Geeky Fandom Cookbooks and Food

So, I just wrote a bit of a blurb about geeky fandom cookbooks on my new foodie blog, and I was going to link it over here, because I think it is relevant, being all nerdy and stuff, and talking about the new "Shire Cookbook" being created by those who brought us "A Feast of Ice and Fire."

You can read the entry here at South Eats North.

Also, to keep on track with Izile’s Oddities, I found some shops I thought were pertinent.  Now, because I don’t approve of blatant copyright violations, I’m not going to feature anyone selling non-licensed Game of Thrones items.  However, a search for “geek” under plants and edibles did give a couple of good hits!

Geek-a-bye Baby is a surprise contender, as, being a baby supply shop, is normally the last thing I’d be looking at.  However, among all the baby paraphernalia, there is a listing that I thought was pretty sweet!   Pun only sort-of-intended.

The Scifi Geek 5 Jam Sampler.  Each jam is inspired by a different fandom, and is a mix of seasonal fruits, hand blended with help from "the Austin-based Kitchen Witch, Axure Anansi Grave Armand, of Half Moon House."  I particularly think the Shiny (Firefly/Serenity) flavor of strawberry blended with lemongrass and ginger might be an interesting take on an old classic! Definitely go check out the jam, there’s plenty of information in the listing (also jams for Star Trek, Star Wars, Doctor Who, and Dune fans!), and if you’re in the market for baby-stuff – eh, why not!

Otherwise, if you’re looking for a shop that specialize more in nothing but edibles, try HearthStone Bakery, they specialize in baked goods inspired by the World of Warcraft.

I never really got into WoW that much – had a bunch of friends back home who did – but I wouldn’t count myself knowledgeable enough to know how accurate these are.  I think this Mage Strudel looks good, though!  Plus, they come in your choice of 5 flavors,
and 3 shapes, with custom decoration options available upon request.

 NOM!

Someone's in the Kitchen

That's where I spent a lot of time today. Made 2lbs of wings and a great batch of homemade butterscotch pudding. I always liked the cook and serve Jell-O butterscotch pudding until I used Gale Gand's recipe from her Butter Sugar Flour Eggs book. She's right, real butterscotch tastes almost nothing like the artificially flavored stuff you buy in a box; and ever since I tried her homemade version, I need the real thing. The smokey character, the way the flavor almost seems to morph in your mouth from first bite to last bite. For those of you who cook, try it sometime, you'll be a convert!

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Well, I love to cook, and I do actually own a very snazzy apron I love to wear when cooking that I plugged here and bought from Dianne Designer Aprons; but I have a rule about plugging new people in ever post, and I just found this new shop that also does aprons, but with a bit of a twist.

Haute Mess Threads showed up on my Facebook wall just the other day, due to my nerdy friendship with several Star Wars obsessives enthusiasts. Yes, that design looks a little familiar, doesn't it? And yes, there's a more golden companion piece in her shop, too. And a darth black apron in the same theme. Now, if you're not so much into Sci-Fi, there's also Wonder Woman, Alice in Wonderland, and even a Harry Potter Gryffindor uniform inspired apron. If you're less geek in your chic, there are plenty of playful and retro designs as well.

Adorable!!

A Post!

I know I've been sorely neglecting this blog, and Izile's Oddities in general. Since the Festival of Ideas where I essentially sold out of everything, there's just been too much muck going on. I've fallen behind on bills and groceries and laundry and when you don't even have the time/energy to deal with those, well, etsy just has to take a backseat, I'm sorry to say.

But, today, I'm hoping to start doing better. (I just paid all my bills and am about to order groceries online, though laundry will have to wait for my next full day off.)

To those who reached out to me in email or mostly notes on DeviantArt, I appreciate it. Life has

been hard since April, and in all honesty, it's not going to be getting any less complicated or drama-rific on my side of the PC any time soon.

Oh, I do have a new toy! It was given to me by new friends who have been doing their best to help out with things since I got back from Mississippi after the tornadoes and all that.

