Cos-play Prepping & St. Paddy Day Party

Today I went through my Hobbit cosplay items. Wondercon is coming up in a few weeks and I needed to make sure I had everything. This year I have been collecting various accessories for my Hobbit outfit. I didn't want to be the same Hobbit as I was the previous two years. So I purchased a LOTR Gold One Ring, a silver chain to hang it from, a toy version of Sting (figured the cons wouldn't let me bring in a real sword). I got a new shirt and vest. Still in search for a pipe and sword sheath. Keeping my pants (as I put a lot a work into making those) and my cape (it's still in great shape). I also ordered some more ears. Still no 100% happy with the ones I ordered (I used them last year as well) but they are the closest thing I have at the moment. I washed my Hobbit wig (it's real hair) and brushed it out.. well that was a mistake (see picture). So I re-wet it and let it dry naturally. All I have to do is curl it up a bit (now that I own a curling iron) and it will be good to go. I'm still using my same feet that Greg Aronowitz made for me a few years ago. I never expected them to last this long but they are doing pretty good. I am going to be asking Greg is make me a new pair for SDCC this year as I don't think they will last much longer.

So I spent the morning prepping my Hobbit stuff and I also did some things around the house (like laundry). Afterwards I jumped on the computer and played a little LOTRO before I headed out for a St. Patrick's Day party.

My buddy Will puts on these EPIC St.Paddy's Day parties every year, and for various reasons I'm not able to go. But this year I made sure I blocked out the date months in advance so I could go. I got there around 8pm and was one of the first to arrive. I debated on drinking as if I did drink I will no drive so that meant I would have to crash at his place. Normally I wouldn't have minded but I had some podcasts to record the next morning and I didn't want to miss it or feel like crap while recording so I opted not to drink. In hindsight I think that was a bad idea. Now I'm not saying that I didn't have fun but I think if I would have had a few shots I'd have had a much better time.

I'm not good at parties, especially with folks I don't know. Wills' friends are all nice but I knew about 6 of the 40 people there. And I don't work well in large groups. I pretty much talked to the few friends I knew and pretty much sat in the corner all night. Watching some of my friends get drunker and drunker as the night progressed was fun but I did miss not participating with them. I left the party just after midnight but I heard it went on for several hours afterwards.

Leveling Up

Spent the day leveling up my Lord of the Rings Online characters. As I have mentioned in previous blog posts I have four characters that I am currently playing on LOTRO. My main one Drialdo is my Hobbit, he was at level 35 and now is 36, my female human Kiwyn was 25 and is now 26, my male Elf, Gillthalion was 20 and is now 21 but my biggest leveling was my Dwarf Arikk, he was level 16 and I was determined to get him to at least level 20 so I could buy a stead and travel alot faster around Middle Earth. By the end of the day I did manage to get him to level 20 and he's now the proud owner of a little dark brown pony named Daper (he came with that name and I liked it, so it's staying).

Sometimes the gaming bug gets me and regardless of what my plans are for the day I am a slave to the game... and you know what.. I'm cool with that :)

MASH 4077 Podcast Episode 50

Download from itunes tinyurl.com/MASH4077itunes , listen on Stitcher Radio ow.ly/iZJIz or Listen, get direct download from our main website MASH4077Podcast.com

Show Notes

Kenny Mittleider from Knights of the Guild, Alien Nation: The Newcomers Podcast & Confessions of a Fanboy Podcast, Simon Meddings from Waffle On Podcast, & Al Kessel from Tales from the Mouse House, Fast Forward & Just Because Podcast discuss one of the most successful and longest running television series in history.. M*A*S*H

Today we cover Season 3, Episode #2 - Rainbow Bridge
50th Episode Overall
Directed by Hy Averback
Written by Larry Gelbart & Laurence Marks
Production code B301
Original air date September 17, 1974

Set during the Korean War in the 1950’s

Plot Summary: April–May 1953: China has made an offer to return a handful of prisoners of war too wounded for their own medical facilities. After some debate about the Chinese motives, Hawkeye, Trapper, Frank, Radar and Klinger take a bus deep into North Korea to an agreed-upon meeting place called "Rainbow Bridge" to receive the prisoners, but Major Burns decides to bring a gun in violation of the agreement. Tensions are defused when the gun is only about as big as a cigarette lighter.

