収束ゾーンでのライフ: Life in the Convergence Zone

The Raptor has this huge cargo area in two-seater mode, larger than that of all but the largest SUVs. It’s also got a three-seat mode, which might actually be useful, as well as four and five (if one person is small) modes. Three-seat mode will be particularly useful for Leannan Sidhe gigs, since that’s usually a three-person band, and we’ll still have quite decent room for cargo in that configuration.

The vehicle comes with a cargo-area tray for all-seats configuration (again, in theory five, really four adults), but you can’t even buy something specifically made for two-seat mode. Even most universal cargo-area liners simply aren’t big enough, which is hilarious – all these SUV toys being too small for my Honda Fit Raptor, lol – but I found a one that was, and stared modifying it.

Pictures below the break…

Read the rest of this entry »

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
Bandcamp (full album streaming) | Videos | iTunes | Amazon | CD Baby

Some photos from Clallam Bay! More are on my Flickr photostream, as usual. Plus, they’re larger, which is really good with some of the panoramas.

Come enjoy a ferry ride! Kingston-Edmonds, of course. I like Kingston quite a bit. Edmonds, too. The downtown is a lot like White Rock, even if I can’t entirely say why. Reminds me of a BC town. Which is fitting, given that it used to have a Vancouver ferry.

Small towns on the peninsula are still kind of a lot of 1959. I present you with The Bay TV Phones Motel. I’m told it used to be the Bay Free HBO Motel back in the 80s; I like the current name better, it flows nicely. But honestly, I edited out reflections of other modern cars, but otherwise? Welcome to 1959:

Fireworks was the first order of the show. I didn’t take pics of those, but here’s Shanti of Leannan Sidhe and … Linden, I think? From Project Wonderful, hanging out with pretty much the rest of town for three hours of legal and not-entirely-legal fireworks.

I didn’t take any photos during the actual convention, mostly because I was too busy! But I did get in a nice beach hike, so you’ll get photos of these. There are several more good ones on my Flickr photostream, as before, but here are some highlights.

Let’s Go Beachcombing!

Acres of Not Clams
Shanti told me what they are called but I keep forgetting. I’m bad at nouns.

Panorama of Not Clams

I’ve tried to get out to the site of the old lighthouse every year, but I’ve never made it. To get there without at least wading, you have to be there at very low tide. This year, the timing worked out perfectly.

The Abandoned Approach
(Again, lots more ruins photography on Flickr.)

Standing on the Foundation Pilings

Tide had already started to turn, and there’s no way back without swimming once tide rises much, so we headed back right away. As the sun started to set, the clouds moved in just so to make the sunset look like a binary star system.

All those pointy bits that look like rain are the not-clams you can see in the acres of not clams photos above. Tide wasn’t taking its time.

We found a bunch of really cool random things on the beach. I only posted pictures of a couple (some didn’t come out). While I didn’t keep it – I don’t tend to be much for keeping objects – I loved the deep blue of this shell:

Oh So Blue

Next year’s Comicon has already been announced, with an official convention hotel and everything. Looks like people want to make this thing succeed. I hope it works out, it’s a lovely place to spend a hot summer weekend – even if the Clallam Bay Inn no longer serves the most excellent waffle fries. (They went to wedges! They’re still good, but not that kind of good.) But I still got my cooked-fish fix, the bay is still gorgeous, and the fireworks are still insane. The important things endure. ^_^

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
Bandcamp (full album streaming) | Videos | iTunes | Amazon | CD Baby

I’ll post about GAMCON tomorrow – it was a lot of fun, thanks for everyone who came! – but today, it’s the photos from the trip back from Greenland. Large versions on Flickr, as usual.

If we did a live album of these shows, or, for that matter, of all this whole tour? This would be the album cover. Totally the cover.

Taking the High Road

Yep, it’s a desert – all these were taken from the car on the way north and west.

Westward, Ho!

