Cranky. Old. Man?

Because I know I'm not ready to be working yet today.

- Flavorwire's 10 most underrated albums of 2011

- Mars500: a mock mission to determine if humans can stand each other in space.

- Pixar would like you to PERSIST.

- Joseph Gordon-Levitt wants your short stories No really.

- Hey, a positive article on fanfic

- Getting the stink out of secondhand clothes. Hey, it happens.

- Mrs. Columbo, and the beginning of a series on female fictional detectives. :D

- Jessie J and bisexuality I have to admit, I have a growing fondness for this lady.

- From homeland to heartland, a documentary on food.

- Beginner sewing recommended reading.

- Bear McCreary's fanfare for the last shuttle mission. *tear*

- Dodging Class War by Scapegoating Public Employees

- Personal essay on a steampunk persona a little less... British. No offense, of course, Brits!

- Education, but not too much education... "Strange how that works. One group—those making millions (billions? Bieberillions?) of dollars think education is important because at the end of the day, it benefits them. The other group—those slogging away, educating children, doing the so-called "dirty work" on the ground think education is important because it empowers the individual receiving the education to have some control over hir life's destiny."

- Steampunk, Tech, and Tardises: A Cosplay Tale

- On not wearing heels

- I love everything about this Jazz Age picnic.

- Old dogs, a series of photographs. Cranky old man approved!

- Favorite books on fashion history Oh god, I want all of them.

- A review of the Bridesmaids movie and thoughts on women and humor.

- The Killer. A haunting not!game.

- Andrej Pejic, beautiful androgynous model. Of course, some people are jerks.

- Sissy's Magical Ponycorn Adventure Game designed by a five year old and her dad in flash. Is really adorable.

- Book of Imaginary Beasts Book 27: Masks and Costumes

- Lume, a casual puzzle game on STEAM. Downloading it when I get home.

- 40s working girl hairstyle tutorial I may do this tomorrow, it's been so freaking hot here lately and I unfortunately have long hair now. XD

- The Three Acts of a Mathematical Story

- Natural disasters and the federal government.

- NASA ART: 50 Years of Exploration exhibit.

- Comet coming in October.

- Ecofeminism and the Feminine Superheroic. So the rumors back in the day where you could raise Aeris in FFVII with DARK POWERZ and stuff? Kind of reminds me of that.

- Leona Anderson's music to suffer by.

- Youth underclass: it's really not your fault. UK oriented, but those of us in the states can get this too.

- 1977 Zine: How to look punk. I used to make zines, actually. They never really got anywhere though, considering this is Indiana. XD

- X-wing from office supplies

Well, here's my latest compile of stuff.

( linkages, cut due to youtube embeds )

Achievements:

- Finished all the charity aprons and mailed them off. Now to get back to cosplay. I've got Drak's Toph cosplay hanging around in pieces, and I need to put the zipper and do the finishing work on my sister's graduation dress. I think I may need to actually get a zipper foot, I've managed to fake it pretty well without one, but I don't want my perfectionist sister complaining. Time to troll eBay.

- Finished Back to the Future: The Game Episode 3. Absolutely ADORE punk Jennifer, beyond words. She's so adorable. Enjoyed where the plot went, still kind of fangirling. Only bad thing is I stayed up until 3 am last night finishing it. XD

- I have a futon. Apparently the one that my parents have they're willing to just let me have. So that's more furniture I don't have to buy. So far I've got: a dining table and chairs (aka: sewing table and chairs xD), a recliner, a sewing machine that doubles as a table, a dresser, and now a futon. Also shelves, but I've always had copious shelves, from all the moves I've done. They're for the most part foldable too. I am pleased with how mobile most of the stuff I'm taking to the apartment is.

- Been slowly bringing some things to work (toys mostly) since I have a lot more places to put them and it'll make moving easier. XD

- Oh and I made some FFIV icons.

