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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 11:31 AM

    You know how when you're a kid, birthday presents are a much bigger deal than when you're an adult?

    This year, my mother gave me a birthday present that even 10-year-old me would have agreed was the most. awesome. birthday. present. EVER.

    She made a 1:12 scale model of Terry Pratchett's study - mostly handmade items.

    (it's a "composite study" based on multiple pictures she'd found of what his study or home office looked like in the various homes he'd had over the years)

    A tiny version of a study; the desk in the middle has six computer monitors on it. A large bookcase covers the entire back wall. There's a fireplace on the left, and on the right is a wall with a sword, a map of Discworld and a clock hanging on it.
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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 11:35 AM

    Close-up of the screens. A webpage about tortoises (one of Sir Terry's many interests), a Wikipedia page on Alzheimer's, two screens with a word processor and a chapter from "The Shepherd's Crown" open, and of course Doom.

    You can also see Pongo the cat hanging out in the cat cave he had built into his desk.

    Notice how worn-down the floor is around the chair.

    The eagle lectern has a tiny felt fedora and a tiny leather jacket on it.

    A desk, with six screens. A tiny plastic cat is sitting in a little cave cut into one of the desk drawer stands.
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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 11:39 AM

    Wall closeup. The sword is a replica of Sir Terry's actual sword, though she cast it in tin rather than trying to make one out of iron.

    Every book in the bookcase is individually bound. They're all glued in place, though, to prevent the whole thing from falling apart if touched.

    The clock works.

    The little figurine and the manuscript on the chest *can* be moved, because the chest can be opened.

    A corner of a tiny room, with a clock, a map of Discworld, and a sword on the wall. A chest stands next to the chair, where a brass figurine of an orangutan and a string-tied paper manuscript are resting on top.
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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 11:41 AM

    There are some goodies inside the chest, too! The string-bound manuscript is *the entire text of "The Colour of Magic"*. Theer's also a printout of Queen Elizabeth's speech for Sir Terry's knighting, some newspaper clippings, etc. All printed in tiny, tiny, tiny copy.

    A tiny open wooden chest with a large pile of paper inside.
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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 11:44 AM

    Anyway. This is THE MOST AWESOME PRESENT EVER IN TIME. If I could gather 47 years' worth of past birthday me's for a poll, we would unanimously agree. I'm frankly stunned.

    She wrote a blog post on the build process - Danish and English is interleaved, but it's the same text in both. (She *loves* if people leave comments on her blog, by the way, she's very tired of how Facebook has eaten up the entire online lives of her generation (she's 70)).

    sussi.dk/terry-pratchetts-study

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 11:49 AM

    The little kid stuck somewhere in my hindbrain really wants to say "my 70-year-old mum can beat up your 70-year-old mum", but I'm sure that if you have one of those, she's fantastic too.

    But ... great A'tuin's shell. I'm so impressed.

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 12:40 PM

    (Footnote, by the way: Back when she was a young parent and I was a tiny little weird kid, she's the one who taught me to code.)

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  • Erikerikcats@dice.camp
    Nov 7, 2026, 4:09 PM

    @datarama Your 70-year-old mum can definitely whoop my 71-year-old mum's ass as the latter just sits around and consumes algorithm fed news with predictable results. The only thing she ever makes is a lot of noise. Truly amazing, yours! 🫰

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 1:48 PM

    The ceiling light works, by the way! It can be detached from the fixture and recharged using a USB-C cable.

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 2:37 PM

    @mia Thread, 0.7mm knitting needles, and patience.

    (Also a dose of autistic hyperfocus.)

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  • bjb :devuannew: :emacs:bjb@fosstodon.org
    Nov 7, 2026, 8:05 PM

    @datarama @mia

    Yes, I noticed the blanket in the close-up and went to the blog post and found:

    "The blanket is knitted with wool and silk thread, with 0,7 mm knitting needles. "

    Lovely. She made the whole model in 1 1/2 months, incredible!

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 3:12 PM

    The bookcase, behind the desk. Many of these details aren't visible on the final mini, but I know they're there.

