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You are Wonder Woman

Wonder Woman 75% Spider-Man 70% Supergirl 70% Green Lantern 60% Iron Man 55% Superman 50% Robin 45% The Flash 45% Batman 40% Hulk 40% Catwoman 35%

You are a beautiful princess with great strength of character.

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I figured out that I am probably allergic to Hawaii. This likely caused the evil ear infection. I remembered that I had one and only pollen allergy that tested super positive when I was tested years ago that I thought was really dumb because it was to a plant that wasn't common in the area I grew up in. Guess what? They are ALL OVER Hawaii. Well, just the "wet" sides of the islands. I probably hadn't ever been in contact with so many plants in that species before at one time. *sigh* I guess that I'll have to start on the Zyrtec a week ahead of time if I ever want to go back there.

I'm back from my trip to Hawaii, but I took a nasty ear infection home with me. The flight home was excruciating, and I've been to the point of being scarily temporarily hearing impaired. I can't smell anything sweet, and I can't taste anything spicy. I have been eating crazy heaping spoonfuls of hot sauce that I usually only need a dab of to taste but just taste like sweet red peppers to me now, because they still make my nose run and help clear the sinuses for some relief. I've been using a neti pot 3-4 times a day since I got home. I was getting a little better, but not better enough; I was able to get in to see the doctor today who gave me a Z-pack of antibiotics. Hoping to get some relief soon! Seriously, this is the worst ear infection that I've had since I had sinus surgery 15 years ago. *shakes fist*

While my inertial dampeners are still offline, you can look at my photos from the trip on Flickr.

I finished knitting a new sleeveless top last Friday and wore it Sunday to an alumni event at the Heard Museum. This was a quick and easy knit for me, which I needed after the labor on the Wonder Woman costume. The costume, which has now made the "featured" list on Craftster. The thread has been viewed over 20,000 times, putting it up on the second page of most viewed entries in completed knitting projects, which I think is pretty darn cool. I still haven't had anyone buy the pattern yet, though. I'm hoping that people will start thinking about their Halloween costumes at the end of August and start buying the pattern.

That would work out fine for me in the meanwhile, since I have a heap of stuff to do before going to Hawaii in a couple of days.

The Heard Museum was more interesting than I expected, BTW. I thought that it would be the usual ubiquitous Katchina dolls and blankets, but they had a lot of unusual things too, and a lot of work by contemporary artists. I have some photos up on Flickr.

We got up, got packed and ready to go, then headed out to meet Alice for breakfast at The Mission, a little restaurant in the North Park area of San Diego. N, Cz, & I had huge tasty plates of roast beef hash with rosemary potatoes and eggs. Alice had it without the meat. I was happy to get to see Alice again before we left town.

We were on the road just after noon, as we planned. I felt kind of worn out all of a sudden not far into the drive home, and I took N up on her offer to drive. She drove the rest of the way home. We didn’t stop for more than gas and snacks, so even after dropping off Czarina and Nikki at their respective homes and stopping in the use the bathroom, I was home before 6. Pretty spent from an exciting time at the Con, I was happy to have an extra day off to relax before going back to work.

Saturday morning, we had breakfast at the Sun Café. N took off after breakfast to get in line for the Lost panel. Cz and I looked around a craft gallery, then she decided that she’d had enough of the Con and wanted to go to Balboa Park instead. I considered going back to the hotel and getting back into costume for the Con, but felt that I’d had enough of that. I connected with Rich on the phone, and made plans to meet up with them.

We leisurely wandered and took photos, and I bought a couple of things. I tried to meet up with N for the Pushing Daisies panel in the afternoon, but she’d gotten in early and I missed the window of opportunity on another long line. I rushed back across the hall to join R & K for the Chuck panel. We wondered if we were even going to get in on that one, but there really weren’t any campers from the previous panel (BSG, I didn’t even venture a try in that line) so we had no problems getting a seat once they let us in. The actors joked around a lot, which made it enjoyable.

R & K decided to head back to Steve’s to relax before going to Gerry’s party that night, I was invited to go as well, but I wasn’t sure. Though I’d been to his condo with Steve last year to feed his cat, I hadn’t talked to Gerry in like 12 years, so I wasn’t sure if it was cool to just show up there.

