I've been developing my costuming bug again. This is an expensive bug to develop, but it's also oh so fun. I've been meaning to put together a costume of vaguely similar appearance to Diziara, my favorite role play character and shameless representation of my Id. I'm also starting to develop a lust to dress like an Andorian.

For both of these costumes, I'll most certainly need to get my hands on an airbrush. Grease paints are problematic, have a tendency to rub off on things being handled and on the clothing worn, and generally fail to photograph in a convincing manner. In theory, I could probably henna on trill spots, but then I'd be stuck with the spots for anywhere up to a month after the event I had 'em done for. The advantage of this would be I could do a multi-day convention without having to worry about redoing the spots each morning.

Both costumes would also require forehead prosthetics. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to make the forehead for the part of Diz, but I have seen a pretty nice Andorian forehead piece on the market. It's $150 though, but it looks like it's pretty nice. I'll need a partner to help me with the klingon forehead making project, but I've got a pretty good idea of what all would be involved in it.

The clothing for both costumes will be of little problem. I have enough leathery/warrior-like bits of clothing I could put together to do a pretty good Andorian costume, and Diz, she has eclectic clothing taste. Also, with Diz, I could probably throw on a fleet uniform in a pinch, as long as I was going to be at the convention with other people likewise costumed, as she isn't likely to be wearing her uniform unless on duty or required to for something silly like an away mission.

Also, I think I'd probably pull off an awesome Peacekeeper, so I also need to come up with the right clothing and accessories for this. Mainly I probably need a pair of leather pants and a pulse pistol. Bonus points if I can come up with a leather vest that has a bi-directional zipper on it, or a kick ass black leather trench that fits me awesomely.

So, my current costuming wish list:

• Airbrush
• Andorian forehead/antennae prosthetic
• time/supplies to make a klingon forehead for a halfbreed
• white wig
• one or more flavors of starfleet uniform
• Farscape style Pulse Pistol
• Aeryn style leather clothing: ie. vest, pants, trench coat

So a couple years ago, it was recommended I read a book called Finding Serenity, which contained a group of essays focusing on Firefly. I did as I was told, though I was bad about it and did it sitting in a Barns & Noble without buying it. I did eventually go back and buy a copy because of one essay which offended me so much that I felt I really should write a reply to it tearing it apart (that's still on my todo list).

The last few days I started poking through the book again for the unofficial glossary of Chinese in the series, as I've been working on background story for the Serenity character I put together, awaiting a game to be started which I can participate in. The dialog is coming a little difficult in the story at the moment, so I started getting side tracked, and eventually ended up at the website listed on the back of the book, www.benbellabooks.com. Poking around, I was reminded that Finding Serenity was part of their Smart Pop Books series and ended up at their website for that.

Scanning over the other titles down the side of the page, there are three of these books I'm going to have to get my hands on. The first is The Anthology at the End of the Universe, as I love Hitchhiker's Guide, and some of the essay topics sound fun. Next, I most certainly have to get Farscape Forever! as I am somewhat of a rabid 'Scaper. ^_^ Finally, a book I recently noticed while geeking out on Veronica Mars, and was reminded about when I hit the Smart Pop website, as it is one of their recent ones, Neptune Noir.

There are probably other books in their catalog I'd enjoy reading, but those are the three that stand out and yell "Read Me!"

I am so seriously jonesing for a Pulse Pistol, it's insane. I could put together an outfit that looks very Aeryn like from clothes already in my closet/drawers, it just wouldn't be right without a pulse pistol at my hip. So it makes me sad.

This actually got where it is today because I started googling for free clothing patterns and toddler sized hoodies, because my mom and I had a silly but fun idea for my niece for easter, as well as wanting to supplement my wardrobe, since I have such a hard time finding stuff off the rack that's actually cute and fits me correctly. Then I got side tracked into Star Trek uniforms, as I've always wanted an original series uniform. From there, I thought about Pulse Pistols, and figured I might as well google that while I'm at it.

I've found a lot of people posting their progress pictures as they've made their own pulse pistols, and it makes me kinda wish I didn't waste the metal sculpture class I took a few years ago. I am planning on going and taking pottery classes again whenever I get the money flow thing rolling again, so I could harass the sculpture teacher to see if my pulse pistol is a viable option. It'd be awesome to do a metal casting, but I'm not sure how easily I could get LEDs into it given the thickness of metal I could work with in a classroom environment like that.

For now, I should just focus on getting a job again, and finishing my current t-shirt modification projects. The pulse pistol will come in time, even if I just have to shell out money for a resin casting I can paint myself. I'll get there. Also, I really want an airbrush so I can paint myself up as a Nebari. Yeah.

So, I have this clearance m500 Motorola mp3 player that basically seriously dropped in price in the back room of the RS I used to work at because it was one of the items in the glass case when our store was broken into. By the time I dug up the box and the player to confirm everything was there, and checked the price, it'd dropped to a significantly lower price (somewhere between a third to half off) and it's a 5GB player. I usually hate Motorola products, and won't buy 'em, but this one was low enough in price for its size that I figured I could deal with it in return for having ~5GB of music on hand easily.

The player's being odd and buggy now. I pretty sure it's still less than a year since I bought it, which means it would be under warranty, but I don't have a receipt. That's not a big deal, as I was an employee when I bought it, therefore my name and address was required for the transaction, and would be easily looked up. I'm not sure how they'd likely deal with it though, as this thing was so seriously discontinued it was probably the only unit in the district at the time, so it wouldn't be exchangeable. I might be able to get the value of the player credited towards something else in the store, but I don't really want to get a crappier player or have to pay the difference to get something equal or better.

I do want to try a firmware upgrade, but the firmware upgrades they offer on the site has two versions, one for windows, one for mac. As I have neither, I emailed them asking what I should do. They pretty much said "Get a mac or PC, also, you shouldn't need to upgrade the firmware right out of the box." Nevermind that the unit was old, and had been sitting in the store a year or more before I bought it. Yeah, really helpful, assholes. I suppose I could ask Geoff if he's okay with me running the update through one of his computers, I think they're clean and virus free.

I am kinda wanting an iPod though, the green nanos are kinda cute. I'm just annoyed that the green only comes in the 4GB size, not the 8GB. The 8GB only seems to come in black. Meh. Also, I'm not sure what linux program I'd sync an iPod up with. After my experiences today with Amarok fighting with the m500, I really don't believe I'd trust it touching an iPod, even if I like how it plays my music on my computer.

At least, after today's fight with the player, I have my Babyland and Bloodwire mp3s, as well as my Farscape musics, on it. I really just need an FM transmitter now, and I will be able to go Sirius free if the XM merger goes through (hopefully and probably won't, but I won't renew my subscription if it does). I might go through and delete more stuff so I can get a couple more new mp3s on the player. Though I might have enough room for Heart's take on The Battle of Evermore. Those ladies really can do the Zeppelin tracks awesomely. ^_^

I need a pulse pistol and a good black leather trench coat. That, or an airbrush that'll handle makeup/body paint.