Has it really been a year since I posted my Wreck-it Ralph Valentines on the blog? Wow. Sadly, I haven’t really had much time to make new Valentines this year, but here’s a smattering of fun ones I’ve found around the internet! Share them with your sweetie today!
Here’s a little blog that might be way too nerdy for most – but I wanted to share it here, because XML makes me happy. 😀
Crossposted from here.
I’ll admit, when I took a look at the title for one of our readings for this week, “A Gentle Introduction to XML”, I scoffed a little. I’ve done work with XML, quite a bit of it. Heck, I’m even teaching two workshops in XML this semester. But knowing how to assemble the code and knowing the history and the specifics behind it are two different things – something I’m realizing after reading through the XML readings for this week.
Well, GenCon opened up preregistration today. And Bryan and I have been talking about the upcoming Indiana Comic Con, and how many days we’re going/what costumes we’re wearing/who should go with us. With all this talk about conventions, and planning for them, it’s got me thinking about the first convention I ever went to…
Most of SUNY Potsdam’s Gaming Club, from Spirit Night back in early 2005. Ahh, those were the days…
Way back in 2004, the SUNY Potsdam Gaming club learned about this most amazing convention that happened down on the other side of the state. It was called I-CON (short for International Convention of Nerds), and one of our members had gone quite a few times and said it was epic. And we’d heard that the Student Government Association would possibly fund trips for clubs, as long as they had a legitimate purpose for going on a specific trip. So, we gamers formulated a plan. We decided that we would go to I-CON, and we would call it “research”. (And, well, we did do some game-related research, so our reason for going was valid!) We put together the proposal. submitted it to the Student Government Association, and waited not so patiently to hear back about whether we’d get the funding or not.
Well, we just about died when SGA said they’d fund our entire trip – hotel, badges, and even gas there and back. Not only were most of us going to our first convention, but we were going for free. We were so so excited it was ridiculous. My only knowledge of conventions involved knowing people wore costumes to them, and there were lots of other people interested in all sorts of nerdy things. So, I dusted off my renfaire garb, as I didn’t have any idea of what else to wear, and in April packed my bags and got ready for the incredibly long trip to I-CON 24.
The ride was long and somewhat eventful – people kept getting lost, one person’s car couldn’t go faster than 40 miles an hour, and we got there so late on Friday that we almost weren’t able to pick up our badges, and we wandered around for a half hour before returning to our hotel and passing out, saving our energy for Saturday.
The Cheat!
Saturday was… amazing. Overwhelming. Insane. I was positively surrounded by delightful geekery. So many costumes. So much excitement. So many things to watch and see and do and buy. It was geeky heaven. Especially… the dealer’s room.
BUY ALL THE THINGS
Oh, the things we could buy. I don’t even know how much money I spent at that first I-CON – probably an entirely irresponsible amount. I think we all did. (I distinctly remember one of my friends coming home with a giant staff – trying to wedge that into a tiny car was interesting, to say the least) I remember buying a gigantic plushie of Shippo from Inuyasha, and a ridiculous amount of Sailor Moon gashapon figurines… I got a few pictures of people in costume, mostly because I was too shy to ask people for their picture and because I didn’t actually have a digital camera of my own back then. In fact, aside from a picture of me and my friend with The Cheat, the only picture I got of myself with anyone was with someone dressed as Edward Elric.
The Fullmetal Alchemist and The Crafty Nerd!
I don’t remember much else about Saturday except for wandering into a couple of viewing rooms and watching random episodes of animes I’d never heard of, wandering aimlessly about the Dealer’s Room spending stupid amounts of money, and beginning my tradition of inadvertantly con-stalking Michael “Mookie” Terraciano of Dominic Deegan fame. Sunday was more of the same, but with a few more pictures!
