![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[sticky entry]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/entry/sticky_entry.png){kind=small}
Our Table of Contents has all the stories/essays. If you're curious about our blog's etiquette, that is here, and you can check your filter status here. (The filters post, like most of this blog, is locked; introduce yourself and ask to have access.) For everything else (including who we are and "how to Dreamwidth"), check our profile page!
( Stories, Essays, Comics and Zines up for grabs! )
Comic: Barred from Pokemon Forever
Feb. 21st, 2026 09:21 pmThis is the winner of the comics/art poll this month! Please enjoy this goofiness... and for added bonus, I'll add the sketch as well!
This was a silly 2016 cooldown sketch from back when I did livestreams. (I have been saying for years that I'd like to start doing them again, but sorry y'all, our art program just doesn't work on Linux. We haven't been able to do digital art on this comp reliably since we got it in Thanksgiving.)
This was a silly 2016 cooldown sketch from back when I did livestreams. (I have been saying for years that I'd like to start doing them again, but sorry y'all, our art program just doesn't work on Linux. We haven't been able to do digital art on this comp reliably since we got it in Thanksgiving.)
The Devil’s Instrument
Feb. 21st, 2026 11:54 am(Alternate title: the Devil Went Down to Georgia... and Regretted It)
While talking with our roommates about the fiddle as the Devil’s Instrument, we got to thinking about the comparative Satanism of other instruments, ranked by how well you could make a Devil dueling song out of it.
The fiddle, yes. The banjo, of course. The harmonica would also be a good contender.
But then we got silly. The tuba would just end like that Spike Jones record where they try to play Flight of the Bumblebee on the trombone. The Devil’s Tympani? The Devil’s Theremin??? (Well, the theremin would likely work out fine.) Warring bassoons? (As a former school bassoonist, we are of course obligated to declare that bassoons can totally war, it’ll just look undignified as the thumbs fly.)
But then we knew. The Devil’s Horn. The instrument that regardless of playing ability instantly sends all listeners to hell:
THE VUVUZELA.
All other contenders go home.
While talking with our roommates about the fiddle as the Devil’s Instrument, we got to thinking about the comparative Satanism of other instruments, ranked by how well you could make a Devil dueling song out of it.
The fiddle, yes. The banjo, of course. The harmonica would also be a good contender.
But then we got silly. The tuba would just end like that Spike Jones record where they try to play Flight of the Bumblebee on the trombone. The Devil’s Tympani? The Devil’s Theremin??? (Well, the theremin would likely work out fine.) Warring bassoons? (As a former school bassoonist, we are of course obligated to declare that bassoons can totally war, it’ll just look undignified as the thumbs fly.)
But then we knew. The Devil’s Horn. The instrument that regardless of playing ability instantly sends all listeners to hell:
THE VUVUZELA.
All other contenders go home.
Amish Wizard
Feb. 20th, 2026 04:22 pmSome smartphone door-to-door salesmen were going around my neighborhood a few days ago, but they made the terrible mistake of getting me at the door, and I easily banished them with the words, "I don't have a smartphone."
Later that day, as I was hauling my laundry for washing, I encountered the salesman again, along with their colleague, both of whom looked to be young, in their early twenties. The one who hadn't encountered me complimented my "necklace," which I said, "Oh, it's a compass!"
"What, really? Can I see?"
"Yup!"
I opened the compass, dazzling both young sellers. They very well may have never seen a compass before in real life.
"Can you really use that?"
"Yup! I use it with maps so I don't get lost!"
"Like, on paper? YOU CAN READ A PAPER MAP???"
At which point the one who'd encountered me said, "They don't have a smartphone either!"
"REALLY?!"
With a flourish, I whipped out my dumbphone and flipped it open. The two salespeople watched as though I had done a magic trick, utterly enchanted, staring at me like I was some kind of Amish wizard. I should've bowed.
So now we and the salespeople are on good terms. ...they probably won't try to sell to us again.
Later that day, as I was hauling my laundry for washing, I encountered the salesman again, along with their colleague, both of whom looked to be young, in their early twenties. The one who hadn't encountered me complimented my "necklace," which I said, "Oh, it's a compass!"
