Showing posts with label shameless self-promotion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shameless self-promotion. Show all posts

Thursday, May 2, 2013

Librarians are probably the most polite paparazzi ever. Or the politest. I don't know, I'm not Merriam-Fucking-Webster.

So, I had this whole post ready to go about how I broke my ankle at roller derby practice a few weeks ago where I was going to complain about how I always have to have people carry stuff for me and how I can't skate again until probably June, or how fucking exhausting it is to have to do a thousand miniature pole-vaults just to get anywhere, but then something happened on Saturday that made it totally worth it, so I had to rewrite the whole fucking post. Thanks a lot, one of the most amazing things that has ever happened to me.

In an effort to make being stuck in a cast for weeks suck less, I got a blue one, and I painted a TARDIS on it (which I'll admit was a bit of a challenge to do upside-down at 2AM):

Yes, it is bigger on the inside. Y'know, to allow for the swelling.
Then I went to the Texas Library Association Annual Conference, where Neil Gaiman happened to be speaking on Saturday. At first, they told me he was just going to be speaking, since he's coming back on a book tour in a couple of months, but then he apparently decided to do an incredibly limited signing that you had to have a ticket to get into. There were 100 tickets—total—for like 7000 librarians, but I totally got the second-to-last one. WHICH LED TO THIS:

Neil Fucking Gaiman signed my cast. Also, yes, I'm pretty sure he took his wife's middle name.
After he signed it, he pulled out his phone and took a picture of it...which he then tweeted and posted on his Facebook page. Then he retweeted my reply to him (about a minute before he came on stage to speak). I posted a couple pictures of it to snark the tumblr. I also tweeted the pictures at The Bloggess and she told me I win the internets AND THEN SHE FOLLOWED ME!

So, for the rest of the afternoon, I'm having some kind of aneurysm of awesome, which is still going on when I go to watch my wife destroy everyone on the track and win Best Blocker in her roller derby bout. While I'm there, she skates over to me and tells me that another girl on her team follows the Doctor Who Official tumblr. Who fucking reblogged my post. And then so did Neil, who added "I was impressed." And Amanda Fucking Palmer. And about 7000 other people. And then I passed out because I couldn't fucking handle the amount of awesome that was happening all in one day.

Also, pretty much the entire conference knew who I was in the span of about 2 hours, and suddenly everybody wanted a picture. It was like the politest paparazzi ever. "Can I take a picture? Do you mind? Is it OK? Oh, thank you SO much! I/my daughter/son/coworker/friend/neighbor is SUCH a fan." Of Doctor Who, that is. Or Neil Gaiman. Probably not of me. Yet.

Hello, Sexy.

Monday, April 1, 2013

Holy shit, you guys. This is real.

I'm about 167% sure this is just one of Google's April Fool's Day things, but this just happened and if it's not I don't know how to make sense of the universe anymore.

About a year ago, I submitted a redesigned snark logo to the Sparks McGee tumblr, which was, in turn, based on this blog post by Wil Wheaton. Since then, I've noticed that a lot of people are finding me here by searching for "i've got a course you can plot." Mainly out of curiosity, I Googled it, and this happened:

In case you can't tell, the first result is the Sparks McGee tumblr. The second one is where I posted about the Sparks McGee tumblr
actually posting my submission. That third one? The original post where Wil Wheaton
FUCKING INVENTED IT IN THE FIRST PLACE.
Not funny, Google.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

This is pretty much how the American Dream works, too.

You know how everybody always says that if you just work hard enough, eventually...you'll burn yourself out? Well, that's true. Wait, no, it's "if you work just hard enough every once in a while, something good will happen, probably. If the right people happen to be looking." And that's true, too. Which brings me to my point:

I WON SOMETHING!!!
It's a major award.
The Cat Lady, who does write about cats sometimes, but also lots of other awesome and hilarious things, and who also spells "über" correctly (which is pretty much an automatic win) has been gracious enough to grant me the Liebster Award. I'll tell you the details in a minute, but first LOOK HOW PRETTY!


It comes from Germany, so you know it's high-quality. It's aimed at up-and-coming bloggers, which mostly just means that you have fewer than 200 subscribers; it's probably the case that millions of people read your blog, but just don't want to publicly admit or commit to it by subscribing. Assholes. It also includes a number of tasks that you have to complete, or you'll have bad luck for TEN MILLION YEARS, and the opposite of whatever you wished for will come true. But it's totally not like a chain-letter, because of reasons.