I met up with N, she’d met up with some LJ friends were also in town for the Con, and I wandered around with them for a while. When we’d had enough, we called Cz to meet us at one of the other Indian places that we’d seen in the vicinity of our hotel. We had a nice dinner, N and I felt refreshed enough to check out that party. I called Gerry, who was totally welcoming after all those years, and got directions. Cz decided to stay at the hotel.

Man, the staff at the US Grant is so super nice. They printed out maps for us to get to the beach on Friday when I just asked for a little direction, and saw us with the inkling of going out and called to get the valet to pull the car around for us.

The drive to Gerry’s was shorter than expected, and surprisingly easy to find. It was pretty quiet at first. A lot of his friends were also at the Con, and stayed till closing. There was a lot of nice, nerdy Con talk going on. R & K got there a little later too, and it was good to be able to spend a little more time with them before we headed our separate ways home the next day.

*Oy, time is slipping away here! It has been super busy at work trying to get things taken care of between trips! So I will try to get to the highlights here…*

Cz and I had a luxurious breakfast of French toast with caramelized bananas and mixed berries delivered to the room Friday morning. N restrained herself and ate some bagels she’d brought. Getting into our costumes took Cz and I extra time getting everything in place, so we left for the Con a bit later than the day before. I was in my Knit Wonder Woman outfit, and Cz dressed in her own sewn Sailor Mars costume. We shared an elevator with Samuel L. Jackson, which was pretty exciting. He greeted us with a “Good Morning”, which N returned, but I just grinned stupidly at him, standing there in my Wonder Woman getup. Cz didn’t even notice who it was until N and I got giggly exiting the hotel!

The photography started on street, before we even got to the Con. Photographs of me and Cz, that is. We were going to make our way across the floor, walking the isles, looking at the wares, but we were stopped every few feet by folks wanting to take photos. We made it as far as the Dumbrella booth, where I dorkily showed off my outfit to Rich Stevens and was a big fangirl to Wil Wheaton. While still at Dumbrella, I got a call from Alice Bag that she and Sophia had arrived at the Con, so we hung out while they found us. I was getting a lot of paparazzi-like attention, so we didn’t get much further along before we stopped for lunch. I’m afraid that I’m really not cut out for celebrity because it really annoyed me that people were taking drive-by photos of me while I was eating. Let me take a break, people!

I was on my way to meet up with N, Cz, Rich & Kate to wait in line for the American Dad/Family Guy panels, when a group of men with a microphone and a video camera stopped me. They were from the Tonight Show, and asked me if I would be willing to be a special correspondent! How often do you get a chance to do that? I figured that it was worth being late for that. They wanted me to grab some random people and use my “lasso of truth” to interview them. I have no idea when or if the segment will air. I’m sure that they filmed a bunch and pill pick out the funniest ones later. I don’t think that mine was particularly funny, the people that I interviewed didn’t say anything hilarious or embarrassing. It was a fun thing to do anyway.

The line for the panel went outside and around the building. With little hope of getting in, we decided to bail. N, Cz, and I called it a day at the Con and took the shuttle back to the hotel. N & Cz took the bus to the beach, while I relaxed in the room for a couple of hours. We tried to hook up with Steve and Kristen for dinner, but that didn’t work out. Rich and Kate picked me up at the hotel and we drove to meet up with N & Cz for dinner by the beach. We had dinner at a little Mexican joint followed by ice cream at a little local shop.

Without an alarm clock set, we took orderly turns in the bathroom fairly early-ish in the morning before walking down to the Con. We stopped for breakfast along the way at the Cheese Shop. I thought that we’d be taking the shuttle, but we found on Wednesday that it was an easy and pleasant walk to the convention center from the US Grant.

At 10am, the three of us went to the “Click & Clack’s As the Wrench Turns” panel about the new animated PBS show about the Car Talk guys on NPR. Afterward, we wandered the Con, meetion up with Rich and Kate. They joined us for the Dumbrella panel at 2:30pm. Rich Stevens was a funny host, and MC Frontalot closed out the hour with a special nerdcore rap for the occasion. My friend Steve and his girlfriend, Kristen, were waiting for us outside the Dumbrella panel. We wandered around some more, and there were more people in costumes for me to photograph than the night before.