At the end of the weekend, we all loaded our goodies into various cars and settled in for what was actually a rather uneventful 8 and a half hour trip back up to Potsdam. I may have spent that trip with part of a giant wizard’s staff across my lap, using my ridiculously large Shippo plushie as a pillow, wearing my Death from Above t-shirt, trying to sleep through a bumpy car ride. Ahh, car trips to and from conventions…
This is the convention that sparked my desire to go to more and more conventions. Later that year I went to Otakon for the first time ever, which was absolutely amazing, and then I continued going to I-CON until I graduated from Potsdam. I also went to the first ever Bear Con in 2011, which was so much fun! Now I’m hoping to make it to three conventions this year – which is more than I’ve ever been to in a convention season! I’ve got Indy Comic Con coming up in March, then PopCon in late May/early June, and then, of course, GenCon in August. I’m so ridiculously excited.
Is it convention season yet?
One of the classes I’m taking this spring, Digital Humanities, has a blog posting component. Which I’m really excited about. As I’m learning while doing readings for my Digital Humanities class, blogging is a really big part of the field. A lot of information gets shared through blogs, and it’s really interesting to learn about. Not only that, but digital humanities in general. It’s got my inner art history nerd peeping out again to see what sorts of projects I could work on that tie Art History into Digital Humanities… so many things to learn this semester!
I’m also taking Gender and Computerization, which so far has proven to be an eye-opening look at how gender plays into various parts of the computing/technology field. Some of the topics discussed in the class so far have given me even more ideas for research projects. Might even talk about them here, although they’re so very nerdy and not exactly crafty. Who cares? Someone out there may find my ideas/realizations interesting! Plus, research!
Oh, and I get to make a website for Information Architecture for the web. Which is always fun.
Speaking of fun! I installed Ubuntu on my laptop last night! It’s my first experience with Linux. I’m enjoying it so far. I’ve got a bit of experience with Unix from my studies in ILS, using it when doing programming in Python and Perl, stuff like that, but this is the first time I’ve jumped in completely and devoted an entire machine to a Linux based OS. I actually enjoy the fact that sometimes it takes a little bit of tinkering to get stuff to work.
I might make some more grad-school-oriented posts this semester, not sure. I mean, most of the stuff I do in grad school is considered pretty nerdy, and I love sharing the things I learn with others, maybe getting people to discuss things on the blog…
Oh. Unrelated to anything except my previous post: I saved a pony from certain death last week. The weather here has been exceptionally chilly lately, though, so I’m going to have to get creative if I want to hit my step goal this week and save another pony. But if I do hit my goal… I GET SOCKS.
And yes, I really am excited about socks. I mean, come on, socks are awesome. Especially fun socks, like the robot-cupcake-unicorn socks I’m wearing right now. 😀
Alright, enough of my disjointed rambling. I’ll hopefully have a more well-formed blog post for everyone next week.
I’ll admit it. I’m not in the greatest shape. There are a number of things that contribute to this – some I can’t control, like health issues, and some that I can control, like being a lump parked at a desk in a cube farm for 29ish hours a week. And I know that I need to be in better shape. I want to be in better shape. I want to fit into my steampunk skirt properly, and I want to avoid having to let out all my cosplay outfits. So, I’ve found a few things to motivate myself with. Quite a few, actually, and some of them more effective than others.
I’ve had a number of these awesome pedometers over the years – and recently, I got a Fitbit Flex. (In obnoxious green, like the one above.) And for some reason, not actually knowing how many steps I’ve taken strangely motivates me to move more. I want to fill up all the little lights on my tracker! I want it to vibrate with glee! AND ALL THE DATA I RECEIVE. Oh, the data. I can see when I was most active, how many steps I took throughout the day, and how well I slept the previous night. I love data. This is one of the many reasons why I’m an Information Science master’s student. Data. 😀
The Aria is the smartest scale I’ve ever owned. It connects to the internet and funnels weight info for 8 people into their respective Fitbit accounts. I do like stepping on it and having it recognize me by name. (Most of the time.) I will admit to having a love-hate relationship with my Aria. I love that it gives me all the freaking data I could ever have on my body and weight and such, but I hate how brutally honest the damn thing is. I also hate when it confuses me with Mr. Crafty Nerd. That’s another motivating reason for me to lose some weight. (Curse you, Aria! SAY MY NAME!) But I guess having a scale that lied to you would be counterproductive, wouldn’t it?
