Trail running in the Rockies. Photo: Bill Day

I am an unabashed outdoor geek, just as obsessed with outdoor activities as I am tech. If you’re thinking “me too”, read on.

Last year I took up running and was looking for an adventurous challenge to push me as I trained. I decided to join my father on a high country camping, hiking, and trail running trip to the San Juans in southwestern Colorado. I had so much fun that I decided to tell the world about it in an Ignite talk on running (see video after the jump or check it out here) several months later. I also decided to set a goal of going back to the Rockies soon and bringing my wife and children with me the next time.

Where to go turned out to be easy to decide. My father and I enjoy hunting together (one of the oldest of “geek dad” activities given how obsessed many of us hunters are with spending time afield with our family). After years of applying and not being drawn, this summer my father and I finally received Wyoming pronghorn antelope tags in the mail. Since we’ll be hunting in the high plains of western Wyoming just a few hours away from Yellowstone National Park, the decision was made: The Day family is headed to Yellowstone!

Over the next few weeks I’ll be writing about places to visit (look out Buffalo Bill Historical Center and Wyoming Dinosaur Center), favorite gear and gadgetry to make the journey smoother, and outdoor activities with family including camping, hiking, trail running, bird and critter watching, and hunting. If you have suggestions or questions you’d like me to address, please let me know via the comments below. Hopefully these posts will give you fodder for your own geek family adventures this fall.

More to come soon.  Until then, happy trails!

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Image by Seha BS used under Creative Commons License

Labor Day, is usually seen as the end of summer here in The States. Time to put away the white pants, get the barbecue grill winterized and get that list of school supplies out. Of course you could also take a little time out of your day and take a shot at this weeks puzzle. Hey a $50.00 ThinkGeek gift certificate could by some really great school supplies.

This week’s puzzle involves a group of geeks who decide to have a weekend of food, drink, movies and board games. So everyone was asked to bring a dish, a drink a DVD and a game. Someone brought their famous Fried Chicken. Someone brought a few bottles of wine. One person pulled out their Predator DVD while another brought Arkham Horror to play.

1. Mark, who did not bring margarita’s doesn’t own Forbidden Island but he did bring Tron.
2. The margaritas did not spill on the Carcassonne box in the drive over.
3. Johnathan who did not bring macaroni salad made his special lemonade.
4. The person who brought WarGames, the person who owned Settlers of Catan and Jennifer didn’t bring margaritas or lemonade.
5. The person who brought beer also brought hamburgers.
6. Kathy brought soda.
7. The person who brought wine brought Munchkin Booty.
8. The Real Genius DVD and the lemonade arrived with the same person.
9. One person brought Arkham Horror and WarGames but not hotdogs. That person was not Brian.
10. The hot-dogs were not brought by Jonathan or with the Alien DVD.
11. Brian promised to e-mail his potato salad recipe to everyone when he got home.

You know the drill by now: work out who brought what food, drink, DVD and game. Slap that answer into your chosen e-mail client and send it over to GeekDAD Puzzle Central and if my random number generating monkey pick your name off the bottom of his cage you will win a $50.00 ThinkGeek gift certificate.

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Images Courtesy of I-Wei from Crabfu Artworks

Ever want to take a picture of that cool insect you found on your last nature hike but all you had was your iPhone? Well I-Wei, a friend of GeekDad and the great mind behind Crabfu Artworks has a hack for you. By attaching an inexpensive field microscope to his iPhone case he was able to take pictures of the tiny world around us. Check out his video and pictures at The Crabfu Artworks Blog.

I’ve always been a big fan of I-Wei’s steam powered machines so make sure you check out Crabfu Steam Works for some awesome toys.

If you do make an iPhone scope remember to post your pictures to the GeekDad Flickr Group

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courtesy Last Exit To Nowhere

Geeks love movies.
Geeks love T-shirts.
Geeks love to express their love of movies on their T-shirts.
And the folks at Last Exit To Nowhere love to make geeky t-shirts inspired by geeky movies.

The company was set up about 3 years ago by a bunch of movie geeks who also happen to be designers, illustrators, screenprinters and photographers. Their goal was to create something a little bit different, and you can see the pride they obviously take in their work from the results.
Where their designs differ from the plethora of other T-shirts out there is in the almost forgotten art of subtlety. Anyone can knock up a shirt with the movie’s logo on it or write something ‘witty’ in The Terminator font, but Last Exit likes to do it in a much more esoteric way. Of course, as soon as someone has a great idea like this, there’s instantly hundreds of copycats around the web, but beware of imitations!

The Overlook Hotel

I’ve seen hundreds of variations of Jack Nicholson’s head coming through the chopped up doorway saying “Here’s Johnny!”, but Last Exit’s take on The Shining resulted in a vintage effect logo for ‘The Overlook Hotel’, complete with the mountains in background.
Why settle for Sloth’s ever quotable, but eminently predictable, “Hey, you guys!” on your Goonies-themed tee, when you could have the logo for the “Lighthouse Lounge” resturant and bar?

Sometimes they take the logo of a company glimpsed for only a few moments in the film and reproduce it, as they’ve done with Omni Consumer Products (OCP) from Robocop and Jack Burton’s Pork Chop Express.

Weyland Yutani Corp

Other designs feature logos for corporations only mentioned verbally in the movie, which Last Exit then creates from scratch in the appropriate style. Ever wondered what the Alien franchise’s ‘Weyland-Yutani’ Corp’s logo would look like? Or how about Gaff’s Spinner from Blade Runner?

Some of the best ones are designed like tourist souvenirs from the real and fictional locations in some of our favourite flicks. How about a shirt from ‘Devil’s Tower, Wyoming’ or ‘Hill Valley High School’? Or maybe even the pub featured in An American Werewolf in London: ‘The Slaughtered Lamb’?

Abe Froman

My favourite thing about the ‘Abe Froman, Sausage King Of Chicago’ one my wife got for me is that so few people actually get it. To them it could just a cute 50s style illustration of a guy with a sausage on a fork, only the Trufan™ will recognise it for what it is and give you that knowing nod of approval. Shame on you if you just had to Google it…

Do you know what the Shimata Dominguez Corporation do? Where did you see Jaffe’s Burger Den? What about Charlie Croker’s Couch Tours? There are so many great design from great movies that it’s actually really tough to decide which ones to buy! There is one odd thing though – all the tees seem to be based on movies from the 20th century, with only a few more recent ones. You won’t find any referencing The Matrix or Moon. Maybe the studios keep a tighter reign on the copyright these days, which is a real shame as I’d love a Lunar Industries t-shirt!

