Let's leave cyberpunk behind for a moment, and go back to home decorating. When I started the blog back up, I had said that I had done a few things to the house during my silence. One of the things I had done, last September, was add a Chinese dragon to the foyer. I found it at a flea market in Panama City Beach during a family reunion.


This gets me closer to finishing the foyer. I need a shoe rack or bench to go along the dividing wall, and I want to replace the light with something less 'middle America suburbia' and more 'far-off, exotic lands.' That will pretty much complete my foyer.

I've also replaced my dining room set with a set my dad gave me when he replaced his dining room. The table fits perfectly with the old world occident-meets-orient look I'm going for. The chairs are definitely a more retro-modern style, but the with the color and pattern, actually seem to fit in well. It doesn't quite match my living room chair, but it doesn't really clash either.


The last thing I got for my living room is an Italian Map Globe bar. It was a Christmas gift from my parents. It looks good there next to the armor. I ought to hang the sword on the wall, but propped in the corner like that, gives it more of a used look instead of display, like I just got back from adventuring and haven't put my gear away. Which is more or less how it got there, after a Renaissance faire.


The globe opens up. The crystal was another Christmas present, this time from grandma. There are wine glasses, highball, and double old fashioned glasses in there.


Those are the big changes in the last year or so. I've printed out photos from some of my trips to hang on the wall, along with some souvenirs, but I haven't gotten around to hanging them yet. Or even finding suitable picture frames. That will probably be the next thing I do, but I will have to make sure it's in keeping with the old world style.

I was perusing ThinkGeek today trying to find a suitable T-shirt for my cyberpunk costume. I want something similar to what Jayne wore on Firefly. ThinkGeek has some of Jayne's shirts, but I'm making a cyberpunk character, not a Firefly character.

But I want something in that style; a logo or brand from a fake universe. I found some good ones, but for the most part, the brand is from some recognizable property in geek culture. This Hyrule shirt is a great example of the style I want, but with a recognizably non-cyberpunk logo. So unless I want to be a gamer cosplaying as a cyberpunk criminal, Zelda fanboy, it's just not gonna work. And if I'm going to be that silly, I should just make a steampunk Link...

Wait, that sounds awesome. If I don't get to it this year, that will definitely be next year's costume.

At any rate, I eventually found this: a Cosa Nostra deliverator shirt. If that means something to you, then you know why this is the perfect shirt for a cyberpunk outfit. Everybody else, Cosa Nostra is a pizza delivery chain run by the mafia in Neal Stephenson's cyberpunk novel, Snow Crash. I hadn't intended my cyberpunk character to be from any particular universe. In fact, I was generally thinking Shadowrun most of the time. But an actual cyberpunk T-shirt for my cyberpunk costume? Perfect. Combined with some urban camo pants, and I think the costume is shaping up nicely.

Also, if you are a science fiction fan, I enjoyed Snow Crass and recommend you go read it.

As for the gun, I'm reinforcing the cardboard with extra glue so it doesn't peel. It's a slow process, waiting for the glue to dry, so I don't have enough done to do a whole post on it yet.

While my enthusiasm for the project is still high, I've started making a cyberpunk gun. I've decided to make a semi-automatic pistol. Cyberpunk is generally not so far into the future that everybody has lasers and other exotic weaponry, so a pistol feels about right.

A little digging around the interwebs and I found a couple articles at Instructables, one for a cyberpunk shotgun and another for a steampunk rifle, both by the same guy. They are both good references and will be influencing my construction.

The first step is to design the basic gun. I want an over sized and blocky gun, that would fit in a high-tech but dystopian future.


This is my basic layout. A pretty straightforward, pistol shape. The block under the barrel is for mounting sensors, stabilizers, or anything else I think of before I get around to making them. I've not yet designed anything, but I'm envisioning several tubular items down there.


I cut it out of corrugated cardboard. Then I used that piece to trace out three more pieces.


Then I glued the four pieces together using PVA glue. It's taped together right now until the glue dries. I also changed the shape of the outer pieces a little. I did that to break up the shape and give the gun some overall texture. Otherwise it would be too blocky.


The next step will be to fill in cardboard with glue to help really hold it all together. I'll also need to trim and smooth the edges, and cover everything with a thin card stock or metal tape (an idea used in the shotgun above).

