I love a good con. I’ve only been to two now where I really felt at home with the theme and the attendees, but when you find the right con and throw yourself into it wholeheartedly there is a lot of fun to be had. Sure I was on my feet for hours each day. I waited in many lines, ate bad cafeteria food, and slept very little. But man, it is all worth it for those moments when you look around you and realize that you are amongst your people. And your people are all having a damn good time.

The Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood "protest" cookie.

The Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood "protest" cookie.

Of course cons with exhibition halls are not entirely about having a good time. They are also often about the hunt for the sweet swag. People will line up for hours for a shot at a good t-shirt, and I am not entirely above that. (Note to exhibitors: more sizes for women, please.) So I give to you my notable swag list from PAX this year.

1. Aion Online shirt with a big angel dude on the front. I don’t play Aion, but I like shirts.
2. Stylized Typefrag shirt, given out at the Raid Warning podcast panel.
3. Retro-style brown shirt that says “Hardcore Pawnstar”, which I obtained for playing some battle chess game for 10 minutes.
4. Torchlight II shirt with a genie on the front. Obtained by PAX companion while I was fangirling in line for Star Wars: The Old Republic.
5. Megaman-ish stylized LEGO dude shirt for LEGO Universe, caught mid-air by limber PAX companion. Too small for either of us, but I kept it anyway.
6. Incredibly kickass Dungeons & Dragons woman’s shirt (gasp!), with a retro heavy metal design. Obtained for free at the D&D Bus.
7. “Kill the healer first” official PAX t-shirt. I paid for this one! Also, seriously, take my word for it as a frequent healer – kill me first or you’ll regret it.
8. A Dead Rising 2 bobblehead, obtained for playing the demo. Any zombie game where you can wield a kayak paddle with a chainsaw tied to each end is okay by me.
9. A .. canned stuffed piggy. This was supposed to just be limited to current Aion players, but we bluffed our way into getting one because it looked cool.
10. A set of Bethesda postcards.
11. A “bionic mustache” for some Capcom game. I didn’t even care which one it was — FREE mustache!
12. A cookie from the fake Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood protest group. Friends don’t let friends shank friends!
13. A whole pile of beta keys, lanyards, pins, stickers, novelty fliers, and samples.

Totally Magnum PI.

Totally Magnum PI.

I have to admit that by the end of the weekend I started viewing t-shirts as pelts, collected as a trophy from each kill (or hands-on game session). Of course swag isn’t everything, though. I haven’t even talked about some of the panels or the concert or the neat cell phone games for folks who lined up early or or or or or… *flail*

See you next year, west coast geeks. <3

Alternate Universe (retro) Posters. I would go see pretty much every single one of these.

An officer took Animal Control property home and ate it, and that’s not appropriate.

– Bay County Animal Control Director Resigns Following Pig Slaughter

“Frances Bean Cobain, daughter of late grunge-god Kurt, is 18 today. Meaning: you are old.”

– Gawker

Punishments meted out to sinners in Dante Alighieri’s Inferno, via Lapham’s Quarterly.

Traitors to their country are doomed to an eternity of cannibalism, whereas Gluttons get rain. Hello, I live in Vancouver! Pass me another beer, Dante.

(Why are hot weather foods really hot to make? Frying chicken and boiling a giant pot of potatoes are not very refreshing at 90°F.)

I thought about it and read some recipes, and decided that it was time stop hypothesizing and make a big bowl of Asian Potato Salad. And here is, roughly, what I did:

Step One: Potatoes

Unsurprisingly, potatoes are a key part of.. potato salad. I used eight fist-sized red potatoes, scrubbed with the skins on. I only cut them in half before boiling, because on MasterChef Australia they said that cooking pre-cut bites of potatoes can cause them to absorb a lot of water and have a weird texture. Anyway:

1) Boil potatoes in salted water for about 20 minutes or until soft.
2) Drain and put in the fridge to cool.

Step Two: Peanuts

One of my requirements for this salad was that it be vegetarian. While lots of recipes called for bacon, I wanted some little crunchy salty flavor nuggets without the meat. Enter peanuts! I used Vietnamese chili sauce for spice — it has chilies, vinegar, and garlic as the main flavors and oh MAN do I love that stuff.

1) Put a little bit of sesame oil and some vegetable oil in a pan to heat up.
2) When it’s warm, toss in some cocktail peanuts, salt, a bit of green onion, a bit of minced cilantro, and the chili sauce.
3) Keep the peanuts moving in the pan!
4) In about three minutes they will have some browning and look delicious, so you can take them off the heat.

Step Three: Not Potatoes!

1) Chop up about a cup of bok choy. I kind of cut up the stems like they were celery, and then added ribbons of the actual leaves.
2) Chop up about one red pepper. I like my red pepper in very small pieces, for what that’s worth.
3) Chop up a bunch of green onion.
4) Mince some cilantro.
5) Get the potatoes out of the fridge, and chop those into bite-sized pieces. (Okay, there are SOME potatoes in this section.)
6) Mix all of the above in a big bowl.

Step Four: Dressing

This is where taste comes into play. I don’t like gloopy dressings, and despite my penchant for spicy stuff I didn’t want to terrify any picnic goers. I think after eating a serving the consumer was left with a pleasant tingle in their mouth, which is just about right in my opinion.

1) Put about a cup of mayo in a bowl. This is the base.
2) Add some of this stuff: sesame oil, soy sauce, hot mustard (just a bit, this isn’t your heat source), sugar, and salt.
3) Add some vinegar to loosen up the mayo and cut the fat. Lemon juice would also work, and might be more thematic.
4) Got it close to what you want? Now it’s time for the spice: wasabi powder! Add it a little bit at a time for obvious reasons (unless you hate your fellow picnickers!)

Step Five: Nomming

1) Add the dressing to the chopped veggies and mix it all together. Taste and re-season as necessary.
2) Sprinkle the peanut mix on top at the last minute (to avoid soggy peanuts).

This turned out pretty dang well, even if it didn’t have bacon.

Billy Mitchell Regains Donkey Kong Record

If you’ve watched King of Kong, the excellent documentary about the fight to be the world’s top Donkey Kong arcade player, then you know who Billy Mitchell is. Ooooooh, he’s irritating.