Here's more of the Dragon*Con 2010 story, including the parade on Saturday, panels on Sunday, and our hunt on Sunday evening.
( Read more... )
I'm going to post the Sunday and Monday recaps later.

Tags: costuming, dragon*con
Current Location: Atlanta

I was down in Atlanta last weekend for Dragon*Con 2010, a nationwide-scale sci-fi convention. It's about time that I finally post a recap of my trip down there.

( Read more... )
To be continued...

Tags: costuming, dragon*con
Current Location: Atlanta

There's sort of a meme on Facebook about where people were on 9/11, so I thought I'd chime in.

On September 11, I had just started a job at Kiehl Hendrickson Group, a small airline consulting firm. I was listening to Minnesota Public Radio in the shower, and they had cut into regular programming and gone into full coverage of the attacks. It took a while for the reality to sink in, even after I watched the video of the coverage on CNN. I drove into work, still listening to MPR, and I tried to do my work for the day. Still, everyone was talking about the attacks, and I went over to Paul's office frequently to listen to continued coverage. Eventually, we made the decision to close the office for the day since nobody was really able to concentrate on anything.

The airline industry, already in a slump, was severely hit by the attacks. I think that was part of the reason why we were acquired by Sabre about a year later. Then, a year after that, in September 2003, they decided to close the local office and attempt to move all the software developers to Dallas. That didn't go over well.

So, that's where I was on 9/11.

Wow. It's been seven months since I posted to LiveJournal. (On the other hand, I'm on Facebook and Twitter all the time, so I'm still getting my social networking in.)

I spent the entire long weekend, Thursday through Sunday, at CONvergence, the local sci-fi/fantasy convention. I had a great time there, and even though I didn't get to see everything there, I enjoyed pretty much everything I participated in.

The highlight was my Predator costume, which I spent over seven months on. I got the idea for building it from The Hunter's Lair, a forum I found while looking for some technical advice about mask making. I figured it would be an interesting challenge, and after a lot of hard work, I had a finished costume. I presented it in the Masquerade on Saturday evening, and won the Best Of Show award!

( Here's a day-by-day recap )

All things considered, it was a great convention. I'm not sure if I'll be able to top this year's Masquerade entry next year, but I have a couple ideas in the works.
Here's my whole set of pictures on Flickr.

Tags: convergence, costuming, cvg2010

Sheesh. I should update LiveJournal more than once a month. (Hey, but at least I'm updating Facebook and Twitter regularly.)

Anyway, I had a good Christmas holiday, although things were rather hectic. I had the Wednesday before Christmas off from work, so I went snowkiting on White Bear Lake that afternoon. I had some problems getting my lines tangled up, but after I got things sorted out, I had some good riding out on the lake. I was using my skiboards, which are about a meter long and about twice as wide as a regular ski -- sort of a cross between skis and snowboards. I was nicely powered on an 11 meter Slingshot T3. The only downside was that there were some bare spots with no snow covering the ice, making control a little dicey.

On Christmas Eve, I went to my parents' place for dinner. Mike, Nicole, and my nephew Liam were there as well. A little later in the evening, Santa came over to visit Liam. Liam introduced Santa to their new Siberian Husky, Akacia. Santa asked if Liam liked the snow, but he said, "No. It's too itchy." Santa knew that Liam had been a good boy, so he gave Liam some presents. Santa encouraged Liam to get plenty of rest, although he was a little too excited to get to sleep right away.

I went to the Christmas Eve vigil mass with my parents and my brother, while Nicole stayed home with Liam. I stayed there overnight, rather than driving back home and then back to my parents' place. I ended up sleeping on a mattress with a sleep number of about 3. Then, in the morning, I woke up when I heard Liam running around excitedly.

On Christmas morning, we opened up all the presents. I gave Liam several fun things, including a kid-sized digital camera and a snorkeling set (mask, snorkel, and fins). I got some cool stuff, including several books and a DVD about costume and mask making, two Wii games (Rabbids Go Home! and Active Life Extreme Challenge), and the first two seasons of the original Land of the Lost series. The biggest gift, though, was from Mike, Nicole, and me to our parents. We bought them a new Dell PC, since their old PC was becoming slow and really unreliable. I think the hard drive was close to failing on the old machine.

I ended up spending a majority of Christmas day setting up their new PC, installing software, and transferring files over. Unfortunately, that meant I didn't get as much time as I wanted to talk with the guests that we had over. Uncle Ed brought several pictures of his parents and relatives, so that was some interesting family history, but I ended up hearing almost none of it. Mike scanned the pictures into the computer -- but we had to use the old computer, since the old scanner doesn't work under Windows XP. We had the usual big turkey dinner with mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, and about 300 side dishes and 18 kinds of pie. (OK, I'm exaggerating a bit.)

I didn't do a heck of a lot on Saturday, since I decided I needed some down time. I spent a big chunk of the day working on the mask that I'm making for the Predator costume.