I also need to add a trigger and trigger guard, stiffen the beaver tail, and round out the grip some. I will eventually wrap the grip in leather or electrical tape. I'll need to make the under barrel attachments, and add various odds and ends to the gun to give it some texture, so that it's not just flat. And then paint it all.

I will not be able to work on the gun everyday, and some days will be spent scrounging for parts for the next step. Stay tuned for Part 2.

Now I need to think about what gear my character would carry around with him. This is where the Shadowrun rule books would come in handy, because they have tables and tables of weapons, equipment, cybernetics, and the like that I can look through for ideas on what to make for the costume.

Since I'm making a shooter, one these items needs to be a gun. A handgun in a holster would be the easiest thing to carry around, but a carbine or an assault rifle would also be suitable for a cyberpunk gun bunny. I think I will make the handgun first, and if time permits, or maybe for next year's Dragon*Con, make a big gun.

I think headset or goggles with some sort of targeting array would also go well with the fire support character. In fact, I could turn it into a fancy sensor suite with radar, sonar, lasers, and cameras in it.

For the infiltrator side of things, a utility belt full of goodies sounds about right. Some of those electronic key cards, and a device suitable for picking electronic locks would make for a good start. Other interesting devices that would be worth making would be a grappling hook gun, a sensor jammer, additional sensors that don't fit on the headset, a roll-up computer screen, and even simple things like a flashlight, respirator, and tools. I could probably just take a bunch of the tools I'm going to have to buy to make all this and hang them on a belt.

I actually have no idea yet how I'm going to make all this. I would like everything to look well used, distressed, or heavily repaired or modified, to keep with the punk aspect of the genre. Some Google searches on making props or cyberpunk accessories ought to get me started.

As I actually make this stuff, I'll be adding all the how-to and what-I-did, including pictures, to the blog.

I want to think some more about the cyberpunk costume. One of the things that was said at a steampunk costuming panel at Dragon*Con last year was that when making a costume, you should design your character first. An airship mechanic suggests different ideas and accessories than a gentleman adventurer. This strikes me as good advice. Since I am designing my costume from scratch instead of cosplaying as an existing character, coming up with a character concept gives me a framework to build on. It will allow me to decide what kind of clothes the character would wear, what gear and accessories he would carry with him.

So the first thing I need to do is come up with a character. There are several archetypes in cyberpunk. The ones I am interested in are the street samurai, fire support, infiltrator, and the street mage (Shadowrun adds magic to the cyberpunk genre). Hacker is another major archetype in cyberpunk, but that’s too close to my normal life to be interesting to me. Actually, I think I will go ahead and drop the street mage too. Magic is an unusual addition to cyberpunk, and I think without a whole runner team going with me, people might not recognize a street mage for what he is.

That leaves me with two combat based archetypes, and a sneaky bastard. I do so love playing sneaky bastards in paper and pencil RPGs. You can get into (and sometimes out of) so much more interesting trouble than the beat sticks, and I love surviving by skill and wit rather than brawn. The combat archetypes would be more recognizable at a convention, though. But I ought to be able to combine multiple archetypes. The standard bad ass hero has a whole host of skills and abilities, so an infiltrator/fire support character would fit in just fine. And now I’ve talked myself into making the same character I’m playing in Shadowrun right now.

So the concept now is a character who shoots stuff and has a bag of tricks for getting into and out of trouble. That is much more concrete than a generic cyberpunk costume.

Now that I have a concept to work with, it’s time to start thinking about what it will look like. There are a few things to keep in mind when designing any kind of costume for a convention. First, you are going to be wearing it all day. So make sure it’s comfortable to wear and walk around in, without heavy pieces you’re going to have to lug around all day. Second, cons are crowded. Moving through a crowd with large, delicate wings or a giant Sephiroth sword is difficult. Plan accordingly. Thirdly, include pockets, pouches, or some other method of carrying around your assorted keys, wallets, and other goodies you acquire when wandering around the con.

