Back to Life
Hello and happy summer, friends!
In this newsletter we have show on-demand updates (tldr: not yet, frustration at every turn), a new poem in a new magazine, and some garden photos.
You might enjoy “Bottle Rocket Astronaut” by Bug Hunter, a catchy jam with a great little animated video and the disability representation we love to see. Rockets are totally adaptive technology.
New Poem
“Open Your Eyes Again” came out in June in issue 2 of Otherside, a new-this-year queer-led magazine of speculative (SFF/weird) fiction. It’s a tender quiet poem about the gift of (neurodivergent) attention. Each of the little moments in it have happened in real life.
It’s free to read, as is the rest of the issue and the debut issue as well, but if you enjoy it maybe consider a digital or print (it’s beautiful!) subscription! Issue 2 also has some slightly worrying spider yuri, and dissolving your crush in acid, among other things. Something for everybody?
A Singular They
THANK YOU everyone who came out to the premiere! We had probably a hundred-ish viewers, accounting for folks sharing screens to watch with others, which is frankly a great turnout for a virtual event from someone who releases work only about once an aeon. The response has been really great. I love hearing about what parts people liked, what resonated, what has stuck with them, so please always feel free to send me a message, too.
I took a while to just crash out afterward and have been slowly trying to get back into a groove. I have finished the nitpicky tidy-up edits of tiny color/timing/audio things that slipped by me before the premiere, and have also proofed and finalized the audio description subtitles, which was a big undertaking. The files are ready to be seen but by god the world is making it hard for me to SHOW THEM to you. I am currently 3 for 3 on video-on-demand hosting services I’ve considered being shut down/phased out/restructured in a way I can’t (or don’t feel ok to) use. If you have personally made a video available for paid (preferably sliding-scale, by coupon if necessary) on-demand viewing recently and can give me a recommendation, I’m all ears.
Patrons have access to the version of the file that’s going out to film festivals; it includes both versions of audio and captions, though the UI for which caption track is which is not ideal. If you’re raring to go, get yourself in there, supporters of all levels ($1+) have access.
Or let me know you want to host an online showing!
The Rest
Just realized this section header is a pun? I am still definitely burned out. I’m not sure how long to expect it to take to recover from a project that took 8.5yrs to bring to fruition with a huge multi-month push at the end, and that’s before you add in medical nonsense, home repairs, and the ongoing fascism, etc. A while. But in the last few weeks I’ve started to feel like I have at least part of a creative brain again and I’m easing back into writing. I’m hand quilting a lot when it’s not too hot. And spending a lot of time in the garden.
No frog visitors yet but enjoy some blooms:
That’s all for me for today. Regular service may or may not be resuming, we’ll see! I hope those of you up north are keeping cool as best you can, and that everyone is hanging in there as we keep moving forward into the future.
Take care,
Toby