On Sunday, I went kiteboarding again at White Bear Lake, this time starting from the east side of the lake. There were several other people there, including four people who I had met in South Padre Island last month. Unfortunately, the wind just wasn't cooperating. I spent a lot of time screwing around trying to get my big kite launched. As soon as I got it launched, I'd get to fly it for a little bit and move a little bit, but if I got the kite too far to one side of the wind window, it flopped to the ice and I had to relaunch it again. The other snowkiters out there were having the same lack of wind, so we ended up standing around and talking until the wind came up again -- which was just about time for me to leave.

Anyway, now I'm caught up with LiveJournal. Whee.

Tags: family, holidays, kiteboarding
Current Music: Nik Kershaw - Wouldn't It Be Good

There's been sort of a meme going around on Facebook where people post one thing each day that they're thankful for. Actually, I haven't participated in that, but I do have several things to be thankful for, so I'll put them in one list.

I'm thankful that I have a good job, despite all the other things that have been going on in this economy. And, I'm thankful that I get to live a comfortable lifestyle. I don't need the largest house, the most expensive car, or all the sorts of things that people like to show off. (A guy named "Not An Alt" in this thread on Fark was bragging yesterday about how he makes lots of money as a manager, even though he's a tyrannical boss and he'll fire people at the drop of a hat. I don't want to live either as a money-grubbing tyrannical manager or a miserable underling who works for someone like that.)

I'm also thankful for all the adventure sports I've been able to pursue, like scuba diving, snowboarding, mountain biking, inline skating, and now kiteboarding. I'm happy that I'm now reasonably proficient at kiteboarding -- I can get up and ride, and do some nice sustained riding now. And, of course, I'm thankful for being able to go on vacation to enjoy these things.

I'm thankful for my good health. I'm also thankful that my family is doing well and is in good health.

I'm thankful for being so close to my family. My nephew Liam is always happy to see me when I come over for dinner. He loves to play ball out on the front porch, or play in my Jeep and pretend like we're driving to Seattle or San Diego.

I'm thankful for having good friends. You guys rock.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Tags: family, thanksgiving
Current Location: home

I just got back yesterday afternoon from a week-long trip to South Padre Island for some kiteboarding. I had a really good time down there, and I made a lot of progress with my kiteboarding skills.

The trip was organized by Lakawa, a local kiteboarding school. I flew into Harlingen on Sunday, the 8th, and met up with the rest of the group who had been down there a few days already. We headed out to the North Flats, on the bay side of the island, and set up to do some riding. At that point, I was able to do some water starts and do some riding, but I wasn't able to do any real sustained riding because I wasn't too confident with my technique. Nonetheless, I had a good session on Sunday and I got some riding in.

On Monday, I took a lesson with an instructor from Air Padre Kiteboarding. I specifically wanted to learn more about making clean water starts and being able to get some sustained riding in. My instructor showed me what I wanted to know and helped me get some practice. At the end of the lesson, I was able to get some sustained riding in, mainly because I was able to figure out some things about positioning my feet on the board. Everything just "clicked" for me in that lesson.

I went out with the group on Tuesday, but for some reason I wasn't quite as dialed-in as I had been on Monday. I'm not sure what happened, although it didn't help that the wind died out around mid-afternoon. I still hadn't mastered everything about staying upwind yet, so I kept ending up downwind from where I had started. This meant I had to do the "walk of shame" back from the fishing piers south of the convention center. Wednesday's kiteboarding session went better, although the wind wasn't really up that much. I used my larger Cabrinha Crossbow kite, a 16 square meter monster. It worked well up until the point where I bumped the chicken loop quick-release knob with my board. It's a safety feature that's essential if I need to disconnect myself from the kite, but at that point I was just trying to get the board back onto my feet -- I wasn't trying to escape a problematic situation. After the chicken loop quick-released, I had to retrieve the control bad with the other three lines still attached, and then wind the whole thing up and walk back to shore. Luckily, the bay side is only waist-deep, so I was able to walk back in.

On Thursday, we didn't have much wind at all. We mostly took it easy during the day. In the afternoon, some of us went out to the Gulf side, just east of the hotel. The waves on the ocean looked better earlier in the morning, but by early afternoon they had settled down considerably. A few of the guys had surfboards meant for kiteboarding, so they tried surfing on them, but they couldn't get up and ride. I bought a cheap foam body board from one of the local beach shops and tried to bodysurf on that, but I didn't get anywhere either. Nevertheless, we had fun out there.

Friday brought better wind. I rented a larger board, a Spleene Door (so-called because it's really big). The other guys I was riding with recommended the Door because it's large enough to help someone get up and ride in a lighter wind. The bigger fins, all located heelside on the board, make it easier to keep the board tracking in one direction. The guys in the group dropped me off at the South Flats, along with Aga, another kiteboarder who's pretty new to kiteboarding. The wind was blowing from the south, so they figured that we'd start downwind and eventually end up at the North Flats. As soon as I got the Door on my feet and started riding, I knew I had made the right choice to rent it. I was able to get up and ride with hardly any trouble, and I was finally able to stay upwind. Moreover, I was able to ride in both directions, and I was able to ride for quite a while without crashing. I hung out around the South Flats for a bit, then traversed downwind to the North Flats to meet up with the group. It was an epic session -- probably the best day of kiteboarding I've ever had. I was even able to ride in the middle of the main group of other riders without having to worry about crashing into anyone. I felt like a real kiteboarder at last.

