A year ago I came across a writing prompt on Reddit:

“You’re at the largest Renaissance festival in the US when the zombie apocalypse starts.”

The song ‘Serious Steel‘ by Leslie Fish came to mind immediately, as did my experiences at Faire, so as a quick writing practice I came up with something I’m still a bit fond of…

—

“Damn, the Celts are looking more hung over than usual,” Sam muttered, hefting his pike as he headed out onto the field. Sure enough, the usually energetic band of opponents to the English in their daily battle pageant were groaning and dragging themselves onto the field.

“Sam, I don’t think they’re hung over…” Chuck said from behind him. In his real day job Chuck was a nurse at the local hospital, but at Faire he was called Charles and he wielded his bastard sword with ease in defense of Queen and Country. “They don’t look healthy at all, and I think they’re chanting something like, well, did Liam just say ‘Brains’?”

Instead of an organized charge onto the field, the camp of Celts oozed men and women out in drips and drabs without their weapons or armor as expected, all of them groaning and staggering towards the pikemen, at first accompanied by a rousing cheer from the audience – which quickly turned to mutters, confusion, and finally a single high pitched scream as one woman noticed Liam’s lack of a left arm, just a dry stump where ragged flesh hung.

But without hesitation the captain called the charge, Sam found himself joining the ranks marching forward, and while his stomach did flip-flops he realized the battle was no pretend-play this time. He felt the weapon make contact with flesh and he pushed on, digging it into the torso of the friend he’d drank with over many an evening. It was the beginning of the end, but his instincts lead him to try to protect the people who watched that day.

The next few hours were a blur. He’d taken up the sword after his pike had been shattered. Many of his friends were dead, and the barber surgeon was forced to play his part for real, bandaging as best he could and making the call when a soul was lost, with Chuck’s help. Decapitation was the order of the day, it was the only way to be sure, and it made everyone sick.

The hair braiding booth became an orphan-care, watching the children that had lost their parents or those whose parents were busy with other activities like manning the pyre, which had once been the site of the Maypole. It seems that after the initial push there had been a lull, but cell phones weren’t getting any signal, and anyone who had been sent away from the park had yet to return or send word back that anything was accessible. Many of the guests had fled, and the Faire workers were trying to keep a sense of calm for the rest. The food court was handing out meals sparingly, not sure how long they were going to make the supplies hold out. Strangely enough, the actress that had been playing the Queen was a great source of leadership – finding those who needed things to do and giving them tasks, providing comfort where she could, organizing the able bodies into turning the former Faire site into a camp for an unknown amount of time.

Sam was recruited for the defensive patrols of the perimeter, and as the sun sets on the world he knew as well as the day of horror, a determination to help see this isolated band organize, survive, and flourish began to spread through him. The blacksmith’s hammer could be heard ringing out, as more blades were prepared for those to be trained. The weavers were ready to make the garb into more practical clothes. Even the military camp was having councils of war. Who else, he reasoned, was more equipped to be ready for the end of the world?

As I continue painting miniature figures, I’m trying to take pictures of the process, as a way to remind myself what I’ve done well and where I need to improve, as well as a way to share it with others. If I have pictures of where I’ve come from I will see my growth over time.

(Also, the phone pictures zoom better than my eyes, so I have found errors that need correction that way, ha!)

Yesterday I opted to tackle Maeve, the Tiefling Warlock. But I was so into getting started and selecting her color scheme for the dress… I forgot to take starter shots! It was only after I laid a very pale skin tone over the white primer (barely visible, but it was the color I was going for), a chemise color that I would later go over with a darker shade when I changed my mind, the undergown color in the center panel, and some of the overgown color that I realized what I was supposed to be doing. Sorry, use your imagination…

I was actually very proud of this stage – there was very little guideline except a thin line to mark the center panel, so the fact that the light blue went down with only one major bobble (on the hip piece, which was getting a dark color later anyway) was noteworthy. One challenge I have had in the past has been going for too many diverse colors, so a large part of this exercise was picking carefully and limiting my palette.

The cyan blue, which is one of my favorite colors in my paint options (I bought a lot of blues when I placed my order, I have a bias), was a little hard to get even, so this was many passes, several bobbles, and a lot of frustration… so when I got it to relatively a mostly done state I got annoyed enough to do something fun… SMOKE!

