Author: Nyx

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Thank You

I want to write a thank you to everyone for your understanding yesterday. The comments and well wishes were absolutely lovely.

Because I believe in being more open about mental illness and ending stigmas, I will share that I seem to be having some bad, cumulative side effects to my medications. It left me feeling exhausted and ill yesterday.

My new GP and I are going to switch things up and address how to take on things in the long term. Meds are all too often trial and error, but at least now we know.

Thank you again, everyone. In the end, a review may be a small thing, but they are very important to me. I hate missing a day no matter what the circumstances, but it helps to know that people understand.

With that said, I should get back to it and type up my notes! Back soon with a review (the last for 2017!).

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Hiccup in the Force

I apologise, zine friends. I don’t have a review for you today. I’m not feeling well, but fingers crossed I’ll be right as rain and back to it tomorrow. 

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Enter Title Here

Hello, zine friends. I hope you are well.

I don’t actually know what I cant to say today. I just keep feeling the urge to post something even though no topic has bubbled to the surface. Usually the topic idea is followed by the urge to write, but here we are.

I feel fairly unprepared for the new year and yet strangely okay with that. 2018 starting on a Monday (oh, how I do starting things on a Monday) should have me ramped up for all sorts of plans and dreams, lists and to-dos, but I’m not there.

I am excited for the new year. Where Christmas feels strange and is emotionally confusing, New Year’s Eve is probably my favourite holiday. I love fresh starts nearly as much as I love zines. Alas, most of my time has been taken up with planning a fairly big project I hope to release into the wild in the next month or so – and I’m okay with that.

I do hope for big, wonderful things in the new year. I hope We Make Zines comes back stronger than ever after the hiccup recently. I hope new podcast Long Arm Stapler goes on to see success. I also hope to see @FANZINE‘s Zine World Calendar gets filled with even more zine events around the world.

I hope things go well for you. Yes, you. You who haven’t dozed off before this point. I wish the best for you in all the years to come, but I know 2017 was difficult for too many people. So I wish you such a wonderful year where you can feel safe, calm, and cared about.

I will be back tomorrow and Friday with the usual schedule. I just needed a ramble, as people sometimes do. Here’s to rambling and the hopes of some random person in South Australia.

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Happy Mail Monday (on Tuesday): Boxing Day Edition

Hello, zine friends!

Whether you are celebrating or not celebrating, I hope the start to your week was wonderful and filled with good things. I spent my day brainstorming and then watching 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown. Not too shabby.

I didn’t think that any mail would come through in the days leading up to Christmas, but lo and behold! Magnificent happy mail, my friends. Wonderful, lovely, complete surprise happy mail. I love it.

Okay, I tell a smidge of a lie in that this package of zine bliss was expected, but I didn’t know it was going to be zines! Oh, the zine love. This pack of zines from Mel at Swap-Bot were – you guessed it – part of a swap. I do profess my love for zines on my profile there, and it was so lovely to see these in the mail. Thank you so much to Mel for being such a great swapping partner.

Another surprise! I didn’t know what to make of this lovely parcel in my postbox, and it turned out to be one of the top combos out there – zines and washi tape! Love it! This pile of happiness came from Debbie Ann who will be leaving our sunny shores and thought I might like some goodies. That I certainly do, Debbie. Thank you so much for your generosity, and best wishes for your adventures outside Australia.

That’s me for today. It’s a toasty one here in the Bridge of Murray, and I’m trying to stay cool in my little office space.

I truly wish you all the best in this, a season of silliness but also often of sadness. I understand what it’s like for this time of year to be confusing and complicated. Know that you’re not alone.

Until next time…

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Zine Review: A Guide to Self-Care

A Guide to Self-Care
Latibule Art
Latibule Art

A Guide to Self-Care is a full-colour A7-sized mini-zine of self-care activities.

Self-care can come in all shapes and sizes, and sometimes it means just doing something. In this little mini-zine, you will find ideas for solitary adventures that can easily be adapted to groups if you’d like.

I like the adaptability of the activities in that way. For the most part, they are as ‘in’ or as ‘out and about’ as you’d like them to be (within the parameters of the activity itself).

This is a lovely little zine for your pocket or wallet to give you ideas on days when thinking of something to do is difficult.

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Zine Review: To The End of Time: A Photography Manifesto

To The End of Time: A Photography Manifesto
Graham Lally
http://exmosis.net
@6loss

To The End of Time is an A7-sized black and white mini-zine featuring small photos and writing about photography.

There is something that can be utterly stunning about black and white photography – even when it’s A7 and printed on cream paper. When it works, it just works, and – for the most part – it works in this zine.

Each page has a single photo, and each photo is accompanied by small blurbs. I found the writing intriguing. Graham opens with an almost aggressive stance on photography and then follows with writing about his fascination with it. It swings back to a disdain for digital photography and then moving in another direction again.

While I don’t know for sure it’s his feeling or intention, I thought the writing spoke to a love/hate relationship with photography without actually saying it.

To The End of Time is a solid little zine. Not only is it printed on thicker (nice, cream) paper, the pages are glued so it doesn’t unfold. It’s nice to hold and flip through.

I think this a poetic tribute to photography and is a mini-zine that anyone who enjoys photography would like.

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200th Zine Review Celebration Awards: I Read a Zine, And I Liked It

Wonderful, beloved zine friends. I’m so happy to be creating this post.

It’s that time again – a time that probably isn’t familiar to a lot of you. When I reached my 100th review in May 2016, I felt inspired by the Golden Stapler Awards and celebrated by awarding zines with titles like ‘best binding’ and ‘funniest zine’.

(100th Zine Review Celebration Awards: All You Need is Zine Love)

I hit my 200th zine reviewed a few months ago, but with everything that was going on, I wasn’t able to get to things until now. I still wasn’t sure whether I would do this, but I do love sharing my zine enthusiasm and celebrating fun and cool zines.

Things to remember:

1. My apologies for any less than stellar photos.
2. This is only meant to be a bit of fun.
3. Zines often fit into more than one category. How they were sorted is all on me.
4. Keep in mind these are limited to the second lot of 100 zines I’ve reviewed – roughly from May 2016 to July 2017. You can find the whole list: Zine Review Index
5. Picking out the ‘best’ stinks. I love them all!

Let’s do this.

(I’m putting everything after a more tag because there are a lot of images.)

Continue reading “200th Zine Review Celebration Awards: I Read a Zine, And I Liked It”