Helpful things

my side blog for helpful things

[shutyourmoustache]

Making exercises more accessible to the disabled? Fuck yeah!

[megacarapa]

ok so this is another long shot but a few years ago there was a twitter post (in japanese i think?) that had measurememts for how to make this book stand thing out of cardboard that you could use to double up books and use up more space on shelves

back then i made a bunch of these but by now i lost the pic and dont know how to find the original post anymore

if it comes down to it i can just take one apart and get the measurements from there but i would be very grateful if anyone happens to have the original post or something similar??

[megacarapa]

don't mind how long it's been since i made this post, anyway i realized that i don't even need to take one apart to get the measurements when i can literally just unfold it and refold it /FACEPALM

so anyway here is the diagram for anyone else who is interested!!

this requires pretty big carboard pieces, if you have a really big box or something you can make it from one piece, but if you don't, you can also just make each of the pieces individually and then tape them together

and then in the end you put it together like this!!

and then when you make a bunch you can put them all next to each other and stack your books like crazy

EVERYONE START GETTING MORE USE OUT OF YOUR SPACE NOW!!!!

[only-tiktoks]

[fieldbears]

Sharing the secrets of your hearth with strangers who will never be able to meet or thank you. Honoring the dead through learning their traditions of the home; emulation and exaltation. A good carrot cake.

[harcodia]

Screenshots for those who want to try to make the recipes. One was completely blocked by text but I thought maybe someone would like to make them ♡

Someone with better typing skills if ya wanna type em up..... ♡

[trainsofthought]

I looked up the obscured grave with the blueberry pie recipe:

From Margaret Davis

GLAZED BLUEBERRY PIE

- Soften a 3 oz. pkg. cream cheese.

- Spread in bottom of cooled, cooked pastry shell.

- Fill shell with 3 cups of blueberries.

- To an additional 1 cup of blueberries add 1 cup of water.

- Bring just to boiling.

- Simmer 2 min.

- Strain reserving juice, about ½ cup.

- Combine ¾ cup sugar, and 2 tablespoons corn starch.

- Gradually add reserved juice.

- Cook, stirring constantly until thick and clear.

- Cool slightly and add:

- 2 tablespoons lemon juice

- Pour over berries in pastry shell and chill.

the others are:

From Kathryn Andrews

KAY’S FUDGE

- 2 SQ. chocolate

- 2 TBS. butter

- Melt on low heat

- Stir in 1 cup milk

- Bring to boil

- 3 cups sugar

- 1 TSP. vanilla

- Pinch of salt

- Cook to softball stage

- Pour on marble slab

- Cool & Beat & Eat

From Naomi Odessa Miller-Dawson

SPRITZ COOKIES

- 1 cup of butter ormargarine

- ¾ cup sugar

- 1 teaspoon vanilla

- 1 egg

- 2 ¼ cups of flour

- ½ teaspoon baking powder.

- ⅛ teaspoon salt

From Constance Galberd

CONNIE’S DATE & NUT BREAD

100% Good Stuff - 0% Bad Stuff

Ingredients:

- 8 oz. dates cut into small pieces

- 1 cup raisins

- 2 cups boiling water

- 2 tsp. baking soda

- 1 ½ cups sugar

- 2 eggs, well beaten

- 4 cups flour

- 2 tsp. baking powder

- ½ cup chopped nuts

Directions:

- Pour boiling water (where 2 tsp. of baking soda have been dissolved) over dates and raisins. Cool.

- Add 1 ½ C. sugar and mix well.

- Add 2 eggs, well beaten.

- Gradually mix in 4 C. of flour and 2 tsp. of baking powder. Beat thoroughly.

- Add ½ C. of chopped nuts. Beat thoroughly.

- Bake at 350 for ¾ - 1 hr.

Bake in tin cans.

One batch = 13 small cans

From Christine Hammills

A GOOD CARROT CAKE

CARROT CAKE

Ingredients:

- 2 cups flour

- 4 eggs

- 2 tsp. baking powder

- 2 cups sugar

- 1 ½ tsp. soda

- 1 ½ cups oil

- 1 tsp. salt

- 2 cups grated carrots

- 2 tsp. cinnamon

- 1 (8 ½ oz.) crushed pineapple, drained

- ⅔ cup chopped nuts

Directions:

- Sift together flour, baking powder, soda salt, and cinnamon.

- Beat eggs and add sugar.

-Let stand 10 mins.

-Mix in oil, pineapple, carrots, nuts, flour mixture.

-Turn into 3 greased and floured 9-inch round cake pans.

-Bake at 350’ for 35 – 40 min.

-Cool in pans for 10 min, remove to wire racks, and cool well.

VANILLA CREAM CHEESE FROSTING

Ingredients:

- ½ cup butter

- 1 (8 oz.) cream cheese

- 1 tsp. vanilla

- 1 pound powdered sugar, sifted

Directions:

- Mix butter, cream cheese, vanilla then add sugar. First between layers, top and sides.

From Annabell Gunderson

ANNABELL’S SNICKERDOODLES

Mix Thoroughly:

- 1 c shortening

- 1 c margarine

- 3 c sugar

- 4 eggs

Sift Together And Stir In:

- 5 ½ c flour

- 4 tsp cream of tartar

- 2 tsp soda

- ½ tsp salt

Directions:

- Roll (softly) into balls the size of small walnuts.