Hard to screw up magic purple smoke, right? It was such a relief that it also inspired me to go back and darken the chemise (under shirt) because there wasn’t enough contrast. I have no idea why purple was really such a relief, but it was downright fun!

Then it was back to tricky stuff, hair. Technically the color I use for most fantasy black hair is actually a color called Nightshade Purple – but it’s so dark that unless you put on a thinnest coat it resembles a very slightly tinted black, which I love for hair.

One ear was done smoothly around, victory. The other was painted over with purple at the tip, which I just decided was loose hair because my thought was that Bleached Linen (my skin tone of choice for a white Tiefling – way too pale for normal flesh) would never cover the purple. I would learn later that I was underestimating Bleached Linen!

And after hair was another tricky pass; luckily I had planned ahead and made the hip pieces and the sleeve cuffs (in close proximity due to the pose) the same dark color, so it was time to apply my main “contrast” color and hope my color sense was not terrible.

Pleasant surprise – my color sense checked out for this garment! The dark red seemed to contrast well without being obnoxious – it actually reminds me of garments I’ve seen in reality (at Faire, probably) so that’s a great sign. This also let me frame the tail, and gave me a color to use for the boots (I was planning black or brown, but dark red was so much more interesting!) which means it was a win across the board.

This is where I started getting… ambitious. A base coat is what I know, but details, washes, any of that? Hell no. Washes for the face (started with flesh wash, no go on this pale tone, used a pale gray wash and still had to keep undoing it until I blended it with Bleached Linen to start with) were not my friend. Part of it is my hesitation to move outside my comfort zone, or accept it not looking ideal until the next stage. But the horns, typical of Tieflings to have horns roughly the same color of their skin, looked really incomplete. Ideally they would be black at the tip and fade back to pearl white at the base, but that’s WAY beyond where I will be for a long time. However my spouse recommended black tips anyway, so with a deep breath I plunged in…

I also decided to add a colored band as a hair tie – figuring it would be easy enough to cover when I botched it. But I didn’t botch it! And the tips came out looking rather cool. I did an experiment using a thinned pearl white to add shine to the tail and horns, but it just muted the black with no real impact that I wanted, so the black was re-added (luckily I had the previous black to use as a template) to the horns and I tried to walk away for the night.

Think about it, I’d already pushed my comfort zone. The mini looked good. Next would be things like eyebrows… those seemed impossible. But as I dwelt on the idea I started idly practicing thin Nightshade Purple lines on my paint tray I waffled.

Over and over I started to hover the brush over the mini, then stopped. Cleaned the brush. Even cleaned the tray as if I were wrapping for the night! Sat back down.

Deep breath…

Silver eyes (hard to see) and crooked eyebrows – I’ll just say she’s raising one at the situation at hand! BUT EYEBROWS… MY FIRST.

VIC- TO-RY!

Whew.

And with that I really was done for the night.

Strangely enough it wasn’t until later I realized that on the 4th of July I did a character almost entirely in blue dress, red accents, and white skin. How patriotic.

So for the time being Maeve is complete and playable, which should make my DM happy.

More importantly… it make me happy.

I suck less than I used to. This is documentation of that.

Yesterday I started out my morning already short on sleep – it was Board Game Night as usual Wednesday night, so I didn’t get home until about midnight, and had to get up earlier than usual for work. Specifically to be at the office early so I could help transport donated clothes to the LGBT+ Youth Center we had made arrangements with during IDAHOTB.

This meant I had to scramble to ensure my car was clear of personal effects (like my N7 jacket, and my sleeping bag) because I didn’t want them to be accidentally donated. In trying to keep the cat out of the garage I slammed the door between the house and garage on my middle finger. OUCH!

Traffic was… trafficy. So I was not as early as I’d hoped, and I had my laptop backpack with me, so I parked under by building before I drove across the street to our campus to ask security to let me park there temporarily while we loaded. Usually I can only park under my building, so I was not looking forward to that persuasion check. On an impulse I set my laptop up on it’s dock so I could ping the person coordinating this effort to let him know to expect me.