(I swear, this article isn’t turning into an advertisement for Fitbit.)
Yes, I will totally stoop to bribing myself. For every week I hit my step goal (I’m not even aiming to hit the gym at this point, I’m shooting for getting my butt out of my desk chair and walking every day), I will allow myself to buy a pair of socks from Sock Dreams. Because aside from all the other addictions I have (like My Little Ponies, video games, crafts, and Toothless the Dragon), I also am addicted to knee socks. My collection is epic… but it could be more epic. And the self-bribing isn’t limited to just socks. When I hit the “holy crap I’ve lost five pounds” point, I’m going to treat myself to a massage. Lose more weight? Get a more awesome reward. And so on. I am hoping to have all the socks on my Sock Dreams wishlist.
Yes, this is a little bit more cruel, I guess you could say, but I think this will also keep me on track. For every week I don’t hit my step goal – and I’m gonna be reasonable, if I’m a couple hundred steps off I’ll go easy on myself, or if I’ve been sick that’s completely understandable – I will give up one pony from my My Little Pony collection. And I’ll even let Mr. Crafty Nerd pick which ones go. He’s been saying I have too many ponies anyway.
Yes, I think I just heard that collective gasp. “But Crafty Nerd, you can’t give up your ponies! You love them too much!” And that’s why I’m doing this – because I don’t want to lose any ponies. No sirree. However, if I do mess up, and a pony has to go… I’ll offer it up to you guys on Facebook first, as a sort of contest. But here’s hoping that doesn’t have to happen.
SO DETERMINED.
I’ll try and post regular updates on here or on Twitter about my progress – here’s hoping I end up with more socks, and not less ponies. I’m determined. I can do this. Oh yes.
Well, I went on vacation to Florida for a week – which was a welcome respite from the crazy end-of-semester busy-ness. However, I came back to probably the coldest weather I’ve experienced in a decade! (And brought a cold home with me, to boot.) It was pretty, that’s for sure, but not the type of weather I enjoy…
Look at those pretty frosted branches!
What’s a snowed-in nerd to do?
Well, lots of things, actually. I may have spent the day listening to NPR on the radio, since the internet was out most of the day. And believe me, a snow day is the worst time to have the internet die on you. Thank goodness for the radio – I listened to classical music while working on some craft projects!
Scooter cross-stitch and the world’s first glimpse of my Doctor Who Season 18 scarf, take two!
This winter break has been lovely for working on projects – I’ve got a shawl in progress that I started on the way to Florida, I’ve got a counted cross-stitch project I started just after Christmas, and I’ve got my new Doctor Who scarf to boot! So while the snow blew around outside and the temperatures plummeted, I stayed warm on the couch and worked on nerdy crafts. (It was pretty much all I had the energy to do, anyway. Stupid chest cold.)
I also took some time to clean out my closet a little bit, and may have dug up some My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic goodies I might give away in a contest during this week… so stay tuned, pony fans! I promise I’ll start blogging more regularly, too.
One thing that I am horrible at is building new habits – and sticking to them. Sure, I’ll wear my Fitbit for about a week, excited about all the data it provides to me about how far I’ve walked and how many times I woke up in the middle of the night, then forget it at home one day… and sure I’ll say “I’m going to read ALL THE BOOKS this year” and then, without fail, end up on the computer all weekend and watching Law and Order to fall asleep. Or I’ll start a craft project, work on it for a few weeks, and then go “oooh I should start another Doctor Who scarf” and forget about whatever it was I was working on completely.
Well, HabitRPG sets out to change that.
