prepare to be INTIMIDATED

... or not, actually.


a couple weeks ago i rolled my lazy ass out to Carowinds to check the new rollercoaster, "The INTIMIDATOR Inspired by Racing Legend Dale Earnhardt." call me crazy, but i was somewhat skeptical of getting on a rollercoaster inspired by a dude who crashed into a wall, had a restraint malfunction, and died. nevertheless, i freaking LOVE rollercoasters, so i figured i'd better hit it up before the summer masses rolled the park. unfortunately, it was closed for repairs.

the second day the park was open for the year, yeah.

but! the GIFT SHOP was wide-open for business, and business was booming.


yes, people were buying mementos of a ride they had not ridden. god love the south, am i right? (please note the gentleman in the lower left wearing a fabulous NASCAR t-shirt, this was quite the recurrent motif during my Carowinds adventure.)

anyway, i hit pretty much every other interesting ride in the park and figured i'd check the "INTIMIDATOR Inspired by Racing Legend Dale Earnhardt" again on my way out. wonder of wonders, it was up and running again. yaaaaaaaaaaaay, i hope i don't die!


looking up at this, it IS actually somewhat intimidating. it is REALLY high, and when the little train rolls into the station, you see that the only thing holding you into your seat is an independent-arm lap bar. it looked almost like a rolling movie-theater seat. behold:



but, something about the little seating design was terribly familiar. there was something inherently... southern... in its design, something that would appeal to NASCAR fans both stereotypical and otherwise...



yup. the freaking rollercoaster seats look like power scooters. now when your scootering through the local Wal-Mart you can pretend you are Dale Earnhardt and FEEL VALIDATED.

sometimes i really do love this world.

in summation: the ride was fun, very high, very fast, very very very fast, and DEFINITELY worth waiting for the front seat. it made a massive difference- hanging over that first hill, looking almost straight down, suspended only by a somewhat dubious lap-bar... fuuuuuuuuun times.

i have to admit

i am the worst blogger. which is cool, because i never want to be referred to as a 'blogger,' ever.

i have to come up with a cooler term.

in other news, i am the BEST 'procrastinator,' which is not actually news. because we all knew that.

in other, OTHER news i have decided i MUST make an 'Interview With the Vampire' costume. because i do not have like 23 other costumes to make first.

ADD. it affects lives.



this message was brought to you by 'it's 4:01am why am i still awake.'

i want a dragon like for serious

i went to see 'How to Train Your Dragon.'



i laughed, i cried, i wished i was a Viking. all in all, pretty much like any other day. it was pretty good, especially for a CG kid's movie (which i usually don't care for. even the ones everyone else in the world loves, like 'The Incredibles' or 'WALL-E.') the worst thing about it was the main character's voice, it was GRATING and sounded like someone doing a bad impression of someone else. in addition to his irritating voice, he looked eerily like the Jordu Schell/Charlie White puppet in the video for Interpol's "Evil.". this is not an association that is going to be problematic for the target audience of the film, but i spent half the movie waiting for the patented Charlie-White-Creepy-Twist.

LOOK AT THAT SHIT IT IS UNCANNY

everyone else was pretty cool, even the dudes who only got a couple of lines. the plot is pretty generic, but it's executed decently here.

the father and son 'breastplate/helmet' scene was my favourite in the movie, because it was simultaneously hilarious and sad, but the highlight of the movie is undoubtedly this guy here:



i wondered how they could have possibly made something so incredibly endearing, and then i realized that a lot of the team here also worked on 'Lilo and Stitch.' and i freaking LOVE Stitch, and i love dragons, so a dragon who looks like Stitch was pretty much a shoo-in for 'character of whom i need a toy and with whom i am unreasonably enamoured.' time for another comparison shot!

UNCANNY!

i wonder if Toothless has an experiment number?

ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you

there is no more magical combination than karaoke and beer.



(except possibly Elton John, Guns'n'Roses, and frat boys. that's a pretty hilarious combination too.)

the Dress-Off Saga 3: the NERDLUNGENLIED

IT JUST KEEPS GOING!

the second edition of the Dress-Off skit was much higher in production value and appropriate wig content. all the things i wished we'd thought of/done before the first edition were changed and added, and the 'story' of the skit was a little clearer. we are rival cosplay gangs, we are competing by dressing up, and Nessa cheats and wins by using the Death Note to kill us. the longer time frame was a big help, and also having some time to practice was rather useful.

3 minutes, 20 costumes...



the order, L to R is Richard, Ness, my brother Cliff, and me.

the costumes in this round are:

1. Trunks and Goku, Dragon Ball Z
2. Yugi and Kaiba, Yu-Gi-Oh
3. Sesshomaru and Inuyasha, Inuyasha
4. Rukia and Ichigo, Bleach
5. Henchman from Venture Brothers and Moononite from Aqua Teen, both on Adult Swim
6. the Hitachiin twins, Ouran Highschool Host Club
7. Sasuke, Naruto, Sakura, and Kakashi, Naruto
8. Near, Light, L, Mello, Death Note
all wrapped up with an OC/SNL 'Dear Sister' reference...

