eller

Can you take a late stone age knife that was shitty by late stone age knife design standards - and make it worse?

( Absolutely, and I'm very impressed by this. )

Double knives are a great thing: you have a larger blade for rough work, a smaller blade for detail work, and you wear them in the same sheath for easy access. A blade for every occasion! I (unironically) love the concept - it's very practical. However... This also happens to be the type of item that tourists love to bring as a souvenir from Finland.

( Let's take a look at a very touristy product. )

I had promised yhlee some reviews of really shitty knives (or knife-shaped objects), and after our recent conversation about the purpose of a ricasso on a blade, it's clear which shitty blade had to be first in line. (The opposite of an all-purpose knife is a no-purpose knife, right?) This lovely "hunting knife" combines all the historical accuracy of pink glittery resin rune earclips with all the functionality of a matte black sundial. Obviously, I'm the target group! :D

( Pictures and detailed review behind the cut )

...so, uh, this "hunting knife" can hunt dust bunnies on the shelf.

I used the holidays for baking...



...and it was fun.

Very fast papercut (and, well, paper tearing, because that's a lot of fun as well) made from the giftwrapping paper of today's advent calendar gift from Eleisis, as well as Kraft paper I got from someone else... Because, hey, it's black-and-gold sparkly paper, it should not be wasted! :D I glued verything into an Arteza watercolor sketchbook, which was a gift from Glitzermond. (So, everything was a gift!) Unfortunately, the paper doesn't really like water, but it makes a nice textured background. (I enjoy having contrasting textures in paper art. It's an entirely underrated part of the fun!)

I got five questions from landofnowhere, thank you! :)

1. Favorite chess opening?

That's easy - my heart belongs to the Ruy Lopez / Spanish opening with white! :D With Black, I'm a Sicilian player, but really, I'm happiest when I can play the Ruy Lopez, which is not just one of the first openings I learned as a little girl, but also frequently results in positions that suit my style well. I have something like a ridiculous 80% win rate in that opening, and I'm just sad I don't get it on the board more often.

2. Tell me about an interesting book that hasn't been translated out of German (or at least not into English)?

Huh... Books... That's an interesting question, since a) I'm not a very bookish person, and b) large parts of my collection consist of political propaganda (of any affiliation whatsoever; I'm just fascinated by the concept) and erotica (which I'm sure you don't want me to discuss here in detail). But I'll combine this with the topology question and recommend - the complete collected writings of Brouwer (yes, the guy with the famous fixed point thingy). I believe his math papers have been translated if they weren't in English in the first place (he published in different languages) but he also wrote some philosophical and personal musings that I read recently, and... Okay, frankly, I concluded the guy was insane or an utter asshole (and that's an inclusive 'or'), but this stuff sure was entertaining - and I don't think anyone ever bothered to translate it. XD

3. What's some interesting wildlife near you?

Wolves. They're cute. :) Interesting, too - some local sheep farmers keep complaining about wolves killing their sheep, and asking for compensation money from the government (which they're getting). The most interesting thing is how many of the sheep carted off to the government show gunshot wounds upon closer examination, so, at some point, the local wolves have learned how to operate firearms! Isn't that fascinating? :D

4. If you could add something to the standard school curriculum, what would it be?

Different techniques for brainstorming / systematic / prompted / assisted thinking and problem-solving. Most school stuff, unfortunately, consists of rote memorization, and even that doesn't work equally well for all learning types, so... Yeah, I'd love teachers to at least mention there are different ways to approach unknown problems, and ideally provide several methods the students can try for themselves. Otherwise? I wouldn't add anything to the school curriculum. I'd remove half the content, though. And that's being generous. Speaking as someone who used to skip a lot of school due to chess: if I return to classes after a two-month absence and haven't missed anything important, clearly, the time of young people is being wasted.

5. A fun topology thing?

All topology is fun... But, since I already mentioned Brouwer's fixed point theorem, let's stick to the historic fundamentals - I'll give a honorary mention to Milnor's Analytic Proofs of the “Hairy Ball Theorem” and the Brouwer Fixed Point Theorem since that's clearly the most amusing math paper in existence. Simple! Elegant! And... I laughed my ass off! :D Definite recommendation.

I'm sloooooowly starting to send out snail mail again. (I took a break from that when I was ill and potentially contagious.) This inchie (yes, that's a little square of 1x1 inch) is for Atlicedrawsstuff who sent me a care package with art supplies that I also haven't seen yet because I've yet to go home to my family. Anyway, I'm sure it's lovely mail! XD



Paper: Vaessen Florence watercolor paper, smooth, 200 g/m² - I'm actually very happy with this paper although it's rather thin and was super cheap, which means it was a really positive surprise to discover it doesn't buckle much when wet. I originally bought it for sketching while traveling, but I may actually use it for more 'serious' artwork as well. It's much better quality than I would have expected, and labeled as acid-free as well, so, YAY.
Watercolors: Winsor&Newton this time. :) Winsor Violet, Permanent Rose, Cadmium-Free Yellow, and Burnt Sienna. I don't use this box very often but technically these paints are perfectly fine.
Acrylic pen: Uni Posca in white. I'm actually not happy with that one. It dries kind of crackly (I don't know how to describe this, but the dried lines are soooo not elastic they crack when you bend the paper), and it's one of the more expensive acrylic pens on the market, while the super-cheap ones (FlySea) I bought in packs of 12 (!) handle much better.