Grinding:

- Going to tackle my book and CD collection soon, see what I could stand to get rid of. I own a decent amount of books; I wouldn't say too many though. Most of the books I seem to hold onto are mythology related or beautiful hardbacks or things like that. I actually don't have a terrible amount of paperbacks. Still, I should probably cull some for the move. I'll be putting them up on here for grabs, as usual, before I find other ways to pass them on.

- Then it's on to my inherited kitchen stuff collection. I have a LOT of junk in there due to my mom giving me all the crap she didn't want in her kitchen anymore. That's pretty much going straight to Goodwill.

- I need to bring the artwork I want to frame to work with me, so that when I have time I can walk over to the place near here and see what it'll cost to frame some of it. This place uses reclaimed stuff for their frames, so I know it'll be a little pricier than going to Michael's, but I like what they do and these are some of my favorite artworks (my huge beautiful Veld with the phoenix picture, and several of my convention scores). Also apparently my mom bought me a huge (and I mean huge) print of this Audrey Hepburn picture. Which box is framed already, thankfully. I think I've got the maximum amount of Audrey artwork I can put on the walls now, though (two large posters, this print, about three small prints, and a smaller metal replica of the Breakfast at Tiffany's poster... what can I say, I think she's lovely).

- omg I have so much paperwork stacked up under my desk that needs to be gone through. ._. I have a nifty plastic container for hanging files which somehow... got forgotten about. But at least I won't need a filing cabinet if I actually sort through that stuff.

- FFEX fic, which is coming along nicely. Need to make sure to scope it properly. Anyone want to volunteer to be my beta already? I'll let you see the gdoc. ^^

If I do this right, the whole Otakon and then moving right after it won't be too painful. Thankfully I've kept my stuff either boxed or within specific areas of the house.

I know there's a lot going on for help_japan and I'm down with that, but I'm asking that for my auction that you donate to Doctors Without Borders, so that aid can go to places like Queensland and New Zealand, which nature has also got a beef with lately. Only fair. On LJ for most exposure.

And yes, I'm bidding on things too.

As usual, I'm auctioning off an apron. Only this time with a definite theme, partly due to the fact that I discovered that my local quilt shop has a ridiculous amount of Japanese and other Asian print fabric right now.

Now for some light reading material!

- Some hair advice for people that want hair that isn't so natural.

- Gram's House: a videogame with girls in mind.

- A super adorbs dress recon

- A 7 year old's hand drawn computer game

- Clarissa Explains It All: something that actually holds up

New people! Just updated my personal information post. If you feel lost about what I'm rambling about at anytime, that might help illuminate things.

So, I managed to do a meeting this morning without any visual aids, because I was running a bit late and totally forgot how to log into the meeting as a host. Virtual meetings are hard. But despite this I seem to have roped three, possibly four schools into the spring pilot of using our game. So yay more kids playing the game!

The catch is that two of the schools want to get this started in March.

Now, we didn't have as great of website set up, and half the documentation wasn't finished for the pilot in the fall, but I am still a little nervous. As IT people don't want to talk to me for some reason (really, they seem incapable of telling me what is wrong directly and assume it's the fault of the game. 9 times out of 10, it is not the game). But since I double triple emphasized that they need to come to me ASAP when they have a problem we shouldn't have a repeat of "hey, so, we can't run the game and we're supposed to use it with kids in a couple days" that happened in the fall.

Also, my interns have a big presentation coming up, they are super excited about it. All five of them have game designs, and the two new ones will start with Cendri's Crash Course in Basic Programming after their presentations. Even if they don't end up programming much, I know for a fact that at least messing programming a little before college will help them immensely if they go into the sciences and especially engineering. Yay!

NASA is still making the grant work I'm doing now a pain in the ass.

But the design for the aerospace game is coming along nicely, I can't wait to start prototyping.

( sewing )

( gaming )

( reading, which includes links as well as books )

Still waiting on some pics before I write up the con report, so have some links to get you through the snowpocalypse.

