If We Were a Nerd Supergroup We’d Be, Like, Bad English
Posted on June 2, 2012 Posted by John Scalzi 35 Comments
Get it? Because we’re all writers? Get it? Get… aw, hell. Just, you know. Never mind.
That’s me, Wil Wheaton, Felicia Day and Pat Rothfuss, hanging about at the Origins Game Fair last night. The three of them were actual guests of the game fair; I and Krissy drove up to Columbus last night to hang with them a bit because hey, they were a drivable distance away. Events in the evening included dinner, a tour of the yeasty, hoppy bowels of the Barley Brewing Company, games of Jungle Speed, Bang! and Cards Against Humanity, and several spilled and/or broken glasses of alcohol as we acted like louche rockstars in the corner of a gaming room (actually, the glasses were spilled/broken because we’re clumsy, excitable nerds. But shut up, man).
It was the veritable tons of fun and as an extra special bonus, I also got to see friends Jennifer Brozek (who played our game of Bang! with us) and Ken Hite, who is an actual rockstar in the games community. It was a hell of an evening. If you’re a nerd.
And now, because I made that horrible allusion in the headline:
I know. I’m sorry too.
Cool!
You should get Wil to include you in on a “Tabletop” episode. I realize it’d be difficult due to location, but it’d still be cool to see you on there.
So you and Dr. Geoffrey A. Landis and Dr. Mary A. Turzillo were all in Columbus at the same time? Don’t that many Hugo and Nebula Awards in a small city cause collapse into a black hole?
Hey! I hung out with Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day last night, too! Except they were a lot smaller. And on my phone. And they were drinking carbonated iced tea instead of real booze.
I’m guessing they had a lot more fun hanging out with you.
Should I be embarrassed that I got the reference immediately – because I really liked Bad English (and still do)?
Bad English rocks! :-)
“Clumsy, Excitable Nerds” is the name of my JoCo cover band.
Ha! Look at Pat. He looks umm… like Pat.
You really do get to hang out with all the cool kids.
Confused. I thought you WERE a Nerd Supergroup.
Yes, me too. But, I like the idea of calling you Bad English. Now, all you need is to long haired wigs to wear, well most of you, and you’ll be good to go. Thanks for the laugh, John. I needed that today!
Oh my goodness, Scalzi, are you SEXUALLY HARRASSING Will Wheaton? That looks like a titty grab if Ive ever seen one. ;)
My brother-in-law was the Bass player for American English…
I’ll triple (or quadruple) the motion for Team Tabletop; that crew right there would make a heck of an episode.
I swear I had the same exact hair cut John Waite has in that video…but then it was 1985.
You can tell that I was writing RPG books long before I decided to write a novel, because my first reaction to this post was, “Wait, you’re friends with Ken Hite too? How cool is that?” Yes, I am a big nerd, but that can be pretty much assumed from the whole Writing Career Started In The Gaming Industry thing.
I get it: you used the phrase “I and Krissy” instead of “Krissy and I” to establish your Bad English Cred. Clever, you writers.
I’d assumed that “I and Krissy” was a reference to “I. Asimov: A Memoir”
http://www.asimovreviews.net/Books/Book507.html
Wait, so John Waite is a writer?
Oh dear, Rothfuss has passed out again. How did you ever carry him back to his room?
You look like an angry Paul Giamatti. A terrifying angry Paul Giamatti.
And I’m suddenly jealous of your life.
Nerd Supergroup is a good name too! You are really making it difficult for me whether to buy Redshirts the book or Redshirts the audio version. Maybe both. I have to have my family join in the fun on a car trip. Felicia Day is probably one of the funniest people around. Just watch her on The Jace Hall Show, among a gazillion other things.
Photographer uncredited . . . doesn’t look like a mirror shot . . . looks too roomy for a photo booth . . . So who took the picture?
Haven’t I previously I mentioned the Nerd Supergroup: Ralph Alpher, Hans Bethe, and George Gamow?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpher%E2%80%93Bethe%E2%80%93Gamow_paper
I would assume Krissy took the picture.
Definitely would love to see a Scalzi-Wheaton Tabletop episode. I don’t think epic is a big enough word for what that would be.
I only hope it was Krissy who took the photo, or maybe Jennifer B. I was afraid it might be a frame from the security video, just before they were ejected for being disturbing disturbers creating a disturbance, perhaps even a Disturbance in the Force, something that would surely knock akilter some of the venue’s games, and some of its gamers.
Bad English rocks, but The Babys *ruled!*
Sean, stop prethinking for me!
