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december 2025

it's been a while. i've missed you. published on january 10, 2025

lately + currently

I guess one of the biggest things that happened in December was that I had left my job. I was there for three years making it the longest job I've ever had. While I did have a lot of liberties there because of my position, I did absolutely hate it. It was the worst of the service industry and events industry in one place. My boss was manipulative and needy. She purposely hired inexperienced people, but complained about their inexperience. Her decisions would change last second which would jeopardize events, but then she'd blame it on the staff. There was always some other fuck ass tedious way she wanted us to do things that took so much extra time, but she complained about labor costing more than she projected when things are seamless and perfect. God, at one point she had us sorting trash for like an hour at the end of every shift because she didn't want to listen to me when I told her that having one small bin for trash and a dumpster for recycling wasn't going to work. Things were going to overflow, and we'd be wishcycling on a large scale. Other staff and I got our clothes so fucking dirty doing that. Some nights, it would be in the middle of service, so we'd come back to our tables covered in trash juices, and we couldn't do anything about it.

There are a number other things she did such as keep an actual misogynist around who said unsavory things about the female burlesque performers to other staff, pushed around fem-presenting staff, and actually voiced his opinions on queer people (he’s a homophobe + transphobe). She’d claim that we were all young people that were “too sensitive.” At least the last shitty guy she hired kept that all to himself. She only fired anyone if they stole from her or were bad for her business. Never anyone who was bad for everyone else. Forgot to mention that she’s the owner of that place. Makes it infinitely harder to work for a place when the owner is there all the time.

Anyways anyways, it's a good thing that I'm gone. I do feel a lot better physically and mentally. However, I don't feel good about still being unemployed. Having this free time allows me to update this site more which has been fun. I really should be making actual portfolio work, but I get too excited about making my site look cooler.

current events

For those that don't know, I do live in Minneapolis, and if you aren't aware, Minneapolis is in the news for an ICE agent being a murderous coward.

ICE has been in the city for a while now. "Metro Surge" they call it. It's such a stupid name. They're also doing this because Minneapolis was defiant in 2020. Other cities that were also defiant are affected. I want folks to know that ICE isn't in St. Paul at all. It is the Twin Cities, so as much as I don't care for St. Paul, they are connected to us. This is only because of the riots, racism, and fascism. They've shown up in other areas like St. Cloud too.

Ever since 2020, border patrol has been dumping busloads of human beings they find at the old Kmart parking lot. They are left in Minnesota regardless of season with nothing but the clothes on their back and maybe a bag. These human beings we placed here as an excuse for ICE to show up.

ICE has been in my neighborhood trying to shake down businesses. They've been in a couple that I tend to frequent. Word is that they're at Targets and Best Buys IDing anyone who isn't white that walks by.

I do believe that cities act as living, breathing entities, and the city has been disturbed. It's restless and mad. People are acting strange and cranky.

the holidays

I didn't go home for Thanksgiving, but I did go home for Christmas. My parents bought a house two summers ago, but obviously, they're not going to have a bedroom for their 26 year old child. What they are going to do is set up an air mattress next to the pool table in the basement, and that is my "room." I'm not actually bothered by it or anything. I just think it's so funny. I am bothered by that damn air mattress though. I swear there's a hole in it somewhere.

Going home is usually an okay time, but this year felt kind of sad. I make it sad for myself really. I see my dad aging, and my younger brothers aren't tiny kids that beat each other anymore. The older one of the two brothers is going into the Army which we're not fans of. I can see why he's doing so though. Nothing interested him much career-wise. He also had a traumatic experience years ago that made the whole family really worry about him. He is a hospital housekeeper now, and he's grown to be really compassionate. I just hate that that compassion is going to be wasted in the Army or just destroyed by the Army. He leaves this month to go across the country, and then he's either stationed in Germany or Venezuela. I have an obvious preference.

The younger brother is still in school. He likes automotive work and cars like I do, but to his credit, he did it first. I don't think he knows what he's going to do though. It would be really cool for him to go into automotive stuff, but I don't think he has a big passion for it. I usually know what this brother is up to because him and I play games on steam occasionally. The older one is more anomalous and reserved.

I have been able to tell that my dad has aged for a while now. He's more of a ditz than he was before. He's got incurable physical ailments that used to put him in the ICU annually. Somehow, he's found himself doing railroad work which is extreme manual labor. Funnily, he's recommended the work to me and told my brothers that they couldn't do it. I guess I'm tough? I don't want to dwell on the topic of AI too much, but he is someone who is duped by it on social media. The whole time I was there him, my mom, and my grandma (who lives in the house) were all actually consumed by brainrot. My mom is very invested in tiktoks while my grandmother watches basically ads for those weird romance phone games. Dude, I don't even know. I just know that it sucks.