- Roll in mixture of 6 tsp sugar and 6 tsp cinnamon.

- Place 2" apart on ungreased cookie sheet.

- Bake at 375 F for 8-10 minutes or 400 F for 6-8 until lightly brown, but still soft.

Secret is: Keep dough fluffy!

[stahsm]

Overlock Stitch by @clothes_reetzy

[thatisuseful]

Damn, that's useful

[misselaney]

Natural Black Hair Tutorial! Usually Black hair is excluded in the hair tutorials which I have seen so I have gone through it in depth because it’s really not enough to tell someone simply, “Black hair is really curly, draw it really curly.” 

The next part of Black Hair In Depth will feature styles and ideas for designing characters and I will release it around February. If you would like to see certain styles, please shoot me a message!

[smallrevolutionary]

YES! BOOSTINGGGG FOR MY FOLKS WHO WANNA/NEED TO KNOW HOW

[theelectricdreamsofddx]

Hey, wanna make music? Yeah? Got a buncha money? No? Well that's perfectly fine, check this free stuff out:

Vital - A powerful wavetable synth, my personal favorite VST synth, very easy to figure out creating new synth sounds, with the help of the plenty of tutorials that are out there for the plug-in. (There are paid versions but they are completely unnecessary to get 99% of the features of the plug-in.)

Synth1 - A classic piece of synthesizer software.

Pendulate - An interesting, chaotic synth that you can make weird little sounds with.

Native Instruments' free plug-ins - Various cool VSTs, including the Komplete Start pack.

The Free Orchestra - A set of orchestral instruments for Kontakt Player (see previous link).

BBC Symphony Orchestra Discover - More orchestral stuff! This one has its own player so you don't have to download a separate VST to use it if you don't want to.

Magical 8bit Plug - A chiptune plug-in, intended for producing sounds like that of 8-bit systems like the NES and Master System.

Genny - A synth VST made to emulate the soundchip of the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive.

MT Power Drum Kit - A nice rock n' roll style drum kit plug-in.

This guy's weird VST collection - 6.4 gigabytes of weird VSTs, including some you might know, like Delay Lama and MeowSynth!

sforzando - A free player for soundfont files.

Musical Artifacts - A resource I mainly use to find soundfonts, on which you can find other various things as well.

Kilohearts Essentials - 30 effect VSTs including reverb, delay, compression, pitch shifting, transient shaping, ring modulation, phase distortion, and more.

Xfer's freeware VSTs - Exactly what it says on the tin, including the one and only OTT compressor.

Illformed - The good ol' dblue Glitch 1.3, Crusher, Stretch, and TapeStop.

Hysteresis and Fracture - Two interesting glitch effects, one being a delay and the other being a buffer.

Codec - A cool digital audio degradation effect.

Le Phonk - A slick distortion plug-in.

MAIM - An effect that mimics the sound of MP3 compression.

Soundly Shape it and Place it - One is simply an equalizer VST, the other is an effect that emulates a speaker (ex: a radio) and a space (ex: a cave).

Fresh Air - An effect that adds high end information to your sounds, to provide brightness.

ValhallaSupermassive - A combo reverb and delay plug-in that sounds quite big.

UnplugRed - A collection of various interesting VSTs, most of which have free versions.

Chowdhury DSP - I can't personally speak for all of these but their tape model effect is great for some lo-fi style effects.

TAL-Chorus-LX - A thick sounding chorus, good for "retro" sounds too.

Polyverse Wider - A great effect for widening sounds up, really simple too with only two controls.

Freesound - A good audio file resource, mainly for foley recordings.

Cymbatics Dubstep Starter Pack - A little sample pack with some good drum and synth samples.

fishmonger drum kit - A pack of samples from the album 'fishmonger' by Underscores!

WangleLine's sample packs - Free samples put out by my awesome mutual WangleLine!

aaand I might as well include this set of drums I made awhile back :P

As for DAWs, it's been a long while since I've used anything other than FL Studio (not counting Audacity, which I still occasionally use for specific purposes), which, while being the only one I can directly recommend, is paid. However, I've heard good things about Reaper which has a "free trial" that you can technically use forever, akin to WinRAR. Additionally, I've also heard some good things about Waveform Free.

[aphidclan-clangen]

(my script is in the alt text if ever the font is hard to read)

I’ve been getting a lot of asks wondering how I go about picking my colors for character designs, pages, backgrounds, etc, pretty much anything about color in general, and I figured in some attempt to try to answer them all at once, here’s my attempt at a color-centric art tutorial! I’m far from an expert on the subject, and I haven’t received any formal training on the matter, so this is entirely constructed of ideas I’ve gleaned from a bunch of snippets of different people’s advice over the years, studying other people’s art, and experimenting on my own to create something that works for me. Nonetheless, I feel passionate about the subject, and I hope this is able to help make color “click!” like a key in a hole for anyone who reads it. I had to discover my key-click moment on my own through trial and error, but i don’t believe in gatekeeping advice, so hopefully I can help you skip the trouble I went through lmfao.

