Well well well, if it isn’t a new medical complication! 😂 And here I thought I was leaving the bulk of that in October.

The last week of October was the first week all month where I had no dental appointments, and yet I end up beset upon by a rousing case of vertigo! Dental work-induced vertigo, to add insult to injury. Basically, all the drilling they were doing on my backmost top left molar last week shook some equilibrium crystals loose in my ear canal, and now I guess my chakras are misaligned? A.k.a. I have BPPV and it’s giving me the mad wobbles. Not just the wobbles, but also light-sensitive headaches and mental fog thanks to the stormy weather causing fluctuation in barometric pressure. So. That’s… rude.

I’m not gonna say that I had an awful October. But I’m also not gonna say that I had a great month either. I’m content with the month I had and that’s going to have to be enough. Oh November, please be kind!

The other day, I was having a conversation with a friend who is experiencing a symptom of The Old, i.e. she did something completely normal and reasonable and somehow threw out her back. “I’m just outraged, I’m genuinely shocked,” she said. And I think that’s just where things are in life now. I’m sure some of you know what I’m talking about, some of you have been here for awhile. And maybe some of you think that it won’t happen to you, The Old. And I know with October in the books, and Halloween over, we should be done with the scary stories. But let me tell you now: it will happen to you. You will wake up one day, with a strange pain in your shoulder because you slept on it wrong, or you will go to stand up and realize that you are bracing both your hands on your knees, making some strange grunting sound. And it will be then that you realize It got you. You’re old now.*

Old and so tired of this shit. Which shit? All of it/take your pick.

*Unless of course, you have a chronic illness! In that case you’ve been old for a very long time, but people who think they know better tell you that you’re too young to be old. But guess what Steve! My knees really are just as bad as yours! I didn’t realize we were going to have a knee cracking competition, but let’s fucking go.

Anyway, I do hope you had a good Halloween. My Halloweek was quite reasonable overall bordering on fun (except for all the time spent in dizzy misery as I rotated myself through a series of therapeutic maneuvers designed to realign the crystals in my ear). Overall it seemed this year like people were hesitant to plan for Halloween or to acknowledge it in advance, but they certainly showed up to the bars this weekend. I think we’re all just really distracted by the fascism and what not, which makes sense.

☑️ The Week that Was - Started the week at a movie theater with friends followed by a costumed dance night, ended the week with a chill Halloween party. Streamed on Wednesday after pushing through multiple tech issues. Everything in between was either vertigo or editing (or both); missed my friends’ baby shower due the former. Did have nice walkies with Irma before and after her vet appointment and found a big stick to carry home (for reasons). Tried a new slow cooker chicken recipe that was delicious but needs refinement; subsequently made broth. Entertained a brief(?) mental side quest about opening a photo studio…

📋 The Week that Will Be - Another weird week ahead… I’m hoping for two streams and more editing work. One big cleaning day on the calendar. Yet another dentist appointment riiiiight before I leave town to stay with family for a few days. I’m already tired.

Since I’ll be traveling again through next weekend, no guarantees on next week’s newsletter timeliness! I’ll do my best to prep beforehand and try to get something queued up to send out around the normal time on Sunday, but the way things have been going lately, IDK man we’ll see.

So this is something I’ve been batting about in my head for a while now, and I’m very optimistically thinking that I’m perhaps closer to enacting it than I expected. For a few years now, I’ve been wondering what it might look like for me to rent a small space outside my home, to turn into a private photography studio. And I think that reality may be closer than previously believed.

I’ve been doing all my own photography for the past five years of being returned to content creation/sex work, and while that was dandy on the outset as I was still getting settled into my space and everything was in flux… at this point I’ve hit some barriers. Too often my work has been impacted by construction on the building, or not being able to sacrifice the space for multi-day shoots, or just life going sideways and impacting my small space. And as much as I’d like to do more photography of other models, friends, and creators, I’m also just not super keen on having folks in my home, especially when it’s like, yes please come into my bedroom/living room/photography studio, no I’m not a creeper this is just how I live and also work and yes I am so totally a professional why do you ask?