"What, really? Can I see?"
"Yup!"
I opened the compass, dazzling both young sellers. They very well may have never seen a compass before in real life.
"Can you really use that?"
"Yup! I use it with maps so I don't get lost!"
"Like, on paper? YOU CAN READ A PAPER MAP???"
At which point the one who'd encountered me said, "They don't have a smartphone either!"
"REALLY?!"
With a flourish, I whipped out my dumbphone and flipped it open. The two salespeople watched as though I had done a magic trick, utterly enchanted, staring at me like I was some kind of Amish wizard. I should've bowed.
So now we and the salespeople are on good terms. ...they probably won't try to sell to us again.
Peter Ibbetson, 1891 vs. 1935
Feb. 19th, 2026 03:29 pmRogan: I’ve gotten obsessed with a 130-year-old novel and its 90-year-old movie, and much like Dracula 2020, I’m gonna make it all y’all’s problem now!
( I hope y’all like Gary Cooper and great-grandma-aged SPOILERS! )
( I hope y’all like Gary Cooper and great-grandma-aged SPOILERS! )
LB tables at Boskone this weekend!
Feb. 11th, 2026 06:57 pmThis weekend, February 13-15, we will be tabling at Boskone 63, at the Westin Boston Seaport District, Boston, Massachusetts. Tabling hours will be 4-8 Friday, 10-6 Saturday, and 10-3 Sunday. To make up for the sick day at Arisia, we will be debuting four new titles, creek don't rise! All of them are short stories, and two of them contain all-new material available nowhere else (yet): Sacrificial Stories of the Neverwas, a collection of imaginary folk takes on the nature of sacrifice, and Kayfabe in the Coliseum, a pseudo Greco-Roman tale of prizefighting and metanarrative.
The other two are a zine version of Crazy Boys Get Money (with an illustration I'm proud of!) and Time is a Mobius Strip, which is a compilation of two short stories, "Ana, Chronistic", and "Chrone," originally published in Flights of Reality under the name "Better Luck Next Time."
All of the stories have been edited for print. Hope to see you there!
EDIT from Rogan: Just realized this I guess makes Crazy Boys Get Money a Valentine's Day debut. Well, maybe it's happier than Red Roses, Old Horses?
The other two are a zine version of Crazy Boys Get Money (with an illustration I'm proud of!) and Time is a Mobius Strip, which is a compilation of two short stories, "Ana, Chronistic", and "Chrone," originally published in Flights of Reality under the name "Better Luck Next Time."
All of the stories have been edited for print. Hope to see you there!
EDIT from Rogan: Just realized this I guess makes Crazy Boys Get Money a Valentine's Day debut. Well, maybe it's happier than Red Roses, Old Horses?
Mori: we are still plugging away at Thunder Shaman: Making History With Mapuche Spirits in Chile and Patagonia by Ana Mariella Bacigalupo. It’s super interesting and opening our mind in all sorts of cool new ways, but it’s really dense and about a people we had never known about prior, who have a vastly different cultural context, so we have to take constant breaks to just think about it. (Also this book really could’ve used a glossary; we’ve had to handwrite our own in the blank pages and have filled two already.)
The chapter we are on now talks about Mapuche ideas of text and books as ritual objects, and written law and documentation as sorcery to be countered and appropriated. And at first I went “what?” But then I thought about how the legal disability system controls the romantic relationships, job potential, and finances of those it identifies, how it fucks with the heads of those under it, and I went, “hey, you know... where’s the lie?” There’s a lot of talk about subverting the colonial legal system as acts of countersorcery, how the Mapuche make their own counterhistories not recognized by the state, and it got me thinking about how we’ve used story ourself.
Even as it was happening to us as kids, large swathes (the most IMPORTANT swathes) of our life was deemed “not real.” The concept of reality, objective fact, was used as a tool to control and harm us: crazy child can’t be trusted! And if it ever became our word against our attacker’s, we insta-lost because of who we were, no matter the circumstance. Sorcery indeed!