I kept the board for Saturday's session and flew the Cabrinha Crossbow. Again, I got in a lot of excellent riding, and all of my skills had just clicked. Unfortunately, I ended up hitting the chicken loop quick release AGAIN, jettisoning the kite. I had it on the safety leash, but at some point when I was fiddling around with it, the safety leash disconnected as well. At that point, I had a real problem. Fortunately, an instructor from South Padre Island Kiteboarding was around with a Jetski, so he retrieved my kite, folded it up, and brought me back to shore. I thanked him profusely. (I wanted to stop at the store and leave him a tip, but unfortunately the store was closed by the time we got there.) By that time, the wind had picked up, and since I didn't want to deal with the Cabrinha any more, I pumped up the Slingshot T3 11 meter kite and went out to ride that. Unfortunately, a little while later, I crashed the kite and ended up getting the lines tangled around the bar floats, so I had to drag the whole mess back into shore to fix it. That was the cue for the wind to die completely.

Nevertheless, since I had such a great time with the larger Spleene Door board, I returned it to the shop and told them that I wanted to keep it. The shop's owner showed me a fairly similar board, although with a different flex pattern (and a cheaper price tag) than what I had rented. I ended up buying it, so now I'll have a nice big board for those days in Minnesota when the wind is rather light.

I had a great time down there, and I really made a lot of progress with my kiteboarding skills. I don't know if I'll be able to get any more kiteboarding on the water in Minnesota before the lakes freeze, but the snowkiting season isn't too far behind.

Tags: kiteboarding, travel
Current Music: Magazine - A Song from Under the Floorboards

My first job was delivering the Minneapolis Star, the former afternoon paper in Minneapolis. That was back in the days when they still hired kids to deliver papers as an after-school job. I had a fairly small route, with about 25 customers or so, so it wasn't strenuous or anything like that. I got pretty good tips, mainly because I provided good service. I even got profiled in a little "Meet a Junior Business Leader" ad that they put in the paper to recruit new carriers.

I started delivering papers when I was in sixth grade, about age 12, and I quit that route when I got a job at the Robbinsdale School District programming educational software on PET and Commodore-64 computers. That was when I was in 10th grade, right about the time I turned 16. By that time, the afternoon paper had merged with the morning paper, making it the Star Tribune, and I only had a weekend route. And, actually, I could have kept the paper route at the same time I did the programming job, since the school district job was after school Monday through Friday, but I decided I didn't need to keep getting up at 4 AM and delivering papers in the cold weather.

Later, I'll tell all about my second job at the microcomputer project, where we had all sorts of hijinks like "It's goofing off time!"

Tags: writer's block
Current Location: home
Current Music: Pink Floyd - Pigs (Three Different Ones)

All I seem to post about any more is kiteboarding. I never got around to mentioning that I had a nice mountain bike ride at Theodore Wirth last Sunday.

That said, I went kiteboarding this evening at Lake Waconia, just west of work. It was my first time using a larger kite -- a 16 meter Cabrinha Crossbow that I bought used from another kiteboarder. I wasn't really sure how well it would handle, since I didn't get enough of a real opportunity to fly it when I test-flew it, but it worked out just fine. It handles fairly similarly to my 11m Slingshot T3, but it's slower since it's bigger.

I'm definitely making progress on my board starts, and I'm able to get some sustained riding in now. One thing I need to resist, though, is the tendency to grab the control bar and yank it in like it provides power. It doesn't -- in fact, in many circumstances, it just chokes it off. Nothing really disastrous happened as a result of that bad habit, though -- I just stopped riding and sank back into the water. As I worked on that, I was also working on my footwork and trying to stay up on the board in a good riding position, thanks to some tips from the guys who did the Progression kite videos. Still, I ended up downwind from where I started. I expected that, and I was expecting that I'd have to walk back along the shoreline.

Unfortunately, just before I ended up running out of room near the beach on the east side of the lake, I ended up spilling over and lost the board. I was close enough to the swimming beach that I figured I could put the kite on shore, then swim out to get the board. Or, if nothing else, someone would pick up the board and call me, since I wrote my phone number on there. So, I drifted into shore, secured the kite, and wrapped up the lines (which were accumulating milfoil). The wind and the waves made it easier to retrieve my board, since it was also drifting into shore.

I started off with the "walk of shame" back to the boat landing where I started, although walking on the rocks in the lake is a royal pain in the ass. (Actually, not the ass -- just my feet.) Luckily, some guy staying on a cabin on shore saw me, and offered to drive me back to the boat landing. I accepted his kind offer, although I had to clean a bunch of milfoil off the lines and bridle rigging first, and we drove back to the landing.

