Mr. Dude appreciates that I appreciate Weird Al. Of course, Mr. Dude has been listening to Weird Al's CDs since forever, whereas I just point out the fact that Al did most of a college education at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, near where I grew up.
It's not what you know, but who you know, people.
Or who's famous from your hometown.
But I digress.
Our favorite Weird Al video is "White and Nerdy".
Let's just say it's spot on for how I think of Mr. Dude, except that he's not quite that awkward.
Here, for your viewing pleasure, you should probably watch it, too. It'll make your day.
Why am I thinking of this?
Two reasons:
1. Mr. Dude sent me a new "Epic Rap Battles of History" video to watch, with Weird Al making a cameo as Sir Isaac Newton. Internet gold, I tell you. [And whist you're at it, go ahead and just watch everything in that series. Again, it'll make your day. And take up a lot of your time that you could be using on, you know, useful things in life. But again, I digress ... ]
2. I've been sitting on my own treasure trove of internet gold with footage of Mr. Dude and one of his fellow nerds attempting to play DDR. I'm not sure if the game had them attempting to do the same steps or not because I couldn't actually see the screen, but I'm pretty sure that makes it even better. So allow me to help you meet your laugh quota for the week:
God bless the nerds!
Excuse me while I go clean up the Tea. Earl Grey. Hot. that just spewed out of my mouth while I was laughing so hard ...
[Near Gear Mondays. Where I tell you all about the random gear that Mr. Dude - or I - may or may not own. Or gear that we may or may not plan to own. Or gear that we may or may not find interesting. You're welcome.]
Once upon a time, a long time ago, baby gear was all about what baby actually needed.
And then along came things like dishwashers, washing machines, dryers, vacuum cleaners and electronic baby swings ... suddenly, people had time on their hands for more than the bare minimum. So they started coming up with things that would be cool for baby to have, which usually coincides with "things baby definitely doesn't need to have".
[As a long time babysitter and nanny, I've seen my fair share of the ridiculous things that people could swear they "need" for their kid. Wipe warmers, anyone? But I digress.]
There are some baby items which - admittedly - baby does not need.
BUT! Mom and Dad find them cool.
Bonus points if Dad finds them cool, because supposedly that makes Dad more interested in hanging out with baby ... or at least feeling like he has a say in some of the gear that you buy. [Let's be honest. Most dads don't care about decorating the nursery or picking out a diaper bag.]
Bonus Points: It's even made of maple. How very ... um ... Canadian of them, eh?
Whenever Little Guy gets a Little Gal or a Littler Guy to teach about all things nerdy, I can almost guarantee you that we'll buy one as a teaching prop for him to use. You gotta equip the next generation, you know.
Can you hear the conversation now?
Little Guy: Here, baby. This button helps you jump and this one makes you go faster. This one helps you get the extra star ... No, no, no! You don't eat it! That will make Mario fall down and die! Future Little Sibling:[blank stare, blink blink, continues chewing]
[Sigh. This is the part where I resign myself to my fate of always living in a house of nerds ... in case you hadn't caught on to that yet ...]
In the computer world, "bug" is a bad, bad word. [This is where all the coders start shuddering.]
Within the confines of my house, "bug" means "pest that's only alive because the cat isn't doing her job or Mr. Dude hasn't killed it yet even though I asked a whole 2 seconds ago".
For my garden, "bug" means "that thing that's trying to eat all the plants!"
As far as my to do list is concerned, "bug" refers to the verb, as in - "I haven't done Item A [or Item B, or Item C, or Item D, or Item E ...] yet, and it's starting to bug me".
For the purposes of this blog, "bug" explains the content of this post, and I'm going to refer to all of the above.
Let's go in reverse order, shall we?
To Do List: Let's just say that mine has been rather long, without much progress and without enough coffee. [For the record, there's never enough coffee. You'll be my best friend if you bring me some good coffee. Promise.] We've had lots going on with Mr. Dude's work schedule, Little Guy's sleep schedule, and my manage-our-home-behind-the-scenes schedule. Thus, the blog fell off the "highest priority, must get something posted today" radar. Hard to blog about life when you're too busy living it, right? Don't worry - it gnawed at me. So we're back.