First:



And before I hear "wa wa it's on DW, I feel excluded" you don't have to log in to comment. OpenID also works.

And now the rest:

- Polyvore clothing sets inspired by videogames and anime. Cute!

- Marketing, and the psychology of colors. Orange always gets me.

- Vintage reborn as new. For some reason this article makes me think of a Daria episode where Jane was dating some guy that was into vintage and was a toolbag.

- Poster size map of the twelve colonies from Caprica/Battlestar Galactica. WANT. THAT. POSTER. Also, no, we are not writing Firefly/BSG crossovers, self.

- A fantastic example of how to advertise with a female character. It's quite a lovely bit of art, really.

- Weaving without a loom. Hrm. Interesting.

- Batman, plutocrat? I lol'd.

- Leave libraries alone!

- Girls on Film genderbend famous film scenes. Tyler Girlden is hot.

- Book of Imaginary Beasts #25: Erase/Rewind" Looks interesting! Love this group.

- Steam-power LESBIONIC stories. Interviews with the authors. I need this collection like NOW.

- Superhero grandma! I may have linked about the basic story before, but this has more pictures and discussions. I think it's a lovely story, and really says a lot about how awesome costuming can be.

- QR Code story adventures.

Haven't done one of these in a while. Mixed bag, as usual. XD Pick and choose according to your mood!

- The Longest Journey and happy lesbians. Considering that my favorite gamer blog takes their name from a place in this game, I am kind of really wanting to play this now.

- Mexican American pulp. Interesting article! Love Beyond Victoriana.

- Turn old cigarette lighters into motorcycles! Little ones.

- Pancho Barnes, another awesome aviatrix. Because Amelia might be awesome, but she's not the only one. ^^

- Monster Tale for the DS. ADORABLE FEMALE PROTAGONIST. Want this game.

- Delicous alternatives. For those of you paranoid. I already use Evernote, AND Delicious, so.

- The Hearing Trumpet: Surrealism and Old Ladies. Now THIS is definitely going on my reading list.

- We are all cyborgs now. Interesting TED talk.

- Lazy double knot that's great for terrible winter hair. Well, provided you've got straight or wavy hair like mine. (seventhe, I think this would work with yours)

- Tokenism: why almost isn't enough. This is like a lot of discussions we have at work about what to avoid with game characters. And even at my workplace the developers don't get it sometimes. And omg I'm not the only one that was uncomfortable with Cho Chang's characterization. (Edit: Hilariously, I typo-d "Tolkenism" at first for this link... this is very telling).

- Best of Bootie mashups. XD

- Why I Didn't Delete Tiger Beatdown. Or why I'm kind of glad that I don't have a large audience, and admire the whole Beatdown crew that much more. Also, I want the shirt sans arrow.

- The continuing adventures of New Dress a Day. Yeah, when I do some more refashions I might contribute.

Hey, so, I'm participating in this Reverb10 thing to make up for my kind of absentness during NaNoWriMo and I like reflecty things anyway.

Today's prompt:

December 1 One Word.
Encapsulate the year 2010 in one word. Explain why you’re choosing that word. Now, imagine it’s one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2011 for you?


My word is creativity. Despite my relative lack of writing fanfic compared to some years (2005-2006 being VERY heavy fanfic years, but also my real life was awful then), this year has definitely been my most creative. I've done things like:

- Completely sewed (and designed!) a cosplay costume for my Daryl cosplay. This may not seem like a big deal, but previously I'd only altered clothes or had people sew things for me.

- Did a lot of content and supplemental work on a computer game, including developing out of game activities and a card game to go with it (AstroEngineer: Moon Rover). This was the bulk of my creative work this year, and I'm proud of it.

- Wrote 25k of my first novel (anything else I've written has basically just been shorter stories or series). Sure, it's not the 50k that NaNoWriMo wants, but it's certainly 2.5 times what I'd ever written for the month previously. And I fully intend on finishing this story, I've got OUTLINES and set aside time to do so.