Podcasts and Gaming

My struggle continues between working on my podcasts and playing LOTRO game. Today podcasting won out for the most part. I'm trying to release two or even three (I know that's crazy) episodes of my Knights of the Guild podcast a month. So far I've barely managed to get one episode done a month. I have a ton of season six interviews that I have to go through and organize so of course it takes me a lot longer to edit these podcasts. But I am determined to get at least one episode done before I allowed myself to start playing LOTRO.


And that's exactly what I did. Took me about four hours but I got the next KOTG episode edited, sweetened, converted, uploaded, show note written and released. Afterwards I was in my podcasting mode so I actually spent another few hours doing podcasting maintenance.

As you all know I'm been kind of slacking with all my podcasts as of recent. So I decided to make this awesome new excel spreadsheet that lists all my podcasts, how I promote them and various other important information. Sometimes it's hard keeping track of everything and with this "cheap sheet" it makes life a bit easier. It also shows me how much work I really put into my podcasting. I spent an hour updating several websites that I normally post about the podcast but missed the past six or seven podcasts. After doing all this I actually felt a sense of accomplishment when it came to my podcasts and I haven't felt that in a while... it was good feeling.

At this point it was evening and I did reward myself with a few hours of LOTRO. It was a very productive day. It also showed me that when I want to I can set my mind of one thing and accomplish it without distractions. Just wish I did it more.

Knights of the Guild Ep 48

Download from itunes bit.ly/KotGCast, Listen on Stitcher Radio ow.ly/iXCpg or Listen and gek Direct Download on our main website bit.ly/2CrYxk

Show Notes:

In this episode I sit down with Brett Sheridan (Mr. Wiggly), Vince Caso (Bladezz), Greg Aronowitz (Production Designer), Robin Thorsen (Clara) and Red 5 (Art Director) as we discuss episode one of season six.... Enjoy, ~Kenny~

Family Fun Time / Buffy Bro Time

Today I drove to Riverside to visit my dad, brother, sister-in-law, nephew and niece. But also my Mom who was visiting as well. It takes me about an hour and forty-five minutes to get there. Once I was there Dad, Mom, Kenobi (nephew) were off to Cici's for some lunch. Cici's is a pizza buffet place with games. The food isn't that great but it's $5 for all you can eat and Kenobi had a great time playing games and spending $5 in quarters buying a ton of useless toys from those quarter machines. So it was the perfect place for us to go.

Today Kenobi was all about his uncle (formally known as unk). He held my hand when walking through the parking lot of the pizza place, I played games with him and helped him spend those quarters. We played in the water when we got home. He showed me his new two wheel (with training wheel) bike. Wanted me to play in his extremely hot plastic castle. He wanted me to push him on his swing and he's getting to that stage of everything is a question.. what's that.. what does that say.. why is this... why is that. I'm thinking another six months or so and he'll be ready to come stay with his uncle once in a while. I'm so looking forward to that.

Now Molly on the other hand I haven't really bonded with. She's very stand offish. For the first few months of her life she would see me and cry bloody murder. She at least has stopped doing that. I actually got to pick her up and made her laugh so she is slowly coming around.

It was great seeing my Dad and sister-in-law, my brother didn't get home until a half hour before I left but it was nice seeing him as well. It was really great seeing my Mom. I haven't seen her since before Christmas. She got to check out my new car and take it for a ride.. she really liked it and is considering getting herself one. We got to spend a good five hours together and for us that's a long time.

It was a pretty great visit with family.

