... or at least that was how my night was supposed to go. When I got back from work last night, I went almost immediately to bed (about 11:30 pm). After dozing slightly for about an hour, my cats wake me up as they start beating the hell out of each other- with my hand in between them. Long story short, I'm not gonna be getting back to sleep. I start some half-assed cleaning, and decide that I'll head to work early, grab a beer, make some buffalo chicken breasts with my left-overs, and watch the lunar eclipse.
As soon as I walk out the door it starts to rain. I've NEVER had it work so perfectly. Anyhow, I go back inside and watch a bit of a TPT show on the European perception of America, and when the finish with Poland I decide that I'll head out anyway. I grab the hot sauce and blue cheese (the beer was already in the fridge), and head to work. I don't know where I put my bottle opener, so I had to open the bottle on the handicap parking sign. Nonetheless, drinking beer from a jagged mouthed bottle of beer and catching the ass end of a great lightning show is STILL one of the best starts to the work day I've ever had...
And now for the chicken.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Re-Con
GenCon has come and gone, and I'm back. It was a freakin' awesome trip, and it's time to give a recap. Here's a day-by-day:
Wednesday: Bug outta work, pick up Matt and Mikey, and head out. My trunk is broken right now, so it doesn't latch and leads to some slow residential driving and consternation. At highway speeds the wind keeps it down and semi-latched but it's something we deal with the whole trip. Mi amiga Tasha is on her way back from Charlotte at the same time on the same route, so after some minor backtracking and miscommunication, we meet up past Madison and say "hi." Matchik takes the wheel for a bit(I had less than an hour of sleep, so a 9 hour drive was NOT gonna happen), and we get into Indy without incident. Once in Indy we meet up with John and Brian, check out the hotel and eat at the Ram- sooooo good.
Thursday: Get up late >:(, and get into the Frost Giant. It's whole lotta make-up and braiding , with a ton of help from Matt. It turns out o.k, though, and we hit the 'Con. I get some pretty good response to my costume, and hit the vendor floor. I pick up a bunch of minis, get hit on (well, okay, mostly just hit) by the Conan girls and interviewed by Maxim.com (I still need to find the interview).
Shortly thereafter, while Matt and I are checking out the art gallery, I get stopped by security and they tell me that my axe looks "too realistic." Now, I understand they need to do their job, but the part that bugs me is that NO ONE else on security other than this guy was concerned, and even he said that within 20' he could tell it wasn't real. So basically, if he'd had the day off I would have had no problems.
We run TrueDungeon just before 5, and it's a good time despite half the party (3 of the 4 melee characters) being turned to stone halfway through the adventure. I go back and try to scour the paint off myself. We head across the street to Claddagh, an Irish pub, and we grub it up. On the way back to the room, John, Brian and I get in the elevator with five other people. No one is talking, and I've had too much to drink to stand there silently for four floors. So I start singing a parody of the Ooompa Loompa song. But here's the thing...
I wasn't really paying attention to the short chubby chick with the orangish hair. As soon as she gets off Brian and John burst out laughing, thinking I was a total asshole (which I was, just not intentionally or maliciously). Even worse, the laughter combined with some greasy bangers and mash put Brian in the can giving the toilet the good old "Irish hello."
Friday: Hit a lecture with Brian and Mikey about using created languages in writing (and to a much lesser extent gaming), buy more stuff, get accosted by hippie artists "trying to create a society that doesn't suck," and attend a game session with Matt and Mikey that gets cancelled. We paint some minis, then I meet John and Brian for some tasty sushi at Mikado. We go back to the room and play "Kill the Hippies." Late night run to Steak n' Shake, which I find out is basically the ugly bastard child of a McDonald's and a Perkins.
Saturday: The big day- costume contest! I get Matt to braid my hair again, but do the paint myself (a huge pain in the ass, but I manage). I spend most of the morning watching anime and trying not to sweat. I register for the contest (well aware I stand no chance of winning, but wanting to do it anyway), do the parade and the contest. I see some really great costumes, and end up in line between two black-robed Raistlins. Sit through the contest (which wasn't too bad), the "entertainment" by some dude named "Luke Ski" or some such who truly blew nuts, and realize that unless you've done a really competitive level costume that it's just a huge time sink to enter the contest. Head back to scrub off.
