• 1 cup Mirin
• 1 cup soy sauce
• 2 tbsp sake
• 2 tbsp rice vinegar
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 tsp light brown sugar
• 1 tsp red pepper flakes
• 6 cloves of garlic, cut in half
• 1 big square inch piece of fresh ginger, cut in half

Simmer the mirin and sugar until combined. Add in all the remaining ingredients except the shallot. Simmer uncovered for 15 minutes. Cover and simmer for another 10. 

I spend a lot of time in darker droning music so I need something full of bounce and a little cheese to get me going sometimes. Here’s the 35 songs I’ve got on my upbeat get to work playlist currently. It’s good any time of the day but if I want to work after 10pm it’s the only way to go.

If you’re a rdio subscriber or if you have the free rdio account you’ll be able to listen to the playlist below, otherwise you will only get 30 second clips of each song. I highly recommend getting at least a free account as it does give you a decent amount of free, ad free songs to listen to each month. I signed up before I hit my limit but I listened for 2 weeks without running out.

It only took 2.5 years, but I’ve finally got flowers that Flux hasn’t eaten!

Now if only I can get those damn bunnies to stop eating my tulips in the front yard.

I will never enjoy snow as much as my dogs enjoy snow.

They have one goal, to eat every single flake that has landed in our yard.

When they're not outside they watch the snow until they lay down to dream about it.

Our dogs are the happiest versions of theirselves.

Here’s the deal:

1. You have a great idea or a new album you want to record or you’ve invented something to make your life easier and need the money to get it off the ground.
2. You make a video about your awesome idea. (Optional, but most do and it really helps me see you and your ideas!)
3. You post the idea and video to kickstarter.com and you give yourself a goal amount and a number of days to reach the goal.
4. You set rewards for people who back you. This is the incentive to fund for most people. From simple thank yous to movie production credits. It could be anything.
5. You let everyone you know in the world about the Kickstarter.

And that’s how it gets to me. You get your idea out there and through Twitter, Reddit, Facebook etc people like me find out about Your Awesome Thing. And then we agree to fund it if others do.

Kickstarter is an all or nothing fundraiser. So, if you set a goal of $3000 in 45 days, and your time runs out with only having raised $2995 you do not get any funding. You have to meet your goal in the timeline chosen to get anything.

From the funding side Kickstarter uses Amazon Payments. The funding process is like so:

1. Find a project that is awesome and deserves to see the light of day (sorry folk singers whose albums I always ignore!)
2. Look at what kind of money the project wants and what incentives they’re giving away.
3. Input an amount you’re willing to pledge and if you choose, what reward in that range you would like to receive.
4. You’ll be sent to Amazon after selecting to authorize the payment.

This is the part where I tell you that Bank of America shut down my account when a payment went through for Kickstarter once. I have no idea if other banks do it, and BoA hasn’t done it again, but it did happen once and I had to call and automated system to reactivate my account.

If you decide to back a project then you should get regular updates about the projects from its creators. All the projects I’ve back have included lots and lots of communication and transparency into how my money was going to help and after funding how it was being used.

As you can see from above I’ve backed 4 successful projects at this point, and I agreed to fund some more that never raised enough money to be finalized. Last year I used a Seattle Toursaver book that I got as my reward from the Global Citizen Project to get deals around town. I’ve got mathematician dice in my purse. Last night Jason and I played a hilarious game of Creatures before bed. And here’s a picture of Flux I took with my Pinwide pinhole cap:

People are out there making enjoyable, neat things at a ridiculously fast rate. I love that I get to help out in some way, and I enjoy all the rewards I’ve chosen. With the Anthony Ryan Auld project I’m trying something new. I’m backing for a single dollar. Lots of projects only slightly interest me, but most of them have a $1 to $3 dollar level with no physical reward. If it was interesting enough to get me to look and read through everything, then I feel they deserve that little bit. Every dollar helps toward a goal.

Now, go find something interesting on Kickstarter and give them a dollar (or more).

So I recently got a new set of coworkers, of the 2 legged and 4 legged type.

I left my job testing software for Large Seattle Area Freight Forwarder to test software for a small company.  The advantages to this were plenty. I would no longer spend my days in polyester shirts, sweater, dress slacks, there would be no more 40 minute commute each way and I would get to work from home.  The extra special bonus is that Jason also works from home.

So, since September 19th I’ve been waking up every morning at 7:45, letting the dogs out, making a cup of coffee and then sitting down to work. Then I get to stop working almost 2 hours before I was previously getting home. It’s wonderful.

Plus, I get to spend all day with 2 great girls laying around my office.

Another year, another PAX.

I'll be honest, I don't really play a lot of games, certainly not enough to stand in line for 4 hours to demo one. But I want to. I feel games played the most formative part of my childhood and added a lot of actual value to how I think and react. It's nice to be around others who've had the same experience, and to see other kids in the midst of it. As the signs around the convention center say, "Welcome home."

PAX is about much more than games though, as the community takes on a life of it's own. This year I participated in Buttoneering, which was 200 or so PAXers who had pinback buttons made representative of them for trade with one another. Many, including myself, also made a bonus button available for trade for other bonus buttons or some other special feat.

My main button is the tiny button in the lower left hand. It's also my avatar on the PAX forum. It's Ness from Earthbound up against a giant Iron Pencil, I just used photoshop to make the pencil 100x bigger than it is in game. If you ever hear me talk about Earthbound it will sound like I'm talking about my first love, the game was just that good. Our first trip to Japan the souvenir I brought back was the original Earthbound game, Mother, for the Japanese famicom system. This button was a good representative of me, the gamer to a crowd of 25,000.

My bonus button was that large thing up top TEAM NOTCH. Notch, a wonderfully sweet man who Jason and I got to meet when we delivered 2 of these buttons to him, is the creator of Minecraft. He's a true overnight success story. And after Minecraft his company is creating a game called Scrolls…except giant game company Bethesda has a line of game called The Elder Scrolls: Some bullshit tagline stuff. So, Bethesda is suing Notch and his company on the grounds their games might get confused. So, the button is my show of support for Notch. It was ridiculously popular for the whole crowd and ended up going to anyone dressed up as a block or creeper from Minecraft as well.

I handed out over 100 buttons, which allowed me to collect over 100 buttons from other Buttoneers.

The creativity in the buttons is amazing, and it was a great way to meet other people. I'm already working on my buttons for next year so that they can top TEAM NOTCH.

Since I'm hoping to be fully and well into the buttonmaking business for PAX Prime 2012 my goal is to be able to have a pre-PAX button making party, and to offer button making services for PAX for everyone that are affordable and include a donation to Child's Play.