Around 5:30pm I said my goodbyes and headed to Mar Vista as it was Buffy night with me buddy Robert. It took about an hour and a half to get to his place with all the traffic. I got to Robert's a little after 7pm. We walked to Taco Bell to grab some dinner. When we got back we started our Buffy rewatch/1st time viewing. We watched 3 episodes tonight  "Doomed",  "A New Man" and "The I In Team"

"Doomed" was a fun episode because when they find out that it's the end of the world again, the gang is so over it. Spike trying to stake himself was pretty funny and Xander and Willow talking him down. Spike also finds out he can beat on demons which makes him very happy. Riley's secret gets out to Willow and Xander. Lot's of story movement in this episode. I also like how the episode literally picks up right where the last episode Hush left off.

"A New Man" was another fun episode, very Giles centric. He's feeling left out of things and pretty useless. We see the return of his "friend" Ethan and of course he's up to no good and turns Giles into a demon and hilarity ensues. Buffy and Riley hook up, Willow feels left out, Buffy meet Professor Walsh and learns more about the initiative. Spike is also very good in this episode as he helps Giles escape from being captured, well for a certain price of $300. We see more Willow and Tara's blossoming relationship and we find out that there is something more to Professor Walsh and the number 314.

"The I In Team" Buffy joins The Initiative and her friends/scoobie gang feel alienated. It's fun to watch Buffy interact with the initiative as they work as a team and Buffy has always done things her way. Spike seeks help from Giles and the gang when the Initiative tag him and are on the hunt. We find out that Professor Walsh is creating some sort of Frankenstein monster / ultimate solider in room 314. She decided that Buffy is a risk and tries to kill her and fails, of course. Riley finds out what she did and walks out of the initiative. Professor Walsh goes in to room 314 and is planning Buffy's demise when a large spike burst out of her chest and you see Adam standing there as he says Mommy. And so the big bad of this season is born.

For some reason the way I remembered it season 4 was my least favorite season of Buffy... but man we are 13 episodes in and though I haven't loved all of them it's been a great season so far. Maybe the final 10 or so will remind me why I have this season so low on my list.. if not I'll have to reevaluate my least favorite Buffy seasons.

Got home around 11pm, played LOTRO for an hour before calling it a night. It was a fun fill day of family and spending time with one of my favorite bros watching one of my favorite shows.

It's All About MASH

Today I was determined to finish my next MASH podcast. It's due to be released in a few days and I wasn't going to let LOTRO distract me any more. I spent the next three hours editing away and got to a point where I couldn't go any further. Since my hard drive died last month and all my podcast material was on it, this included my MASH episodes so I don't have any episode audio to use. I did manage to find an episode online for the last MASH podcast but it had a laugh track and it was so distracting and horrible but I was in a pinch and had to use it. This time around I wasn't going to use the poor audio so I figured I'd go out and purchase season 3 on DVD. First place I looked was Costco, I had heard they had the DVD's for $10, but alas my Costco didn't have any DVD's of any kind. I grabbed a bite to eat from El Pollo Loco before going up the hill to Target. Once again they didn't have any MASH episodes on DVD, not even the box set of the entire series (which I considered getting). My next stop was Walmart but they only had seasons 10 & 11 on DVD. I was starting to worry. I knew I could buy the boxsets online but if I wanted them quick I'd have to pay for faster shipping.

There as one more place to look Best Buy. Again they had seasons 10 & 11 but no 3 :( . I didn't give up that easy I walked up and down each aisle just in case they were in a "special" section and sure enough I found more seasons and one DVD left for season 3. It's regular price was $35 and I didn't really care but this week it was on sale for $9.99... SCORE!!!!

Oh I forgot to mention when I was at Target I picked up a curling iron... no it's not for my hair.. well it is in a way, it's for my Hobbit wig. It needs a good curling and instead of borrowing a curling iron (and so far I couldn't find a friend who had one) I figured I'm going to be cos-playing as a Hobbit (as it's my thing) for a while and will be in need of one every so often.