None of this is meant to be like… a shaming or judgmental authoritative truth of “this is how it must always be done! anything outside of my vision is wrong and morally bad! Harrumph!!!” Especially since this is random shit I’ve figured out on my own with no formal training. It’s more just “if you are looking for something to ease your strain, perhaps this might help you give you what you need to have an easier time!” But most of the time I don’t even color my illustrations the way I do in this tutorial. Usually I try to balance & combine these principles with the “standard colors” that a scene is “supposed to be,” like if the ground is a concrete gray and the trees are green, I’ll keep them looking gray and green (depending on the lighting), but with the knowledge of “I want this to be a sad scene, so I’ll make the grays and greens lean heavily closer to blue, so the audience knows that it’s time to be sad.” Stuff like that. They’re cheat codes for strategic intent, not strict rules.

Now hopefully when it comes to covering more specific things, like how I design my characters, you guys now know the baseline foundation I’m running off of so I don’t have to explain all of this first before I get into the nitty-gritty hairs of “why I made this character purple and green vs why this character is blue and yellow” lmao.

Color is a hard subject to explain! Most of the color theory explanations I’ve heard primarily cover stuff like the science of reflecting light, then name drops all the famous kinds of color palettes, tells me what a cool vs warm color is, explains nothing else, and dips. Which, personally, has literally never been helpful for me when it comes to understanding why the fuck my painting should include the color blue in the shadows. Heaven forbid applying any of that shit to character design. Ough. No I had to figure that out on my own lmfao. So therefore this tutorial is more skewed towards that kind of perspective, someone who doesn’t really benefit (at least at this skill level) from the scientific cerebral shit. I want to know the why behind your creative choices!!! Tell me why the curtains must be blue!! That’s what’s important to me on a practical level. Dont get me wrong, I’m sure one day I’ll learn the purpose behind the scientific stuff, I’m sure there’s a reason behind it, but you’ve gotta figure out how to take the first steps at all to begin with before I can get to the master level stuff of like………scientifically understanding how bounce light works. And if we don’t understand why the curtains are blue, I don’t think we’re gonna get why the bounce light should be blue, too. So I wanted to explain it!!! I wanted to cover it!! Because I’ve never seen it explained before!!! And it’s important to know the why!!!

And uhm. Hopefully I managed to do an alright job at that lol. I hope you guys enjoy! <3

[a-literate-chicken]

Bro I was just complaining about struggling with this! This is so incredibly helpful and makes so much more sense than the other things I was finding online

[outerspacekat-deactivated201801]

ADVICE FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT HAVING A GOOD DAY:

wait until it gets dark and make tea or coffee or hot chocolate, or if it’s too hot outside make yourself a healthy smoothie with your favorite things in it at any point during the day

put on your favorite underwear, it helps, trust me, it’s an old family secret (i’m not kidding)

if you have a pet, play the “how many things can i stick on you until you move or get mad” game (bonus points if they fall asleep, extra bonus points if a family member sees you and tells you to quit it, extra double ultra points if they join in)

rip a peice of paper into as many little pieces as you can

go to animeseason.com and click “random anime” until you see one that looks completely ridiculous (or actually good) and watch the first episode. repeat if it sucked or if you get bored halfway through

spend at least an hour making a music playlist for how you feel right now and save it for now or when you feel a bad mood rise again

curl up in bed and cover yourself with blankets and pillows and put in music and just lay there for a while (sleeping is also good)

eat everything

drink lots of water

it’s okay bad moods don’t last forever!!!!!! i promise!!! you will be yourself soon and there are people who love you very much, don’t be afraid to reach out to them

you are lovely

eat lots of bananas

[asoftgoblin]

here are some more friends

i bet there is still a box of crayons in your house somewhere (if not you can get them cheap during back-to-school sales); find them and use them (maybe while watching ridiculous anime)

sunshine if you can manage it or just a sun lamp trust me it matters more than you think especially in winter

hugs even if they are stuffed animals or your pet or your pillow whatever is on hand

if you’ve got a favorite lotion/soap/thing that is scented use it liberally

cry if you need, if it doesn’t start by itself or if you don’t want to attract attention put on a sad movie so you have an excuse

write this down to pull out on future bad days:

it is okay to have a day where you don’t get things done

it is okay not to have a reason for feeling bad

taking care of yourself is a worthwhile use of time

if you still don’t feel better it is not your fault (and it is okay to ask for help)

[dino-dancer]

@daysleftofsecondterm

[daysleftofsecondterm]

And may I say, before the crowd of “self care isn’t always fun” crowd rolls in… not with that attitude it’s not.

[kedreeva]

shower/bath (being dirty/sticky/warm/cold when you don’t want to be can make a bad day worse, and sometimes slapping on some music and sitting in bath stew with a cold drink or taking a cold shower or whatever will give your system time to handle/deplete stress chemicals)

brush teeth (see above)

go outside without a screen and sit, lay down, stand, or walk and just look at the space around you/the sky for a few minutes. Take your break at work someplace you can see outside if you can.

