friends

Yesterday, I was upset to learn that at some point in the last five months Masklab (Wayback link) decided not to sell masks anymore. They were the brand that fit me the best and they came in so many colors and patterns they made wearing a mask feel a little less dire.

Here's the stats for comparison:

• Made in Hong Kong in an ISO-certified Class 7 clean room
• Highest surgical mask standard ASTM F2100 Level 3 certified by STC:Test Report
• PFE>99.9%, BFE>99.9%
• EU PPE Standard EN149 FFP2:Test Report
• Printed with non-toxic, azo-free dyes certified by STC:Test Report
• High breathability
• Fluid resistant up to 160mmHg
• Individually-wrapped
• Size: 190mm x 85mm

The good news is that other companies also make this style of mask. So does anyone have recommendations for PPF2/KF94 Korean-style respirators? I'd love it if they came in fun colors, but it's more important that they're trustworthy and reasonably priced.

The folks in r/Masks4All recommend Savewo (Family Masks in the US site), Breatheteq, WellBefore, and Vida as substitutes.

Anyone familiar with any of these?

Or just tell me what you're wearing these days.

Another Ana and Din mystery. It was fine! But, like the first book, it lacked charisma. I'd put it down fully intending to pick it back up again once I'd eaten dinner or brushed my teeth or ensured the kitten wasn't quietly unravelling the fabric of the universe, but once I got back I'd do literally anything but pick it up again, sometimes leaving the actual book open next to me while I played hours of picross, watched trashy documentaries on Netflix, or read articles I'd had languishing in open tabs for months.

The world is interesting, but the main characters still aren't doing it for me. Like the first book, I was more intrigued by the secondary characters. Here, the warden Malo with her brash confidence, traumatic past, and uncertain future, and in the last book, the investigator who was better with a sword than a notebook and whom I'd inadvertently—and with absolutely no encouragement from the text—pictured as Gimli from The Lord of The Rings movies. Din, in many ways, reads as a means to an end, a recording device more than a fully developed person with his own voice and thoughts, and Ana, well, I figured out what she was before Din, but that's not saying much.

Contains: smoking (especially as a form of self-medication); hereditary enslavement; descriptions of violence and dead bodies; body horror.