Every once in a while I’ll go online to window shop hourly creative studio rentals and get frustrated by how much extra work it would take just to shoot in a new space… transporting my gear (did I pack/bring the right gear?), doing all the setup, all the teardown, keeping my fingers crossed that anyone else involved shows up on time. Is it worth it to rent a fully furnished studio set for $60-100 an hour when it would take me 3 hours total for just shooting my own content? I feel like I’d be exhausted by the time the camera was turned on… as I usually am trying to do a big shoot in my home within a 24-hour window! At that rate I might as well rent a hotel room and spend the night, you know? Which, I’m not against, but that still wouldn’t enable me to really “create a set” in the way that most inspires me.

A few weeks ago after just such a window-shopping adventure, I was musing in my notes about what an external studio may require from me or what I’d need from it… cost of the rental, location, etc. Most importantly, it would provide some stability for my goals as someone who would very much like to be a career photographer. I could spend time doing soft construction with fabrics and small furniture props, keep all my bigger photography gear there, the tripods and soft box lights and strobes that are all meant for studio work anyway. I could put together a set and take my time shooting a variety of content, even have some folks come through to shoot something unique for them, too. And then, when I got bored, tear it all down and start again with something new. No rush, no deadline.

Less than 48 hours later I was browsing on Instagram and got served an ad for a new maker space that was offering private studio rental for creatives. The location was very accessible for me, and a full month of rent would be less(!) than a full day at an hourly studio. Hmm! This really got the wheels turning, and since my physical noggin was down for the count due to aforementioned vertigo issues, I spent an afternoon last week leaning into this particular tangent and doing some plotting. It at least got the ideas out of my head so I could get back to other work once I felt better.

This led me to part 2 of this whole premise, and part 2 is also years in the making and is where the plotlines start to converge: funding the studio itself via… a Patreon? Perhaps? I had a Patreon over a decade ago for a very different project and learned a lot about the platform as well as my capacity for such projects. And for the past few years—arguably, before I started my OF page in 2020—I’ve been contemplating restarting my Patreon and remaking it into a (SFW) photography project. So then a loose framework for a Patreon got folded into my mental tangent last week.

And now, the whole concept is basically ready to launch whenever I’m ready to launch it. Start with a Patreon with multiple posts each month exploring my more traditional (and experimental) photography work, offer more intentional guidance on being a content creator, move some prints, and start gathering funds for a studio rental. Will this location that kicked off this whole mental side quest still be available by the time I hit any goals that make that viable? Impossible to say. But the alignement of the ad showing up just days after I came to accept that I do need some kind of external studio time just felt too aligned, you know? Also, the spaces are pet friendly, and being able to bring Irma with me is definitely icing on the cake.

So we’ll see! While this concept is years in the making (decades, if you consider the span of my actual work as a photographer), I’m not quite at the point where I feel comfortable dropping a chunk of change on a space. Camming is going well but it’s still a very fresh part of my income, and I’d prefer to continue paying down the debt accrued from Irma’s vet bills over this past year before I invest in anything new. So the photography Patreon could happen regardless, but beyond that… 🤷‍♀️

Either way, it’s gratifying to feel reminded by the universe that maybe it’s still possible to do the work I want, to create the art I want, despite how difficult the world is becoming. And the reminder that my goals are still worth working toward is very much appreciated.

This is the last week of October-focused movies, and I know I need to update my Letterboxd now! So this section will probably calm down in November and I’ll maybe have other stuff to talk about.

🎬 Movie #1 - I attended a screening of a beautiful and vibrant 4k restoration of one of the original giallo movies, Blood and Black Lace (1964), as part of an indie theater’s October presentations. I was first introduced to this movie a few years ago, and the vivacity of color and the depth of the set designs throughout this film have lingered with me. It was very nice to see it on a big screen, and with friends no less.

🎬 Movie #2 - Wanting to watch a chill ghost story, I pulled up Things Heard & Seen (2021), starring Amanda Seyfried. This wasn’t on my watchlist but I liked the cast and premise, and took a chance. And tbh, I missed. Sure, yes, this was a ghost story, but it was also a domestic violence story, and a toxic masculinity story. And that’s a year-round but not particular October-y. This was weird and I don’t really recommend it.

