Blogs of folks I met at Vida Vegan Bloggers Conference

Howdy, folks! I just got to attend the amazingly curated Resistance Ecology conference in portland. It was amazing! A conference that was all about intersectionality in animal rights. I left feeling ready to rebuild- and with so many new connections and ideas, I hope that as we rebuild our movement we will be working from a stronger framework, one that holds each other accountable so that we can truly grow stronger. If we are trying to cause the least suffering, we must also take care to not oppress people as well.

My favourite talks were with Breeze Harper from Sistavegan, and Lauren Ornelas from Food Empowerment Project on racism in animal rights campaigning, and addressing the fact that our "cruelty free" choices can still oppress people working for the companies that steer clear of animal products. Like Clif Bar...
Another highlight was a timeline of the powerfully successful movement against italian vivisectionists, and hearing about how activists have gotten thousands of people involved and hundreds of dogs, mice, rats and rabbits freed. The Lab lieration was my favourite thing that has happened all year, so It was nice to hear from someone involved in Italy.
I also was stoked to hear a talk on corporate control with an emphasis on Ag-Gag bills with Will Potter, David Shapiro and Lauren Reagan.
I'll post my favourite recordings of the talks as they come out.

BLOGS

I said I was going to make a post of blogs i liked from folks I met during the Vida Vegan Lifestyle Blogger conference's Vegan snack after party at Herbivore Clothing and Food Fight! Vegan Grocery. We ate vegan smores on cake crackers, and Gordita crunch taco things. It was really good, and I asked some folks about their blogs. As to be expected, some were by self centred people that only care about their health and smatter it all over their blog.
Aside from that, I sure do like blogs with a lot of pretty pictures of recipes and food.

Vegan Moxie - Seattle based blog, supporter of Vegan Haven/Pig's peace. Jam making!
Becky's Tasty Planet -   Dank cornbread and broccoli soup recipes
The Vegan Word  All I can say is snacks snacks snacks

Yeah whatever

Some things I have been listening to

I'm not sure if Anyone reads my blog any longer. I hope so.

Here are some podcasts I have been listening to, mostly about Animal Rights.

Animal Voices
The episode I just listened to is fascinating - A Mennonite talking about religion and Animal rights.
All Things Vegan
The guest on this episode is talking about the way to truly reform the Industrial Food System.

Well fuck I got an OK cupid. Now want to blog again.

EMETIC - Leslie James Pickering

Here's a little post for a zine that came for consideration many months ago - EMETIC, Or, The Evan Mechan Eco-Terrorist International Conspiracy.
The group were a bunch of activists fighting for the earth, and the Holy San Fransisco peaks in Arizona (where I'm from.)

The zine details some of their actions, communiques, and THERMCON - the FBI investigation launched after the sabotage of Snowbowl ski lifts near Flagstaff, and the trials subsequently.

I really loved this zine when I received it, but I decided to promote it in light of the still frightfully imminent issues of the peaks destruction, and the safety + freedom of those who continue to fight for them. Get a copy at Burning Books !

Artists I like that i saw about a year ago at stumptown.

I saw this person's things at stumptown 2011. I liked them.

Martine Workman, royalty of the tiny flourish, Is also charming. 

Matt Sundstrom's Illustrated Map of Portland. All illustration of The former blackrose. RIP.

Jen Tong

A few zine reviews

Sweet Heart Sweet Rot
Lily Kerson, 2011

lilykerson@gmail.com
A thin pink quarter size with cute ghosts on the cover, inside the theme seemingly tied together with twine; just a little spookiness that rolls around inside one's self. a few pictures, doodles, quotes, and a short tale about a visit to a psychic. Very nice.
I Guess I mostly think That if people were more willing to acknowledge the dark and scary sides of life, not to mention the inevitability of death, the world would be a better place.

