Saturday morning, I went to participate in the 5th Annual "United We Run" Rad Rocky D Fun Run in SF. Basically, it's a 5k run along Crissy Field, near the Golden Gate Bridge. Tanya, Ivy, Jen, and I did the run. Felicia went to take pictures around the area, I think.
I was able to jog for almost all of the ~3.5 miles, but I ended up having to walk .2 or so of it just to catch my breath. It seems I've made a discovery; it's not my legs are too weak, it's that my respiratory system sucks donkeys. I was coughing a little on the way back in but when I actually finished, my legs were still in pretty good shape.
There was also a raffle at the end. Tanya won a nice big gift certificate for a facial at Ajune Skincare. I won a towel, shirt, and sweater. We were hoping Jen or Ivy would win the panini grill, but that didn't work out.
I kinda ignored spam comments and just quietly deleted them because they only appeared about once every 2 months. Until now. Some bastard has decided it'd be a great idea to add porn link spam in my comments.
So, the race is on! I've started with blocking a few choice url snips, so we'll see what happens from there.
If you're getting blocked from commenting back, well, email me.
MT-blacklist ftw!
This entry is depressing if not vague.
I don't know if she minds being IDed, so I'll leave it anonymous. A friend's mother passed away over this weekend after taking her best shot against cancer. For the time I knew her, she always had a smile on her face and was always very friendly to us. Her antics regarding phone calls were amusing as well. Unfortunete that it turned out this way. She will be missed.
Also this weekend, my mom asked me to print out a map off mapquest for her to go visit a friend. Mom's friend was also in the hospital diagnosed with stomach cancer. As a unmarried, top of the class (read stressed lifestyle), 40-something year old Bhuddist, she decided not to get treatment. Since she believes in reincarnation, she said something like she'll meet up with her friends again in the next life. Sadly, when my mom arrived, my mom found out that her friend left just a half hour ago.
May both of their bodies rest in peace and their spirits move freely on to their respective destinations.
GM sponsored a driving event called Autoshow in Motion where they took the parking lot at Great America and segmented it into several courses and let you drive a bunch of GM cars as well as competitor cars to see what you like. Brian, Yanting, Crystal, and I went on Sunday.
Personally, I think it's nice that they brought in so many different cars. But I could definetely see it working against them.
I drove an Escalade EXV, a Hummer h3 and h2, an Audi a4, a Corvette (Manual), and a Pontiac Solstice (Manual).
Things to note (For some reason I seem to remember the negatives here. Guess that's -1 for the advertisers.):
The Escalade really handles like a boat. Really. It rocks and leans as it makes "sharp" turns and everything!
The h2 was kinda fun because they set up a course with lots of dirt mounds including one that was basically like a 10 foot high ski jump except made of dirt. It was steep enough that it felt like it was going to tip over but obviously didn't. The hummer h3, on a road course, needs the left and right windshield bar moved outwards cuz it was blocking my view, and traction control trigger in my left rear wheel during a turn.
The Corvette and the Solstice were manuals. I stalled out 3 times on the corvette. :P I was impressed it had a decent feel during the one turn, but they didn't give us a twisty track to try it on, just a straight line. I think I might have gotten a better impression of it if it could show off some of the manuverability that is said to have been improved in newer generations.
The Solstice is that car that was on The Apprentice, I think. It was okay, nothing special about the driving experience but the interior looked really cheap. It reminded me of my dad's old Toyota Camry.
Each section, passenger cars, mini SUVs, trucks, urban assault vehicles, etc, is divided up into lines for GM cars and lines for non-GM cars. In the area with the mini SUVs, you could see the lines for all of the ones pretty much empty except the Mercedes ML and the BMW X3. If popularity was an indicator of anything, it would be that GM wasn't doing so well in this area.
Overall, I kinda got what I came for. I wanted to try some of the stuff that I'm fairly sure I'll never drive again. (giant american wannabe offroad vehicles)
Since Halloween just passed by, it seemed that now is a reasonable time to write this article which is already like a year overdue.