We eat at the Ram again, and I nearly kill myself (beer, calamari, a 1lb burger, and a towering piece of mud pie). I am truly in pain from eating so much, and when we get back Brian decides he's gonna skip the Midnight Zombie Show. Matt and I go anyway, because why the hell not? The MZS goes something like this- 80 people at eight tables, with one guy monitoring the action. Everyone grabs a character in the theme (this year was zombies attack Toon Town), and when the zombies attack your table tries to survive. I ended up being Speed Buggy, and Matt was Snively Whiplash (he did a damned good job too). It was too convoluted to recap, but at the end the person the moderator liked the most (i.e was the most entertaining) wins a copy of the game "Zombies!!!" And the winner is.... ME!!! Yay!
Sunday: My big thing Sunday was that I wanted to watch to movie "The Great Yokai War," which was a story involving monsters from Japanese folklore. It gets cancelled, which peeves me greatly, but we watch "12 Kingdoms" instead, a fuedal-era Japan type anime where nearly all the heroine does is bawl uncontrollably. We hang out a little more, I watch some dudes play a game of minis while Matt finished a mini, we play a game of werewolf, and hit the road.
We'd parked in the garage near our hotel, since it said "lost tickets $18" and we figure we'll just say we lost our tickets and get 5 days of parking for $18 bucks. Long story short, we get busted but the dude says in broken english that he understands and doesn't care. We get his name, and when we go back next year we are TOTALLY bringing him a souvenir.
The drive back begins, and after a couple hours the rain begins and takes us back to the cities. This time I don't need a nap, and we get back shortly after 1 am. All in all, a freakin' awesome trip.
Wednesday: Bug outta work, pick up Matt and Mikey, and head out. My trunk is broken right now, so it doesn't latch and leads to some slow residential driving and consternation. At highway speeds the wind keeps it down and semi-latched but it's something we deal with the whole trip. Mi amiga Tasha is on her way back from Charlotte at the same time on the same route, so after some minor backtracking and miscommunication, we meet up past Madison and say "hi." Matchik takes the wheel for a bit(I had less than an hour of sleep, so a 9 hour drive was NOT gonna happen), and we get into Indy without incident. Once in Indy we meet up with John and Brian, check out the hotel and eat at the Ram- sooooo good.
Thursday: Get up late >:(, and get into the Frost Giant. It's whole lotta make-up and braiding , with a ton of help from Matt. It turns out o.k, though, and we hit the 'Con. I get some pretty good response to my costume, and hit the vendor floor. I pick up a bunch of minis, get hit on (well, okay, mostly just hit) by the Conan girls and interviewed by Maxim.com (I still need to find the interview).
Shortly thereafter, while Matt and I are checking out the art gallery, I get stopped by security and they tell me that my axe looks "too realistic." Now, I understand they need to do their job, but the part that bugs me is that NO ONE else on security other than this guy was concerned, and even he said that within 20' he could tell it wasn't real. So basically, if he'd had the day off I would have had no problems.
We run TrueDungeon just before 5, and it's a good time despite half the party (3 of the 4 melee characters) being turned to stone halfway through the adventure. I go back and try to scour the paint off myself. We head across the street to Claddagh, an Irish pub, and we grub it up. On the way back to the room, John, Brian and I get in the elevator with five other people. No one is talking, and I've had too much to drink to stand there silently for four floors. So I start singing a parody of the Ooompa Loompa song. But here's the thing...
I wasn't really paying attention to the short chubby chick with the orangish hair. As soon as she gets off Brian and John burst out laughing, thinking I was a total asshole (which I was, just not intentionally or maliciously). Even worse, the laughter combined with some greasy bangers and mash put Brian in the can giving the toilet the good old "Irish hello."
Friday: Hit a lecture with Brian and Mikey about using created languages in writing (and to a much lesser extent gaming), buy more stuff, get accosted by hippie artists "trying to create a society that doesn't suck," and attend a game session with Matt and Mikey that gets cancelled. We paint some minis, then I meet John and Brian for some tasty sushi at Mikado. We go back to the room and play "Kill the Hippies." Late night run to Steak n' Shake, which I find out is basically the ugly bastard child of a McDonald's and a Perkins.
