The Wordsmith's Forge

Check out this tabletop roleplaying game about old ladies in space. 

Common Bonds: An anthology of speculative fiction featuring aromantic characters and centering platonic relationships by Claudie Arseneault has reached its first stretch goal to pay contributors a professional rate. With about 6 hours left in the campaign, they're $1000 from the next stretch goal of illustrations.

Now funding on Kickstarter: an anthology of asexual fairy tales with illustrations.  :D 3q3q3q!!! 

I definitely want the hardcopy.  I am considering whether I want to bump up to the next level and also get two signed prints of the artwork.

If you want there to be more acefic in the world, go check out this project.  Fairytales are for everyone!  And the author is right, some of those things were already ace as hell, it doesn't take much to highlight that.

In an update for the Potlatch game, the Kickstarter project has reached its second stretch goal. It now stands at $7,720 pledged of $2,500 goal, with 266 backers and 45 days to go.  \o/

This awesome new project involves commissioning composers (including our own artsyhonker) to create new, wordless lullabies to be sung by Megan Ihnen. I gather the intent is something akin to scat singing.  This project is at $3,923 pledged of $5,650 goal, with 78 backers, and 4 days to go.  It's an all-or-nothing project so it only funds if it meets the goal.

For my friends with insomnia or anxiety, think about whether such a recording might help you sleep or relax.  A pledge of $25 gets you a downloadable copy of the digital album upon completion.  For anyone else with such friends, note that a pledge of $15 gets you listed as a backer in the liner notes, while a pledge of $85 allows you to dedicate a song to someone you know. I'm waffling between the $15 and the $25 levels, and wishing that I'd heard of this darn thing a week ago when people were asking what I wanted for my birthday!

This project just seems like a fantastic way to support people with the invisible disabilities of insomnia and anxiety.  It's a practical aid that should work for many people, given the popularity of extant soothing music, and it's a nifty new idea.  It alos offers an opportunity to support the arts.  If you wish you were in Terramagne-America, this is the kind of project often sponsored by their awesome public art grants, but people do these as crowdfunding too.

The Harp Twins are crowdfunding new harps. (Remember, they need two of everything. Yikes.) At the concert we saw, they had acoustic pedal harps, and electic lever harps. Now they're saving for electroacoustic pedal harps, which will have special effects pedals along with the usual ones for changing the pitch. Pay close attention to the status: $13,615 of $6,000 goal.  $6000 was the amount they were short of the downpayment for having the harps made, after saving money on their own.  The overage all goes toward the monthly payments, which are also large.  So the more, the merrier.  If you've got a few bucks to spare, chip in and let there be more harping!

I have to say, my farmemory makes this all the more squeeworthy.  Concert harps were exciting enough -- the classic harps could only be repitched with a tuning key.  Special effects pedals?  My historic and futuristic aspects are both geeking out at the same time, and that almost never happens.  :D

my_partner_doug and I are continuing the assembly of the Yellow Submarine.

( Let's play with Legos! )

I've started posting pictures of our project to assemble the Yellow Submarine model from Lego. 

A group of people are working to launch an artist colony in Cambodia.  They have thoughtfully laid it out in stages of development.   

This looks interesting:

Zenith ~ a post-apocalyptic islamic futures adventure about the phases of the moon, jackals, and learning to assert your identity ~

29 pages / B&W / PDF

ALL proceeds through the rest of 2016 will be donated directly to the ACLU + Muslim community centers in Florida.