Space and Nonsense

Side-blog of try-and-try-and-try-again Formerly floatinginotterspace Primarily a space to indulge my Red Dwarf obsession and dump fan art. Other pieces of media I like may feature too.

[space-and-nonsense]

Introductory Post!

Hello. This is my new side blog for fandom related stuff including my own fan art which I want to get back into doing. I used to have a main blog on a different account called @floatinginotterspace but I more or less abandoned it several years ago when health issues got on top of me and I tried and failed to resurrect it. I decided I wanted to get back into this side of tumblr after following the red dwarf tag and rediscovering how much I liked this fandom. I hope doing this again will cheer me up. I can’t remember my log in details for my old blog so I’ve made this one instead.

I used to enjoy doing fan art (mostly line art and drawing) so if you have any art requests please feel free to ask. It might give me some motivation to draw.

A little about me:

I’m Jaye (not my actual name), I'm 25 years old and my preferred pronouns are they/them or xe/xem. I'm autistic and have ADHD.

I live in the UK and have a passion for natural history. Particularly fungi, lichens and prehistoric life.

My main blog is @try-and-try-and-try-again which I mainly use as a vent space to dump stuff about my health issues. That will be the blog name that comes up if I message you I assume.

I am a huge fan of Red Dwarf (obviously).

I also love the works of Douglas Adams, Olaf Stapledon, Terry Pratchett, P.G. Wodehouse (especially Jeeves and Wooster) and Studio Ghibli films.

Another niche interest of mine is early music. I sing, I am currently learning the lute and I previously learnt piano, violin, tenor recorder and for a short period the pipe organ.

As well as wildlife, I am obsessed with cats which my parents have three of, and my two guinea-pigs. I used to keep hamsters and betta fish which I love too. I'm generally a fan of all non-human animals. I have arachnophobia but I respect spiders, and I'm trying to get over my fear of them. Progress is up and down...

I'm also a wildlife/pet portrait artist. I have an art account on instagram but I want to keep this separate to that, so if you want to see it, please message me for the account name.

[dangerthrillryanson]

He got hired.

[strange-and-off-putting]

Smegtober 2025

In the interest of giving those who want to participate ample time to plan, here is the Smegtober 2025 prompt list!

Smegtober is a 31 day writing (or art!) challenge running in October. It's meant to be fun and motivating, and you might opt to write/draw for every prompt, or you may cherry pick the ones that call out to you -- the end results is more Red Dwarf fic, and we can all agree that's a net positive.

Signal boost if you'd like, and if you choose to participate this October, please tag your posts #smegtober2025!!

[rosie-maybe]

Red Dwarf Watchalong Drawings Series 2!

That's 'cause you make me tongue tied (tongue tied) tongue tied Whenever you are near me (near me)

Thanks for all the love on my Series 1 drawing!

[space-and-nonsense]

It's taken me a stupidly long time to remember, but this is my Holly design on ACNH in response to the post by @dandunn

[devil-taemin]

Red dwarfers - let’s psychoanalyze one another based on our favorite episode

I’ll go first. My favorite episode is the one where Rimmer catches psychic space flu and puts on a dress to kill the crew

[quillustrates]

everyone loves a bastard

[mitchipedia]

[daebelly]

[sarah-ankh]

trying to explain sorting algorithms to a brick wall that loves you isn't going to get you any further tbh. I'm not sure the emotional inner life of a brick wall has that much effect.

[meatierbunger]

yeah but the brick wall would at least be interested in what you would be saying

prolly a confidence boost at least

[sarah-ankh]

The wall stares at you dumbly for a while, then gently pats you on the head and sides away. Its a good wall, it cares about you and wants you to like it. But it's literally dumb as bricks and everything you said went right over it and got lost in the weeds on the far side. It will continue to do exactly what it was doing already because it can do nothing else. Its only a wall after all.