Considering that I watch a fair amount of select Japanese animation, I've grown accustomed to hearing opinions from people who also enjoy it and also from those don't. One of the topics happens to be in regards to the true fans who attend conventions as cosplayers. It seems some people really find cosplay (costume + play) bizarre. Nevertheless, the popularity of donning the outfit of your favorite character, whether they be from a movie or an animated series) becomes quite a bit more universal around Halloween. Personally, I find it a bit amusing to hear about those who when asked "can I get a picture," actually have a prepared pose and everything. And while I've never been to a major anime convention, I've been invited along in such groups who have thought it'd be fun to go in cosplay.
If I ever were to put together a typical costume and wear it to a convention, chances are, somebody will have the same outfit. Even a guy who's crazy enough to make a giant Dr. Octopus vs. Spiderman costume for Halloween contests mentions that he scours the floor to make sure he's unique. Yeah, it's probably the same kind of feeling that high school girls get when going to a dance making sure she's got a unique dress. But hey, I could be wrong. As a guy, we all wear a black suit jacket, black pants, a belt, black shoes, and possibly a unique tie. So we usually don't care because it's become to routine for us. However, if you're trying to be unique, that kinda changes.
If you're going to go to take the effort to dress up, might as well do it right. Make it actually look like the character. Like this. Though I can't tell if that's a girl dressed as a guy, or a guy dressed as a guy, it works. Unlike this. I'm sorry, if you're going to go as Gogo Yubari, you have to at least be female and properly shapely. It'd also help if you're an asian girl dressing up as an asian girl with attitude.
Consider that there's many characters which, while special, are fairly realistic anyways. Ruroni Kenshin as an example is a swordsman. His skill and speed are what makes him legendary in the storyline. There's no fireworks or casting magic or anything like that. Dressed as Kenshin, you're about as realistic as you're going to get without actually pulling out a sword and actually killing people.
Likewise, Yuuhi (from Ayashi no Ceres) was a character that I once considered dressing as. He's got no special powers himself, but he wears a headband with a glyph that lights up when it protects him from stuff. He cooks and his weapon of choice is a pair of long metal chopsticks. It's not too hard to wear a green robe, carry around some chopsticks, and wear a headband. Heck, it's not that hard to make the headband pulse or light up from time to time either. I just need to find a cute girl with long black hair in a schoolgirl outfit to pose with me.....
At any rate, Sasuke, the first example, is a fairly easy costume as you can see. A extra large blue sweater with a huge collar, some blue ribbons, a pair of white shorts, a headband plate from ebay, and some modified sandals. To match, you have to have relatively long hair and skin that is on the lighter side. Ethnicity doesn't really matter cuz he's drawn with vague ethnic features anyways. It is so easy a costume you're almost guaranteed to find duplicates all over the place as this person notes.
What then? Take it to the next level. Note that in one of the links above, Sasuke's blowing a hugeass fireball from his mouth. Unlike many anime characters, Sasuke doesn't have very many special abilities. They arn't really flashy like Yuna in FFX. Nor are they long pump, grunt, and blow the planet away sequences like in Dragonball and Pokemon (Reminder to self. Pump, grunt, and blow are all bad words to use in the same sentence. But both Dragonball and Pokemon suck anyways for lack of plot so I don't care.) In fact, he's relatively human except for the following:
1) His eyes glow red when he uses his power to see better. (Sharingan)
2) He can collect up spiritual energy to make a ball of lightning in his hand. And he DOES NOT launch it. (Chidori)
3) He can blow fire like Dhalsim in Street Fighter 2. The fireball in the link I was talking about? Exaggerated for the sake of a cool looking wallpaper. In the anime, as himself he doesn't make them that big. It's really short range like Dhalsim. (Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu)
It's kinda obvious what I mean by "take it to the next level." Of course, bring to life some of his special abilities! Look. #1 is easily fixed because a costume company makes red Sharingan contact lenses. They've worked that out for you.