They produce some of the designs in slim-fit and hoodie styles, as well as kids sizes so the little geeklets can be in on the joke too, even if they don’t really get it. Add to that some special posters and embroidered caps and it’s a one stop shop for geek satisfaction. They use the highest quality t-shirts and the screenprinting is faultless – unless it’s supposed to have a vintage look of course. International shipping starts at £4, which seems very reasonable to me given that I’ve paid upwards of $10 to get shirts shipped from the US to England in the past. The ones I’ve ordered for myself have generally arrived the next day.

Last Exit To Nowhere is very active on the social media scene, and are constantly previewing new designs and running competitions through their twitter account @lastexitshirts and facebook page. Their #hashtag games are great fun to take part in even if you don’t win – the last two were #BestTopicalFilm and #BestHorrorMonster – and then there’s always the photo of the month competition, where people show off their purchases in very creative ways.

Speaking of competitions, Last Exit To Nowhere has very kindly given five lucky GeekDad readers the chance to win one their fabulous t-shirts. We thought we’d make it a bit more interesting than just leaving a comment, so we’ve put together a little multiple choice quiz for you. Correctly name all 20 movies that each of these t-shirt designs were inspired by, leave your email address and we’ll pick five winners at random on the 13th September.

Even if you don’t win, you can still save 15% on the price of the t-shirts be using the code GEEKDAD at the checkout on lastexittonowhere.com.

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Down here in Melbourne, Australia the annual science fiction and fantasy convention AussieCon has been host to the 68th World Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention. And, as part of the event the Hugo Awards were handed out tonight (Sunday 5 September). The Hugo Awards are the premier award in the science fiction genre, honoring science fiction literature and media as well as the genre’s fans. The awards began back in 1953 and have a long tradition of honoring the greats of fantasy and science fiction such as Isaac Asimov, Robert Silverberg, Ursula K. Le Guin, Neil Gaiman and so many others; while still celebrating and recognising the role of fans to this genre — the favorite amongst all GeekDads, everywhere.

If you want to read some of the winning and nominated works, check out the artwork of the winning illustrators and designer, check out the background of the best editors or sign up to the successful fanzines of this year’s awards. There are a host of links to winners and nominees at the AussieCon 4 website.

So, without further ado, the winners are…

BEST NOVEL
[Tie for first place]
The City & The City by China Miéville (Del Rey; Macmillan UK)
The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi (Night Shade)

BEST NOVELLA
“Palimpsest” by Charles Stross (Wireless; Ace; Orbit)

BEST NOVELETTE
“The Island” by Peter Watts (The New Space Opera 2; Eos)

BEST SHORT STORY
“Bridesicle” by Will McIntosh (Asimov’s 1/09)

BEST RELATED WORK
This is Me, Jack Vance! (Or, More Properly, This is “I”) by Jack Vance (Subterranean)

BEST GRAPHIC STORY
Girl Genius, Volume 9: Agatha Heterodyne and the Heirs of the Storm
Written by Kaja and Phil Foglio; Art by Phil Foglio; Colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION – LONG FORM
Moon Screenplay by Nathan Parker; Story by Duncan Jones; Directed by Duncan Jones (Liberty Films)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION – SHORT FORM
Doctor Who: “The Waters of Mars”
Written by Russell T Davies and Phil Ford; Directed by Graeme Harper (BBC Wales)

BEST EDITOR, LONG FORM
Patrick Nielsen Hayden

BEST EDITOR, SHORT FORM
Ellen Datlow

BEST PROFESSIONAL ARTIST
Shaun Tan

BEST SEMIPROZINE
Clarkesworld edited by Neil Clarke, Sean Wallace and Cheryl Morgan

BEST FAN WRITER
Frederik Pohl

BEST FANZINE
StarShipSofa edited by Tony C. Smith

BEST FAN ARTIST
Brad W. Foster

THE JOHN W. CAMPBELL AWARD FOR BEST NEW WRITER
Seanan McGuire

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The first test is the easier test. Is the Connecticut Science Center one of the best places to bring kids in Greater Hartford?

Test passed. If you live in greater Hartford, you should bring your kids to the Connecticut Science Center.

The second test is the harder test. Hartford is not that far from Boston. It’s about an hour and half to two hour drive. That means it could be just as easy to visit the Connecticut Science Center as it is to visit Boston’s Museum of Science.

Is the Connecticut Science Center a better choice than the Museum of Science?

Before addressing that question, let me share some of my experiences while visiting. They were nice enough to treat my family to admission, a movie, and bag of swag. (The $17/$14 price of admission is a bit less than Boston’s $21/$18.)

Image courtesy of CTSC

The Connecticut Science Center is housed a sleek and shiny, modern, new building in downtown Hartford. Sunshine pours in through the massive glass curtain wall that overlooks the banks of the Connecticut River. The building, opened in June of 2009, has easy access from I-84 and I-91 with plenty of parking in an attached garage.

For those of you looking for “green credentials”, the facility is LEED Gold Certified and obtains the majority of its energy needs from an on-site fuel cell. (The real estate guy side of me is very impressed.)

Under its green roof, the Connecticut Science Center hosts 150 hands-on exhibits, a 3D digital theater, and four educational labs. They try to address every part of science “from Physics to Forensics, Geology to Astronomy.”

The first floor houses Kid Space for kids age 3 – 6 to explore spouting and whirling vortexes of water. It will be hard to get your young kids past this to take the elevator up to the other exhibits.

They are currently featuring a “Robots + Us” exhibit that showcases robot behavior. My highlight was a race against a robot to assemble a puzzle. I was subjected to its mocking taunt when it finished before me.

The Forces of Motion exhibit was the highlight for my six year old and two year old geeklets. A downhill racetrack and race cars with square wheels is a fascinating idea. I think my kids missed this aspect. The were happy to build the race cars and race them, regardless of the shape of their wheels.

Be prepared for the sights and sound when you enter the Sight and Sound Experience on the fourth floor. It’s flashy and loud, but fun. Kids love matching movement with sound and light changes. Even I got caught up in the excitement and danced in the light chamber.

Does Connecticut Science Center pass the second test? I’m going to hedge and say that it’s not a fair test. The Museum of Science can trace its roots back to 1830 and its current building has been open for almost 50 years. It’s been a GeekDad destination of choice for generations. Its 1.5 million visitors a year dwarfs the 365,000 the Science Center had in its first year of operation.

In my opinion, they target different audiences. The Connecticut Science Center is more focused on kids and their parents. Teenagers and childless adults may not find it as interesting as the do-everything Museum of Science. But you don’t have to chose one or the other, you should visit both. They are very different experiences.