Yes, that’s my little tiny character, clad in leather armor, brandishing a sword. I need to keep up my good habits in order to earn a helm.
The premise is very simple – build habits and complete tasks, earn XP and gold pieces to spend on in-game goodies to keep you from losing too much health should you forget to complete a given task in a day, or to redeem for real-life privileges and treats. When you log in for the first time, you’ll see four columns – Habits, Dailies, To Do, and Rewards. You’ll also see a little pixel version of your character up in the left hand corner of the screen, which you can customize to your liking. HabitRPG will suggest some habits and daily tasks for you, as well as suggest some possible rewards you can give to yourself – the first thing I did was set up some habits that I’m working on (like wearing my Fitbit every day, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, bringing my lunch to work) and also add some daily tasks I wanted to make sure I did every day (including reading a book for at least 30 minutes, and spending an hour away from the computer – which you might think is easy, but when you work in IT, your entire life is computers!). To-do comes in handy as a reminder list that also earns me gold and XP – and the Rewards section is where you can go spend your gold.
Don’t think that it’s just a cute way to remember to walk the dog and mail out the bills, however. There are QUESTS. (Or, as HabitRPG calls them, challenges.) Yes, you can compete with/against other HabitRPG warriors for the potential to earn goodies while building good habits! Which is pretty awesome. And you can randomly get pets – I picked up a wolf egg when I checked off one of my dailies today. 😀
And so you don’t have to go it alone – you can create parties, join a guild, and more. I’m currently going it alone, as there’s no easy way to share a link to a party so others can join, but if any of you readers join up, shoot me a comment on here or on the Facebook page with your User ID (which can be found either here or here, but you must be logged in) and I’ll add you to my party!
So, for those of you who have some trouble sticking to new habits, or just want to find a new way to make doing all that laundry exciting, give HabitRPG a try! I’m enjoying the heck out of it, and may have freaked out a little when I neglected my chores for a day and though “nooo, my little warrior is going to die if I don’t clean!”, heheh.
I’m still not quite back to regular posting, thanks to NaNoWriMo eating up all my creative brain (only 11,944 words to go until I win! Story is nowhere near over yet though), but I wanted to post a little tidbit of awesomeness here.
One of my most favorite webcomics ever is Dumbing of Age, by David Willis. I’ve had the chance to meet him in person twice at comic book signings at my local comic book store, Vintage Phoenix, and he’s always been super friendly. So when a recent strip gave me some inspiration to draw some fanart, I figured, why the heck not?
Yes, I drew Joyce, one of the comic’s main characters, on a scooter. Driving in the grass, and being rebellious. At least, as rebellious as Joyce can get, anyway. I posted it to Twitter, David retweeted it, and I flailed about a bit. Then, this past Wednesday, he was at Vintage Phoenix. And after I flailed about and said “I WANT JOYCE IN MY BOOK” (which was much better than last year where I completely blanked on every single character’s name, and blurted out “DRAW ME SUPERHERO GIRL”), I said “I’m the one who drew Joyce on the scooter, by the way.” And he said “Oh, that was you? Awesome!”
AND THEN HE POSTED MY FANART ON HIS SITE YESTERDAY.
And he said I’m awesome.
*flails*
I love webcomic artists. They’re a special breed of awesome, I swear. I’ve never had a bad interaction with one. From my all awkward-turtle purchase of Questionable Content book 1 from Jeph Jacques at GenCon (where I said “I sent my husband over here to get a sketch of Marigold earlier ’cause I was too shy to ask myself”), to my unintentional convention-stalking of Michael “Mookie” Terraciano , formerly of Dominic Deegan: Oracle for Hire fame back in 2005 (I can’t believe he remembered me from I-CON when I found him at Otacon! not to mention he let me touch the following day’s comic strip, I may have nearly died, haha), to David Willis posting my fanart… yeah. Webcomic artists are awesome.
