43 posts tagged “geek”
Not sure who is the bigger nerd here.
I spent $65 on tshirts (rarrr!), posters for me and for Allyson, and keyrings from Nanamation, and it required self restraint to not spend more at her booth. Super cute and awesome. Tomorrow I'm getting a spiderman poster for Christopher, but I was out of cash and that vendor didn't accept plastic.
Also met the artist who writes the semi-autobiographical The Devil's Panties web comic, she was super cool. Picked up a devilgirl pin (support the arts, yo) that will grace my office bulletin board since I can't think of anywhere else I'd really put it. It would go with my motorcycle jacket, but that is armored leather. Not sticking a pin in that.
I'm going back tomorrow with some friends, should be fun. I saw a lot of other awesome things (mostly art) that I restrained myself from buying today, but suspect I might pick up tomorrow. The art isn't expensive, its the framing that will kill you. My goal is to stay under $100 on stuff. We'll see. I already know where $50 is going. So maybe $150. :s
I don't plan on getting a Cthuthlu for the kids, but the fact that such a thing exists is awesome.
Saw lots of folks in costumes, some were really good. I liked Master Chief of course, but also two men in suits with blue latex gloves (two by two, hands of blue). I saw a woman in a Leia slave costume who I had two instant reactions to: 1. wow, that takes guts to wear that anywhere that has this many socially inept men and 2. she has no business wearing a Leia slave costume, really. She wasn't built like Jabba, but she wasn't Carrie Fisher either. Regardless, mad props to her for sheer guts. There was a really fantastic Batgirl and Captain America too.
In a way, I totally get the costume thing. I could see myself wearing my Catwoman costume, and in a way, being more comfortable. Sure, more random strangers would talk to me and I'd get a lot of attention (which I generally dislike), but they wouldn't really be talking to me. I'd be in character, someone else. And in a way, that is easier.
edited to add Cthuthlu content
this is what the geeksplosion was about.
but being a WWdN reader for many years (50,000 monkeys on 50,000 typewriters can't be wrong), I thought it would be entertaining to get a slightly more skeptical looking picture than the utter fangirldom one above.
Background:
Tuesday night was the Child’s Play charity dinner and silent auction, and at the last minute a free spare ticket fell in my lap. Anyway, Wil was super nice, a very normal geek guy (wish there were more of those at Black Hat and fewer Wannabe Rockstar Hackers). He twittered Tuesday that he was ‘in Seattle wearing his binary scarf so he was nerdy AND warm’. So when I ended up walking just a couple feet from him into the dinner (it wasn't creepy stalker-ish, I swear, and I didn't interrupt some other fan, my mamma raised me to be polite!) I asked him to post a picture of that scarf, that I was interested for my next geek knitting project. He said his friend made it for him, that it says ‘awesome’ in binary, I told him about the Fibonacci scarf I had knit and the prime number scarf I’m working on… I don’t remember exactly what happened next but within minutes he had bought the scarf. Now if I’d just met the guy, that would be cool enough. But he bought something I made! That is just… too… awesome. Can I claim to knit for celebrities now? LOL.
both of the new items I recently listed on etsy have sold... The pedicure socks will be a Christmas gift in Ohio, but worry not if you missed out on picking those up for yourself, a new pair in a spicy color combination should be listed in a few days (I'm almost done!). The Fibonacci scarf sold tonight to
*geeksplosion*
As in, girls who know how to change the oil or spark plugs in their vehicle (be it the 2 or 4 wheeled variety). This is pretty cool, if I'm not working that evening I am going to try to attend.
Recently, the actress who played Saffron on Firefly auctioned a handknit scarf on ebay for charity. The winning bid was $255.00.
Some folks at work thought there was enough of a resemblance to suggest we could be sisters... not sure I agree with them, but still, it got me thinking. I'm not an actress but I do knit and there are lots of deserving charities out there. So here's the deal: donate $250 to either Children's Hospital or Climb for Kids and I'll knit you one of Jayne's Cunning Hats, or a Fibonacci Scarf in the two colors of your choice.
I'm un-following @mediaphyter on Twitter tonight. She is interested in a lot of the same things I am, but none of my other 104 friends get a word in edgewise while she carries on targeted conversations in the twitterverse. Also, with Twitter only giving me one page of tweet depth for the last few days (I'm not complaining about a free service, I swear!) I can't see anything I've missed while she has been the victim of a tweetsplosion.
Sorry Jen.
Stand back! I have a cookie gun and know how to use it!
Ok, seriously, a cookie press looks a lot like a caulk gun, but the results are edible. I've had a cookie press for years and years (though my first cookie press wasn't nearly as nice as the one I have now, it was a true press, you turned a screw driven knob on the back to push the dough out through the plate - my current cookie press is really more of a cookie extruder...), and at least a few times a year I get it out and bake peppermint cookies. I started doing this 10-12 years ago at Christmastime, when I would make them in a Christmas tree shape with a bit of green food coloring. They are super tasty and while one batch of dough claims to make 6 dozen (it actually makes 8 dozen) they are always eaten so quickly you wish there were more. So tonight I made two batches of dough. The first was green. It was supposed to be blue. I used blue food coloring. But the cookie dough is slightly beige, so I guess there was enough of a yellow shift (or not enough blue food coloring) that they came out green.
The second batch of dough I put red food coloring in, and the cookies turned out a light red color. I know in the picture they look HOT PINK or maybe traffic cone orange, but that is just because the picture is from my iPhone and I didn't bother to do any color correction - its just a blogpost about cookies after all.
Normally, I don't really make cookies or bake anything. With the exception of things that require some sort of engineering. Like a cookie press. Or a checkerboard cake. I like to geek out even in my kitchen.
So here it is, the all up picture of my 2.5 hours of baking tonight. 16 dozen cookies (minus the couple dozen I already ate) and a cookie pretzel from the leftover dough for my daughter:
I don't know if any will last till Tuesday, but if they do, I'll bring them to Black Hat and share.
doesn't really stay in Vegas. Though that would be pretty amusing, if there were a law enacted that required that any non-criminal act that happened within the city limits could never be spoken of outside of the city limits and couldn't follow you home in any way. The city would be even more popular! Imagine the entertainment you could have just people watching!
This is going to be my sixth Black Hat Vegas and second Defcon. I'm excited to go and hear the (good) talks, do some professional networking, catch up with friends, sneak some time at the pool, and get to dance at the inevitable vendor receptions. Since my job changed last year my involvement and role at conferences is extremely different than it once was. Now I'm just another conference attendee, no responsibility for any of the events at the con, so folks probably won't see as much of me as they used to. The freedom is kind of cool actually, but I'm still on the clock. :)