Saturday: The big day- costume contest! I get Matt to braid my hair again, but do the paint myself (a huge pain in the ass, but I manage). I spend most of the morning watching anime and trying not to sweat. I register for the contest (well aware I stand no chance of winning, but wanting to do it anyway), do the parade and the contest. I see some really great costumes, and end up in line between two black-robed Raistlins. Sit through the contest (which wasn't too bad), the "entertainment" by some dude named "Luke Ski" or some such who truly blew nuts, and realize that unless you've done a really competitive level costume that it's just a huge time sink to enter the contest. Head back to scrub off.
We eat at the Ram again, and I nearly kill myself (beer, calamari, a 1lb burger, and a towering piece of mud pie). I am truly in pain from eating so much, and when we get back Brian decides he's gonna skip the Midnight Zombie Show. Matt and I go anyway, because why the hell not? The MZS goes something like this- 80 people at eight tables, with one guy monitoring the action. Everyone grabs a character in the theme (this year was zombies attack Toon Town), and when the zombies attack your table tries to survive. I ended up being Speed Buggy, and Matt was Snively Whiplash (he did a damned good job too). It was too convoluted to recap, but at the end the person the moderator liked the most (i.e was the most entertaining) wins a copy of the game "Zombies!!!" And the winner is.... ME!!! Yay!
Sunday: My big thing Sunday was that I wanted to watch to movie "The Great Yokai War," which was a story involving monsters from Japanese folklore. It gets cancelled, which peeves me greatly, but we watch "12 Kingdoms" instead, a fuedal-era Japan type anime where nearly all the heroine does is bawl uncontrollably. We hang out a little more, I watch some dudes play a game of minis while Matt finished a mini, we play a game of werewolf, and hit the road.
We'd parked in the garage near our hotel, since it said "lost tickets $18" and we figure we'll just say we lost our tickets and get 5 days of parking for $18 bucks. Long story short, we get busted but the dude says in broken english that he understands and doesn't care. We get his name, and when we go back next year we are TOTALLY bringing him a souvenir.
The drive back begins, and after a couple hours the rain begins and takes us back to the cities. This time I don't need a nap, and we get back shortly after 1 am. All in all, a freakin' awesome trip.
Monday, August 6, 2007
Con Men
Nine days until ye old GenCon, and I'm gettin' pretty stoked. Granted, since I dragged my ass on it I don't have ANY events set up for myself. My plan is thus-
Day 1.) Bag some swag and hit the vendor floor like a mad bitch. I intend to get as much free shit as humanly possible. And maybe some shit that's only inhumanly possible. Also, True Freakin' Dungeon.
Days 2-4.) Seminars, pick-up games, anime, and maybe trying to finagle myself into a few rpgs.
The biggest thing for me as of yet is costuming. I've decided that I'm doing one main costume, with up to three others. There'd be a lot of cross-over between pieces, particularly boots, but here's where I'm at:
Main Costume- Frost Giant: Picture a viking raider. Then give them bluish hair and whitish skin. Progress thus far:
Clothes: I'll use my knee-high leather boots (yes, I'm a stripper), and do a simple tunic for the rest of it (with a plain black belt). I haven't found a fabric I like yet for the tunic, which is something I need to do soon. Then I need to find someone who knows what the hell they're doing so they can show me, and hopefully let me use their sowing machine.
Buckler: I currently have a leather covered buckler (made from a stool seat that was $2 at Axeman) with upholstery tacks for "studs." I just need to attach a handle, but it's looking good.
Axe: Using a mini canoe paddle, I took craft foam and made an oversized double-bit axe head. Wrapped the bottom of the head with leather boot laces, and the rest of the handle with an old brown leather belt. Painted the very bottom with black acrylic paint and the foam with silver rub 'n buff, and it's turned out okay. For some reason it's not really seeming as impressive as I'd hoped, but it works.
Helmet: This is by far the piece giving me the most trouble. I have the general structure set, with the round base, four strip with a center connection, and the eyeguards. The problem
is coming from the panels that go in between to fill the gaps. I can't seem to get them to bend properly. This really bugs me, because if I can't pull off the helmet I can't pull off the costume. Luckily my work on the axe showed me that the toughest part of making this stuff from foam is what I'm doing right now. As soon as I figure this out it should finish rather quickly.