Yup. Best I can describe it as an Elvish lightsaber. Now, I've been friends with a couple of the NY Jedi for a few years (love to the Melbat), but it's never been my scene. Now, I do love sword fighting, however. Fencing in college, some long sword after that, was even married to a ren-faire swordsman (regrettably) for over half a decade. And of course, I love fantasy of all kinds, and particularly anything with the classic bent of fantasy (elves, fairies, unicorns, dragons, griffins, wizards and all that). And I was absolutely speechless when I was given this beautiful thing (the blade is bright green, too! just out of batteries at the moment) and told if I was going to keep up my training (have been brushing up on my sword work and learning some staff work, too.) I would need something of my own. (I have a large collection of steel swords (some battle live, some stainless steel, some costume only) back in Mississippi, but it has proved problematic to get them up here - shipping being expensive and airlines frowning on that sort of thing.)

I am told it is a "Bob." Here's his Link: Advanced Light .Com

Go get your geek on!

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I'm still holding up my thing about promoting something/someone not-me from etsy every post. So, I think we can guess what I searched on etsy today.

However, life is funny like that. I get a little uncomfortable with some of the copyright stuff on etsy. There's a lot of it out there. Some of it is rather dubious and in a grey-area, and is probably fine, and then there's lots of just blatant examples of full out copyright infringement being passed off as well. So, I try not to promote anything that I'm uncertain about. So, I ended up searching "sword" and found these awesome wall decals instead! Go figure!

Vinyl Wall Accents caught my attention with the pictured decal. If that doesn't also catch your attention, I don't know what would. There shop has over 21 pages of designing options, so yeah, take your time and enjoy!

Happy Valentine's Day!

I'm skipping today right into the plugging.

I bought an item a couple of weeks ago from a seller on etsy and wanted to promote them immediately, but, the recipient of said gift does read my blog now and again, and I didn't want him to see it before I gave it to him. Granted, he doesn't have it yet, but I'm hedging my bets that he won't look at my blog at work between now and when he gets off.

So, I love this new fine, Sleepy Robot 13. When I stumbled across her shop, while browsing for plugs for my earlier V-day post, I knew I had to buy, it just became problematic which little robot to get. Her shop is also constantly being updated with new robots and even has a DIY kit if you want to build you own. Of course, this also means that your favorite choice could sell out quick! Not only is the one I bought gone, but all the other potential candidates except the one pictured here have flown off her shelves!

They are adorable in person, the shipping was fairly quick and the communication with the artist was friendly and timely. Everything was packaged very well and was just a great seller to deal with! Highly recommended!

Holiday Season

Wooo, it's coming, isn't it? I've already got a few gifts out of the way, and some that will just have to wait a bit.

Thankfully, I've already started getting in the first of the Christmas/Yule/Holiday et al custom orders. As a reminder, I'm always up for custom work, just please note that I require 50% deposit before I create anything custom.

But, it's good. I need the extra paypal funds for my own family and friends. Which reminds me, I am TRADE/BARTER FRIENDLY to anyone who is able to offer a trade in something that I could use as a gift for one of my 4 siblings, 2 parents, 2 sibling's spouses and 3 -soon to be 4

nieces/nephews, or roommate/friends. I am a little picky, but it's something I've done in seasons past and has worked out well when artists/crafters are low on funds and have a lot of people to

shop for.

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In that thought, I'm featuring a couple of things I'm thinking about for other people (who I'm pretty sure don't read this blog.) As always, etsy only promotions.

From Gr0glmann, specializing in toy jewelry, I found these. Yes, purple lightsaber earrings. I kind of wish I'd seen these earlier, as my favorite little jedi is already bought for, and while she loves to kick ass with dual purple lightsabers, I'm not sure if she'd wear them as earrings. Still. Adorable!

Also, I know someone who's very fond of moons, and I cannot tell you

how much I really hate Twilight right now for all the flood of Twilight-themed crap on etsy that comes up when I start trying to look for a "moon" something.

Now, despite the pages of bogged down copyright infringement

items, I did find a lovely shop, Braithwaite Studios specializing in glass works. Beautiful handmade sun catchers, and now this is what you like to see when you search for "moon."

and last one before I have to run to my "day job," which is something I think would be funny for my brother's future first kid, but I'm not sure his wife would be amused.

The Design Vine has this hilarious baby-thing. I know, the photo had to be shrunk to fit and is hard to read, but go to the shop and browse around. See the full size images.

In fact, go to all of these shops and browse around and look at their awesome stuff. Hopefully, I might have given you some ideas for what to get your family/friends.