We couldn’t say directly what happened or was happening to us, because then we’d get caught and it’d get erased. But we could make our own twist on being unbelievable narrators: we could write fiction! And we could imbue it with all the shadow narrative of our truth that we could, interspersed with loads of nonsense, distraction, and noise, so nobody would suspect. We were, to the best of our ability, keeping our own history safe for our future selves. Though lots of sifting and salt is required, we still rely on those shadow histories today for records work! We have found ways not only to hang onto our “fake” history, but to spread it around so other people can use it and hang onto it too! So many of our comics and zines are just us trying to keep our life from getting derealized out from under us again!
And much like how the Mapuche aren’t above trying to use the legal system and its documents to their own purpose, we too use “real” records: dated photos, medical records, school calendars and report cards, etc.
We never considered this a battle of sorceries, but it’s a fascinating new lens with which to look at this stuff. Because if our digging around in archives has taught us anything, it’s that derealization, that erasure and erosion of history and reality, is constant. What gets buried, or retracted, or forever prefaced with “alleged” “identified as” or “perceived as,” what gets endlessly converted into symbolic metaphor instead of flat statement... it’s here all the time, and it affects us. I do believe that an objective reality exists, though I dunno that any one human can perceive it, but what becomes “history” and what becomes irrelevant footnotes is about way more than that objective truth. It’s so much harder than that (or the reverse of believing whatever damn fool thing your brain tells you no matter what).
We’ll probably post more about this book; I think Rogan was like, “I’ll do one big post when I’m done,” but there are so many angles and things to pursue in this book, that ain’t gonna happen. I didn’t even TOUCH the Mapuche concept of multitemporality and how it’s affected our ideas on memory work yet!
The chapter we are on now talks about Mapuche ideas of text and books as ritual objects, and written law and documentation as sorcery to be countered and appropriated. And at first I went “what?” But then I thought about how the legal disability system controls the romantic relationships, job potential, and finances of those it identifies, how it fucks with the heads of those under it, and I went, “hey, you know... where’s the lie?” There’s a lot of talk about subverting the colonial legal system as acts of countersorcery, how the Mapuche make their own counterhistories not recognized by the state, and it got me thinking about how we’ve used story ourself.
Even as it was happening to us as kids, large swathes (the most IMPORTANT swathes) of our life was deemed “not real.” The concept of reality, objective fact, was used as a tool to control and harm us: crazy child can’t be trusted! And if it ever became our word against our attacker’s, we insta-lost because of who we were, no matter the circumstance. Sorcery indeed!
We couldn’t say directly what happened or was happening to us, because then we’d get caught and it’d get erased. But we could make our own twist on being unbelievable narrators: we could write fiction! And we could imbue it with all the shadow narrative of our truth that we could, interspersed with loads of nonsense, distraction, and noise, so nobody would suspect. We were, to the best of our ability, keeping our own history safe for our future selves. Though lots of sifting and salt is required, we still rely on those shadow histories today for records work! We have found ways not only to hang onto our “fake” history, but to spread it around so other people can use it and hang onto it too! So many of our comics and zines are just us trying to keep our life from getting derealized out from under us again!
And much like how the Mapuche aren’t above trying to use the legal system and its documents to their own purpose, we too use “real” records: dated photos, medical records, school calendars and report cards, etc.
We never considered this a battle of sorceries, but it’s a fascinating new lens with which to look at this stuff. Because if our digging around in archives has taught us anything, it’s that derealization, that erasure and erosion of history and reality, is constant. What gets buried, or retracted, or forever prefaced with “alleged” “identified as” or “perceived as,” what gets endlessly converted into symbolic metaphor instead of flat statement... it’s here all the time, and it affects us. I do believe that an objective reality exists, though I dunno that any one human can perceive it, but what becomes “history” and what becomes irrelevant footnotes is about way more than that objective truth. It’s so much harder than that (or the reverse of believing whatever damn fool thing your brain tells you no matter what).
We’ll probably post more about this book; I think Rogan was like, “I’ll do one big post when I’m done,” but there are so many angles and things to pursue in this book, that ain’t gonna happen. I didn’t even TOUCH the Mapuche concept of multitemporality and how it’s affected our ideas on memory work yet!