Pigment: Friday I'm going to head down to Twin Cities Costume and Magic and pick that stuff up. Not worried in the least.
Secondary Costume: The big gay guardsman. Leather boots, kittle, boots, and a halberd. The halberd's gonna follow much the same procedure as the frost giant's axe. I just need to get a pole to put it on and do the gluing and painting.
Tertiary Costume: Generic swashbuckler. My poet shirt, leather boots, and poofy pants. Don't have the poofy pants, but I could get those done while I do the tunic. Accessorize to taste.
Quaternary Costume: I may try to pull of Hellboy again. I'd need to re-do the Right Hand of Doom, which could be a helluvan endeavor. I'm redoing the horn stubs right now, and this time I just poured a thick coat of latex over it, instead of doing coat by coat. It's going to take a looooong time to dry, but I don't need to touch 'em for another week, so I'm good there. I'd also want to get the tail done, and get the gun. This one is the "if I finish the other junk first this would be soooooo cool to pull off at GenCon" costume. I probably won't have time to get it done, despite that fact that I'll be devoting nearly all my spare time between now and then to costuming. Of course, if I stay stumped on the whole helmet deal, that'll give me lots of time to work on HB.
Day 1.) Bag some swag and hit the vendor floor like a mad bitch. I intend to get as much free shit as humanly possible. And maybe some shit that's only inhumanly possible. Also, True Freakin' Dungeon.
Days 2-4.) Seminars, pick-up games, anime, and maybe trying to finagle myself into a few rpgs.
The biggest thing for me as of yet is costuming. I've decided that I'm doing one main costume, with up to three others. There'd be a lot of cross-over between pieces, particularly boots, but here's where I'm at:
Main Costume- Frost Giant: Picture a viking raider. Then give them bluish hair and whitish skin. Progress thus far:
Clothes: I'll use my knee-high leather boots (yes, I'm a stripper), and do a simple tunic for the rest of it (with a plain black belt). I haven't found a fabric I like yet for the tunic, which is something I need to do soon. Then I need to find someone who knows what the hell they're doing so they can show me, and hopefully let me use their sowing machine.
Buckler: I currently have a leather covered buckler (made from a stool seat that was $2 at Axeman) with upholstery tacks for "studs." I just need to attach a handle, but it's looking good.
Axe: Using a mini canoe paddle, I took craft foam and made an oversized double-bit axe head. Wrapped the bottom of the head with leather boot laces, and the rest of the handle with an old brown leather belt. Painted the very bottom with black acrylic paint and the foam with silver rub 'n buff, and it's turned out okay. For some reason it's not really seeming as impressive as I'd hoped, but it works.
Helmet: This is by far the piece giving me the most trouble. I have the general structure set, with the round base, four strip with a center connection, and the eyeguards. The problem
is coming from the panels that go in between to fill the gaps. I can't seem to get them to bend properly. This really bugs me, because if I can't pull off the helmet I can't pull off the costume. Luckily my work on the axe showed me that the toughest part of making this stuff from foam is what I'm doing right now. As soon as I figure this out it should finish rather quickly.
Pigment: Friday I'm going to head down to Twin Cities Costume and Magic and pick that stuff up. Not worried in the least.
Secondary Costume: The big gay guardsman. Leather boots, kittle, boots, and a halberd. The halberd's gonna follow much the same procedure as the frost giant's axe. I just need to get a pole to put it on and do the gluing and painting.
Tertiary Costume: Generic swashbuckler. My poet shirt, leather boots, and poofy pants. Don't have the poofy pants, but I could get those done while I do the tunic. Accessorize to taste.
Quaternary Costume: I may try to pull of Hellboy again. I'd need to re-do the Right Hand of Doom, which could be a helluvan endeavor. I'm redoing the horn stubs right now, and this time I just poured a thick coat of latex over it, instead of doing coat by coat. It's going to take a looooong time to dry, but I don't need to touch 'em for another week, so I'm good there. I'd also want to get the tail done, and get the gun. This one is the "if I finish the other junk first this would be soooooo cool to pull off at GenCon" costume. I probably won't have time to get it done, despite that fact that I'll be devoting nearly all my spare time between now and then to costuming. Of course, if I stay stumped on the whole helmet deal, that'll give me lots of time to work on HB.
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