I Drew This Yesterday Owo (6.19.2018)

I call this piece, “Space is Lorge”

Art by me c:

Cutefish are adorable. Like, seriously. Look them up. Be amazed.

Marine life is a wonderful thing!

Art by me

10 Things: Mars Helicopter

When our next Mars rover lands on the Red Planet in 2021, it will deliver a groundbreaking technology demonstration: the first helicopter to ever fly on a planetary body other than Earth. This Mars Helicopter will demonstrate the first controlled, powered, sustained flight on another world. It could also pave the way for future missions that guide rovers and gather science data and images at locations previously inaccessible on Mars. This exciting new technology could change the way we explore Mars.

1. Its body is small, but its blades are mighty.

One of the biggest engineering challenges is getting the Mars Helicopter’s blades just right. They need to push enough air downward to receive an upward force that allows for thrust and controlled flight — a big concern on a planet where the atmosphere is only one percent as dense as Earth’s. “No helicopter has flown in those flight conditions – equivalent to 100,000 feet (30,000 meters) on Earth,” said Bob Balaram, chief engineer for the project at our Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

2. It has to fly in really thin Martian air.

To compensate for Mars’ thin atmosphere, the blades must spin much faster than on an Earth helicopter, and the blade size relative to the weight of the helicopter has to be larger too. The Mars Helicopter’s rotors measure 4 feet wide (about 1.2 meters) long, tip to tip. At 2,800 rotations per minute, it will spin about 10 times faster than an Earth helicopter. At the same time, the blades shouldn’t flap around too much, as the helicopter’s design team discovered during testing. Their solution: make the blades more rigid. “Our blades are much stiffer than any terrestrial helicopter’s would need to be,” Balaram said.   The body, meanwhile, is tiny — about the size of a softball. In total, the helicopter will weigh just under 4 pounds (1.8 kilograms).

3. It will make up to five flights on Mars.

Over a 30-day period on Mars, the helicopter will attempt up to five flights, each time going farther than the last. The helicopter will fly up to 90 seconds at a time, at heights of up to 10 to 15 feet (3 to 5 meters). Engineers will learn a lot about flying a helicopter on Mars with each flight, since it’s never been done before!

4. The Mars Helicopter team has already completed groundbreaking tests.

Because a helicopter has never visited Mars before, the Mars Helicopter team has worked hard to figure out how to predict the helicopter’s performance on the Red Planet. “We had to invent how to do planetary helicopter testing on Earth,” said Joe Melko, deputy chief engineer of Mars Helicopter, based at JPL.

The team, led by JPL and including members from JPL, AeroVironment Inc.,  Ames Research Center, and Langley Research Center, has designed, built and tested a series of test vehicles.

In 2016, the team flew a full-scale prototype test model of the helicopter in the 25-foot (7.6-meter) space simulator at JPL. The chamber simulated the low pressure of the Martian atmosphere. More recently, in 2018, the team built a fully autonomous helicopter designed to operate on Mars, and successfully flew it in the 25-foot chamber in Mars-like atmospheric density.

Engineers have also exercised the rotors of a test helicopter in a cold chamber to simulate the low temperatures of Mars at night. In addition, they have taken design steps to deal with Mars-like radiation conditions. They have also tested the helicopter’s landing gear on Mars-like terrain. More tests are coming to see how it performs with Mars-like winds and other conditions.

5. The camera is as good as your cell phone camera.

The helicopter’s first priority is successfully flying on Mars, so engineering information takes priority. An added bonus is its camera. The Mars Helicopter has the ability to take color photos with a 13-megapixel camera — the same type commonly found in smart phones today. Engineers will attempt to take plenty of good pictures.

6. It’s battery-powered, but the battery is rechargeable.

The helicopter requires 360 watts of power for each second it hovers in the Martian atmosphere – equivalent to the power required by six regular lightbulbs. But it isn’t out of luck when its lithium-ion batteries run dry. A solar array on the helicopter will recharge the batteries, making it a self-sufficient system as long as there is adequate sunlight. Most of the energy will be used to keep the helicopter warm, since nighttime temperatures on Mars plummet to around minus 130 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 90 Celsius). During daytime flights, temperatures may rise to a much warmer minus 13 to minus 58 degrees Fahrenheit to (minus 25 to minus 50 degrees Celsius) — still chilly by Earth standards. The solar panel makes an average of 3 watts of power continuously during a 12-hour Martian day.