Garden: The bugs in the garden have been watching us pull up undergrowth, kill off the moss that was eating our lawns [oh, the joys of living in the PNW] and set up all kinds of accessories. Our backyard is now sporting some awesome garage sale finds and hand-me-downs: patio table and chairs, solar LED umbrella [oooh! blinky lights!], fire pit, and gas bbq grill. [Can you say "neighborhood cookout"?!]
If you thought Mr. Dude's only hobbies were building and modifying computers or finding random videos on YouTube featuring reviews of the Goat Simulator game given by a gal who just ate a habanero pepper stuffed with ghost chili pepper sauce, then you were mistaken.
He ALSO loves sprucing up a much-loved grill to make it shine like new and filling up the gargantuan yard waste can with vines and dandelions and blackberry bush clippings. Not the stereotypical nerd who never sees daylight, I tell you. [Although, did I tell you about how he worked in the basement at our university's IT Help Desk, and they had pictures of windows overlooking sunny landscapes on their computer desktops in lieu of actual windows? Apparently the nerds thought their virtual UV rays were sufficient ...]
But seriously, when he's not doing yardwork, he really is looking up Goat Simulator game reviews.
House: I've been doing my own geeking out over things like design, function and decorating. I may or may not have spent most of a sunny day outside, lounging in our new-to-us patio furniture and reading this:
Mr. Dude likes the "DIY" concept for building computers; I like it applied to cooking and decorating. Also, I appreciate bloggers with a sense of humor, so I follow them on Bloglovin'. [Note: You could follow The Almost Nerdy Wife on Bloglovin', too. Just sayin'. #shamelessselfpromotion #justkiddingIhateselfpromoting]
The only downside is that I can't actually do most of the project ideas in here: we're waiting on even basic things like paint and hanging pictures until our walls are demolished and rebuilt. No, we're not knocking our entire house down. Yes, we have to redo most of our electrical work.
[1916 House + Nerd with Excess of Electronic Devices = Supply and Demand Imbalance]
Actually, we needed to do the update anyways [hellooooooo, knob and tube!], and I'm too lazy to paint walls that are just going to be torn up in a few months. But it's so much more fun to point out Mr. Dude's wattage consumption. He won't mind, though. He willingly measures how many watts his machines pull out anyways.
This is actually pretty low, especially after we had legit outlets installed downstairs, in addition to the lightbulb-to-outlet conversions he had done. Otherwise, he had a ridiculous number of devices daisy-chained to a single extension cord running off one outlet in the mudroom/pantry just up the stairs from his man cave and it was consistently up in the 400s. We really need to get the electricity finished, folks!
Where were we?
Oh yeah. Decorating. Or not. At least not until Mr. Dude's machines can't cause a shortage throughout our entire house and blow every fuse in the box with one fell swoop of overclocking.
Excuse me. I'm off to go stock up on batteries for the flashlight in case of Wattage-gate.
Maybe I'll buy a can of paint while I'm at it.
[*Bonus Points for those of you who ever watched the Cartoon Network "June Bugs" specials where they ran a marathon of Warner Brothers' Bugs Bunny cartoons. Ah, such wonderful childhood memories.]
Or in my case today, what about a second cup of tea?
There have been a lot of second "cuppas" this past week as both I and this blog fell off the face of the earth. That's what happens when you've got one very sick Little Guy who decided that a fever meant lots of snuggling with momma and sleeping. I took to calling him a "Clingy Monkey". But at least he was a cute clingy monkey.
So, we're back. He's back to causing mischief, I'm back to writing, and Mr. Dude is the same as he ever was.
Well, except for today, when his company sent him to a SharePoint training this week instead of his normal work routine.
Know what he's most excited about?
Free, unlimited Mountain Dew.
You know, the kind of soda he used to drink during multiple weekends of playing waaaaaaay too much Halo in high school. He claims it's how he stayed out of trouble.
[I'm guessing his mom is grateful her couch got a little beat up by crowds of teenage boys working their way through endless levels of video games on the "Legendary" difficulty, rather than have her son get mixed in with the wrong crowd. I wonder if they thought to buy stock in Mountain Dew since they were probably single-handedly keeping the profit margin high?]
