Happy Loot-Mas!

Kathy and I decided to do a more scaled back holiday this year, but I have to say I am married to one of the best women out there. Kathy did a great job shopping within a limited budget. Of course it helps that my tastes tend to have two speeds:

• Very expensive high-end tech.
• Toys for my inner eight year old.
  

Ken's Dark Side Birthday Cookies

Experiment 081121

Come to the the Dark Side, we have cookies! - Anon

This year my friend Ken requested cookies instead of a cake for his birthday. In particular "Dark Side" cookies.... Bwah ha ha ha ha!



(Late addition added on Thu 12/25/2008.)

New Xbox Experience

Allow me a moment of fan-boyish enthusiasm please. The "New Xbox Experience" Xbox 360 console upgrade is awesome! The upgrade itself only took about five minutes for me and the new Netflix Watch Instantly integration is flawless. The video quality on the copies of "Hellboy: Animated: Blood & Iron" and "Last Exile: Vol. 1: Ep. 2: Luft Vanship" that I watched last night was fantastic. Whee! New toy!

Valkyrie screening

Adventure 081118

Kathy and I were lucky enough to be invited to attend an early screening of Tom Cruise's newest movie last night and I found myself surprisingly entertained. I personally am not a Tom Cruise fan, and WWII dramas have not generally appealed to me but I found myself wrapped up in the story and the marvelous performances by Tom Cruise, Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, and Tom Wilkinson. I walked into the theater only knowing that Valkyrie was going to be a dramatic retelling of Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg's plot to assassinate Hitler at the end of WWII, but even knowing the story would have to end poorly I couldn't help but be enthralled by how well the characters were portrayed as fighting against their destiny. I was particularly pleased by how the inevitably depressing ending was handled, and walked out of the theater buoyed by the characters strength. I strongly suggest going to see this one on the big screen.

Epic MacBook Pro Cake Failure

Experiment 081115

After a co-worker saw the cakes I brought in from my Wilton class she wanted to hire me to bake a cake for her husband's 50th birthday. I was feeling pretty proud of myself after the class and decided to break my rule about taking money for my cakes. Big mistake. After sitting down to discuss at work, she asked me to try and make a MacBook Pro cake. "A MacBook Pro cake? Sure! That shouldn't be too hard. I can just bake a normal sheet cake with my Dream-Whip White Cake recipe, then I'll level it and put it on a nice cake-board, frost it with Wilton recipe Buttercream icing, and then use this nifty wax-paper trick I learned in my Wilton class to get really smooth frosting." Pride goeth before a fall.... Or in the case of this experiment it "goeth" before waking up to find a bunch of cracks that appeared in the frosting overnight. Kathy and I tried just about everything short of scrapping the icing off and starting over, which unfortunately we really didn't have time to do. With time getting short Kathy and I went ahead and tried applying the silver dust with both a folded piece of cheese-cloth, and by "painting" the dust on with a small brush. In both cases the silver dust highlighted every crack, bubble, and imperfection. I will note that using a piece of cheese-cloth to "dust" large areas did work very well, and I will use that method again if I can get around or don't have to deal with the cracked icing issue. Once the silver had been applied we added the white chocolate Apple symbol, and started adding the ports, DVD slot, and thumbscoop. I then tried to show a better height match by adding clamshells with royal blue decorating gel dots. Finally I called my co-worker and told her that I would be giving her check back with the cake and warned her that "the cake looks like a ten year old's drawing of a MacBook." Here's what I learned:

1. "Simple" cakes are harder than cakes where you can hide your mistakes under an extra glob of icing. (Duh. I should know this by now....)
2. Silver dust highlights every crack, bubble, and imperfection. I just don't think icing is a good choice for a cake like this and need to spend some time to learn how to use fondant.
3. I'm really not ready to charge for my cakes. Not only are my skills not quite up to the right quality for that, but I'm also apparently completely unable to accurately estimate cost and time. I asked for $30 to create this cake. I used about $15 worth of supplies, I spent about 6 hours of my time, and Kathy also spent about 4 hours helping me. So even if the cake had come out perfectly I would have been charging $1.50/hour for our time....

Additional info: My co-worker Kim met me at my desk first thing Monday morning and insisted that I take her check back. She said she was thrilled with the cake and that it had been the hit of the party. I'm happy she was pleased even if a bit confused....

More geek points from videogamecartoons.com!

More geek points! Greg Houston of videogamecartoons.com included a DragonCon 2007 shot of Kathy, Ken, Larry and Mom in the #10 slot of his "Video Game Halloween Costume Guide 2008" post.