That’s what I saw the update from the night before that the donation drop was canceled, so my day was suddenly opened up – kind of a relief- but there I was in the office early. I used the time to catch up on some yearly review work (ick), some planning work on a fun project (yay), and generally was pretty productive, to redeem my exhausted mind state. Everything was once again normal until after lunch.

After lunch I realize my normal one-on-one was canceled earlier that week, so I was just chilling and getting some normal work done when I get a FB message from a friend asking about my plans for the night. This is unusual, especially given that this friend lives out in Riverside, which is not close by. So I explain my plans to go home, watch some of Critical Role, and turn in early…

OR, she suggests, I could join her for the Janelle Monae concert since her planned concert buddy had already paid for a ticket, but had to cancel at last minute due to illness.

YES! I got it cleared with my spouse, and my boss to leave a bit early, and after my next meeting I was gone!

But… I had on a sleeveless light dress (luckily with leggings) and my jacket had been removed from the car due to earlier transportation of donation plans. So a quick trip to a Target that Google said was on the way.

Turns out the USC Target is VERY small, half groceries, nothing larger than a Junior’s size to speak of, and no long sleeve shirts, sweaters, or jackets to be seen (unless I wanted a USC sweatshirt, they had a few). To have avoided wasting my trip I did snag eyeliner and mascara to keep in my purse, since this is not the first time I’d wished I had easily available makeup due to unexpected circumstances. Well, hoping that it wouldn’t get that cold (we were at the Greek which is an outdoor venue) I swung through a drive through to get myself a bit of dinner and made it to the theater early!

Got a bit of makeup on – Selfie mode for phone cameras = great mirror, figured out the venue wi-fi since the Greek is in Griffith Park where phone signal is terrible at best, and took it easy, wished I had brought my book, tried to keep from getting sunburnt on the benches by standing in the shade. Then my friend arrived and we waited for the gates to open, but once they did all was awesome!

She got food, we got cocktails, we bought event merch (a totebag for me, because it was useful), and then we took silly selfies up at the Belvedere Vodka lounge. Because we were early all the staff was slightly bored and gave us a lot of positive attention, so it was a lot of fun. Found out seats, then realized we needed drinks again, but this time we decided to split a bottle of prosecco while watching the opening act – who we knew nothing about.

Turns out the opener, St. Beauty, was a lot of fun! They had great energy and good music, so that was fun. Then we watched it get dark as the place filled to the brim with a ridiculously diverse group of people!

And then… the show. I just, I lack words. Janelle was obviously having a BLAST, you could see it in her smile and bounce the whole night. Especially great was the moment of the encore, when she came out wearing the Pan pride flag, tried to be super serious… but the love and reaction from the crowd was too much and she broke out in the biggest grin of the night.

Of course it’s hard to get pictures during a concert, and I was far more focused on enjoying the show, but a few moments captured on phone-film:

From a day that started with slamming my finger in a door – that was a magical ending.

Audiobooks and podcasts are not for me.

I want to like them, but somehow I always find my mind drifting, losing important bits, having to rewind, which defeats the point of hands free and listening while doing something else. So I’ve just regarded them as not-for-me, especially since audiobooks can be acquired as just plain books, which I do enjoy!

Then a friend recommended a podcast called ‘Tanis‘ and managed to make it sound compelling enough that I took my longstanding grudge against audio inputs off the shelf and examined them again. Part of it was timing – I’ve found that by not listening to NPR or other radio stations while driving I have lowered my stress levels lately, so I need good things to listen to on Spotify.

Tanis: “What they tried to do with World of Darkness (the tabletop RPG) – but clever.” That was the description that helped sell me on giving it a try. The real world references given a slightly darker shadow, the nuance that anything on the podcast that sounded too weird to be real could be input into Google to show that it was actually the factual source material they were using. Add in the character ‘Meerkatnip’ as a acerbic hacker who I find super compelling to listen to, and I had to stop to absorb it, at least a little. That little has turned into a lot.

If I listen at work, I either stop working or start missing large swaths of Tanis, so that was a bad sign. Any time I’m at my computer with a browser open, I have to be careful not to have that mental wandering take place. It turns out, though, that there are two activities that let me do what needs to be done at the same time as receive Tanis appropriately – driving alone and, strangely enough, showering. I’m fortunate my phone is waterproof.

