The Crafty Nerd

  • A letter to Scooterlou

    2012-05-05 11.41.58

    Dear Scooterlou,

    It’s been a good nearly two years together.  We’ve been through a lot of good times, a couple of bad times, and one really nasty time (I’m pretty sure I shielded you from the road that one time we were in an accident together), and rode 1,730ish miles together (give or take).  You’ve taken good care of me, and I’m pretty sure I’ve taken good care of you – aside from covering you in stickers, anyway.  And that nasty spill on College Ave.  You’re my first scooter, and I love you to death.

    But… y’see, I think I’ve outgrown you.

    I know, I know, you’ll say “but come on, you haven’t gotten any taller!  I’m short and dainty and perfect for you!”  But over the past twoish years, I’ve been learning about what I really need in a scooter.  I need something that, while being a 49cc scooter, can go up hills without sounding like it’s having an asthma attack.  Something that can go from zero to useful in a short amount of time at a stop light.  Something that doesn’t piss off the drivers behind me because I’m slowly making my way up to 35 miles an hour after turning onto a new road.  I also want something a little bigger, something a little taller, something a little zippier, something a little more reliable.  (And I’m not saying you’re not reliable!  I am, however, saying that you have been in the shop a couple times over the past two years, and I’ve heard Honda Metropolitans have certain things that get problematic as they age.)

    I’m getting a Buddy tomorrow, Scooterlou.  And you’re going to end up finding a new home.

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  • Things that The Crafty Nerd has been up to…

    I know, sometimes I’m not very good at this “regular posting” thing.  Especially during the school year.  I’ve got to kick my own butt about it, and remind myself “hey, you have people actually maybe wanting to read what you write, so you have to write something”.  Even if it’s just something little and silly like that pony creator I posted a few weeks ago, it shows you guys I’m still alive, right?

    Well, here’s what I’ve been up to that’s keeping me from posting regularly…

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  • “I’m not that crafty,” he says.

    My husband, who I’ve affectionately dubbed Mr. Crafty Nerd, claims he’s not crafty.
    Mister Crafty Nerd, pondering his allegedly uncrafty status...
    Mister Crafty Nerd, pondering his allegedly uncrafty status…
    “I’m not a designer or anything,” Bryan says.  “I’m not crafty.”  But as you peek into his office, you can see some evidence of his creativity.  There’s a bookshelf that’s been turned into a standing desk.  A Nerf gun that’s been disassembled, painted, and reworked to look very steampunky.  Costume elements from his steampunk costume, worn at Gencon.  A backlit monitor stand, with LEDs adding some ambient light to his computer setup.  If you wake up his tablet, you’ll see a background with a space-commander-esque insignia and a widget proclaiming “Welcome Commander Hoey”.
    Sure, he may not consider himself crafty in the conventional sense, but he’s definitely a creative guy.

  • Quick nerdy treat: General Zoi’s Pony Creator!

    ponyWithBackgroundI won’t lie – I may have just spent a half hour making this little pony.  While I should have been downing coffee and preparing for work.  Her name is Raspberry.  Don’t judge.

    For those of you of the pony persuasion, you can find General Zoi’s updated pony creator here – not only does it have more options to choose from, but you can change the angle of your pony’s head, play with new poses, and much more!  I could have spent a bunch more time playing with it, and seeing what accidentally awkward positions I could create (there was one pose where the pony’s head was in a ridiculously unnatural position, based on how I’d turned her head), but alas – work calls.

    Go play with the pony creator for a little bit!  It’ll make your day better, I promise. 🙂

     

  • I have a t-shirt problem.

    Yes, everyone, I have a t-shirt problem.  And it might be getting out of control, heh.

    2013-08-26 17.15.36It hit me earlier this week, when I got this new t-shirt in the mail – found it on Ript during the last day of GenCon, ordered it when I got home, and promptly took a picture of it upon its arrival.  As I was neatly arranging my new t-shirt under Toothless, I thought of the many other t-shirts I owned, and thought it might be neat to pull them all out and see just how many awesomely nerdy t-shirts I had.  And so I did.