So, some lessons from this evening (which I already tweeted:
1. Even though it's very instinctive to pull the control bar in after launching, that doesn't work. It usually slows the kite down.
2. Plan to be self-sufficient, but if someone offers you help, accept it graciously. (In fact, that applies to a lot of areas in life -- not just kiteboarding.)
3. Whoever brought milfoil into Minnesota needs to be dragged through a weedy lakebed until they're tied up in it. I hate invasive species.
4. As much as I'd like to learn to have a good stance on the board, I still need to keep the kite moving and in control.

Tags: adventure sports, kiteboarding
Current Location: Lake Waconia
Current Music: Pink Floyd - Dogs

I took the day off from work on Friday and went up to Malmo, on Mille Lacs Lake, for a kiteboarding lesson and some practice. I had a good time, except for a boneheaded mistake I made at the end of the day.

I did a lesson with Nathan of North Star Kiteboarding. I wanted to work on board starts and getting some sustained riding in. As I've mentioned before, I've been able to get up on the board, but not in a very coordinated manner, and I haven't been able to get any sustained riding in. Nathan helped me out with that, first by showing me how to dive the kite into the power zone more effectively, and then by reinforcing the lesson that I don't need to keep pulling in the control bar. Even though it's really instinctive to pull the control bar to get more power, it actually slows the kite down and makes it stall.

So, we worked at that for a while, and about midway through we switched from an 11 meter kite to a 7 meter kite. The wind was blowing pretty well up there, and Nathan thought a smaller kite would make it easier for me to work at diving the kite into the power zone. That worked pretty well, and I made a lot of progress at getting up on the board and getting some riding in. I actually got to the point where I could make some sustained rides, as long as I kept the kite in a place where I'd get wind. The wind started slowing down later in the afternoon, so I took a break and switched back to the 11 meter kite.

About midway through the second session, I made the boneheaded mistake. At one point, the wind got squirrely, and the kite flipped over and went through its own lines. I thought I could fix the lines at the bar by passing the bar through the lines. That didn't work too well, so I unhooked from the kite and tried some more to undo the problem. Unhooking from the kite was the boneheaded mistake, because the wind picked up the kite and blew it out of my hands. The kite was folded up in a way that it didn't just blow downwind -- it started blowing away from shore! I cursed my stupidity and started swimming after the kite, but it wasn't any use -- it kept blowing out. So, I made my way back into shore and flagged down a guy who had a boat, and asked if he could bring me out and pick up the kite. Luckily, the kite wasn't moving very fast and it wasn't a long boat ride, but I was still pretty pissed off with myself. Thankfully, the guy was very helpful.

As if that wasn't bad enough, I forgot my helmet in the boat and had to drive back there later in the evening to pick it up. The family was expecting me, so I was very appreciative. And, Nathan wasn't even upset that I had let the kite start drifting off.

I think I was making some good progress, until I made the boneheaded mistake of letting the kite drift off into the middle of the lake. I just hate learning kiteboarding by making stupid mistakes.

---

Yesterday, I helped with a volunteer project at church. I helped paint a house in south Bloomington. That doesn't make me a saint or anything, but I think the family appreciated it.

Tags: kiteboarding
Current Location: Malmo, MN
Current Music: Phideaux - Love Theme from Number Seven

Wow, I should post on LiveJournal more often. I paid for the service, after all. Actually, I've been posting my short updates on Twitter and/or Facebook lately.

So, here's a long update. I went out to Lake Waconia this afternoon for some kiteboarding. I wasn't really sure I wanted to go out there today, since I had went out there on Friday and the wind just died suddenly around 6 PM. I've been having real mixed luck with kiteboarding lately -- one day I'll have a great session, while later on everything will go wrong. Today's winds were nice and consistent, though, and I probably would have kicked myself if I hadn't taken advantage of the wind.

I got out there and worked on some drift launches, although I had to be careful to stay out of the way of the boat launch. I eventually ended up to the southeast of the boat launch, which worked well for practice. I practiced getting up on the board, and I'm definitely making progress at it -- it's starting to become a more disciplined and less error-prone process now. Actually staying up and riding is still taking me some work, though. I haven't figured out all of the footwork necessary to keep the board going in the right direction once I'm up and out of the water. I made a lot of progress with that today, though -- I'm starting to figure out how to keep the board going where I want it.

I wish I would have had a little more shallow area to work in, though. Malmo and Reddy Creek on Mille Lacs Lake are good for that, because they have shallows for a long distance out. Still, Waconia is nice and close. I also wish I would have had more than a couple hours to ride today, but that's just the way my schedule worked out.

After kiteboarding, I went to my parents' place for dinner. Mike, Nicole, and my 5-year-old nephew Liam were there, and we watched video of the trip they took out to Seattle on the Empire Builder. Liam is really into trains like the Empire Builder, and he's also really into volcanoes, so the trip was tailor-made for him. Mike and Nicole gave him a disposable camera for the trip, and he ended up taking some good photos with it. Pretty precocious photography for a 5-year-old, I think.

Tags: family, kiteboarding
Current Location: Lake Waconia
Current Mood: good
Current Music: The Replacements - I Will Dare

I went out to Lake Washington, near Dassel, Minnesota (an hour's drive west of Minneapolis) this afternoon for some kitesurfing. I had some real success, but also some problems.

