Zak Jarvis
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zakjarvis.bsky.social
Zak Jarvis
@zakjarvis.bsky.social
900 followers 280 following 6.9K posts
Artist, writer, extremely niche historian. He/him.
Links to my published fiction can be found on http://voidmonster.com

My collected writings on straight razors can be found at http://theshiveringbeggar.com

Tabula rasa accounts are auto-blocked.
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zakjarvis.bsky.social
When you see this, post an image from your galley to describe your mental health.
An engraving of a terrified horse being lowered into a mineshaft barely large enough for the horse to go down lengthwise. A man in a hat on the platform has his hand on the horse’s leg, seemingly attempting to comfort the panicked animal.
November 27, 2025 at 6:22 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
It looks like her face was cut & pasted from a bunch of disparate photographs.

I think she must have been the manager in Fighting Baseball:
A screenshot from the Japanese SNES game Fighting Baseball, showing the roster of available players for your team: SLEVE MC DICHAEL - WILLIE DUSTICE ONSON SWEEMEY - JEROMY GRIDE DARRYL ARCHIDELD - SCOTT DOUROUE ANATOLI SMORIN - SHOWN FURCOTTE REY MCSRIFF - DEAN WESREY GLENALLEN MIXON - MIKE TRUK MARIO MCRLWAIN - DWIGT RORTUGAL RAUL CHAMGERLAIN - TIM SANDAELE KEVIN NOGILNY - KARL DANDLETON KEVIN NOGILNY - MIKE SERNANDEZ BOBSON DUGNUTT - TODD BONZALEZ
November 26, 2025 at 4:22 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
The Sumerians really got it.
A screen capture from one of the Dumuzi/Inanna poems. It reads: "Dance, dance! O Bau, let us be very glad about my genitals!"
November 25, 2025 at 1:55 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Fortunately, the book lists its sources.
The cover of a book of poetry called Pure Pagan: Secen Centuries of Greek Poems and Fragments, translated by Burton Rafael and introduced by Guy Davenport. The top quadrant of the book shows a domestic scene as painted on ancient pottery. The title cuts into the bottom of the painting and below it is a left-justified bunch of grapes. A page from the book. It reads: Menecrates Old age We all pray for it Before it comes Then blame it When it arrives. Old age is a debt We like to be owed, Not one we like to collect.
November 24, 2025 at 11:35 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
I only noticed this bit of custom engineering on my new bike because of a video review. The “quick release” is actually a multi-tool that mounts in the rear through-axel.
A photo of the mount for the rear wheel on my new bike. A gold lever sticks out to unscrew the bolt. But oh! That gold lever comes out! It is both a hex driver to remove both through axels and a smaller hex driver that fits other bolts on the bike. It’s held in *very* firmly by friction and magnets.
November 23, 2025 at 7:25 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
A picture of my new e-bike, which I’ve named Velocipes bergfresser. It is a black road bike which says Trek in glossy on matte black paint. The name is outlined in a thin band of gold. There’s an insulated metal water bottle. It has a SRAM 1x group set, hydraulic brakes and an astonishing, tiny TQ HPR60 motor hidden between the cranks providing power directly to the pedals. A group of deer. 5 are visible, one is a buck with antlers, but he’s got his head down for food, like all the others. They are standing just on the other side of a fence on the side of a steep hill covered in dry, dead grass with fresh shoots of green coming up after last night’s rain.
November 18, 2025 at 11:28 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
TFW you finally get a 250 year old joke you've been looking at for ten years.
An entry in Gale's & Martin's Sheffield Directory of 1787 for "Rose, William, Coalpit-lane" his mark, shown on the right side are two printers ornaments. The stiletto above a fleuron variant. A thorn and a rose.
November 16, 2025 at 9:06 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
If you see this, post a comics cover you love.
A picture of the cover of Clive Barker's Son of Celluloid painted by Les Edwards. It shows Marilyn Monroe licking blood that is pouring out of her empty right eye. A single drop has landed on her chest, nowhere near the lowcut white dress.
November 16, 2025 at 7:01 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Got the new bike home just in time to get spandexed up, hop on the saddle and ride to the main road before it started raining… and I don’t currently have glasses for riding in rain.
A picture of Zak in the car, he’s several days past the last shave with a mustache and goatee and wearing a black button up shirt. In the back of the car is the new bike. Mostly You can see that it is matte black. But it’s also fast.
November 16, 2025 at 12:10 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Because of Woke, you can no longer praise the graceful intercourse of your friend's recently deceased wife.
A screenshot from Alexander von Humboldt's letters. It reads: "12. HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN. Saturday, March 9th, 1833. To a mind like yours, noble friend, solitude and calm are necessary. You draw only upon yourself. Think, that I received the painful news[9] only last night by Prince Carolath. You know what a warm-hearted, long-proved, and kind friend I lost in her, the honor of her sex! how amiable she was, when lately she instructed me to transact the little business with Beuth. So experienced in all the vicissitudes and illusions of life, and yet so cheerful, and so gentle! With such an intellect, so full of soul, and so true of heart! The world will appear to you a solitude for a long time, but the consciousness of having imparted to such a lovely woman, until her very last breath, all that genius, and heart, and gracefulness of intercourse like yours can afford, will be a balm to your wound, dear Varnhagen. I conjure you, take care of your health! A. Humboldt"
November 15, 2025 at 7:01 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
This is what was taken from us.