DragonCon

Yeah! Back, and I know, I was technically back on Wednesday, but it's been kind of weird/strange slow-ish week, and at least one day of hell.

So, first, I have yet to locate any *good* pictures of us from D*Con, have been scouring flickr and google and other as much as I can and so far, nada. So, if you see us, let me know. Might even throw in a thank you goodie of some kind.

So, a revamped of last year's Mad Scientists costume:

Goggles by: Darkly Sewn of Etsy

Both Lab Coat/Lab Coat Dress customs by: Aughra Moon (

roommate and pro seamstress)

Arm band Test Tube holder by: Lost Realm of Etsy

Thigh holster by: BoMoLuTra of Etsy

Raygun by: Agent of Chaos of Etsy

Boot spats by: Faitavec of Etsy

(and those are fiber optic hair clips I got off ebay, and the

pink stuff in the test tubes is X-rated, lovely neon pink vodka liqueur flavored with blood orange, mango and passion fruit. Nummy! And a nice way to spike a Sprite in the hotel lobby!)

And then there was our Steampunk costumes. This is our first year with them, and we'll both need a LOT of accessories before next year to up the steampunk factor.

Now, this is the ONLY picture I have of us in these costumes together, so this one is a HUGE - PLEASE - if you see a picture of us in these costumes, let me know! I don't know what happened, between my camera, Bentley's Iphone (which is one of the new ones with the actually decent camera) and our other friend, Mel's camera (this one was from hers).

Goggles by: Darkly Sewn of Etsy

Necklace, obviously by me, Izile's Oddities

Shirt by Lip Service Corset by: Timeless Trends

Skirt by: Aughra Moon (roommate and professional seamstress)

and Bentley's leather doublet and shirt are by: Ravens Wood Leather (he also wanted me to note that he did actual have pirate boots that he did end up wearing, they were just in the car and he hadn't gone and gotten them yet)

So, those were the costumes of this year, and those are all the etsy sellers who helped me put together these looks. And you know I'll be looking for more for next year!!

Also, one last thing. They aren't etsy sellers, but I love it so much I have to brag. DragonCon weekend always falls on Labor Day weekend, which is always my Birthday weekend (9/4), so while the whole trip is kind of a birthday present, this was my actual tangible birthday present from Bentley, from Brute Force Leather

Blargum

Exciting title, right? Just kinda how I'm feeling this morning.

So, the fair went fairly well. It did rain from almost 2-6pm, so no customers for that part of the day. I had a few experiments at table that are not on my etsy store. I had made homemade bath bombs. I had a "Blackberry Bramble" which was blackberry fragrance oil with rose petals and cocoa butter; and I had a "Sweet Summer Tea" that was lemon balm, lemon and peach fragrance oil with cocoa butter. Those sold out and most of them went pretty fast. I had only made 4 of each, so it didn't take much to wipe them out. Something to consider for future fairs. I also had made a batch of my "Demon Cookies" to give away free as product testing. Everyone seemed to love them, one lady told me I should be charging $3.00 a piece. Wow!

So, I guess now I just look for the next available opportunity.

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Well, it's slowly getting to be that time of year where my thoughts turn to DragonCon, my costume, and the Mad Scientists Ball.

Sadly, while steampunk gets more and more popular, and more and more a broad-spectrum and inclusive term, mad science just isn't really growing the way I'd hoped. Kids today, they just don't have the same global-domination dreams like we did when I was little!

I admit, I was looking for something particular. Remember last year at this time, I plugged this Mad Scientist Shooter Bar for drinking your shots out of test tubes. Well, I was told by a friend who went with me, that they saw a guy at the nearby liquor store who had the same concept, but built into a leather wrist brace. Apparently, he was standing at the counter, holding his wrist up to explain, pointing to the slots for each test tube saying "rum, vodka, bourbon, tequilla. . ." I wanted to see if such a thing was on etsy. . . sadly no. It's not as cleaver as the Steampunk Professor X who's steam powered wheelchair also chilled and dispensed massive quantities of any liquid, but I figure it'd also be a lot less labor, time and money.

Muah-ha! With persistence I have found Lost Realm's "Potion Holder" which, isn't 6+ test tubes around the wrist, but two off the belt is going in the right direction! Pictured left is the "simple" potion holder, but for $5.00 extra, there is another potion holder in a nearly black-brown leather with a D-ring for attachments and screw on metal caps.