THAT is some classic nerdening. yessssss. we won 'Best Performance' and got a crazy ridiculous trophy, in addition to being the best Death Note cosplayers at the con. i talk a lot of shit about that convention (Nekocon '08) but i actually had a lot of fun in the bits where i wasn't passed unconscious from exhaustion or furiously gluing things trying to finish our costumes....

the Dress-Off Saga 2: the NERDENING

so, part two of the Dress-Off Saga...

we (by 'we' i usually mean 'i,' everyone else just humours me,) decided that our skit needed polishing, upgrading, and another shot at being performed. Alicia couldn't go to Nekocon '08 with us, but my 'little' brother stepped up and took over. because i am lame and also stupid i decided we all needed Death Note costumes: me as Mello, Ness as Misa, my bro Cliff as Shidou, Richard as Light,and Jin as L.



Richard and Jin took care of their own costumes, but i made the bulk of Mello, Misa, and Shidou. i spent a long, long time making my own wig, (which i didn't realize was too long until i saw pictures,) and due to my delightful procrastination problems, a great deal of the actual costumes were made AT THE CON, and a variety of things were glued rather than sewn properly. poor Ness was glued into her costume, which was basically made of plastic wrap. (sorry, Nessa.)



Ness makes awesome jewelry, so she hand-made my awesome rosary, her awesome rosary, my awesome rosary bracelet, and her cute little goth earrings. (they were not, however, awesome rosary earrings.)

Cliff's costume weighs a ton, is built on hockey shoulder pads so it's mad hot, has gloves with two-foot-long fingers, and has very limited visibility. he was also stopped every ten feet for pictures and/or hugs. (AND apparently masks are semi-illegal in Virginia, so he had to keep the head off while walking around, and put it back on and re-adjust it every three minutes for pictures. Cliff is far too patient with my dumb hobbies, and obliged with minimal complaining.) i think he secretly enjoys dressing up like a crazy person...

i spent a retarded amount of money on this costume, but i don't care. Mello is still one of my favourite characters, despite having a largely insane fanbase. he is also the victim of the "Marsh-Mello" phenomenon, wherein he is mainly cosplayed by pasty overweight girls...

...



...yeah. lol.

anyway- i spent so much time freaking out about our Death Note costumes that i almost forgot to freak out about our Masq performance...

embarrassment for posterity: the Dress-Off Saga

our FIRST EVER COSPLAY SKIT

for some unearthly reason i decided we needed to participate in the Masq at Animazement '08. my friends consented to participate. the idea had started out as an for idea video project, where we would put on shitty closet cosplays and abridge anime series- it evolved into SpeedCosplay- where participants would attempt to create a recognizable costume in a set amount of time. for a skit, all of the costume pieces obviously had to be pre-selected and pre-set. they DIDN'T have to be GOOD.



from left to right, the cosplayers are Richard, Ness, myself, (if i look fat it is because i am. god, i look SO BAD here...) and Alicia.

in case you can't tell, the characters are: (from left to right, in order:)
1. Goku and Trunks, Dragon Ball Z
2. Yugi and Kaiba, Yu-Gi-Oh
3. Inuyasha and Sesshomaru, Inuyasha
4. Henchman from Venture Brothers and Moononite from Aqua Teen, both on Adult Swim
5. Sakura, Naruto, Kakashi, and Sasuke, Naruto
6. L, Light, Mello, and Matt, Death Note

there is so much bad happening here- we'd never had the chance to practice together, we'd never been in a Con Masq before (although all of us had stage experience,) and i hadn't slept in days. the others weren't much better off. a shipment of wigs had not arrived from China, leading to some pretty ridiculous improvising, (my favourite of which was Naruto's furry yellow Bart-Simpson-esque hat-hair. my least favourite was desperately trying to find a wig for Mello, driving almost 100 miles total to get the crappy "Glinda the Good Witch" THING i ended up with, and making myself actually, physically sick because i was so stressed. good times. i have since learned about WIG STORES duh, and will never buy a Party City wig EVER AGAIN. but i digress.)

even so, it worked out- people thought it was funny. we won Best-in-Show at Animazement, and when we re-worked the skit, re-did the costumes, and changed the cast up a little, we participated in the Nekocon '08 Masq and placed.(in hindsight, i would not have entered what was basically the same skit- it was almost entirely overhauled, but it still seems unfair. we were essentially stealing the premise from ourselves...)

in the end, it's a piece of crap but i'm still proud of it. with help from my co-conspirators i created the skit, chose the characters, made about sixteen change-sheets so that everything would run smoothly (ha ha,) made sixteen shitty costumes (by made i mostly mean 'assembled from things found in thrift stores,' and edited the music, (which i'd never done before,) and performed it with almost no actual practice, and we made it almost work...

and thus, the SpeedCosplayers were born. next post: the return of the Dress-Off...

HEY

HEY!

HEY GUYS!



HEY!


that is all.