Welcome to Pennydragon's blog

Hello, I like to go by Penny. |♉|them/ they pronouns|

[miyuliart]

Trying to figure out how to draw armour. These are some of my notes I uploaded on patreon. A lot more to come since I really want to figure this one out.

[rare-vos-in-socks]

This is really cool!

[honey-fire]

My dad was eating pistachios so I reached my hand out and he just started peeling them and giving them to me. Then suddenly went “I really hope you find someone who loves you a lot” and I went “enough to peel my pistachios for me?” And he laughed and said “yeah exactly” before carrying on giving me more

[peopleareaproblem]

The Raincoat

by Ada Limón

When the doctor suggested surgery

and a brace for all my youngest years,

my parents scrambled to take me

to massage therapy, deep tissue work,

osteopathy, and soon my crooked spine

unspooled a bit, I could breathe again,

and move more in a body unclouded

by pain. My mom would tell me to sing

songs to her the whole forty-five minute

drive to Middle Two Rock Road and forty-

five minutes back from physical therapy.

She’d say, even my voice sounded unfettered

by my spine afterward. So I sang and sang,

because I thought she liked it. I never

asked her what she gave up to drive me,

or how her day was before this chore. Today,

at her age, I was driving myself home from yet

another spine appointment, singing along

to some maudlin but solid song on the radio,

and I saw a mom take her raincoat off

and give it to her young daughter when

a storm took over the afternoon. My god,

I thought, my whole life I’ve been under her

raincoat thinking it was somehow a marvel

that I never got wet.

[androcola]

[memeclassheroes]

[bish0ps]

[souliex]

The other perspective makes it funnier

[theblackparadeisdead]

Kid today (probably like 6 years) came up to me and was like "teacher teacher what's your name" and i was like "asha :) also im not a teacher" and he was like "okay asha asha asha I need help" and i was like "okay buddy what's wrong" and he showed me this chunk of metal he'd found sitting in the sun that he was just carrying around and it was super sharp and super hot from the sun and he was like "my hand hurts :(" and i was like "ok. put that down. does it still hurt?" And he did and was like "no." and then he picked it up again and immediately went "my hand hurts :(" again and then I was like "kid. put that down and stop touching it" and he was like "ok but when I touch it my hand hurts :(" and i was like "Please Just Stop Touching That. If you dont touch it your hand won't hurt" and this went on for like another 2 minutes before i got him to realize that if he stopped touching the metal it would not hurt. Kids are so fucking weird man

[theblackparadeisdead]

Comments that make me realize this kid is probably what I sounded like to my therapist when complaining about the consequences of all my bad habits

[anyawen]

[myrling-art]

That artist is the founder of Cara by the way (https://cara.app/zemotion/all).

Cara is the only art platform I have found that not only prohibits AI art from being uploaded on the site, but also offers their users to Glaze their art (which protects them from ai mimicry). They are also working on implementing Nightshade, which actively poisons ai training.

I have used Cara for a couple of months now, and I hope more people check it out. It's really nice. 💚

We need these kinds of places for artists, and it's also FREE (despite the staff paying out of their own pockets to keep it running).

[caitlin-elias]

reblogging this as I was just complaining about the rampant AI usage on pinterest yesterday lol

[ettawritesnstudies]

Even if you're not an artist, I highly recommend signing up just to lurk because it's been such a lovely wholesome experience free of the noise and brainrot that comes with the ads and reels on instagram. As a writer I think it has a niche for connecting authors with cover designers and illustrators. I'm documenting my experience in this thread if anyone wants to follow along!

[boybeetles]

Someone in Glasgow please go see this for me pls. I will be there in spirit 🙏

[tinyglowingsharks]

Brief report from the flute accompaniment:

It went well! At least 100 people attended, families dogs a solid portion of Glasgow's trans community. There was a really lovely atmosphere, nice weather and a very cheerful celebratory vibe.

After short speeches from the ballhaver and the large dyke (my wife), the ballhaver was given a chupa chup and blindfolded (execution style). The balls were then duly kicked; it made a surprisingly loud dull thumping sound. She fell to the ground to loud cheers and there was a moment of silence while Taps played on the flute. The large dyke wore solovair urban hikers.

[butch-bear-arcadia]

Account from the Large Dyke.

Arrived early to find the crowd already gathering, so the kick got off to a prompt start. Following some introductions from everybody and some cheery folk music from our flautist (my wife!) we got on with the kick.