Close your eyes and happy-paws knead a pillow for a couple minutes.

call or message someone you like and ask them about something they like. listening to someone I like talk to me about something they like tends to cheer me up and remind me there are good things, and gets me out of my own head. plus I get to talk to someone I like, and make their day better, too.

do some stretches for the endorphins

[midwinterhunt]

hot artists don't gatekeep

I've been resource gathering for YEARS so now I am going to share my dragons hoard

Floorplanner. Design and furnish a house for you to use for having a consistent background in your comic or anything! Free, you need an account, easy to use, and you can save multiple houses.

Comparing Heights. Input the heights of characters to see what the different is between them. Great for keeping consistency. Free.

Magma. Draw online with friends in real time. Great for practice or hanging out. Free, paid plan available, account preferred.

Smithsonian Open Access. Loads of free images. Free.

SketchDaily. Lots of pose references, massive library, is set on a timer so you can practice quick figure drawing. Free.

SculptGL. A sculpting tool which I am yet to master, but you should be able to make whatever 3d object you like with it. free.

Pexels. Free stock images. And the search engine is actually pretty good at pulling up what you want.

Figurosity. Great pose references, diverse body types, lots of "how to draw" videos directly on the site, the models are 3d and you can rotate the angle, but you can't make custom poses or edit body proportions. Free, account option, paid plans available.

Line of Action. More drawing references, this one also has a focus on expressions, hands/feet, animals, landscapes. Free.

Animal Photo. You pose a 3d skull model and select an animal species, and they give you a bunch of photo references for that animal at that angle. Super handy. Free.

Height Weight Chart. You ever see an OC listed as having a certain weight but then they look Wildly different than the number suggests? Well here's a site to avoid that! It shows real people at different weights and heights to give you a better idea of what these abstract numbers all look like. Free to use.

[narrettwist]

Homie gonna share this

[aphidclan-clangen]

(my script is in the alt text if ever the font is hard to read)

I’ve been getting a lot of asks wondering how I go about picking my colors for character designs, pages, backgrounds, etc, pretty much anything about color in general, and I figured in some attempt to try to answer them all at once, here’s my attempt at a color-centric art tutorial! I’m far from an expert on the subject, and I haven’t received any formal training on the matter, so this is entirely constructed of ideas I’ve gleaned from a bunch of snippets of different people’s advice over the years, studying other people’s art, and experimenting on my own to create something that works for me. Nonetheless, I feel passionate about the subject, and I hope this is able to help make color “click!” like a key in a hole for anyone who reads it. I had to discover my key-click moment on my own through trial and error, but i don’t believe in gatekeeping advice, so hopefully I can help you skip the trouble I went through lmfao.

None of this is meant to be like… a shaming or judgmental authoritative truth of “this is how it must always be done! anything outside of my vision is wrong and morally bad! Harrumph!!!” Especially since this is random shit I’ve figured out on my own with no formal training. It’s more just “if you are looking for something to ease your strain, perhaps this might help you give you what you need to have an easier time!” But most of the time I don’t even color my illustrations the way I do in this tutorial. Usually I try to balance & combine these principles with the “standard colors” that a scene is “supposed to be,” like if the ground is a concrete gray and the trees are green, I’ll keep them looking gray and green (depending on the lighting), but with the knowledge of “I want this to be a sad scene, so I’ll make the grays and greens lean heavily closer to blue, so the audience knows that it’s time to be sad.” Stuff like that. They’re cheat codes for strategic intent, not strict rules.

Now hopefully when it comes to covering more specific things, like how I design my characters, you guys now know the baseline foundation I’m running off of so I don’t have to explain all of this first before I get into the nitty-gritty hairs of “why I made this character purple and green vs why this character is blue and yellow” lmao.

Color is a hard subject to explain! Most of the color theory explanations I’ve heard primarily cover stuff like the science of reflecting light, then name drops all the famous kinds of color palettes, tells me what a cool vs warm color is, explains nothing else, and dips. Which, personally, has literally never been helpful for me when it comes to understanding why the fuck my painting should include the color blue in the shadows. Heaven forbid applying any of that shit to character design. Ough. No I had to figure that out on my own lmfao. So therefore this tutorial is more skewed towards that kind of perspective, someone who doesn’t really benefit (at least at this skill level) from the scientific cerebral shit. I want to know the why behind your creative choices!!! Tell me why the curtains must be blue!! That’s what’s important to me on a practical level. Dont get me wrong, I’m sure one day I’ll learn the purpose behind the scientific stuff, I’m sure there’s a reason behind it, but you’ve gotta figure out how to take the first steps at all to begin with before I can get to the master level stuff of like………scientifically understanding how bounce light works. And if we don’t understand why the curtains are blue, I don’t think we’re gonna get why the bounce light should be blue, too. So I wanted to explain it!!! I wanted to cover it!! Because I’ve never seen it explained before!!! And it’s important to know the why!!!