It was a really windy day, about a 20 mph wind from the northwest. I got my stuff set up and waded out into the water with my kite and my board. I went to set up my kite and unwind the lines, and something went wrong -- my kite started taking off on a mad dash toward shore, with the lines barely unwound and me still attached. I released the kite and let it crash into shore. The trees caught it nicely, but then I had to disconnect the lines, pull the kite out of the trees, and then go back to the landing and straighten out the lines.

So, I went out again and practiced drift launching and board starts. The second time worked much better -- I didn't get tangled or anything, and after practicing for a bit, I actually got up on the board and rode for a while! It wasn't an impressive ride as most kiteboarders would see it -- I was only up for a minute, maybe less -- but it was a thrilling feeling. I don't really have all my riding skills down yet, though, so I ended up crashing the kite and trying more water starts.

At one point, the kite crossed all the way across the wind window, going hard from left to right, and I figured I was in trouble. I pulled the chicken loop safety release and figured the leash would get the kite in a manageable position, so I could get set up again. Well, that didn't happen. The leash wasn't correctly attached to my harness, so the kite drifted to shore, and I had to swim back into shore to get it. The kite ended up between two boats at someone's dock, and luckily the guy was cool about it and helped me untangle lines. So, I took the "walk of shame" back to the landing.

I tried to go out for a third session, but that just didn't happen. Once again, when I was trying to unwind the lines and get the kite into flying position, the kite went out of control and started plowing forward, with me semi-attached. I was able to let go of it, but the safety leash caught on something and snapped a retaining pin out of place, breaking it. So, I headed back into shore, this time thoroughly pissed, and brought the kite in and called it a day.

So, it wasn't an entirely successful day, but I got some practice with getting a feel for board starts. I'm going to have to work on that safety stuff though.

Tags: kiteboarding
Current Location: Darwin, MN
Current Music: Ozric Tentacles - Oakum

I took the day off from work on Friday and went up to
the little hamlet of Malmo, on Mille Lacs Lake, for some kitesurfing. There was an informal gathering of kitesurfers up there for the weekend, so I figured I'd get some practice in with the board. I first worked on flying the kite in the power zone to get used to pulling myself up on the board, and then I tried working on board starts. The first try didn't work so well because I was trying too hard to launch the kite and keep it flying while I got the board on my feet. Then Tighe, an instructor, gave me a tip. He said that if I had the kite floating on one wingtip in the water, I could put the board on my feet and then launch the kite. This worked much better and I was able to do some board starts and ride for a bit, but nothing really sustained. It's a lot of work to manage the board and the kite at the same time. Still, I got some good practice in and I'm making progress.

Yesterday was my nephew Liam's fifth birthday, so I went down to their house for a kids' birthday party. Liam had some of his friends from daycare and preschool there, and Nicole's family came up from Iowa to visit. Liam is into volcanoes now, so he had a volcano shaped birthday cake with candy and icing lava coming out of it. I think he had a lot of fun, though it may have been a little too much excitement for him at times.

Right now, I'm in the Denver airport about to start an inline skate tour. More details later.

Tags: blue frosting, kiteboarding, skate races
Current Location: Denver International Airport

I started my description of Thursday through Saturday at CONvergence, and I more-or-less live-posted the story of Masquerade, but I should finish describing the whole weekend.

Saturday

"When we last left our intrepid heroes, they were..." Oh, wait, that's not it. The Masquerade had a lot of costumes ranging in quality from good to awesome. I don't think I saw a mediocre one in the bunch. My friend Jim did "Darth Laddie", sort of a Scottish Darth Vader with a Highlander accent. He won the "Best Prop" award for his plaid light saber. Melinda did "Eleven", a story about Doctor Who regenerating and coming back as a red-haired Irish woman. Kate played the role of the Grim Reaper in that sketch. I already mentioned how I did "Godzilla vs. Barney", where Kate came out on stage dressed as Barney and got roundly booed by the crowd before I came out as Godzilla and frightened Barney into submission.

Here's a video:


Now that I can look back at the video, I think the performance went off fantastically well. Kate did a great job of pantomiming Barney's song and dance and "I love you, you love me" syrupy sweetness, then acting frightened when Godzilla came out. Then, as Godzilla, I got to stomp around stage a lot. The crowd really got into it, and they started clapping along with Blue Oyster Cult's song "Godzilla". I could have stayed on stage longer and milked the applause, but I didn't -- I powered up the bluish-white lights a second time, and the stage lights went dark, showing only the glowing dorsal fins. The audience loved it.

I won the "Best Workmanship" award for the costume, which I was happy with receiving, considering how much time I had put into it. Plus, it was a lot of fun to entertain the audience and surprise them with something they didn't expect.

After the Masquerade, we cleared out the green room and went out for photos. A lot of people took photos of the Godzilla costume, though Kate didn't want to put the Barney costume on again. (I think she was afraid of being pummeled or something. The purple dinosaur isn't exactly a crowd favorite.) Several of us, including Jim in the Darth Laddie costume, and his brother Yancey in their Jedi outfits, Harvey Birdman, Wolverine and Jean Grey from the X-Men, Catwoman, and Spider-Man, posed for a picture together. It was quite an unlikely group of superheroes and other characters.