Villains Halloween Party

Adventure 081101

Kathy wanted to have a big Halloween party this year and choose a Villains theme. It turned out gorgeous! My pictures are on Picasa and our friends Hank and Jon have posted their pictures as well.

Jennie sketch from DragonCon '08

Kathy and I were not able to make it to DragonCon this year but our friend Dea did attend and brought back this awesome sketch from our favorite webcomic artist Jennie Breeden of The Devil's Panties.

A week with Social Networking

Experiment 081012

As most of the people who will read this already know, I work as a project manager for a real estate software company. In the current U.S. recession-enhanced economy, this is very close to working as a piranha feeder for a boss who keeps shortening the handle on the chum shovel each week. As the real estate market continues to worsen, the expectations for what any particular piece of software will do for an MLS board and it's agents expands dramatically, and inversely the expectation of how much these wonders should cost drops catastrophically. As you can imagine, I tend to have trouble sleeping....

Recently I've read several articles suggesting that one of the first steps in recession-proofing your career is to work on your networking. This make a lot of sense to me, as all of the decent jobs I've ever gotten have been through word of mouth, so last weekend I spent time researching and implementing accounts on what I believe are the four major social networking services. Here is what I have found after a week:

#4: MySpace.com

• I completed a MySpace page first, but after a week I honestly still don't have any idea what to do with it now. I already have a Blogger account that I'm attempting to keep updated, so the rather awkward MySpace blog tools are redundant. The social networking tools are nearly non-existent, and there seems to be very little interactivity other than a globally shared meta-game of "how many friends can you get". Considering what I am looking for, it just doesn't seem to be a good match. I'll probably leave the MySpace page up and check in on it randomly from time to time, but otherwise it's a dead end for me. (Also, the fact that someone else beat me to the "samthegiant" MySpace URL is annoying. Oh well, that's what I get for waiting so long to try it out.)

#3: Twitter

• I really like Twitter. It's micro-blogging boiled down to it's absolute core functionality. Unfortunately, I have two problems with Twitter's minimalism. First, no one I know is on Twitter. Second, the 140 character limit and global broadcast nature of the updates make it unlikely to be useful for the kind of "Hey, I've been laid off, have you got any good leads" kind of networking I am looking for. I'll try and check my Twitter account often enough to keep it active, but otherwise, it just isn't what I'm looking for right now.

#2: LinkedIn

• LinkedIn is exactly what I started my search to find. It's professionally oriented, has a fantastic method for making contacts based on what companies you've worked for, and it has what I find to be a much better shared meta-game of writing and requesting "Recommendations". LinkedIn also has a personal bonus for me in that it's an acceptable use of free time at my workplace. (Not that I have much....) I believe LinkedIn is the perfect match for anyone intending on improving their professional networking.

#4: Facebook

• Facebook was the surprise find of my experiments this week. I had honestly just avoided all the social networking sites up to this point as being, in my mind, targeted at a much younger audience. I had visions of a target demographic of cell-phone texting tweens and embarrassing party-picture-posting college kids. If that was ever true, I have apparently skipped past that phase because Facebook strikes me as all-grown-up. The application itself is a relatively uncluttered and straight-forward way to keep up with your online social circle. It offers a multitude of options, but the core functionality surprised me by reminding me strongly of the BBS systems that I fell in love with when I first started playing with computers in the '80s. I hadn't been looking for something else to do with my scant free time, but I found one anyway. Of all four services I have worked on this week, I have spent more time and enjoyed myself much more on Facebook.

Bonus: Digsby

• As a bonus item I think that anyone who finds this post at all interesting should take a look at Digsby. I've been a long time fan of Trillian for my multi-protocol IM client, but over the last week I've found Digsby to be much more polished and ascetically pleasing. In addition Digsby offers the killer app of integrating all of the four social networking sites I've tried this week seamlessly into the IM interface. I found Digsby an amazingly easy way to provide and keep track of updates.

As a side note I've removed my Twitter and MySpace graphics and links from the left column of the page.

LinkedIn

And last but not least on my whirlwind list of social networking site additions we have LinkedIn.

Twitter

In my continuing efforts towards creating a social networking presence, I've created a Twitter account at http://twitter.com/samthegiant and added a Twitter image link to the left column of the page.

Facebook

Now I've created a Facebook page and added a link on the left side of the page. Facebook makes sense to me. It's just a good way to find people. It doesn't try to be anything else. I like that.

MySpace???