My commute is miserable and mindless hours in traffic – generally at least an hour and a half each way to and from work. I used to keep up on world events via NPR, but as I mentioned it was slowly eroding my calm in a way I hadn’t noticed until I stopped letting it. Since it’s some of my best thinking time, though, having something thought-provoking, like the intersection between reality and fiction, the eerie and the mundane, seems to work very well for me. I can’t look things up while I’m driving, so it’s all equally regarded as real world, making it feel more alive.

What is Tanis? As the show says, “It’s not an easy thing to understand.” The very root of it is a short story, written by Jack Parsons (of JPL fame), and that amount of oversimplification takes it to a near criminal degree. It’s an intersection of science, history, mystical forces, and conspiracy theories like you wouldn’t believe. But even that cheapens it. Maybe it is just enough to call it ‘Mystery’ and leave it at that.

I need a weekend from my weekend, in the best possible way.

I’m finding as I grow up I have less time to take away for myself aside from those elusive weekend days that aren’t committed or full of mundane tasks that need doing between the sound and fury of the work week days. So when my vacation last October went awry due to the fires in the Napa Valley, I knew I needed to find a way to do a brief Napa Redux.

Included in that redux  would be some of the wineries we missed, another stay at the Napa Inn, and most importantly… the French Laundry at last! That meant this couldn’t just be any weekend, it had to fall on some kind of landmark event, some reason to justify to my brain weasels spending the money on that high end splurge. I also wanted to give Napa some time to recover from the fires, so the distance between my spouse’s birthday (October) and mine (June) seemed like a great time frame to wait – over half a year and a good growing season in there.

Friday morning bright and early I tucked my spouse into the passenger seat of my car so that I could brave the escaping LA traffic jams of morning rush hour, armed him with some coffee energy drinks, and started the trek north. I’ve never really done road trips where I’ve done any significant amount of driving, so the non-stop 3.5+ hours I put in before we needed gas was a personal record, and one I am actually quite proud of! All the way through the Grapevine, well into the Central Valley, before we had to stop for gas and did the switch until lunch at Pea Soup Andersen’s. He took us through the delta, since it’s a route he knew well from his time living in Napa, and to our lovely B&B. Dinner was at a favorite from the last trip, Zuzu, and then a nice relaxing bath in the claw footed tub before bed.

Saturday was for downtown adventures outside of Napa. A nice long drive took us to Treehorn for used books in Santa Rosa, then lunch and a gaming/comic book store in the same walkable area. Used books are a dangerous indulgence, but found some fun stuff. I resisted the game and comics siren songs. Another road trip, this time through what should have been some majorly burned areas that were surprisingly green, to Calistoga’s downtown main street. Art galleries, window shopping, and finishing with wine tasting at August Briggs – a favorite from my first trip many years ago. I’m rapidly discovering that I love Pinot Blanc as a summer sipping wine. After enough walking it was time to regroup at the Napa Inn and plot out a dinner. I had my eye caught by Basalt in downtown Napa, but they had no reservations available, so we gambled on their lounge which was first come first served and got in right away. The seating was uncomfortable, the service was a little off, but the food was amazing and the drinks were tasty too, so over all it was good but next time I will make sure to have reservations for the dining room instead of the lounge. More bath bomb experimentation – this time in a delightful pink with bubbles!

Sunday was my birthday! First thing of all we made it to Castello di Amorosa for the tour and reserve tasting, which took longer than anticipated. The original plan was to hit four wineries that day, but due to the tour and tasting starting late and taking longer than expected, we got out of there in time for a late lunch. I gave my Google-fu another go (Basalt had been my idea based on Google results) and we ended up at the Brasswood Bar + Kitchen (didn’t get to visit their winery) which gave my food-picker the redemption I needed. Great cocktails (and colorful!), outstanding food, and pleasant staff that was able to get us through quickly so we could make our reservations at the next vineyard. This time it was Materra, a Cunat family vineyard. Since my spouse’s name is Matera, and from his time living in the valley he knew one of the people managing Materra, we had a great connection before we ever arrived! Meeting the owners, having a lovely private tasting, talking about the valley, it was wonderful. So wonderful I joined their wine club!