Edit 1/30/14 10:57 am: It seems like a new influx of people are getting infected with BetterSurf – and the BetterSurf malware may be behaving differently than it did when it landed on my system. So, for those of you who are stumbling across this page in your efforts to rid your system of BetterSurf, please understand the following:
I’m happy that this post was able to help an incredible amount of people (over a thousand at last count), and I hope it helps more people out as they deal with this unpleasant bit of malware/adware.
Edit 11/15 8:34 am: I can’t believe how many people I’ve helped out with this! If any of you who’re stumbling across this post are of the nerdy or crafty persuasion, please visit The Crafty Nerd’s Facebook page, or add my blog to your RSS reader of choice.
Still not quite sure how this virus is being spread around – some rumors have it as coming from YouTube, others remark that it’s hitting web developers pretty hard. If you hear anything about where it’s coming from, post about it in the comments – I’d appreciate it.
Edit 11/14 6:14 pm: Holy crap I think this is the most visitors my site has ever had in an entire day ever. I hope this walkthrough’s helping people out – share it with everyone you know! I’ve added a section on how to remove some of the additional files that BetterSurf may have sneaked into your computer.
I know, I know, I don’t tend to do this sort of thing here, but as this was a sneaky little bit of malware that crawled into my Chrome installation without any sort of fanfare… I figured it might not be a bad idea to share with my readers. (Plus, I’m all kinds of angry. I’ve been spyware/malware/virus free since I don’t know when, and having something sneak in undetected… grr.)
I noticed yesterday that Chrome on my desktop and laptop computers had been crashing – while I figured it was just the Hangouts extension crashing the whole works (in the reviews of Hangouts on the Chrome Web Store, it’s notorious for crashing in all sorts of spectacular ways) and it was nothing to be worried about. Well, this morning, Chrome crashed so spectacularly that I had to go into Task Manager and clear out the stuck Google Crash Handler processes before Chrome would even open up again – and then as it did open, a little pop-up from Chrome appeared saying “Extension BetterSurf was installed, and has been causing problems” or something to that effect, and gave me the options to disable or remove the extension. (I’ve seen a similar window when the Adobe PDF reader extension was giving me issues.) Since I’d never seen BetterSurf before in my life, and certainly hadn’t installed any extensions lately, nor visited any remotely questionable sites, and I also have AdBlock running on my computer too, I removed it – and then visited Google Search to see what else was out there about this.
I first found this forum thread on the subject – which was exactly what happened to me. Chrome crashed, upon reboot the extension was installed. The extension’s not limited to Chrome users, though. Firefox users are affected as well, as noted by this post. The extension seems to pop up windows advertising similar services/products to sites you’re currently visiting – which is never a good thing. There’s also an analysis overview of BetterSurf over at Malwr.com, for those interested.
So, it might be a good idea for everyone – whether or not you’ve installed any extensions lately – to go take a quick look at what’s installed and get rid of BetterSurf if it’s there. For Chrome users, just go to the Options menu in the very upper right hand corner (just under the Close button), point to Tools, and then click on Extensions – it’ll bring up the list of all the extensions you have installed. If you see BetterSurf in there, click the little trash can icon to the far right of BetterSurf’s listing in your extensions – Chrome will confirm that you really want to remove it, so click Remove, and it’s gone.
There it is, lurking in my Firefox extensions. And I haven’t even opened Firefox since the AJAX class I took in July! Grumpy Jasmine Cat is not pleased.
Firefox users – go to the Firefox menu at the top left of your Firefox window, then click on Add-ons – it’ll bring you to the Add-ons Manager. Click on the Extensions tab, and should you see BetterSurf there, click Disable. Firefox will require you to restart, so do that, go back to the Extensions tab on the Add-Ons window, and it’ll show you that BetterSurf has been disabled. There’s not much else you can do from here.