Rawlin's New Hair
Feb. 9th, 2026 09:15 pmMori: Rawlin, alone amongst all of us, never changed her hairstyle... until now! And I did doodles because my girlfriend is cute and pretty.
Font Woes; Help?
Feb. 7th, 2026 05:22 pmOkay, I know there are folks who do Font Stuff and I am at my wits end so I throw myself on y'all's mercy. I have a couple fonts. One, Hershey Noailles Old French 2.5, is a bold version of the other, Hershey Noailles Old French.
And I CANNOT FOR THE LIFE OF ME get my computer to see that. At first, it insisted they were two completely different, unrelated fonts, so I popped them into FontForge, renamed them to have the same family and named one Hershey Noailles Old French with weight Regular and the other Hershey Noailles Old French Bold with weight Bold. That at least got my computer to go, "Ah, I see, these are indeed the same family, one is bold and one is regular!" which is great... but now my computer insists that the two fonts are identical. I do not know why, they very clearly are not when I open them individually in Font Forge... but they show up as identical in Font Viewer too! And any time I try to use it, I get the bold face, and I cannot get the regular one.
I am giving up for now but ARGH. (And all of this could've been avoided if the font distributor had just NAMED THEM RIGHT IN THE FIRST PLACE!)
And I CANNOT FOR THE LIFE OF ME get my computer to see that. At first, it insisted they were two completely different, unrelated fonts, so I popped them into FontForge, renamed them to have the same family and named one Hershey Noailles Old French with weight Regular and the other Hershey Noailles Old French Bold with weight Bold. That at least got my computer to go, "Ah, I see, these are indeed the same family, one is bold and one is regular!" which is great... but now my computer insists that the two fonts are identical. I do not know why, they very clearly are not when I open them individually in Font Forge... but they show up as identical in Font Viewer too! And any time I try to use it, I get the bold face, and I cannot get the regular one.
I am giving up for now but ARGH. (And all of this could've been avoided if the font distributor had just NAMED THEM RIGHT IN THE FIRST PLACE!)
Autobio: Crazy Boys Get Money
Feb. 5th, 2026 12:15 amCrazy Boys Get Money (D Stories)
Summary: Two teens in Texas hook and heist their way out of danger. True story.
Series: LB autobio (D Stories)
Word Count: 8100
Notes: Winner by a long shot of the February fan poll. Depending on how this story is received, I’ll be pulling out more regarding this period of my life, a series called “the D Stories.” Normally I would break it into 3 installments, but due to the nature of the content, I have chosen to upload it all at once. I feel professionally obligated to disclaim that this story is not appropriate for anyone under 18… but this was my life when I was younger than that, and it's both insulting and degrading to say that my youth is unspeakable to the very age demographic it happens to.
Content warnings for anti-black racism; coerced, underaged, bad sex work, and (separate) consensual, okay teenage sex, along with the circumstances surrounding both. More information is in the comments.
Summary: Two teens in Texas hook and heist their way out of danger. True story.
Series: LB autobio (D Stories)
Word Count: 8100
Notes: Winner by a long shot of the February fan poll. Depending on how this story is received, I’ll be pulling out more regarding this period of my life, a series called “the D Stories.” Normally I would break it into 3 installments, but due to the nature of the content, I have chosen to upload it all at once. I feel professionally obligated to disclaim that this story is not appropriate for anyone under 18… but this was my life when I was younger than that, and it's both insulting and degrading to say that my youth is unspeakable to the very age demographic it happens to.
Content warnings for anti-black racism; coerced, underaged, bad sex work, and (separate) consensual, okay teenage sex, along with the circumstances surrounding both. More information is in the comments.
2026 February Fan Poll
Feb. 2nd, 2026 05:02 pmHey everybody, it's that time again: time to vote for which stuff gets the LiberaPay/Patreon money this month! We've got some new zines/comics on the pile this month, because I finally sold my last copy of Rumbleghost!