Glimmers
Neurotic Musings on Love, Death, Magic, Astronomy, and learning how to be brave in Kapitalist America
Jane AppleSauce

A super cute, posi, and sentimental zine filled with doodles, friendcrush letters, words on friendship and infinite love, moving to seattle, realizing better ways to live and have relationships, and dying. Apparently, this amazing person may also be starting a zine distro - bring it on, Jane!
"When I die, I believe that i will lose conciousness, probably forever, and that the atoms in my body will slowly spill out into everything. The ground, the mountains, the stars in the sky, the ice cream that they serve in waffle cones down the street from my house"

Last Night at The Casino
iknowbilly@gmail.com

I like zines about work. For the most part, I like this one. It's interesting to hear from an environment where "emotional highs and lows are sort of the objective of the entire procedure." Lots of talk about money, shit-talking and regulars. Overall a fun quick read but with some fucked up and objectifying behaviors toward women, but is great about homosexuality... (BTW,I understand.)
 The author finds humour in "short sticking", a process where the dice are pushed shy of a "good looking lady with big tits and a low-cut shirt" so she has to lean over and give the crap's dealer a free look, and judging by the text likely participates himself?  Wanna respond to that one?

whisperkid

whisperkid

WHAT I WANT FOR MY BIRTHDAY!

very short "i'm reading the News" roundup!

The Gulnare Freewill Baptist Church In Kentucky Votes against interracial couples...after a couple is to a sing a duet to their congregation.

I know the iphone Siri thing has been played to death, but...Blogger Jill asks siri some more questions to a hilarious and sad result. Excerpt:

Jill: My girlfriend is pregnant. What do I do?
Siri: First, do no harm.

Jill: I want my pussy eaten.
Siri: I have found eleven pet stores in your area.

The Dreary Argument about WHO IS A SEX WORKER?

Sex workers pushing for a trade union in Argentina. YEAH!

American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists - Get ready to treat patients who are trans! (With respect and awesome healthcare, hopefully!) Sweet statement here.

Feministing Loves Portland's FAT FANCY plus size vintage and consignment...And so do I!

GIVING THANKS FOR PORN OBESESSED FEMINISTS!

Also, I just wanna commend Kevin Hogan of Boston - a porn actor and teacher.

And also, Props to the folks holding the building in Santa Cruz. Cool.

Oh coleen!

Softest tree

Oh, I am drunk on daydreams of you

beyond bible pages of crystals and crosses, babies and bathwater

windows and wonder-falls

we will greet a day together soon

sing a soft hallelujia!

Halle

halle

halle!

yours forever in a thought locket

Danielle Rodeo Warhola

Pink clad Messengers / Onward Hardline Soliders Split

PO Box 11703 Eugene, OR 97440

Attention to whomever sent me this hardline/queer positive/joke/sarcastic from 2000 or what have you..Boom, thank you. I started reading and fell quite into a trap of retro an-snark-ism. So i got bored and fucked my friend instead. We made out for a long time, dry humped, petted me with his hand, and I went down on him for a while before he asked if he could get inside my panties and i complied, happy to forget this awfully laid out zine with near impossible to read typography. He fucked me from the back and it was GREAT! The kind of sex that makes you want to take the day off work and stop reviewing zines (from ten years ago) so your new sweetheart can come over and do you hard on the pile of zines you should be reviewing!!! I don't care if this shit got bent! RECOMMENDED!

2 reviews

Ladybeard

Maddy Phelan

beardedlasyzine@gmail.com

A fabulous zine from a rad, hair queer on Electrolysis, being bearded and sexuality/attraction/orientation. I really enjoyed their journey from guilty and conditioned to energized and owning of their sexuality. As a hairy person myself (who unabashedly admits to shaving facial hair regularly) it feels great to read accounts like these - smart, eloquent and honest.

"I started to postpone my lazer appointments although i was still shaving every day, in between appointments you can't pluck or wax and the first time i put a razor to my face I felt a bit like what i imagine a teenage boy feels like her he starts to shave his face."

