Dolls and puppets by Jusaburo Tsujimura

Art by Andres Rios

I

with #3!!!!!!!

I’m fucking WHEEZING

That post about rural America, Russia and China having the same energy reminds me of something that comes up every time someone here hears I grew up in Australia - people will be like “oh wow! so living here in Finland is the total opposite of what you’re used to” but you have to realise that the moment I first felt oddly at home here was when I was working in Inari village and one of the other guys there gestured at the lake before saying “we race snowmobiles on that in summer. Turns out they work on water”. Finland hides being a hick country behind a Helsinki-shaped smokescreen in the same way Australia tries to hide behind its 3 entire large cities, but if you go further north than about Jyväskylä (or drive an hour out of Sydney) you will know the truth and part of that truth is that all hick places in the world are the same. Someone in the forest near Kemi is probably trying to combine car modding and grilling like that Chinese guy did right this very second, and so is someone in the desert brush near Broken Hill, and the only difference is what kind of weather-repellent hat they’re wearing

ATTENTION UNITED STATES CITIZENS:

a US federal LAW was just created that allows you to SMACK anyone who replies “THE SKY” when you ask them whats up

FOLLOW FOR MORE OFFICIAL LAW UPDATES

BRAIN WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME

YOU MUST DESTROY THE OLD AND UNKIND PARTS OF YOURSELF LIKE A SLEDGEHAMMER TO THE ROTTING DRYWALL OF IDENTITY THERE CAN BE NO RENOVATION NO EXPANSION WITHOUT DEMOLITION

I really enjoy just existing in hotels. The long identical hallways. The soulless abstract art. The weird noises the air-conditioner makes. Strange city lights in the window. Six stories off the ground. Strangers chatting in the hall. Nothing in the dresser. No past, but an infinite present. 

Finally, Someone Understands

The myth of Achilles, but instead of holding him by the heel, Thetis sumberges him fully so that Achilles is completely invulnerable and Thetis has one invulnerable hand.

She only needs one oven mitt when taking cookies out of the oven.

But there would still be two small parts of him that are vulnerable because they were covered by her fingertips at the time, stopping the water from touching them. Which means those fingertips are also vulnerable on her hand 

Achilles *putting those little round band-aids on two parts of his ankle before battle*

Thetis *knitting fingertip oven mitts for her thumb and forefinger*

This is a Greek comedy I could get behind 

What if she put him in a sack and dunked him in? The water would saturate the sack and soak him and so long as she pulled him out quick, he wouldn't drown. Then they'd have a sack that's invulnerable too and can be used as the most unexpected shield ever.

Imagine Achilles storming Troy with one (1) invulnerable sack for a shield

thetis just sticks him in one of these bad boys

and swirls him around like a batch of chicken nuggets until he’s invulnerable all over. 

i don’t know nothing about mooming but i am best friends with that three inch tall onion head FREAK that looks like an 80 year old 2 year old

this thing is every swear word personified

I’ve been on a  Discworld re-read for about a year now, and it just struck me how Pterry gets progressively angrier and less subtle about it throughout the series.

Like, we start out nice and easy with Rincewind who’s on some wacky adventures and ha ha ha oh golly that Twoflower sure is silly and the Luggage is epic, where can I get one. Meanwhile Rincewind just wants to live out his boring days as a boring Librarian but is dragged along against his will by an annoying little tourist guy and honestly? Fuck this.

We get the first view of Sam Vimes, and he’s just a drunken beaten down sod who wants to spend his last days as a copper in some dive but oh fuck now he has to fight a dragon and honestly? Fuck this. 

The first time we see Granny Weatherwax, she’s just a cranky old woman who has never set foot outside her village but oh fuck now she has to guide this weird girl who should be a witch but is apparently a wizard all the way down to Ankh Morpork and honestly? Fuck this.

Like, these books deal with grumpy, cranky people.  But mostly, the early books are a lot of fun. Sure, they have messages about good and evil and the weirdness of the world, and they’re good messages too, but mostly they are just wacky romps through a world that’s just different enough that we can have a good laugh about it without taking things too much to heart.

But then you get to Small Gods, in which organized religion is eviscerated so thorouhgly that if it was human, even the Quisition would say it’s gone a bit too far while at the same time not condemning people having faith which is kind of an important distinction.

You get to Men at Arms and I encourage everybody with an opinion on the Second Amendment to read that one. 

You get to Jingo, Monstrous Regiment, Going Postal (featuring an evil CEO who is squeezing his own company dry to get to every last penny, not caring one lick about his product or his workers or his customers or anything else and who, coincidentally, works out of Tump Tower. I’m not making this up). 

And just when you think, whew, this is getting a bit much but hey, look, he wrote YA as well! And it’s about this cute little girl who wants to be a witch and has help from a lot of rowdy blue little men, this will be fun! A bit of a break from all the anger!

Wrong. 

The Tiffany Aching books are the angriest of all. But you know what the great thing is? 

The great thing is that Pterry’s anger is the kind of fury that makes you want to get up and do something about it. It upsets you, sure. But it also says It’s up to you to change all of this. And you can change all of this, and even if you can’t. Do it anyway. Because magicians have calculated that million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten.

It’s the kind of anger that gives you purpose, and it gives you hope. And that concludes my essay about why the Discworld series is so gloriously cathartic to read when it seems like all the world is going to shit.

So go. Read them, get angry and then get up and fight. Fight for truth. Justice. Freedom. Reasonably priced love and, most importantly, a hard-boiled egg.

GNU Terry Pratchett.

No one is allowed to use the word “postmodernism” because none of you know what it fucking means

post modernism is when I don’t like stuff

This guy’s got the right idea

I realized that some of recovering from depression is changing your perspective on things. So I made my very first two-sided embroidery!

(etsy)

That’s genius

Holy cannoli…I love this project so much!!

This is really clever and really well done! If it were me, I would frame this in a double-sided glass frame, and hang it in a window, so the viewer could always enjoy both sides.

i think sometimes when we see the weight of systemic oppression / crushing capitalism / pain and destruction it feels overwhelining and stuns us into inaction because it feels like there is SO MUCH that needs to be done, but you alone don’t need to solve it all. what you can do is find your own strength, and use that to help to make your community / this world a more loving and safer space, we can all contribute to revolution and it’s not solely through front line activism, but through cooking, teaching, art making, healthcare, growing food, organizing, etc

candles are how we keep fires as pets

this is unnecessarily adorable

THANK YOU  THANK YOU  THANK YOU