If you live in New England and have kids, you should definitely add the Connecticut Science Center to your list of places to visit. I’d tell you to visit during Labor Day weekend, but they are closed for Labor Day. Go to Boston’s Museum of Science for Labor Day and go to Hartford’s Connecticut Science Center the next time.

You can find more about the Connecticut Science from its website, Twitter account (@CTScienceCenter), and its Facebook page.

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The ongoing relationship between Kiwa Media’s Qbooks and Penguin New Zealand has produced this little “retro” number – a retelling of an old classic that I was previously unaware of called “Flick the Little Red Fire Engine“. I previously reviewed “Hairy Maclary from Donaldson’s Dairy” and this title backs that one up very well.

I am a fan of what this partnership is producing. They are going for good quality stories and content. They are treating the original stories and illustrations with respect. They are getting serious voice talent for their books (this one has Sam Neill as Narrator). But, they are still making the experience an interactive one for children and making use of what the iPad has to offer.

I enjoy the use of sound effects sparingly — a bark for a dog, the wail of a fire engine — maximum two per page. The fact children can point at individual words, and have that single word read to them is an excellent device for early readers. You’ll see it demonstrated at the end of the above promo video, it even spells out the word. I guess what I am getting at is that the developers have kept the best of the book, the thing that makes children’s books so enjoyable like the actual story and illustrations and they’ve given it some extra educational value and a few nice technological tweaks. This is done with a simplicity that makes it work. It isn’t about all the bells and whistles but about the story, and that is what many creators of ebooks for children are missing. Just like the ABC apps, there are a lot of books that are missing the mark. But these ones don’t.

That said, I am not sure the song at the end of this ebook app was really required. It obviously has a history, and the crackle and hiss remind me of the old vinyl LPs I had as a kid that played stories and songs to me (“And when you hear the bell, then turn the page”). What value it really adds to this story isn’t that great.

Wired: A great story, that will capture younger readers and encourage reading.

Tired: Not sure the song was a necessary element.

Note: The author of this piece received a free review copy of the application

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We at GeekDad don’t like to toot our own horn. Much, anyway. Actually, come to think of it, we really don’t have a problem tooting our own horn. We enjoy it, even.

So it gives us all great joy and pride to congratulate our very own Z on his Parsec award for “Best Speculative Fiction Music Podcast.” The Parsec awards recognize excellence in podcasts and podcast novels related to speculative fiction of all sorts, and are presented annually at Dragon*Con in Atlanta.

If you haven’t listened to Z’s awesome Radio Free Hipster podcast, there’s no time like the present to check it out. You can also hear Z, along with GeekDad’s fearless leader Ken Denmead, on the biweekly GeekDad HipTrax podcast.

Congratulations, Z! We can’t think of anyone who deserves such recognition more than you do.

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In Machete, Danny Trejo reprises his role from the Spy Kids films. Or perhaps not.

1. Will My Kids Like It?

You may remember the title character Machete, the gruff but lovable uncle played by Danny Trejo in the Spy Kids series. Turns out, this is NOT the sequel to Spy Kids 3D. But my kids – who have become extreme fans of director Robert Rodriguez, who also did Sin City and Grindhouse – already knew that when they begged me to take them. Here Machete, the former federale, illegally crosses the border from Mexico into Texas and gets caught up in a political scheme that gives him the chance to pay back the corrupt leaders who betrayed him. There’s also lots of romping about with such co-stars as Lindsey Lohan, Jessica Alba and Michelle Rodriguez (the helicopter pilot from Avatar). So yeah, if your kids are teenage boys, they’ll like it.

2. Will the Clerk at the Ticket Booth Let Me Drop the Kids Off to See This R-rated Film While I Go Next Door to Watch George Clooney?

No.

3. Will I Like It?

Surprisingly, yes. Although I had to hide my eyes at several points in the action, this is a grainy exploitation flick with lots of humor and intelligence.

4. How is the Cast?

Danny Trejo’s lived-in face is of course worth watching all on its own. And with Robert DeNiro, Cheech Marin, Steven Seagal and Don Johnson in supporting roles, Rodriguez certainly had a lot to work with.

5. Does it Have Any Redeeming Social Value?

Although I hadn’t seen it mentioned in any of the reviews, the plot actually centers around the issue of illegal immigration. You will gain an appreciation of the role Mexican workers play in the US economy, versus how they are perceived by some of our louder politicians. So you could almost call it educational.

6. When Would be the Best Time for a Bathroom Break?

When the hero swings out of the hospital window using the bad guy’s disemboweled small intestine as a rope, or any time Trejo starts swinging those machetes. You’re not going to be looking at the screen then anyway.

7. Any Good Previews?

What is it with previews that show you the entire movie? I guess they’re helpful to keep you informed if you’re not planning on seeing those movies anyway. But Green Hornet looked promising.

8. How Are the Special Effects?

Did I mention the intestines?

9. Is It Loud or Scary?

No, it’s not particularly loud.

10. Is the Ending Satisfying?

Rodriguez puts an interesting twist on the classic hero riding off into the sunset ending – and then throws up title cards which promise sequels to come.

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Congratulations to Liz Meuse who figured out this week’s puzzle and won a $50 gift certificate from the good people over at ThinkGeek. But that’s not all! As special thanks to GeekDad readers, ThinkGeek is offering a special discount for all of you swell folks. Enter the code GEEKDAD87UP and get $10 off any order of $40 or more. So head over and pick up some geeky stuff now!

Puzzle:

Formula One is heralded as the pinnacle of technological innovation in sports — and with good reason. With so much money at stake, the highest class of racing attracts some of the best and brightest minds. Engineers and aerodynamicists attract nearly as much attention as drivers when it comes to building teams and working for an F1 team has been called one of the best jobs in science. Millions of dollars are spent trying to achieve the most minute of advantages because discovering a couple hundredths of a second advantage in the wind tunnel can equate to a win on the track — or a championship.

But we’re not about millions of dollars today. Find the hidden message in these Formula One circuits.

Solution:

This one was pretty straight forward. Start by identifying the circuits:

• Magny-Cours
• Adelaide Street Circuit
• Tanaka International Circuit
• Hungaroring
• Fuji Speedway
• Tanaka International Circuit
• Watkins Glen

Pull the first letter from each to get this week’s solution:

MATH FTW!

Thanks to everyone who entered. Check back on Monday when other-Dave will be back with another puzzle that’ll throw a triple chicane at your brain.

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When organizing family vacations, I have to keep in mind that half of the six of us are not beach people. That means wherever we go in the summer, I need to schedule activities both in and out of the water.