ANGRY channeling
What WOULD be the ultimate Nerd Supergroup? I’ve had the good fortune to converse at length with potential members including Stephen Hawking (subsequently on Star Trek: TNG, The Simpsons, and Futurama); Richard Feynman in duet with Murray Gell-Mann, Linus Pauling, Robert Lord May of Oxford, Freeman Dyson, Brian Josephson, and James D. Watson. If only they’d jammed together, I’d pay big bucks for the bootleg album.
Damn I really miss not living in Columbus any more. Going to Origins every year was so cheap when you don’t have to worry about hotel rooms…
Forget Wheaton…you got to hang out with Felicia Day ? ::George Takei voice, ‘Oh MY!’:: + Nerdgasm!
Looks like so much fun! Great photo.
Shouldn’t that be across to Columbus? Up implies a northerly direction and Darke Co. is more westish from Franklin Co.
6+ months later [no clue how i missed this post origin — oh, wait, *ORIGINS*
Jonathan Vos Post : Columbus? is NOT small. it’s definitely not New York sized, but it’s pretty huge. it’s also, for instance, the 3rd largest “Gay” city in the US [San Fran and, great, now i can’t remember the other one that beats CBus] and it’s one of the epicenters of Finance and Technology in the U.S.
and i’m so very, very defensive of Columbus because I? am from California [*Redding* CA, an actually small city – more like a TOWN, actually. in the summer, it probably has a population of 300,000. if it tops half that in the winter, i’ll fall over of shock. yay tourism and Mt Shasta?] and i could go on FOREVER about the “Big Cities” and how they pretty much suck. L.A., for example, is TINY – and people never seem to go to L.A. proper – they go to Orange County, Beverly Hills, even Hollywood – but L.A. itself? i don’t think anyone even LIVES there. San Diego is actually more populated, if you only include the actual city limits. Columbus is the 15th largest city in the US, and just a few years ago was named [by business week] as THE best city to raise a family, and THE #1 up-and-coming tech city in the US.
there’s so much that’s AWESOME about Columbus, and it annoys me that people who don’t know CBus keep thinking of it as some random hick, cow-town only known because of it’s college football team [OSU is the largest campus in the country. and, much as i hate dealing with it because i’m not in college anymore and it’s NOT as ADA-compliant as i’d like, it’s an awesome campus if you AREN’T disabled. or over the age of 30. my bad luck that i’m both]
here are other cool things about Columbus;
i appear to be white [i’m not. i’m Cherokee. well, half-cherokee. but i have porphyria, and i’ve been losing melanin from my skinsince i was 8. so at by 16 i was looked like a tan white girl, and at 35… yeah. i’m pale as hell, now. but i can walk down the street [be pushed in the wheelchair, now] with my boyfriend, who happens to be black, *and no one even notices*.
THAT wouldn’t happen in LA or Frisco.
Columbus is one of the places Congress would go if they have to evacuate DC. as such. it’s got AWESOME backup systems [and defense systems]. not to mention Battelle here [one of THE largest, i think it IS the largest, R&D foundations in the country]. it’s got OSU, by which i mean the HOSPITAL, and it’s ALSO got two other hospital networks not associated with OSU, for a grand total of about a DOZEN hospitals, all of which are fairly new, are huge, are well-equipped…
it was hit less hard than much of the country by 2008, and it’s recovered faster and better [knock on wood]
okay, i’m done bragging about my adopted home town. i only have TWO problems with CBus. the first? is simple. i’m from CALIFORNIA, and snow? it’s something you’re supposed to DRIVE TO! it’s NOT supposed to just… show up and oh gods people here can’t DRIVE in the snow [and it’s the state capital, so we NEVER get to a Level 3 snow emergency, even when we SHOULD]
my other complaint is that CBus could be better about be accessible. it really really could. it’s not really the CITY’S fault, rather the businesses here. but, here’s an example; the Barnes and Noble closest to my apartment? doesn’t have automatic doors. to get in, you have to pull them towards you [can’t push.] they’re heavy, and awkwardly weighted, and i can’t open them AND get my wheelchair through, i need help. it’s BARNES AND NOBLE, WTF? there are more places than i can count that have STAIRS to their entrances, or just inside, that means i can’t go into them at all. and even MORE places that, nominally, have elevators but they don’t work all the time [i can’t count the number of classes i missed, my last year at OSU, because the elevator in this or that building was off line]
i bet no one sees this.
but if you do, and you’re interested, wikipedia has a fairly decent write-up in the basics of CBus. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbus,_Ohio