But back to real life outside of Mr. Dude's nostalgia trip today ...
I'm back on "PAX Duty" since he's out of WiFi. And back to real life chores after spending most of my weekend doing this:
Ever seen Meryl Streep's amazing performance in Julie and Julia? Holy cow. The movie is based on a mix of this book and the blog of a gal named Julie who learned to cook by working her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. I'm wondering if anyone can read this book without getting drool all over their face and not getting up at least three times to go scour the kitchen for something, anything that could be even a fraction as tasty as all the food she describes in her book.
The mug, by the way, is full of Earl Grey. Hot. Make it so. [Yeah, that was a Star Trek reference. I know.] Because every good book needs a good mug or glass of something yummy to accompany it. One friend suggested that I have a good glass of wine, some fantastic crusty French bread and a really creamy Brie to savor while I read. I agreed, but I was fresh out of all three. And too glued to the book to go to the grocery store. So I settled for the tea. Much more British than French, but still tasty.
So that's what I geeked out on this weekend. Mr. Dude may be writing PowerShell scripts for this and that, continually locking down our network, and waiting for PAX Prime tickets to go on sale. I'm learning how to cook all sorts of tasty things.
C'mon. 'Fess up. What hobbies did you do instead of chores this weekend?
If Mr. Dude had his way, there'd be a giant arcade game - or multiples - somewhere in our home, with a library of all the best titles from days gone by.
For now, he's stuck with an emulator on his original Xbox, the arcade library on the Xbox 360, and his dream.
But wait! There's more!
The BBC posted an article a few days ago about the Internet Archive making a bunch of games available to play on any internet browser.
[Yes, I read the BBC news. And yes, this article caught my eye. Can you tell that Mr. Dude and I have been married for a while? He must be rubbing off on me ...]
Sound isn't available yet, but apparently it's coming. The article also speaks of bespoke [haha! I think I made a funny there ...] cartridges that the old games used to run on and are getting harder to find. So they're doing the equivalent of translating old photographic slides into digital jpg files.
You know, the folks who try not to give Christmas the time of day until after Thanksgiving has passed.
No Christmas music.
No Christmas decorating.
And definitely no Christmas tree or lights.
I keep up my fall home decor until the day after Thanksgiving and enjoy a day full of turkey, family members (not to be confused with the turkeys), and giving thanks.
Folks, it's now after Thanksgiving.
Time for Christmas!
We took a rather long and crazy trip to CA to visit family last week, so of course I have lots of nerdy happenings to relate to you. But it also meant that we had lots of things to unpack and clean.
My reward for finishing it all?
A cup of coconut 'nog (don't knock it till you try it), decorating for Christmas, and watching this:
Oh, Kermit. How we love your endearing rendition of Dickens' classic tale.
[This is where I'd like to draw your attention to the resolution on the TV screen. You'll note that it's kind of fuzzy, because it's only a DVD and not a Blu-Ray. Gasp! Mr. Dude will be ecstatic to find out that I actually noticed the difference in quality after all the times he's pointed it out and I've simply shrugged my shoulders because I neither noticed nor cared. I suppose if you're going to have HD, you may as well use it to its full potential, right? Drats. I think he's rubbing off on me. Meanwhile, I'm searching Amazon for a Blu-Ray copy of The Muppet Christmas Carol.]
Only 21 days till we celebrate the birth of our Savior! What are some of your traditions to celebrate the season?
No, not our own nostalgia for college - although we are headed to our own 5 year reunion soon.
[Gasp! We're old!]
We stumbled upon this nostalgic video game art in all of its 8bit/Post It Note glory during an afternoon family walk. It's brought to you by a dorm at a college here in town:
Mr. Dude, of course, thinks it's awesome.
Meanwhile, I'm starting a list of all the reasons why he can't do the same thing in our apartment windows, just in case he asks. Good to be prepared, you know!
They happen in the theater, and sometimes they happen in real life.
Like when Little Guy hits a growth spurt and decides that a full meal every two hours between 10 pm and 6 am for a week straight is necessary to life.
There's not enough coffee in life for me to function well after that, let alone blog.