For the family vacation this summer to Cape Cod, Massachusetts, I contacted the local Chamber of Commerce for suggestions. They were incredibly helpful, pointing me to two local museums that everyone enjoyed: the Heritage Museum and Gardens in Sandwich, Massachusetts and the Cape Cod Museum of Natural History in Brewster.

Hikers along the nature walk from the Cape Cod Museum of Natural History to Cape Cod bay

We’d first visited the Heritage Museum over a decade ago, on a short trip to Cape Cod for a friend’s wedding. At the time, what most delighted me was a beautifully restored carousel. On this visit, the carousel was as I remembered but the museum had improved and updated their facilities, especially with children in mind.

The museum now boasts a place just for children called Hidden Hollow.  The area has outdoor musical instruments and a stage,  natural wooden blocks to construct toys, another area to dig in the dirt and even a secluded spot under a tree where my twins disappeared to hoe the soil.

It should be even more fun when the treehouse is finished next year.

I like walking tours, so we also spent time on the Heritage trails looking at the gardens. My two boys joined me in walking the outdoor labyrinth. I’ve walked a labyrinth in a church before but never one outside. I fear my youngest son had too much energy to quite get the point of using it as a spiritual centering device though he liked the concept. He had much more fun with his twin sister in a garden maze that was designed for kids.

On our way out of Heritage, we spent time admiring the cars in the JK Lilly, III Antique Automobile Museum. Despite the collection of classic cars, including one driven by Steve McQueen, the hands down favorite of my kids was the Ford Model T that they could climb on.

The Cape Code Museum of Natural History is located near the bay beaches on the Cape. While they have fascinating indoor exhibits, including blue and pumpkin colored lobsters, the main attractions are the nature trails through salt marshes, over the sand dunes, to the beaches and tidal pools and then back.

The day we were there, flooding has washed out one of the trails so we had to go the long way around. It was worth it. I saw kids on the trail with binoculars and butterfly nets. Alas, we were not quite as prepared.

Inside the museum is extremely kid-friendly. There’s a hands-on room with microscopes, various sea items like shells and large wooden puzzles that my younger ones liked putting together. Downstairs, the aquarium included the lobsters, moon jellies, several species of turtles, American eels, spider crabs, bullfrogs, and other fish. The museum also has an active honey bee observation hive and a well-stocked library. (Though I believe my teenage daughter’s use of the public computers there to check her email was not quite what museum officials had in mind as a learning experience.)

We would go back to both museums, especially to do some further hiking. My kids would likely vote for the Heritage Museum as their favorite because of the ice cream snack bar but I’d vote for the science museum so I can hike the other two trails.

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Buckminister Fuller's geodesic dome for Expo 67 in Montreal inspired the buckyball. Image: Kathy Ceceri

Carbon is a remarkable little atom. When it’s arranged in sheets, it’s soft as pencil lead. Arrange it in crystals, and it’s hard as diamonds. On September 4, 1985, three scientists trying to figure out the structure of a carbon molecule known as C60 began playing around with toothpicks and jellybeans. One of them began sticking his jellybean atoms together in the shape of alternating pentagons and hexagons. Interestingly, his structure began to curve into a ball.

To the scientists, the sphere created this arrangement of candy and sticks looked an awful lot like the geodesic dome built by visionary architect R. Buckminster Fuller in 1967 for the world’s fair in Montreal.  As it turned out, the jellybean model of C60 was correct, and the molecule discovered was named “buckminsterfullerene” after its inspiration.

The exhibit "Molecules That Matter" used dog toys as buckyballs. Image: Kathy Ceceri

This was not some esoteric finding. The advent of the fullerene, which can be round, ellipsoid or tube-shaped, led to the entire nanotech industry. Today fullerenes show up in everything from ultra-light, ultra-strong bicycle frames and tennis rackets to “nanopants” that are soft and breathable yet repeal water and stains. And they make great desk toys, too.

You can still visit Bucky Fuller’s geodesic dome in Montreal, too. Today it houses the Biosphere, a museum about the region’s ecology. There’s an exhibit about Fuller inside.

Thanks to the Tang Museum’s exhibit Molecules That Matter, which introduced my family to Buckyballs.  Curator Ray Giguere noted that dog toys made very good models. And thanks to Google, which today has an animated doodle honoring the 25th anniversary of the discovery of the Buckyball.

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Photo: Ken Denmead

It was sort of a last-minute decision for me to attend PAX Prime. I’d read (with some amount of envy) about the GeekDads attending PAX East earlier this year but hadn’t even considered the possibility of attending PAX myself, at least not this year —we had too many trips planned, vacation time was running out, etc. But here I am anyway! I’m just a lucky guy, with a fantastic wife who indulges my geekery.

I really didn’t have much of an idea what to expect. I’m staying with a friend, about a half-hour bus ride away from downtown and the convention center, so I missed a lot of the hustle and bustle when I arrived Thursday night. Riding the bus into town, I was torn between gawking out the window (watching for my first glimpse of downtown Seattle) and reading the con-appropriate book I’d brought with me, Tom Bissel’s Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter. (Note: if you love video games, you need to read this book. I’ll tell you all about it later.) I did glance up from time to time, and got a glimpse of the loading cranes down at the harbor. They had the look of giant metal giraffes gathered around a watering hole—sort of a starved cousin of the AT-AT, maybe.

Photo: Ken Denmead

My bus stop was right across the street from the Benaroya Theater, where Warren Spector would be delivering the PAX keynote speech in about an hour and a half, and I saw people in geeky T-shirts and PAX badges on lanyards headed that way. But I’d seen on Twitter that some people had been in line for the keynote for nearly two hours already, so I decided it wasn’t really worth trying for. Instead, I walked over to the Sheraton, picked up my Speaker badge (surprisingly quickly) and then headed to the convention center, where I met up with fellow GeekDads Dave Banks and Michael Harrison.

Since the halls weren’t open yet, we kicked off PAX the right way: with a game of San Juan, on a little cafe table that was much too small. We finished up right at 10:00, and headed upstairs to explore the main hall. After finding a helpful Enforcer (the volunteers at PAX) who got us maps and schedules, we entered the Exhibit Hall and commenced gawking.

My first impression was that it was loud. The entrance we’d chosen was facing a Rock Band 3 stage, where somebody was belting out an off-tune rendition of some song I’ve since blocked out of my head. My second impression was: hey, look at all this room to walk! (I’ve been told that Saturday will be much more crowded, but it’s hard to imagine it beating the Comic-Con crowds.)