Then, I went around circulating to various room parties and had my picture taken many more times. I made a few visits to ConSuite to rehydrate, because once again I had put together a rather sweaty costume, though nowhere near as unbreathable as the Gamera costume. I visited the karaoke party, where Luke Ski proposed to his girlfriend in song. (She said yes.) I sang the karaoke version of "Godzilla" by Blue Oyster Cult, in costume, albeit with the mask off.
(Here's a video on YouTube.) I also visited the Ghostbustin' 911 party and talked with them for a while about prop building, monster making, and things like that. Oh, and of course, I visited the House of Toast.

At one point, I got stopped in the hallway and interviewed for some TV show -- or maybe it was just a couple independent film producers or something. They asked me what I liked most about the convention, and I replied that it was cool when people took photos and told me how much they liked my costume. They also asked what I thought the most regrettable part of the convention was. I should have said it was when people got too drunk and started acting stupid, but that didn't come to me at the time. I would have thought about it a little bit later on, when some woman in an anime costume came out of a room party squealing and slurring, "Cake! CAKE!" Apparently, she really wanted me to go into that party and have some cake. I was really on the way back to Todd and Kate's room so I could clear my stuff out of there for the night, but I figured I'd have some cake just so she wouldn't tip over on me.

Sunday

It's sort of bittersweet to be in CONvergence on the last day of the weekend. It's a little sad to see people packing up and tearing stuff down, and to know that I had to go back to "normal life" (whatever that means) after a four-day weekend. On the other hand, there were a lot of memories and a lot of fun to relive. Plus, there was the fun "Iron Artist" panel, in which a number of artists got together to produce artwork based on a randomly selected theme in one hour. If I describe it like that, it sounds like there are five or six panelists drawing quietly for an hour, but it's really quite funny, because the emcee of the event always has a lot of witty banter with the artists, the judges, and the band (an Irish parody group called The Dregs). It was hysterically funny.

I went to a couple other panels that afternoon, and finished up the day watching Star Trek IV: The Journey Home. I had forgotten how funny the movie had been, especially when the Star Trek crew tried to deal with twentieth-century San Francisco.

So, that's pretty much it. It was a fun convention, and I'll be back next year. I'll have to make a villainous monster next year. (Maybe Bowser from the Mario Bros. games.)

Tags: convergence, costuming
Current Location: work

Well, it was a long four-day weekend at CONvergence. I'm pretty tired now, after staying up late and partying too late, but it was all worth it.

( Cut for length )

OK, it's late and I'm tired, so I'll have to continue this later. Up next: The story of stiff Masquerade competition (with so many excellent entries), the results, and then the fun of going around to all the parties and being recognized.

Tags: convergence, costuming, cvg2009
Current Mood: tired

I just finished my performance of Godzilla vs. Barney. The crowd loved it.

Kate wore the Barney costume first and came on stage to the Barney theme, and she got a predictable round of hissing and booing from the crowd. The Barney "I love you" theme was interrupted three times by Godzilla roars. The first time, she looked around, confused. The second time, she hesitated more and skittered to the side. The third time, she cowered in fear, and I came stomping out as Godzilla. The music changed to "Godzilla" by Blue Oyster Cult. The crowd cheered wildly as I stomped onto stage and frightened Barney severely. When Godzilla's lights charged up, Barney scampered off the stage and I did a Godzilla victory dance. The crowd loved every second of it and started clapping along to the song. At the end of my act, I charged up the lights and had them cut the house lights.

There was some pretty stiff competition so I'm not guaranteed an award, but I think people will be talking about this show a lot.

Tags: convergence, costuming, cvg2009
Current Location: Sheraton Bloomington

I went out to Medicine Lake in Plymouth this afternoon for another kitesurfing lesson. This one was a board skills class, where we kept the kites at home and just worked on water starts -- i.e. being pulled out of the water and getting the board to plane out. We used a boat for propulsion, while being towed with a waterski rope, so it was kind of like a mix between wakeboarding and kitesurfing. I'm happy to say that by my second ride, I figured out how to do a water start and I had a good ride.

There were four of us in our lesson group. After an on-land lesson, we got on the boat and took turns working on our water starts. The first guy got in and he made various attempts to get started, but he didn't make it all the way out of the water on that try. The second guy, who's an experienced wakeboarder, got in the water and was able to get up and ride the board with hardly any trouble. He was able to do all sorts of good riding. I think the guy's going to be a natural at kiteboarding if his kite skills are as good as his board skills.

Then, it was my turn to ride -- or at least try to. I got in the water and put the board on my feet, and tried to get started with the tow rope, but I couldn't get the hang of it on my first set of tries in the water. I think I wasn't angling the board quite right in the water -- I was sort of trying to plow forward (like I was on a snowboard?) and I couldn't get my feet in the right position. So, I got back onto the board and let the fourth guy take a try. He looked like he was getting close, but he didn't quite make it.