I took a lot of mountain pictures, but they were all from windows and only a couple came out. But they aren’t bad:

Desert Range

Desert Range 2

Getting a decent lens flare on a phone camera isn’t easy! I didn’t even do it on purpose, it just worked out that way. I thought it was worth posting for that alone:

Arc of a Driver

I wasn’t sure whether to I took a few of these as the sun set; the colours at the edges were really interesting:

Approaching Wormhole – Confirm Destination Vector

We saw a lot of these little white plumes along fences – it wasn’t smoke, it was just some sort of vapour rise at sunset. But that’s not poetic, so I called it…

Ghosts Dancing

Yes, I was taking panoramas from a moving car. The amazing thing is that some of them actually worked!

High Tension in the Distance

I brought up the lows a bit in this shot, because it was too dark, but it’s still just dark enough to call it…

The Dark of Sunset

The sharp edges of the mountains here are so stark. I imagine trying to climb them.

The Range and Road Go On and On

But then the rendering engine decided it couldn’t keep up. Clearly I need to upgrade reality’s graphics card. Or maybe I just need a new driver. I haven’t had time to be sure.

Texture Glitch

These came out really well for being shot through a bug-splattered windshield.

Down to the River (1)

Down to the River (2)

And finally, before darkness set too far in to shoot.

Moonrise over the Desert Sunset

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
Bandcamp (full album streaming) | Videos | iTunes | Amazon | CD Baby

HI CASCADIA I HAVE SHOWS

I’m also swamped to the gills with Day Jobbe work. I worked all weekend, I’ll be working all week, it’s going to be insane. THAT SAID: I HAVE SHOWS.

• June 28-29, 2014: Guest appearance with Leannan Sidhe, Greenwood Renfaire, Richland, Washington.
• July 5, 2014: GAMCON 2014, The Kitsap Convention Centre, Bremerton, Washington.
• July 13-14, 2014: Clallam Bay Comicon, Clallam Bay, Washington. Double-bill with Leannan Sidhe.

The difference between Greenwood and Clallam Bay is that in Greenwood, I’m playing as part of the Leannan Sidhe touring band; at Comicon, Shanti will be part of my band. And also then I’ll be part of her band for her set. lol transforming bands. XD

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
Bandcamp (full album streaming) | Videos | iTunes | Amazon | CD Baby

It’s another picspam post! Yay! As always, much larger versions are over on my Flickr feed – the panoramas in particular are good to view larger.

It’s been a couple of years since I had any dates in Oregon, so I jumped on the chance to play with Leannan Sidhe again. Shanti’s good about letting people play a couple of their songs, which means you can sell some CDs, and all around it tends to be fun. As it was!

We met up at King Street Station and took the train south. This is the first time I’ve been in the new higher-capacity Cascadia Rail cars. They’re nice enough – the chairs are a new thinner type, which lets them add a new row without sacrificing person space – but they’re now a 50/50 orientation split, and I don’t like that.

Too Much Backwards

The new dining car style itself is fine, but the serving car has lost its booth, and I miss it. On the other hand, they have speed trackers in the cars, and the outlets are easier to reach, and there are other nice parts as well.

Vancouver the South has a train station too! It’s smaller than Vancouver of the North’s, but tidy and attractive.

And a bit hard to shoot, even in panorama

Shanti’s mom picked us up there, to take us down to Newport. They’d been wanting to get together for Mother’s Day anyway, so that worked out well. I’m afraid I don’t have a good picture, which makes me feel bad. But here, welcome to rural Oregon:

Really Quite Lovely

We kept stopping to take countryside pictures, since the next show wasn’t until 12:30 the next day. I’d brought both my phone and my old Canon G9; it’s kind of telling how far digital technology has progressed that most of these are from the phone. Still, there’s some thing the phone can’t do that the G9 can.

Once we reached 101, the Coast Highway, the cameras really started coming out, in between cloudbursts, which we kept seeing. As it turned out, we were probably wise to get a hotel the first night – tho’ we could’ve camped the second, as the weather turned fair.

Hey, That Island Looks Like a Submarine!

