Great Hera!

D&D Diary: Snack Attack

So our D&D adventure seems to be grooving along to a nice, experience points-gaining rhythm. I thought it would be near-impossible for seven LA-dwellers to gather on a semi-regular basis, but I guess all it really takes is the promise of storming the Shadowkeep with a bunch of like-minded nerds and their pizza-stained power cards. Book clubs, take note.

Anyway, one fantasticawful thing about our sessions is that there is always a prodigious amount of snacks available. Snacks of all sizes, shapes, colors and levels of wheat and/or gluten-free-ness. And for whatever reason, all that arrow-shooting and questing and damage points-ing makes me eat fucking constantly. Roll for initiative...to stuff your face!

So my elven cleric pal Airleas and I  decided to introduce some semi-healthy snacks to the proceedings. I mean, you know, I'm not too body-obsessive, but I would like to still be able to zip up my chain mail once this quest is all over. And as an Almost Officially Old Person, I have things like cholesterol to think of!

Here are some of the offerings we tried out last week, complete with ratings. Maybe this will help you and your similarly snack-addicted D&D posse out. I live to serve.

Trader Joe's Baked Jalapeno Cheese Crunchies:  Sort of like a hippie take on Cheetos. The Dungeonmaster thought these looked "really fucking gross," and they do sort of bear a not-all-that-pleasant resemblance to tiny, mold-encrusted tumors. But guess what? They're tastiness personified! Er, chipified. Now, whether this type of tastiness is for you is another question entirely. I liked the airy crunch and hint of spice. Others seemed unimpressed. They might be akin to how a well-meaning waiter once described a weird-sounding appetizer to me: "a two-biter." Spider, our Tiefling rogue, enthusiastically popped one in his mouth, then went through a series of "eh? Bleah...eh?" faces. But then he hypothesized that he just chose a crunchy with too many green jalapeno flecks on it, so he went back for more and found the second crunchy much more pleasing. One bonus for D&Ders -- there's a light cheese dusting, but it's not as finger-encasing as, say, actual Cheetos or white cheddar popcorn. Easy to wipe quickly, then keep rolling. Overall rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Cilantro Chive Yogurt Dip: I think this might be another TJ-brand item, but it seems like something you could make fairly easily. You know, in all your spare time between quests! I was looking for a substitute for your basic Ranch Dip, which I unfortunately consumed about a gallon of during a previous encounter. This has a surprisingly thick texture and a nice, mild flavor, although truth be told, I don't remember it that well. I think it was good with carrots. The aforementioned texture is a boon for role-players worried about dripping all over the dungeon tiles, which has, after all, been known to cause quest-ending arguments.  Overall rating: 7 out of 10.

Hansen's Diet Tangerine Lime Natural Soda: OK, I'll confess -- I generally hate "natural" sodas. I don't even know why. It's a Coke addict's bias, I guess. But this sounded light and refreshing and generally perfect for a sticky summer's eve spent indoors, so I thought, why not? Annnnd...it's OK. It's cool and fizzy and goes down just fine. But there was a weird sort of aftertaste that went along with it that was almost...chemical-y. Now was it actually chemical-y or are my tastebuds so frakked up from all my real soda consumption that I just think natural things taste chemical-y and vice versa? Well, whatever. In the end, it's not for me. I did, however, have a sip of the DM's Hansen's Diet Root Beer and found that much more to my liking. It kind of had the same aftertaste, though. Overall rating: 4.5 out of 10.

If you have further suggestions for RPG-friendly eats, please send them my way. In the meantime, more healthy-ish snacks await us this week. But I think I'll eat them with regular soda, the way God intended.

The Sarah ConnAWKWARD Chronicles

I feel like this blog has kind of turned into a chronicle of my navel-gaze-y social ineptitude, a series of posts that could all be summed up as The Dumb Thing I Did That One Time. Well, whatever. The kids love the wacky, self-deprecating antics, so I am told!

So here's what happens when a geek starts thinking maybe, just maybe, she's got this "interaction with people" thing down.

Friday night, I go to a show written by this stupendously talented young lady. I'm milling about, feeling pretty dang good about myself, because 1) I'm wearing those ridiculous Target shoes, and apparently Jenelle told everyone in advance about the Target shoes, so I keep hearing "OooOOOooooh, are those them?!" followed by a chorus of admiring coos centered around whichever foot I happen to stick out for inspection and 2) I know a lot of people there and am managing to act normal around them. I meet one of my super-awesome, super-geek internet friends and don't say anything weird. I compliment my friend Jaime* in a charming (ie not overly loud and/or inappropriate and/or off-putting) fashion. I make the much-dreaded small talk.

