Mom's Guide to the Galaxy

Capricon 45: Let Your Geek Flag Fly… was amazing!

I mean, I’m biased, so you don’t have to take my word for it. So here are few words from less biased sources… some of our Guests of Honor (GoHs):

Dr. Micaiah Johnson (which includes a comment from…)
Zeta Jane
and John Kovalic.

Alas, our fourth GoH, Dr. Tom Barclay, isn’t particularly active on social media. Rest assured, he appears in photos and definitely had a blast. In fact, here’s how it started, with the traditional Meet the GoHs panel Thursday afternoon:

Guests of Honor at Capricon 45: Dr. Thomas Barclay (astrophysicist), Zeta Jane (costumer), Dr. Micaiah Johnson (author), and John Kovalic (cartoonist)

These four guests met at their first panel, an opportunity for them to talk about anything they want before Opening Ceremonies. And here’s how it looked near the end, on Saturday night:

Guests of Honor and their guests at the Steampunk party. Dr. Tom Barclay and friend Sean; Nina, with friend of Dr. Micaiah Johnson; and Zeta Jane.

This was an exciting moment for me, as co-chair, when I realized that three of our GoHs were circulating through the parties together. Not pictured is a slightly different combination of GoHs on DJ Scalzi‘s dance floor about an hour later for the traditional midnight rendition of the Time Warp.

I know, you’re probably thinking that sounds like a fabulous photo opportunity. It was! I’ve seen several photos that include the three GoHs… and myself… doing the Time Warp. Obviously, I was too busy… doing the Time Warp… to take photos.

What are your geek flags?

As I mentioned before, this year’s theme for Capricon is Let Your Geek Flag Fly!

Capricon 45 banner image featuring two characters on the left, one holding a flag with alternating white and light blue lines with a 20-side die (rolled a 20), a goat's head, and an open book. On right, below the headline of Capricon 45: Let Your Geek Flag Fly! is a goat with a draped cloth that reads XLV, the Roman numerals for 45. Along the bottom, text reads Sheraton Grand Chicago Riverwalk, February 6-9 2025, Capricon.org

Depending on your interests, you probably have one of two questions:
1) What’s a geek flag? or
2) Why only one?

I’ll work through them in order. A geek flag is a flag that represents geek pride or a love of geeky things. Really, there’s no limitation on what you can geek out about. According to Dictionary.com, one definition for geek is “a person who has excessive enthusiasm for and some expertise about a specialized subject or activity”. My father, for example, was a Jerome K. Jerome geek, which can also be presented as Jerome K. Jerome was one of his geek flags.

You may have noticed “one of” in the previous sentence. Most geeks I know fly multiple geek flags. The earliest one I identify with is Star Trek, having been introduced to the original show before elementary school, closely followed by Doctor Who. By college, I was also flying a gamer flag – video, board, and role-playing games – and had realized that reading is its own flag as well. It will surprise nobody that Dork Tower is another geek flags I fly proudly.

Obviously, I fly multiple geek flags, which brings us back to the second question… why is our theme singular? Another one of my geek flags is musicals, and it’s a reference to Shrek: the Musical, specifically the song “Freak Flag.” The theme is singular in order to fly that particular geek flag.

What are your geek flags? Better yet, come find me at Capricon this weekend and tell me in person.

Another Restaurant Week, another new restaurant tried

This year’s Restaurant Week (which actually runs for two weeks) took us to the nearby suburb of Aurora, to a restaurant I have been following on Facebook since before they opened this location: Leilani Asian Fusion. Restaurant Week, if you’re unfamiliar with it, is an opportunity for local restaurants to draw in new customers with fixed price (“prix-fixe”) menus that offer a limited selection, showcasing some of their best options.

Honey Walnut Shrimp: Tempura Fried Shrimp, Honey Aioli, Candied Walnuts
Salmon Teriyaki: Scottish Wild-Caught Salmon, Miso Carrot Puree, Charred Broccolini
Drunken Scottish & California Rolls: California (Crab Mix, Cucumber, Avocado); Drunken Scottish (Crab Mix, Cucumber, Avocado, Seared Salmon, Unagi Sauce)
Ube Crème Brûlée: Ube Custard Topped with Seasonal Fruits

I’m not sure it’s possible to overstate how good this meal was. The Honey Walnut Shrimp had a surprising bit of spice to it (probably those red specks in the aioli sauce), and that may be well have been the best salmon dish I’ve ever eaten. The waitress mentioned that they use sushi-grade salmon for it, so it’s high enough quality that it can be served anywhere from raw to well done. The entire outside of the salmon had a delicious crunch to it. (The sushi plate wasn’t mine, though I assume it was also tasty.) And then the dessert… the Ube Crème Brûlée was melt-in-your-mouth delicious, with that beautiful purple color and fresh berries on top. And everything was perfectly-sized, so we left feeling full without that overwhelming need to explode or sink into a food coma.