No, really, it really looks like a submarine

Oh Look, it’s Commander Crane

The light was all over the place as the clouds whipped around – bright sun, dark clouds, changing at little or no notice. This makes for excellent photography if you can keep your kit dry. This one really needs to be seen on Flickr tho’.

The Sandy Beach.

Shanti’s not popping her hood up; she’s trying to keep it on her head. #windy

We stopped at a couple of particularly rocky beach areas for sunset. All of these photos come from those stops. I have video of the waves in the bay, but I don’t really have a good place to put them. I really should make an account at the appropriate services, I suppose, but who has time?

Big Beach Sky

Big Beach Bay

Sunset

Heathcliff, Is That Your Hotel?

Waterfall Into Ocean

Sploosh

Once the sun went down, we made pretty good time, snacked in the hotel room and headed pretty straight to unpacking and bed. But I took a picture to tweet successful arrival, so here that is:

Who is the Comfiest of them All?

Tomorrow, some pictures from the fair!

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
Bandcamp (full album streaming) | Videos | iTunes | Amazon | CD Baby

I’ll be guesting with Leannan Sidhe in May and June, in Oregon and on the Washington dry side. In Oregon in particular we’ll actually just be a duo, which is kind of taking it to extremes, but nobody else in the band is available(!) due to Many Reasons.

Which means doing the little things, like wrapping some picks in fabric so my zouk loses a lot of the high-end harmonics and sounds superficially more like a guitar. I tried felt picks, but they just didn’t feel right, or sound the same. So it’s DIY, ahoy:

Double-sided Tape Solves Many Problems

Wrap in double-sided tape, then fabric, then trim with scissors. Doesn’t actually take long. I’ve used these with Leannan Sidhe before, but not in a while, because normally her guitarists are actually around, and then I don’t need them.

Got some decent mandolin recording last night, on Some for a Free Court/Anarchy Now. Also had some interesting discussion with Anna, whose books these are (and who has a new book out now, by the way) about future timelines and worldbuilding.

I love being on this side of the spoiler wall. This – all of it? It’s gonna be good. :D

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
Bandcamp (full album streaming) | Videos | iTunes | Amazon | CD Baby

So, right, where was I? Oh right, VCON!

Same Con Same Badge Same Picture

Saturday morning, I popped up early for more kaiju programming – this time on monster anatomy and alternate worlds. But being a bit sleepier than I’d expected, I arrived a bit late – still, the pieces I saw were fun. Then the songwriting workshop, which I mentioned previously, rehearsal for the show, a very late lunch/early dinner and some hanging out, then off to set up for the show!

The Supervillain Origin Story set seemed to go over well; my goal is to get you on the supervillain’s side here, and while it’s still missing one part of the story, I think it’s starting to jell. A lot of people were nodding where I want them to during the Rant Segment, which is definitively a good sign.

There may be an unofficial/ninja performance of this at GeekGirlCon, by the way. Just sayin’.

Then I did a second mini-set, this one all piratey! And I have to say, it is so nice to be doing “Last Saskatchewan Pirate” where people both know and do the callbacks. I encouraged them starting the song, and when hitting that first chorus and having the crowd shout back the response lines? That felt nice. You guys were great.

For encore I did an a cappella – because I don’t have chords yet – of “You Can’t Get a Good Kamikaze in Vancouver.” I know I have at least some video and some audio, so we’ll look at how that goes – and thank you so much, VCON Tech Crew, for setting up my camera for me. That was awesome of you.

Then! Con suite and room parties and hangouts and all the rest. The only downside of the con suite this year was that they ran out of cider crazy early, and I ended up indulging in the dubious pleasure of a fake highball made of Canadian Club and Diet Pepsi, emphasis on dubious and fake.

Needless to say, a kamikaze was out of the question. XD

Sunday! Up at a leisurely pace to hit the art show, finally, where I bought this:

Art Lamp

Once again, the art show? Lots of 3D, an awfully good standard of work, most of it more F&SF-y than the lamp above (including most of the other lamps by the same artist). Honestly, it’s the best art show I see at a convention.

