A trip to the Bay area

Yep, that's a spherical robot.  It turns out you really can make one of them.  I got a chance to talk with one of the lead designers of the "orb swarm" robots about some of the trials of making something so outside of the norm.  It turns out the propulsion system that Mikey and I designed was pretty much what they'd come up with as well - score one for amateur nerds!

I spent a little more time with the folks at The Crucible learning some very basic blacksmithing.  Technically they weren't offering classes but I was apparently visibly interested enough that they threw me into the forge.  Figure of speech there, I am not currently hideously burned.  I have no idea what this guy was making other than a heavy pointy bit of metal but I like the flying flakes of metal in this shot.  I made a hook.  I'm immensely proud of it.

There were some interesting folks at the faire.  I have no idea who this guy is (as in, what acting or artist troupe he's part of) but he was quite fond of showing pictures of the polar bear he'd shot with his steam powered rifle.  He was interviewed by internet celebrities (that's Xeni from boingboing).  There were quite a few interviews going on, only a few from "legitimate" sources.  I really need to see about getting a press pass next year!


There were quite a few "girlscout" aged girls at the show which, I'll admit, surprised me a little.  The young gal with the missing tooth absolutely loved "Finger puppets who wish to not die" and I was incredibly proud of the next batch of young nerds being raised when the little gal to the right exclaimed, "Mom, check out all of the new lego robot designs!" while browsing the book section.
Robots and steampunk were pretty much the order of the day for the faire.

There were robot dinosaurs that were oh so affectionate and tiny little robots that could never rest, never drop their burden lest they starve!  That little guy was kind of tragic actually.

And of course steampunk hats on steampunk gals who eventually all congregated at the steampunk concert featuring - yep - steampunk punk.  Abney Park were actually pretty good, and it turns out they're from here but sadly - and I'm quoting now - they could never get an audience to show up in seattle but they're hugely popular in california.  That's a strike against you there pacific northwest, let's do better next time, okay?

Other than that, pretty much just fire and tools (both of which I love) and gals dressed up as mice inside a 15,000 pound recreation of the game "mousetrap".  So, you know, good times.