I am old

Warning! Geek Speak ahead

So I'm playing a Half-Life Mod called Insurgency online with some pretty cool people. An Aussie, a German some froggers and some Amuricans. Great. We kick the snot out of the enemy team and do a little victory dance. Cool. The game at this point should load up another map and we should continue to crush our enemies. But the game seems to just stall. It doesn't crash. But we're all sitting there waiting. We have voice chat and begin to wonder what's up with the server.

"Da suhrvur, eet must have locked up I zink" said the German.

"They're probably running some shitty P2" chimes in some kid who sounds like he's 9.

"No," I say "It's a it's a 486 with an add on math co-processor".

There is a moment of silence.

'What ze 'el is a math co-processor?" asks the Frenchman.

"I'm sorry to admit I do" said another American.

"That's because you sir, are 39 years old I'll bet. You are I are ancient ones here. We walked the earth on 640k of ram and got our pron over 14.4 modems from BBS's. We wrote our own autoexec.bat files to load our CD-Rom and sound drivers in to HIMEM. And none of you young bastards know what the hell I'm talking about do you?".

There was much laughing.

Then the next map loaded and we prepared to crush the other team.

"That was great mate" said the Brit. "But really, what's a math co-processor?"

Hot priest on priest action...

No, not THAT kind. It seems that there's a new Ultimate Fighting Organization forming right in the Holy Land. Several different Christian faiths share responsibility for maintaining the Church where Jesus was supposedly born. When some Greek Orthadox priests set up ladders to clean the walls and ceiling after the X-mas day mass, the Armenians claimed the ladders encroached on their part of the church.

The result? Holy land Iron Cage match.

To let you know how stupid this conflict was 20 Palestinian police came in to stop the fight.

The Palestinians were the calm voice of reason. Awesome.

Go read the article, there are even pics! So, whose side do you think Jesus would fight on?

Happy swag day!

Yes, I got some very practical gifts. A winter Tilly hat and some thick socks. I got some books (which I always love). But I have to admit that my two favorite gifts were given to me by my sweetie. One was the Firefly ships papers I blogged about a few days ago. They're lovelier that I could have imagined. The other is a simply massive and completely impractical lock made in India I believe. It takes two keys to open. It's huge! I have NO use for it, but I love it dearly. I am already thinking about how to decorate it with brass and other gunge.

So, what neat swag did you get?

The Ho-ho-horror

This has to be one of the best claymation parodies ever. It combines Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer and Apocalypse Now. Really. It is a warped bit of genius.





On a side note- Back in Jr. High this film was some kind of fixation for me. I remember my friends and I had a tape recording of it and we could recite most of the movie from memory.

Greatest Nativity Play EVAR!

No really. It's painful AND it's funny.

Sweet find...

A week ago or so I visited the local Army/Navy surplus store in Oberlin. I'm looking for bits and bobs for a Steampunk costume and military surplus is sometimes a great resource. I found a cool looking map case for about $12 and a small canvas pouch for $2 that used to be used to carry hand grenades. As I was checking out I felt my Souk Sense tingle. My souk sense is like Peter Parkers Spidey sense but more practical. I don't need to know if Doc Oc is behind me, but I do need to know when something cool is nearby and for sale. That thing was a flintlock pistol sitting on a hook on the wall behind the register.

I casually asked the salesman about it and he said it wasn't real (well Duh) and some guy had traded it in or something. I asked to see it and tried to keep my composure as I checked it over. It wasn't real, but it was a very good reproduction. Made in Spain. Better than the mass produced items available at any ren fair. I had owned a nicer version a few years ago that I picked up in a trade and regrettably sold it at a Pirate event to make sure we broke even. I got $300 for it. This one wasn't near as nice but it was close. Real flint holder, solid barel, mechanism in good shape. I asked if he'd sell it.

"How much you offering?" he asked.

Tough call that, but as he knew nothing of its worth and I had nothing to loose I said "20 bucks".

"Sold" Sweet.

This picture was taken before I did any work on it. I completely disassembled it, sanded the barrel, cleaned up the firing mechanism, ground down the trigger to a smooth finish, polished the brass and treated the wood. Aside from a missing screw (which I replaced) and a cracked ramrod (invisible) it's in top form and looks great.

Achingly Beautiful

In addition to my love of paper ephemera, I have a deep love of old books and journals. So, of course any place that stockpiles them, any place that lavishly displays thousands of tomes in soaring cathedral like locals is enough to send my salivary glands into overdive. I present to you a wonderful collection of libraries I will some day have sex in around the world. Wait...what? Forget the sex part. I meant visit, libraries i will visit someday.