Okay, I've finished creating a MySpace page. Now what the heck are they actually for? No, seriously. The only thing I can actually see it being used for is a very odd form of dating service/bulletin board? My friends Jon and Hank are using it for their blogs, but from what I've seen it really doesn't compare at all well with Blogger or even just a stand-alone vanity page like my old Evil Adventure & Experiment Log. I'm willing to listen to any dissenting opinions. Maybe I'm just missing something here.... In any case I've added a MySpace graphic to the left column with a link to my page. While I was working on that I also updated the blog links for my friends Carrie and Hank, added a Followers display, and put together a RSS feed of the Netflix DVDs that Kathy and I have checked out.

Wilton Discover Cake Decorating – Course 1 - Class 3

Adventure 080930

Tonight was the last of my three Wilton Method Cake Decorating classes and I'm tempted to go ahead and sign up for the next series right away. Unfortunately even though the class itself is on sale right now I don't have quite enough extra money to buy all the extra course materials. In any case it was a great class, it really filled in several of the basic skills I had been missing, and I had quite a lot of fun.


The class instructor insisted that we write something on our final cakes.... I really am going to have to get one of the letter icing stamp kits Wilton makes.

I am now an officially certified cake decorator and can blame Wilton for the evil I do with baked goods. Bwah ha ha ha ha!

Jennie linked to me!

W00t! Jennie Breeden linked to me! Excuse me while I have a fan-boy moment. (Happy dance!!!)

Although I do note that her link to me and the time-stamp from her reply to Jon's email are both awfully close to her Friday 20080926 comic....

Wilton Discover Cake Decorating – Course 1 - Class 3 prep

Experiment 080928

This is the last prep session for my Wilton Course 1 classes and I had to make a few changes from what I had been originally planning. (When I got home from work on the evening of Wednesday the 24th I found Kathy and everything in the kitchen covered in fire extinguisher powder from where the stove had developed a short and tried to burn down the house.... The new stove will be here on Friday the 3rd, but that's a little late for getting a cake baked for my last class on the 30th.)


Rice Crispy treats are the best!

What's even better than Rice Crispy treats? A Rice Crispy treat cake!

This time I remembered to add the correct amount of water thankfully.

First pass at frosting.

I think the best tip I've picked up out of this class has been waiting 15-30 minutes for the icing to harden and then using wax paper to finish smoothing the cake. The results are fantastic.

With friends like these....

With friends like these.... Apparently my buddy Jon up in Detroit is trying get me into trouble and deserves a horrible evil smackdown....

From: Jennie Breeden
Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2008 1:16 PM
To: Barron, Jon
Subject: Re: Hehehe...you've got to see this

Wow! thanks so much for showing that to me. It's awesome! I wouldn't even pretend to send him a cease and desist order.

That is just too cool

thanks
jennieB
www.thedevilspanties.com
www.geebasonparade.com

---------------------------------------------------
On Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 4:15 PM, Barron, Jon wrote:

Jennie,

'ello, long time webcomic admirer and got hooked by a friend of mine that you just happen to know. It is this mutual friend of ours that I feel compelled to share something with you that I think you'll get a kick out of.

First, his name is Sam McClanahan and he is the husband of the couple that three or four years ago dropped of that huge freaken basket of chocolate goodies for you at DragonCon that you were so kind to include them in your webcomic doing just that. I believe that your choice words at the time were "Holy crap!" :) In any case, Sam is on this cake making kick now and well...check this out:

http://samthegiant.blogspot.com/2008/09/chocolate-jennie.html

I hope you get a laugh out of it as I did. If you want to play a joke on him, I'm a network admin at a law firm up here in Detroit and I'm sure I could get any number of attorney friends of mine to draw up fake cease and desist orders if you'd like to pull one over on Sam.

Keep up the good work!!

Jon Barron

Wilton Discover Cake Decorating – Course 1 - Class 2

Adventure 080923

A three hour cake decorating class after a ten hour work day makes Sam a very tired boy, but I'm pretty happy about how my first Wilton Method cake turned out.

Wilton Discover Cake Decorating – Course 1 - Class 2 prep

Experiment 080921

I made two major mistakes in my prep work for the second Wilton class session.

1. I forgot the eggs in the Dream Whip cake recipe (with extra 1/4 cup oil) my instructor suggested until after I had mixed the other ingredients.
   
2. I forgot that I needed to add extra water to the Class Buttercream Icing recipe to use it to frost the cake until after I had finished.... Despite the fact that it was REALLY hard to frost....
   

The Wilton instructor suggested using this recipe with the addition of 1/4 cup oil. It turned out very tasty.

Note the lack of eggs. D'oh!

Whee! Vanilla Crisco flavored sugar!

Yes, I have to make sure everything is on the counter before starting. It's a compulsion.

The finished cake looks pretty good but was incredibly time consuming. I'm thinking that even knowing that I messed up the icing, the way to go here is to frost the cake like normal and then use a tub of the Wilton Decorating icing.