🎬 Movie #3 - I don’t usually go for campy horror or Troma-style movies, but the creative novelty of How to Kill Monsters (2023) pulled me in so hard in the first five minutes that I actually hit pause and came back later when I knew I could pay attention. And yes, this was definitely an independent production, but it was a fun and unexpected Cthulhu story, with a solid three acts where I could not predict what would happen next. I’m intrigued to check out more of this group’s work because I did really enjoy their style and am curious to see what else they can do.

🎬 Movie #4 - A few years back I watched all the Halloween movies in the lead up to the penultimate Halloween Kills, but I neglected to finish out the franchise at the time. Well, the night after Halloween I watched Halloween Ends (2022) and it felt like an appropriate way to end what had been a frustrating October. It was fun to see all the nods to the original movie(s) throughout this one, and I was glad they returned to more practical effects. Some plot elements felt a little too “we don’t want to invalidate the lonely young men in the audience,” but overall it was a very satisfying and meaningful conclusion to a much beloved franchise.

🍳 Cooking - I keep a gallon bag of vegetable scraps in my freezer; all the bits I trim off during food prep, or maybe bruised or damaged or about to go bad and I’m not going to get around to eating it. I have another bag that’s bones and meat scraps. When I have enough of either, I put them in the slow cooker for a few days. Meat I try to run for a solid 24 hours on low before adding in any vegetable scraps and going another 24-36. You can push the meats a bit longer, but too long and the bones disintegrate and you’ll have to do more straining; vegetable matter is more delicate and too high a heat or too long will burn it. But god, you get your timing right and… the broth. The broth!! My freezer also has a rotating selection of bone and vegetable broths I keep in those quart-sized takeout containers. I use 1-2 in soups, or dilute them with more water to make rice, or a pasta bake. Extremely valuable and easy way to improve your cooking and minimize food waste.

💄 Wearing - I’m back on my Ipsy shit—I usually resubscribe at least for October to get the cute Halloween makeup bag but I am also running low on a lot of basic makeup and need to start replenishing supplies. In my last box of stuff I received a bottle of e.l.f. Cosmetics Power Grip Dewey Setting Spray. I already had what I thought was a great setting spray (Urban Decay All Nighter), but this stuff… it sprays a very fine mist that doesn’t make you flinch when you apply it, and when I tell you my makeup lasted through three hours of drinking and dancing…! At $11/bottle I’m never going back.

🤖 Speaking of problematic reliance on AI… the AI bubble is THE bubble to burst them all. I’m sure by now you’ve already seen the headlines about how the AI bubble is basically propping up the entire American market, but this article does an extremely thorough job of diving into the why that is and how we/the country got to this point.

🔞 I’ve never been “on the apps” as they say (aka dating apps), but I’ve been very online since even before my sex work career started in 2004. And as much as I am pro-sex, pro-free speech, pro-#freethenipple, pro-my job is Internet, I often lean into thinking that the Internet has not really been good for sex in America. Of course, A Lot a lot of that has to do with both our education system and capitalism, and how those things combined have led to an online culture of misogyny and abuse. Alas, what could have been… (Source: journalist Micco Caporale on Bluesky)

🎨 Playing into both the link above and also my recent musings on what it would be like to have a dedicated creative space… this piece on how consumer culture punishes creators, and forces us to chase the dopamine high of public approval without necessarily receiving any actual support. Which also ties into genAI sloppers who think they should have access to “being an artist” without any of the training or effort of creating. It’s kind of grim out there. (source: writer A.L. Goldfuss on Bluesky)

I hear tell the mall started playing Christmas music on October 29. I wish there was something to be done, but I think it will take the complete and utter end of capitalism to cease the relentless march of psychological warfare Christmas music from pressing in upon delightful celebrations of the macabre.

Keep your fingers crossed for me this week, if you could. Today is sunny and Irma and I will be getting out again for a walkabout, but it’s supposed to turn stormy again within a few days. And if my inner ear problem persists, I might not have the wherewithal to be upright as much as I need to be. Sometimes too much physical rest is mentally exhausting, you know? Especially when you know there’s work to be done.

And I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you that you get all the rest you need, all the motivation you require, and all the leftover Halloween candy you desire. (Please just brush your teeth after lol.)

xox,