With that in mind, I want to think about the base costume for a bit. By that I mean the general outfit, as separate from the accessories, such as guns and headsets. I don’t want to look like a soldier, so lots of body armor and full BDUs are out. And while I’ve been calling the archetype ‘infiltrator,’ I am envisioning more of a likeable scoundrel with a bunch of tricks up his cybernetic sleeves rather than a stealthy, covert-ops type character. So the outfit doesn’t need to be subtle or commando-ish. One of the ideas that I had when I first thought of the doing a cyberpunk costume was to have a sleeveless long coat. Dusters and trench coats have been a hallmark of the adventurous since the Hollywood western, and the Matrix used them to good effect. And sleeveless because it’s punk. I think this will have a very good chance of being in the final costume.

The question is what to wear underneath it. My first idea was to wear a jumpsuit under the coat. The plain utility of a jumpsuit seems suited to a cyberpunk outfit. Another idea is to wear BDU pants with a T-shirt with a cyberpunk type logo on it, like the Laughing Man icon or a Shadowrun corporate logo. I think either will work. If I can find urban camo pants or a good digital camo I will choose the BDUs over the jumpsuit. I'll need to look around and see what I can find.

Footwear will be the standard heavy black boots.

That will make up the core of my costume. The next step is to think about what gear and accessories I want for the costume. I'll tackle that in a later post.

Well, it’s less than five months until Dragon*Con and past time for me to be thinking about what costume I want to make for this year. I have made a Final Fantasy XI black mage costume in the past, and have used my medieval warrior costume I built for the Renaissance Fairs, but I think it’s time for a new costume.

I’ve a few ideas bouncing around in my head right now. The first is to make a steampunk costume. I’ve been intrigued by steampunk since I saw the costumes at Dragon*Con a couple years ago. I like the Victorian style dress, particularly the rougher, adventurous style of the old American West. I also like the virtues and ideals of the period. The Art of Manliness goes into both aspects in some detail. But we’re talking steampunk, not straight Victorian fashion and behavior. Steampunk has always put me in mind of the 19^th century’s vision of the future, along the lines of Jules Verne and HG Wells. The anachronistic imagining of 20^th century inventions using 19^th century technology has wonderful visual appeal. I could have a lot of fun making a swashbuckling adventurer.

But I have two problems with steampunk. The first is that I actually know very little about the genre. The only steampunk work I am familiar with is Girl Genius, which is pretty light on the punk aspect. Almost all of my visual references would be costumes from Dragon*Con. Still, imagining a steampunk version of something is pretty easy, even if building it is not. The second problem is that steampunk is very popular at Dragon*Con right now, so my costume wouldn’t stand out. I would have to come up with a unique and detailed implementation to distinguish myself from the crowds. Still, I’m a fan and would enjoy a steampunk costume.

Option two is to make a cyberpunk costume. Steampunk’s futuristic cousin, I love the cyberpunk genre. I am currently playing Shadowrun, and Ghost in the Shell is one of my favorite anime series. I have a lot more to draw on than I do with steampunk. It’s also not near as popular at Dragon*Con, so a good cyberpunk costume would really stand out. The problem will be with making a good cyberpunk costume. Cyberpunk tends to be much heavier on the punk aspect of the genre than steampunk is. In making a generic cyberpunk costume, as opposed to cosplaying an actual, recognizable character, I’d have to be careful to not look like a normal goth or punk. Those are quite common at Dragon*Con, so an all black punk outfit with a gun is almost indistinguishable from a plain punk and not recognizable as cyberpunk. I’ve also seen people who look like random paramilitary dudes, something that is likewise not recognizable as cyberpunk, even if it was a copy of the outfits from Ghost in the Shell. I’d love to make a cyberpunk costume, but I’m just not sure how to approach it so that the cyber part of it stands out.

The third idea is to make a Link costume, from Legend of Zelda. Ocarina of Time was one of my favorite N64 games, and Link is an iconic character. As straight cosplay, it would be easier to make a Link costume than inventing my own steampunk or cyberpunk outfit. And while there are always a few Link’s running around Dragon*Con, he is not so common that I would blend in. Plus it would be fun to make some of Link’s equipment. Unfortunately, I have not played a Zelda game since the N64, so I would have to go buy a Wii and every Zelda game out there and play through them.

What? It’s important to do your research.