I think we got good contact, the top of my boot making a good solid noise on impact. Very good atmosphere all round, people stayed to chat for a while. Were it not January it would have been an excellent opportunity for a picnic.

10/10 queer event, would happily kick anybody in the balls in the name of community.

[noisepuppy]

Account from the ball haver

7am: the pressure is getting to me; I wake up and drink half a bottle of diet iron bru from my bedside table; roll out of bed, and psych myself up in the mirror - "you can do this my little pogchamp" I say to myself over and over until I decend into a stupor.

8am: I play an hour of Okami on steam to replenish my chi levels

9am: I look at my balls for a while

10am: I spend 20 or so minutes trying to decide what to wear before realising it's the subartic in midwinter and I'm going to have to dress for -2C° regardless of what I choose and opt of my trusty black Schott thermal padded winter flight jacket and a pair of loose, warm Uniqlo trousers to give my testicles room to breathe.

11am: crashing out, texting my friends to arange a substitute kickee, an understudy, anybody so I can just become one with the crowd and not go through with it

12am: the homies have arrived, I'm drinking redbush tea in a small cafe by the park; god is in his heaven and all is right with the world

12.15: "you must be here to watch me get kicked in the balls?"

12.40: a circle emerges, from within the circle a palpable energy focuses like a lens down unto me and I feel like I'm gonna pee my pants a little

12.50: cheers begin, several complete families with dogs arrive - more friends appear and assort themselves into a gathering of 'real heads' ready to watch my groin be dessicated by the firm lace of a women for woman woman with a foot loosed through the gates of war as Augustus saw fit the dispatch and return of his troops from far corners through the blessings of Janus.

12.55: I think I left the stove on

1pm: Short introductions are made, grace is shown, beautiful flute music accompanies the gathering

1.03pm: what is left of my dignity disappears up my inguinal canal; I fall to the ground and languish a moment. I can feel it more in my lower chest than I can in my groin but the humour and adrenaline lift me and I'm laughing on my feet again soon. I kneel for the last post.

[3liza]

one thing everyone who is struggling with cooking for themselves needs to know is that the shittiest rice cooker, like the ones that cost $5 at rite aid, can make entire meals. you can put anything you want (except uncooked meats that need prolonged temperatures to be safe to eat) in with the rice and push the button and go lie down for 20 minutes. you will learn through making slightly over or undercooked rice a few times how you need to adjust the liquid:rice ratios. you can put rice, a bag of baby carrots, whatever salt and spices, and a can of tuna (or a can of shredded chicken, beef, etc, or tofu, or canned beans, or canned tomatoes) in a rice cooker and it will be completely edible in ~20min. it costs like $1 per batch, less if you get regular carrots and cut them into chunks yourself. you should have frozen spinach and peas and corn in your freezer, or whatever frozen veg is safe for your food allergies. this kind of meal can survive in the fridge for a while and the freezer even longer. if you make it badly it wont poison you and can be salvaged with hot sauce, if you make it disastrously it can be thrown away without losing more than a dollar or two. if you make it okay it fullfills the Just Need Some Real Food requirements completely. if you need more calories you can add butter or oil, or eat sour cream on the side. if you forget about the rice cooker or fall asleep it will dry out on the bottom but wont burn. they should teach you this in 5th grade

[it-grrl]

If you enjoy an odd cookbook, Roger Ebert wrote "The Pot and How to Use It" in 2010. It's a rice cooker cookbook but also just an ode to the rice cooker. It's out of print but worth looking for at your local library; it's also available on The Internet Archive

[3liza]

thank you!! also i forgot to mention: when you are too sick or depressed to do dishes, you can eat your dinner out of the rice cooker pot itself. just dont touch a metal or ceramic utensil to the actual pot because it will scrape the nonstick coating which causes a lot of problems for another post. wooden or plastic spoon or chopsticks, or just eat carefully out of the middle of the pot without touching the sides. or you can use the actual rice paddle, who cares. ive done it! if youre too sick to cook "properly", making a one pot rice and veg and protein bowl and eating it directly out of the pot in your pajamas is 100% fine. you will recover and function so much better after eating a hot meal made of actual ingredients.