    Some of the items are only peripherally related to Pratchett. The meerschaum turtle is obviously an A'Tuin reference ... but I happen to know it's also a trinket our family once bought during a vacation in Turkiye, when I was a kid. The Ewok mini was painted by me in my teens, when I was a Warhammer mini nerd myself (Pratchett had some Star Wars figurines in his actual bookcase). And all the books are individually bound.

    Image attached toot
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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 3:06 PM

    @WTL @Faintdreams She recently ditched the auto-translation plugin and now just writes all her posts in both Danish and English - usually, the English version is the second half of a post. She'll be setting up a plugin to allow for sitewide language switching later this evening, she says.

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 3:26 PM

    Here are the posts she made about her other miniatures. sussi.dk/category/miniaturer

    She also does installation art, but hasn't had time to put any of that on the blog yet.

    (She *has* put some of her angry rants about AI on there, though.)

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 3:32 PM

    sussi.dk/elmegades-boghandel

    This is probably my favourite of her other works. The tree behind the Elm Street Bookstore here is an actual, living bonsai elm - I got it for her, back when she made it. Unfortunately, it died from an aphid infestation later.

    (I'm still on the lookout for a replacement elm that has an appropriate build and size. Chinese ulmus elms are a lot hardier than Japanese zelkova elms, and the latter will almost always die indoors.)

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 3:33 PM

    (and yes, the walls of the bookstore is actual, tiny masonry, with tiny fired clay bricks and a special mortar mixture.)

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 3:42 PM

    I sort of feel compelled to mention that I have also given her homemade gifts. When she turned 64 - this being a binary round birthday - I gave her a geometric sans-serif display font (regular, bold and true italics, all hand-kerned; support for the Unicode Basic Latin, Latin-1 Supplement, Greek and Cyrillic character sets) that she's used for various things ... though mostly internet memes. She used to make *lots* of internet memes.

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 3:43 PM

    (The font is named Anolis - I name all my fonts after genus names of lizards. I picked Anolis because the anole is her favourite lizard.

    I suppose the fact that my mum has a favourite lizard tells you everything you really need to know about me.)

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 1:12 PM

    @krig This is based on Sir Terry's actual setup. He used a 6-screen setup.

    Gimme a second, I'll take some more close-ups of the desk.

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  • krigkrig@goto.liten.app
    Nov 7, 2026, 1:25 PM

    @datarama I’m amazed that he could get so much writing done with 5 other screens to distract himself with. Not exactly “zen mode”.

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 5:14 PM

    @krig btw, the screen with Doom on it is both a reference to a quote of his about Doom (that up until Doom, all mankind's many wards against demons had failed to take into account the double-barreled shotgun), but also that he was apparently an absolute ungodly terror at FPSes in general.

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 1:46 PM

    @krig Desk clutter.

    (this is the mini, not Sir Terry's actual desk. But the clutter is based on things she saw on pictures of his writing desk.)

    Image attached toot
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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 1:47 PM

    @krig More desk clutter.

    (The hourglass is one of few things not glued in place - and it actually works.)

    Image attached toot
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  • benbenjamineskola@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 7:37 PM

    @datarama I was going to comment that I love that you can tell it’s Wikipedia; but then I zoomed and yeah it’s even possible to tell what article it is. That’s incredible!

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 5:41 PM

    @samir I've seen all her other works, and I'm still completely stunned. This is seriously the most awesome single item in my possession now.

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  • dataramadatarama@hachyderm.io
    Nov 7, 2026, 5:49 PM

    @samir She lives in an old defunct farmhouse, but her neighbours are active farmers. A neighbouring couple started a vineyard a few years ago - and she made them this: sussi.dk/vinkaelder

    (I think she now has a lifetime supply of locally-made wine.)

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  • samir, tired of the discoursesamir@functional.computer
    Nov 7, 2026, 5:52 PM

    @datarama Also beautiful! I think you win though, if only because I personally care about Pratchett a lot more than I do wine. 😛

    I shall be reading the rest of this blog sooner or later. Thank you for sharing it.

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