Anyway, here's all the stuff you have to do:
1. Thank the person that nominated you. Thanks, The Cat Lady!
2. Display the Liebster Heart on your blog. Done and done.
3. Nominate 3 to 5 more different bloggers (who may potentially have millions of readers, but fewer than 200 subscribers)
4. Post 11 things about yourself.
5. Create 11 questions for your nominees to answer.
6. Answer the 11 questions you've been asked in your nomination.
7. Ignore the fact that you're now being asked to nominate 11 people to award, and just stick with the original 3 to 5.
8. (Optional, as I've just invented it) Wonder why this award suddenly became obsessed with the number 11.
9. (Also optional, as it stems from the recently-invented 8th task) Blame Matt Smith.
10. (Also just invented; only applies to non-Whovians) Wonder why the hell you were just asked to blame Matt Smith.
11. (For ambitious non-Whovians who will be glad they did, and also because it brings the number of tasks to 11, creating some kind of self-referential circle of completeness) Watch all of Doctor Who to find out.

And here's me completing the aforementioned tasks:

11 Answers (With Questions!)

1. Did you ever have a teacher who yelled at/embarrassed/totally ruined you for life? If so, tell the story.
Not exactly, but during my senior year of high school, all but about 3 teachers at my school got caught up in a panic that my best friend and I ran a local mafia and were going to shoot up the school. Not even joking. (I will so write about this in a separate post.)

2. What is your dream career?
Librarian. And also writer. Technically, I am both of those, but only one probably counts as a career at this point. I'll let you guess which one.

3. Unicorn or Sasquatch for president?
I'd totally vote Unicorn, but I'm not sure they're native to the U.S., so they're probably not eligible to run. We'll have to ask Donald Trump for verification on this one.

4. What is your most embarrassing habit?
I'm kind of a hoarder. Not like A&E-class, this-building-should-be-condemned, but I'm very not good at throwing things away.

5. If you could have one talent that you do not currently have, what would it be?
Regeneration? Although, I've never actually died, so I can't say with absolute certainty that it's a talent I don't already have.

6. Last meal on earth: describe in detail. I'm hungry.
Pizza. Actually, 6 million pizzas. That should buy me some time.

7. If you could bring only three things on a deserted island, what would they be?
I'm going to assume it's not in the spirit of this question to say "my wife and our cats" or "a raft/TARDIS." In that case: 1) Some kind of awesome multi-tool with choppy things and whittly things and probably a magnifying glass for starting fires 2) A really well-stocked first aid kit 3) The Library of Congress

8. Favorite guilty pleasure?
INTERNET. FOREVER.

9. What kind of car do you drive, and what do you think that says about you?
It's a Focus, which probably says that I have a wonderful sense of irony because sometimes I'm not very good at seeing things through to HEY, do you want to go swimming? Once, I went to Scotland. Do you like tigers? I want some enchiladas. Baseball is fun.

10. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
I can has confidence?

11. Favorite Disney movie?
The Empire Strikes Back totally counts. So does The Avengers.

11 Things About Me

1. I play roller derby; my derby name is Albus Rumbledore (Number: The Only 1 He Ever Feared).
2. I cross-stitch. Someday, I'll post pictures of some of the awesome stuff I've made. Probably.
3. I'm a vegetarian.
4. I've been on anxiety/depression meds for almost a year now. I've been trying to write about it for that same amount of time, minus about five minutes.
5. I have hitchhiked exactly once in my life. I got picked up by the short bus. Not even joking. There was a kid on there. He was in a wheelchair and wearing a helmet. (Still not joking.)
6. My superpowers are retcon and snakes.
7. I totally own a Sonic Screwdriver (10th Doctor's model). Once, I used it to fix a screaming child in the library.
8. I have 5 parents: Mother, Father-I-Grew-Up-With, Biological Father, Stepfather (married to Mother), and Stepmother (married to Biological Father). Hallmark does not make cards for this shit.
9. There is an Odin in my family tree. Given my unique family situation, I figure that, at worst, that makes me Loki.
10. I have tattoos of several things that are awesome and which have been important in my life for various reasons. Someday I will have full sleeves.
11. At least once in my life, I want to do stand-up comedy.

11 Questions for victims recipients of this award

1. Do you have any semi-useless superpowers (e.g., "I always know exactly what time it is," or "I can pay attention to two TV shows at once")? If so, what are they?
2. What is the worst book you have ever read? What was so terrible about it?
3. If you use some kind of analytics tool, what's the weirdest search that's led someone to your blog?
4. Which Hogwarts house would the Sorting Hat place you in?
5. How many roads must a man walk down?
6. What's your favorite alcoholic drink? (If it's somewhat obscure, what's in it?)
7. What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow? Please specify African or European.
8. What's the coolest thing you've ever gotten paid to do?
9. What's in your Zombie Apocalypse survival kit?
10. What would you do for a Klondike Bar?
11. Cake or death?

Tag, you're it!