After the first round, Tighe, our instructor, and Mike, the other instructor and boat driver, got into the water and demonstrated board starts. Then, the first guy (Joel? Joseph?) got in again and tried a few more times, and he looked like he was just about to do a good water start and ride, but he came just shy of making it. I got back in the water and put the board on my feet, and again tried several times to get started. I kept getting closer each time, and they were giving me good advice on foot position and where to put the board, but it didn't click right away. Meanwhile, at one point, I overheard the guys on the boat talking about the ShamWow guy (you know, this guy), and I think that provided enough of a distraction to make me stop overthinking everything. The next time I tried, I actually made it up on the water, and I was able to ride nicely for a while. I was really stoked, and everyone on the boat was giving me applause and congratulating me. I got a good ride in for a while, and I tried to figure out a few things with footwork so I could learn how to do turns and stuff, but I didn't really stick with it. At that point, my hands and arms were pretty tired, and my legs were a little bit toasted as well, so I didn't ride for a super long time. Still, I did really well. The only problem is that I had smacked my fingers with the board a few times, so my fingers ended up bruised and swollen up afterward. (Stupid Plavix.)

The fourth guy (Bill?) got in the water and did some more water start attempts. After a few tries, he popped out of the water and he did some nice riding. I think it clicked for him just like it clicked for me. He even tried a strapless board and was able to ride it for a while, so I was very impressed.

I had to leave for dinner at my parents' place, so I'm hoping that the first guy (Joseph?) was able to make things work.

Tags: adventure sports, kiteboarding
Current Location: Medicine Lake - Plymouth, MN
Current Music: "Hi, it's Vince for ShamWow!"

After a rainy week, the weather finally cleared up enough to make it safe to venture outdoors again. (Well, maybe it wasn't completely unsafe or anything, but just not all that appealing.) Yesterday (Friday) evening, I went to Lake Calhoun to do the Friday Fitness Skate with the inline skate club. Oddly, though, nobody else showed up. Bill skated in from downtown, but he was going back there to get the Friday Night Skate started at 9 PM. So, I decided to ditch the usual Friday Fitness Skate route (which goes to Hopkins and makes a 13-mile loop), and I skated with Bill back into downtown. We headed east on the Midtown Greenway and then north along the LRT tracks to Gold Medal Park, near the west bank of the Mississippi River. From that point, I skated south a bit and then crossed the Mississippi River on the old Northern Pacific bridge, which connects to the University of Minnesota campus. Then, I continued north along University Avenue and crossed the Mississippi again on the Stone Arch Bridge. I headed up West River Parkway a bit, then turned westward toward the Cedar Lake Trail. I had to take city streets to get there, since the trail connection isn't in place yet, so I ended up going past a lot of construction. I saw the work being done on the station platforms for the Northstar Commuter Rail line, the extension of the LRT line going to the new Twins stadium, and the new Twins stadium itself. Unfortunately, nobody's building an extension to the skate trail yet, so I just picked it up where it currently ends, at Lee's Liquor Bar, and headed back to Lake Calhoun along the Cedar Lake Trail.

This afternoon (Saturday afternoon), I went mountain biking with Todd at Salem Hills Park in Inver Grove Heights. It's several miles of nice singletrack that twists and curves along prairie lands, with some wooded sections. It isn't a super-challenging trail -- there aren't any lung-busting climbs or tricky tight sections in the trees -- but it made for a good afternoon's worth of riding. We did three laps of the trail system, and we agreed that it made for a very good ride. I just wish I had more time for mountain biking, but then again, I've been busy with other stuff lately. (Like kitesurfing, for example.)

Tags: mtb, skating
Current Music: Magazine - Motorcade

I went up to the tiny hamlet of Malmo on Mille Lacs Lake yesterday afternoon (Saturday) to do some more kitesurfing practice. I was practicing body dragging, which is where I was flying the kite and having it pull me through the water without actually being up on the board. The first time I went out, I had a great session, except for the fact that I ended up a ways downwind from where I started. I expected that to happen, of course, but I also had to contend with being blown toward shore with resorts, docks, and a couple channel markers that were too far out in the water. (Well, too far out for my tastes, anyway.) I walked back upwind and into shore to take a break and visit with Paul and Amy for a while, and then I went back out for a second session. Some other guy came over to help me launch, and he thought it would be good for he and I to practice together since he's also new to kitesurfing. Well, as it turned out, he wasn't as much as a help as he thought he was. He didn't launch my kite from the proper position, and then when the kite fell into the water a few times and I had to try to relaunch it, he was showing me a few things that I probably should have just tried for myself. I did get some decent practice in, though.

Oh, and I forgot to mention earlier that I bought an 11 meter Slingshot Turbo3 (T3) kite at Midwest Mountaineering. It's easier to control and to relaunch than the 9 meter Diesel that I bought used, but having more surface area means it pulls harder. Luckily, that wasn't an issue yesterday.

After that, I went down to Isle to have dinner with Paul and Amy, who live in the area. They were happy that I came by to visit.