[gallusrostromegalus]

At the gate for my flight home from visiting friends and there's a woman here with a service Shiba Inu. No pics because he has a Do Not Disturb vest and taking pics of strangers is illegal but I need to stress how ON DUTY this animal is. Ears up. Eyes doing Lazer scans of everything. Examining everyone who passes within 10ft like a security guard. Ass planted on her feet. I have never seen a dog with such intense chivalric guardian energy before. He has tiny eyebrows and they are FURROWED with concentration.

[gallusrostromegalus]

Man behind me having unhinged phone conversation. There is an internationally famous dairy in the area I was visiting and he was commissioned by the lady on the other end of the phone to collect specific cheeses from there. The lady is very high strung about the type and condition of the cheese.

The man does not know from cheese. The man "ain't never seen no cheese but orange before" and "I showed ya list to the cheese lady so if it's wrong it's her fault ok?"

I am 80% sure she sent him there for a really specific bleu cheese, 40% sure he does not have the very specific bleu cheese, and 100% sure he's done with her shit.

Our flight is delayed.

He does not have the cheeses in a cooler, just a regular backpack.

[gallusrostromegalus]

I need to emphasize that there is no cooler bag in the backpack. He has Jansport backpack that is jam-packed with cheeses. There is apparently $405 dollars worth of cheeses in that backpack, which I know because he has been trying to get the lady to venmo him the expense, which she has failed to do. It is unclear whether his relation to the lady is romantic, familial or what, but I'm leaning towards "what".

Two more people have joined us. One is a very elegant man with a perfect manicure in a tailored business suit, the other is a neon-haired person of indeterminate gender wearing a fox kirigumi. The Shiba Inu has been staring at the latter for three minutes now.

[gallusrostromegalus]

Uh oh.

Cheese man has been demanding payment because apparently he went like six hours out of his way and paid with his own money and between the cheese and price of gas, he is pretty sure he does not have enough money in his account for an Uber home.

The lady is FLABBERGASTED that he is demanding payment at all, as she was under the impression he was doing this for her out of the goodness of his heart.

He's not having it. He's insisting she told him she would pay him back- he would have gotten her maybe one cheese somewhere closer to his business in the area out of love, but he went out of his way because she agreed to pay him costs+ extra to cover it.

[gallusrostromegalus]

HE RECORDED THE CONVERSATION IN WHICH SHE PROMISED TO PAY FOR THE CHEESE, SHE'S THAT MUCH OF A FLAKE.

I am about to offer this man cash for some of these cheeses because our flight is now more delayed.

[gallusrostromegalus]

"YOU ALWAYS DO THIS! YOU ALWAYS DO THIS AND I FALL FOR IT EVERY TIME! NO! NO! FUCK YOU! IF YOU'RE NOT GONNA PAY ME, YOU DON'T GET FANCY CHEESE."

"OR ELSE WHAT?"

"I'm gonna-? THE BABY SHOWER? MONICA CAN'T EVEN HAVE THIS CHEESE SHE'S PREGNANT!"

"The cheese lady asked if it was for someone because the mushrooms or whatever in the cheese are dangerous for the baby or something?? You wanna poison Monica?"

"WHY WOULD I LIE ABOUT THAT?"

"YEAH OF COURSE I GOT THE CHEESE, THATS WHY I DON'T GOT MONEY FOR UBER!"

"YEAH, GO TELL! GO TELL MOMMA I STOPPED YOUR STUPID ASS FROM KILLING MONICA OR THE BABY! FUCK!"

*hangs up phone*

*head in hands, borderline hyperventilating*

The man in the three piece suit is in the chair next to him. He waits a moment, then reaches into his carryon and pulls out an entire bottle of wine with the TSA pre check sticker on it, and taps cheese guy on the shoulder.

"If your friend doesn't want it, would you be amenable to having it right now?"

[gallusrostromegalus]

Naturally, I have volunteered my box of wheat thins and offered to buy one of the harder cheeses which should be fine if it makes it home.

[gallusrostromegalus]

Meanwhile, Kirigumi has noticed that the Shiba Inu is staring at her and is correctly intimidated.

[gallusrostromegalus]

1. This is some fucking great Camembert. I have compensated cheese guy accordingly. So have like six other people. He's recouped like half his losses.

2. Cheese guy is crying a little about the cash and opening up about his problems. The cheese lady is his younger sister. Suit guy is being very generous with his Pinot Blanc. We are having a picnic/improv family therapy session.

3. This is apparently the latest in a long string of his sister asking for something and then flaking when he asks to be paid back. Started with paying him back only some of what he was owed, then claiming something she paid for him was of equal value when it was not, then recently telling him his memory is wrong and he said it was a gift or that he'd do it for free.

