Normally when I do one of these recommendations I have to explain who the person in question is, but chances are you already know Amelia Mellor, or Paper Alchemist as she’s known around these parts. What you may not know is that she’s started her own blog where she reviews Young Adult fiction in a snarky style while interacting with stock photos and using visual gags and ohhhhhh how original. I’m on to you Mellor.
Seriously though, this is now one of my favourite blogs and I recommend it mightily. It’s called Under the Doona by Torchlight. I don’t know what a Doona is but Amelia’s Australian so I’m guessing something large, venomous and with more legs than anything could possibly need.
A Doona, probably.
unshavedmouse 
Welp, Doonas (probably) are my new nightmare fuel
It’s a camel spider. Normally my nature-nerd side would compel me to post a link here, but you REALLY don’t want know anything more about those guys.
You doona wanna know, huh?
Huh. Aussies say “doona”, Americans say “comforter” and Brits say “continental quilt.”
Well, as long as there are no spiders, camel kind or otherwise, in it!
And Irish say “duvet” like normal people.
Gram, I have found spiders everywhere you could possibly find spiders. Including under my doona. And in my car. And at the bottom of drinking glasses. And my laptop case. And once, memorably, in a wetsuit. That I was wearing. Several of these were the size of my hand.
I wish I was kidding.
I have a suspicion Amelia is just a mass of spiders in a person suit.
‘Damn it, sheilas – he’s on to us!’
‘Justine! Shut up!’
Have you seen gravity falls Alchemist?
All bleventeen episodes. I’ve even got some fan-art floating around on fb.
Bloody spiders. 😦 i have arachnophobia..
Oh god that arachnid thing!
But seriously, she has a great and hilarious blog. Thank’s for the heads up.
Thank *you*, Dinosaur – and pipe up any time you like!
Anytime.
I just wanted to let you know that I okay’d your blog as my daughter’s summer reading hour, because it’s hilarious and awesome.
I’m honoured. Um…how old is she?
Oh. Oh you were talking to Amelia. Oh God that’s embarrassing
No no no, I was talking to you! Anyway, I’ve read all your stuff. She’s 13 and I promise you she hears me say worse on a daily basis 😀
Fair enough!
Hey, that style feels vaguely familiar…
Hhhhhhhhmmmmmmm…
I know! She stole it from last Friday’s episode of Pardon My Zinger!
But that means…She couldn’t have shot Burns! To the police station Jen!
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!! You, good sir, have made me a very happy little alchemist. I shall have to draw you something.
You say that as if Cracked didn’t do it first. 😉
For inquiring minds, a doona is in fact what some of you might call a quilt or duvet. It is the only known weapon against yowies, dackers and the dreaded Pobblebonk.
Oh man those pobblebonks don’t fuck around. “Cracked?” “Cra-cked?” Nope, never heard of it.
They come out of the swamp and fear nothing. Well, nothing except for mopokes and bidgee-widgees.
They any good around Snozzwangers and rotten Vermicious Knids?
Am I the only one who thinks Willy Wonka is a timelord? He fights aliens and had a box that goes anywhere.
They eat those suckers like popcorn, AC.*
*The truth about pobblebonks is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limnodynastes_dumerilii
Holy shit pobblebonk is a real thing. I was certain you were making words up but no, more Australian subterfuge to disguise it’s slithering horror beneath a veneer of whimsy.
All mimsy were the borogoves…
And the mome raths outgrabe.
I had borogroves that were all mimsy once…you just had to be there.
… Oh, I can’t keep doing this to you guys.
Yowie – mythical ape-like man; chocolate from the 90s rather like a Kinder egg.
Dacker – someone who pulls down your pants.
Mopoke – a type of completely harmless owl named for its two-note call, also known as a morpork or boobook.
Bidgee-widgee – a large burr that sticks to your socks.
And…
Pobblebonk – a tiny frog.
Yet, we still don’t know what the fox says!
CHAOS REIGNS!
Cracked? Oh c’mon, this sight’s way cooler than that. Plus, its article titles are always honest/relevant.
Yeah, the old Cracked site just ain’t what it used to be. My first and possibly still favourite article is ’13 (Unintentionally Perverted) Toys For Children’.
I loved Five Ways the World might end with three entries dedicated to the Large Scale Hadron Collider.
No matter how SJW-y the rest of Cracked gets, I will eternally love those “So you’ve been X” articles.
Ahh, our dear Alchemist got herself a Mouse approval. We’re all so proud. *sniffs*
And yeah, I remember that picture. Particularly, scourging the internet to find out what kind of creature that was, only to find that it was in fact a craft some clever artist made. Turns out there’s no such camel spider that’s that fancy.
I found Torchlight to be a bit hypocritical. She (rightfully) criticized Divergence for stereotyping Atheists, but also criticized The Hobbit for being written by a devout Christian, while psychoanalyzing how Tolkien’s Catholic worldview could have lead to the book being so bad. I… really did not like that.
Ooookay let’s keep the flame wars to a minimum peeps.
Right you are Mouse. This is getting to Frozen Tangled levels of insanity! 😛
Ugh, you’re right. Sorry, guys. Feel free to delete that, Mouse – I’m really dumb first thing in the morning.
No worries. I can be dumb 24/7.
You say that like it wasn’t entirely my fault anyway.
I didn’t have to jump on your throat, though. If you feel like coming back to UTDBT, thorny topics and Tolkien-griping are not going to be a regular thing. I do sort of wish I could be open-minded enough to enjoy the books because LOTR fans look like they have a lot of fun.
My opinion on Tolkien is that he has his strengths and his weaknesses. He had a genius for world building and created some great characters but he’s not exactly what you’d call a tight plotter.
Yeh, most everyone I know praises Tolkien for his ridiculously fleshed-out setting and attention to detail. From a modern perspective, quite a bit of LOTR uses dated fairy-tale tropes (like having a massive amount of supporting characters for no reason other than to achieve a funny number like 13).
A doona is a kind of baby carriage, which you would know if you weren’t an utter idiot, you thrice cursed, llama-hating son of an incestuous jackal!
What happened to your blog? I can’t get to it anymore! (this is to Paper Alchemist, I’m here at the mouse house just fine.)
Sorry. It was stressing me out so a few weeks after my ‘Sayonara’ post, I set it to private and haven’t posted since. I felt like it was sabotaging my present as a student and my future as a writer.
And your past as a pirate!
Yarr, indeed.