Comments on Washington Bullets on Youtube

Did some craft supplies reorganisation, didn't find the needles I need but _did_ find this forgotten WIP, so I guess I'm working on it while I acquire the needles for the other thing. 🇳🇿🧶

Did a big tidy up and now I'm clutching my inhaler amid a cloud of dust. There are various lessons one could learn from this, and I suspect I'll learn the wrong one.

I did this one a couple of years ago and really liked it!

Nominations for 2026 Sir Julius Vogel Awards now open! sffanz.nz/blog/2025/12...

REMINDER to send your 2025 original publications of queer speculative short stories (science fiction, fantasy, horror, anything odd and unusual) to We're Here 2025 for consideration - I am the guest editor this year, with the always awesome @cypayseur.bsky.social!! www.neonhemlock.com/were-here

Happy new year everyone!

The not-personal thing I'm personally most excited about for 2026 is Auracast. I'm not wild about having to upgrade my phone when it's otherwise perfectly good, but damn. Imagine being able to not only hear things but understand them.

I don't get to start the new year with a new writing project this time (for overall positive reasons, but I do like doing that) so I'm letting myself cast on a new knitting project instead. I have yarn at the ready...

Shocked to hear that the health portal where you could avoid the COVID screening questions by just uh clicking hide element has security flaws.

Here are my recs from the books I read in 2025: andis-newsletter.ghost.io/books-i-read...

WE'RE LIVE! From 8 December to 2 January, you can head over to itch and support QTBIPOC creators with our mutual aid bundle! itch.io/b/3424/qtbip... #QTBIPOCStorm #qtbipoc #IndieGameDev #IndieDev

The pilot ep of my new literary podcast dropped today on YouTube, so if you want to watch/listen to me blab with Aussie Asian authors Emma Pei Yin & Jacquie Pham about author journeys, that would be a great way to spend your Mon eve and support us 🥰 Reposts appreciated! youtu.be/vfhIVfjN83w

Dear bluskeeters! I'm doing research with a friend. If you're a Black Author with a speculative book publishing in 2026, could you please pitch and link me, please? This a difficult to sus intersection. Please add your friends' work. Please tag people. Please share

My parents were usually pretty restrictive but at some point my dad showed me Alice's Restaurant well before he should have done.

A pair of happy hammerhead sharks (ca. 1735 Edo period Japan)

Spent the morning reading and (gently) walking at the local reserve and it was a good choice.

Putting together my list of "great books I read this year that I think you might like too" and I promise you all of them are real!

Folks. I finished the draft manuscript, knowing I could edit it when I had obtained & read this book. I sent it to a couple of people who agreed to read it. One of them responds to say they happen to have another book on the subject out from the library but haven't got round to reading it yet...

I’ve done some catalogue searching and am fairly confident in saying that 5/10 titles in this list do not exist (1, 2, 4, 5 and 7). Sloppy, unacceptable, and a real kick in the guts to real authors with real books they’d love people to buy and read!

You've heard of Elf on the Shelf, now it's time for... (Extremely Aotearoa specific, sorry!)

A very Parliamentary (and apocryphal) Christ-tide to you all.

Ok yes, I know it's Christmas Eve, but I really want to get this book to first readers before Christmas. SO. I have 3 sections of the last chapter that need substantial edits (and probably about 1.5 new words) and 21 references to fix up (which may increase with the new words). Wish me luck?

this website full of elder millennials has been training for this for 25 years

Ok, so in The War Between the Land and the Sea, Hynes surprises everyone by confidently speaking Russian. In the Torchwood audios, Norton Folgate was recruited to Torchwood from his National Service at the Joint Services School for Linguists. Fan theory is developing.

*ahem* to anyone still doing some holiday shopping for readers who love weird family curses where everyone is queer: hi, I wrote a novella! It's called Death Valley Blooms and goddamn just look at that cover, I'll never get over it www.neonhemlock.com/books/death-...