7. The helicopter will be carried to Mars under the belly of the rover.

Somewhere between 60 to 90 Martian days (or sols) after the Mars 2020 rover lands, the helicopter will be deployed from the underside of the rover. Mars Helicopter Delivery System on the rover will rotate the helicopter down from the rover and release it onto the ground. The rover will then drive away to a safe distance.

8. The helicopter will talk to the rover.

The Mars 2020 rover will act as a telecommunication relay, receiving commands from engineers back on Earth and relaying them to the helicopter. The helicopter will then send images and information about its own performance to the rover, which will send them back to Earth. The rover will also take measurements of wind and atmospheric data to help flight controllers on Earth.

9. It has to fly by itself, with some help.

Radio signals take time to travel to Mars — between four and 21 minutes, depending on where Earth and Mars are in their orbits — so instantaneous communication with the helicopter will be impossible. That means flight controllers can’t use a joystick to fly it in real time, like a video game. Instead, they need to send commands to the helicopter in advance, and the little flying robot will follow through. Autonomous systems will allow the helicopter to look at the ground, analyze the terrain to look how fast it’s moving, and land on its own.

10. It could pave the way for future missions.

A future Mars helicopter could scout points of interest, help scientists and engineers select new locations and plan driving routes for a rover. Larger standalone helicopters could carry science payloads to investigate multiple sites at Mars. Future helicopters could also be used to fly to places on Mars that rovers cannot reach, such as cliffs or walls of craters. They could even assist with human exploration one day. Says Balaram: “Someday, if we send astronauts, these could be the eyes of the astronauts across Mars.”

Read the full version of this week’s ‘10 Things to Know’ article on the web HERE.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.

I was honestly kinda upset with Daisy being added to smash at first, but now I’m kinda happy about it. yay c:

Fighting princesses!

Just finished this gift drawing for my friend :3

they gave me a boo gif for my birthday ^///^ yay

Art by me

Vent Piece. Art By Me.

I felt the same anger that I did all those years ago. I felt the world fall still, and shrink to only what was in my own lens. My eyes were hazed over, shutting myself down to unresponsiveness because I was afraid of my own anguish. Intimacy is a servicehood that I only give exception to who I think are different, and yet all of those that are different, are the same.

I am deeply afraid of sex. Of intimacy. I often feel that I’m only used for my body. Nobody knows the extent of how bad my abuse was, because I’ve never wanted to tell. Recently, I was disowned by my family for coming forward. For once in my life, I’d like to talk about the horrifics that nobody knows about. I’m going to be unapologetic, because I’m not a whore. I’m a servant, and everyone knows that.

My earliest memory of abuse was at my grandparents house. I was taking a shower, when my grandfather came in and sat on the toilet cover, watching me as he leaned forward onto his knees. I hid behind a towel that was hanging on the rack on the outside of the shower door-- the shower was otherwise see-through. Trying to groom me with a sweet voice, he asked me to come out from behind the shower and to talk to him, and that I “shouldn’t be ashamed of my body.” Before it could go any further, my grandmother burst into the room, screaming at him and crying. Nothing came of it after that, but my grandmother fell into a deep depression. “YOU DON’T DO THAT TO A CHILD!” I don’t remember anything after that.

A year or two later (I don’t know what age I was or how much time had passed precisely, but I know I was very young and didn’t understand what was happening.), we were all at a family gathering-- all the members being on the paternal side. We were out on my aunt’s country property, and it was an okay time. I went into the house to go to the restroom, finding my cousin in the bathroom, who asked me to come inside and help her masturbate. I remember thinking she was in pain (though I now know differently), frantically trying to help her. 

On my other side of the family, when I was still very very young (elementary school), I was also experiencing sexual abuse. In the middle of the night, I would be thrown in the hallway, pinned to the floor as my cousin molested me, asking me to stay quiet, or I was ordered to do things to her.  I do not know how old I was, but I remember feeling strange, and scared. Years later however, it developed to more sexual endeavors, where she would make me practice sexual positions that her parents were teaching her to perform. One of the games would be “marriage” where we would roleplay the ceremony. Husband and wife. And then consummate the marriage. We would repeat it back to back multiple times, over and over. At every family gathering, we were being sexual. 

At one point, there were multiple children over, friends of hers, to which we all played a sexual game. My entire family knew of this game, but did nothing of significance. Or really... anything at all. No. Nothing at all.

The molestation with my cousin continued for years. I don’t remember what age I was when it ended, but I remember completely disassociating. I don’t like violence unless it’s upon myself. Even when I’ve been in physical fights, I always avoided hurting the other person. But at this time, I was being told I was unloved by my family, that I should have been thrown away to childcare (”so that your mom can have a child worthy of love”) or aborted, and I was being beaten at school. Badly. Bruises, being choked, being beaten to the point of coughing up blood. And then.... on top of everything else, I was being molested. And suddenly, she didn’t want me anymore.

