"A Tale of Fire and Panic" - Chapter 5: Fort Roguelike

If you are new to Project:  Spiral, then click here to read the teaser, or click here to read from the Prologue.  Otherwise, welcome back!

Content Warning!

This story contains instances, descriptions, and frank discussions of:  depression, personality disorders, and other mental health issues; suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts; child abuse and neglect; graphic violence, war crimes, and institutional/systemic violence; gender dysphoria, body dysmorphia, and transphobia.  Reader discretion is advised.

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"Project: Spiral" - Art Update #16

Hi!  This has been a crazy busy week, and today was a rough day, so I've got more art from the archive (art-chive?  Maybe.) behind the cut.  This time, it's sundries and miscellanies.  Enjoy!  (And don't forget to click for huge!)

"Stories About My Life," part 4: Adventures in Locksmithing

While P:S is in editing mode, I thought I'd write up a few stories about my life.  These are things that I have wanted to talk about, but haven't really been able to because P:S is written mostly from the perspective of my seventeen-year-old self.

Today's story was also prompted by some rando post:

I have a similar tale from my own stint as a locksmith.  Enjoy!

"A Tale of Fire and Panic" - Chapter 4: Grayl

If you are new to Project:  Spiral, then click here to read the teaser, or click here to read from the Prologue.  Otherwise, welcome back!

Content Warning!

This story contains instances, descriptions, and frank discussions of:  depression, personality disorders, and other mental health issues; suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts; child abuse and neglect; graphic violence, war crimes, and institutional/systemic violence; gender dysphoria, body dysmorphia, and transphobia.  Reader discretion is advised.

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"Project: Spiral" - Art Update #15

This was supposed to go up last Thursday (and that's where I'm putting it, by the stars), but I got way busier than I expected.  It's a good thing:  I'm booking more jobs, and more kinds of jobs, which means more financial stability but also less time to do this blogging stuff.  Fortunately, I have the P:S chapters and stories about my life on autopilot for the next month and a half - I just have to figure out what to do about the art updates.  I'm thinking a "retrospective" theme.  This week's retrospective is on Alice.

Everyone's favorite snarky zombie elf!

Back in the days of Project:  Suck the comic, Alice was a palette-swapped Roll sprite:

 

Project:  Suck strips featuring Alice.  Click for huge!

Her illustrations were also fairly by-the-numbers, unlike Pannych and Phyr who had their sprites changed to match their jaunty garb (though Alice did get costume changes that the others did not, outside of their power forms).

Over the following years, I redesigned her a bit to make her less like Roll - but I still kept her super-skinny, so meh.

When it came time for the reboot, I decided she needed a new build.  As Alice had previously been a love interest for Vulcan (now Rayla) and Pannych, and I had since axed that angle, I thought it would be thematically symmetrical to model her after Lady M's physique.  If that doesn't make sense to you, then it at least makes sense in my head.

OK, that's all for now!  Stay tuned for... Jegus, it's only three days until I have to come up with an actual plan for this shit!  Wish me luck!

"Stories About My Life," part 3: My Story Spirals Back

While P:S is in editing mode, I thought I'd write up a few stories about my life.  These are things that I have wanted to talk about, but haven't really been able to because P:S is written mostly from the perspective of my seventeen-year-old self.

Today's story is inspired by a Tumblr post:

As it happens, I also have a concrete example of a story about me that got way out of hand.  Enjoy!

"A Tale of Fire and Panic" - Chapter 3: Noob Valley

If you are new to Project:  Spiral, then click here to read the teaser, or click here to read from the Prologue.  Otherwise, welcome back!

Content Warning!

This story contains instances, descriptions, and frank discussions of:  depression, personality disorders, and other mental health issues; suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts; child abuse and neglect; graphic violence, war crimes, and institutional/systemic violence; gender dysphoria, body dysmorphia, and transphobia.  Reader discretion is advised.

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"Project: Spiral" - Art Update #14

Made some good progress on Tom the Prophet's cabin!

OK, that's all for now.  Just happy to get this in on the actual day it's supposed to be.  Cheers!

"Stories About My Life," part 2: My College Arrest

While P:S is in editing mode, I thought I'd write up a few stories about my life.  These are things that I have wanted to talk about, but haven't really been able to because P:S is written mostly from the perspective of my seventeen-year-old self.

Today's story is from a time in my life when I behaved very differently to the police than I do now.  In short:  my mother would call the cops frivolously and frequently while our lives were unraveling; accordingly, my five-to-twelve-year-old experience was that cops came running at her beck and call, wouldn't point out her Obvious Bullshit, did nothing to fix the problem, and left after telling my parents to sort out their own issues (which they clearly could not do).  Point being:  I no longer treat the police like I do in this story, though I had well-established (if personal and improbable) reasons for doing so.

"A Tale of Fire and Panic" - Chapter 2: Fite Nite

If you are new to Project:  Spiral, then click here to read the teaser, or click here to read from the Prologue.  Otherwise, welcome back!

Content Warning!

This story contains instances, descriptions, and frank discussions of:  depression, personality disorders, and other mental health issues; suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts; child abuse and neglect; graphic violence, war crimes, and institutional/systemic violence; gender dysphoria, body dysmorphia, and transphobia.  Reader discretion is advised.

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"Project: Spiral" - Art Update #13.5

I completely forgot that yesterday was Thursday!  Nothing bad happened, just a busy week.  Here's the sketch of HellPhyr, finally complete with ENERGY LEGS!  (Any Picnicface fans here?  Anyone?  Bueller?)

I'm actually not too happy with how the energy stuff came out, but I need to A. be done with this, and B. do other arts; and this has been kinda holding me back.  Hopefully, I'll figure out what I did to make other magicalnesses look so good decent, and do that again.  My modus operandi is mostly "fuck with it until it looks right," and that time-honored technique is suddenly failing me... sad face.  Wish me luck!

"Stories About My Life," part 1: Ninja Training

While P:S is in editing mode (I wanna make a cocoon/chrysalis pun, but nothing's coming to mind right now), I thought I'd write up a few stories about my life.  These are things that I have wanted to talk about, but haven't really been able to because P:S is written mostly from the perspective of my seventeen-year-old self.  On top of that, I was very mindful of getting doxxed-and-outed before I came out, so I was pretty tight-lipped about my personal life; but I don't need to do that any more, so hooray!

Today's story is one I need to tell as background for some other stories.  I workshopped this one in a storytelling course I took in grad school with a professional storyteller.  He is also an iaido instructor, so with my own martial arts background, we had a lot of fun chats after class.  I keep this story in my back pocket for any time I need to fill ten minutes or want to dangle an incentive in front of some students/patrons.  I'll just say up front that these are all true stories, and obviously certain parts work better when I can demonstrate in person, use tone of voice, and make illustrative gestures.  Anyway:  Enjoy!