This seller seems brand new. Joined in May of 2010, has four items for sale and 1 positive feedback and 1 sale. You know I always like to encourage everyone to help out the new guys! My costume doesn't have a belt (and wouldn't look right to add one) but I may have to talk to my guy-friend (who wants a belt) about this possible addition!

Wootage!

Well, before we get to the woot-age, the awwww-age: guess I'm not doing the Brooklyn Indie Market this weekend, turns out the kiosks were already booked up, just didn't hear back for a very long time. Ah well, it gives me more time to get ready for DragonCon! WOOT-AGE!

So, I've ordered the boot-spats, and I bought the goggles (see both in last post); and I'll bribe my roommate for the lab coat/dress when she gets back from Alabama. I need to order those fiberoptic hair fasinators, but I keep forgetting. Must do that after I blog!

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So, I'm still on the whole mad science and steampunk kick, but let's get away from the costumes and wearables for a change of pace.

Eagles Nest Wood Crafts has a Mad Scientist Shooter Bar. I love the photography and the pitch, too; showing two of the test tubes filled with two different shots.

My host for DragonCon is also going as a mad scientist and has wanted to have a belt that holds test tubes for similar shooter purposes. I've even been looking into a dried, powdered additive that could be poured from test tube into any beverage, and make it fizz and change color without effecting it's drinkability. (thinking some combination of powdered food color, citric acid and baking soda. All harmless when injested, and should prove interesting when added to clear liquors.)

And, because I haven't done any art promoting in a while, J Van Hulle's Steampunk Burlesque Art is a must visit! I had to pick her Dr. Girlfriend variation because . . well. . just because it's awesome!

Prints of all her vintage style scienc/steampunk babes are avialble from $57 to $125, depending on the size.

Wherefore art thou Geek?

I picked the title, because I get sick and tired of the commercial on tv thinking that "wherefore" actually means "where" and not "why". "Wherefore" means WHY. WHY ARE YOU, not WHERE are you. Gah! OK. Word-grubber vent over.

So, a friend of mine had taken this quiz, and being a sucker, I had to take this one. No, this is a shop blog, and it's not going to become a quiz farm. One time exception.

82% Geek

OnePlusYou Quizzes and Widgets

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PLUS, this makes a great segue into one of my favorite categories on Etsy. I do love the geek tag!

Now, I cannot possibly feature every single geek-chic item and seller that makes me LOL. But, here are some of my top picks!

Topping off the list with the most luxurious geeky line is Molecular Muse. We've all long seen the t-shirts with the molecular structure of caffeine; but Molecular Muse takes it a couple of steps further, first by offering it as sterling silver jewelry, and secondly, by offering custom words and phrases spelled out in amino acid. Wow. Now that's a GEEK! (all complementary here).

I have to admit, there's not much in her shop that I wouldn't covet, though the lack of superfluous holes in my head render the most affordable of her items (earrings) as no more a possibility for me than the several hundred dollar bracelet shown left.

Now for something completely different: Munchey's T-shirts. Now, he's got a wide variety of slogan tees here that range from groaners to almost witty. My favorite, and the reason he had to be included in this blog today, is the Klingon insult t-shirt.

It means "Your Mother has a Smooth Forehead." Yeah. That tickles the geek button in all the right ways right there. If you're more a fan of the groaner style. I'd suggest checking out his "You Got Rick-Rolled" t-shirt; and no, that's not what the shirt actually says.

Before hitting my last pick, I would like to say I am purposefully omitting any WoW and gamer items as a punishment to my friends back in Mississippi who can no longer carry on a conversation without mentioning Gorestag. I love some RPG, but if you can't go 10 minutes without it being brought up into the conversation, that's a bit of a failing, I believe. Diversify your geekdom!

Made By Paddy is getting the last plug because of his super-awesome wallets. I'm including the photo of his "Fat Man Plan" wallet, which is a schematic of the "Fat Man" atomic bomb. However, my favorite wallet is probably the "Bunker" wallet. You'll have to go visit his store and look it up. The outside has plans for a 1959 US fallout shelter. The inside contains a similar issuing from the UK government in the 1980's. Go look. I very nearly did myself a mischief.