I Hate it When My Head Gets Clogged

The word of the day: feculent.


The other day I woke up on my boat and, as often happens first thing in the morning, I felt the sudden urge to go to the head* to sit down and catch up on my reading.  I ended up taking a number four** and when I got up and stepped on the flush pedal I was mortified when there was no flushing.  No flushing at all. 


On the boat I have a vacuum flush system.  This means that there's a ball valve at the base of the bowl and a vacuum pump and tank downstream in the plumbing.  It's a pretty foolproof system.  When working properly, stepping on the flush pedal opens such a powerful vacuum source that there's an audible rending of the air around the bowl itself.  Your ears pop and, if your mouth happens to be open when you flush, you may actually have the breath sucked from your lungs.  It's all very satisfying.


So you can imagine my dismay when I stepped on the pedal and nothing happened.  Not only did I miss the satisfaction of having my daily intestinal sculpture evacuated into some far away place where it would no longer offend anyone, I was also filled with dread at the thought of the repairs that I would get to peform on the system itself.


What follows is a tale of filth and flatulence, the slightest word of which could harrow up your soul.  There's also pictures.  In order to spare those folks who might have just eaten a meal, the rest is after the jump. Click "read more" if you dare...

Other People's Pictures from Maker Faire 2011

Just as the title says, these are pics I've found around the internets that were taken by other folks at the Maker Faire.  Clearly there were a lot of photographers there who were much more capable than me.  You can see my pictures in the previous post by clicking HERE.

Halo Cosplayers by Doug Luberts, on Flickr





"Master Chief and friends Maker Faire" by Doug Luberts, on Flickr






"Halo Guys" by Jen_Hansen, on Flickr



"Halo Soldiers" by DoNotLick, on Flickr


This guy interviewed me for a brief spot on CNET:

"Eric and Master Chief" by BeerNotBombs, on Flickr


You can see the video here: http://cnettv.cnet.com/maker-faire-2011/9742-1_53-50105322.html


The character on the left in this shot is Sir Tsaboc from 405th.com.  He was the only HALO costumer that I didn't bring with me and he came in his excellent ODST suit:

With a Spartan" by Tsabo Tsaboc, on Flickr


Melissa Howell, a very talented photography student, was on the scene and took tons of pictures.  Here's a couple of my favorites:

No infants were harmed in the making of this photograph.


Here's Trevor and Breana making my Marine armor look good:


She got one of the best shots I've found of my weapon display:

Unfortunately, this was after my crew had been pulling things off of it and replacing them haphazardly while coming and going in costume.


Then there's this goofy bastard:

Melissa Howell posted almost three hundred pictures from all around the Faire.  You can see more of her pictures by clicking HERE.



"Halo Helmets" by Kati Giblin, on Flickr


I've found a good many pics showing the helmet lineup on that side of the booth:

"Maker Faire Bay Area 2011" by Blake Maloof, posted by Bekathwia on Flickr>


So far this is the best shot I've found of the two beaky Space Marine helmets:

"Maker Faire Bay Area 2011" by Blake Maloof, posted by Bekathwia on Flickr


Here's a winning shot of my crew with the display in the background:

"Maker Faire Bay Area 2011" by Blake Maloof, posted by Bekathwia on Flickr


Plus one of a couple of Spartans and a Marine just milling about:

"Maker Faire Bay Area 2011" by Blake Maloof, posted by Bekathwia on Flickr



I've found some other pictures here and there, but my favorite of all is still this one:

"Master Chief Red" by ohad*, on Flickr

2011 Ancient Mariner's Regatta

Last weekend marked the 60th Annual Ancient Mariners Regatta, a chance for Sea Scout Ships from all over California to come together and match their skills in all manner of aquatic competition.  This year the regatta was held in Alameda at the USS HORNET Museum.


I cruised there aboard the SSS COMPASS ROSE.  When I say I cruised there, what I mean is I loaded my gear onto the ship and we got underway.  It was only a short while after that when I'd sat down to read a book.  Then I woke up and we were moored outboard of our sister ship, the SSS ALBATROSS out of Martinez, CA:

I guess I was overdue for some rest.

Attendance in all types of scouting has been on the decline for years, but you wouldn't guess it from the crowd that assembled for the opening remarks on Saturday morning:



For my part, I was the event director for Flotilla Drill throughout the weekend.  Flotilla Drill is a precision rowing event in which the crews are judged on their ability to crew a 26-foot whaleboat with eight oars.  This meant that most of my view for the weekend looked like so:



At some point my sister Rose snagged my camera to get pictures of the rest of the event, but all she really got was this shot of me debriefing one of the crews after their flotilla run:



Fortunately Melissa Howell, a much more diligent photographer managed to get these other shots:









In addition to plenty of pics from the flotilla drill, she snapped some gorgeous shots of other events. Here's Breeches Buoy:



Pulling Boat Race:



Scuttlebutt:



Flag Signalling:


You can see the rest of the pictures she took during the regatta by clicking HERE.  Out of all the photos Melissa took for the weekend, this one is still my favorite:


She also took this picture:


For the sake of retribution, I snapped this winning shot of her:



Because the crew of the COMPASS ROSE didn't have enough people to muster a full competing team, they combined with the crew of the SEA FOX for the duration of the regatta.  For all of their lack of previous cooperative practice, they actually did pretty good.

Finally, here's a shot of the two crews after the dress blue inspection on Sunday night:


At least they look like they've got their act together...

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I'm on TV!

Well not me, but a couple of my little Cthulhu Thinker bookend statues appeared in the season finale of  SUPERNATURAL.  I'm still looking for a couple of screen captures (they can be seen in the background in a couple of scenes) but the show's art department was kind enough to send me a few photos showing my statues on the set. 

Here's a closeup of one of them sitting on a mantle:


A wider shot showing where he fits into the bigger picture:


The other one is centered on the lower shelf above this desk:


Their property masters added a faux marble base to the bottom of each statue to make it stand out a bit better.  It looks pretty good, so I'm thinking I might start offering them this way:


In the meantime, you can get yourself one of these statues from my Etsy shop: http://www.etsy.com/shop/thorssoli

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Time to Unload a Few Things

For those of you who've been looking forward to having me list more of them, I've posted three more of my Combat Garden Gnomes to my Etsy shop.  Here's what they look like:

You can find them here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/thorssoli

I've also listed one of the HALO Sniper Rifles I had at the Maker Faire on Ebay.  Here's a shot of it sitting on the back of a friend's truck:


You can bid on it by clicking here: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180675671202

I'm sure I'll end up posting more things for sale both to my Etsy shop and my Ebay listings.  Stay tuned...