monthly recap (november 2025)
i've spent the last few weeks attending my gay therapist's queer male self empowerment program at the HIV foundation but i had a mental breakdown during the final session so i'll be out of commission for a little longer.
that aside, i do think i'm slowly becoming more confident and happier again. you free up a lot of time for hobbies when you aren't on social media 24/7 and it's much easier to make friends when you can bear to exist in real life.
i still have a couple of goals to tackle before the year ends!
blog updates
updating my blog on the regular again so i now have a monthly mailing list! join it here on google groups.
also working on redoing the layout and tags, writing some big EOY wrestling posts and smaller reviews of experiences/places i've been to. i finally manually indexed some local wrestling posts a couple weeks back and soon after got an email response from my favorite wrestler's mother. i'm pleased but mortified!!!
cyanotype photography
attended a fun cyanotype photography course by anna-maria bribiesca at the start of the year. it helped me visualize the process of photography much better—with smartphone photos it's often difficult to understand how labor intensive taking photos used to be! i never realized that photography was literally recording (graphing) light (photons) until this.
i'm currently reading the synthetic eye: photography transformed in the age of AI by fred ritchin. it's more important than ever to be able to understand photography as a physical, analog process and one shaped by composition—not just within the photograph itself but how framing, setting, context, etc.
aotearoa showdown
aotearoa wrestling promised the biggest night in the NZ scene and they didn't disappoint! it was actually quite fucking incredible to watch pro wrestling at due drop arena; the setting and lighting was so good that every shot looked professional. it was a 3+ hour long event so i did some live drawing between matches. tee hawke jumping off the second floor was the highlight!
loved watching rangi and jamie tagataese as well—sad to see the big man go but it was a great venue for a send-off. i enjoyed the tubbs and murdoch tag team a lot, really great bumbling foolery fun in the same sense as the bushwhackers. just an amazing night. i love pro wrestling.
thrift store finds
despite my distaste towards consumerism i'm seriously a fiend for branded items. this is what growing up as a teen in the 2017 hypebeast era does to you.
- radiac wulcosa shirt ($15 NZD): made in ireland! apparently this was from the 50s or 60s so it's my first real vintage item, though the pattern is so timeless it's just like what i'd wear today (granted i have the fashion sense of an old man).
- reyn spooner shirt ($20~): beautiful 90's summer shirt in my three favorite clothing colors. i love the blockiness of the pattern and the slightly faded effect. reyn spooner shirts are typically $200+ NZD new so it was a total steal.
- tommy hilfiger shirt ($20~): unfortunately i can't resist tommy if i see it in my size. i'm never going to pay for a new $180 dress shirt so i am very happy to get such a lovely 100% cotton shirt for so low!
- uniqlo shorts ($8): i've been after a pair of black dress shorts forever. uniqlo is fast fashion everywhere else but you literally can't buy uniqlo in NZ so it's rare (nevermind that i went to japan four months ago).
- tatty teddy teddy bear ($2): SO adorable. this poor teddy looks so pathetic and cute and has a little pillow for sleepy time.
- rune naito teddy bank ($2): just plain adorable. i didn't realize he was rune naito until i got home; now i regret not getting the little teddy bank too!
- russ thornbury teddy bear ($5): russ bears are sooo adorable you can instantly recognize them in any op shop. mr thornbury looks so sweet with his little brown bow tie i had to get him as a friend for my mr fuzzby.
i don't buy branded goods on purpose! it's just that the high-quality stuff happens to be pricier. i'm sorry for having expensive tastes.
i did volunteer at a charity op shop near the start of the month and it was quite interesting to see the logistics behind it. i've heard the horror stories about syringes and soiled clothes but i came across nothing of the sort. however, there was just so much stock and so little space that we still had to toss anything that seemed unsellable, including items that would be a relatively easy fix. this doesn't help my penchant for buying second-hand clothes!
art log
some photo studies with cameos from wrestler james shaw and my gay therapist. if my gay therapist is reading this sorry i keep calling you my gay therapist online. i'm practicing j. c. leyendecker's style... once i figure out a consistent process i'll write a guide. composition of the sketch page inspired by tamagosan1001.
finally starting on this sideM wizard of oz concept i've had since 2018 or so. the teddy bear outfit genbu is unrelated i just wanted to draw him in a teddy bear outfit.
i'm trying to act like a proper marketer and come up with audience personas so i can better target my writing. i designed this character to be my muse for a packaging-related client. she runs an eco-friendly small business where she makes bikinis to order. now i have to come up with a character who's the chief technology officer of a corporation that earns $100 million revenue per year.
media log
- impact pro wrestling - necessary evil: i missed vinny dunn's final event so it was great to catch his IPW HOF induction at least. raven and nico tag team felt made for me. liking khan capital a lot lately: megan kate is megan kate, ringo ryan is a real big fun pro, troy daniels excels at being cringe, ant khan truly embodies the art of being a bored financebro, and maximillion is the perfect addition to a corrupt corpo stable. GOD, the horus and joseph cruz match—i need to write a whole post on the character of joseph cruz this past year because it has fascinated me—but man pro wrestling is fucking awesome.
- leon thomas - mutt: pretty good! i like the title track.
- colorful stage! the movie: a miku who can't sing: i think the moral of the story was that music needs to involve human involvement in order to resonate with others but the way it was handled was stupid as hell goddamn. complete fanservice film for pjsk fans except all of the music is stuffed in a single sequence at the end so it's not even fun in the same way as other idol media.
- rosalía - lux: crazy music for a main pop girl.
- letora utagawa - glass: why did they give some random va-liv girl the only live action MV since .KR and why is it actually good? it's shocking that va-liv is allowed to have high production quality lesbian music videos and original art that isn't used for merchandising when every other idolmaster brand bar gakumas is stuck in the gutter selling $20 acrylic stands of the same characters in a 3/4 standing position.
- f4mi - poisoning AI with ".ass" subtitles
- arthur conan doyle - a study in scarlet, the sign of the four, a scandal in bohemia, the red-headed league, a case of identity: going through the sherlock holmes canon at last! i do love sherlock for being an eccentric with a kind heart. he's not nearly as stoic as i had expected him to be, and actually much closer to herlock sholmes in personality except competent. the closest modern character equivalent i can think of is senku from dr stone. the
mormon jumpscare in a study in scarlet was crazy and KKK jumpscare in five orange pips as well. i liked the boscombe valley mystery the most so far; it's kinda like the sign of the four except not racist lol. very witty and surprisingly funny set of stories. - nz sculpture onshore: this was a sculpture show up in north head where all the old military bunkers and tunnels are. typically only a few are accessible, but for this event all of the tunnels were open and filled with artwork by kids from schools. it was truly amazing to see the scale and craftmanship of the artworks as well as the use of space! i can't imagine an exhibition area more unique.
- wicked: it really is just a good movie TBH. though it was shockingly long for the first part in a duology.
- chantal plamondon and jay sinha - life without plastic: the practical step-by-step guide to avoiding plastic to keep your family and the planet healthy: this book was written in 2014, so it's interesting so see how some practices outlined in the book have become the norm. while i was already quite conscious of my plastic usage, this book made me even more aware of the casual plastic in my life. i'm aiming to no longer buy new items entirely and (try) stop purchasing meat in plastic trays or milk in tetrapak. but unfortunately i will just have to live with consuming microplastics in my aluminium cans.
- defunctland - disney's living characters: a broken promise: it's art and humanity in the face of artificial intelligence. kinda like if the project sekai movie was good.