In the meantime, Mr. Dude has made a declaration:
"Look, Stephanie! Little Guy's first console will be a Nintendo Gameboy. I'm going to start showing him how to use it!"
Aren't they just the cutest?
Okay, okay, I'll confess my bias. I only think they're cute because they're mine. But you have to admit that it's cute to watch a munchkin and his daddy hanging out together.
Side note: Curious as to how Mr. Dude acquired a Nintendo Gameboy?
A friend of ours decided to have a "Hipster"-themed birthday party and posted this as the cover photo for the event:
Source unknown. My apologies to wherever he downloaded this from!
Mr. Dude saw the guy on the right and immediately yelled out, "That's awesome!"
A search on craigslist and ebay ensued for a Nintendo Gameboy in good, working condition.
A trip across town and $20 later, and he had a new toy.
A trip to Goodwill and $5 later, and he had the appropriate gold chain.
A pair of shorts, a button up shirt, an origami paper bowtie and white socks helped him look like the hipster version of a guy from Weird Al's "White and Nerdy".
Ergo, more proof that my husband is most definitely a nerd. And a sucker for nostalgia.
Mr. Dude has a lifelong goal: Have our very own computer museum in the basement of our someday-house.
Doesn't matter that others before him have already built a collection for the public to enjoy so he could go visit anytime he wants. Nope, he wants to gather a bunch of "legacy" machines and tinker with them to his heart's content.
[Yes, computer museums exist. Didn't you know there's one in Seattle's very own SODO district? Mr. Dude passes by it every day on his way to work. I'm surprised he hasn't stopped by yet and just gotten lost inside, ogling at all the amazing technology. If I remind him about it, we may never see him again. He'd be lost in a world of computer nostalgia.]
So in yesterday's BBC news (yes, I read international newspapers; no, that doesn't make me cooler than you), the article on "Flossie" caught my eye.
Didn't you know about Flossie? Oh good, me neither.
But now I know that it's found a home and they want to get it working again in the next 2-3 years so people can interact with it in its very own museum-like environment.
I'm waiting for Mr. Dude to announce that we're headed to England to go visit the computer. Handy, since I want to visit England for a bunch of other reasons, too.
One quote in particular jumped out at me:
"Other editions of the machine were later used as props thanks to their arresting design. Doctor Who, the Pink Panther and the James Bond movie The Man with the Golden Gun all featured ICT 1301s."
Those are some good credits, Flossie! I've seen most of the Pink Panther and James Bond movies, so I guess I'll have to watch them again more closely to look for you in there.
Now comes my big confession of the day:
I've never seen a single episode of Dr. Who.
[Insert collective gasp from every Dr. Who fan everywhere. -
"Not seen Dr. Who?! Stephanie! How could you?! It's the best show EVER!!!!!!"]
For all the nerdy things I've watched, I've never watched that.
Shoot, I'm stalking the TV listings to figure out when the next season of Sherlock is coming (bother - Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch are in such high demand for things like The Hobbit, Star Trek and Comic Con that they can't even finish a lowly BBC series) and already have Downton Abbey on the calendar, much to Mr. Dude's shagrin. I'll gladly watch an episode of Mythbusters (despite their lousy science - they're mostly just hilarious). And I've seen episodes from most of the TV shows featured in Glove and Boots' History of Television.
But I have never seen Dr. Who.
THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is yet another reason why I am not actually a nerd.
Who needs to watch Dr. Who when I could read and drink tea instead? We call this picture of last night's agenda #nerdalert. And I blamed my sister for introducing me to such literature. She told me I'm not a nerd until I can say the Ring's inscription in the language of Mordor. I think I'm safe on that for a very, very long time.
Mr. Dude would like to point out that this version (yes, there were multiples! on and off Broadway and film!) came out in 1986.
Therefore, it is (supposedly) good.
Anyone think it's a tad bit on the tacky side? (*cough!* *sarcasm!* *cough!*)
Mr. Dude likes just about anything that came from the 80's and 90's. He considers that to be a strength. I, um, do not.
But this one is a conundrum for me.
I, for one, like musicals. As in, I've seen a lot of them. As in, I can sing the songs or remember the quotes from a lot of them. As in, I was skeptical of Wicked being as good as everyone claimed it was simply because I had seen so many truly amazing musicals.
