i genuinely like puns

So currently I answer to my full first name (which I usually introduce myself with) as well as two nicknames/diminutives plus my last name when people mistake it for a first name. There are two or three other nicknames I've also gone by in the past. I'm perfectly fine with this, or neutral at minimum-- I have a common name and have had to be flexible with how I'm distinguished for my whole life. I also don't feel a deep and fundamental connection of my name with my identity, though I think going by another name entirely would confuse me.

A number of friends have been appalled at me being called names I don't say are my name. Which is really weird to me, although I'd go to battle for anyone else who was getting either deadnamed or called something they didn't want. But this perspective seems surprisingly common!

The artist is in the box, made up as a marionette and the viewer can use pulleys and switches to position the artist's limbs and to change the background and lighting of the box and can type a short prompt for the artist to repeat and act out verbatim.

The viewer has to drop a token (provided as part of the piece) into a coin slot and work a crank to complete the prompt. While the artist is acting out the prompt, the prompt is printed on a photo strip that includes a picture of the prompter (taken by a hidden webcam on the booth). One copy of the prompt and photo is spit out along with the cranked token (which has the phrase "it's what you make of it" and an image of a clown pressed into it) for the viewer to keep, one copy of the prompt and photo is spit out inside the booth where the artist can collect it after completing the prompt.

And they will walk away with their prompt attributed to them with their photo and a coin they used their energy to mint into a reminder that the art is what they made of it. And their creation is documented in the hands of the artist as well. What did they put into the world? What did they decide to say when they had a chance to say anything? What were they comfortable saying before they realized that someone would quote them on it? What did they make of it, and how would they feel if their photo was attached to their prompt in a book or video or somewhere that people might see it?

[ survey.gendercensus.com ]

The 13th annual international gender census, collecting information about the language we use to refer to ourselves and each other, is now open until 13th August 2026.

It’s short and easy, for most participants it takes 5 minutes or less.

After the survey is closed I’ll process the results and publish a spreadsheet of the data and a report summarising the main findings. Then anyone can use them for academic or business purposes, self-advocacy, tracking the popularity of language over time, and just feeling like we’re part of a huge and diverse community.

If you think you might have friends and followers who’d be interested, please do reblog this blog post, and share the survey URL by email or at AFK social groups or on other social networks. Every share is extremely helpful!

Survey URL: https://survey.gendercensus.com

The survey is open to anyone anywhere who speaks English and feels that the gender binary doesn’t fully describe their experience of themselves and their gender(s) or lack thereof.

Thank you so much!

[ Link to survey ]

PS: You can see some regularly-updated statistics about incoming data here, with lots of demography and graphs to peruse!

I am delighted to report that there have been about 21,500 responses!

As you can see, we're still way behind last year and the record-breaking response from 2024, responses are about 25% lower than usual - but honestly, I'm not sad about it because 21,500 is still a mind-boggling sample size. (That reminds me, I should repost on /r/SampleSize.)

Other cool facts:

The average participant age is the highest it's been since I started collecting age info in 2020!

At least 46% of participants are new to the survey - decent!

New Zealand is again winning the annual "participants as a percentage of country's population" rankings. How are they so reliably good at that??

The USA is hilariously dominant, as usual - literally more entries than all other countries in the entire rest of the world combined:

So as you can see, it's especially helpful to send the survey URL (https://survey.gendercensus.com) to any genderly-interesting folks you know who are outside of the USA. 👍

Dazed while trying to piece together the series of bizarre yet deeply vivid images, the entire nation reportedly awoke Monday from a strange dream in which it had been watching soccer. “I wasn’t just willingly viewing it, I actually cared who won, and I was tuning in right here in the United States instead of watching it in Europe or someplace like that,” said 27-year-old Philadelphia resident Erika Sloan, one of the 340 million bewildered Americans who were kneading their foreheads in an attempt to recall the almost lifelike scenes in which they knew when Cape Verde was playing and had an opinion on whether a player was offside.

Gideon The Ninth- mock dustcover

I draw book covers for freelance all the time. I feel pretty lucky to do so, and wanted to create one with all my free will and spare time, to make just for me. Well, and for you lot as well. But mainly, for me.

I will be drawing book 2 and book 3 as well. And potentalially have prints of them later this year.