“What is Filk?”, my noon panel, saw only slightly more audience than panelists actually kind of stay on topic and get reasonably educational. Then a quick bite and a run down to my personal VCON highlight every year: the Turkey Readings.

Now, you have to understand what this is: it’s “straight” readings of terrible fiction, acted out by members of the audience, with other members of the audience bidding to stop or continue the action. ALL BIDS MUST BE PAID; it’s a fundraiser for the Canadian Unity Fan Fund, which pays to fly fans across the continent to opposite-side conventions.

And that’s all nice, but the best part is the terrible, terrible acting (I’m becoming a regular!) and the terrible, terrible pain. Perry Rhodan books are on the literate end of the scale here, people. It is not a pretty sight.

But it is hilarious.

Anyway, then! Closing ceremonies and the dead dog party. VCON knows how to throw a proper dead dog, I have to tell you. I started to fade around 2am but then people got out instruments in one room and a few of us did some serious jamming until 3:30 when I finally called it a convention. (They really liked my treatment of SJ Tucker’s “Come to the Labyrinth.” Quite different to hers, her fans who’ve heard me do it call it the Led Zeppelin version, even acoustic. Fair cop.) They also sell pre-reg for next year, and I got that sorted out.

After that, it was all sleeping late and Vancouver errands and a really excellent lunch with friends (Hi Geri! Hi Kate! Hi Angela! Hi Lara!) and acquisition of bagels and cider. The pleasant trip home was marred only by another terrible interaction with American customs – I think the last trip where I had to travel by car being unexpectedly pleasant, I had been lulled into a false sense of security; this was a bracing reminder that no, they are just awful – that at least had the benefit of being relatively brief.

Next year’s VCON will also be Canvention! Given that this VCON was of unusual size by itself – my badge had a four-digit number and I’ve never seen that before – next year should be quite the event. They’re changing hotels (again…) for it, which is a shame, because as I told one of the VCON concom at the dead dog: this hotel’s layout is confusing. I like it! Because despite it being confusing the social flow worked really well.

And that counts for a lot.

Next up: GeekGirlCon! And a ninja show! But you didn’t hear that from me – you’ll hear it from me next week. :D

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
Bandcamp (full album streaming) | Videos | iTunes | Amazon | CD Baby

Clallam Bay Comicon! Otherwise known as a rather large party at Donna’s house The Lion’s Club. It’s a tiny event, but this year they had a venue and everything! But they’re still trying to figure out what they can do – the dream is to have a whole fleet of these things out in tiny Olympic Peninsula towns, maybe even on the same days, so you can have kind of a tour-the-peninsula-via-comic-conventions event.

Anyway, there were probably twice as many exhibitors as last year, plus we had panel programming. Next year, there’ll be more than one room, so the panels and exhibitor space won’t overlap. I did substantially better in sales than last year, to talk about business for a moment, but I think I’m the only one.

Donna Getting Ready for Opening Ceremonies on the Beach

Opening Ceremonies was more beachwalk than anything else. But it’s a gorgeous bay. Utterly lovely. I’ll throw more photos on the flickr stream later, but here are a couple:

Clallam Bay, East Side

Sunset, from behind the bridge

Then we went on a parade! We had a cosplay Scotsman playing flaming bagpipes on stilts. He won a ribbon.

I See You’ve Won First Prize!
(Niall actually did win first prize.)
(photo Angela Korra’ti)

The convention didn’t have a newsletter. I used to do the daily ‘zines at Norwescon for years, so I made one in the bar with a rubber stamp kit and some post-its.

Typesetting
(phone photo courtesy Donna Barr)

Electronic Edition, a.k.a. Typesetting is Difficult

The entire print run

There were, of course, panel presentations, and I did my concert. And if you’re looking for the PDF version of the Kitting Out Cheap – Building Gear on a Budget handout, click here; also, the series of articles I talked about on making your own podcasting or recording studio is here.