The 3 of us parted ways with the gang to go to the "Spike: Scream Like a Girl" panel. It was touted as: "Spike loves women. And the coolest women on the planet are the ones who destroy aliens, defeat serial killers and battle evil villains with their superpowers!" It was hosted by Kevin Smith, and we figured that any other panel he was in would be swamped. There was some really nutty banter with Lucy Lawless, to the point that we started to suspect that she might be drunk. She was saying some kooky stuff, I tell ya. But, maybe those Comic-Con crowds have a heady affect on some. Before we left the Con for the evening, Czarina bought a hot-lookin’ corset. Maybe those heady affects spread to us too?

Wiped out from the day’s activities, we were happy to settle in at one of the plethora of Indian restaurants we pass on the way back to the hotel for a tasty meal. Czarina was happy to find an unusual okra dish on the menu that she enjoyed.

(I’d better make this quick before I forget, but it has been crazy busy at work since I got back. I’ll steal a few moments here and there to get some content here.)

We met up with Rich earthdog and Kate explosivegreen at his friend Jim’s booth, then set out to cruise the convention floor. We made a bee-line for the Dumbrella booth, where we had a fun time chatting up Rich Stevens. The place was pretty crazy with people, I don’t think that my travel companions, Nikki and Czarina, were quite prepared for the size and scope of the thing. Some people were dressed in costumes in the crowd, but not a lot.

After Preview Night, Nikki, Rich, Kate, and I (Czarina went back to the hotel) walked to a nearby Mexican place where Rich and Kate had some dinner. Nikki and I just had drinks. It was nice to spend some time with Rich and to get to know Kate better. They live in San Jose, so I don’t get to see them often enough.

It was a long day, but an exciting one. We wound down back at the room and chatted a bit before going to sleep on some soft, high thread count sheets.

Wednesday morning, I got a little bit of a later start than I wanted to in picking up the gals, but still managed to make my desired 8am mark heading west out of Phoenix. There was a slow patch at the edge of town around an accident, but the rest of the drive was pretty smooth. We stopped in El Centro at the nicely decorated Exotic Thai for a tasty lunch. Though we arrived in San Diego around 2:30, the street was temporarily closed by our hotel, so we had to waste a bit of time until the road cleared. I drove down by the convention center, were we could see people already lining up to get their badges.

We took a few minutes to freshen up in our lovely hotel room, and then headed back out on foot to the convention center. It was wonderful to be out in the mild weather, walking around the kind of city that has the kind of cultural density that was made for walking around in; streets lined with shops, bars, and restaurants. The line for badges moved quickly, and we found ourselves back out in front of the convention center at 4pm with some spare time until the Con opened at 6. Rich and Kate were inside helping a friend set up their booth. The three of us headed back into the gaslamp, ending up at The Whiskey Girl for a couple of $3 pints and 1/2 priced appetizers.

I just got home from San Diego, but I'll be heading back out in less than 2 weeks to Kona, Hawaii!

This last-minute fling coalesced today as Myrna was telling me that she had rented two condos in Kona, but her husband, his son, and his mother were no longer going, so it would be just her and her sister (the same one we met up with in Mexico). She said that the rooms were already paid for, that I should go with them if I could get a flight....I wondered if I could even get time off again so soon! I started the conversation with my boss, "You're going to think this is totally crazy, but...." He said that as long as I going get a certain project set before I go that it was fine with him! Hooray! Next, I had to find a reasonable flight at the last minute. I found that if I went home a day earlier than Myrna, I could use frequent flyer miles, the flight only costing $85 in fees. Sweet! I think that I can afford food, share of the rental car, and taxis to and from the airport. I've never been to Hawaii, so I am super excited!

PS: I'll post about San Diego soon!

I got it together and set up the spreadsheet for the custom bodysuit pattern for my Wonder Woman costume and posted to Etsy for sale:

chriswass.etsy.com

I took my friends' advice and posted notes on the bodysuit construction on Craftster, and posted 3 sets of patterns for sale. One for just the bodysuit (in case people like other headband/wristband sets better, or are using other color combos for a different hero), another offers the accessories (headband, wristbands, and invisible jet tote), and the last has all patterns included at a lower cost than the others purchased separately. Whew! That was a lot to do.

Now, off to the Con!