(*Sidebar: I think I need to share how I met and became friends with Jaime. That story is  not-so-navel-gaze-y and actually sort of fun.)

Eventually, we all move into the theater. I secure a seat next to my favorite Two Librarians and bolt for the bathroom. I am scurrying back -- mentally patting myself on the back for being such a well-adjusted social butterfly -- when the following happens.

I'm walking up the stairs to my seat and, out of the corner of my eye, see someone seated on the aisle get up out of their chair, as if to let someone else into said aisle. I am VERY FOCUSED on getting back to my seat (and also on the back-patting), so I sort of scoot around this person, pointing beyond them all the while, as if to say "I'm going here, excuse me." I do not register this person's face. I am on a mission! Back to my seat!

So I sit back down and then I see that this person? That I just scooted around so blithely? Totally my friend Ben. And he stood up, I think, not to let someone else into the aisle, but to say hi to me. And I blew right past him, not even registering his face, just seeing a blank torso standing up and impeding my progress.  (Or maybe it was a dual purpose -- letting someone else in AND saying hi. Either way, I'm a tool.)

Fuckity O'Fuck!

So I scurry back down and say, "Hey...I just totally walked by you, didn't I?"

And then the show was starting so it was sort of like, "well...well...awkward..."

Afterwards, face flaming, I find him in the crowd and am like, "Sorry! I didn't realize it was you! Blahblahblah!"

"That's OK," he says. "You're just dead to me."

Anyway. It just goes to show you: I cannot get too comfortable in my own perceived awesomeness, because it is always oh-so-very-temporary.

At least I still have my shoes.

Stuff I Like This Week

It's been a long and trying sort of week, the kind where you just want to hit DO-OVER, DO-OVER, DO-OVER! Where doing this three times is not excessive!

But there are small things that keep you happy and warm and whistling along with every "tra-la" and "dum-diddy" on that She & Him record that I am still listening to obsessively. Such as...

1. Amazingcrazy shoes from Target. These are so great. Jenelle and I had to go on a Target field trip for a bridal shower gift and these screamed out my name so insistently that I heard them all the way over in Housewares. They are a little bit of The Vintage crossed with a little bit of The Weird, which is basically me. Yet they are surprisingly versatile and could work with a number of geekgirl styles. Gothic Lolitas? You're set. Bunhead librarians who long for Mad Men Joan's smashing wardrobe? Buy them immediately. Reformed grungeheads with a penchant for clever t-shirts and post-apocalyptic scarves? These are yours, too. Wear them well.

2. Ultra. This is one of those things people kept telling me I would like and I was like "OK" and then didn't do anything about it. But I finally read it and it's just as good as everyone says. Well-drawn characters (in both senses), a nice melding of superheroics and slice-of-life-isms, and women who actually talk like women I know. And you've gotta love all the fake magazine articles, which pretty much nail the various styles of Maxim, Rolling Stone and so forth.

3. That Ghostbusters episode of The Middleman. Did you see how they did that? Not just with the GB references, which made Chris very happy, but they have this guy who seems like he might come between Wendy and Lacey and then he totally doesn't. They go out of their way to make sure he doesn't. This representation of a nerdgirl friendship is one of the best ones going right now.

4. This post by Conditional Jeff. If you aren't reading Jeff's blog...well, why aren't you?! Anyway, this post made me LOL. "That's his dinner." (FYI, this is not the previously mentioned Husband Jeff, who refuses to blog, Facebook, Twitter or do anything that requires him to interact with other humans via the computer machine. Hence the nickname Conditional Jeff.)

5. Much posting on Alert Nerd this week! Yes, we're ending on a self-pimp...but I'm not just talking about my posts. Matt blogged his vintage interview about Buffy Animated with Jeph Loeb and created a  Shitty Watchmen Sequel Contest, which you should all enter. And Chris penned a nice essay about  WTF with the internet and the "news" about the Ghostbusters game. And I finally wrote about Daisy Steiner. Also, I'm not-so-secretly pleased that my extremely important entry about Cyclops' hair continues to draw comments. Who knew this issue was so controversial?

So all in all...the week seems just a little better now, doesn't it?