"Yeah, the specific thing of trying to convince you your memory is unreliable is called gaslighting and it's really fucked up." I say

"yeeeeah. The other stuff I forgave because she's never really had a good job so she can't pay me back all the time but at least she was making an effort y'know? But that was. That was over the line."

"If you haven't already, check on the rest of your family's finances. My brother started trying to gaslight everyone when he started stealing from our parents." Says Pinot Blanc.

4. Shiba Inu Lady has purchased a cheddar. Apparently, the dog's name is Donut, and he's her service dog because she's severely visually impaired.

"Oh, he's a guide dog?" Asks cheese guy.

"oh, no." She laughs. "He's too short, and the way my eyes are, it's easier for me to navigate with a cane. No, the problem I have is that some morally impaired people see the cane and think they can get away with stealing my bag or assaulting me because I wouldn't be able to give a description- which is wrong, but rather than deal with that I got Donut, and he helps me by howling at anyone who gets in my personal space and biting anyone who grabs me!"

"Uh." Says Kirigumi. "He's been staring at me do I need to back up or..?"

"Ohdear! No, no- He wasn't looking at you! He loves cheese but he knows he's not supposed to beg so he decided the way to deal with something he wants but can't have is to stare in the other direction."

"OKAY!" Says Kirigumi. "I'm wearing fox pajamas and thought like. He thought I was another dog or something."

"No, no- he doesn't care about dogs, and you get a warning before he goes for the calves. Very helpful, when I was living in Italy!"

"Oh what part? I have family in Tuscany." Says Pinot.

"Does he want a cheese? There is still so much cheese." Says cheese guy.

[gallusrostromegalus]

Plane may be arriving. I am paying for in flight WiFi to keep y'all updated.

[gallusrostromegalus]

1. Cheese guy has sold all but two or three cheeses that he an Pinot are going to eat on the flight.

2. I know they're planning to continue because Pinot talked to the gate agent so he and cheese guy can sit together and talk about family drama and cheese.

3. Pinot has been teaching him about different types of cheese and how to enjoy them.

4. Cheese guy apparently repairs computers and other technology devices for a living and is currently doing the software version of scraping barnacles and other crap off Pinot'macbook.

5. Pinot is now convinced that cheese guy is the smartest and most interesting man in the world.

[gallusrostromegalus]

Ok so the Wifi wasn't working on the plane (also like, nonstop turbulence) and also they got seated in a different row from me, but:

Now that I've heard the word aloud, and they are an astrophysicist. Who correctly believes in being comfy as fuck on planes. They are also familar with the concept of a meet-cute and is rooting for them too.

Got to walk the nice lady and her Tactical Assault Shiba to her next gate because it was on the way out and talk for a bit. Donut is called that not because he is the color of a Donut (which he is) but because he likes to sleep curled up in a perfect circle. He has a sister who does the same thing named Bagel.

Lost track of Pinot and Cheeseguy for a bit but when I saw them again at Baggage claim, Cheeseguy was holding both their jackets, and Pinot was on the phone to his hotel about "Well do you have any rooms with TWO beds?". The rest of the call indicated that yes, there were rooms with two beds, but Readers, I Had A Moment.

:)

Anyway, it's 2AM, I need to sleep, if you feel like supporting this kind of hard-hitting reporting, I have a Tip Jar!

[thatclockworkdoll]

Happy (late) Pride Month to Cheese Guy and Pinot Blanc

[maddiesharafian]

Oops, I never uploaded this one to Tumblr (which I only realized when someone else did, but then was kind enough to tag me, thank you)!

This is the comic that kickstarted my obsession with telling stories with as few panels as I could (usually 10-11 haha), so it’s got a soft spot in my heart. 

[what-even-is-thiss]

“Cats don’t actually love you”

A cat is a small creature in the middle of the food chain that is fully aware that you are a very large thing that could stomp its head in at any moment and yet it chooses to rest its tiny little head on your leg for a nap and spreads out on the floor near you exposing its belly and its most sensitive organs. It brings dead mice and bugs to you to share food.

Don’t you get it? This tiny thing trusts you. It wants to help you too. It licks your leg thinking that it’s helping. It kneads on you to find comfort. It shares its body warmth with you in the cold and gives you your space in the heat. It hisses at other mammals it sees outside including other cats in an effort to protect its family.