The final option I am considering is making a Jedi costume. I’ve been a Star Wars fan since I was old enough to watch movies, and I’ve always wanted to be a space wizard samurai. I would definitely want to build it to the level of quality seen in the Rebel Legion, so I would look into joining their community for costuming help. It wouldn’t be a bad place to start, since they are a costuming group and could give me help and advice.

Those are the ideas I'm considering right now. Since it takes a while to design and make these costumes to an acceptable level of quality, I need to decide soon which one I'm going to make. I'll post further updates as I work things out.

It's been a long while since I've bothered with the blog. Since it's spring, we'll start off with some garden updates. All the plants I put on the patio last spring are still growing. Most of the ones on the front walk died.

I added a new plant stand to the patio today. I got it at the Winter Garden plant festival, from a place called Nature on the Rocks. Today I planted some azaleas, snapdragons, and some tropical plant whose name I've already forgotten. There is still a lot of room on the stand, but I don't think I'll manage to fill it this year. I want to see what the azaleas do, since they can get quite large.


Last summer, I added a couple of wind chimes to the patio. One is bamboo, from Black Market Mineral, and the other is stained glass, that I got from the Tampa Renaissance Festival. Unfortunately, there is very little breeze down here, so most of the time they hang silent.

I also replaced the plants on the front walk. Most had died when I forgot to get someone to water them while I was out of town. Weeds had since started growing in some of the pots. We'll see how well these do.

There's a few other things I've done to the downstairs, so hopefully I'll remember to update the blog a little more frequently than every nine months.

I found an interesting article over on the Anchoress' blog. It's a piece from 1941 about the character of different types of Americans and whether or not they'd join the Nazis. It's definitely worth the read. But you can apply the same principle today. But instead of asking whether a person is a Nazi, ask whether a person is a statist. Play a game the next time you're in a group and see if you can determine who believes the State should tell them what to do, who would join the State just because it's the most powerful, who would oppose the State; ask how people would react to the State controlling everything. And more importantly, ask why. What is it about the person, his character, that would make him act the way he does?

Found this at the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler.

God bless Marines.

This is why we won the Revolutionary War. Shenanigans like this. This time we had 1440 plus a couple handfuls of bottle rockets. Then we placed 600 Saturn Missile Batteries next to it, and attached 5 mortars.


We, uhh, ran out of bottle rockets. Next year, we need 12 gross.

And of course, the after effects.



This is another place I'm not allowed to come back to.

From Morgan over at House of Eratosthenes. I'm going to steal the whole thing, because I agree with every word of it. But do go over and read his blog.

I’m polite, pleasant and belligerent. Anti-Marijuana, pro-states’-rights, anti-abortion-for-profit, pro-child-discipline, anti-tofu, pro-meat, mostly-anti-tattoo, pro-nice-lookin’-lady-in-skimpy-clothes, anti-little-kids’-shopping-cart, pro-clean-new-socks, anti-women-with-short-hair, pro-beer, anti-Hillary, pro-dry-wine, anti-anti-war, pro-soldier, anti-made-up-learning-disability, pro-charcoal-barbeque, anti-communist, pro-Hooters’-waitress, anti-hippy, pro-nuclear-arsenal, anti-carbon-cap-n-trade, pro-family, anti-feminist, pro-Boy-Scouts, anti-needle-exchange-program, pro-Palin, anti-judicial-activisim, pro-Mike-Rowe-Dirty-Jobs, anti-George-Soros, pro-capitalism, anti-woman-politician-in-pant-suits, pro-nice-lookin’-ladies-in-short-skirts, anti-convertible-with-top-down-going-boom-chicka-boom, pro-cute-woman-giving-me-a-cold-beer, anti-Michael-Moore, pro-profit, anti-ObamaCare, pro-free-market, anti-tribal-living, pro-individualist, anti-dickhead, pro-entrepreneur, anti-douchebag, pro-nice-person, anti-sleezebag, pro-law-abiding-citizen, anti-pervert, pro-capital-punishment, anti-murderer, pro-vigilante, anti-rapist, pro-vigilante, anti-kidnapper, pro-vigilante, anti-creep, anti-weirdo, anti-whacko, pro-vigilante…

I like the smell of gunpowder. I like it when the caliber begins with the number 3. I like it even better when the number begins with a 4.

