November 20, 2023

pokemon drag casserole

Hello, friends!

I had a refreshingly odd week. I've been making a lot of illustrations, sticking lots of stickers, learning some piano songs, and playing lots of Factorio. I'm going to share some highlights first, then at the end I'll share the interesting replies that I asked for last week.

I wasn't even walking in tall grass.

My 12-year-old neighbor knocked on my door this week and asked me if I wanted to play Pokemon. He taught me the rules, handed me his sister's deck, and destroyed me with Charizard(s). I tried to point out that my deck was much worse than his, but he just laughed. Apparently his parents were sick of losing and told him to see if I'd lose to him instead.

I am really grateful for my neighbors. Just as I was starting to feel a bit bummed about being bored that night, a Pokemon-pajama'd memorable experience knocked on my door.

Does anyone out there have an OP Pokemon deck I can borrow for the next time this happens? I want to destroy his Charizard(s).

If you're on the shore, then you're sho' not me-oh.

I attended a Decked Out Divas Cruise this weekend. It's a floating drag show on the Mississippi. It was a very cool, strange, casual, and fun. Also, the river is very pretty at night.

But the best piece of content captured that night is this video of me being captivated by the performance: frank astounded

Cassette Hacking

On Saturday I attended my second of four meetings of a "Cassette Hacking" remote workshop where we modify a walkman and play with cassette tapes to make cool sounds and learn and stuff. It's the third workshop I've taken with a group called Dogbotic. The first was DIY Synthesizers (which I recommend!) and the second was DIY Video Synthesis. Which was really difficult but really cool.

What's not a casserole?

I also attended an "It's Giving Casserole" dinner on Saturday. I'm not sure if this is a surprising fact or not, but I have never made a casserole. I tried to play to my hotdog-loving audience by making a Chili Cheese Dog Casserole. Despite the odds, it was actually kind of good. I don't think I'll ever make a hotdog-based casserole again because, let's face it, it doesn't need to exist. But it was pretty good, nonetheless!

Replies from Last Week

Rachel B. sent me this politically charged cheese meme.

Austin U. dropped some hot month facts on me:

Okay, so here's my interesting thing--and I bet most people already figured this out--but our months are absolutely fucked. It didn't occur to me until recently that the root Sept means 7, Oct 8, Nov 9, Dec 10. And yet September is our 9th month? December our 12th? WTF happened?

Of course the answer is the Romans. They originally used a 10-month calendar but realized that didn't jive with the sun. So they dropped two new months: January and February. A lot of people assume they added July and August, as those are named after a dictator and emperor, respectively. But that's not the case. Those months already existed but were later renamed for Caesar and Augustus.

Sara B. shared some yard shrooms that Google Lens identified as Sulphur Tufts. Don't eat 'em.

And Jordan W. shared his weird 6-string bass.

I bought this giant guitar a couple of days ago. It is called a Bass VI. It has six strings like a guitar, but is tuned an octave lower... so, like a bass. The fattest string on it is about as big as the thinnest string on a bass but the neck is about the same width as a normal guitar. It is... weird... and I like it.

Goodbye, friends!

Thanks for reading! Would love to hear about what you've been up to lately. And don't forget to watch this video from the drag show. It's hilarious.