🌱 Alyssa 🏳️‍🌈

Just your garden variety nerd, as in, I love my garden and am a nerd. Would love to connect with you.

I'm also trans, poly, and pan. Allegedly in my 40s. Resident of northern Aotearoa.

Pronouns: She/They
Amateur Nouns: Maker, Photographer, Tinkerer
Loves: Permaculture, Cheese
Sewing Machine: Bernina 830, 1973

Last Notes

2026-03-22 20:17:46 UTC

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Linux, repair, reuse, bicycles? Heck yes great combo!

2026-01-05 20:33:35 UTC

I've no complaints about my current instance, but I'm considering finding a new one with a more aligned local community.
If anyone knows of a space where a #queer #SolarPunk #permaculture #boatbuilding tech nerd would find her people, drop me a line?
🌱

2025-12-11 01:35:19 UTC

Braiding garlic turns out to be surprisingly difficult. This will have to do, and I hope the vampires won't mind.
#permaculture #homegrown #preserving
https://o.mastodon.nz/media_attachments/files/115/698/359/311/258/920/original/8c92c8587e7f7179.png

2025-10-07 23:51:05 UTC

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Make it sow.

2025-09-29 03:10:33 UTC

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Oh. No. My gut is a little sensitive and the suffering for the week after isn't worth it, lol

2025-09-29 03:03:48 UTC

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And when I need to escalate from that... well it's a bad night. :/

2025-09-29 03:01:11 UTC

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I don't find it very useful. Ibuprofen (Advil?) is my go to for the lighter tension headaches though and it helps.

2025-08-25 23:17:23 UTC

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Gosh those look good.

2025-08-24 23:47:02 UTC

A little update from the Germination Station for #solarpunksunday .
I use the solar from my roof to power LED grow lights for getting my seedlings started and ready to plant out in the main garden. This lets me start the season early when the weather is still very unpredictable. All the punnets are reused ones from past seedling purchases.
Growing from seed lets me have a good catalogue of seeds and sow what I want when I need. The grow lights are really enhancing what I can do outside.
https://o.mastodon.nz/media_attachments/files/115/086/403/775/527/184/original/5dc325e2e1be9802.jpg

2025-08-24 23:34:45 UTC

@npub1san…jgxu Due to timezones I get a lovely feed of nice positive #solarpunksunday news as I make my way through Monday morning.
:)

2025-08-18 23:22:02 UTC

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I just came out of a meeting where two people were telling me different things that logically contradicted, and staring at me with smiles like I was supposed to accept their collective agreement.
I think I'm supposed to let it go and gloss over such things, but I'm a programmer, and I can't implement an impossibility.
I quite often feel like I'm being really difficult when I'm trying to get people to speak accurately.

2025-08-09 00:17:37 UTC

Germination Station.
I'm making a real effort to grow from seed rather than buy starts as it's much more economical. It is genuinely trickier though, especially with the weather being so random.
I'm a nerd too though so I'm enjoying the tech in play here. This is one place where I feel #permaculture and #solarpunk overlap in a lovely way. Solar powered LED lights ensuring we have healthy seedlings ready to go in to the outdoor garden.
https://o.mastodon.nz/media_attachments/files/114/995/915/912/973/857/original/490b93eb4792acdf.png

2025-08-07 00:34:36 UTC

On hobbies in 2025:
My interests have changed a lot over time. Early on was deeply interested in electronics, photography, computer graphics coding.
All of these fields have been significantly impacted by technology in ways that take the user away from the underlying fundamentals. With modern digital cameras and AI in the world, photos have lost their mystery. Modern hobby electronics has become about plugging together microcontrollers rather than understanding how they work. Computer graphics has long since moved on from the hand unrolled software rasterisation tricks I treasured.
Of course, you can always approach these hobbies with limitations and scope in mind. There is nothing stopping you making timing circuits using resistors and capacitors, but it wont be what you see on YouTube and in community.
My hobbies today tend towards things that have been less impacted by technology. Yes we have new steel and composite woods, but hand tool woodworking is still very much grounded in the hands on practical skills of old. Yes I have so much more information and LED grow lights and sensors, but when I do gardening I am still mostly moving dirt with a shovel.
I don't know how to name this feeling, but there's something about the soul of writing cursive with a fountain pen, or sewing with a machine older than me, that I can't find in the newer hobbies.
Wistful longing for working with my hands.
#handmade #maker #craft

2025-07-08 21:40:56 UTC

I'm attempting to explain to the snoot that the reason I can not give him head pats ALL day is capitalism. He's not getting it. I think he might be one of them commies?
https://o.mastodon.nz/media_attachments/files/114/819/777/444/303/991/original/3345791dbd8338f6.jpg