This morning (Sunday), I went out to Lake Waconia with Chad, one of the instructors who taught me last Monday. This time, the lesson was to get up on the board and start riding it. We started with some lessons and explanation on a simulated board in the parking lot, and then he took me out on the Jet Ski to the middle of the lake, so I wouldn't be in the way of everything. I had a problem with that right off the bat, though -- the board fell off the Jet Ski, and when we circled around to get it, I fell off the Jet Ski as well. I got back on, but in the process I got the lines entangled, and I couldn't sort them out right away to get the kite launched, so we had to stop at the beach and untangle them. After that mess, I worked on drift launching and then trying to get the board on my feet. For some reason, I couldn't get the board on my feet very well and have them stay in place. I had to play around with the straps, take my neoprene booties off, and fiddle with them for a while before I finally got my feet into position. Then, with Chad's instruction, I worked on launching the kite and getting it into the right position to pull me up onto the board. This took a lot of work, mainly because I had to spend a lot of time watching the kite and getting it in the right place in the sky while simultaneously figuring out how to arrange my feet on the board. After many tries at it, and several falls in which I ended up being dragged into the water and inhaling water, I started getting the hang of it -- for a little bit, at least. I had a few successful launches where I was able to ride the board briefly, but I never figured out how to turn the board in the correct direction so I wouldn't end up putting the board exactly perpendicular to the wind.

I did end up inhaling a lot of water and having to cough it out, though. Now I know what it's like to be at Gitmo and to get waterboarded. (Er, make that "enhanced interrogation techniques." "Waterboarding" makes it sound like torture.)

I think I either need more practice, about another hour or two of lessons, or both. I think I'm really close, and maybe after visualizing it a little more and putting things into practice, I'll be able to ride the board.

Tags: kiteboarding
Current Location: Lake Waconia
Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Foreigner - Waiting for a Girl Like You

I went up to the tiny town of Malmo yesterday for my Kiteboarding 101 lesson. Malmo is on the northeast shore of Mille Lacs Lake, and it used to be a one-horse town, but now they have to share that one horse with a neighboring town or two. I was up there with Tim, another student, along with our instructors Tighe and Chad.

We went through the basics of setting up the kites and lines and learning how to control the kite. I had covered a lot of this in the lesson in Florida in February, but it never hurts to refresh my memory. After the on-shore lesson, we donned wetsuits and headed out into the water. We covered topics such as self-launching, assisted launching, and water relaunching. Launching and relaunching in the water seems to work out much better with the Slingshot Turbo3 (T3) kites than it does with the traditional "C" shaped kites I've used before. Kite technology has been improving in the past few years. Despite the gusty winds, Tim and I did pretty well in the water. I really didn't have much trouble flying the kite, thanks to my previous experience, although I think Tim could use a little more practice. Finally, at the end of the lesson, I practiced some body dragging using the kite to pull myself in one direction and then in the other.

After the lesson, Tighe and Chad headed off to another beach for some kitesurfing of their own, while I stayed behind to practice with my Slingshot Diesel. The Diesel is an older-style kite, a C-shaped kite. Tim stayed behind to help me launch and stuff, but it turns out that flying the Diesel is much trickier than flying the T3. The Diesel isn't worth crap when trying to water relaunch, because it's hard to get one wingtip up out of the water enough to make it flip over. It's also really difficult to depower the kite and to adjust it for different wind strength. When the kite was launched and powered up, my body drags were much more chaotic -- I was getting all sorts of water up my nose and in my mouth. Then, when I crashed and tried to relaunch, it took several minutes of screwing around before finally getting the thing out of the water.

I was rather frustrated at that point, but not ready to give up the sport yet. I figured that if I was having good luck with the T3, but a crappy time with the Diesel, that a more beginner-friendly kite would be helpful in the future. I packed up my kite and headed off to Reddy Creek, on the north side of Mille Lacs, to watch the real kitesurfers have fun for a while. I was talking with a guy named Rick on the beach and I told him about my experiences at Malmo. He suggested that if I wanted to bring the Diesel out again and fly it, he'd help me out with launching and stuff. So, I geared up again and pumped up the Diesel and then got out into the water with Rick. He helped me out with assisted launches and helped me figure out a few things with doing water relaunches, but even with his help, he and I still had to work pretty hard to get the thing to relaunch. I did a little bit better with controlling the kite once I had it launched, mainly since I didn't have it directly in the power zone dragging me forward at high speed, and I was able to successfully body drag for a while. In fact, I did really well on the last body drag I did, although the onshore wind meant I was coming closer to shore than I really wanted. Still, I had a much better experience at Reddy Creek with the Diesel.

I really should have put sunscreen on earlier in the day, though. I didn't think to put it on before I first got on the water, so my face ended up toasted more than the Subway sandwich I had for dinner. And on the way back in the evening, my windshield got pelted with bugs. I got more bugs on my windshield yesterday evening than I've had in my code at work all year.

All things considered, I think I'm going to get a T3. Tighe recommends it highly, and it would probably make a lot of difference for me when learning.

Tags: adventure sports, kiteboarding
Current Location: Malmo, MN
Current Music: Michael McDonald - I Keep Forgettin' (yes, it's soft rock hour this afternoon)