76 Utilikilts

August 10, 2015

A week back from GenCon 2015, and swag bags of games and gadgets are all unpacked and ready to play.

From day one of the con, my boyfriend and I decided to take a tally for every utilikilt seen--not including the table where they were being sold.

76 Utilitkilts

Now what is that? It's basically a kilt and some cargo pants had a drunken one-night stand. The fact that there were 76 seen that week is entertaining to me, because it reminds me of the "Seventy-Six Trombones" song from the Music Man. A con man trying to promote a flashy idea to an unsuspecting town, the splendor of a marching band! Well, we're all at a con, so does that sort of make us con-men? (and women). There is a lot of splendor and pizzazz, and you really do get caught up in the moment before you realize. So instead of humming "seventy-six trombones led the big parade," it goes a little more like "seventy-six u-til-i-kilts at Gen-Con!" give or take some properly stressed/unstressed syllables. And I would doubt very seriously there weren't any Marian the Librarians there--nerds love their books!

It's weird I was only at the con a week ago. There were over 60,000 people in attendance, I'd be comfortable saying that about a third of them dressed up--my favorite cosplays were the Disney Heroine Ghost Busters:

Tinkerbell and Meg bustin' ghosts

The whole city gets psyched for this event--restaurants had signs in the window welcoming the nerds of the world, and comic themed paintings were hung on the walls of establishments, onomatopoeia decals everywhere--it was amazing! So much energy, and the overall body odor of that many people (some of whom unfortunately fit the stereotype of the Slimer-physique and who do not bathe as regularly as one should) wasn't really as bad as I'd been prepared for. 

Oh, right! The games. The main point of GenCon. Yeah, we totally played some games! The gamer hall was sometimes overwhelming, that's where you could test out some table top games for free or purchase them at booths, or just hunt for the nerdy "stuff" that become collectors items or cosplay pieces. My boyfriend and I ordered some tickets to play some other games not on the market yet, too, and my favorite out of those was hands down 1879. 

1879 is a steampunk London, with some mythical creatures thrown in like trolls and elves. Steampunk is a style of gears, steam powered gadgets, and Victorians. It's based a lot around a DIY culture and the romanticism associated with the age of invention and corsets. 

I got to play a "fiddler," and my newbie mistake was that was not the equivalent of a bard in a D&D game, but is the old London slang for a con-artist. 

Still extremely fun, fiddle or no fiddle, when my character ran into a mob pointing rifles at her and I got to say: "Move, there's a grenade," and the mob dives out of her way, letting her escape. See, while her combat skills were not so great, she gives off a great air of sincerity, even when the "grenade" is a police club. Sorry, bobby club. Also there are characters that can make steampunk gadgets that work the same as defense spells, so that's brilliant.

This RPG doesn't come out until October, but it's definitely on my list. 

There goes my summer break, right? So back to work!

Eight applications sent out this week, and you know, at least a couple of them were to people I met at GenCon. There are a lot of freelance editing opportunities in gaming that I didn't know about until the con. 

The requirements, as I'm told, for getting into the gaming industry for editors are that you must:

1. Be talented.

2. Be on time.

3. Be available.

Great! I have at least TWO of those things! I don't like to brag and say that I'm a triple threat, but...you know. I'm pretty awesome, too. How do I get other people to know that?

There's the question I'm working on. But with eight more applications out this week, that's not a bad start.

And last item for this post, my blogger friend just launched her first eBook, and hired me to edit it for her. 

I'm really proud of this and so glad I had the opportunity to be involved--I've said it before, and I'll say it again, I'd read the ingredients in a soup can if she wrote them--and I think it's got some really helpful materials for people trying to organize their lives. I know I've picked up a tip or two when I read it!

Check it out here!

"Seventy-six u-til-i-kilts at Gen-Con!/With eight app-li-ca-tions sent, a book published..."

And you know, that song is only in Act 1.