Portland Zine Symposium And Coming Home

So, as I've mentioned practically ONE HUNDRED TIMES, I flew up to Portland last weekend for the Zine Symposium!  I had racked up enough miles flying home during college that I got the flight for free.  I woke up early, early, early on Saturday morning, took a shuttle to the airport, and got into Portland at around 8.  I was astounded at how cheap their public transportation is ($5!! For a WHOLE DAY!), had a lovely breakfast at a place called Junior's, and then headed over to the Symposium.  I hung out all day going to several workshops and checking out all the tables.  I finally met the lovely Amber of Fight Boredom Distro in person got to see Maranda and Neely again (we met in San Francisco earlier this year!).  Corina, the creator of Portable Fortitude as well as many other beautiful illustrations was such a sweetheart and right by my roommate's table.  And Kione's hand made sign was too cute not to photograph!  I wish I'd taken more pictures of tables, but I felt intimidated asking.  But I'm working on it!  And hopefully I'll be a little bit more outgoing for the SF Zine Fest and East Bay Alternative Book And Zine Fests coming up soon!

Sunday I explored Portland as a tourist visiting Fat Fancy, Powell's, and several yarn stores.  And on Monday I hung out with a new friend/QT who I'm remaining in close contact with.  n_n  Portland was gorgeous and I definitely want to visit again soon!  I was so intimidated to travel solo, but having folks to hang out with once I was IN Portland made it a perfect experience!





And these last photos are some things I've been up to since I got back.  Porch hangs, Hedwig (who missed me a bit... :3), and crafternoons with Scout and Emil!

Bitten By A Travel Bug

 These are a few pictures of the many I've taken since the beginning of July!  July has been treating me very well thus far.  The last four pictures are from my house's anti-patriotism July 4th extravaganza (with some queers).  It was such a great party for so many reasons!  The people were all great, even the people I didn't know were such a joy to be around, the drinking wasn't excessive, and the food was delicious!  I didn't get a picture, but I made vegan mini corn dogs.  Yum.

Last week I road-tripped up to Eugene to help my roommate sell hats for her family's business at the Oregon Country Fair.  I wish I could go into more details about my experience, but I don't want to bore you.  The politics of the place were tedious and exhausting, but I made some money, which I wasn't expecting, and I got out of the house.  Hedwig was happy for me to be home and, unexpectedly, the next month is also going to include a lot of traveling for me.

On July 30th I'll be headed to LA to see my family and attend a wedding and on a whim I've decided to head to Portland for the Zine Symposium from the 10th to the 12th!  If you or anyone you know would be willing to house me for a night or two, I would be extremely grateful!

Take Care!
Mckenzie

Summer Days

The past weeks have been quiet.  Some tarot readings for guidance, writing for cover letters and a zine, finishing the first two seasons of Buffy, and a lot of animal cuddles.  The two dogs in the first picture (Pancakes and Buffy) live with me, and the blue-eyed kitten is my little fluff muffin, Hedwig.  I've been stealing herbs such as lemon balm, pineapple sage, lavender, santolina, and camomile for tea and baths.  I can't wait for our garden to be producing plants that I can use for natural dye as well as herbs.  But there's so much work left to do.

This weekend I'll be going to Trans March in San Francisco, but aside from that will be hiding from the Pride festivities happening in the Bay Area.  I'll talk about that more some other day.  Tonight I'm going to A Verb for Keeping Warm for a talk by Stephen West.  Ysolda Teague will also be there to sign books!  Of course, the only people I fangirl over are knitting designers and trans* reality tv stars (that story is also for another day).

Take Care,
Mckenzie

Keeping Busy

I keep wanting to say that I'm having a hard time keeping myself busy, but then as I'm reflecting I realize that it's not that I'm not keeping myself busy, but I'm having a hard time convincing myself that I'm being productive while I'm not making money.  I'm privileged to have some time to think about what I want to do, because even though I walked in graduation, I still have one class to take next semester.  Not having my degree yet puts me in an odd place and limits what jobs I can apply for.  So I'm going to keep taking pictures, writing, reading, knitting, and gardening while I can and hope that I start to get some responses from some of these applications I keep sending out!

The first couple pictures are from Donut Farm which is a brilliant vegan donut/weekend brunch place in Oakland.  I got biscuits and gravy that were to die for, but they also have chick'n and waffles, breakfast burritos, and tofu scrambles!  There pictures of some SCOBY and the preparation of some kombucha, which is fermenting perfectly.  There are some pictures of Hedwig, my little cream puff, and my qt housemates.  My Ravelry page is linked in the sidebar if you want more info about my knitting projects.  I'm planning on filming another episode of the Double Chin Knitting podcast later today or tomorrow, too!