Call It A Countdown You Mustn't - Day 3 - Geek Girl Edition

One of the things I like best about myself (stick with me here, I'm pretty sure this turns out way better than it sounds) is that I'm just a gigantic nerd.  Seriously.  Big.  Fat.  Nerd.

I am a geek girl.  (I watched a video a few weeks ago about calling yourself a geek woman rather than girl and, wow, it made totally awesome, valid points that I totally agreed with.  Geek girl just rolls off the tongue so much better though.)

And that kicks ass.  Like I said, probably the coolest thing about me.  Super big nerd.  It's where a lot of my humor comes from and I'm also kinda smart so that's cool too.  Pretty sweet package overall, the nerdiness.

Settle in for a long-ass story - because there's bonus Christmas nonsense today!  (Man I hope that's incentive.)

Awhile back Steve and I were in the car on the way home from somewhere and - searching for something we hadn't talked about already that day - I said:

"I was reading Wil Wheaton's Blog the other day and -"

"Whoa, wait," he interrupted, "you were reading Wil Wheaton's blog?"

"Yeah."

"You were?"

"Yeeeees." (This seemed pretty obvious to me, as I had just said so.)

"Why?"

"Because it's funny?"  (Again, these are the things that seem obvious to me.)

"But you don't like Wil Wheaton."

"Why wouldn't I like Whil Wheaton?!" (Seriously, we kept saying his full name.  What's up with that?)

"You've never watched Star Trek.  You're not into that.  What reason would you have to be a fan of Wil Wheaton?"

"Stand by Me."

"Are you kidding?"

"And Toy Soldiers."  (Seriously - Toy Soldiers was, and remains, part of my reasoning.)

"... I... what... that doesn't even make sense, Hun."

"Sure it does.  He's the kid from Stand by Me.  Which I love.  So I love him.  Then he was in Toy Soldiers.  Which I also love.  For some reason.  So I keep loving him.  Now he has a really funny blog which I read and love.  And he guest stars on stuff I usually watch and enjoy.  So I love him."

"But he's best known for a role on Star Trek, which you don't and never have watched."

"So?"

"So that's why people know him."

"But that's not why I know him."

"But that's not why everyone else knows him."

"I don't see how that's a reason why I shouldn't read his blog."

"... I guess.  Go on."

I proceeded to tell him whatever I'd read on Wil Wheaton's blog that had made me giggle and, as we were getting out of the car a few minutes later Steve said to me:

"Seriously, Hun, you should just watch Star Trek already.  You're so close to you're black belt in nerd, Hun, just go for it already."

...And that was hilarious.

A few days later I sent him an email that said:
"So I've been meaning to ask:  If I do watch Star Trek, do I get an actual black belt?  And if so, what does a black belt in nerd look like exactly?  Does it have decals?  (I personally think it should have decals.)  Does it come with a holster for a light saber?  It seems like any sort of belt for a nerd should come with holsters for various weapons - swords, stakes, phasers, light sabers, etc.  Is there a ceremony of some kind involved?  Like a crowning, but with a belt instead of a crown?  A belting, if you will?

Also, inquiring minds want to know (okay, well one inquiring mind wants to know): does nerdery follow the standard levels of belting:  i.e. white, yellow, orange, green, purple, red, brown, black?  What does one have to do to attain the various lever?  Am I really a brown belt nerd?  I know I'm nerdy, I like my nerdiness, still."

His response was:  "ummm... sure?  I don't know, Hun, it was just a joke.  But I this this conversation proves your a nerd already."

And because I'm unwilling to let things go:
"Well I'm not denying that I'm a nerd, sweetie.  I think that's been pretty blatantly obvious for quite some time now.  But... it was a good joke, and now I want a black belt in nerd.  I could do it, if I train hard enough... I can do the crane like Daniel-Son!  Sweep the leg!  Wait, no.  That was Johnny, dammit.  Wouldn't it be cool?  My black belt in nerd with like a little Nintendo controller on it, and - I don't know, like a Lego brick or something, and... a little TARDIS! and it could have a little holster for my blaster (cause hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side and all.)  It would be my nerdy badge of honor."

... And then Steve stopped talking to me about this topic.  That was probably the right plan of action for his sanity.  But we don't value sanity that much in our house.

I'm sharing all of this because tonight the super huge geek girl inside me had a very exciting night.  Why?

See that?

And that?

I made those.

HEEHEE!

I made paper snowflakes that look like Yoda and Boba Fett!  Hee!

I have more that look like Darth Vader, C3PO, a Storm Trooper and a Clone Trooper.  (When I showed them to Steve he said to me "You know it's seriously hot that you know the difference, on sight, between a storm trooper and a clone trooper, right?"  Which made me laugh.  Because, yeah, I kinda do know that.)

