I hadn't quite realized how much Seattle had become home to me until I had to leave it. I grew up on the Boston area and the lived in NYC for 9 years. Those are also places I think of as home. In Boston and New York both there are must have foods that no trip is complete without. In Boston it is New England style fried clams (In Essex if possible ( Read more... )

Saturday was Dragonmeet. Since it's one day show, I made sure to get up early and fortify myself with a classic English breakfast in the hotel's restaurant. This was such a calorie fest I skipped lunch, but that was fine because it let me spend all day at the con. I had two seminars to do. The first was a general Green Ronin Q+A in the early ( Read more... )

Last week on Thanksgiving I was flying to London instead of packing away turkey and  stuffing. I had been invited to a one day convention called Dragonmeet that dates back to the 80s. Nicole and I had gone in 2002 but I hadn't had the chance to go back until this year. It was a whirlwind trip but I squeezed a lot in and had an excellent time. I had ( Read more... )

This Thursday is Nicole and I's 9 year wedding anniversary. Since I'm going to be up visiting BioWare Monday to Wednesday and on Thursday the guys are arriving for the Green Ronin Summit, we decided we had best celebrate over the weekend. So Friday we drove up to Vancouver, dropped Kate off with her dad, and checked into the Hyatt downtown. Our ( Read more... )

I have never liked beer. To me it always seemed like a giant bait and switch scam. When I was a kid, I saw all these TV commercials that told me how awesome and delicious beer was. When I was 12 some of my cousins sneaked some from the keg at my Uncle Mel's place and we found a corner away from the adults to try it. It tasted like boiled socks. ( Read more... )

This past weekend I was down in the Bay Area for Endgame's 8th Anniversary party. I decided to make the most of my three days by flying down really early on Friday and coming back late Sunday night. This proved a good plan and I was able to pack a lot into the trip ( Read more... )

I started trying to write a helpful post for people visiting Seattle for PaizoCon and looking for good places to eat. I had planned to suggest some eateries in other parts of town (like Saffron Grill, Stellar Pizza, and the Schwalb approved Judy Fu's Snappy Dragon) but I never got out of downtown and Belltown. So if you are looking for somewhere to ( Read more... )

When I first moved to New York City, I lived blocks away from Mamoun's Falafel on MacDougal St. I could get a hot and fresh falafel for $1.50 or go crazy and get the falafel/hummus combo for $2.00. I was a vegetarian at the time, so a cheap and tasty sandwich I could get as late as 5 am was most welcome ( Read more... )

I have a theory about Iron Chef America, which is mine. It goes like this. Bobby Flay is in more battles than any other Iron Chef for the same reason you groan when one of his episodes comes on: he's a dick. I suspect that when these chefs agree to be on the show, they think, "God, Flay is such a dick; I want to crush him!" Really, who wants to lay ( Read more... )

I grew up in New England, which gets all four seasons in full measure. It can get brutally hot in the summer and frigidly cold in the winter. I know how to deal with snow and lived through the blizzard of '78. Seattle though, has a much milder climate. It only gets really hot for maybe a week of the year and when it does snow, it usually melts in a ( Read more... )