Then it was time to return to the B&B to prepare for that special birthday dinner. Dressed up, decked out, and smart enough to take a Lyft instead of driving, we ventured out to Yountville. All for an experience that transcends words. Sparkling wine in the garden while we waited to start, a cozy table for two inside, and then to my delight a happy birthday to me at the top of the menu! Everyone visiting our table wished me a happy birthday and made sure that it was, indeed, a delightful night. Amazing wine pairings, adventures in food I’ve never tried – caviar and abalone come to mind, and upbeat well timed service for every course. Watching the timing on service for the larger tables near us was very impressive, the food was truly amazing and memorable for us (and tailored to our food predilections!), over all just an amazing night. Did I mention wine? A glass with every course ensured I was glad we had to catch a ride back instead of driving, and I got poured into bed at the end of the night. We didn’t see Chef Keller this time, like we did at Bouchon back in October, but they sent me home with lots of lovely bites and souvenirs of a remarkable night.

Due to our distractions of the day before, Monday after breakfast was packing up, a quick visit to Heitz and V. Sattui (my favorite vineyard and the place we were already wine club members) and lunch from V. Sattui’s divine deli. Then on the road home. Dinner was a brief detour to see friends, and with traffic caused by construction we found ourselves squeaking home shortly after midnight. Luckily the spouse made sure I had what I needed to sleep and get ready for work in the morning, then he finished unloading the car on my behalf.

Early Tuesday morning was back to the real world to catch up with all the work that was waiting for me. I find myself a little wrung out all this week, but so worth it in the long run.

Ever have a period of time where you are strangely in sync with another human?

Those weird moments when the thoughts you can’t put into words don’t have to be, because they are understood. Last night was a traditional Wednesday – work from home, join a friend for Korean BBQ, then go together to the board game night at our local game store.

Conversation was good, but pretty normal, until the last round of pork belly came out for grilling. Somehow we discovered that six of the pieces were matched pairs from the same strip. Normally even if this happened, we wouldn’t see it, but mystically they lay on the grill in such a way that they lined up perfectly. It brought strange joy for a coincidence, and I have no way to explain why it was so entertaining, but it felt like a cool and kind of special magic.

Later we were playing a game called ‘Dixit‘ that I remembered from years ago, where you play with picture cards, and each round a storyteller dictates the word or short phrase theme for one of their cards, just cryptically enough that some but not all the people will know which card is theirs, then other players try to match the theme. All the cards are mixed and revealed together, and the players vote as to which they think is the storyteller’s card. It’s beautifully simple to play, and the cards are wonderfully absurd, as well as abstract, art. I had a moment where I had a girl peering through the curtains on a stage, so I used “Slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” because it’s a quote from Hamlet. As I predicted, my KBBQ partner totally knew what it was, but many other people at the table did not. Later he laid down the theme “teapot” and I guessed that the card with a hand-held sized tornado was the reference to “tempest in a teapot.” In a game where knowing your audience can make all the difference, these line ups were wonderful.

Other, smaller moments manifested, not that any of these were large. Nods to shared in-jokes with our tabletop RPG group, for instance. Just moment after moment of remembering why you are friends and sharing those strange brain-twists that are so rare to find in someone else.

I’m finding I don’t even have the words today, it feels like a bit of dream that you remember the feeling of, but not the subject or why it mattered. So all I can ask is that if you find that moment of wavelength with someone, hold that close because the value transcends language or logic, and yet can mean so much.

Or… when did I become cool?

Geek, to me, has always been associated with a significant level of passion, a dedication to something that may not be cool but is cool to you to a degree that it radiates when you talk about it or get involved. It’s why there’s so much in this world that is “geek” – Star Wars to Ren Faire, real world tech to the deep delve into fictional histories, all over the map. But it still falls into geek, because what defines it is the level of dedication we’ve shown.

Once upon a time, if this level wasn’t towards something “cool”, well, you were an outcast. Sports, sure, go ahead and express that passion. Comic books? Don’t even think about it. Go find some quiet corner of the internet (when we finally had that resource) to geek out with your people, but don’t interrupt the norm with your nerd. Before the internet it was quiet corners of the playground, library, or something like the ever so rare Star Trek convention that your parents wouldn’t let you attend anyway and stayed a dream of the future.

