Sock Summit day 2

So, today (Friday) has been another good day. It started by getting on the wrong train to go to Voodoo doughnuts where some of the knitters were meeting up. Eventually though, I got there. The line wasn't even too long. I got a bacon maple bar, an old dirty bastard and an apple fritter the size of my face. Don't worry, I didn't eat them all at once.

My classes were chroma zone with Tina from Blue Moon Fiber Arts, Curvy Girl legwarmers and knee highs and arch shaping for toe up.socks. All of which, were good. I also worked a volunteer shift in the bookstore which was fun. I got to meet several knitting authors while I was there.

The highlight though, was that Clarine and I went to Pok Pok. Joe and I had wanted to go there, but tbe 1.5 hour wait was a no go. Luckily Clarine and I got a spot in the bar right away. Pok Pok serves Thai street cuisine, which is lovingly reproduced.

Our water was flavored with some sort of leaf, which made it smell like jasmine rice. We both had the Vietnamese coffee spiked with burbon, which was delicious! For food, I had the spicy boar collar served with iced mustard greens and sticky rice. Clarine had the curry with pork belly. We also split corn on the cob with creamy coconut sauce. All of it was stellar!! For desert, there was mango sticky rice. I can't even describe how good of a meal this was.

I am really having so much fun!!

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Sock summit day 1

This is a little late, as by the time I got back to the hotel last night, I was exhausted.

I was up by 7 and taking a nice walk to Stumptown coffee by 7:30. From there it was a quick ride on the max to the convention center. My morning class was heels for toe up socks. I was proud for having done all of my homework, until I discovered that the homework changed while I was at comic-con. Suddenly I was scrambling to make the modifications from the changed homework. The class was good and I learned quite a bit to point me in the right direction for my socks.

After class was a quick lunch, and them camping for the marketplace. I met some lovely people during my 3 hour wait and made a lot of progress on my hitchhiker. I am up to 32 points. Sadly, my center pull ball has fallen into disarray. As I am writing this some lovely knitter next to me is untangling it. She said she loves to untangle and asked if she could help. I love knitters! Anyway, back to the waiting. We all got bunched up at the doors before they opened, and despite the fact that I was first in line, everyone shoved, pushed and elbowed. So despite my patience, the Rainy Days and Wooly Dogs's booth was empty. Luckily they had some tucked away that I got my paws on. Not as much as I wanted though. Poor Clarine even had yarn ripped out of her hands. For shame knitters! I also got some Sanguine Gryphon skinny bugga. Other than that, just a couple of project bags came home with me. I'll post pictures later.

The opening night reception was fun. Tina and Stephanie were really funny. There was also vodka. Nursing our wounds and toting our precious cargo Clarine and I headed back to the hotel before going out for some beer. We went to the Deschutes brew house. It was yummy.

More coming soon.

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Sock Summit Day 0

After a little frantic lady minute packing, I got myself out the door and headed south. The drive was really pleasent and traffic was negligible. The farther south I got, the sunnier it got and it ended up being nice and warm. I had some podcasts to keep me company, Knit Picks, Never Not Knitting, Ready Set Knit and Stash and Burn, so I was able to get caught up on those.

After checking in, I met up with my friend Clarine who is sharing a room with me. The hotel is absolutely gorgeous. It is the nicest hotel I have stayed in, including the 5 diamond I've stayed in. I am currently blogging from their roof top lounge.

Once we got settled, we headed to the convention center and git checked in. We did lunch at Burgerville, which was awesome! I then reported for my volunteer shift on the loading dock. It was fun seeing all of the pretty yarn come in. I got to plot out my course of attack for when the hall opens.

Now, I'm finishing up my homework, for my 9am heels for toe up socks class.

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SDCC 2011: The rest of it

Ok, I was going to try and blog each day, but out just didn't happen. Partially, because my phone was usually dead as a doornail by the end of the day. Also, because I was constantly, moving and exhausted. So, here is a break down of Friday- Sunday.

Friday, I premiered my new steampunk costume. It went rather well. I managed to wear it for 7 hours, which is pretty good considering the corset and 3in heels. We wandered the exhibits hall some, working on the Doctor Who QR code scavenger hunt. Also Joe picked up a Bender (Futurama) print he had been wanting for years. We also worked the ANCEA/Sakura-Con booth and took donations for Peace Winds America.

Later we met up with one of Joe's former co-workers who had just moved to San Diego 2 weeks ago. She's already got a great tan and is really happy. We also had dinner with one of my Japanese guest contacts. It was this great Brazilian place. Fantastic good and drinks!

We were waiting outside the restarunt to say goodbye when a lady walked up to us and asked if we wanted to see a movie. We were all tired so we kindof shrugged and asked what it was. Turns out it was a pre-showing of Fright Night, including a pre-funk. We all agreed and were lead to this gorgeous Spanish style house. After convincing the bouncer that Alyx was indeed 31 and no that's not a fake ID, we were allowed into the bar area. The drinks were good, my glass of Svedka with a drop of cranberry juice was delicious! The inside of the house had been totally done up with a coffin in the corner and all kind of other vampire themed decorations. After a few minutes Colin Farrell and other members of the cast (sadly no David Tennant) showed up to introduce the movie.