Cats love you so so much. But they will keep trying to eat plastic.

[notsofrangible]

the world has been horrifying recently but i have personally witnessed something that brought me joy

Every year, California’s largest sheep and fiber festival, Lambtown, takes place in Dixon, CA. On the second day of Lambtown, teams of eight compete in a “sheep to shawl” competition, where the teams must start the day with un-spun wool and end the day with a 72” woven shawl. Teams may “warp” a loom ahead of time (where you thread the loom with its foundation of parallel threads), but on the day of competition they must spin their wool into yarn and weave it into a complete shawl.

This year competition was stiff, and very very close, and the winning team finished their shawl with two and a half minutes to spare.

I frequently hear about “needing to keep “politics” out of fiber arts, but art is inherently political.

These were beautiful, masterfully spun, woven, and finished shawls and that in itself is worthy of note.

But watching this team of eight would fight for hours, and pour their love for their community into their art was deeply moving and I am still reveling in the opportunity to have seen this win.

There are few things to rejoice in today, but they do exist. The horrors may persist, but so do we.

[theprofessional-amateur]

For no reason here is a library story

[theprofessional-amateur]

There will be millions of actions like this over the coming years. An important thing to remember is that for them to work (anywhere, not just libraries) is people absolutely can’t announce that this is what they are doing.

Not seeing constant acts of resistance doesn’t mean it isn’t happening all around you all the time. Some very effective methods require silence and secrecy.

Something to keep in mind.

[sprinkledsalt]

At the end of week 4 of the semester, my mom has already clocked two AI-plagiarized summaries. She makes students do in-class quizzes each day on the given assigned reading to make sure they actually read it, but nope, asking grown ass adults who chose to register for an English class to read an essay and summarize it is apparently too much to ask for the ShitGPT generation!

The thing is that it's week 4, so these two students have already submitted work and my mom can very clearly see that the AI summaries do not match the previous work they turned in at all lol, in addition to AI writing just generally not sounding like student writing (which she's been grading for about 40 years), and the AI got things like page numbers wrong (my mom uploads PDFs of all the assigned readings, so everyone is using the same versions of the text). She failed their quizzes and told them they'll fail the course if they submit AI again, and she plans to go into her classes this week, put the university's anti-AI policy and her own syllabus' anti-AI policy up on the board, and say to the class, "So, you can all read that, right? So you know there's nothing stopping me from failing you if you submit AI garbage. Do you know what a 4-credit F will do to your GPA?? Do you seriously think you'll be able to get through 4 years of college if you can't even write a summary on your own?"

I'm a broken record but we need to stress how lazy and shameful this shit is. ShitGPT cheaters remind me a lot of the adults who brag about not having read a book since like 8th grade, with the way they think they're sly and clever somewhoe while the rest of us are staring at them like "ah ok so you're dumb"

[nealashitposts]

A year or so ago I went to wood carving club with a bruised eye from my dog slamming his nose into my eyesocket and like every old lady there pulled me aside at some point to ask if my partner hit me here are some of the solutions they had in case he did.

-Replacing his vitimens with poision

- getting her brother to invite him out onto his boat and then killing him and dumping him in the ocean and saying he got drunk and fell off.

- get tboned with him in the passenger seat and then once he was in the hospital theres all kinds of easy ways to kill him like not washing my hands after a poop and then touching his wound casually.

-replacing his drink of choice with moonshine!?

- take him on a hike thats locally notorious for a rapid otter attacking hikers and once he had rabies I could just kill him any ol way and say self defense.

-One lady just cheerfully informed me she had a gun and only a few years left anyway

[janedrewfinally]

Accurate tags:

#and this is why no-fault divorce brings down the murder rate

[quintessentialverbalized]

You guys I just realized that what I’ve always wanted out of werewolf fiction is a story where lycanthropy isn’t a purely human condition

Like this dude wakes up from his wolfbender and his room is full of all these fucking chickens from local farms that he initiated into his pack. They all start clucking and crowing at the moon and when it’s full they all transform into these tiny little weird bipedal wolves with wings.

[quintessentialverbalized]

I don’t remember making this post but it’s going around again and I’m losing my shit

[foldingfittedsheets]

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

Imagine becoming a werewolf because you got attacked by a fucked up chicken

[cheeseanonioncrisps]

A wildlife rehab centre discovers that one of its patients is a lycanthrope when the full moon hits and their wolf transforms into a slightly different wolf.