Leilani Asian Fusion is conveniently located just down the street from the Paramount Theatre, which makes it an easy meal choice before or after a show.

Are you coming to Capricon 45?

By the time I wrote last year’s post about Capricon 44, I knew was putting in a bid to co-chair Capricon 45 with a friend. It’s less than two weeks away now and I’m super excited about the guests, the events… everything! We are going to have a rockin’ good time, as evidenced by the fabulous items listed in the flyers I’m including below.

Flyer for Capricon 45, a SciFi, Fantasy, and Literature Convention held February 6-9, 2025 at the Sheraton Grand Riverwalk in Chicago. The flyer mentions the four Guests of Honor (Dr. Tom Barclay, Astrophysicist; Zeta Jane, Cosplayer; Dr. Micaiah Johnson, Author; and John Kovalic, Comic Author) and some of the events they're participating in, with small images representing some other parts of the convention (Silent Auction, Parties, Gaming, Live Music, Writer's Room, Art Show, Dealer's Hall).

But… oh my goodness, there’s so much to choose from and I’ll be chairing and won’t have time for most of it. We have an actual astrophysicist talking about how to design a spaceship, an amazing cosplayer leading some hands-on sewing workshops, an award-winning author discussing automatons, and our friendly neighborhood cartoonist (if you consider Madison in the neighborhood of Chicago) comparing graphic novels and comic books. And that’s just a handful of the programming events, ranging from panels to round tables to make-and-take gatherings and even a cosplay parade.

The room block is open until January 31st, you can still join us and get in on the fun. Even if you can only come for a day – we have day badge rates here – it is absolutely worth the experience!

Take the sick day.

I took a sick day this week. I woke up a couple times during the night feeling poorly, then a couple hours before my alarm that morning, unable to get back to sleep. I dragged my way towards breakfast and realized that I would have a terrible day if I attempted to work. I commuted my way to the living room, booted up my work computer, send out some “I’m sick” messages to team channels, posted an out of office message, and logged out.

I hesitated though, in making that decision, and I realize that’s a flaw in our system. In elementary school, we had awards for “perfect attendance” (it didn’t count excused absences, which I wondered about when I received one), though if you think about it, that’s mostly an award for your parent calling in when you’re absent. As an adult, my early jobs didn’t involve e-mail, so calling in sick was actually calling someone and hoping they didn’t object. (I don’t recall it being a problem, though there was one time when my car wasn’t working where I was asked if I had another way to get into work.)

We shouldn’t have to justify sick days. If anything, people should be encouraged to take them, paid, to avoid sharing their illness with co-workers and, depending on the job, customers. In my case, working remotely, I have to be fairly miserable to call in sick. Fortunately, my boss understands that sick days exist to be used when needed and has never questioned my need to use one.

A short(ened) trip to Virginia

We traveled to Virginia last week, originally intending to stay for three nights. For flight time convenience, we flew into Richmond and out of Norfolk, with a plan of staying in Williamsburg and exploring the area. Research into the area showed that public transportation wasn’t going to be an option, so I rented a car through Costco.

The Williamsburg area feels fairly tourist-oriented, with a plethora of hotels and resorts. While the Colonial Williamsburg is eminently walkable (as was our gated resort), the area from our resort to nearby restaurants was not – the lack of sidewalks combined with poorly lit roads meant driving to get dinner even if it was within our definition of walking distance. To be fair, that lack of ambient light meant we had fabulous views of the night sky.

After the timeshare talk that inspired our trip (the resort stay was free other than taxes and such), we explored one of the Art Museums in Colonial Williamsburg – despite different names, the museums are attached and you move easily between them. On our way there from the nearby public parking, we had noticed a section of street closed off (through February) for an ice rink. When we left the museum around closing, the ice rink was reasonably full with children who let up a cheer as a light snow started to fall. We finished off the evening with video games at the resort’s arcade – free play for everything – and some time in the indoor pool. (Yes, the outdoor pool and hot tub were open. At 30-some degrees, no, thank you.)