So on to #2. Mr. Tesla demonstrated the "skin effect" which says something about high frequency energy (those sparks from tesla coils) staying on the surface of a conductor (his skin). Now, there's evidence that despite that, some of those sparks might not shock you simply because your nerves don't respond to it. So that's not particularly good. However, Faraday demonstrated that a cage of metal can protect you from dangerous (and obviously non-dangerous) electricity. What's this mean for you?
Simple. You'll excuse yourself from having the generic Sasuke outfit by adding some gloves. In one of your arm sleeves, you can put together a mini tesla coil with the rest of the system grounded to a grid on the inside of your gloves with the antenna cables running through your fingers. This way, you're expected to get big ass sparks that don't ever hit you, but go directly for the center of your palm and return to the system through the grid and not your hand.
Still with me? What? I'm nucking futs? Come on, if you're not going to go all the way, you'll just look like another poser. :P But if you're really scared that your lightning will get out of control, I have another way.
Instead, let us be reminded that the little sparklers or "Roman Candles" as some people call it, makes sparks. Duh. And if little children can hold on to them without parents freaking out, you better be up to the task for holding on to one too. So, while they're not as cool nor noisy as real lighting sparks, it'll have to suffice. You'll have to make a few pellets out of the stuff on the sparklers by grinding it off and packing it together with a little water. And you'll now have to take your glove and add a small area which is fireproof. At the same time, wire it with a small ignitor so that you can have the pellet light up and spark from your palm. Better yet, embedded the ignitor along with a sort of plug that fits on a little socket in your palm. Oh, and might as well take one of those cheap $10 voice recorders from Toys r' us and record the sounds too. You know, for full effect.
This way you can make whatever gestures and gang signs you think are appropriate, while sticking the pellet in your hand. And then with a switch in the other hand, you can activate the ignitor and voice module right as you shout out "chidori!" to your audience of fan stunned by shock, awe, and jealousy. Yes!
Now on to the finale. You're going to go equipped not only to do a rendition of chidori, but Gokakyu no Jutsu. "Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu" translates to "Fire Element Technique: summon fireball." What better way to do this than to take the age old male tradition of taking a lighter and a can of hairspray, and doing exactly what the label tells you not to do? Don't tell me you've never tried that.
On the other hand, you're not going to run around with a can of hairspray cuz it's too big. You're also not going to run around with a full lighter cuz that's unsafe. You are on the other hand going to take one of the bic Electra lighters that makes sparks, empty it out for the sparky thing, and then equip your hand with that and a can of bianca.
You make the sparky thing be at the edge of your glove so that the spark comes out over a finger. You hide the bianca can the sleeve of your right hand. So after doing all the gang signs and summon gestures and pulling the bianca out, you shout "Gokakyu no Jutsu!" Take a big breath like you're about to spit fire, and then punch the button to light the bianca as it comes out, as you blow more air into the fireball.
There you have it. A proper Sasuke costume. Complete with live-action special effects.
Now, I do understand there's a lot of safety issues, and depending on what you trust or don't trust, there's many ways to get around it. For example, lighting bianca from a spark in your hand doesn't exactly seem all that reliable. You could turn that into a single unit where you just have to push a button and some electronics will take care of making the spark and spraying. But what if you push that button at the wrong time?
You could then make it so that it triggers only when certain fingers touch other fingers when forming the symbols that preceeds "casting" the fireball. Foil contacts or conductive cloth can be wired to a little controller so that when you're doing the hand gestures, they're actually entering a code to trigger the fireball. Wouldn't that look cool? A nearly fully automated suit.
At any rate, I have other ideas as to how this could be done. And while I'm not about to go to an convention with a mini flamethrower......yet....... It's still pretty tempting. I can just imagine the faces of people if they saw that.
Disclaimer: If you actually execute these ideas before I do, but manage to hurt yourself in the progress. It's not my fault. At all. And you agree to these terms by actually trying this stuff. But if you have pictures, I wanna see! But that still won't mean it's my fault if something goes wrong.