I like pretty ladies much better than ugly ladies, and I like fit ladies much better than tubs-o’-lard — BUT!! — if you’re a female, if your hips are 46″ wide, but you love humans and you love strength and ability, you and I will enjoy a bond those skinny man-bashing bitches will never ever know. If you’re pretty, I’ll like you even better when you bring me a cold beer. I like the pretty gals even better when they bring me a hot plate of appetizers with the beer…especially when it’s basted with something slightly tangy. And when they wear something short that shows lots of leg, I like that even better. Cold beer, hot wings, nice-lookin’ bare female leg…and gunpowder. And when I earn money beyond the sensibilities of magnitude of whoever might be paying attention…I get to keep it all…I’m like a puppy when you rub its belly. I’ll follow ya anywhere.

But don’t literally rub my belly, unless you’re my girlfriend.

When I see little kids figure out how to do something they didn’t know how to do five minutes ago, it absolutely makes my day. I don’t care if it’s my kid or someone else’s — well, I do, but the situation holds irregardless. When I see a crooked psychiatrist invent a new three-letter-acronym so a new weakness can be enabled across the decades, I get sick to my stomach and wanna kill somebody.

I think Indiana Jones, as unrealistic as he is, is a role model. Because he’s all about L-I-C-O-R-I-C-E: Leadership, Initiative, Creativity, Ownership of problems, Resourcefulness, Ingenuity, Courage & conviction and Energy. (Those Skywalker boys, as my son and I have noticed, are a little bit light on the O and the C.) T.I., as gritty and realistic as he may be, is not a role model because he’s a thug. He’s missing his licorice.

In short — I’m pro-freedom. Pro-ability. Anti-co-dependence. Pro-strength. Anti-drug-dealing-scumbag-fuckwad.

It really can’t get any simpler than that. Any questions?

This needs no embellishment.

The road to freedom and the restoration of the republic has more to do with the Founders' "Public Virtue" than almost anything else. Time will prove me right, but the longer you let this go, the more painful The Reckoning.

Irish Cicero

I've finally added some plants to my back patio. Only a few so far. The first set consists of a small rose bush, salvia, and lily of the Nile, in your basic terracotta pots. The little table there came with the chairs, and makes a good plant stand.

In the other corner I've placed a Confederate Jasmine. It's definitely one of my favorite plants, and looks and smells amazing when it blooms. To keep with the Mediterranean feel, I got the big terracotta pot there with the neat looking vine creeping around the whole thing.

The nursery I got them from, Blodgett Gardens, also had a really cool armillary, that I want the jasmine to grow on. A bit of Roman statuary and I'll be all set.

This is still just a start, though I might not do a whole lot more this season. Ultimately I want there to be green and flowers everywhere. I better see how well I do taking care of these before I spend hundreds of dollars on more plants. It'll also give me a chance to see what I can find at the medieval fairs next winter. I really like their copper fountains.

A couple of weeks ago, I found some patio furniture for my house. I had been wandering around the garden sections at Walmart, Lowe's, and Home Depot, when I found this table at the Home Depot.


I love the tile. I didn't have anything in particular in mind when I was looking, but when I saw the table, I knew that's what I wanted. Puts me in mind of the Mediterranean.

My next goal is to deck it out with plants and flowers. It'll be a jungle by the time I'm done with it. Though that might take some time, given that I'll have to get pots and planters and everything else. Oh well. Gives me time to plan. I think I ought to stick with the Mediterranean theme.

Now that the House has passed the health care bill, though it still needs Obama's signature to become law, it seems like the time to review what to do about it. We are fairly far down the road to serfdom, one we have been walking for over a century. It's not like state control of our lives is a new thing. People are not going to suddenly get better because the government runs everything (as opposed to just regulating it...), nor are they going to magically get sick and die. For most of us, the changes will come slowly and without notice. So option number one is:

Do Nothing
Bureaucracy being as ineffective as it is, it will take time to implement any of the legislation, accompanying regulations, agencies, and enforcement. It might be years before everyone finally figures out what it all means and how to comply with it, and it will happen slowly, giving people time to adjust. That's not intentional, but bureaucracy retards progress, and people are used to bureaucracies doing stupid things anyways, so a new set of random regulations and procedures aren't going to phase anybody.