The original 1837 Cooke & Wheatstone electric telegraph.
A photograph of the telegraph device. It sits in a gorgeous wooden base carved to resemble a harp. Mounted where the strings would be is a polished nickle diamond with the alphabet engraved into a diamond grid. A row of 5 needles in the middle can be actuated so two needles point to a single letter at the intersection of the grid points. There is a small group of keys for input at the bottom with ivory or porcelain buttons.
November 11, 2025 at 7:50 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
She smiles and says "I will always love you."
A still from the Claire Denis film "Trouble Every Day". Béatrice Dalle smiles faintly and looks just past the camera. She has dark hair in a somewhat short cut. The background is blurred out sky with a hint of city.
November 9, 2025 at 12:02 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
The forest I was wandering around in today near Moss Beach.
A panoramic photograph inside a dark pine forest. The sun weakly penetrates the canopy. The forest floor is all pine duff, seemingly downy soft (in reality, these are nut fun to sit or lay on at all). In the distance, a residential neighborhood's landscaping vines have begun to take over and the bare, brown trunks of the tall pines are vividly green. The entrance to the pine forest. Light filters through tree trunks and branches. This is approaching what feels like the disphotic zone of the forest, where things are permanently darker. What we are seeing appears peaceful, but represents the violent victory of conifers over ground-based deciduous plants. This is the species of pine which sprouted all the slippery jacks. It has branches beginning low to the ground and largely bare limbs. Many of its branches lay on the ground.
November 8, 2025 at 11:46 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Another very pleasant mushroom hike. Found many mushrooms. Still no Laccaria amethysteo-occidentalis.
I believe this is a species of pine rust. It looks like a lump of shit stuck to pine needles with a dusting of powdered sugar. It is extremely woody -- enough so it made a loud SNAP when I pulled it free of the ground litter. The cap of a slippery jack. I *believe* these are pungent slippery jacks, but none of the ones I found smelled like much. They were, however, all growing over the root systems of specific pine. The picture makes clear why it's called a slippery jack. It's a dark brown, extremely slimy, goopy mushroom with large holes from the critters that eat it. A pair of absolutely lovely amanita mushrooms. They are the absolute characteristic red-fading to yellow at the edge caps with a dark pattern that mirrors the gills on the underside. One has a very visible stipe, and both are glistening and covered in crunchy white flakes. The stalk and underside of one of the slippery jacks showing the spotted stalk and sponge-like structure of the cap. The underside of the cap is vividly yellow, while the stalk is the color of perfectly cooked meringue with a dusting of chocolate.
November 8, 2025 at 11:39 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
I know JUST enough about mushrooms to never eat ANYTHING I find.

