Nerdy Must Haves

1. The Holy Trinity Tank; I need this so badly. I mean, it’s my life in a nutshell (I’m sure along with every other fangirl). Is there anything else to life? Not to me there isn’t! This would be the perfect casual convention tee, paired with your favorite jeans or a high-waisted skirt and a fandom hair accessory. Easy, comfortable, but still expressive enough to get some high-fives!
2. Sailor Jupiter Dress; can I have a moment? Maybe two? Every time I lay my eyes on Living Dead’s Sailor Scout skater dresses, a little piece of me dies. They are all ridiculously perfect, seemingly fit like a glove, and must be mine. I was brainstorming an intense Sailor Scout cosplay for upcoming Animate Miami, but now I think I’ll pick up one of these babies and accessorize, accessorize! I’m really loving this fandom dress trend, especially when it’s done right!
3. Sailor Moon Pin; I am a firm believer that pins are the best geeky accessories. This is probably because they are so easy. Just push one in to your tee, purse or elsewhere and you are promoting instant fandom. This is a personal favorite of mine for conventions where I don’t cosplay. This Sailor Moon pin is a fun and slightly cheeky take on your typical scout love, which naturally makes me dig it. Check out the shop’s sticker sets too – they are swoon worthy!
4. Smaug Pop Figure; I am fire, I am death, I am….adorable? I dare you to tell me that you have seen something cuter than Smaug the dragon gone pop. I mean, I had a verbal reaction when I saw it (all sorts of squeals, gasps and other unintelligible noises I’m not proud of). This is only one out of the two variants (but clearly my favorite), and it will be available next month for purchase just in time to add a little geekery to your Halloween decor!
5. Cupcake Bikini; not necessarily a “geeky” find, but freaking adorable nonetheless. I found this ridiculous must-have via Instagram, who introduced me to my new blogger crush, Mermaidens. She’s kind of perfect and I must own her entire wardrobe (she dresses like a ice cream cone & I love it). This retro high-waisted suit is from Pretty Attitude and coming in at less than $40, it’s good enough to eat. Buy, I mean buy.

A Guide to Geeky Girl Travel

Hi everyone!!!
I hope you enjoyed our guest posts from our buddy, Jessica! I really appreciate her covering me for a portion of my travel time, but I actually have some free time now to throw up some posts of my own. I was surprised at how much I missed the blog during this past week and some change (well, I’m missing a lot of things to be honest), so I’m glad I got the opportunity to get back to business!

Since I do travel quite a bit, and these next 2 months are taking the cake with three different trips lined up back to back, I figured I would bestow some of my most essential travel tips on you all;

1. Make lists; nothing gives me greater joy than starting a trip list. I know this may make me a very strange person but it helps me not forget a single thing. I also have the ability to plan outfits beforehand. This is especially important for longer trips where you will have to wear the same item in different ways in order to maximize space, or for events where you know you will be photographed or will have to attend important functions (for a geeky blogger like me, that’s convention packing). I even make multiple lists for the same trip leading up to departure, such as things I have left to buy or all the last minute items I have to throw in my bag right before I leave. Go ahead. Mock my OCD.

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“No, I’m going to hyphenate a second time.”

This was my joking response the first time my fiance asked me to marry him. Of course, the way that he asked was “Are you taking my last name when we get married?” I didn’t mean it (I’m totally taking his last name), but he did. After being together for almost three years, we’ve decided that it’s the right time to make ourselves crazy for the next 14 months and get married on Halloween 2015. When it all comes down to it, I really am the luckiest girl in the world and I’m happy that, through whatever happenstance, our lives pushed us back together. (Our “first date” never actually happened and we were briefly split up last year through no one’s fault but ultimately determined that wasn’t going to work.) He and his whole family feels the same way about Halloween that I do and with it falling on a Saturday next year, the date seemed a perfect fit. He works full time and I’m a full time student with a few other things on my part time plate, so we decided that it wasn’t too soon to start planning, and we’ve also got a move on our plate between now and the ringing of wedding bells. If you want to tag along as my journey continues, I’ll leave a link to my currently empty wedding board on Pinterest at the end of the post. But for now…

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The Final Ride..

With my time here nearly finished and my wedding geekery post coming tomorrow, technology permitting, there’s one other thing that September’s brought with it since 2008. Tomorrow night (Tuesday!) at 10 PM on FX, the Sons of Anarchy ride again. If you’re a fan of the Reaper Crew, tomorrow night’s season premiere comes with a bittersweet note because this is the show’s final season and the finale date has even already been set (Dec. 2). Through its run, the show has had a little bit of something for everybody when it comes to guest casting, featuring rocker Dave Navarro, Disney star Ashley Tisdale, “Pensatucky” of “OitNB” Taryn Manning, Danny Trejo, real bikers including Sonny Barger, and a handful of FX favorites in roles you might not expect to see them in, to this year’s additions of shock-rocker (do we still use that term?) Marilyn Manson, Lea Michelle and Annabeth Gish.