Now before we get too crazy I didn't just make these up.  I made them from templates.  Which I originally read about on EPBOT (which I love to pieces) but the TARDIS one looked way too complicated for me to attempt.  Then I saw them again, specifically the Star Wars ones, on Geeks are Sexy, which I check several times a day and may be the site I look at more than any other actually.  It's awesome sauce.  Plus - completely accurate title.  The Star Wars designs got me much more interested and once Boba Fett got into the mix (via Anthony Herrera Designs, which is also included in the GaS article) I was hooked.  It was tricky, especially Yoda.  There are some really teeny cuts in there.  But so, so cool.

When I finished Yoda, I said to Steve "Hunny, you have to come and look at this.  It's so cool!"  I'm not kidding, I was literally bouncing.

Steve loves the Fett.  So I knew I could get him on board with this.

I had decided earlier today to post a picture of our Yoda tree ornament tonight:

Because of course we have a Yoda Christmas tree ornament.  It may not be the first thing that occurs to you, but once you start thinking about it - you don't want to live in a world where we don't.  I don't want to live in a world where we don't anyway.  I mean seriously.  Yoda ornaments should be the new pickles (you know? the Christmas pickle tradition?) - and that's as someone who totally loves pickles too.

That reminds me - I have a pretty great story about standing up for the awesomeness of Yoda as a, like, 8-year-old that I'm not sure I've ever actually told anyone.  Once upon a time I joined some friends who were playing in the school yard by our house.  They were talking about Star Wars, which I had recently seen for the first time, and which characters were their favorites.  They asked me who I liked best and I told them - Yoda.  Because Yoda was, and is, the shit.  What I didn't know or particularly understand at the time was that they weren't necessarily talking about who was the best character (Yoda) they were talking about who was the cutest.  This was the Han Vs. Luke conversation.  (The answer is Han, by the way.)  So their response to me was a fairly incredulous "Yoda?  Ew.  He has ear hair."  No joke, this was like 20 years ago and I remember specifically that they pointed out ear hair.  I gotta tell you they teased me pretty hard for probably 10, 15 minutes or so and the whole time I was like "Whatever, Yoda is way better than Luke." (Which is totally true, by the way.)  And they kind of made me feel like crap.  It's not really their fault either, I didn't get what that conversation was really about until I reflected on it many years later.  And not even that I wasn't aware of boys being cute at that point or anything - I just wasn't there for the beginning.  Anyway - the point of the story:  Even at 8 years old, Yoda was freaking awesome.  And even now, faced with the question "Who's better: Han or Luke?"  I'm probably just as likely to say Yoda as I was then.  Because Yoda's still the best character.

Don't Call It A Countdown - Day Two - First World Problems

This post will henceforth be known as "the one where she complained about sunshine" or "Stupid Sun" or, more probably "Seriously, What is She On"?

The good news is my mom thinks I'm funny.  So there.  

A little bit of back story here – We have had, like, four days of rain here in Minnesota.  Just your typical December weather.  You know, plus roughly 30 degrees.  But whatever.  Nothing is wrong with the environment!  Mind your business.  (That was my impression of... dumb, I guess.)  My point being, it’s been pretty dark and gloomy for about a week.  I’m not kidding.  It got cloudy on Sunday afternoon and that was that.

Earlier today I wasn’t thinking I was going to have anything to ramble on about.  Because I was neck deep into a spreadsheet that is generally the bane of my existence and just, oh my god, the stupidity.  The complete, abject and total stupidity of this spreadsheet.  And how incredibly manual everything is and seriously, what the hell just, why?  (To put this into perspective I normally have a fair amount of patience with the spreadsheets that are my working life.  No seriously, I do.  However - I've spent the last three full days at work fighting with Microsoft Access and so now, basically, everything is just incredibly dumb.  So the things that were just kind of dumb before are horrifying stupid.  And the things that were face-palm worthy before induce the above rant.)

So yeah, I was thinking about that most of the day.

This afternoon, still working on the same spreadsheet, the sun just came from nowhere and blinded the shit out of me.  But then it went away.  So I was still sitting there in my chair being all like "what is that bright ball of gas in the sky?" when it got cloudy and normal again, so I went back to work.  This proceeded to happen over and over again for the next two hours.  Basically I kept thinking about closing the blinds but every time it was like "well, now it's cloudy again, oh well.  Problem solved."  Then ten minutes later "holy crap, what the?  Why can't I see anything?"

Anyway - my overall points are these:

1) Man, the sun is annoying.

2) This is not rambling, this is free association run amok.  My mom said so.  So there.  Neener neener.

Since I started out yesterday with a penguin, I thought it was only fair to have a monkey today - for steve.  This one is make of blown glass, so it's an annual Christmas miracle that we don't break it.  I also really dig his little Santa hat and the fact that he hangs from his legs.  It's a pretty cool ornaments and easily one of my favorites.  ... It actually just occurred to me that I don't if Steve really likes this ornament or not.  I hope he does, cuz I think it's super cool.  Plus it's a monkey.  So come on, it's a monkey.  What else do you need?  A penguin with it maybe?  That would make it better, come to think of it.