Hello!

Details:
LOCATION: 15 Thompson Street, Kensington. Head up into the big empty courtyard and there'll be a room there. Please knock, I do not have FOH so you'll have to be a little brave.

TIME: uhoh 6:00pm!!! Don't be late!

FOOD: my friend Tito is going to make a big rawon curry with chickpeas. It will be vegan and there will be lots. We may also bake some real fly pupae as some crunchy optional toppings.

Do you wish to cook with us?! Come around 5 and you can help slice. Or! Bring items for a salad or a dessert or whatever and you can use the kitchen also :)

Looking forward to seeing you all!!

Okay little essays as usual (Martha in 🧡, Pheobe in ❤️):

🧡

I've learned a lot about flies while doing this play and I have genuinely come to love them. Little two winged freaks who eat crap and die young.

I started to type that all out. All that I had learned, but it's a bit long and boring so instead I will not. Just know that lots of vampire myths around the world have the vampire turn into a fly and not a bat.
 
One thing I did learn about flies is how much people hate them. I would ask people “what do you think about flies?” and people would generally say “ergh”. 

It's undeniable that they are pretty gross. They lay their eggs in rot after all. They carry diseases. They have bad opinions on brat. 

And that made me wonder if a fly thinks it's gross? Like is the fly like “Sure, I eat food waste all day everyday. But like, there's heaps of it and nobody else is so?”. 

And then that made me wonder if flies could get mental illness. Like do flies go “god I'm such a worthless little vermin”. Sometimes, I think to myself “god I'm such a worthless little vermin” and I'm really not a worthless little vermin, so I imagine if I was literally a worthless little vermin I’d probably think to myself “god I'm such a worthless little vermin”.

I don't know though, maybe I'm projecting. Here's a picture of a fly that landed on my hand while I was grabbing coffee:

🧡

 

❤️ 

I’m trained as an architect. I’ve worked with flies for over six years. At our company, we breed around one billion flies per week, but they never become “flies.” We freight them from the factory in truckloads to chicken farms. Before they become pupae, they are spread across paddocks by tractor as fifth-instar larvae and devoured by layer hens. (Zoom in for maggot pics)

We started working with flies in the threshold year of tech optimism. AI, biotech, agtech, and alternative proteins all carried a “this could solve big problems” feeling. The texture of that hope was earnest, system-oriented, and forward-looking.

Now, 84 fly generations in, my partner Alex, a geneticist among many other things, has industrialised an American fly from the Everglades into a food-waste-processing, protein-and organic-fertiliser-producing biological machine. Every day, the factory transforms 40,000 kg of food waste into organic farm inputs.

It’s sustainable. It’s circular. It’s also hard, industrial, intensive animal agriculture. Paddy, the diesel mechanic up the street, has made over 150 separate complaints to the EPA.

Do the flies know they’ve been integrated into a cashed-up, clandestine waste industry? Is a chicken scarier than an alligator? Will it take off?

 ❤️

Did you like this?
Read archived emails from past shows here: https://listmonk.sadgoldfish.com/archive
Want even more historical? Here is some of martha's archived writing on science and art: https://kscopearts.wordpress.com/2025/10/26/essay-i-promise-this-is-about-i-promise-this-isnt-about-you-even-if-it-seems-like-it-is-even-if-it-seems-like-it-isnt/

 

See you tomorrow! Any problems shoot me a message 0450 221 313 :)