I walked around and admired a lot of the video games being demoed throughout the hall, but my main destination was the tabletop gaming sections, which were mostly around the edges. I got my first glimpse of Flying Frog Production’s upcoming Invasion From Outer Space game (which looks awesome) as well as Mayfair’s Settlers of America (which looks daunting). There was also a game of Settlers of Catan being played on a Microsoft Surface table, which was pretty impressive. And then I boggled over Geek Chic’s custom-made gaming tables, which look like nice dining tables until you pull off the leaves to uncover the gorgeous gaming surface underneath.

I’d love to tell you all about the rest of the day, but I really need to get going so I can catch my bus downtown again. We met up with Ken Denmead when he arrived and got to see the Dungeons & Dragons party bus, and then tried out the D&D Essentials Red Box. It was in fact my first ever experience with D&D, and it was pretty fun. I can see why it could become a lifestyle. I played a bunch of games from the Tabletop Gaming Headquarters, where you could check out a board game from their library and take it to any of the many many tables around the convention center. And then, as I was making my last sweep through the convention center on my way out to catch my bus … I saw an empty seat at a Microsoft Surface table, where they were playing some sort of space-aliens cooperative tower defense game. I stayed for about an hour, missing the midnight bus home by about five minutes, and ended up waiting an extra 25 minutes for the next bus.

It was a long, full day, and I can’t wait to do it again.

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Credit: Eliot Phillips (Community Commons)

Have you ever noticed certain cocktails are perfect for specific geeky pursuits? Whether it’s a special kind of ‘tini for tinkering or a hearty grog for saluting an awesome rocket launch, we (non-teetotaler) adults appreciate a cocktail that complements our hobbies. Here are some examples to sample over this long weekend as you pursue whatever it is that makes your geeky heart happy:

Sissy Klingon
Activity: Good for softening the blow of ‘The Undiscovered Country.’

If you can’t handle real Blood Wine, pataQ, try this one out. Strong, sweet and sophisticated, just like Worf circa TNG, when he couldn’t win a fight to save his life.

1 shot Flor de Caña rum
1/2 shot Raspberry Pucker
1/2 shot Bombay Sapphire gin
Cherry Bomb Jolt

Instructions: Mix the booze together in a shaker and pour over ice. Add the Jolt to taste.

Neon Geek (Matt Blum)
Activity: Good for drinking with action shows/movies.

1/2 oz Mountain Dew, Sprite, or 7-Up
1/2 oz Bourbon
1 oz Cinnamon Schnapps

(Sodas are listed in order of preference.) Mix together with ice, then pour into a margarita glass. Garnish with mint.

Green Acres Punch
Activity: Great for relaxing after (not before!) some heavy-duty carpentry.

2 oz. Flor de Caña 4-year old
1oz. Flor de Caña 18-year old
0.75 oz. rich demerara simple syrup*
1 oz. lime juice
6 oz. HOT STRONG Green Tea
1 mint sprig

Instructions: All of the ingredients should be combined and left in a container overnight. Strain the next day, then refrigerate and drink at your leisure. Pour the punch into a glass and garnish with a lime wheel and mint sprig.

*Demerara syrup can be made in a pot over low heat on stove top.
2 parts demerara sugar to 1 part water. Heat and stir until dissolved.

Romulan Ale
Activity: Drink while rewatching TNG episodes.

1 1/2 oz White rum
1 oz Blue Curacao
7-Up
6 drops Tabasco sauce

Instructions: Mix all ingredients together. Pour into a tall, narrow glass. Add a grain of salt.

(Via webtender.com)

Sazerac Cocktail (Bill Gurstelle)
Activity: Sipping while sitting in a leather easy chair reading Douglas Adams’ ‘Hitchhiker’s Guide.’

In 2008 the Louisiana House of Representatives voted to make the Sazerac the official cocktail of New Orleans. It’s a great mix of flavors and packs a kick. A favorite with those who understand the art of living dangerously.

1/2 cup ice cubes
1 sugar cube
3 dashes Bitters
2 ounces rye Jim Beam or Old Overholt RYE (not bourbon) whiskey
1/2 teaspoon of absinthe
Lemon twist

Chill an old-fashioned glass by filling it with ice and water. In second old-fashioned glass, mix together sugar, bitters, and 1/2 teaspoon water thoroughly. Add cognac or whiskey and remaining 1/2 cup ice, and stir well, at least 15 seconds. Take the chilled glass, discard ice and water and pour in absinthe. Swirl it around so the absinthe coats the interior of the glass. Add rye whiskey mixture into the chilled, absinthe-coated glass. Add lemon peel and enjoy.

The Princess Leia
Activity: Writing yourself into your favorite fanfic.

Classy yet strong, just like its namesake. The acai-flavored VeeV adds a little tang to your ‘pagne while the gin supplies the kick.

1/2 shot Bombay Sapphire gin
1/2 shot VeeV Acai liquor
Champagne

In a champagne flute, add the VeeV and Sapphire, stir, then top off glass with your sparkling wine or champagne of choice.

Sapphire Collins
Activity: Harvesting parts from a busted piece of consumer electronics.

2 parts Bombay Sapphire Gin
1 part fresh lemon juice
3/4 part simple syrup
Club soda

Instructions: Pour first three ingredients into a Collins glass with ice and stir well. Add more ice and top with club soda. Garnish with a lemon wedge.

Royal Tea (Royalty) (Curtis Silver)
Activity: I like to drink while using the Adobe Creative Suite to edit videos and pictures of my kids.

Arizona Iced Tea (original with lemon)
Crown Royal
Fresh lemons

Fill 16oz cup up with ice to brim, then iced tea to three quarters cup. Fill in rest with Crown Royal. Cut a lemon in half. Squeeze one into the cup and discard. Take the other half and cut it into fours. Put that right into the drink

(via Don Martelli, Boston PR Madman.)

Cherry Grog (Michael Harrison)
Activity: Perfect for a night spent powerleveling your guildies through Deadmines (again) or roleplaying your way through the pirate city of Freeport. Splice the main brace, mateys; just don’t overdo it and pull a Leeroy Jenkins, ya lightweight.

Collins glass (or a pewter beer stein, if you’re feeling saucy)
Mountain Dew Game Fuel, Horde Red
Light rum
Lime juice
Limes

Instructions: Fill glass with cracked ice and drop a shot or two of spirits over the ice. Fill the rest up with the Game Fuel. Add a splash of juice and garnish with a wedge of lime

The Mom Mellowing Cocktail (Corrina Lawson)
Activity: It is best consumed after a long, exhausting day, to clear the mind.

Two fingers of vodka with lemon flavor
Any flavor of diet cola but Diet Coke with Lime works best.
Add ice.

This is your basic soda & hard liquor mixed drink but I drink it for two reasons:
1. I cannot drink vodka straight.
2. It is somewhat low calorie, with the use of diet soda.

Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster (Matt Blum)
Activity: Best to drink with the old HHGttG TV show or the decidedly-mediocre movie.

There are multiple versions this legendary Hitchhikers Guide beverage. This one comes from webtender.

2 oz Vodka
1 oz Triple sec
1/2 oz Grenadine
Pineapple juice
7-Up or Slice

Instructions: Fill Collins glass with ice. Add 2 oz. of vodka and 1 oz. triple sec. Fill glass almost to the top with pineapple juice, add Grenadine for color, and top off the glass with 7-Up or Slice. Shake or stir until the drink turns a light orange-pink color.

Humongor (Curtis Silver)
Activity: All-night HALO benders.

Bottle of Jonnie Walker Black or Red
Liter of Mountain Dew
One large sports cup

Mix 50% Jonnie Walker (didn’t use the cheap stuff to avoid headaches) and 50% Mountain Dew, warm, in a large sports cup. CHUG.

Photo: John Edgar Park

The Ramos Gin Fizz
Activity: This cocktail takes a lot of shaking to fix — great for combining with dice-shaking activities like D&D or Yahtzee!

Ah. Born in 1887 to Henry Charles “Carl” Ramos. Not technically a cocktail, but a fizz. A morning-after drink for clearing the haze after you’ve had a few too many the night before. Downright delicious; a creamy, frothy, fragrant, lovely way to set things right again with the dawning day.

1 1/2 oz Old Tom Gin*
3/4 oz Cointreau
3/4 oz Fresh squeezed Lemon Juice
3/4 oz Fresh squeezed Lime Juice
3/4 oz Heavy Whipping Cream
1/2 oz simple Syrup (2:1)
1/2 an egg white (this drink is traditionally built for two, in which case, double the recipe and use the whole egg white)
2 oz Club Soda
3 drops Orange Flower Water

Pour the citrus and egg white in a Boston Shaker with the spring from a
Hawthorn strainer and dry shake for one minute. Keep ingredients in the tin
and in the glass add the Gin, Cointreau, Cream, and Simple Syrup. Fill with
ice reconnect with the tin and Shake for one minute. Strain into a large
Highball glass (no ice,) top with Club soda, and garnish with Orange Flower
Water.

(Note: Learn more about the Ramos Gin Fizz on John Park’s website.)

Lucid Frappe
Activity: Great for moistening a parched throat after an invigorating soldering session.

1 oz. Lucid Absinthe
0.5 oz. of Simple Syrup
6-8 Fresh Mint Leaves
1 oz. of Soda Water

Muddle mint leaves in the bottom of a frappe style glass. Add absinthe, simple syrup and fill with crushed ice. Pour mixture into shaker and shake vigorously. Pour contents into glass, top with splash of soda water and garnish with mint sprig.

…………..

So, what are your favorite recipes? Leave a comment.

[Note: This article was originally published in September of 2009.]

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Some people are fond of saying that it isn’t the Earth that needs saving—the Earth will be around long after we’re gone. No, it’s we humans who need saving from ourselves. (Need evidence? Look no further than the Gulf, where another oil rig just caught fire.) 6th Mega is a new indie game developer dedicated to preventing the sixth mega extinction. Their flagship product is Puff Puff, an underwater arcade game, and they’re contributing 30% of net proceeds to ecosystem restoration with a focus on the Gulf of Mexico marine habitat. A new version of Puff Puff just hit the iTunes store this week

Puff Puff screenshots: the coral reef and the Gulf oil spill. Click to enlarge.

In Puff Puff, you play a diodon holocanthus, the spiny pufferfish, navigating your way through coral reefs or the Gulf oil spill. The game has an interesting control system, combining the accelerometer with pinch/squeeze gestures. Pinching and squeezing causes the puffer to deflate and inflate, which then affects its buoyancy and moves it up or down on the screen. Tilting the screen makes the puffer move forward or back, though there’s a constant automatic forward movement. Grab power-ups for a speed boost, keep your energy levels up, or temporary shield, but avoid the obstacles—three hits and you die (unless you find the extra lives). Enemies will float by as well—sharks in the coral reef and robo-subs in the Gulf—but you can hit them if you’ve got your spines extended.

Puff Puff is nicely designed and the graphics really do a great job of putting you in an underwater world. I haven’t seen any other games with this sort of control, so it’s a cool use of the iPhone’s capabilities. The goal of the game is simply to get as far as possible, so it can get a little monotonous after a while, but an upcoming update will add some new enemies, and the two levels give you a change of scenery.

Here’s a little video of gameplay (from version 1.0, which doesn’t have the Gulf Spill level):

What’s also neat is that 6th Mega is releasing Puff Puff as “goodware”—they’re distributing the source code for free and encouraging remixes. I’d love to see what somebody else can do with the app as well.

Puff Puff is $.99 in the iTunes store. Of course, if you really want to help save the humans, 6th Mega encourages you to donate to The Nature Conservancy’s Adopt a Coral Reef program.

Wired: Unique controls using pinch/squeeze and accelerometer give the game a different feel; 6th Mega donates 30% of proceeds to conservancy efforts.

Tired: Could use a little more variety along the way.

Disclosure: 6th Mega provided a review copy of Puff Puff.

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I picked up the Dungeons and Dragons Heroscape Master Set: Battle for the Underdark not long ago and finally had a chance to play with my son.I was surprised to find a game that we both enjoyed and has my friends (which are my age) scrambling to buy their own sets.

The basic game comes with different setup designs for a campaign type adventure, but we had more fun just picking up tiles and setting them up as we went. We then picked our teams. My six year old played the heroes that had a friendly troll at their side and I played the Drow of the Underdark with pet dragon.

There is two different types of play, an advanced and a basic. The basic game is understandable by anyone who can count to ten and read those same numbers. Each figure has a card which has a number of steps that character can take and how many dice are rolled to attack and how many are rolled to defend. The dice have red skulls, blue shields and a blank “wild” side. If the attacker rolls more skulls than the defender roll shields, then the defender is out (dead). My six year old had no trouble with the concept.

The advanced side of the game is a bit more difficult, but would definitely be more fun for older gamers. It incorporates origins of line of sight, spells, abilities, hit points and even healing.

Finally, the other great reason to pick this line of products, as I alluded to in the first paragraph, is they can be incorporated into your regular RPG game. The figures are heavy duty plastic and already painted. The tiles can be used to create some great elevations to add that third dimension to you regular boring table-top game. Heroscape sets and expansion packs can be picked up at most major retailers. Here is a link to the main Heroscape page and here is the link to the D&D branded.

Box art from Wizards of the Coast, game photos by T.Sims.