After an explosive finale to the penultimate season, pushing the ever mounting body count even higher (and I won’t spoil the major deaths there, though one of those ones there at the end felt very overdue to everyone in my household, and… We’re not the only ones still mourning the loss of Opie, are we?), the series’ return tomorrow night is titled “Black Widower.” The episode is set to pick up with Jax in jail, ten days after the deaths and events of the season finale. It’s been a strange trip, full of loss and violence and peppered between with lightness, surprising humanity and humor. There are undoubtedly more losses to come in these final thirteen episodes, and I couldn’t be more excited to see where it all winds up.

Will Jax make it out alive, will he suffer his father’s fate, or will he make himself a martyr for his club and his boys? Will Gemma finally have to answer for her years of villainy? Were you as curious as I was how many body parts Otto could stand to lose before he finally went on to be with Luanne again? Are you as hopeful as I am that this premiere will include the seemingly prerequisite shot of Jax’s bare backside? Will Wendy somehow wind up with her son back? And can we please get Ray McKinnon back as that weird-o US attorney? Every weird thing he said and all those meaningful glances left un-answered. Will you be tuning in to keep up with the final ride for the Sons of Charming, CA?

It’s the most wonderful time of the year…

Now that I know that my laptop survived an attempted assassination at the hands of my cats (Don’t ask!), I’m back!

 

And, it’s the hap-happiest season of all..! And, sorry, Christmas devotees, I don’t mean Yule. I mean the ever fabulous and fast approaching Halloween! With Labor Day marked off on the Calendars and the back-to-school rush settling, stores are ushering us into fall with the introduction of Halloween items to their shelves and I couldn’t be happier. Halloween has always been big business for me, since I was a kid. I can recall years that I managed to find ways to wear three and four Halloween costumes, huge wings, elaborate face paint, and growing older hasn’t managed to take away my love for the holiday of all things spooky. I’m even such a Halloween fan that my fiance and I decided to set the date for our wedding as Halloween (Mega-post on that coming on Monday)!

Some of my Halloween swag on my dresser. The black glass skull came from Big Lots this year and the pink skull candle should still be available from D.L. and Co. Other goodies came from Loved to Death in San Francisco and Necromance in Los Angeles.

 

 

A little bit of last Halloween's ensemble.

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I’m late, I’m late for a very important…

Let’s not beleaguer the fact that I have no sense of timing, the fact is, I’m here. And I couldn’t be happier to have the opportunity to guest post while the wonderful Melificent is off on her European adventure! I’m Jess, though some of you might know me better as Frightwing. In the past, I’ve been on the Fangirl Diaries to talk about Batman and all things Fall TV and comic related. Instead of a boring “Get to know me” post, I thought I’d just jump right on in with a less boring and maybe more telling way to introduce myself that’s hopefully some fun.

Without further ado, any grandstanding or further textual waste of time, here we go!

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Allons-y!

Hi, my loves!
Just letting you all know that I will be starting on quite a few adventures tomorrow. I start my journeys in Eastern Europe for my day job and then continue to California and New York City for lots and lots of fun straight into October! During my 2-week stint in Europe, I will have an amazing guest blogger taking over, but I’ll still be extremely active during the U.S. portion of my travels.

See you all soon!

Zachary Quinto Talks About “The Chair,” Mentoring & Being a Jack of All Trades

I was lucky enough to be able to interview Zachary Quinto earlier this week about the new Starz docu-series he will be co-producing, The Chair. It has a really interesting premise, where two first-time directors are given the opportunity to direct separate films adapted from one original screenplay. Zach serves as a mentor for both directors, Anna Martemucci and Shane Dawson.

Photo by Chiun-Kai Shih

Zach is one of my absolute favorite actors (hello, I traveled to NYC to see him on Broadway last year), so I was really excited to have this opportunity. I especially loved that he listed J.J. Abrams and Leonard Nimoy as his inspirations during the interview. Hell, I’m not in the film industry, and Abrams is one of my inspirations! He also touched on his amazing Instagram bromance with James Franco (c’mon, you know you had a hard time breathing with some of those photos, ladies). As usual, I can’t wait to support Zach yet again on this new venture.

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On “The Chair,” you will be serving as mentor for the up and coming directors. After years of looking up to others and their craft, how does it feel to have the tables turned and have others seeking your advice and knowledge? 