Especially ones that look like this:
Most likely amanita muscaria. It is a vividly red mushroom with sugary white clumps on the cap, rising out of pine needles. The cap is dome-shaped and the red color shifts slightly to yellow near the edge.
November 8, 2025 at 2:09 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Many mushrooms on my hike today! None of what I was looking for though.
Probably a variety of amanita mushroom. It has a light tan cap that is dark brown at the center with a pale ring surrounded by a band of dark, fine stripes to the edge of the cap. A closeup of what’s likely a bolete of some kind. It’s a yellow bleb of fleshy mushroom springing from leaf litter. I’ve seen many boletes in the area, but never any earth balls, so I’m going with bolete. A cluster of likely agaricus mushrooms. They have flat, light brown caps and are densely clustered, erupting from a thick bed of pine duff. Likely one of several possible amanita mushrooms. It stands proud of the soil and pine duff on an embankment, showing the delicate while gills. There is no volva visible.
November 8, 2025 at 12:39 AM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
We are *owed* a Magnus the Robot Fighter movie with production design by Phil Hale.
A painting by Phil Hale of Johnny Badhair in an improbable ten foot leap up to smash the head of a damaged robot with some kind of bat against a wispy blue sky and khaki landscape. Johnny is in shorts and a shirt, both the same color as the earth. His namesake hair is as much a smudge of black smoke as what rises from the dying robot.
November 4, 2025 at 10:55 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
A screencap of my Strava stats for the hike. 4.5 Miles, 513 feet of elevation gain, one hour 47 minutes moving, 10,736 steps and 1,121 calories burned. A picture of a trail wending through a dark copse of trees. A view of the demolished wall of an abandoned structure of some kind filled with graffiti. A single ray of light penetrates in from the left making a section of red paint seem to glow. A promontory overlooking the vast expanse of the Pacifica ocean. They sky and sea blend together at the horizon. The ground looks very dark.
October 23, 2025 at 11:57 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Maps of imaginary cosmologies.
An image showing the circular money flow of AI investing, with NVidia at the center of the universe. A flowchart labeled "Should I be using AI for this?: Nonprofit AI Treasure Map". For all those treasure-seeking nonprofits out there. 13th century map of the cosmos as commentary on Ovid. It shows a series of interconnected rings with Nvidia in the middle. A late 18th century diagram of the Gnostic Sophia from "Geheime Figuren der Rosenkreuzer", showing Nvidia at the center of a series of interconnected rings.
October 22, 2025 at 8:37 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
No, really. Very equal opportunity.

This is a tree.
Treebeard's Tom Hardy in Bronson moment. A closeup of a convoluted puckered surface on a tree with an extraordinary resemblance to a particular piece of human anatomy, regularly used as an insult, yet beloved by millions.
October 18, 2025 at 10:22 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
This is an equal opportunity shitposting environment.

If you would prefer a different blessing, here is the Joshua Tree "I just woke up this way" rock.
A stone formation in Joshua Tree National Park which looks for all the world like standing on the belly of a giant sporting a thick erection, complete with glans.
October 18, 2025 at 10:22 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
You have been blessed with the Carlsbad Caverns cave titty.
A photograph of a very large limestone stalagmite which has somehow grown as an anatomically correct human breast. I must emphasize this is a 100% natural formation, though there are likely large quantities of silica involved, the matrix is very different I assure you. It is, after all, *stone*.
October 18, 2025 at 10:13 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
A gray cat laying in a cat bed on my desk, pushing her head back while our very large black, tan & white tabby rubs his head against her. An exceptionally rare moment of these two being almost snuggly.
October 18, 2025 at 10:10 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Looking at the numbers I've run up on my bikes makes me feel pretty good.
A screenshot from my Strava page showing the number of miles I've put on each bike. Velocipes gracilis (my thoroughbred French carbon fiber 1337 bike) has 5,211.7 miles. Velocipes harrijasotzaile (my Basque-made EBike) 1,213.1 miles. And Velocipes robustus (my tank-like gravel bike) 2,576 miles. Yes I pretended there is a zoological taxonomy of bicycles. They're my bikes.
October 11, 2025 at 9:21 PM
zakjarvis.bsky.social
Left the house before dawn. Couldn’t easily stop until well after sunrise to get a picture, but I still got to watch the sun come up over the bay.
Just after dawn over the San Francisco Bay. A transmission town stands to the right of the water, the sky golden with sun just behind it.
October 11, 2025 at 4:44 PM