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GeekDad is at PAX all weekend, and we’ll be adding pictures as we take them.

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Six Apart is shutting down its Vox blogging service. Users have until Sept. 30 to export their data to other services, including Six Apart’s TypePad blogging service. After that, Vox will be gone.

If you’ve got a Vox blog, there are several export options — Six Apart has instructions for moving to TypePad, Posterous and WordPress. There’s also an option to move your photos and videos over to Flickr.

Of course none of those services quite combine the privacy and small social network features that endeared Vox to users, but at least you can retrieve your content in some form.

The export options also make no mention of the fact that Vox is an OpenID provider, which means that, presumably, when your Vox URL is gone, your OpenID is gone with it. That means any site you’ve signed into using your Vox account will no longer let you sign in. In some cases that could mean a total loss of access to the third-party site — exactly the sort of thing OpenID is supposed to help prevent.

If there’s a moral to Vox shutting down, it’s pretty simple: choose your OpenID provider with care. It would seem that the bigger the provider, the safer you are. Alternately you could be your own OpenID provider, ensuring that you retain control over your identity.

Six Apart’s blog does not give any reason for the shutdown, and the company did not respond to requests to comment on this story. However, it seems likely that Vox was simply supplanted by Facebook, Twitter and other, more popular means of sharing content with your web friends.

The social network landscape has also changed considerably since Vox launched in 2006. Much of the initial appeal of Vox — namely, its tightly controlled privacy — is less of a concern for many of today’s users.

See Also:

• New ‘OpenID Connect’ Proposal Could Solve Many of the Social Web’s Woes
• To See How OpenID Can Work Well, Look at Stack Overflow
• Be Your Own Open ID Provider

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Thus speaketh the PAX Prime schedule:

Saturday, 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM, Wolfman Theatre
Raising Geek Generation 2.0: Roll For Parenting Ability

How young is too young for The Hobbit? Why is LEGO Star Wars the best console game for your child? What’s the best way to deal with bullying? How can I control my disgust if my child tells me he likes Jar Jar? As a parent, how do you deal with smart phones, texting and technology in your kid’s life? These questions and many more will be discussed by writers for Wired.com’s GeekDad blog and other geek parents. Come share your stories and advice for how to make sure our kids grow up to be geeks like us! Don’t have kids? Show up and find out what may be in store for you if you ever do!

Panelists include: Ken Denmead [Editor], Dave Banks [Core Contributor], Michael Harrison [Core Contributor], Jonathan Liu [GeekDad], Paul Sabourin [Paul and Storm]

Yes, four members of the GeekDad staff, including our benevolent despot editor Ken, will be on the panel. And we’re very excited that Paul Sabourin, half of the always-awesome musical duo Paul and Storm and a geek dad himself, will be there as well! For those of you that may have attended our panel at PAX East back in March, two of the panelists (Dave and Michael) are the same, but the others are all-new, all-different GeekDads.

Oh, and there will be ThinkGeek swag given out. You know, in case geeky swag interests you.

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For every Batman, there’s a Matter-Eater Lad. For every X-Men, there’s a Legion of Super-Pets. There are comic book characters and groups who make it big, and there are those who never find a lasting audience. Only now and then do the obscure characters get noticed, and even more rarely do they get the big-screen treatment (Blade is the notable exception). Here are ten superheroes there’s a good chance you’ve never heard of, but that we at GeekDad think are good enough to carry a movie. Please feel free to list your own entries in a comment, or make some casting suggestions.

	10. Machine Man: He’s a sentient robot with flight, super strength, speed, vision, and reflexes. He can put special tools in his fingers, including a gun and all kinds of scientific equipment. In one story, he falls in love with another sentient robot. There’s all kinds of potential here, and he even has a human identity as Aaron Stack, an insurance investigator.
	9. Squirrel Girl: She has a squirrel tail and squirrel teeth and can control squirrels by talking to them. And she carries nuts in her utility belt. Silly, you say? Well, sure, but Ghost Rider is a guy with a burning skull for a head who rides around on a motorcycle, so silly is clearly not a bar to superhero movies. Seriously, though, we think her story would make a great kids’ movie.
	8. normalman: He’s a powerless man in a world where everybody else has super powers. This could be played for laughs, like in the comic books he comes from, or it could be rewritten as a dark satire.
	7. Coldblood: He’s a cyborg with the ability to interface with computer systems, in addition to superhuman fighting skills and a ray gun in his arm. Plus, he’s got a heck of an origin story, which the Marvel link describes in detail, including love, war, and robots. What more could you ask for in a movie?
	6. The Creeper: He’s sort of a heroic version of the Joker, only with powers. He’s got the crimefighting to drive the plot, and the insanity to offer a cool twist. Plus, he operates in Gotham City, so a Batman crossover would be easy to engineer.

	5. The Question: Frankly, we can’t figure out why nobody’s made this one yet. He’s got Batman’s no-powers-just-skills-and-grit thing going, only without all the cool gadgets. Plus, when in character he has no face! The only problem with making this one now is that the Watchmen movie is still pretty recent, and The Question looks too much like Rorschach (since Rorschach was based on The Question, this is hardly surprising).
	4. GrimJack: He’s a rogue with a rich past who kicks ass in a pan-dimensional city full of strange characters. The movie would practically write itself.
	3. Cloak & Dagger: He’s an African-American teenage boy from South Boston; she’s an overprivileged teenage white girl from the Midwest. They meet when he returns her stolen purse and become partners in fighting crime after they gain powers through a series of experiments. There’s really something for everyone here.
	2. Azrael: No, not Gargamel’s cat. In addition to the obvious tie-in with Batman, he’s a good choice for a movie on his own. He kicks ass, has flaming swords, and is seriously screwed up in the head. It would take a heck of an actor to pull off a role like this, but if someone could, the movie would rock.
	1. Girl Genius (Agatha Heterodyne): A strong female character. An awesomely spectacular steampunk-style world. Mad scientists. The only thing that a movie would lose would be Phil Foglio’s amazing art. But this could be the female-led superhero movie (though she’s far from a traditional superhero) that succeeds where others have failed.

So, what’d we miss?

Image credits: Marvel Comics (Machine Man, Squirrel Girl, Coldblood, Cloak & Dagger); Renegade Press (normalman); DC Comics (The Creeper, The Question, Azrael); First Comics/IDW Publishing (GrimJack); Studio Foglio LLC (Girl Genius).

[A version of this article was published on GeekDad in August of 2008.]

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I was contacted by a friend from the comics world about the new Intervention convention. Intrigued, I checked out the workshop list. My first thought after looking at it was “Ooo! A con that talks about web comics and how to create them.”