My first geek con was Anime Expo 2000, I was a newly minted 18 so it was up to me how I wanted to spend my time and what little money I was making from my first job! I went all out, hotel room (with 8 of us in it, so there was a lot of sleeping on floors and showering in shifts) to cosplay (only one costume, Febreeze was my friend), playing to the hilt. And my geek community love was realized, but my peers from high school, my coworkers at that first job, and eventually my classmates when I got to college that fall… many of them just didn’t get it. Why work so hard to go be with a bunch of anime geeks?

There weren’t words for it. If they weren’t geeks themselves, there was no way to translate finally being amongst my people, even if they would go to similar crazy lengths for their popular passions (again, the sports analogy should have worked, and strangely did not).

Yet here I sit, eighteen years later, knowing that it’s impossible to get into San Diego Comic Con because too many people are knocking down the doors to wait in Hall H lines all day, just for a glimpse at those geek-stars, a tidbit about a treasured TV show, or some magical moment for a fan base to come together. It’s cool to care about the geekiest of things.

The internet was a huge factor, we could find our people without flying across the country for a convention, we could connect over those quirks that made us outcasts as children and young adults.

But there was also some hard to define cultural ground shift, as well. Passion was no longer relegated to the quiet corners of the world, suddenly it was acceptable to wave your interest flags from the highest peaks, even if they weren’t typical. And by doing so, they became typical!

Suddenly nerd was in, and sure enough… geek was chic. The world found us on the fringes and felt it was time to call us cool.

Thanks, world. Next time can we start earlier so I don’t have so many issues as a result?

I don’t mean to give you the cold shoulder, the recent silent treatment is because the end of Faire and day job have taken so much time as of late I don’t have the bandwidth for much else.

My sincere apologies!

As a member of the Rainbow Rioters, an LGBT+ organizing committee at work, this week is very important to us. Today is the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia – that last one is new this year and is especially meaningful to me.

It was the first Riot IDAHOTB picture in 2016 that brought the fact that we had an LGBT+ group at work to my attention (I missed the picture because I couldn’t find them, the group was smaller back then) – it was tweeted out and made a small but significant ripple. But it was the start of something awesome. Baby steps.

Then last year we had a rather notable 60-70 person turn out for our picture, and the tweet got a lot more coverage. The Rainbow Rioters and LGBT+ at Riot in general had seen an increase in visibility, activity, and passion. Another set of steps.

This year we spent more time getting prepared, with Riot investment in our success, and working with the company to do something special…

How’s this for special? An article about all the cool things we’re doing!

That’s right, we made the CUTEST icon, the Rainbow Fluft!

To be able to stand up and put an in-game way to stand against bullying and discrimination, to stand out loud and proud as who we are no matter where we go, it honestly brings a bit of a tear to my eye. As a woman who can “pass” it means I want even more to out there and be loudly who I am, to make sure the world knows that I am Bi and proud of who I have always been – will always be. Having a male partner does not make me less of who I am inside. Now I can do that in League as well as out in the real world.

Our IDAHOTB 2018 picture went out as a beautiful tweet today, with something approaching 200 Rioters (we keep losing count when we try to tally it) forming a wide rainbow of support! Check out the Tweet!

Big. Beautiful. Strides.

Forward, onward.

Lately my browser has been “forgetting” all my logins – I have to relog into everything, even my google accounts. With two-factor this is a long an tedious process through several different systems. This is frustrating, and I’ve gone through several sets of solutions that haven’t panned out, until I finally relented and switched to the beta of Chrome. So far, even through a computer restart, this seems to have worked.

Why is this relevant? Well, logging in to everything includes WordPress. In order to write here, I have to add yet another login to my list. After that long list of logins, I get here, log in… and am DONE.

As a result my entries have been a little bit slower, sparser. It takes that extra willingness to get over the hurdle and put pen to paper, so to speak. An idea may be bubbling when I boot up, but after I go through all the steps to get here, my word-oriented state has faded away. I’d rather just poke around and absorb other people’s content than generate my own.

Now that I’m solved, I’m hoping that excuse will also fade away. Now to find my next excuse. (Kidding!)