I felt a range of conflicted emotions. I was holding all of my pain by a rope, and finally my tendons had separated from my bones and erupted. I disassociated, as though I had completely cut out all emotion at all except for rage.  All I could see was red at the time. I threw her on to the bed, and beat her until the parents came in to save her from me. For most of my childhood, every couple of months, I was being molested-- and suddenly I wasn’t wanted anymore. 

Eventually I made friends when I transferred to public middle school, who proved to be sexual predators. I thought it was normal, or rather, became accustomed to being restrained, or forced to be sexually touched. No matter how much I was reluctant, if they pressured enough, I would eventually stop fighting and submit. All of my relationships were unhealthy and extremely sexual. Most of it occurred in the woods, or in my own home. I joined an anime club, where most of my relationships were sexual. I had an affair with my best friend’s boyfriend as well, where I would be pinned to a tree, or shoved down onto the ground and my shirt ripped off of me, hearing a “you know you want me so bad.” I can still smell the scent of him. Additionally, I was dealing with another boy who often threw me into closets or against a wall, sliding his hand down my pants and pleading with me to have sex. These all went down for months. Eventually, I got into an abusive relationship, who made me have sex every time I was sad. Hours and hours of sex. Of sexting. of pictures. of sex. During that time, I had also been assaulted by my stalker, who forced his hand down my pants despite me using all my strength to stop him.

I don’t even remember my first time. I remember being pressured. And giving in. And crying afterwards, texting one of my friends that I didn’t want it. But I didn’t say no.

Eventually, I was pressured to have sex until I gave in, forcing myself to have sex in a car. I remember crying when I got home. I sat in the shower for several hours.

But then we get to college. I entered a relationship that consisted of only sex. It was the most destructive relationship I had been in, and eventually ended up with me in a hospital, almost dying due to an overdose. I cut myself so badly that my entire body was bloodied. My dorm room was stained with blood. My arms... my neck, my stomach... my legs... my chest... my shoulders. What he would do was speak romantically, or invite me over to his dorm, and then proceed to fuck me for hours until I was literally in tears from the pain. He would never finish. Hours... and hours... and hours. Sometimes I would get an hour break to sleep, and would wake up to him jacking off next to me. Or wake me by touching me in my sleep. Then, he would ignore me for a week, or call me unattractive, and then ignore me for a week. Then the cycle would repeat. He was my only friend in college, as it was difficult to make friends being a trans guy (though I stopped transitioning for him so I wouldn’t be alone). Years later, he would eventually assault me while I was unconscious. 

I don’t even know if I want sex, or if it’s that I’m running through a rythm-- like my body doesn’t even matter. I just obey because it’s the only thing I know how to do. Or I do it because I know it’s the only way I’ll be wanted.

Sorry. All of this came up due to some flashbacks from last night. 

well, thanks for reading I suppose. I feel better after doing the artwork and writing all that out. Please don’t message me calling me a whore. 

-Ashe.

“Blues Kitty”

oh, I’ve got the blues~ But it’s not so bad :3 

Art by me

Enderman!!!!! Aaaaa!

Art by me

This is a self portrait of me-- 

Most people see me as this shy person who never sings or dances or does anything that would provoke my anxiety. But the truth is, I didn’t always used to be that way. I used to take classes for swing dance, and I used to sing in chorus. But my anxiety for these things I used to love developed after being bullied in elementary school to the point that I got sick. I began to lipsync and soon left chorus. Not many people have heard my voice since then. But, I just wanna dance.

Art by me

Hello! My name is Ashe and I’m a creator of photography, and drawing. :) I wanted to have a platform to post my content, and thus created this blog. I hope that at least some of them will bring you joy and happiness as my favorite works are the silly ones. I’m really into marine biology, and hope to pursue marine photography in the future! How cool would that be? Anyway, I wanted to also say that I am part of the LGBT community, being a nonbinary trans-masculine person. I prefer him/they, but I try not to hold myself to any clear-cut rules. Some days, this boy likes to wear flowers and paint their nails, and other days they like to look a little too hipster. #Clotheshavenogender ! So know that I support you wherever you are and however you identify. Additionally, I’m part of the furry community, and like to draw my characters from time to time doing cute things-- so you may know me as KawaiiFira on the Furry Amino and the LGBT Amino. ^///^ Anyways, nice to meet you. :) Please enjoy my blog and all of its randomocity. <3

Ashe~