Most of us will simply accept things as they are, and keep our heads down, hoping that we never become the target of the government's ire. It's a very practical mentality. The government is extremely powerful and not required to play by its own rules. Challenging it on your own is a loosing strategy. Most people will assume it's not that bad, and hope and wait for sanity and common sense to return to D.C.

Only we've been slowly shedding our freedoms for several generations now. Something most people haven't really noticed because we've been gaining material wealth much faster. But we've reached the point where our material wealth is going to stop growing and start shrinking. And then we'll realize we have neither the freedom nor the power to go create all that wealth. All the while some faceless government bureaucracy adds more and more regulations and laws on how we work, and play, and build, and consume. So we could always:

Switch Sides
The best place to be in a statist regime is high up in the government apparatus. The laws don't apply, you get more of the wealth, such people will generally see no change at all in their lives due to the all consuming power of the state. The point of taking over everything is reap the benefits of controlling everything.

In America at least, media elites also fall in this category, being more an informal branch of government than an independent organization (the Department of Propaganda, to be specific).

Of course, for us on the right, we wouldn't be able to maintain our principles. Or reason. Or common sense. So if we don't want to sell our souls, we could:

Fight
Open rebellion is an option. One that our founding fathers ultimately picked against British (and for much less cause). I've not heard anybody seriously advocate revolt, but at this point, I think an armed revolt that completely replaces our current government is the only way to regain our liberties. I wonder how much trouble I'll get in for saying that?

The problem with this approach is that if you loose, you die. And you cause all kinds of hell for everybody else on your way out. And give the government a solid excuse for taking away more of our freedoms.

A little insurrection looses. To beat something as powerful as the US government, you'd need a sizable portion of the population willing to fight and die for their freedom. More and better people than those willing to fight and kill to maintain the current regime. Nothing I've heard from the Tea Parties or the right wing blogosphere indicates that people are willing to fight and die for their beliefs. They're still trying to work within the system, all nice and legal. I've not even heard any serious calls for civil disobedience.

So if fighting is not an option, that leaves:

Flight
Our last option is simply to run away. Leave America and it's state run nightmare and go...somewhere. The list of places better than America is really short. I haven't put any entries on the list yet.

America's influence spreads across the world, but that influence is weakening, and it will get weaker, as socialism slowly eats up all our resources. So there should be places out there that don't have to follow America's lead.

Ideally, such a place would be strong and growing in Christianity. Christian morals and values are the foundation of liberty. From Christianity we get such ideals as hard work, taking responsibility for yourself, honesty, generosity.

Such a country should have the resources and industry to provide for it's people, to be self sufficient in the event of a global economic collapse. Basically have everything going for it that America had going for it for most of its history. Such a country may exist, but I don't know where it is, which makes it difficult to run away to it.

None of these options are very good. Perhaps instead of asking 'what should I do,' I should be asking a different question:

Why
Why do I need freedom? Not in the abstract sense, not in the 'what's best for society' sense. In the very personal sense, why do I need freedom? And I realize that I need freedom so I can choose to follow God. Or not. Everything hinges on that choice. I choose to follow God, and His son, Jesus. That is not a choice anybody can make for me, and it is not a choice anybody can prevent me from making. At best, they can hide that the choice needs to be made.

But having already made my decision, having already declared my faith in the LORD, what can any power on earth do? Persecute me? Imprison me? Kill me? Such things are hard to stand, but they are nothing compared to eternal life with the Father.

But now I am truly free. It does not matter if our government takes over every aspect of our lives. It does not matter if I am a citizen or a serf. I have the freedom to follow God, to try and live a righteous life. I can be honest, though it cost me. I can be generous, though I have nothing. I can love, though I am hated for it. What freedom I need no force can take away. The real question is will I exercise that freedom, even unto death, or will I cower and submit, and take the easy way out?

I do not need to flee what my country is becoming. I do not need to rebel against the government. I do not need to give in to progressivism. I need to be the best man I can be. That is an option that is infinitely more difficult than any of the others. But if I can do that, then I have done all I can to fight for freedom.