Jen, the Geek Fabulous geekiness from places like Firefly and The Walking Dead. Also, spoilers, so be careful if you're not caught up (or if you don't want to be nagged by River Song).

Gabi Books It Contender for next companion of The Doctor, wearer of high heels, and reviewer of books. Quite possibly involved with Sherlock Holmes. She's also joining roller derby soon (Ha! Now you have to do it!).

Desperate for Something Life. Love. Politics. Recently, quite a number of political posts, which were equal parts awesome and glorious snark that amounted to a bitchslap of, well, Mitt Romney, mainly. But other kinds of stupid in the election process as well.

Monday, May 14, 2012

I meant to post this yesterday. It didn't happen.

You know how sometimes you're switching out the laundry, and the brand-fucking-new box of dryer sheets falls into the washing machine, but you don't notice because you're holding a huge pile of towels and shit, and you drop all of that in on top of it, and then when it comes out, everything is covered in dryer sheets and bits of cardboard?

Yeah, I just fucking did that.
Welcome to every day of my life.

In other news, here's what you've been missing on the rest of the interwebs:

What you missed on stumblr.
I pinned this stuff. It's made of awesome.
SNARKS MCGEE. I made this, and they totally posted it. "I've got a course you can plot." (The back story.)

What you missed this week on snark:
My brother graduated from college.
Apparently they don't do "have it your way" anymore.
The actual end of my patience.

Some other stuff that I didn't make, but you should look at anyway:
This is one of the most horrifying things I've ever heard of.
For the love of god, someone get me one of these.
Holy trainwreck, Batman.
Being a human: You're doing it wrong.
10 lovely reasons why men shouldn't be ordained.

Finally, something that a friend inflicted upon sent to me:
http://thecleverhelper.tumblr.com/post/22263818618

You're welcome, Internet.

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Things you will never hear me say: "My stylist..."

I've never exactly given enough fuck to be bothered to spend copious amounts of time trying to make my hair look all perfect. If it takes longer than about thirty seconds, I'm probably going to give up and just go out with it looking however it did when I lost interest often much to the chagrin of my wife. And I can't even remember the last time I actually paid somebody to cut it. The closest thing I've ever had to a stylist was my friend Jess, who used to cut my hair into mohawks and dye it green or blue or whatever sometimes until she moved to Far The Fuck Away, and I started just doing it myself. Mostly, I use the four-year-old method, which is where you just sort of grab and cut until it's generally shorter. Except most four-year-olds probably don't ask their wife to fix the spots they can't see so that it doesn't end up looking entirely ridiculous when they're done.

Pretty much, this is how I decide when it's time to cut my hair: I wake up, shamble over to the mirror, and look at my reflection. If I look like me, it's OK, but if I look like someone famous, it's probably time to cut it. Eventually.




In other news, this is still not a travel update. That's tomorrow.

Here's what I've inflicted on the rest of the interwebs:
This stuff is made of awesome.
Snark + tumblr = stumblr.

And here's some stuff the rest of the interwebs have given me in return:
Snoop gets technical.
Indiana Jones: not so much on the tenure track.
I've started doing this.
North Dakota has about the fewest zombie apocalypse danger zones of any state. Who's surprised?
DOCTOR WHO COMIC MAKER. SO. MUCH. WIN.

I'm pretty sure I got the better end of that deal.

Friday, October 21, 2011

UPDATED: You're welcome, Internet.

So, I warned you the other day that I had been planning to do this, and today I did it. I know. I'm surprised, too.

I've been quietly claiming little bits of the interwebs for myself lately, and now I'm forcing them upon sharing them with you! I'd meant to do this last week, but didn't. If you've stopped by since last Saturday, you already know that story.

Here's what you've been missing:

I have a Pinterest now. I've been collecting awesome stuff. You're welcome.
http://pinterest.com/snark/this-stuff-is-made-of-awesome/

Also, Flickr.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/causticsnark/

And stuff that has nothing to do with me, but that you should check out anyway.
The Rejection of Anne Frank. This is exactly how it would happen today.
Reasoning with Vampires. It's really hard to go wrong when you're making fun of Twilight.
Vampire Moths. It's moderately terrifying until you realize they're basically just giant mosquitoes.

In case you haven't heard, the Rapturepocalypsequake happens again today, so you can probably expect to see more of this. Also, lots of recycled dinosaur jokes and REM lyrics. In case of Rapture, you can have this blog. Not because I expect to go, but because if it does happen, I'll be too busy dealing with the zombies and figuring out how to find food to update it. Plus, it probably wouldn't exist anymore anyway because if God really wanted to destroy the world, He'd probably start by shutting down the Internet. In the event that doesn't happen, I'll be back tomorrow.