Mathi Arts Things

The sexuality of a police officer is cop.

The gender of a police officer is cop.

When you become the enforcer and protector of capital, you are making the deal to be slightly favored by the system over others like you, in exchange for being its servant. Your solidarity is with the system that you serve, even if it hates you.

Mexihcatl Education

Europeans crossed an ocean 500 years ago.

We have been here for thousands of years.

Who is really native to this land?

“Back in my day we didn’t have any of these childhood protective things, we were smart enough not to do stupid shit on our own!” Except your little neighbour, who got the funniest idea at the age of seven, and got his skull pierced when he slipped?

“Back in my day nobody got divorced, we stuck together and fixed our problems!” What about your cousin, who was slowly killed by her husband because she had nowhere to escape him?

“Back in my day nobody had ‘mental problems’, we didn’t whine, we just toughed it out and endured life!” Hey remember that guy you used to work with, who seemed really friendly and normal, and then suddenly hanged himself ‘for no reason’?

“Back in my day we didn’t have any of this ‘gay’ or ‘transgender’ thing.” You did, but your family cut all ties with her before you were born.

Basically, people are using their key fobs to set off their car alarms when they see ICE.

This is effective for several reasons:

Obviously, it alerts everyone that something is wrong. Given ICE has been terrorizing Minnesota, people are likely to immediately know it is ICE. This gives people time to flee or barricade themselves in their homes.

ICE loses the element of surprise.

day two! yes, obviously I have both "Mr. Faggot" and "Mr. Dyke" versions of this shirt. it's like you don't know me at all

day seven six! we've already covered Middle-Aged Queers, so let's talk The Homobiles. The Homobiles is a peer-to-peer ride share service that precedes both Uber and Lyft and serves the queer community of the Bay Area, regardless of the rider's ability to pay. it is also "the bay's mainstay queer punk supergroup", according to the pull quote on their bandcamp site, and I believe it. The Homobiles features, among others, my beloved faggot dyke Unka Lynee and role model Lynn Breedlove, formerly of dyke punk band Tribe 8, which basically invented punk rock. Lynn founded both the ride share service and the band and is cooler than all of us put together.

a couple of choice quotes from Lynee, my fellow dyke who's also a man:

"I'm a feminist and I'm a dyke and I fucking hate men and I'm a man. I identify as a dyke and as a guy. People are pissed off about that because they want you to pick a side. Really, my choice isn't about you. I don't tell you to lop your tits off, and you don't get to tell me that I can't be a dyke and a guy. That is just as repressive as any of the bullshit that we're rebelling against." [source, 2005]

Hey there! I didn’t know if you meant just sewing or cosplay as a whole, so I tried to include some of both.

Cosplay Tutorial is a master list of tutorials for pretty much everything under the sun, and was, and is, my go-to site since I started! They have a whole section of sewing basics that pretty much held my hand while I learned to sew. They also have multiple tutorials per topic and label which tutorials are text-based and which are videos so you can find ones that work for you! 

Kamui Cosplay has a whole line of books that branch from sewing and armor-building basics, to more advanced techniques like electronics and 3D modeling. I have a few of her books and used one of her horn patterns for my Mollymauk costume!

Kinpatsu Cosplay has amazing books on wig styling and makeup and offers patterns and full tutorials on previous projects they’ve done. They also have a Youtube channel that has really great tutorials and tips!

With Wendy has a Youtube playlist of sewing basics that seems pretty beginner-friendly from what I can gather by flipping through! 

Punished Props makes amazing props and has a wide variety of tutorials and books that break down different techniques that he and his team use.

Don’t be afraid to keep a tab open specifically for looking up terms and techniques you don’t recognize! And write down any terms you think are important if it helps! Learning a new skill is like learning a new language and I know how overwhelming it gets, especially when starting out. I have a whole file of links to super specific tutorials and techniques that I can never remember how to do, (Will I ever remember how to sew a mitered corner? Probably not.) and am constantly googling for definitions and tutorials when I start something new. 

I remember my dad picking me up to sit on his shoulders (possibly one of the last times he did that because I was getting too big to hold there for long) so I could be close to it's flipper because he wanted to show me something. He had me hold up my arm parallel to the whale's, and explained that we had the same bones, pointing to it's scapula and humerus and radius and ulna and so on while poking the same bones in my skinny little arm, all they way down to the tips of my fingers and it's own.

And in that moment, I could suddenly see how the whale and I were the same animal, just stretched and shrunk into different proportions by nature. There was an entire exhibit with skeletons of different animals and we went through all of them, picking out the hands and faces of all of them on myself.

I had never felt such a profound connection to the world around me before as I realized on a visceral level that not only was I related to all these creatures, they were very literally my distant cousins, and that in a way, they were me from back then and I was them from now, and we all were others still from the future.

Every living thing on earth is your cousin. The most distantly related humans are your 50th cousins. Chimps are your several thousandth cousins. An octopus is your 25 millionth cousin. Trees are your billionth cousins. You and I are surrounded by family. And that makes me feel profoundly loved.

Keep in ming that this is not me shaming you, I know you have your reasons, folks. This is just a guy who enjoys clean spaces asking that you start learning now.

Here’s what I suggest as an adult who has lived with other adults who didn’t have housekeeping skills:

First and foremost, learn about all the places in your house that need to be cleaned and understand how often they should be cleaned. the American Cleaning Institute (I guess that’s a thing) has a good article about basic cleaning info. Plus this video on cleaning tips is great!

Learn how to do your dishes. HOT water is the only way to clean your dishes.

Learn how to clean your shower head, especially if you live in a place with hard water. Same goes for your sinks.

Learn how to do your laundry correctly. Even without the whole “separating whites and colors” thing, there are things you need to learn about washing your clothes. Learn what the tags mean, too.

Also, you don’t have to use fabric softener and you shouldn’t use it on towels or any fabric meant to absorb. (Learn about laundromats) And please learn how to clean out your dryer vent, it’s a safety hazard!

Get a disinfecting cleaner for your high-touch areas, especially the gross ones like the bathroom. Just because it doesn’t look dirty, doesn’t mean it’s clean!

Learn how to sweep, mop, and vacuum effectively.

You’ll also want to make sure to change out your home’s air filters.

TL;DR, here are some cleaning videos.

How to Clean Everything in Your Bathroom

How to Clean Everything in Your Kitchen

Livingroom Cleaning Routine

How to Clean Everything in Your Bedroom

Favorite Cleaning Book: it helps you work through the emotional side of cleaning (and other care tasks)

Current Favorite Decluttering Method/Concept: it helps you know how much is too much to keep and how to get started when you’re overwhelmed. (having too much stuff makes it incredibly hard to clean/organize.)

Basic Cleaning Skills: this channel is amazing! this man has a special interest in cleaning and cleans people’s spaces who deal nurodivergence that make it hard to clean. he does this for free (or at a deficit because he pays for supplies and dumpsters and transport and such) and does it all with empathy and kindness working With the people as much as people can handle instead of just coming in to “fix” an issue. these videos are a bit different from his usual ones, (the last one’s most like his usual videos) but i find having the sped up cleaning videos with a voiceover can help fill in for body doubling when im too ashamed to bring people into my messy spaces.

Yes the fuck it is, stop being a baby

Yes pride is a riot and a fight and yadda yadda yadda but you are not revolutionary for sucking the joy out of queerness. Sometimes, pride is a party. It is a celebration of the fact that we are here, we're queer, and we're not going anywhere. And that is just as important as throwing bricks and fighting cops, actually.