The workshops go beyond the simple nuts and bolts of writing and also get into the technical details on how to use WordPress and other sites to host your blog and comics, from beginning to advanced programming.

This new con, set for September 10-12 in Rockville, Maryland, was put together by artist Onezumi Hartstein and web developer James Harknell to fill a void. They noticed that while there were sci-fi conventions, comic book conventions, and anime conventions, there was no Internet Culture convention.

“James and I wanted to put together an event that would compliment the existing print-centric conventions — we wanted to showcase the creators who use the internet as their primary publishing method,” Hartstein said in a press release. “I went to conventions for years to promote my webcomic, and was always treated well, but felt that web creators needed their own space. We’re giving them that with Intervention.”

I asked Brian Lynch, the press agent for the con, what one thing he wanted people considering attending to know about Intervention, especially it’s the same weekend as SPX aka the Small Press Expo.

He said to tell Wired readers that “we’re the only con to ever host a two-night, Cthulhu-themed goth/industrial dance party, replete with cosplaying go-go dancers. Alternately, I hear that SPX has a very nice chocolate fountain….”

More seriously, Lynch pointed out the low registration price. “We’re the diet con. All the big con fun, half the big con price.”

The biggest name at the con will be science fiction legend Ben Bova. Aside from the writing workshops and discussion panels, there’s also a comprehensive gaming track. The con’s sponsors include ThinkGeek and Popcap Games, among others.

Pre-registration tickets for the weekend can be purchased for $40; tickets at the door will cost $45, with single-day rates to be announced.

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Image: Pearl Crescent

Geocaching tends to have quite a few electronic helpers, based on the fact that it’s an electronic sport. Letterboxing, however, the old fashioned analog version of geocaching, has usually been a pen-and-paper kind of activity. I recently reviewed BoxFinder, an app for letterboxing clues. I have since found a second one called Clue Tracker.

Clue Tracker will allow you to search for letterboxes through Atlas Quest or Letterboxing North America (LbNA), the two major letterboxing websites. You can search for boxes near your location, by address or zip code or by box name. Once you choose a letterbox to find, touch the map to show where the box is located or to get directions to the box. You can also save the letterbox by touching the backback. Once you save several letterboxes, you can display all of them on one map.

If you save a clue that is from Atlas Quest, Clue Tracker saves the clue text for offline use. If you save a clue from Letterboxing North America, whether the clue text is saved locally or not depends on how the person entered the clue on LbNA. The Clue Tracker authors do plan some improvements regarding this issue in the future, however, and will eventually allow offline clue reading for all clues. They also plan to add support for more than one set of saved letterboxes.

For saved letterboxes, there is also a Notes field for recording information about the boxes, or about your adventure in finding them. To get there from the Saved Letterboxes area, touch “Edit” and you’ll see the Notes field.

Touching LbNA or AQ on a clue screen will take you to Safari and out of the program, since it shows you the clue on the LbNA or Atlas Quest website. Fortunately, when you start up Clue Tracker again, it takes you right back to where you were, at the clue. This is a very nice feature. The app also allows you to log into your Letterboxing North America account to hide the boxes you’ve planted yourself and those you have already found.

Clue Tracker is simple to use, and does what it is supposed to do, but for a few of the letterboxes, it is only useful at home and in wifi hot spots for people with an iPod Touch. It is available in the iTunes store for $4.99.

Wired: Best for those with an iPhone, lets you view multiple clues on a map and gives directions to the clue start. Has a notes field.

Tired: Some of the clues won’t save within the app.

Note: I received a free copy of this app for review purposes.

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Google is celebrating the second birthday of its Chrome web browser with the release of a new, improved version.

Chrome 6 arrives with an updated user interface, better syncing tools that include support for web form data and extensions, and — as should be expected with every new browser release these days — increased speed and numerous bug fixes.

If you don’t want to wait for Chrome to automatically update, head over to the download page and grab Chrome 6 for Windows, Mac and Linux.

Google’s browser is in an enviable position right now. It recently passed Safari in user share — new data from August shows the lead it snagged in June is stretching — and it’s gaining on Firefox and IE. Also, in a market where raw speed is the most important metric, Chrome is enjoying a solid reputation as the one of the fastest — if not the fastest — browser on the scene.

Chrome has also had considerable impact on how other browsers in the market look and behave since it arrived in September, 2008. It kickstarted a shift toward minimal interfaces that Firefox and Internet Explorer are mimicking. Chrome also started the trend of tightly sandboxing web browsers to improve stability and security.

If you’ve been using early builds of Chrome 6, there isn’t much here that’s new, but if you’re upgrading from the older, stable release of Chrome 5 there are quite a few changes.

Perhaps the most noticeable thing about Chrome 6 is what’s missing — almost all the toolbar buttons. Chrome has consolidated nearly everything into a new menu button to the right of the URL bar. Click it and you’ll find the browser’s most-used menu functions.

Other nice touches include a new green padlock icon in the URL bar to indicate you’re on a secure HTTPS connection, and a less-cluttered new tab page that serves as your starting point for new browsing windows.

Chrome 6 isn’t just a visual update — new features like form auto-fill make for faster checkouts at e-commerce sites and faster sign-ups on new services. Chrome can now also sync both your autofill form data and any installed extensions across all your computers.

Chrome may be celebrating its second birthday, but it isn’t resting on its laurels. The Chrome dev channel already contains an embryonic version of Chrome 7 with hardware acceleration and the new “Tabpose” feature for quickly switching between your open tabs.

Browser data from NetMarketShare, chart from Google. Browsers with less than 2 percent share have been omitted.

See Also:

• Leaked Screenshot Shows a Cleaner, Simpler IE9
• Google Chrome 6 Beta Is Right Around the Corner
• Chrome 6 Beta Boasts New Look, Better Sync
• Chrome 7 Shows Off Hardware Acceleration, ‘Tabpose’

View full post on Webmonkey

Original Photo: joshmadison via Flickr

Whether you’re a foodie or somebody who feels like eating just takes up time that could be better used for important things (like playing games), if you’re here on GeekDad you’d probably appreciate any tips on making cooking geekier, right? We’ve mentioned the Star Wars Cookbooks before and last fall we had a round-up of geeky drinks for Labor Day.

Recently, Game Couch — a site about video games and related geeky things — has been compiling recipes for their own Geek Cookbook, and they’re looking for entries. They need original (non-copyrighted) recipes with a geeky twist, which they’ll compile into a cookbook and release as a free PDF. So while there isn’t any financial compensation involved, you could win fame and the gratitude of food-ingesting geeks everywhere!

Submit your recipe here.

Photo by joshmadison via Flickr, used under Creative Commons License.

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