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  • Nerd world problems

    Well.  Here it is, Sunday evening, and I have no idea what to write about.  I don’t have a planned article that’s ready enough for the world to see, I don’t have a batch of craft projects to share with everyone – so instead, I’m going to ramble about my nerd world problems.

    Grad school starts up again tomorrow.  I don’t have any classes until Tuesday, but still – the school year starts anew, and I have a fresh batch of classes to work through.  I’m fine with that, I’m actually rather excited about classes, but what the heck am I going to make while I’m in class?  I honestly think the reason I got a 4.0 in all my classes this summer is because I had a craft project in my hands, keeping me from surfing the internet and helping me absorb all the knowledge for that day’s session.  But aside from this massively massive capelet I’m making (it’s from a Game of Thrones themed pattern, and it’s going to be My Little Pony themed – the colors are black and navy blue, Princess Luna’s colors!), I don’t have anything I’m working on that’s small enough to toss into my backpack.  I might work on a cowl, might work on a scarf… I dunno yet, though.

    Nerd world problems, I know.

    I did put about 30 miles on Scooterlou this weekend!  And it spurred me into making a website for our scooter riding group.  I spent maybe four hours cranking out the website last night – you can see it here if you’re interested.  My eyes were going crossed by the end of everything, though, and I fought with phpBB for a good hour on top of that.  I dunno if anyone’s even going to use it, heh, but it’s there.  And it looks pretty awesome, I think.

    Aside from that, there’s not much going on in my little corner of the world – just gearing up for the beginning of a new semester.  I promise there’ll be more exciting things to talk about on Wednesday!

  • My Little Pony: Conventions are Magic! (and so are games!)

    There is one thing I can definitely say about the My Little Pony community – they are INCREDIBLY friendly people.

    1185785_10152169926188378_44284679_n
    Like Rainbow Factory Dash, who started to laugh every time we ran into each other.

    I’ve never noticed this so much as I did at GenCon this year.  Now, as I’m sure most of you who know me know, or those of you who’ve been reading the blog for any length of time know, I deal with anxiety and a heck of a lot of social awkwardness.  And because of that, it’s hard for me to just strike up a conversation with people, especially random people I’ve never met that I’m chasing down to take their picture.  (More often than not, by the time I worked up the nerve to ask someone for their picture, they’d wandered too far away – thank goodness for Mister Crafty Nerd hunting them down for me and snagging them for pictures!)  Or random people I meet in panels.  I mean, if there’s a My Little Pony community here in Bloomington, I sure haven’t found it – and even if I did, I’d be a little nervous to just jump right in, hollering “OMG PONIES!”  But the My Little Pony fans (or bronies, as I’ll call them for short – I know not everyone identifies as a brony, but it’s just quicker than saying My Little Pony fans every time I want to refer to the group as a whole, heh) at GenCon were just so welcoming and friendly and easy to talk to.  I found this out in both of the Enterplay My Little Pony: Collectible Card Game panels I went to, as well as in my wanderings around the con.  (One of those Enterplay panels was supposed to be My Little Pony: This Panel is MAGIC, but it got rescheduled…)  People commented on how awesome my costume was, and there were a few people who I recognized from when they took my picture earlier in the day.  And a magical thing happened – I actually started to talk to people.  People I didn’t know.  It was amazing.

    Immediately surrounding me at the first MLP:CCG panel I went to were a bunch of older guys, and a couple of younger girls and their moms who seemed to enjoy the show as much as their kids did.  And we all talked.  We discussed our favorite episodes, I showed off pictures of my ridiculous collection of My Little Pony plush, we talked about who our favorite ponies were, and wondered what the collectible card game would be like.  It was like we were all old friends – and the fact that it was My Little Pony that brought us all together made it even more awesome.