And uhm. Hopefully I managed to do an alright job at that lol. I hope you guys enjoy! <3

[a-literate-chicken]

Bro I was just complaining about struggling with this! This is so incredibly helpful and makes so much more sense than the other things I was finding online

[unusual]

Japanese is an incredibly fun and rewarding language (if you’ve ever wanted to learn it for ANY reason, most importantly including the “silly” reasons) but the fearmongering and capitalist intervention involved in the language learning process have given it a reputation as an “impossible task” for English speakers, leading to confusion and dkn learners and weird pessimist attitudes about the whole thing. In this thread I will explain how to effectively learn and retain Japanese. This is a tried, tested and true method; probably 99% of all people who try to learn Japanese give up, but everyone I’ve met who has tried and stuck with this has been at or above N3-N4 after 6 months or less including me

[unusual]

You can teach yourself Japanese for free if you have a little free time every day and a computer

1. Drill yourself on hiragana and katakana. These are the phonetic building blocks of Japanese, think of them as equivalent to english letters. This site is a good resource in general. Once you have a solid grasp on this, DO NOT LINGER HERE; move to step 2. You will master kana later.

2. Download Anki. This is a flashcard service. They have a paid app if you’re willing to invest for it, but if not, they have a mobile website (create an account and sync it with your computer).

This is the deck you’re going to download. Import it to Anki and do this every day. I have learned the hard way (twice) that skipping this is bad. If you become overwhelmed, you can change the number of new cards and reviews by clicking the cog next to the name of the deck!

3. Cure Dolly (Youtube, grammar) + transcript. She has kind of a posh accent, you might want to turn subtitles on. Watch a few videos when you feel like it but most importantly set up 4 and 5 as soon as possible

4. Yomitan (must have) is a browser extension that functions as a pop-up dictionary. you need to install dictionaries for it to work. here are some dictionaries you can use with yomitan and explanations of what they do

5. READ. DO NOT LET YOURSELF GET STUCK BEFORE THIS STEP. JUST READ!!!! Most people who fail to learn Japanese do so because they are afraid of not being ready to move on, which is counterproductive. Just read. When you were a child did you spend years on vocab and grammar before reading? No I bet you did not. Pick something to read and learn what you don’t already know by reading in Japanese.

Jiten.moe has a list of novels and visual novels that you can read on your computer sorted by difficulty. So does jpdb. There’s also this document. There’s also this document. Hey look this website is cool too

For visual novels: download LunaHook. It “hooks” to your VN and allows you to use Yomitan on words you don’t know. Turn off the translation feature, it does nothing to help you learn

For literary texts: ttsu e-reader supports epub and htmlz files.

You can also learn Japanese by watching anime, but it’s a little more convoluted and requires a lot more patience.

For manga, utilize Mangatan, but I don’t recommend this right out the gate because when you’re first learning sentence structure you’ll want something with complete sentences.

Set your computer up for mining vocab before you start reading. Once you finish your kaishi deck, you can drill your mining cards (I didn’t do mine until after finishing kaishi because it was too much).

Most importantly: reading is going to be hard at first. It is going to piss you off. You need to muscle through with this because this is where the bulk of your learning will happen. After a while you will just feel like reading because you love reading! Try not to pick something too hard for your first read, but if you’re interested in the story you might be able to muscle through something a little tougher.

Remember to consult yomitan and cure dolly where needed, that’s what it’s there for. As you can see I am quite normal about the Japanese language, so if you have any other questions or need help with anything else feel free to shoot me an ask and I will get back to you promptly. Japanese is not your enemy and it is not impossible. It is your friend

[talesfromthecrypts]

They actually make physical media for a much larger percentage of movies than they ever did in the past. Often with a lot more care than any small release was treated in the early dvd days. Its just if you only watch streaming stuff or the big new recent box office hits you won't see that. It is so ridiculously easy to get physical media for movies that even 5 years ago you couldn't even find. Like yes Netflix is a stingy bastard but so many things are available on disc WITH special features than ever before

[talesfromthecrypts]

And here is where you can get them! (mostly American)

Diabolikdvd

Grindhouse Video

Deep Discount

OrbitDVD

Barnes and Noble

And specific labels:

Kino Lorber

Criterion

Arrow Films (UK based)

Shout Factory

Eureka (UK based)

Vinegar Syndrome

Synapse

Warner Archive

Indicator/Powerhouse (UK based)

Severin

Second Sight (UK based)

Umbrella (Australia based)

And many of these have sales several times a year so if you're patient you don't need to buy full price for any of it.

[croxovergoddess]

My “draw the squad” memes so far

[croxovergoddess]

Also you can buy my Ref folder here 

Patreon

[croxovergoddess]

[croxovergoddess]

Updating with some newer ones!

[theawesomeraccoon]

@mexicanesecat @raimeyl references for y'all!

[amira-zahirah]

WOW! THE OG POST!

[blintzy-pumpkin]

i will let my mind go wild with these knowing i’ll finally be able to credit the original artist

[mothanon-deactivated20200918]

EEEE FINALLY THE ORIGINAL ARTIST

[embergeist]

Oh hell yeah, going to use these later!

[boiled-teeth-and-eggs]

FINALLY! PINTEREST GO SUCK DICK WE FOUND THE SOURCE!

[croxovergoddess]

Pinterest is one of the reasons why I’m broke

[croxovergoddess]

Speaking of broke, my newest ref folder’s full of new DTS doodles is out NOW!

Buy it in my Ko-Fi store!