- Sewed my first clothes for myself from scratch ever (previously I'd only altered clothes). A skirt and a shirt! I've also been sewing vintage-y aprons, and a dress for my sister.

- Put in three game design concepts for grants where I was the creative lead (so far one didn't get funded though D:). Sure it's just the grant stage, but this was a big deal to be given this much control creatively.

- Found a way to teach a 16 year old three programming languages with no prior experience (I had to come up with some creative ways to do this). I AM KIND OF SHOCKED THAT IT ALL WORKED TO BE HONEST.

May seem like a short list, but everything on there was time consuming. And pretty much sealed that if I'm not making things in life or doing something a little different, well, my life is lame.

I'd really love for 2011's word to be either invention or innovation. Because that's the direction I'm heading in. At least I want to head that way. I think next year will be a very exciting year if all goes well.

And here's some links of stuff I've been reading, in case you're bored!

- PhD Gender ratios. Totally not surprised.

- New Dress a Day Photos. Since this project (a chick buys $1 dresses from thrift stores and makes them awesome every day for a year) just ended, she put up the pictures from all the days. I rather liked following this project, and some of the changes are pretty awesome.

- Mushroom Soba and Miso-Braised Mustard Greens recipe. Ramen is kind of my comfort junk food, so finding alternatives is always good.

- A 1920s Atlanta Bungalow that I rather like.

- Quinn Dunki of One Girl One Laptop Productions is my hero. Really.

- THE SCALE OF THE UNIVERSE. Something from my nanotech research for work (yes, we're making a nanotech game).

- Bioluminescent clothes. Interesting!

- Fooducate. This app is REALLY fun to use on gas station foods. Did you know spam is the worst food in its category (...which I guess is meat product?)

- Huge list of specialty size resources. Yes, not every place make clothes for a size 2 only, or shoes for tiny calves.

- Transformable unisex clothes. Huh. The model looks so thrilled.

- Truthout About Kyriarchy: An Open Letter To “Feminist” Writers, Bloggers, and Journalists

- Google's 20% Rule is Awesome

- Haters be hating on NaNoWriMo I stick out my tongue!

- Les Sapeurs: Gentleman of the Congo Stylish dudes of awesomeness.

- Passion and Problem Solving This reflects for CompSci what I love about Engineering at a fundamental level.

- Feminist is a great word This comic had me fall out of my chair. XD

- Halloween costumers that know the internet. Because the internet is for slash porn.

- A fun little election themed short story from John Scalzi. Because I like John Scalzi. Good for those of you in areas where there was much fail (I live in Indiana guys) in their local elections.

- KING. badreputation's been hosting a fantastic genderswapped noir story, which I have been enjoying.

- The Beautiful and the Damned Some very lovely photography of the early punk scene.

- Family-based fic meme! Definition of family is loose. WISH I WASN'T WRITING NANO.

( some video links now )

Kind of crazy lately, but when I'm not working, I'm getting all sorts of things watched/read/played! In fact, part of me regrets starting to have a social life, as all the stuff I like to do tends to be more solitary. It's also nice to watch TV/Movies while sewing. So yeah.

( TV/Anime )

( reading )

( videogames )

And now some links, of the other kind of reading variety!

- Interactive Apollo 13 event

- Lying on the internet isn't the problem, it's creeps that invade your privacy: or the real story behind the movie Catfish

- The Lilypad controller opens up new ways to geek out. STILL WANT. SERIOUSLY.

- Hangover cures. Apparently craving eggs after a wild night is a natural thing!

- A welcoming place for all gamers... is not PAX East Possible rape/assault triggers.

- Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath: an unfortunate repeating tale

- The Social Network and the problem of retroactive history writing. Spoiler: if you're a chick, you obviously had nothing to do with anything awesome.

- A dystopian YA novel that sounds awesome.

- What does the Bechdel test really mean?

- The Fundementals of Game Design: an essay

- Study shoes that men are no better at math than women The differences start with social reactions, though.