A (matcha) break

Dear readers,

I’m taking a break from sharing comics this week, partly because I finally, finally, am making progress on my book, a monograph on the computer art pioneer Vera Molnar, which was the subject of the PhD dissertation I finished 2 years ago. Working on the book proposal during my first summer break from teaching, when all I want to do is lounge and eat my bougie buckwheat crackers while watching Love Island (Nicolandria til death), has been like pulling teeth. Yesterday I did Chani Nicholas’s “inner critic” meditation and learned that my inner critic is a mean girl named Stacey with a bob and round metal-rimmed glasses, so I’m learning how to lot let her run my life. I am doing enough, Stacey!

Also, my amazing friend Clara Venice, Canada’s theremin prodigy™️, is back in town, which means we are spending the rest of this week hunched over our laptops in her pastel pink house, hyper-focusing on our project Soft Reset. We’re finishing up our first mini-album, emotional tech support <3. When it’s out in cyberspace and on miniature CD (!), you’ll be the first to know.

As a final update, I am really excited to be a part of this year’s Leonardo CripTech Incubator cohort, which is focused on AI and disability; I’ve been dreaming of participating for years so it feels really surreal to be on the Zoom calls every Friday morning with like-minded weirdos.

I want to express my heartfelt thanks to everyone who has subscribed to this newsletter and dropped little hearts or emailed me supportive notes. It means so much to me, especially as sharing this stuff can leave me feeling quite vulny.

Moving forward, I am going to experiment with more paid content on High Functioning. This will include paid subscriber-only comics, printable zines, and my personal recommendations for functioning in the modern world. I welcome suggestions for any other content you’d like more of. If a paid sub feels too steep but you have the means to buy me a matcha, you can do so virtually here. And if any of the stories I share resonate with you, please feel free to comment or reply to the emails. It really means a lot to hear when the comics resonate with people.

If you are like me and have a tendency to neglect your inbox, you can catch up on comics #1-9 in the archive. Next week, comic #10 will take us to Berlin, which has a special place in my heart. See you there!

xoxo,
Zsofi