A French Cake Wrecks Meetup and Disney Steampunk Inspirations

Cake, Dessert, Disney, DisneySMMoms, Food, Geeky Pursuits, Photos

Have you ever read CakeWrecks?  If not, you definitely should.  People from all over send Jen and John photos of badly designed/executed cakes done by professionals.  These might be funny on their own, but Jen and John don’t simply post the photos.  They include hilarious commentary as well.  The end result is a website that can often result in you laughing out loud thus alerting your co-workers to the fact that the website you’re on is not work related.  (Not that I’d ever do that, mind you!)

Anyway, as we were planning to go to Disney World for DisneySMMoms, I noticed a Cake Wrecks post that mentioned that Jen and John reside in Orlando.  I asked if they’d be interested in a meet-up and they said yes!

While walking through Disney World, I was so looking forward to meeting the folks behind Cake Wrecks that I began seeing Steampunk influences in various locations in Disney World.  Ok, this might require some explanation.

Many of you are probably saying “What the @%^# is Steampunk?”  First of all, you should all be ashamed of yourselves for using that kind of language.  That aside, Steampunk envisions a world in which steam powers everything.  (For a detailed analysis of Steampunk, consult Wikipedia.)  From many readings of Jen’s other blog Epbot, I know that they like Steampunk.  So my brain seemed to home in on Steampunk elements.

One thing about Steampunk is that gears and bronze coloring are big.

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Those shots are from the Dumbo ride.  Yes, the ride known for letting kids of all ages fly atop an elephant is secretly a Steampunk ride!

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This robot can be found outside of House of Blues in Downtown Disney right near where La Nouba is located.  I’m not positive that Steampunk includes robots, but if it did, I think this is what one might look like.

Of course, my imagination being what it is, I couldn’t help but expand on Steampunk.  Introducing Junglepunk!

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These are from the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse.  The river turns the big wheel which pulls ropes to move a series of buckets.  The buckets collect water, get lifted high up and then spill their contents onto a series of drainage gutters which lead to a storage vessel in the kitchen.  I’d bet you could design a whole series of “technology based on running water”  I believe Futurama has already provided one:

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Getting back to the Swiss Family Treehouse (which my boys loved so much that we walked through it twice back-to-back and then they complained when we didn’t go through a third time), I loved the look of this piano.

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Getting back to the “*punk” genre expansions, though, how about “Toypunk”?

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I’m thinking that the Lincoln Logs could be miniaturized and used to replace gears in a Steampunk-esque design.  Steampunk meets Toy Story!

Of course, this post wouldn’t be complete without mentioning the Cake Wrecks-TechyDad/TheAngelForever meet up.  We had agreed to meet in Epcot’s France area.  Twice prior to this, the boys and I (and B on one of the occasions) ate at Patisserie.  Both times, the boys had Cheese Tartine – French bread topped with a touch of sauce and some cheese.  No, it’s not pizza.  That would be found in Italy and this was France!  Both times I had the vegetable quiche.  Both times, I eyed the pastries.  Please excuse the drool as I think of them again.

When we met, we got a seat and then John, the boys and I went to procure some snacks.  JSL wanted chocolate cake, NHL saw John getting a strawberry tart and wanted one.  Me?  I had my eyes on the Napoleon.  (There’s that pesky drool again.)

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As good as it looked, it tasted even better.  As we ate, we talked about various subjects both online-related and offline-related.  A good time was had by all.  Even when JSL – with perfect kid-timing declared he needed to use the restroom and I had to walk all the way from France to Morocco to find one for him.  The lengths dads will go for their kids and I didn’t even get any frequent flier miles!

Pretty soon the snacks were consumed and it was time to head out.  We said goodbye and went out separate ways.  Here’s hoping we can meet again the next time we go to Disney or if they happen to be in the Upstate NY area!

Dizzy Fun Times On The Playground

Fun, JSL, NHL, Videos

As a perk of the warmer weather, I took NHL and JSL to a local park two times over the weekend.  Of course, I took my camera and video camera with me and took many, many photos as well as a few videos.  I’ll run a few of the photos tomorrow for Wordless Wednesday.  For now, I dare you to watch this video full screen and not get dizzy!

20 Pounds In 20 Weeks: Week 12: Nearly There

20lbs in 20 weeks, Fitness, Weight Loss

Sunday morning, I stepped on the scale and nearly jumped for joy.  The scale said I weighed 185.5 pounds.  This is only a half a pound above my goal weight.  Huzzah!

Starting Weight 205
Current Weight 185.5
Goal Weight 185
Lost 19.5
Left Until Goal 0.5

Of course, I’m not claiming victory anytime soon.  The next three weeks will be tough ones dietarily-speaking.  (Is “dietarily” a word?  Well, it is now!)  As I’ve been saying for weeks now, Passover is approaching.  I’ve been mentally getting ready for packing on some pounds due to Matzoh overload.  Still, I didn’t remember one other “Passover is approaching” danger: Pre-Passover “Gotta Finish It Up” Snacking

You see, when Passover is here, all non-Kosher-for-Passover foods must be put away so Passover foods have room.  Of course, there is limited space to “put away” these foods and some of them might spoil if not consumed during the eight days that we celebrate Passover.  Since I hate wasting food, I wind up snacking on it.  Sleeve of opened Girl Scout Cookies?  Munch on them instead of putting the box in the bin.  Ritz crackers?  They’ll go nicely with that block of leftover cheddar instead of taking up room in the cabinets.

In the end, I wind up with less food to put away (good), but more pounds on my waistline (not so good).  I’ve all but given up on keeping track of points this week.  I’ll try to mentally keep score to keep my snacking down, but I’m not going to add the stress of points tracking to the stress of Passover preparation.  I’ll just have to re-double my weight loss efforts once Passover is done.

It’s Spring, There Are Birds – What Are Those Bees Doing?

Photography, Photos, Wildlife

Today, I took the boys to the park for some play time (and also to give B some time by herself to get some writing done).  As we piled into my car, I noticed a bug atop my car.  Nothing odd there.  It’s spring, the weather has gotten warmer and the bugs are out.  I looked closer and noticed it was a bee.  Two bees, in fact.  One atop the other.

The boys were already in the car so my first instinct was to send a TwitPic of the situation.  After that was done, I was going to go in the car and drive off, but then I stopped.  I had my DSLR with me to take photos of the boys at the playground.  Why not put it to a macro test?

So out came my camera and I began snapping away.  I’ve taken bee macro photos before so I know how to do it safely.  I’ve learned that you can get pretty close to bees without bothering them.  They tend to try to fly away from you first.  But if they start buzzing angrily and dive bombing you, it’s time to move away fast.

Anyway, I got as close as I felt I could safely get and let my zoom lens do the rest.  A few clicks of the shutter later and…

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You can click that to magnify the photo, but here’s a cropped version from the full resolution original.

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After I was done photographing, I went in the car and started it up.  NHL was curious about what was happening.  I told him that there were some bees up there that wouldn’t be happy that I was moving the car.  He asked why.  I danced around the facts and told him that they were happy with the car where it was and wouldn’t like for it to move.

As we drove off, he said he was sad for the bees because they might get blown off.  I told him that we started slowly and they probably got the hint before we went so fast that they would be blown off.  I really hope that’s the case.  Sorry about the interruption, bees!

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