I did manage to squeeze in some time this weekend to cobble together an invisible jet tote to wear with my Wonder Woman outfit at Comic-Con. It's just big enough for the essentials; cell, money, lip gloss, and a con guide.

Saturday night, I had a few people over for movies and pina coladas. BrienBear can only have liquids for 2 weeks while his Lap Band rights itself, and he was feeling bad about it, so I wanted to do something fun for him that he could participate in that he wouldn't feel deprived (like if we went to dinner and he couldn't eat anything). I think that it was a success. Well, at least the drinks were, everyone liked my mixing of the pina colada, but the movie was just ok. We watched Jabberwocky, an old Terry Gilliam film that none of us had seen before. Started out fun, but seemed to kind of drag on.

Sunday, I had two birthday gatherings, one for razz and the other for my dad's wife. This photo is of my first try at making gluten-free cake since my dad found out he couldn't have wheat anymore. It was a little dense but not bad. I put junglemonkee's blackberry preserves between the layers, home made vanilla buttercream, fresh mint, and marzipan fruit on top. It was well received. I was lame and didn't make anything for razz's party, but a lot of other people did, so there was plenty of food to be had. She even sent me home with leftovers - her cake was yummy for breakfast today!

Friday afternoon, I was at my desk, on my computer, setting up an Etsy seller account when I suddenly had glass shards all over me. Something had slid off the top shelf of my desk and crashed through the glass of my desk top, sending little bits of glass everywhere. I was just wearing a tank top and underwear, so I have little cuts all over my arms, legs, and stomach from the glass. I am ok now, but they stung for a few hours. I don't know if I should consider that a bad omen or not.

I started cleanup on Saturday before people came over for movie watching, but thought that it was more important to clean the rest of the kitchen and the living room, so there is still some hard to reach glass left at the edges of the desk; some bigger pieces that I need to pick up before I can try to vacuum. Ugh, sucks up valuable time that I need for travel prep! I did try to make some lemonade out of my lemons and recycled some of the remnants as landscape glass around my fairy duster bush in the back yard. More pics on flickr.

I've been super restless this week. It will be nice to have the day off tomorrow, but I have a lot to do over the weekend, so I won't really get any extra rest. Lots of errands to be run, last minute stuff and getting packed for Comic-Con, and social obligations. Eh, I shouldn't complain! I just need a good night's sleep to feel better. Hopefully, I can get one soon!

I am really hooked on this tune from Flight of the Conchords, ( clicky to get to the video. )

I made this LOLCAT from a camera phone message Myrna sent me. She stuck at home after having some dental surgery.


moar funny pictures

I broke it off with Nate on Friday. I don't want to talk about it anymore because it makes me angry. On Saturday, I made a shop apron out of the ratty jeans that he left at my house and the remnants of a pair of my skinny jeans that I'd sacrificed for his party costume last week. I actually really needed a shop apron for glass class, since I don't have time to go home and change after work before class and I don't want to risk burning my work clothes when shards of hot glass go a-flying on occasion. I tried looking for a BBQ apron at Target on Thursday, but they were switching their stock over to "Back to School". Lowe's didn't have one either, nor any welding aprons. The aprons at Michael's don't have enough coverage. So, now I am set for apron-age.

I am having a really hard time concentrating at work this week. I'm also really dragging this afternoon. Allergies have been wicked bad since that wild fire on the west side of town last week. I think that there is still crud in the air. I'm taking Zyrtec, but that's just keeping the irritation down enough so I don't dig my ears and eyes out, but they are still irritated. It also seems to be a bit humid. which makes me a little uncomfortable. There is also some sort of grating faint beeping from a construction-type thing going on across the street that is more annoying than usual today, but I was able to put music on because my boss is out of the office. And, I'm having some issues with the dude that are causing me not to sleep so well. So, it's not any one thing, but a cumulative thing that is causing my lack of attention span and energy today.

Things to be thankful for: The boss that I share an office with is out of town until the 14th and I have a 4-day weekend starting tomorrow.

I forgot to mention in my previous post that Ginger stopped by my glass class last night, which was really neat! She was on her way out from a meditation class upstairs in the same building, and spotted me through the window. I haven't seen her and Ian since the Winter Festival of Pie! It was nice to catch up a bit.

( Here's a silly LOLcat test for those that are amused by such things: )