On what would have been our last full day there, I woke up to news of a winter storm heading towards Virginia and an emergency declaration from the governor, recommending anyone who was planning to travel on the Sunday more up their schedule. By a couple hours later, the airline app had updated to offer free changes, so we dropped our plan to explore the historic guided sites and gardens and moved onto our day of departure plan: visiting the Virginia Zoo. (To be clear, we were flying Southwest anyways, where changing flights is fairly easy under normal circumstances.)

There are pros and cons to visiting a zoo in winter… especially somewhere that experiences winter. The primary disadvantage is that many animals, especially those from warmer climates, are off exhibit, and only some of them have indoor viewing areas. On the other hand, other than the Reptile House – an entirely indoor experience for obvious reasons – you can walk through parts of the zoo without crowds. Or really, any other people for large sections, which gives you time to appreciate the animals (and a surprising amount of bamboo) without feeling like you’re monopolizing the space.

There’s a lot more we would like to see and do in the Williamsburg area. I suppose we’ll just have to go back at some point.

Goals we set are goals we get… sometimes.

I’ve talked about goal setting before, I find it’s a more useful approach to accomplishing things across the year than resolutions. That said, sometimes life throws some twists in that interfere with those goals. As an example, I returned to karate near the end of 2023, so had a goal of attending a certain number of classes across the year. And then I had hand surgery in March, which knocked me off the mat for a couple months, followed by physical therapy for arthritis in my knees for a couple summer months, and a whirlwind of travel in the fall.

At least that’s explainable… I’m not sure how I only tracked 42 books on Goodreads. After hitting my goal of 52 books multiple years, I had increased it to 54 for 2024. Even if I missed tracking a couple, that seems low, especially with all of the Hugo nominees I read before voting in those awards before attending WorldCon in Glasgow.

Regardless, I accomplished some goals – fixing up my master bedroom closet (which had been on my list for years), paying down my home equity loan, and, of course, writing my weekly blog posts. Now I reset, determining what goals I want to work towards in 2025. I’ve found 10 to be a reasonable number, and have made sure they meet the SMART requirement – Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-based.

Having done that, I should decide what I want to work on… re-organizing my work desk or my reading goal, noting that I’m currently reading Wind and Truth, which is over 1300 pages. As one of my karate instructors says, start strong, finish stronger.

Art as a progression

There are people – presumably with skills – that make a living from their drawings, paintings, and other artistic presentations. Some are serious, some comic, some downright absurd (especially what people will pay for them). I am not one of those people.

I have a day job I enjoy, along with assorted creative hobbies, from crocheting to writing, that I occasionally present in a way that could supplement my income. Drawing and painting, however, are activities that I do simply for fun, or to extricate a stuck idea from my head.

The butterfly below, for example, is another iteration of Andrea Nelson’s activities that present a focus image divided into smaller sections for coloring. In this particular case, drawn and painted on Christmas Eve, I decided that the butterfly should be painted in red and green. For contrast, I selected blue and purple as the background colors.

A red and green butterfly with assorted squiggly lines drawn through and around it.

A red and green butterfly with assorted squiggly lines drawn through and around it, with a blue and purple background.

The process itself was fun, just sitting and painting for a while on a relaxing day off. The naming process can be fun too… I call this image The Very Hungry Caterpillar Who Ate the Christmas Decorations.

For myself, art is not a progression of skill – though there is a bit of that happening. Rather, it’s been a progression of appreciation for the creative process, knowing that whatever the result looks like, I had fun making it.

Happy Holidays!

As we approach Solstice, Christmas, and Chanukah (among other holidays), I want to wish a happy holiday season to all of you.

A painted holiday tree with a red ball at the top and three words down the middle, with photos to either side of each word. At the very top, cats Zuko and Arwen on opposite sides of the word "joy"; in the middle, humans Frances and Cassandra on opposite sides of the word "love"; and at the bottom, cats Diane and June on opposite sides of the word "peace."

A decorated tree!

Part of a holiday tree decorated with assorted ornaments, mostly crocheted. Also, there's a dinosaur attached to a stick on the tree, only because the stick is useful for opening and closing the curtain behind the tree.

We’re trying something new this year… putting ornaments on the tree! I don’t think we’ve had ornaments on a tree since we adopted Arwen back in 2017, since cats – especially kittens – and ornaments are a notoriously bad combination.

In 2020, Zuko moved in, postponing the possibility of ornaments longer. Even now, none of them are particularly breakable. We lucked out and rediscovered a bag filled with crocheted ornaments – candy canes, snowflakes, and tiny trees with wine corks – and have supplemented those with a couple 3D-printed decorations from a friend.

So far, only a couple of the cork-filled trees have gone wandering through the house. Next year, I may be tempted to dig out my animated character ornaments. They’re plastic, of course.