Courtesy of Curious Expeditions

Knees...getting...weak...

Anyone who knows me knows that I have a certain...weakness... for props and specifically paper ephemera. Maps, documents, old foreign money, deeds. Now some clever monkeys have created some awesome looking props and documents from Firefly.


There are blueprints that look just gorgeous. And the best? A set of official ships papers that are too cool to be believed. We never saw these in the show, just the leather case they were carried in, but these guys have done some awesome work in creating what should have been seen. Alas, they are $120 which is more than I can spend right now. They also look to be creating some other great looking props. If you are a Battlestar Galactica fan (and who in their right mind isn't) you might like to check out their tongue in cheek "How to spot a Cylon poster" for only $20.

Horay for Democracy!

Do they love us yet? No? Maybe we need to beat them harder.


Honestly. Is that what we've have become? Is this the America you are proud of? I want my country safe. But this is not making America safe, its destroying it.

Oh how the mighty have fallen...

What would Lord Vader say?

FAIL

That's the only way to descibe this show. I'd like to blame poor managment or low attendance. But I can't. The event is well run and well attended. The sad truth is that anime fans don't have a lot of money. At least not enough for our product.

Its been a learning experience, to be sure. I used to think that trekkers wore a lot of body shape innapropriate stuff. I was wrong. But there a great deal of creativity in how they attempt to mimic their favorite manga. And anime seems to truly embrace a wider social and racial cross section. That being said there are a lot of guys dressed as chicks. If you're thinking of attending an event, just be ready for a sausage fest in schoolgirl outfits.

Althouth we had nothing to celebrate I insisted we take a cab to times square. It would be a shame not to see such a NY landmark. It's quite a feast for the eyes. Almost seizure inducing. We grabbed a couple of tasty slices and watched the Hari Krishnas dance. (I swear to the gods a guy dressed like Batman was dancing and singing right along with them. Keen).

For a panniced moment I thought my phone was lifted but it turns out I only forgot it at the convention center. I doubt tomorrow will be better but hope springs eternal. If anything I now know that Anime shows are not for us.

Meanwhile...

We're in New York City at the Anime Expo. I had thought the show was in January for some reason and was flip flopping on whether I wanted to attend. When I checked the website I learned that it was essentially 2 days away. On a lark I contacted the dealers coordinator and due to a last minute cancellation we had a space if we wanted it. 24 hours later we were packed and on the road. This show is a big unknown. Table space ain't cheap and there's another (cheap) corset company here.

But we had to get out, get away. Get busy. I've been in a slump and doing a show forces you into action. It forces you to deal with problems and solve them. So we're in New York, waiting for a shuttle bus to get us to the event site (we're actually in Jersey). Its late. The dealers are starting to get twitchy. We open in a little over an hour. Driving over is not an option. This city and its drivers make every attempt to remove you from the gene pool. Plus the cost to park are like a hot poker up the but. Unpleasant to say the least.

A pretty shitty day...

We lost our cat Ray yesterday. He was struck by a car. Rossana had been worried about him because he wasn't at the door for breakfast. But I told he was fine. He sometimes comes late.

But I was wrong.

I recovered him and placed him in a cardboard box. I didn't want Rossana to have to do that, but I had to hand him over to her for burial because I had an emergency with a client. She buried him near the barn and hauled a large stone over to top it. She buried him with some food and a toy mouse and she placed a small statue of the Egyptian god Bastet next to the grave.

Ray could be a pain in the ass sometimes. For the longest time he didn't know how to purr or play. He could shred your hand without even realizing what he was doing. He didn't get along with Little One and attacked her several times. But in the end he was a good cat. He found his purr and learned to play. And he was totally affectionate. A total lap whore.

I am trying not to think about it because this stuff just wrecks me. Rossana is really torn up.

The day was topped off with a clients web site being attacked by hackers and knocked offline for 8 hours or so. It was a mad dash to recover the site, change all the passwords, find out what information had been compromised, and emailing the findings to the client.

Halfway through the day I took Rossana out. We worked collecting some fieldstone we'd been offered by our friend Grimm. It was cold/wet work but it kept our minds off Ray. By the time we were done and grabbed a meal the temperature had plummeted. Icy rain started to fall. We drove home with a van overloaded with loose stone on the most slippery roads I have driven in quite a while. We nearly slid right off the road several times. It rained today, but it was much warmer. My stomach started to unknot a little.

All and all a pretty shitty couple of days.