. This year, weeds have been tackled and things gone leggy have been pruned, tho it will take another year to get things back under control.
In the foreground, spherical black alien-looking plant buds at the ends of green leafy stalks. In the background, furniture and trees at the top of rise. The camera has caught a beam of sunlight as a lense flare cutting diagonally across the photo.
May 12, 2025 at 1:48 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Anyway, here's to all the Malms.
An Ikea Malm four door dresser in birch
May 11, 2025 at 6:33 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Cedar ceiling friends!! Love that gorgeous MCM room. I hope the lovely new floor helps with the asthma.
A cedar ceiling with black beams. Two hanging lamp heads are in between the ceiling and the photographer.
May 11, 2025 at 5:46 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Anyway here's Wonderwall
White middle-aged woman wearing a black robe and a skeptical expression. Oh her head is a sleep mask that says "DEI Confluent." In the background, an unfinished room and exposed plumbing.
May 7, 2025 at 6:20 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
If you see this, post the most recent photo of yourself from your camera roll.
A photo of me in an unfinished basement, with an eye mask that says "DEI Confluent" on it.
May 7, 2025 at 5:11 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
This is why I got my MIL these mugs for Christmas one year!!
Two mugs, one printed "Paint water" splattered with paint, the other says "Not paint water"
May 2, 2025 at 4:07 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Like it is literally happening rn

xtramagazine.com/power/politi...
April 26, 2025 at 7:25 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
I mean
April 26, 2025 at 4:45 PM
reneestephen.bsky.social
Yep -- this is a great rundown of what was going on behind the scenes. looniepolitics.com/asking-for-a...
Conservatives started demanded millions of pages of documents that they also insisted that the civil service could not redact for the usual reasons (personal or commercially sensitive information, as examples) and that the Commons’ law clerk was to do all of the redactions because they judged him a more neutral person. The demands were physically impossible
April 26, 2025 at 2:32 AM
reneestephen.bsky.social
I've literally started just posting this onto FB threads. Been accused of "deflecting" and "shilling for the Liberal party"

brooo it's called the constitution, I

(source, CanInfo: www.craigmarlatt.com/canada/image...)
Government in Canada: Division of Powers. Shows Federal, Provincial, Municipal Region, Municipal Township. Lists the powers for each.
April 24, 2025 at 6:04 AM