As always, anyone can vote (please do!), but LiberaPay and Patreon patrons get double weight for their votes. (Due to Patreon's porn purges, I really encourage you to use LiberaPay, if you get a choice.) If you want to see the blurbs for any of these works, those are here! (You can also leave your requests there; requesting a story or essay is always free!) If you don't have a DW and so can't do the poll, that's okay; just leave your vote in the comments below; anon comments are turned on.
Which works gets the money, and thus posted this month? YOU CHOOSE, readers!
As always, anyone can vote (please do!), but LiberaPay and Patreon patrons get double weight for their votes. (Due to Patreon's porn purges, I really encourage you to use LiberaPay, if you get a choice.) If you want to see the blurbs for any of these works, those are here! (You can also leave your requests there; requesting a story or essay is always free!) If you don't have a DW and so can't do the poll, that's okay; just leave your vote in the comments below; anon comments are turned on.
Which works gets the money, and thus posted this month? YOU CHOOSE, readers!
Poll #34175 2026 February Fan Poll
This poll is closed.
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 23
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 23
Did you toss LiberaPay/Patreon money my way last month?
What writing gets posted this month?
View Answers
Infinity Smashed: Born Lucky
6 (27.3%)
Reverend Alpert: the Traveling Exorcist
3 (13.6%)
Henchwench for Hire (F/F supervillainy)
4 (18.2%)
Rutless (trans omegaverse porno)
4 (18.2%)
Crazy Boys Get Money (autobio heist)
12 (54.5%)
The Battle-Axe and the Blood-Eater (pseudo-Greco-Roman blood sports)
7 (31.8%)
What art/comic/zine gets posted this month?
View Answers
Cult Comix
4 (19.0%)
Death Watch
6 (28.6%)
Protection
3 (14.3%)
Thrown Away
0 (0.0%)
Sneak Attack!
10 (47.6%)
Barred from Pokemon Forever
13 (61.9%)
Possessions (Rumbleghost)
2 (9.5%)
Adult Content Bans
Jan. 30th, 2026 04:51 pmSince the Vice articles apparently got taken down, this Mashable article by Raksha Muthukumar, "Adult creators are still getting debanked — but it doesn't just impact them," is the best summary I have of how a bunch of middle-men can get between you, a consenting paying customer, and a willing seller of legal work. (Back when itch.io banned AllFam, I likened this to being jerked around by the guys who made the cash register.)
AllFam is still banned on itch.io, and if Payhip/Patreon goes down next, we'll probably end up on Ream. But just so y'all know, this is an ongoing problem, and for a lot more people than just us.
EDIT: also, Apple's on their Patreon shit again, so please, please, if you want to support our work, do it through your browser and not some app that allows yet another middle-man to chokehold our business. I swear, I'm this close to just taking checks through the damn mail or something, because then at least we only have to deal with the post office and the banks...
AllFam is still banned on itch.io, and if Payhip/Patreon goes down next, we'll probably end up on Ream. But just so y'all know, this is an ongoing problem, and for a lot more people than just us.
EDIT: also, Apple's on their Patreon shit again, so please, please, if you want to support our work, do it through your browser and not some app that allows yet another middle-man to chokehold our business. I swear, I'm this close to just taking checks through the damn mail or something, because then at least we only have to deal with the post office and the banks...
We Will All Go Together When We Go
Jan. 30th, 2026 12:57 pmWe Will All Go Together When We Go
Summary: a failed stand-up comedian walks into a bar at the end of the world. What’re you having?
Series: none (stand-alone)
Word Count: 1400
Notes: Winner of the January 2026 fan poll, originally written 1/2/2020… and man, I don't know how I feel about posting this story considering what's happening politically right now. This is a rare case where I’ll be quoting liberally from a real song, because Tom Lehrer, who made “We Will All Go Together When We Go,” put all of his music and lyrics into the public domain in 2022. (https://tomlehrersongs.com/disclaimer/) You can listen to the song and read the lyrics here: https://tomlehrersongs.com/we-will-all-go-together-when-we-go/ He died July 26, 2025.
A funny thing happened today, on the way to Armageddon. Buy me a drink and I’ll tell you all about it!