It's kind of embarrassing but I don't have any scissors here, so Atlice will have to cut the painting once she receives it, ahaha. (I'm not going to buy new scissors because, heck, I've done that before when I forgot to pack any, so, uh, I have enough scissors at home. I mean, I do papercuts, so... I have enough scissors. Really.) I'm also sending Atlice some ATC-sized outlines she can color - I guess I'm going to link those when she got them and painted them. I drew everything on the same postcard-sized piece of paper anyway, which at least makes mailing it really uncomplicated.

A little rant, inspired by 'gender-neutral' fashion that's a lot less 'neutral' than the designers and their target group seem to think, and the misogyny in that.

( What is neutral supposed to mean here? )

I bought some new toys!



In my last papercutting suply post, I had mentioned my intention to buy a cutting mat. Well, I did that! I mail-ordered one from Gerstaecker (one of Germany's largest art supply stores), and because I've never before owned a cutting mat and don't know the quality criteria, I simply took the cheapest one: their home brand. (I've made good experiences with their own products before; those are usually perfectly good artists quality.) What can I say? I'm very happy with this purchase! Turns out this is a much better support for cutting than the back of watercolor pads. The mat provides the perfect counterpressure without getting scratched, and the paper edges turn out very clean. This is clearly an improvement.

Additionally, because I was curious, I ordered some weird products. These art knives are not held like pens but rather act as an elongation of the index finger: basically, you cut by pointing. They're made by Fiskars, which means they were on the expensive side, but also, I was expecting reliable quality. The orange one is a fixed blade, the white one is a swivel blade.



My first impression is, wow, this is an interesting product! Also, as you can see, the hole is a bit too large for my finger, but that's not a design flaw; rather, I simply have very small hands. I will have to modify that grip with tape. (Not the first time I've had to do that with tools.) Especially, I really enjoy the fixed-blade one. The blade size is chosen in a way that the tip is exactly where my index finger would be pointing, which is very helpful! I managed some very precise test cuts without even a period of having to get used to how this instrument behaved, it's just that intuitive. I have a lot of control over the pressure, too: that's directly controlled by the index finger as well. I think I'll be using this scalpel quite regularly! (Especially since I don't enjoy holding pens and pencils, so anything that feels less like a pen and more like a natural body extension is a welcome improvement.)



Interestingly, I'm less sure about the swivel blade (the white one). Because that blade rotates, the blade's orientation doesn't always align with the direction my finger is pointing, and because I'm a very primitive and very direct person, this is causing me some issues. Basically, the main advantage the tool with the fixed blade provides me is gone, so despite the design similarities, my brain interprets this as a completely different tool. A sure sign of that is that I instinctively use these tools with different hands: the fixed-blade one wants to be an extension of my left hand, while the swivel-blade one feels more like a knife, and, as such, has to be used with my right. By the way, it's an excellent knife (I mean, it should be, for the price... Otherwise, I'd be upset!), and I still like it better than the more pen-like swivel-blade scalpel I already owned, so I guess it's good to have. Just... It's the fixed-blade one I'm super happy with. Amazing tool design.

In case anyone is curious: these are my most important papercutting tools.



In this picture:
- large scissors (for long cuts; actually the professional thing because hey, Fiskars is a ridiculously expensive brand but they do make great scissors)
- small papercutting scissors (actually also the professional thing; these ones are from "ideen mit herz")
- utility knife with snap-off blade (the most important tool ever: cheap, reliable, irreplaceable)
- tiny paper scalpel thingy (No idea which brand this one is, but it's magic: I got it in an Advent calendar a few years ago, regularly use it since then, and the blade shows no sign of wear at all.)
- black paper: professional papercutting paper. Because I'm not a professional, I tore it, which is something I often do with paper.
- white paper: super-cheap note paper that I use for my practice papercuts. It's not good paper, but it somehow works.

I'm showing a close-up of the sharp things because the tips are kind of important.



NOT in these pictures:
- Japanese swivel knife which I have somehow misplaced. (It has to be somewhere in my suitcase, I guess.)
- can of spray glue
- cutting mat, because I don't own one yet. (You may think it's kind of important to have one, but so far, I've simply used scrap paper and the back of watercolor pads. I'm planning to buy one next week, though.)
- like, twenty scissors I can't use for various reasons. (I draw and write with my left, which is why well-meaning people assume I'm left-handed and keep gifting me scissors intended for use with the left hand... Except, oops, I'm actually mixed-handed, and I use almost all tools with the right, including scissors and knives. Also, yes, I usually hide that because of the serious stigma, so ending up with wrong scissors is partly my own fault for "passing" as lefthanded, which is also a social problem but less of one. Of the tools shown here, I'd only use the smallest scalpel, which feels like a pen in my hand, with my left!)
- lifetime supply of different papers. LOL