Despite the long line outside of Amoeba Records in San Francisco last Saturday, we still managed to score most of the special releases on our list. We were lucky we were not looking for the really rare stuff. The guys … Continue reading
Category Archives: Geekery
A measure of Steve Matchett’s awesomeness
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Formula One fans in the US know the dynamic trio of sportscasters who make Speed TV the best channel for watching the races – David Hobbs, Bob Varsha, and Steve Matchett.
Unless you are really and truly a gear-head, you may not know that Steve Matchett also records a video series which streams on Speedtv.com called “Chalk Talk” in which Steve goes over various elements that go into Formula One cars and car development. (He was an F1 mechanic after all!)
But wait, there’s more!
Apparently, Steve is also a bit of a sci-fi fan, and shares the stage with two knitted robots – Bender and Flexo from Futurerama.
This is so cool, I think my head just exploded and fell off.
Check out the Chalk Talk for the 2012 Chinese Grand Prix, featuring Steve, Bender and Flexo for yourself.
Robots and knitting at the 2012 Robot Block Party
On April 11th I dropped by this year’s Robot Block Party at the Stanford Volkswagen Automotive Innovation Lab. Despite the clouds, the rain held off, which was great news for the kids running around chasing the robots. Probably pretty good for the robots too!
Robots live here!
Just as last year, there were military robots, consumer robots, and robots built out of Legos and various other bits and pieces by robot enthusiasts.
PRD from Willow Garage says hello.
There were robots from Nasa and SRI, robots doing push-ups, robots dancing to ‘Thriller‘, movie-making robots and cars that drive themselves.
Nao gets down with his bad self.
Robots. There’s an app for that!
Knitting at the Robot Block Party. Awesome.
Although there were no knitting robots present, one of the folks sitting near the Tech Museum display was knitting and attracting the interest of her fellow booth-manners.
Robots and knitting. Sounds like a great combination, don’t you think?
Robot Art and Indie Craft in Boston – Joy!!!
The hubby and I were lucky tonight to get to two fabulous events, the Cabin Fever Indie Gift Show in Boston’s SoWa art district and I…You…We…ROBOT: A Visual Homage To Our Inner Geek! at Space 242 nearby on East Berkeley Street.
We arrived in the South End a little too early (doors at the craft show opened at 6) so we walked around to a few of the studios open for First Friday to stay warm, and see what was happening in the Boston art scene.
After viewing some of the less-obtainable art, we paid our $2 and ran amok at the gift show. Perhaps it was because we found so many wonderful, inspiring things. Or perhaps it was because spending under $100 on a lovely oil painting seems smart after passing up $7000 ones at the studios nearby. Whatever the reason, we are thrilled with our new objects d’art!
In particular, we scored a painting I’ve been lusting for on Etsy for the past year by Botodesigns.
Tea CeremonyHere are cards from a few of the vendors we visited (and many of whom we deprived of several lovely things). The full list of vendors can be found on the Cabin Fever website. If you are hanging around Boston on Saturday, February 6th you should go check it out!
With our happy bag of goodies in tow, we next headed over to Space 242 to see the display of robotic art. Lots, and lots of robots in many different media. Many items to tempt. Among my favorites were “Longing,” “Sundae-bot” and “The Robots Steal our Jobs“.
This should be a yearly event, and next year, they need to include some fiber robot art (hint, hint).
Check out this video of artists discussing their inspiration:
If you can’t make it to Boston before the show ends on February 19th, you can always visit Space 242′s set of images on Flickr.
Here’s a photo we took of a bit of graffiti art spotted in the studio bathroom. Shocking!
How I knit
>For fun, I recorded how I knit on a wrong side row of the Lace Scarf I’ve been working on. This got me to thinking about a comment the Yarn Harlot made about how she is fascinated by watching other people knit. Wouldn’t you know it, a search on YouTube turned up lots of examples. Here is my video and a few of my favorites. Enjoy!
Sorry about the pause at the beginning. I was waiting for hubby to say “Go!”
This is a fascinating knitting style. Notice the crochet hook-like needles.
This is a long one – but the manner in which the right needle is held kept me mesmerized.
I was taught to knit Eastern European style but re-taught myself to knit from a book when I found following knitting directions difficult. Interweave had a great article on this style in the Spring 2004 issue – unfortunately, this is no longer online.
Love the technique. Love the nails.
This rhythmic flick is hypnotizing.
Bet she’s glad to get a moment to herself.
Great background music.
Silly. And makes me hungry for some reason….
Do you have a favorite?
Bots over Brooklyn
We had a wonderful visit to Brooklyn in July. Some of the high points:
Got to see brother Bill in a production of Hamlet in J.J. Byrne park in front of The Old Stone House. It was a perfect summer night, and the performance was very enjoyable despite the tragic plot. There are so many familiar quotes from that play – I’d forgotten where they came from.
Did you know there are fireflies in the city? We saw several playing hide-and-seek between folks spread out on the lawn to watch the play. Who knew?
As the city that spawned Etsy, it should not have been a surprise that Brooklyn houses a diverse and interesting artist community. We spent quite a while window shopping. Found a very friendly LYS (local yarn store) called Knit-A-Way and dropped some cash on a few skeins of Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino. Yum! Also found a cute pair of robot earrings. Joy!
At one point, we stood transfixed by the contents of an antiques shop window which was filled with amazing robot sculptures.
Yet another thing to save my pennies for (or is that buy lottery tickets for?). But which one? Ms. Jello, Simplex 3, or Spot?? Sigh….
Shopportunity
So no good deed goes unpunished, right? I loaned my sweet Avenue A | Razorfish USB flash drive out to a co-worker. Long story short, co-worker departed with the drive and says they mailed it back. A week ago.
Excuse to go shopping? You betcha!
Reason departed, and BOTH of these sweet mimobots will be mine! Let the Empire beware…
In search of the Mecha Dunny
I have a small addiction. I’ve been collecting series 5 Dunnies. The lure of the blind box. The quest for the rare Dunny. I only buy one. Here and there. The problem is that most of them are really so, well, ugly. And the object of my desire is so very rare…
Surely going to the source – the Kidrobot store in NYC – would bring me luck? No soap. Drat and double drat. A duplicate Dunny!
Oh Mecha Dunny, where are you??
RoboGames: Olympics for the circuit board crowd!
Wish I could have made it out to RoboGames 2009 in San Francisco June 12-14 this year. Looks like it was a lot of geeky fun! Now that’s an Olympics I could compete in! (maybe…)
Take a peek at this documentary from the RoboGames site. Best quote “Anytime you get geeks thinking in mass, you get societal benefits from that.”
Pin me
Here is the Proto Robot Brooch as it looks “on”. Flogging Molly t-shirt not included.
I do have one for sale on Etsy, if anyone is interested.
Speaking of which, does anyone have a good online source for brooch pin fasteners? I want to make a bunch more of the little guys and I want to spend my time knitting, not driving, parking, getting parking tickets, paying parking tickets…. yes, donnez-moi the internet-don’t-have-to-leave-my-house transaction s’il vous plait.
Anyway – know any good sources?
Thanks in advance.
La Knitterre Robotte