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

listen I ended up regretting saying anything about this on my old blog because people will interpret literally any and every statement maliciously on this hellsite but I want to start like. a helpline for people who are like “hey I pretty much only read YA but I’m like 22 now and don’t relate to teenagers as much, it’s such a shame that there are no fun books written for adults :(” because boy HOWDY are there some fun books for adults 

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

maybe I’ll start a big google doc or something one day but for now *deep breath*

The Beautiful Ones (Silvia Moreno-Garcia) - absolutely BUCKWILD romance with a dash of telekinesis; nonstop high society drama and misunderstanding from start to finish, happy ending guaranteed. STRONGLY recommend if you, like me, are a basic bitch who enjoys a bit of Pride and Prejudice. 

Binti (Nnedi Okorafor) - a math prodigy runs away from Earth to become the first of her people to attend a prestigious university in space, but shit gets real when a crew of hostile jellyfish aliens attack her ship. 

Chilling Effect (Valerie Valdes) - a spaceship captain and her crew take on a series of convoluted missions in order to rescue the captain’s sister, who’s been frozen and held for ransom. 

The City of Brass (S.A. Chakraborty) - an 18th century conwoman and a mysterious djinn team up to go looking for a legendary hidden city.

The City We Became (N.K. Jemisin) - a scrappy bunch of Chosen Ones have to band together to defend New York City (which is very much alive) from a huge ass monster. 

The Empress of Forever (Max Gladstone) - a lady supervillain gets blasted into space and meets an even bigger, planet-destroying evil space empress. literally WHAT is not to like?

The Empress of Salt and Fortune (Nghi Vo) - high fantasy royal drama about a woman making her way to power in the wake of a political marriage that left without friends or allies. 

Escaping Exodus (Nicky Drayden) - a space-faring clan are creating their latest spaceship from the insides of a giant monster when absolutely everything goes to shit (as things are wont to do in science fiction stories). 

Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars (Kai Cheng Thom) - a trans girl runs away to the big city, where she uses her martial arts skills to team up with other trans woman and form a vigilante gang to defend their own when police look the other way. a fascinating blend of poetry and prose and magical realism. 

Finna (Nino Cipri) - two exes working at an IKEA have to team up to save a customer who disappeared through one of those interdimensional portals that all IKEAs have laying around. you know how it is.

Gideon the Ninth (Tamsyn Muir) - come on, you’ve heard about this one. it’s the one with the lesbian space necromancers? yeah, that’s the one. you got it.

In the Vanishers’ Palace (Aliette de Bodard) - a Beauty and the Beast retelling based in science fiction and Vietnamese fantasy, featuring a young woman falling in love with a “beast” who’s actually a motherly dragon after becoming a tutor to the dragon’s two powerful children. 

Jade City (Fonda Lee) - urban fantasy gang wars, pitting one magically enhanced family against rivals and a new drug that lets anyone mimic their abilities. 

The Library of the Unwritten (A.J. Hackwith) - hell’s librarian gets sent on a quest to find a runaway soul. 

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet (Becky Chambers) - aka one of my favorite books ever, essentially slice of life science fiction following an interspecies crew of deep space truckers making the longest and most complicated delivery of their lives. very warm and fuzzy. 

Mort (Terry Pratchett) - one of many MANY Discworld books, but a very good one to start with, following the adventures of a boy named Mort after he’s taken on as Death’s apprentice. you know, like the Grim Reaper? that Death. 

River of Teeth (Sarah Gailey) - historical AU in which the United States imported and domesticated hippos in the Mississippi River; follows a crew of hippo-riding crooks and hooligans as they plan one heck of a caper. 

Space Opera (Catherynne Valente) - a washed up rock star and his old bandmate get roped into performing in an intergalactic singing competition that will determine the fate of the entire planet Earth. full of aliens, attempted assassination, art, and emotional turmoil. 

This Is How You Lose the Time War (Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone) - time-travelling assassins from rival factions fall in love in a poetic and breathless story that spans centuries and reality. 

Under the Pendulum Sun (Jeannette Ng) - fairyland is real, and Victorian England is sending missionaries. a woman and her brother attempt to bring the good word to the fair folk, but start to suspect the queen might just be screwing with their heads. PEAK gothic horror with a creepy fairy twist. 

Witchmark (C.L. Polk) - a doctor and former soldier with magical powers of healing is trying to live a quiet life and avoid his controlling, aristocratic family’s plans for him, only to get tangled up in a massive political conspiracy when one of his patients mysterious dies. accompanying him in his investigation is a mysterious and gorgeous faerie man. romance ensues. 

[bittenwraths]

The First Sister by Linden A Lewis. Three protagonists and all of them queer, a fun space opera. It’s not out yet, but I can tell you it’s really, really good. I highly recommend

Gods of Jade and Shadow another Silvia Moreno-Garcia book. It takes place in 1920s Mexico and has Mayan gods. A fun breezy book.

Kill the Queen by Jennifer Estep. If you like YA fantasy but want a little more swearing, violence and sex then this novel is for you.

The Bridge Kingdom by Danielle Jensen. This one I really enjoyed. If you like the winner’s curse then you’ll like this book.

Books I haven’t read but I’ve heard good things about

Trouble the Saints by Alaya Dawn Johnson. This one isn’t out it but I believe it’s got a black protagonist.

Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri. An Indian inspired fantasy novel. I haven’t read this one but I’ve heard good things about it.

Rage of Dragons by Evan Winters. A black fantasy novel.

The Unspoken Name by AK Larkwood. I haven’t read it but I know it’s got a lesbian protagonist.

Song of Blood and Stone by L. Penelope. Just started this book but I believe it’s for adults.

Tiger’s Daughter by K Arsenault Rivera. Lesbian protagonists and it’s still on my tbr.

[chillgamesh-the-swing]

A great way to get back into the habit of reading and discover new authors is to pick up an anthology of shorter works. You can find them in any genre, on all kinds of specific themes, by diverse authors, and if one story isn’t your jam you can move on. A couple of my favorites are:

Biketopia: Feminist Bicycle Science Fiction in Extreme Futures;

Solarpunk: Ecological and Fantastical Stories in a Sustainable World

A People’s Future of the United States

Sisters of the Revolution: A feminist speculative fiction anthology

plus a few more full length books i like:

Singing the Dogstar Blues by Alison Goodman - space college punk with a harmonica what time travel crimes will she commit, queerplatonic human/alien relationships, very fun all around

Becky Chambers has several excellent books in the same setting as Long Way to a Small Angry Planet!

Nnedi Okorafor also has a bunch of great ones including sequels to Binti and other scifi/Afrofuturist works do NOT sleep on her

The Last Girl Scout by Natalie Ironside - if u like trans lesbians fighting zombies and nazis and vampires in the Appalachian nuclear wasteland I CANNOT recommend it enough.

[actualblanketgremlin]

Bloodsucking Fiends/Bite Me/You Suck by Christopher Moore - two new vampires navigate un-living and love in San Francisco.

A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore - What happens when the grim reaper dies? A thrift store owner gets a mysterious letter in the mail–he’s been appointed to be the grim reaper for San Francisco. The plot kicks in when a couple demons arrive and try to steal the souls of the recently deceased. Plus, there’s some crossover with the Bloodsucking Fiends trilogy! This guy really likes San Francisco as a setting.

Practical Demonkeeping by Christopher Moore (can you tell I really like this author? Lmao) - A seminary student accidentally summons an ancient demon and gives away the object that would banish him again. He then spends 70 years tracking them down again. Only problem is, he has to keep feeding the demon, who won’t leave him alone, and who is invisible. Very funny, I love Moore’s writing style. Our main character makes the demon help him cheat at pool for car repairs.

[bemusedlybespectacled]

If I might add:

A Taste of Gold and Iron by Alexandra Rowland. First of all, THE WORLDBUILDING. I can’t even explain just how much worldbuilding, but the short list: fantasy Ottoman Empire except polytheistic and matriarchal, the royal family is protected by The World’s Most Competent and Well-Treated Bodyguards, there is a legally- and socially-recognized third gender, and some people can tell the composition of metals by touching them. Second of all: Prince/bodyguard romance with a heavy dose of power dynamics kink. Very sexy. Third of all: the main plot is a political intrigue mystery involving counterfeit money. Practically tailor-made for me.

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik. Fantasy Russian Empire with three first person POV narrators, who are each living out three different but interlocking fairy-tale-esque storylines involving Ice Fey Folk and fire demons. One of them is Jewish and that (and antisemitism) inform a significant part of her story. BIG fan of the worldbuilding here as well.

The Queen’s Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner: So, the FIRST one is YA. All of the SUBSEQUENT ones are arguably more adult, as they deal with adult topics like the logistics of war and political intrigue and amputation. Alternate history Greece at war with alternate history Sumer, where everything is basically non-fantasy EXCEPT the gods are real and they communicate directly with one (1) absolute mad lad. Also lots of good world building, including in-universe myths and history.

[lunammoon]

Katabasis by R.F. Kuang

Alice Law is a grad student at Cambridge University majoring in magical studies. When she accidentally blows up her academic advisor she and her academic rival Peter go to hell to retrieve him.

[10moonymhrivertam]

I was skimming really hard so I don’t know if the Vrokosigan saga was on here but my dad enjoys that one. I cannot summarize it for you but the bits my dad has been compelled to share over the years sound pretty cool

And a couple of recommendations for books that started out as skit series —

For Whom The Belle Tolls by Jaysea Lynn. (I’ve started the book and then my brain misbehaved so I’m only ~3 chapters in) For those who would be content making customer service their forever job if only they could match energy 100% of the time. Finding family and the ability to better yourself are big here. Working through religious trauma, too. An afterlife book, so right out the gate has the weight of the MC dying of cancer.

Heart of Iron by C.M Alongi. (Have not read the book yet but love the skits) A banished faerie runs a coffee shop. A lot of the same matching energy fantasy but with more neighborhood and interspecies politics. The faerie’s ’you may call me’ is most often Violet, though in the skits she’s dubbed Bob by a customer who she eventually hires, which may also help give you an idea of the vibes (iirc. It might not be J.C. who gave her the name :P)

[teal-chimera]

i hate seeing people now making fun of those who care about privacy online. i've seen people saying things like "well they already have your data. what are companies going to do with it" and it's like, that's not the point. it's that companies /shouldn't/ be able to have my data and sell it. am i aware they probably already have my data? yes, absolutely. but i'm still going to try and keep them from monetizing it any further, why are we defending companies selling data they shouldn't have to begin with though?

