#jelly week

[st4rguy]

Jelly week day 1: first meeting, i think they probably meet in collage and bonded over their shared passion for robots, know its not great but I really like them and waned to draw something for jelly week! hosted by @useless-space-rock-lesbians and @true-colours

[queercoded-disney-villain]

Jelly Week Day 2! Prompt: Robots.

This ended up way out of the scope of the challenge, but hey, it got me to write. Sorry that I missed day 1, and showed up 15 minutes late with an iced coffee and this hot garbage.

After an exhausting day, Jess is cheered up by a stupid Roomba.

535 words.

@useless-space-rock-lesbians@true-colours

Jess collapsed on the couch. Another day, another failure, another chance she’d flunk out of her classes. She knew failure was part of the process, but the positively brilliant education system didn’t provide time for discovering 10,000 ways not to make a lightbulb. Besides, she was out of motivation for 10,000 more mistakes. Why couldn’t things just work ? Maybe it was time to give up. If she couldn’t even get a simple panda robot to dance without bursting into flame, maybe she shouldn’t even try.

The mere thought made her feel guilty. Her parents had worked so hard to send her to college. She and Ally had built their channel, their plans for life, on robotics. This was the dream she’d been chasing for so long. This is what she’d been racing after. And still, in the face of constant failure, she wasn’t sure she could keep running.

Jess slid her goggles off her head, tossing them onto one of numerous pillows stacked on the couch. She leaned back into the cushions, staring blankly at the ceiling. Why was she even trying anymore?

Her reminder came in the form of a Roomba by the name of Phillip Andrew Nathaniel. They’d been required to give it a full name after building it. It’s what they did with all their finished projects. Jess could hear the humming of his inner parts in their state of near-collapse, and the squeaking of the brush that never stayed on quite right. Still, Phillip was infinitely superior to any plain Roomba. In addition to being decked out in lovely stickers, and having a lovely cat faceplate, it could connect to their Spotify account through Bluetooth. As it rammed repeatedly into the couch, it blasted a familiar tune from their playlist entitled “:( -> :))))))”

“‘Cause you had a bad day, you’re taking one down, you sing a sad song just to turn it around.”

The notes cut out for a fraction of a second each time the machine ran back into the couch’s leg. A small smile came to Jess’s lips.

“You say you don’t know, you tell me ‘don’t lie,’ you work at a smile and you go for a ride. You had a bad day.”

Jess sat up. She picked up the robot and turned it around, allowing it to continue cleaning uninterrupted. She watched it scoot cheerfully across the floor. She and Ally had made that .

Sure, it wasn’t perfect. Phillip couldn’t avoid the furniture, no matter what programming they tried. But here he was still, joyfully puttering around their apartment. And look at him. Adorable.

Besides. She and Ally had made that.

That’s why she was still trying.

Jess looked back at the assignment thrown onto the table in frustration. She grabbed her goggles and adjusted them between the messy buns on top of her head. “Hey Ally?”

She was met by frantic crashing for several seconds. Then came her girlfriend’s cheerful voice. “Yeah?”

“Can you help me with this?”

“Of course!” Several more crashes echoed through the apartment as Ally scrambled toward her.

Jess stood up. Maybe it didn’t matter if this would work. She was happy just being one of two girlfriends who really love robots.

[witchbugs]

For the final prompt of Jelly Week, hosted by myself and @true-colours: Free Day! I had so much fun with this week and I hope everyone else did as well!

[montereybayaquarium]

The spectacular sea butterfly is one of the gelata you may have met but didn't recognize! When alive and at sea, these open-ocean snails fly with a foot flapping like a wing. Washed up on the beach, all that's left is the clear, spiky thimble of their soft shell.

But that's not the only tubular jelly that you may have found beach-combing—besides sea butterflies, you may have discovered a few "sea pickles," especially last year! More on those in tomorrow's post!

[st4rguy]

Jelly week day 2: robot i just drew them making their panda robo, its not my favourite drawing i have done but i like Jess and Ally and I wanted to participate, hosted by @useless-space-rock-lesbians and @true-colours

[montereybayaquarium]

What if we told you that a group of gelatinous animals helps control the planet’s climate? Your disbelief would be salp-able! 

Salps are filter-feeding gelata related to pyrosomes that pack up plankton produce into poo pellets that precipitate into the deep, capturing carbon from the atmosphere and tucking it away in the depths of the hydrosphere.

Thanks to local photographers Michelle Manson and Joe Platko for the salp selfies! Joe's photo on top shows a solitary Pegea confoederata ready to birth the same kind of long chain that Michelle found in her lower photo! 

(The pink orbs are the salps’ guts, and these tubular animals are essentially a passing pasta strainer for plankton!)

[montereybayaquarium]

In yesterday's post—and perhaps on the beach—you met washed up "sea pickles." Introducing... *drumroll* PYROSOMES! 

These colonial filter-feeders invaded the coast in huge numbers last year, and they're members of a unique gelata group: the urochordates. As larvae, these animals have the beginnings of a spinal chord, making them some of the most vertebrate of the invertebrates!

Top photo: Sally at the Oregon Coast Aquarium

Bottom photo: Living pyrosome off of Monterey by Michelle Manson

[watermelon-converse]

For the amazing brainchild that is @useless-space-rock-lesbians and @true-colours ’s Jelly Week … a doodle! Prompt is “valentines”

Some headcanons to go with this art:

• Jess and Ally tend to … get competitive. Any time gift giving is in play, they like to make robots to deliver the gifts, be the gifts, or something similar.

• they have some rules in place, like you can’t spend more that a certain number of hours on it because they care about each other’s sleep schedule

• somehow they manage to be super competitive while still like - not being sore losers? Their relationship is bootiful 😭

• I feel like a robot like this is how a first date/confession happened imao