Because I was there, that’s why. No, there, there. In shitting distance when it came down. Amazing I wasn’t killed.
Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, Chuckles. Everyone’s a critic nowadays. You buying or not?
That’s better. Okay, so it went like this…
( Down by the old maelstrom, / There'll be a storm before the calm... )
Summary: a failed stand-up comedian walks into a bar at the end of the world. What’re you having?
Series: none (stand-alone)
Word Count: 1400
Notes: Winner of the January 2026 fan poll, originally written 1/2/2020… and man, I don't know how I feel about posting this story considering what's happening politically right now. This is a rare case where I’ll be quoting liberally from a real song, because Tom Lehrer, who made “We Will All Go Together When We Go,” put all of his music and lyrics into the public domain in 2022. (https://tomlehrersongs.com/disclaimer/) You can listen to the song and read the lyrics here: https://tomlehrersongs.com/we-will-all-go-together-when-we-go/ He died July 26, 2025.
A funny thing happened today, on the way to Armageddon. Buy me a drink and I’ll tell you all about it!
Because I was there, that’s why. No, there, there. In shitting distance when it came down. Amazing I wasn’t killed.
Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, Chuckles. Everyone’s a critic nowadays. You buying or not?
That’s better. Okay, so it went like this…
( Down by the old maelstrom, / There'll be a storm before the calm... )
Attn: Thor!
Jan. 30th, 2026 07:32 am(Everyone else can just ignore this; this is specifically for the one who emailed me using the name Thor.)
Hey, sorry to be a bother, just responded to your email about a week ago and heard nothing back, and I’m just making sure my new email worked for you and things didn’t disappoint into the void! Let me know!
Hey, sorry to be a bother, just responded to your email about a week ago and heard nothing back, and I’m just making sure my new email worked for you and things didn’t disappoint into the void! Let me know!
Peter Ibbetson, by du Maurier (1891)
Jan. 29th, 2026 08:31 pmRogan: I did it! My con crud lasted the exact amount of time for me to finally read Peter Ibbetson, and I’m super glad I did!
( #1 Wife Guy on the astral plane. Major spoilers for a century-old book. )
( #1 Wife Guy on the astral plane. Major spoilers for a century-old book. )
Rogan: In my sickness, I posted that picture of Bob's "Subtext is Overrated" shirt and didn't explain the context of it! In summary: it was advice he gave me the first time he ever met me (though NOT the first time I ever met him).
( Read more... )
( Read more... )
NyQuil Adventures with Peter Ibbetson
Jan. 28th, 2026 08:07 amRogan: well! That was exciting and awful!
I took NyQuil because I badly wanted a nap and to be able to breathe. What I got was twenty-four hours (and counting) of badness.
( Read more... )
The NyQuil has mercifully mostly worn off now, twenty-four hours later. I’m still moving carefully, but I’m not afraid to stand up and walk around the apartment. But for real, never taking this stuff again, what a horrible experience.
I took NyQuil because I badly wanted a nap and to be able to breathe. What I got was twenty-four hours (and counting) of badness.
( Read more... )
The NyQuil has mercifully mostly worn off now, twenty-four hours later. I’m still moving carefully, but I’m not afraid to stand up and walk around the apartment. But for real, never taking this stuff again, what a horrible experience.
Guys. We took NyQuil. We have learned that we should NEVER take NyQuil. It has been bad. Should've just not taken anything.
I am starting to think that the rest of the writing might be late this month. January has not gone well.
Extremely grateful for roommates helping me out. Typing this in bed.
I am starting to think that the rest of the writing might be late this month. January has not gone well.
Extremely grateful for roommates helping me out. Typing this in bed.
Bob: Subtext is Overrated
Jan. 26th, 2026 09:49 pmRogan: I made Bob a shirt. (I drew this a while ago, but then January happened.)
DROWN ME IN LADY BOOKS, pt. 2
Jan. 25th, 2026 08:18 amMori: I think we’ve turned the corner, sickwise. At least I got a good amount of ladyreading done!
( BOOOOOOKS )
( BOOOOOOKS )