Usually when I go back home, I just end up feeling bad because everyone's aging. Even the dog.

the dog, Fran. She has no teeth now. She loves her heated blanket.
other smaller things in december

December had a lot of snow here. It was far worse in Southern MN. While I was at my parents' house, a blizzard dumped 10 inches of snow. The dog couldn't go outside! She's so small that she was basically drowning in it.

images taken on my digicam, but during other storms that

While I was home, I went deep into the idea of quilting. My mom had a bunch of unused fabric, so I brought it home with me. I started working on a quilted vest. It's nearly done, but I got sick of my sewing machine jamming. It's a little Janome Derby. Nothing special. It does what I needed it to do. Initially, that was sewing my own house curtains.

I had been obsessed with the idea of making quilts that I already planned a couple. I wanted to start these quilts while a crochet blanket has been waiting for me to pick it back up for two years now.

I've been working a lot on this site too. I have many more plans for it like revamping the garden page before I start the next garden things. I've got a lot of things to fix yet though.

Right before I went home, I got into printmaking again. I did it a lot during school. Printmaking is the most accessible way of reproducing work, so it's often used for social causes. Art schools invest a lot in printmaking studios, and there's people that have great solutions to doing it at home.

like screenprinting a lot. I think it's my preferred printmaking process. I really want to do it more, but the last time I was doing it, I was using crazy stuff. I was printing things on mylar then exposing the green goo (photo emulsion) with this big machine that has a big light and like suctions the screen down. It was crazy. That whole process make it really feel like screenprinting is inaccessible. Well, this person on youtube has shown me something that I have never considered.

Using a Circut to cut a stencil to put on the screen. I have a Cricut I never use.

I've done stencils on a screen before, but it was like wax paper and the printing ink would make the stencil disintegrate over time. So, I'll be trying the Circut vinyl stencils. In the mean time, I dug up some old stamp blocks and linoleum to carve. Block printing is fun too. I wish I could do woodblock again, but the piece of wood ick me out.

I've been sketching more too. Drawing cars is hard.

taken on digicam

Lastly, I've been deep into font world. I am on the hunt for a good, modern script font. I have no real reason to have it other than hoarding fonts. I just find most script fonts to be too like "wedding invite" or either like 2013 Pinterest lettering. One font I found is Jacquard (9/12/24). I found it just on Google Fonts. It's a pixelated blackletter font. I prefer 12 personally. I like blackletter fonts, but the ones that look more like some medieval monk wrote it not the ones that look like Fraktur.

I think I'm just going to hoard more fonts. I have so many installed.

december vibes
images from pinterest; none are mine. my image; digicam

I don't really have songs this month. Just listened to radio, and I'm not going to remember those songs!

january

I started January by hosting what we called "Christmas Two." My partner and I just had our friends/neighbors over for a little dinner and to exchange gifts. We arranged an array of cheeses, crackers, cookies, and a vegetable. This vegetable will be important later, but I try to give the neighbors vegetables. They need it!

I spent a few days planning + working on the cookies. My partner wanted a bunch of Christmas cookies, and I had this bass cookie cutter that I wanted to use. I made bass sugar cookies paired with cookie that looked like "chips." Fish + chips cookies. Also make the peanut butter blossoms and chocolate covered pretzels as requested. I am still sitting on a lot of it because hush hush I am dieting hush hush.

The fucking vegetable though. Ooooh my god. I made brussel sprouts. I have been wanted to make some good roasted brussel sprouts for like ever. I tossed them in oil, herbs, salt, and pepper. Then sat them on grated parmesan which melted and crisped up. It tasted great! But what the fuck! I was sick for a whole day after.

Brussel sprouts hurt my stomach enough already, but this was extreme. I couldn't sleep or eat or just survive. FUCK I couldn't even drink water. It was bad enough that my partner was worried that I had the flu. I can't even think about brussel sprouts positively anymore which is good because I wasn't going to put them in my garden anywayyyysssss.

The rest of January is quiet. Just prepping for the next rally racing trip soon.

sillies

I am going to leave you with some silly things I enjoy because this one was a bummer. Everyone deserves a little whimsy even with everything going on. Having joy and whimsy is a part of the resistance.

I never watched sesame street as a child, but I am obssesed with Slimey. Porsche snow plow?