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  • GenCon 2013 Photos: Days 3 and 4

    This is the other post you’ve all been waiting for – the second chunk of photos from GenCon 2013!  Again, a few of these shots were taken by Mr. Crafty Nerd, and many of the Doctor Who photoshoot images were taken by my wonderful friend Michael. Due to the fact that there are so many pictures, shots from Day 1 and 2 are in a separate post so that way things don’t run as slow as molasses!  Enjoy! 😀

    2013-08-17 12.03.42

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  • GenCon 2013 Photos: Day 1 and 2

    This is the post you’ve all been waiting for (or one of them, anyway) – part one of my massive photo dump of shots from GenCon 2013!  There are plenty of pictures that I took, with a little assistance from Mr. Crafty Nerd – hope everyone enjoys them! Due to the fact that there are so many pictures, shots from Day 3 and 4 are in a separate post so that way things don’t slow to a crawl here!  Enjoy! 😀

    2013-08-15 14.47.54

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  • GenCon, Day 2 (Or, The Crafty Nerd battles her social anxiety)

    Today has been… a day, we’ll put it at that.  There were good parts, there were bad parts, and there were absolutely exhausting parts.

    It’s no secret to those who know me well, but for those who don’t know me, I deal with some bad social anxiety and can get seriously awkward as a result.  For the most part, it doesn’t bother me, unless I’m in situations where there are lots of people/lots of noises or I’m an unfamiliar place.  And, well, GenCon hits all three.  I don’t know my way around too well, there are way too many people everywhere, and more often than not I have to REALLY work up the nerve to ask a favorite author or webcomic artist to sign something for me because I feel bad bothering them.  I know, I know, they wouldn’t be here if they didn’t want their fans to talk to them or flail about in their general presence, but still.  Social anxiety is irrational.  And it was incredibly irrational today, that is for sure.  I ended up retreating back to the hotel room mid-day to hide and recharge my batteries, so to speak.

    My day was fun, though, I won’t deny it.  I ended up at another instance of the Enterplay My Little Pony trading card game, and ended up with more swag – I have only bought one pony related thing so far this trip, haha.  I got a trading card folio and this card:

    2013-08-16 11.10.10-2Yes, this is one of the more rare Rainbow Dash cards for the trading card series – rumor has it that one went for $700 on eBay recently.  (It’s going for around $180 at the time of this writing, which isn’t $700, but still!)  I’m ridiculously lucky to have gotten this – the guys at Enterplay are amazing.  I’ve said it before, and I’ll likely say it again, hah.

    After the pony panel, I wandered around the exhibition hall before having a slight meltdown/freakout because I couldn’t work up the nerve to ask Jeph Jacques (of Questionable Content fame) to draw me a picture of Marigold, so I ended up going back to the room and just sat there for a while, overwhelmed and overtired.  (I didn’t sleep much last night, which probably contributed to it.)  Bryan, wonderful husband that he is, ended up going back and getting me the sketch.  I am very thankful that he is so patient with me.  Thankfully, sleep and quiet did the trick, and I braved the exhibition hall for one last round of goodies before getting dinner and camping out in front of the room where An Evening with Patrick Rothfuss was scheduled to happen.

    I am ridiculously glad I got there early.  Apparently the event was sold out – and since I got in line early enough, I got to sit right up front.  It was amazing.  Patrick is just so… I don’t know how to explain it, except it feels like he’s just one of the gang, an awesome person the likes of which I’d love to just hang out with.  And it felt like we were hanging out, him and around 200 other people, myself included.  He talked candidly.  He cussed a lot.  He talked about feminism and sexism in fantasy novels, and he read stuff to us from when he wrote a humorous advice column back in college, he told us about his writing processes, he talked about tons of other stuff which I cannot remember, and then we all sang “You Are My Sunshine” together.

    And then I had him sign my iPad.  Which I will post pictures of tomorrow, when I am actually near my iPad and my phone.  Apparently it was not the first electronic device he had signed.  Awesome.  He is now, officially, my most favorite author.  Not only are his books amazing, but he is frigging awesome.  Sorry, Anne Bishop, but Patrick has dethroned you.

    And entirely unrelated to anything – there’s a guy sitting not too far away from where I’m parked in the lobby with my laptop who has been playing the Game of Thrones theme on his guitar for, well, about an hour.  I am not kidding.  I’m pretty sure I never want to hear that song again.

    Until tomorrow, everyone!  I’ll be dressed as the 4th Doctor, which I am incredibly excited about.  I am also excited about the fact that I have enough stuff to post about to fill the site for a week straight.  😀  And we’re only halfway through the con!