I also like oldies music. It's one of my default musical genres for listening to at any time (although I do make fun of my parents for how some of their favorites like Chicago and Journey keep showing up on the free stages at the fair).
So Little Shop of Horrors is a musical. Offbeat. Weird. But a musical.
AND it has Levi Stubbs playing the part of the Audrey II. Yeah, I couldn't remember who he was, either. That's what Wikipedia is for. He was the lead singer of The Four Tops with such hits as "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)" and "Baby I Need Your Lovin'".
Oh, and we'll just throw in Rick Moranis (dad on Honey, I Shrunk the Kids), Steve Martin and Bill Murray because we can.
Great lineup. Great genre of movie. Fantastic singing ability.
Still very, very, VERY tacky.
Siiiiiiiiiiiiiggggggggghhhhhhhhhh ......
Do I have to like it?
Okay. Fine. I'll say I do. But I don't want to.
Just don't tell Mr. Dude. He'll be all giddy about the chance to say, "I told you so!"
You know you're a foodie when ... it's 10:30 at night and you're waiting for your homemade Italian minestrone to finish simmering so you can taste it and then go to sleep.
Apparently I got waaaaaaay too excited about my meal plan for the week yesterday and decided to do a bunch of cooking all at once rather than waiting to cook on the day(s) when we're supposed to actually eat each item.
So now we have [extra] spicy tomato soup and minestrone awaiting us in the fridge.
Oh yeah, and the last of the potato soup I made this weekend.
And a squash soup I pulled out of the freezer to make room in there for some of the new soup.
Monday took TWO cups of coffee for me to function like a semi-conscious human being, especially when Little Guy decided that 4:30 am and 5:30 am were good wake up times this weekend.
This morning, he actually let me sleep (mostly) till 6. It was heavenly.
Not to worry. Despite the crazy "let's pretend we're three time zones away" schedule, it was a fun weekend.
For one, I did this:
"Never laugh at live dragons!" - The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien Duly noted.
while drinking this:
"Earl Grey. Hot ... Make it so." - Jean Luc Picard
I lucked out with a husband who says, "What can I do to help? Take Little Guy? Okay!"
I got an entire afternoon to sit and read The Hobbit and drink tea while he and Little Guy watched the Seahawks/Jaguars game upstairs with the neighbors.
And it was fantastic.
To be honest, I'm not sure if he likes hanging out with Little Guy more because he likes being a dad ... or because he likes having a legit excuse to act like a little kid. Either way, it's ridiculously fun to watch them giggle together.
Mr. Dude keeps telling me all the things he's going to do with our kids - play whiffle ball in the yard, go to the science center, play Mario Kart, build Lego sets.
I believe him, too, because those were a large part of his childhood and he loves any chance he can get to act on his nostalgia.
That being said, I should be on the lookout for hidden plans to build a treehouse, complete with acrylic window for a Star Trek-inspired clear screen thingy.
Mr. Dude has indulged me by watching all of Season 6 over the course of the last week. Big Bang Theory, that is.
Not The Next Generation.
We already did that.
In fact, we've already watched The Original Series, The Next Generation AND Deep Space Nine.
That's seventeen (17!) seasons, folks.
Not episodes. Seasons.
So when I reference Earl Grey and think of Picard, or when I see an episode of Big Bang Theory that has the main characters dress up as Data, Worf, Picard and the Borg ... I know what I'm talking about.
The irony?
Watching The Big Bang Theory counts toward the seasons Mr. Dude "owes" me since I watched SEVENTEEN (17!) seasons of one of his shows.
He's now seen SIX full seasons of Big Bang Theory and THREE full seasons of Downton Abbey.
He'd like to claim that each season of Downton should really count as 2, and that he should be off the hook for anymore since last season was such a heartbreaker.
And then I remind him that 6 + 3 = 9.
He's still short by 8 seasons.
So ... Casa de Nerds has a standing 8 pm Thursday date to watch Season 7 of Big Bang Theory (aka, laugh at the nerds) starting this week. And there will be a standing 8 pm Sunday date to watch Downton, starting in January, no matter how many times he protests. Even then, he's still got 6 more seasons of my choice to go ...
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