With DVD in hand I headed home. That little adventure took a few hours and it was now close to 7pm. It took me an hour or so to figure out how to import the episodes off of the DVD without the  laugh tracks but in the end I got the episode imported into the Avid and another few hours my MASH 4077 Podcast Episode 50 was complete.

And to reward myself I played a little LOTRO before going to bed.

I'm Going to Disneyland

Since I'm out of work, one of the first things that popped into my head was "I'm Going to Disneyland". It's been a few months since I went last and since I have an annual pass I like to take advantage of the parks as much as I can.

It just so happen that my long time friend Craig texted me asking if I wanted to go to Disneyland (out of the blue). I texted him back.. saying OMG I was just wanting to go, so we made plans to go today. Craig's brother Ross was also joining us.

We got to the park around 11am, the parking lot made it look alot less busy then it actually was. I figured it was a Monday and that it wouldn't be too bad, well I should have known better.. Disneyland is always busy.

My friend Craig can't walk long distances (medical issues) so he rented a motorized scooter. The upside of being disabled at Disneyland is that you normally don't have to wait in the long lines. That's not so true for Disney California Adventures. Since it's a newer park it's been built for the handicapped so you have to wait in line like everyone else.

Craig and Ross hadn't done DCA yet so that was the first park we went to. We spent half our day there doing Monster Inc ride, Tower of Terror and Screaming. We tried to do the Radiator Spring Racers but the wait was over 90 minutes and neither of the guys wanted to wait that long. We had lunch in that park before heading over to Disneyland. There we were able to jump lines and not have to wait so long. We did Space Mountain, Star Tours, Indian Jones Ride, Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean and Matterhorn.

By 8ish Craig was getting tired so we called it a night. We had some dinner across the street at Denny's before making our way home. It was a fun visit to Disneyland and I can't wait to go back again.

It's a LOTRO Kind of Day

I played LOTRO all day today. From the moment I woke up to the moment I went to bed. I did mange to eat a bit here and there but it was Lord of the Rings Online play from dawn til dusk and it was glorious!!!

I've never understood how someone could play video games for hours on end, now I do. You honestly don't realize that you are playing a game for that many hours. Your stomach rumbles and you check to the time and realize you've been playing for six hour straight. Or you jump on to play for an hour and seven hours later you can't figure out why the sun is already setting... It's pretty crazy. So I take back all the times I said to my gamer friends "how can you play for that long". Now I get it, now I completely understand.

My biggest hurdle is to not let this take over my life. Playing is fun and releases stress but I still have a house to fix up to sell, podcasts to record, edit and release and most importantly finding a new job. Life can't be put on hold for gaming.. that much I know.. it's just implementing that plan is a bit tougher then I expected.

Alien Nation: The Newcomers Podcast Ep14

Download from itunes http://bit.ly/itunesAlienNation Listen on Stitcher Radio http://app.stitcher.com/browse/feed/32281/episodes or Listen/ Get Direct Download http://Aliennationpodcast.com

Show Notes

Brothers Kenny and Michael Mittleider review and discuss a short lived but very socially aware TV series from the late 80's early 90's ALIEN NATION. Each podcast we will review a single episode in sequential order starting with the Pilot. Will give you our thoughts on the episode as well as some fun behind the scenes information.

Today we cover Season 1, Episode 14 - Generation To Generation
Directed by John McPherson
Written by Diane Frolov & Andrew Schneider
Original air date January 29th 1990

Plot Summary: A series of murders in which the victims are burned to death is tied to a mysterious Tenctonese box that keeps transferring from person to person. George is shocked to learn that one of the people involved in the killing is Uncle Moodri, who is a member of the Edlers, the Newcomers chosen to keep the old ways alive in the minds of future generations. The search for the box intensifies, with Sikes and George finally coming to understand it's importance to the memory of the Tenctons' home plant.

As a subplot, Sikes becomes a big brother to a youth, first to avoid weekend police duty, and then because he realizes the importance of reaching out to others in need.

Alien Nation: The Newcomers Podcast is a Geekyfanboy Productions