Maker Fair

A couple of weekends ago, William & I went to the "Maker Fair", a gathering of people who make & create.

The Maker Fair started here in the Bay Area three years ago, and is becoming fairly well known, spawning knock-off events around the world.

It has a lot of overlap with Burning Man, the annual festival in the desert, minus the sand, heat, drugs, and nudity.  It's sort of the day-camp G-rated version of Burning Man.

The fair is both inside and outside, spread over many acres and six huge hangar-like buildings.

Outside you have vehicles of every description.

This was a "zero gravity" wheel.

Art cars

Apocalyptic music wagon

 

"Help, I'm a robot and I've fallen and I can't get up"

One of my very favorite things was the Raygun Gothic Rocket, a 40 foot tall comic-book type rocket ship with three interior floors.  This was the runaway hit of the last Burning Man, with legendarily long lines to visit the interior.  I was thrilled that William and I had a chance to see it under less arduous circumstances.

William climbing up to the rocket entrance

Getting around inside

Alien specimen

One of the themes of Maker Fair this year was music.  

This was one of the musical highlights -- giant Tesla coils shooting lightning bolts at a guy in a Farraday cage with their zapping noises tuned to play the Super Mario song.

Nerd DJs playing music using oh-so-many computers

21st Century one-man-band using controllers of his own devising

A collaborative jamming instrument

The coolest guitars I've ever seen with embedded video displays showing animations synchronized to the music

The largest building was really dark because many of its exhibits were best appreciated that way.

A child encountering the nose of the electric giraffe

The electric giraffe's control panel

The radio-controlled neon land shark mingled with the fair visitors

Insert a quarter and hi tech Budha would display your fortune on his LEDs

Free electric shocks here

So many R2D2s from the "Bay Area R2 Builders Society"

These UFO lamps included little toy cows and people constantly being sucked up by their tractor beams

This guy came all the way from Japan to build a giant inflated dome out of garbage bags.  Inside the dome everyone gets red/blue 3D glasses.  He them puts on a science fiction themed 3D shadow play with red/blue shadows his models cast on the walls.

After the garbage bag dome, we needed a little fresh air.  Back outside we encountered the Flaming Ball of Death which attracted many children and toddlers.

We wrapped up the day with the retro-futuristic steampunk contingent.  This guy with a giant ratchet is enjoying a nice cup of tea.

As are these two spectral women

Sunrise walk

William has been wanting to do the hill walk to school and back at sunrise, so on Saturday he and I set out at 5:30 am.  It was a beautiful morning -- still and clear -- and we caught the sun just peeking over the hills.

With all the late spring rain we've had lately (very unusual), the hills have stayed quite green but the wild oats are turning a pale yellow and make a pretty backdrop for the wildflowers.



Not having to rush to school since it was Saturday, William had a chance to stop at his favorite rock and clamber around.



When we got to the school, we came across the school cat, Vince.  On school days he likes to hang out in the main office or in the kindergarten classes.



Then it was back up the hill to home.

Kitty versus Kraken

As most of you know, William has a vast collection of stuffed cephalopods.  A few days ago, the kittens seized one of his octopuses and made it their toy.

To them, it's a fearsome creature nearly the same size as themselves.  They wrestle it into submission, and carry the trophy around in their mouths.

Jake eyes the Kraken

Julie wrestles the monster

Is it vanquished?

I think we got it

Calamari for everyone

Japan tidbit 2 - Monkeys!

One of our favorite days in Japan included visiting a large open air sanctuary for Japanese macaques, the same monkeys that lounge around in hot springs.

This sanctuary had no monkey hot tubs; it was cold and rainy and the spa-loving monkeys were often huddled together for warmth.

We had a great time, though, because they were very tame and unperturbed by our avid photography, even when we got quite close.

MUD football - part two

Last time William was invited to play mud football with his friends, there was no mud (although he had a good time).

Those same friends had a birthday party this weekend (they're twins -- same birthday) and this time they made sure there was mud!  A family friend with property in the country agreed to  dig up a field and water it for some very muddy football.

Mud oozing through the holes in his crocs

Afterwards, the kids cleaned off in a pond.  The pond had a small raft which was hugely popular and made for a perfect summer day, even though it's only May.

For those who want to see more pictures from that day, they're at Birthday/Mud Football where the full size pictures can also be downloaded.

Restarting Blog!

Well we're back from Japan, recovered from the jet lag, and starting to go through the 7000 pictures we took there.

Now that life feels back under control and we're going through so many fun pictures, it's time to start blogging again.  We'll try to blog almost every day, and post quite a bit from Japan in the next few weeks.

To get started here are a couple of shots from the Toyko subway, which was our main way of getting around.  Tokyo also has an extensive above-ground train system, but there was a subway stop right by our hotel, so that's the system we used more often.

Apparently, it is quite rude to speak loudly or make eye contact on public transportation in Japan.  I wonder how rude it is to take pictures??!?!

The subways & trains were smooth, quiet, clean, punctual, & safe.  Buses were a lurchy nightmare proving that it is impossible to make that form of transportation pleasant, even by the Japanese.

Coolest/Nerdiest picture ever

One of William's classmates was exhibiting a movie at the San Francisco Children's International Film Festival, and we went to support her.

Turns out the festival was part of a larger comic book/action hero/collectibles fair called WonderCon.  We checked it out after the movie, and it was the the nerdiest event I've ever attended.

So without further preamble, here is the coolest/nerdiest picture ever:

William showing his new iPad to stormtroopers

A few other images from Wondercon:

OMG Batman has a lightsaber

 Princess Leia is bored

Lots of comic books 

Raking in the cash with Mario

Who is this guy and why are people taking his picture?

A suprising number of women at Wondercon...

but many of them look like this.