Les Carnets De Rastapopoulos #8

2-7 Larch Street

Ottowa, Ontario

Canada

IR 6W4

Unique zine about pen palling in the 1980s when the berlin wall was still intact! Sweet Canadian boyhood with interesting charts of everyone he ever wrote. One pen pal wanted ad in a Czech youth magazine raked in over 250 letters!

"as excited as i was to finally correspond with someone from australia, my self designated favourite country, landing a pen pal on the other side of the Iron curtain became my next target. The whole idealogical Us Vs. Them, Capitalism Vs. Communism divide during the cold war made it impossible to find a pen pal agency with eastern european names"

Not saints, nor whores, Only Women

BLOGGERS!

OH HEY. my sidebar links went back to what they were a few years ago? is anyone else experiencing this?

.

A couple more zine reviews.

Arts and Crafts Revolution #3

Ian.zwicer@gmail.com

I thought this would just be a how to book of knitting or shellacking breakfast foods or what have you , but it's actually a smart look at illustration and the history of outsider art. The history part is my favourite (Who would have thought..!) with short descriptions of inspiring artists such as Henry Darger and Maude Lewis, folks that prove art is for everyone. Colour theory, Perspective, photography, and some cute additions like a pattern for a giraffe shaped scissor case and group drawing games. Recommended.

Bitch King

madame.angela.chaos@gmail.com

A collage laden zine with some prose and an article on Queer Suicide and systematic violence used for social control. word. "Violence is so weaved into the fabric of our lives so much that we rarely question the roots of political violence."

The Anarchist Queer Person of Color

No clue where you can get this, but it is circulating, i belie

ve from riverside california.

while the layout is sloppy to say best, i liked this zine - it includes profiles of queer anarchists of color, Lucy Parson, Luisa Capetillo, Lorenzo Kom'boa Ervin, and Ricardo Flores Magon.

Town and Country

Kinoko & Cameron Hawkeye

kinokogallery@gmail.com

Another smart comic and sketch collection from Kinoko, this time collaborating with the talented Cameron Hawkeye. Whimsy and existential pain meet a very hungry hand-bird that wants nachos. Full colour pullout but don't pull it out it will fuck up your comic book. It's nice to see them come together in this lush zine. "we relaxed today. It was not easy. There is heaviness weighing in on our fear. knowing despite all i do."

A couple of zine reviews

Wonderland

Sapira Cheuk

sapiracheuk.com

A fold out zine illustrating some curvy forms surrounded by some graphic POP Lines. Just something to take a quick look at.

By the River Side

www.lista.tumblr.com

Cut and paste, cute zine from Riverside CA. Facts about cats (Did you know all kittens are born with blue eyes?) a little prose, some photography, a brief piece on body love, herbal hair cleaning recipe. Seems like a younger person did it, Enjoyable layout.

While I'm away I'll write home every day

Lista.tumblr.com

Apparently made by a teenage girl that loves her boyfriend, hopefully this was for her boyfriend? a list of love weekend..."take a shower, see a shower, watch a sweet movie, take photos, picnic w/ cosmo, do/make something nice for our parents, make a list of why we love each other, eat pizza, overlook, fairmount park, lots of kissing, make a good breakfast together, start a puzzle, finish a puzzle, romantic dinner, fireworks, craft, play dress up..."

and there are photos of the happy couple. I guess I'm just bitter because i used to feel like this with my ex girlfriend and now I think love is dumb half the time.

Ilse Content out today, and also, Summertime #4

Not that long awaited because she is motivated, Alexis Wolf's Ilse Content #10 is out! It's all about home.

Summertime #4

ginasiciliano@gmail.com

Last night I read the fourth and final Installment if Seattle Based artist and Author Gina Sicilliano's graphic novel "Summertime". The characters in her beautiful sketched pen and ink pieces are given such emotion in their faces; dissapointment, heartache, dissatisfaction; but ocassionally the look of love, and glimpses of excitement. #4 delves into the ending struggle with a friend/lover and addiction. Don't read if you're in the thick of heartache or friend loss, but everyone else please do so! Reccomended.

And also, a link to Tart Magazine's blog. A truer sentiment has never existed.