I Swear By My Pretty Floral Bonnet, I Will End You..

When I revamped and started writing this blog, I promised myself that this time I would not be overly concerned with sticking to one subject. I did myself a complete disservice by trying to keep my last blog strictly craft and food. Now that hasn’t disappeared and I have a few ideas on some craft and food ideas that I want to share, but I found the scope was just too limited. I feel better in writing from wherever and whatever feels best, so from Gaming to Geekdom, comics, food, craft, movies and all stops in between, I endeavour to put write about what feels good and maybe sometimes what doesn’t. That can only be a good thing.

So San Diego Comic Con has come to a close this week….and once again I feel wretched for not being there but at least this time as the doors close, I feel a glimmer of hope that I could actually get there in years to come. This initially started life as a way to vent the frustrations of being a woman who geeks, my annoyances and a list on all the things that suck and really get on my last nerve. But I have to say that maybe it’s the strange London heatwave mixed with some of the instagrams I have seen from #SDCC.

Maybe it’s Seth Green and Nathan Fillion and a brilliant Venture Brothers cosplay that I saw. Whatever it is, I just don’t have that vitriol in me right now…at least not this time.

Instead I find myself feeling hopeful and I am fully prepared to admit that this is purely down to seeing a poster of the upcoming X-Men: Days of Future Past movie, but I want to take the time to say a word of thanks.

Being a geek in whatever form that may take is a freedom. If you spent a lot of time in childhood and adolescence feeling like everything around you resembles a shoe that is 2 sizes too small, then climbing the mountain, getting to the cave and seeing someone huddled by the fire who just happens to hum the Firefly theme fills you up.

It still happens to me. I am 35 and when I meet someone who likes a selection of the things that I love, from the on-again-off-again of Katchoo and Francine to the mayhem of Preacher, it still feels like hot tea on a freezing cold day. In a world of folks going on about North West Kardash, it feels good to roll your eyes and look to see someone else thinking, “Wouldn’t you just kill for a Firefly rerun right now?”

We know that there are people out there who just don’t like women identifying themselves as Geeks. They think we are playing at it or just have seen Big Bang Theory too often. When you get to the professional level, there are still those that think we do not have enough to say or that for some reason, as eloquently pointed out by Joss Whedon a few months back when I saw him, Men are not interested in what women have to put on screen or in a comic, but then expect the same women to be interested in what men have to say and do. We know this. But sometimes I feel that in focussing on this, we miss the opportunity to say Thank you.

Thank you to those comic shop owners and workers who do what they can to make sure that a raft of people don’t feel even more awkward and ostracized. I know that I can cynically say that, of course it’s in that person’s interest to engage me as I have greasy pounds in my pocket that they want. However, I have walked into shops where the dipshit behind the counter couldn’t give a rat’s arse if I had £1,000 to spend, as far as he was concerned, “What do you want? We don’t sell Look-in!” or “The Archie comics are over there” without as much as a look up from the greasy pages of Fangoria. Luckily I found another shop that was more than happy to let me know what happened when Hardcase and the Harriers met the X-Men and in a twist of fate the other shop went out of business. Unfortunately, a few years later so did the nice one. So thank you, for every dumb bloody question you have to endure and every really ridiculous request, thank you…..you guys deserve a medal and a ceremony, a bit like the end of A New Hope would suffice.

 

A big thanks to the people who didn’t assume that on the way to finding the shoe shop, I just happened to walk into a comic shop and proceeded to while away the hours getting into a very heated discussion as to the wonders of Top 10 and Fables.

How clichéd is it to wheel out the old ‘With great power comes yadda yadda” but the clichés have this annoying thing of being true a lot of the time and I am aware of that more and more with younger folks around me. When I see them in shops, I do my best not to write them off as a collection of Lumpy Space Princesses. I do what I can, if the opportunity presents itself to show them to something different….try a little Authority perhaps, maybe in a few years you’ll be ready for Preacher and then there’s My Monkey’s Name is Jennifer…..

It is an odd and liberating thing to give yourself the geek title. It means so many different things to so many different corners of the world. Embrace and disdain go hand in hand because from that point on, the world and your place in it is changed. I guess that’s my two pence, a word of thanks to all of those out there combined with a word to visit a comic shop when you can. Ok it can be a bit strange and I cannot guarantee things won’t get a little odd before you leave, but I promise you, by my pretty floral bonnet, it really is worth a look see.

 

Now for that drink

Rampancy Cocktail – Courtesy of Clint Slowik

Ingredients

1 part Chambord
½ part Grenadine
2 parts Alize Wild Passion or Gold Passion
2 parts UV Pink Lemonade Vodka
1 splash Aftershock
Raspberry Ginger Ale (UK: methinks here add some fresh raspberries and ginger ale)
2       drops of red food colouring

Directions:

‒       Pour Chambord followed by Grenadine over ice in a hi-ball glass.

‒       Float the Alize then the UV pink vodka and lightly pour the Ginger Ale to fill the glass (adding the raspberries for the UK folks)

‒       Finally add the Aftershock and the drops of food colour

‒       Proceed to lapse into Rampancy