[teal-chimera]

adding this to the post because, 100%, just there's a fire doesn't mean you should pour gasoline on it

[hunter-rodrigez]

I have like ten different ad and/or tracking blockers on my PC and phone... just out of pure spite

[coolestglalie-intoxicatedinkeep]

Can link it? I wish to hop aboard that train.

[hunter-rodrigez]

@drunkenbartend

Firefox with build in tracker protection

Ublock Origin adblocker for Firefox

Adguard adblocker for firefox, for everything that gets past Ublock

Mullvad VPN, one of the most reliable, cheapest and safest VPNs at the moment

DuckDuckGo android app that blocks trackers for every app on your phone

DuckDuckGo for firefox for blocking trackers and the likes

SponsorBlock for firefox, skips the sponsor segments of youtube videos

Adaway Adblocker for android (works much better with root access but doesn't require it)

Is there any benefit to using multiple ad blockers at once? I honestly don't know, but I haven't seen a single ad on the internet in ages and I get to use this image:

[niennanir]

Listen to your elders

So last week I posted abut the importance of downloading your fic. And then three days later AO3 went down for 24 hours. No one was more weirded out by this than I was. But while y’all were acting like the library at Alexandria was on fire I was reading my download fic and editing chapter eight of Buck, Rogers, and the 21st Century. And also thinking about what I could do to be helpful when the crisis was actually over.

So first off, I’m going to repeat that if you’re going to bookmark a fic, you really need to also download the fic and back it up in a safe place. I just do it automatically now and it’s a good habit to get into.

But let’s talk about some other scenarios. Last October I lost power for over a week after hurricane Ian. Apart from not having internet or A/C I did find plenty to do, I collect books so I had plenty to read, but maybe, unlike me, your favorite comfort reads aren’t sitting on a bookshelf. So let’s do something about that, shall we?

In olden times many long years ago around 1995 we printed off a lot of fic. It was mostly SOP to print a fic you planned to reread and stick it in a three ring binder. And that’s totally valid today too, but you can also make a very nice paperback with a minimum amount of skill and materials.

Let’s start with the download; Go to Ao3 and select your fic, we’ll be working with one of mine. This method works best with one shots, long fic tends to need a more complicated approach. Get yourself an HTML download

Open up the HTML download and select all then copy paste into any word processor. Set the page to landscape and two columns, then change the font to something you find easy to read, this is your book, no judgement. This is all you have to do for layout but I like to play a little bit. I move all the meta, summary, notes to the end and pick out a fun font for the title: 

No time like the present to do a quick proofread. Congratulations, you’ve just created your first typeset. On to the fun part.

Now you’re going to need some materials:  8.5x11in paper ruler one sheet of 12x12 medium card stock (60-80lb) scissors pencil pen or fine tip marker sheet of wax paper white glue two binder clips 2 heavy books or 1 brick butter knife

You’ll also need a printer, if you’re in the US there is almost a 100% chance your local library has a printer you can use if you don’t have your own. None of these materials are expensive and you can literally use cheap copy paper and Elmers glue.

Print your text block, one page per side. Fold the first page in half so that the blank side is inside and the printed side out:

use the butter knife to crease the edge. Repeat on all the sheets. When you’ve finished, stack them up with the raw edge on the left and the folded edge on the right. I used standard copy paper, because you’re only printing on one side there’s no bleed to worry about. Take the text block and line everything up. Use the binder clips to hold the raw edge in place.

Wrap the text block in the wax paper so that the raw edge and binder clips are facing out. I’m going to use my home built book press but you don’t need one, a brick or a couple of books or anything else heavy will work fine.

Once the text block is anchored down, take off he binder clips and get out the glue.

You can use a brush but you don’t need one, smear some glue on that raw edge.

Go make a margarita, watch The Mandalorian, call your mother. Don’t come back for at least an hour

In an hour smear some more glue on there and shift your brick forward so that the whole book is covered. This keeps the paper from warping. While glue part 2 is drying we’ll do the cover. Get out your 12x12 cardstock

Mark the cardstock off at 8.5 inches and cut it. Measure in 5.5 inches from the left and put in a score line with the butter knife (the back edge not the sharp edge)

Carefully fold the score line, this is your front cover. You have some options for the cover title, you can use a cutting machine like a cricut if you have one, you can print out a title on the computer and use carbon paper to transfer the text to the cardstock. I was in a mood so I just freehanded that beoch. Pencil first then in pen.

Take your text block out from under your brick. Line it up against the score mark and mark the second score on the other side of the spine

Fold the score and glue the textblock into the cover at the spine. Once the glue dries up mark the back cover with the pencil and then trim the back cover to fit with your scissors.

Voila:

I’m going to put this baby on the shelf next to the Silmarillion.

The whole process, not counting drying time, took less than an hour.

If you want to make a book of a longer fic, I recommend Renegade Publishing, they have a ton of resources for fan-binders. 

[sometiktoksarevalid]