Yep, this sucker just made itself at home…
This next part is for both Chrome and Firefox users. The last thing to do is to remove the BetterSurf folder from your Program Files folder on the hard drive – mine showed up in the Program Files (x86) folder. Drag that sucker to the recycle bin, right-click and then select Delete, either way will get rid of it. Make sure to empty your Recycle Bin afterwards. If you go back to Firefox afterwards, you’ll notice it’s not in the list of installed extensions, which is exactly what we wanted!
This next part involves a little bit of digging. Another post mentioned the following, regarding this stupid BetterSurf crap…
There are several other things it does to your PC, including a TASK it schedules to run called AmiUpdXP, which you can find and delete from c:\windows\tasks\AmiUpdXp.job on windows 7.
Other things I have found: A folder is created in your appdata/local called SwvUpdater which is referenced by the Task to run Updater.exe – the frightening part, since it will be able to download and execute any future malware/virus/worm.”
I went and investigated on my own computer – and found the AmiUpdXp.job in Tasks, as well as SwvUpdater in apps/local. Since I’ve deleted them already (and my computer hasn’t imploded), there are no screenshots for you, but here’s how to take care of the next part.
To ditch the AmiUpXp.job file, you’ll need to go into C:\Windows\Tasks – inside that folder may be a couple of different things, I deleted the AmiUpXp.job file and moved onto the next step.
SwvUpdater is indeed malware, according to ShouldIRemoveIt.com – and you can read more about it and what it does here. I may have been ridiculous and just deleted the folder for SwvUpdater, but you can actually uninstall it via Windows, too. Just go to Control Panel, then click on Programs and Features (or Uninstall a Program if you’re in category view). Scroll down, and look for Software Version Updater.
See it? This stupid little thing’s been hiding in my computer since October, apparently!
Select Software Version Updater from the list, click the Uninstall button at the top, and there you go. (To double-check that it’s really gone, for those of you who feel like it, go look in your User/AppData/Local folder and make sure that the SwvUpdater folder is gone. You’ll have to make Windows show hidden files and folders first.)
Nobody’s quite sure how this little piece of malware snuck its way onto computers- rumor has it that it’s been spreading through YouTube somehow. Hopefully this’ll help people who’ve been infected with this stupid add-on get rid of it!
Aheheheh. I do apologize sincerely for my absence over the past few weeks – with NaNoWriMo approaching (and then starting), I’ve been wrapped up in plotting and writing and such… and on top of that, I started another Doctor Who scarf, so… yes. I am not dead, just crazy.
So much so that I just about died when I saw this enter my Facebook news feed this morning.
Yes, that is Grumpy Cat as Ariel, The Little Mermaid. Yes, I am very glad I wasn’t drinking coffee at the time. I might have snorted it all across my monitor otherwise.
Eric Proctor (TsaoShin on DeviantArt) is the wonderful mind who came up with the delightful idea of inserting Grumpy Cat into various Disney films – with the simple premise of: ” the appearance of the cat must derail the plot of the film.” And oh, would Grumpy Cat derail these films, haha.
I mean, come on. Grumpy Cat as Lilo? Adorable. I love the little fist-bump she’s giving Stitch.
And this last one is my absolute favorite – especially for the look of horror on the Beast’s face as Grumpy bats at the rose. Oh lord. I just about died.
If you want to see more, check out the Grumpy Disney gallery on DeviantArt! Eric’s other artwork is great as well – he’s got some My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic stuff, and this little treat that made me squeal with delight.
OH MY GOD YOU GUYS IT’S TOOTHLESS. And he looks so much better than any of my little clay Toothlesses. (Toothli?)
So yes, go check out his artwork, and stay away from the beverages while you look at the Grumpy Disney gallery – trust me, your monitor will thank you.
Meanwhile, AUGH I’ve written almost 300 words that aren’t novel related! I MUST WRITE MY BOOK. (For those curious: the working title is For Whom the Bard Sings, and it’s a fantasy novel loosely set in the D&D Eberron world. If it comes out as well as I’m hoping, maybe someday I may eventually publish this one… maybe.)
Back to writing! 😀