[amy-in-hell]

This reads like Douglas Adams and by fuck I wanna kiss somebody about it

[quillustrates]

i just think listy would turn his raggiest shirts into crop tops and rock the shit out of them (and give rimmer a nosebleed in the process) 🚬 🎸

[arnoldlister]

The internet is yielding very few results so I’m putting it out to fellow Dwarfers: do you have any RD crochet patterns you’d be willing to share? If so, feel free to reach out via ask or DM! (The only patterns I could find were Mr Flibble and Starbug by Jazmo, of which I’ll be making Flibble right after my current project!)

Thank you chums 🧶 💫

[timelydoseoflister]

Which Rimmer are you today?

[miniherodesktales]

Carl Jung was a Swiss psychiatrist who was famous for writing about the 12 symbolic archetypes of the human personality.

One concept is known as "the shadow". Given it's name it's easy to assume that this refers to our "dark sides", all our worst and most primitive traits mushed together.

It's more nuanced than that. Our Shadows are made up of all our traits, ideas, and feelings that we're in denial about and push into the unconscious. We repress them so that we're no longer aware of them.

This can include positive traits as well as negative ones.

I think it could be argued that Ace and Rimmer are each other's Shadow, although I may be misunderstanding the concept and overly simplifying it.

Anyway, one example, we could look at is creativity. Ace can play the piano and gives Kryten a lesson. However, our Rimmer seems to have repressed his creative tendencies more. We see glimpses of it in his colourful timetables, but he doesn't consciously acknowledge it.

In Series 10, The Beginning, Prof Rimmer speaks in a derisive tone about Rimmer's true family being made of *gasp* "artisans" so it's probably not much of a stretch to suggest that creativity and artists were frowned upon in the Rimmer household. Rimmer would have pushed his creative traits into his Shadow in order to protect himself.

Another trait we could look at is anger. Rimmer's anger is not hidden or masked. It's out in the open. Ace's anger is much more repressed and hidden, but it's there.

On the surface, Ace is a very agreeable person. He's kind to others and works well in a team. But it's also rather superficial. In spite of all the admiration he receives, Ace is a very isolated individual. Spanners seems to have been his only true friend and even then Ace doesn't hesitate to abandon his own reality for the sake of his doing job. He's repressed his loneliness and anger into his Shadow so that he can please others and excel.

In contrast, angry Rimmer is much more willing to stay in a group. He's open about his fear of being alone. He gets cross when Lister plans to go into stasis. He's seen to play cards with the others and there are references to him watching TV with Lister. On the rare occasion he compliments Lister, it sounds sincere. In Me2 he says something like, "you may be a slob, but you keep your word".

Jung also said most people don't examine their Shadows because it's too overwhelming to analyse what we repress. Looking into the mirror is scary.

So it's interesting to see how Rimmer and Ace react to meeting each other in Dimension Jump. And of course they don't like each other, seeing the traits they repressed on full display.

Ace who is usually so easy going becomes very hostile: "The man's a maggot. I can't bear to look at him."

Meanwhile Rimmer makes a number of homophobic jibes towards Ace. He's jealous of how easy Ace and Lister get along.

At this point neither Ace nor Rimmer can stand to look at their Shadows. They are unable to accept the fragmented parts of their personalities.

If we are to become whole as people we have to accept every aspect of ourselves, even the pieces we've repressed because they are also part of us.

I think The Beginning shows what Rimmer behaves like when he is more "whole". He accepts that Prof Rimmer was not true father, that he has a very different bloodline. Following the Cat's advice he gives up on the hope that he can impress Prof Rimmer.

It leads him to becoming more much clear headed and he is able to save the day. He does so in a way that is brave, but also very "Rimmer". And by that I mean, he has a clever plan but it also involves arguing the toss with the enemy. Not very Ace, but very Rimmer. And it works.

(anyway apologises for the weak understanding of Jung and applying it to RD, but it's fun :D What do you think?)

[space-and-nonsense]

ALIENS!

[ohhhyestottytottytotty]

[bitterghost1987]

guys hear me out.. the gang as guinea pigs 🤯

[holoship]

howard burden changed the world whn he decided what this scifi sitcom needed was more quilted fabrics 😌❤️

[clone-thugs-n-harmony]

"Lister, is that a cigarette you’re smoking?"

"No, it's a chicken."

[oneremainingbraincell]

Please. Please can you draw it as an on- fire chicken? Please?