I really love the opportunity to share the experiences that I’ve had with other people. It’s an incredibly gratifying position to be in and I want to utilize it to the fullest as I continue to grow my life and my career as an actor, a producer and film maker. Bringing people to a point that they otherwise would not have reached is something that I feel really good about – I feel really humbled by, and I’d like to continue it. I like to reach out to people that have ambition and are dreaming of a different level of experience than the one they might be having now.

With producing, Broadway, TV and movies under your belt, along with expressing the desire to direct, do you feel like you gravitate more towards one than the others?

I always consider myself an actor first and I feel like my experience reflects that. I’ve been acting since I was 10 years old and I hope that that will be the thing that I do forever, but as I continue to expand I want to inhabit that expansion. I want to diversify. The industry has changed so much that diversity is key in a way that it didn’t used to be, and I can see that. I also have an interest in cultivating a keen business mind, so I’m trying to navigate these waters from a number of different perspectives. Creativity is the foundation and the thing that I always want to come back to, but within that, I want to give myself opportunities to do other stuff and have other experiences. That’s why I started my company, that’s why I produce things and try to look at things from the business side as well, because that is also fascinating, but I would say that my gravitation is always towards acting and creating in that way.

Make sure to check out The Chair, premiering on Starz on September 6th at 11pm.
Wanna see more? Check out the trailer!

Special thanks to Gotham News for giving me this opportunity!

Cosplay For Dummies: Store Bought

I have loved to dress up since I can remember. My favorite holiday was always Halloween and whether it was myself or my parents choosing my costume, it was always quite the affair. I’m pretty sure without any social norms (those suck by the way), I would be running around in some form of costume on a daily basis (tutu’s are functional, every-day wear). With that said, I am not crafty. Well, I am, but in the way I can use a glue gun and a pair of scissors. I cannot sew, nor do I really trust myself to get near a machine, despite the fact that I own one. You may think this makes me a cosplay failure, and maybe to some it does, but I have embraced my terrible home ec skills and have gone another route: store bought.

Store bought costumes not only save you stress, but also save your wallet! Here are some budget ways to make your store bought costume unique and creative;

1. Accessorize! Many store bought costumes just come with the basics or offer accessories as extras. Take that chance to skip out on the extra bits and find or make your own. For my Babydoll cosplay, I got my swords from Geek Chic HQ. They were extremely affordable, but definitely made a statement. Check out the rest of their swag – you’ll be impressed with their craftsmanship!
2. Use Your Closet! You may find functional pieces in your own wardrobe! Rather than buying a pair of black maryjanes I probably would never wear again, I opted for raiding my collection and finding a much better looking pair of black wedged booties (oldies from ShoeDazzle). They gave the same effect, but flattered the look. Sure, it wouldn’t be considered “accurate,” but these tips are ultimately for a more casual cosplayer like myself.
3. Makeup! Everyone knows the right makeup pulls any look together, and costumes are no exception. Reference character photos and look up YouTube tutorials if need be. For my Babydoll look, I knew I had to go with smoky eyes and a nude lip. Makeup was the last bit I added while getting ready, and I was shocked to see how it all came together the second I “put on my face.”
4. Swag! It’s all about the acting when you don cosplay. Get into character, don’t be afraid to be silly and be confident! Even while taking these shots, my husband was directing me to get into bad-ass-chick-with-swords-and-a-tiny-skirt poses, and at first I felt ridiculous. However, I eventually relaxed and was shocked with the final outcome. When I let go and tried to embody the little ass kicking persona that is Babydoll, I looked legit. I mean, do you see those squats? Hardcore.
5. Pick the right site! Not all costume sites are created equal. Make sure to shop around and find the right one with quality merchandise. My costume came from Costume Super Center, and I loved the product. For the price, it came with a lot of pieces, leaving me with a small laundry list of additional props and accessories. I also loved their selection of geeky costume options. Maybe one day I’ll be brave enough (& ripped enough) to don their iconic Slave Leia piece!

Sponsored post; Very special thanks to Costume Super Center, who provided my costume for me in return for this post. All opinions expressed are my own.

Book Requests!

Hi all you lovely geeks out there!

I’ll be taking quite the journey in about 2 weeks to a far off land. It’s not for play, instead for work, but I intend on enjoying every single new experience it brings me. I’ve never traveled alone, much less to Europe. This is something the old Meli would have never done, but my goal after a certain event this year is to not be afraid and not let my anxiety rule me. Thus: hello adventure!

However, this little journey will take me approximately 12 hours so I need BOOKS. That’s right. I’m asking all the amazing people I’ve met through this blog recently to give me your recommendations on some great reading. Please leave them in the comments. I’ll be heading to the bookstore this weekend and hope to share which ones I chose with you all!