Monday | 10.16.23

...They really called me and had me come in for an "interview" just to say they weren't actually hiring. I was in and out in less than five minutes -- they didn't even ask any questions or anything. What the fuck was the point of any of that??? What an absolute waste of time!

...I feel so pathetic for being kind of excited for it. Like just fuck me, I guess, for having any kind of ambitions whatsoever....

In more positive news, someone bought one of the zines I put up on Etsy! I was feeling nosy, so I looked up the name and it might be someone who collects LGBT literature, newsletters, pamphlets, etc. If it's the same guy (or even if it isn't, it's cool either way), someone with the same name donated a large collection of LGBT materials to a university and sponsors a fellowship for people out of state to go research and write a paper based on what they learn. It's open to "independent scholars," as well, and you get a living stipend and other stuff while there.

I had never heard of that sort of thing before, but that would genuinely be such a dream opportunity! I stayed up until five am last night researching some other ones; really might have to apply next year!

Honestly, I wish patrons were still a thing, that someone would pay you to make art, etc. My ideal life would be like the relationship between Tchaikovsky and Nadezhda von Meck -- being paid to make art and sending back and forth emotional personal letters, while never meeting face to face, even when living in the same house... Or maybe something like Celestial Mechanics by Olivia Waite, where a rich widow pays for a woman to translate a book of mathematical theories. Or even how they used to have feminist book stores back in the 70's and 80's and you could work there and publish your writing etc, and have a sense of community...

*sigh* It's sad how the internet / capitalism / etc has actually made everything so much worse than it was before. No one wants to buy paintings -- you could look at a painting whenever you want online of any subject in just a few taps (and yes, via AI, but also in general). No one wants to buy handbound books -- you could buy a shitty notebook from Amazon for a fraction of the cost! Everything is an oversaturated market, everything is available at once -- all of the products, all of the information and art from the whole of human history can be easily accessed at your leisure!

And it's all too much. You get caught staring down the Library of Babel and it overwhelms you. Instead of even attempting to read anything, you just crawl into one of the hexagon-shaped cubbies and cry. There's no sense of community -- only the totality of humanity screaming at you all at once trying to get your attention. Decision paralysis and overstimulation to the extreme.

...but it's better to not dwell in those sorts of thoughts.

Thursday | 10.12.23

The interview is tomorrow (just realized that's Friday the 13th, yeesh!). Again, I'm not, like, actually sure what it is I'm gonna be doing there or what the pay is going to be or anything? Even back when I first applied, there was a section on the application that asked "have you been informed what the duties of the job are and will you be able to do them?" and it's like... no clue. It was a paper application and when I handed it in, I asked someone and she said, "It's fine, just mark it off." ...Okay?

Again, I think I do need to, like, re-enter society a bit, though... *sigh*

Anyway! I made a little needle felted Kilala!

She's quite a bit bigger than other things I've made, actually. Birb for comparison:

And she took three full 3g bags of white and off-white wool, so I'm gonna have to reorder that... I kinda had a lot of trouble with shaping her and getting the proportions down, honestly, rip. It'll just take more practice, I guess..

I also used an armature for the first time! It's a bit of a pain in the ass because you have to try to felt around the wires (which is really difficult in thin parts, like tiny legs!), but then the end result is poseable, which really sets this medium apart from something like polymer clay. I also tried to add loose fluff and that also creates a cool effect! ...Her tails were originally more fluffy like her mane, but since they're pretty thin, the needle would go all the way through and flatten the other side to the point that you can't really fix it. There might be a better way to do it, but :/

At the end of the day, though, I think she did turn out cute! And I learned a lot from making her, so I guess that's all that matters..

Saturday | 10.07.23

In the last entry, I mentioned how I was really interested in the idea of zines, right? I finally got my printer working and made a few!

They're available on my Etsy, if you were interested in buying one! I edited that Demonization essay so it's typeset prettily with art from various editions of Baudelaire's Fleurs du Mal and reworded some things, fixed some typos (there are so many typos in the actual essay on the site, I'm sorry! I'm also kinda too lazy to go back and fix it, but I swear I tried to proofread it a while ago, but I think I ended up just adding more typos in the process! It's just soo difficult to proofread something written in HTML!), but otherwise it's basically the same as the version on the site. Again, I just thought: a) it'd be fun to typeset something, b) that physical copies hit differently than reading something on the internet... regardless of whether anyone's interested, I think I'm gonna make myself some hard copies of my other essays as well.

Also, a job I applied to quite a while ago finally got back to me. Gonna call back on Monday to set up the interview. It's not really a good position, but something is better than nothing, yeah...?

I think I'm starting to go a bit stir-crazy, actually. I'm having trouble focusing on doing one thing, I'm just kinda jumping around, a little of this, how about this?, read a chapter of that, etc. And not actually getting anything done...

And I've been looking into a couple of fandomy challenges on Dreamwidth. I've got one prompt down for Ladies' Bingo already (it's Simpsons fanfic, looking at Marge & Lisa's complicated mother-daughter relationship).

...and I'm being yelled at, so I guess I'll just end this entry here. See ya!