Genetically I Am Half Alien

Just very clearly an attempt at saying, “my what?”

this was me right before i started t, 2021

this was me after a year on t, 2022

this was me after 2 years on t, 2023

this was me after 3 years on t, 2024

this was me 4 years on t, 2025 (post op top surgery for a couple months by then)

this was me today, 5 years on t

Here’s HSTHETE, the 24 hour comic I drew this year!  Thanks to everybody who followed along on twitter this weekend as I posted these pages <3

but, the thing is

even polyester fabric was higher quality in the past

yes, not all of it, but, still, a noticeable amount of older polyester was...nicer.

yeah, it would still get picks and hold on to every bit of underarm odor, and that's on top of no-one knowing about microplastic shedding

the BLINDING difference in clothing quality between even the 1990s and the mid-2000s...not even going in to the decline in quality of clothing made in natural fibers (jeans with elastane, i'm looking at you), I've got faux-leather trousers from 1980s that are in near-mint condition, even after being hired and worn repeatedly for the past 40 years. we get donations of clothing that shows and films have bought online for contemporary shows that are disintegrating after being used on one show, for like....10 days, max.

don't even get me started on the seam allowances we used to get in clothes, because the assumption was you'd alter it at some point...

I got the idea from cowcatchers old locomotives used to have.

Anyways, yesterday I uploaded the model to Thingiverse, and just hours after uploading it, the Community Relationship Manager of the whole website left a comment suggesting I enter the model into a competition that's currently being held on the site.

So I did... and now it's in third place not even a day later. First place is $500, but the competition still has a month to go.

Then the Community Manager contacted me again, telling me they want to feature my model in an upcoming design promotion.

Just, what is happening? I mostly made this thing for myself in, like, an hour, and now it's suddenly super popular? This is all a little bit overwhelming 😵‍💫

Other models I worked on for weeks didn't get nearly as popular. I swear, it's impossible to predict what people will like.

Anyways, if you want to print the wheel guards yourself, you can get the model here or here.

I also made a quiet version you can stick furniture felt pads on.

Listening to a podcast about bodies and eating disorders and the body positivity movement of the last decade ish and hearing someone say (paraphrasing from memory here) "body positivity was all capitalism, there were no legislative changes, just new brands of jeans"

Legislative changes are super important but I cannot emphasize enough that jeans coming in bigger sizes and fat-friendly cuts is actually a really big deal! With meaningful impacts on people's lives (including mine)! Fat people do need clothes! And you may not realize this, but if you're over a certain size (that's not even that big a size) there's a very good chance you can go to a big box store and *not find anything that fits you*. There are towns in the US where if you're over a size 18 you need to drive an hour away or shop online to get things in your size. And they're expensive! "Just buy used" if they even have your size! Fat people want to look nice too. And we face enough judgement during job interviews (to give one example) without trying to do it in clothes that don't fit or are super uncomfortable.

Actually: If you're fat and you want to look cute/hot/masc/femme/etc I cannot recommend this website enough, you put in your measurements and it lists what brands have your size. You can filter for stuff like sensory friendly, nonbinary, masc, organic, etc. It's not AI just a database.