I am delighted to report that Spellcasting On by @andiwrites.bsky.social is exactly as delightful as I thought it would be! Go get it! amzn.to/49njAjB

16 days late and this is funny and all but I actually need this book for research before I start querying publishers with a related book of my own and I'm almost ready to do that. And I could buy it and probably should but I know if I do it will just become available.

blergh, I HATE having to ask coz I know it’s super hard for everyone especially around this time of year… but I’m also about to hit negative balances and I don’t get paid til next Friday :/ been a real f’ing hard eight months tbh and I’m sorry everything is so awful ko-fi.com/mercwolfmoor

ah, the butlerian jihad

So next year's challenges are include restrictions on my access to transport and underwear (as if having to import it wasn't barrier enough) on top of all the existing challenges ANYTHING ELSE YOU'D LIKE TO ADD???

Ōtautahi, tonight’s rally has been postponed due to a storm rolling in right on 6pm.

So the normal sunflower patch is back in stock, and the sales for those were huge, like, a massive demand, I'm in triple digits of sales for those! I've added this double whammy now, hidden disability meets rainbow: pocomoto.co.nz/product/rain...

Also I caved and got an air fryer, please tell me easy and tasty (vegetarian, also no mushrooms) things to make in it.

What are your favourite NOVELLAS from 2025? I'm primarily looking for: - weird/experimental/literary SFF - SFF w queer characters/elements/communities - historical sapphic romance - works that explore disabled experiences/communities Bonus if on Kobo, double for Kobo+, but open to other platforms.

Water pipe is fixed! That was a drama but could have been much worse.

I swear to god it was easier to find presents for my great aunt who had taken a literal vow of poverty than it is for my youngest brother.

And we have a water pipe burst, one week before Christmas. Thankfully the water is heading OUTSIDE but still, I do not need more to deal with when everyone is booked. (If anyone reading this thinks it's normal for the time of year I am reminding you it is SUMMER here.)

We split the workload in this household. Today I'm earning money and partner has gone into town to yell at the government. Next time we'll swap 😂

BREAKING: The High Court of New Zealand has granted PATHA’s application for interim relief, declaring that the Crown should not take any steps to enforce the incoming ban on new prescriptions of puberty blockers to transgender children and young people. More to come:

I want to share a bit about my personal experiences with Total Mobility, as a user. I'm someone who can often use buses and trains (which I'll call mass transit here, because I consider taxis with TM part of the public transport system) but sometimes I can't. 1/?

So not being able to drive isn't actually enough to get a total mobility card. You have to have significant difficulty with public transport also. This is cutting taxi funding to people who have no other option. (Source: I have a total mobility card.)

This one’s important e hoa mā - a few of our orgs are collaborating on this fund to ensure that no trans young person in Aotearoa misses out on lifesaving care. Alternative treatment pathways exist but are expensive and we need your help. givealittle.co.nz/cause/we-got...

SO many things I've been waiting on have happened today (mostly good) and I'm in a rush of adrenaline and the only thing I can concentrate on is trying to make a DIY tactile board for Draftosaurus. (You visit our house, you play Draftosaurus with us, and blind friends are NOT exempt.)

Ōtautahi, we’re rallying Friday from 6pm in Hagley Park at the corner of Riccarton and Hagley. No one is in support of this ban - every major medical body has come out against it. Let’s show that the public don’t support it, either.

Weird Al Yankovic recently did a completely straight cover of "Killing In The Name", if you were wondering how things were going youtu.be/COZcKrUx1Ts?...

Excited and grateful to have been awarded a residency at Toi Pōneke for next year: toiponeke.nz/events/2025/...

So shall you hear Of carnal, bloody and unnatural acts, Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters, Of deaths put on by cunning and forc’d cause, And, in this upshot, purposes mistook Fall’n on the inventors’ heads. All this can I Truly deliver.

Kia ora koutou — Te Waka Taki Kōrero/The Māori Literature Trust has opened applications for two grants (up to $6K) for mid-career Māori writers. Applications for Te Tupu Hauora close on 30 Jan, 2026. All info on the website linked below. Mauri ora! mlt.org.nz/te-tupu-haur...