Introducing Cosplay to the Fishers

 

Supervillainy on a Microphone
(photo courtesy Angela Korra’ti)

I did a new thing called the Supervillain Origin Story set, just to see if they’d cope. And actually… they really did. I did much better in sales than last year, and I think that’s partly why. Also:

I HAVE A HEADSET MICROPHONE DO YOU SEE IT? OH MY GOD I CANNOT TELL YOU HOW MUCH I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS HEADSET MICROPHONE. HEADSET MICROPHONE WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE?! I grabbed it on the way out of town from a Guitar Centre on sale for $210 including transmitter/receiver and … I should’ve bought one of these two years ago. I’ve got pretty good mic discipline at this point – and even use distance/proximity effect on purpose sometime – but I’m a highly kinetic player and always, always felt constricted and tied down and weird. I’ve always been much better without a mic and this is exactly like being without a microphone except I have a microphone.

FUCK YEAH HEADSET MICROPHONE!

Anyway.

After things closed down for the day but before we went out for dinner we stopped back at our hotel room. I have never wanted to open an appliance door more than when I saw this:

Do Not Open

OH MY GOD MUST OPEN. MUST. OPEN. Anna had to put a towel on my head and feed me ice cream.

Then we went and hung out on the beach for the illegal fireworks. It’s seriously Ten Finger Johnny time on the beach out here, particularly for the two hours before the official big fireworks display on the south side of the bay in Sekiu.

One Point Five Limbed Johnny on the 14th of July…

I don’t have any photos of the official fireworks, but Sekiu put son a great display for Fun Days; just like last year, there were cruise ships lined up out on the Salish to watch from a boring safe distance. They have some seriously exotic fireworks and they launch them really high, and it’s just great.

Today, cleaning, and mending, and patching a few fire holes in the old battlesuit – the usual drill after Escapades. How was your weekend?

ps: I put up a few dozen photos of Harrison Hot Springs over on my Flickr account, which I keep forgetting to use. I’ll add more Clallam Bay photos there later, but I don’t want these lost in too huge an update.

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!

Home again for a few days, under the dome hanging out in environment suits as we test the new… yeah, no, Dr. Horrible taught us about not blogging things like that, right. We’re here ’till Thursday, then it’s back on the road again for a few. Harrison Hot Springs was pretty and relaxing, we played a lot, I met some musicians and we hung out Sunday night late and kicked it a bit.

Whup – I’d type more, but it’s time to throw the battlesuit into the dryer. Enjoy some picspam, or else. There will be a quiz. And by quiz, I mean interrogation. And by interrogation, I mean lasers.

We went to the mountains

We went to the beach
(Does it count as a selfie if it’s only your shins and feet?)

We visited some historic lairs – we actually reached the legendary Doctor SulFURY’s front door! It’s even still radioactive. I miss her.

We met some musicians
(I’m pretty sure this band is 2/3rds clones – their opposites are in Le Vent du Nord)

Anna’s keeping this one
(Thankfully supervillains ignore customs fees, or we couldn’t afford him)

We ate out a bit

Panda is delicious!

Visited our compatriots at the Laser Cutter Cafe
(and if those aren’t supervillains in streetclothes… well, let’s just say my ph33rdar is well-calibrated)

We had tea! And lasers! Just like it says on the tin. Or the wall.

They made a Jiji! These guys are awesome.

Those Amoeba Boys, I gotta tell you, they know how to rock a town. Vancouver will never recover.

Clallam Bay is up next. You’ll be there, if you know what’s good for you.

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!

Here we go – to the east, to the dry side. Six shows by Monday or bust! I’m going to try to get recordings entirely on battery; I make no promises. If you’re in Richland, we’ll be at the Greenwood Faire, listed as Leannan Sidhe; there are time schedules, tho’ I don’t have one handy.

Whatever I record, I must say, cannot be as awesome as this:

(It didn't embed for some reason, click and play)

…because it simply would not be musically or physically possible.

And we’re out. Zoom~!

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!