Next we were given stainless steel water bottles that said holy water on them and lead down the street to a movie theater whet our phones and cameras were checked and we were given sweet 3d glasses in a coffin case, popcorn, candy and a drink. The theater was large and nice and had been booked just for this event. The movie itself was rather good, I love David Tennant and he was his usually crazy self. My friends who had seen the original said it was a really good omage. It got out around 1:30am and we all wandered back to the hotel and passed out.

I'm not smiling because we had been taking pictures for 10min

Saturday was Steampunk day at SDCC, so I wore my costume again, minutes the heels. I ran into one of my best friends from high school, Hector, who read also in costume. We went to the meetup together, which was a lot of fun. There was also a photo shoot at the Privateer Press booth in front of the War Machine statue. I then abandoned the costume for the day.


Joe and I wandered the exhibits hall, handing out Sakura-Con brocheures and looking for anything we missed. We met up later with the FUNimation crew for some drinks before an early night of packing.

Line for hall H

This morning (Sunday) we were up at 7am, so we could make it to the Doctor Who panel at 12:30. We got into line at a great time as right after we got there, it started filling quick and ended up across the street and down the block. We got into the hall right when it opened, which meant sitting through the Glee and Supernatural panels. Neither of which I really cared about. It was worth it though.



Matt and Karen are just as funny in person as they are on camera. They showed clips from the next half of the season, which have me wondering about a great many things. The show is just simply brilliant!

So, now I an waiting at.the airport to fly home. I have lots of laundry to do before Sock Summit and my homework for class.

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SDCC day 0 and 1

This has been a really good SDCC so far. Day 0, was initially a bit rough. There was trouble with the hoyUtel. First, their fax machine had been jammed for 18 hours and they didn't realize it and therefore didn't have our paperwork. So our check in was delayed an hour. Then, apparently SDCC collapsed the grid and we lost power in the hotel. I had to carry 40 pounds if flyers down 10 flights of stairs.

Once we got to the convention center, check in went well. We had to lug those flyers about a mile though. Setting up the Sakura-Con booth was pretty easy. It's pretty much booth in a box at this point. So, that left us plenty of time to stalk the exhibitors hall. I did some work for Sakura-Con while we were at it.

I managed to score a TARDIS bobblehead, 2 Doctor Who shirts, a my little pony and a Futurama plushie robot devil. After that, we got some room service and decided to call it a night.


Today, I decided to get into room 6A for the panel before the one I wanted to see. It was the Oh You Sexy Geek panel. It was about women in the world of nerdom and the self image of women. It was ok, Seth Green made an appearance even.

What I was there to see was the Putting the "epic" in Epic Fantasy panel. Patrick Rothfuss is one of my favorite new authors and he was on the panel along with Brent Sandersen (Wheel of Time), George R. Martin (Game of Thrones), Christopher Paolini (Inheritance Cycle) and others. It was literary masturbation, but I loved it. I also managed to get Patrick, George and Chris' autographs.

After that Alyx and I went into the exhibits hall to talk to some people and do some shopping. While she was checking out I was looking around and saw 2 guys hugging. One of them I realized was John Barrowman!!! For those of you who don't know who he is, he's Captain Jack from Doctor Who and Torchwood. We got a picture and a hug. So, my weekend can't be bad after that.

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Craftspolsion

Finished wrist cuffs

Lace Wrist cuffs blocking

So, leading up to SDCC and Sock Summit I have been doing a lot of crafting. For my steampunk costume, I had to cut all the fabric which Alyx kindly sewed. I had to cover my nuclear grade welding goggle in leather and brass studs and paint them. I finished knitting my lace cuffs and neck collar and had to decorate my felted hat. I even made myself a necklace. So, my house is an utter mess and there are bits and pieces of costume remnants everywhere!

The good news is, I think blogger droid is going to work great for posting from SDCC. I also got a new battery for my pedometer, so I can tell you guys how far I walked each day. It'll be fun! I hope you will enjoy my report.

goggles

Me Wearing the necklace I made

MIA aka What I do for a living

I've been meaning to post for weeks. I've even been meaning to write this post for weeks. Where does time go? So, my apologies to those out there who read my blog and to those who were disapointed I wasn't at AX this year.

You see, my job requires me to be on call ever so often. This year, it was my turn to do 4th of July. This holiday has a much more ominous ring when you work in the operating room of the level 1 trauma center for a 5 state radius. People are dumb, 'nuff said.

For those who have asked me what I do, you know I often give cagey answers. Such as I work in an operating room. If you really press me, I'll tell you I'm an Electro-Neurodiagnostic Tecnician, and hope you won't ask what that means. Why? My job is hard to explain. It's not terribly mainstream or out in the public eye. The UW system (Harborview, Children's an UW) has only 12 people who do my job.

So, here it is, what I do accordong to Wikipedia. I know, it sounds like a lot. Here is another one.

One might ask how I came to do this job. Well, this all goes back to when your parents told you to go to college because having a degree will get you a job. You see, I really wanted to be a vet. I got my BS is biology and went to Ross Veterinary school in the caribbean. I started vet school at the age of 20. Between personal and medical issues, I didn't finish. So, I needed something to do. After working some jobs I hated, my friend got me a job as a sleep tech. I will forever be indebted to Jenny for this. After 6 years, the sleep field got really boring, and there was a job in a related field open. So, that is the long and short of it.

For the weekend of the 4th, I.worked 40 hours of overtime, and got 13 hours of sleep. It was a bit crazy. I'll clean this up later as I am on the bus posting from my phone.

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