Caught up at last!!!

Double W00t!!! I've uploaded the last of the back-log and am caught up at last!

Move complete!

W00t!!! I've completed the move to Blogger from my old Sam's Evil Adventure & Experiment Log vanity page! Now to see if the Blogger tools and ease of access will allow me to catch up on the back-log and help me keep this updated....

Wilton Discover Cake Decorating – Course 1 - Class 1

Adventure 080916

Kathy noticed that the Maryville Hobby Lobby was running a half-price sale on their Wilton Cake Decorating classes so I rushed over and got the second to last slot on the sign-up sheet for the "Discover Cake Decorating – Course 1" series. The first class was really just a basic introduction and review of what we would need to bring to the next classes followed by a quick demonstration of some of the techniques the instructor would be showing us. Not a lot of actual content but the instructor seemed very skilled and I managed to pick up several tips to try out. I'm hoping this class will fill in some of the basic techniques I'm missing and I'll try to post pictures from each prep session and class.



(Late back-log addition added on Sat 9/20/2008.)

Great Island Festival

Adventure 080906

My Step-Dad Larry, Kathy, and I took a trip out to the Great Island Festival and spent several enjoyable hours wandering around the Sequoyah Birthplace Museum and the Fort Loudoun State Historical Area. Kathy actually spent a good portion of her childhood in Vonore and most of her extended family still lives there so she got to play tour guide. My favorite portion of the day was the mock battle.





(Late back-log addition added on Sat 9/20/2008.)

Chocolate Jennie

Experiment 080809

While web-surfing I happened to run across an article that showed how to create custom cake topper decorations by using white and dark chocolate. Here are a couple of shots of my first attempt. Yes, I did use a signed Devil's Panties comic for my template. (Note the plastic bag in addition to the layer of wax paper.) Yes, I'm expecting an anti-stalking restraining order from Georgia any day now....




(Late back-log addition added on Sat 9/20/2008.)

Carrie's ITT Graduation Party Cake

Experiment 080629

In what was probably one of our better experiments in mental manipulation we waited a week before throwing Carrie a surprise Graduation party. I love being evil....





(Late back-log addition added on Sat 9/20/2008.)

Carrie's ITT Graduation

Adventure 080621

If you happened to be at the June 21st Knoxville TN ITT Graduation ceremony I would like to take a moment to apologize for my friends. They were the bunch of yahoos who screamed "For The WIN!!!" at the top of their lungs. Still, we all are inordinately proud of Carrie, so I suppose a little extra enthusiasm should be forgiven.




(Late back-log addition added on Sat 9/20/2008.)

Greg's Hello Kitty Birthday Cake

Experiment 080503

For some reason neither Kathy or I can remember now, (It must have seemed like a good idea at the time....) Kathy created a bright pink Hello Kitty Birthday Cake for Greg this year. It was incredibly bright, colorful, and terrifying. I had Hello Kitty nightmares the night after she decorated it. (Shudder....)




(Late back-log addition added on Sat 9/20/2008.)

Marble Springs Living History Weekend

Adventure 080419

Despite living just under five miles away from the site for the last five years I had never visited the John Sevier Marble Springs Tennessee State Historic Farmstead until Kathy and I noticed that they were holding a Living History Weekend. Marble Springs is a small site but it's obvious that many people have put a lot of love and effort into keeping it maintained. My Mother, Step-Dad, Kathy, and I spent a very pleasant Saturday afternoon wandering around the several buildings that have been moved to the site and restored including a Tavern/Trading Post, a Loom House with a very impressive working loom, the Walker Cabin, and the John Sevier Cabin where some claim that John Sevier lived for the last years of his life.





(Late back-log addition added on Sat 9/20/2008.)

A T. Rex Named Sue

Adventure: 080412

Kathy and I went to see the Chicago Field Museum of Natural History's traveling "A T. Rex Named Sue" exhibit when it came to the Gray Fossil Museum, and I have to say I was very impressed. Not only was the exhibit fantastic, but I really had no idea how much was going on at the site. I encourage anyone who has the chance to go visit.





(Late back-log addition added on Thu 9/18/2008.)

Carrie's Portal Cube Birthday Cake

Experiment: 080222

This was a triumph. I'm making a note here HUGE SUCCESS. It's hard to overstate my satisfaction. - GLaDOS

My friend Carrie requested a "Portal Cube" birthday cake this year. The cake itself is loosely based on the recipe from the game and Kathy put together a wonderful mockup of the cube.





(Transferred from the original http://www.samthegiant.com/ website on Wed 9/17/2008.)