About a week ago Drew Bacon of Music Box Dynamo sent me a tweet about his ridiculously geeky guitar, The Poppler. After watching the clip that shows off the axe (and his vocal prowess), I had to post a little something about the instrument.

Drew admits that this isn’t the fanciest guitar in the world, a simple Fender DG8 acoustic guitar… but to him, it’s pretty damn special. It’s the guitar he learned how to play music on back in 2007.

Fast forward to 2011, and he’s regularly performing with a better guitar. He spotted his old ax sitting lonely in the corner and broke out pads of paper and pencils, furiously sketching characters he admired.

“It’s a little bit of good and evil,” says Bacon about the art on the guitar, “Superman, The Death Star, Bender, Leeloo Multipass, Lord Voldemort, The Bride, Spiderman, Philadelphia Skyline, Batman, The Joker, Captain America, A Snow Willow Tree, Wolverine, The Man With No Name, Mickey Mouse, an Iron Man [Arc Reactor], and a hidden hometown logo I don’t mention unless someone spots it.”

The whole thing took a little over two months to create, and it looks awesome. And in case you didn’t know, Poppler is a brilliant Futurama reference.

Make sure to check out Music Box Dynamo as they perform all around the city over the year. The song in the video is actually about their first show together. Hit up the band on their official website and on Facebook.

Being the film geek that I am, when I am not watching movies I’m probably either reading about them or listening to people talk about them.

Speaking of which, Film Versus Film is a great new weekly web series produced at our very own Temple University. The series features a different in-depth film discussion each week by a panel made up of local filmmakers, professors, critics and scholars.

While I am a fan of the series, I only wish that the shows were a bit longer, though the series looks quite polished and well produced. I highly suggest checking it out and you can see a sample episode below, enjoy!

Geekadelphia obviously hearts WordPress: it’s the very foundation of our beloved blog. And, as it turns out, we’re not the only ones in Philly who prefer to manage our content with Automattic’s open source system. There’s a great community of WordPress fans in our fine city, meeting monthly to discuss the popular blogging platform.

On November 5th and 6th at Temple University, that community will gather for the much bigger annual WordCamp Philly conference. With Saturday sessions for users, power users, designers and developers, WordCamp Philly covers all the bases, no matter what your specific interest.

Super-duper WordPress geeks can return to Temple on Sunday for more code-oriented fare like contributing to the underlying codebase that powers the platform and developing plugins that augment the great built-in functionality of WordPress.

The conference will include talks from a wide range of speakers, including one of those guys from that other blog. Of course, you may fancy yourself a WordPress guru, in which case you can cast aside all that humility we know you have for a moment and nominate yourself to speak at the event. And if a solid day or two of WordPress geekery just sounds like the best kind of weekend ever, hit the registration page to secure a spot.

Update: It looks like they’re sold out, but you can get on the waiting list here.

WordCamp Philly 2011
Temple University’s Alter Hall
1801 Liacouras Walk
Philadelphia, PA 19122-6083
Register here

Photo by Danya Henninger

Today’s Geek of the Week column features Collin Flatt, who a lot of you might know from his food writing here in Philadelphia. From Phoodie to the Feast, you’ve surely read his blogs about tasty noms. Read on to learn about how he got into food writing, his massive video game collection (MASSIVE), and his favorite haunts for food and drink.

Let’s start off with you telling me about yourself. People might know you best for your former involvement with Phoodie and presently with The Feast. How did you get into the food scene and blogging about it?

I am a food obsessed individual, like most young Philadelphians, but I just happened to get obsessed a little ahead of the curve. My mom was a bad cook (love you, moms), and because of this, I wasn’t exposed to great vittles when I was little and have no allegiance to her gravy or casseroles, like most food folks I know.

What this did, though, was provide my palate with an early education on odd flavor combinations, and food that was inexplicably out of balance. She made meatloaf that was covered in Rice Krispies, and her Chicken a la King is legendary for it’s bonding properties. Obviously it has scarred me for life. Because of those experiences, I searched out food from cultures all around the world, and made it my mission to be a better cook than she was.

I started writing about wine first, and it spread into food journaling, and then beer as well. Hobbies become your job if you decide to spend more time on them than what you’re paid to do.

Word on the street is that you’ve got a seriously impressive video game console collection. Let’s hear as full of a report as you can provide.

I got way into the Atari 2600 when I was old enough to pick up the sticks, with my favorite games being Adventure, Pitfall, and Yars Revenge. We had an original from 1977, which still has the price tag from Boscov’s on it. A note to people who bitch about pricey game systems, the Atari was $175 back then, which translates to almost $600 today. Crazy.

I subsequently got my own first game console when I was 8 years old in 1986, which was the Sega Master System. All of my friends had the NES, but the SMS was a little more powerful, and a little more cutting edge. From that point, I was hooked on gaming, and collected systems.

I own 32 systems total, past and present. Most of them have been purchased long after release, as no kid could really keep up with the technology financially. The crown jewels in my collection are the Vectrex, and the Odyssey2, because of their rarity.

The systems I own are: Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Atari 7800, Coleco Vision, Intellivision, Sega Master System, NES, Gameboy, Atari Lynx, Sega Game Gear, Nintendo DSi, Nintendo 3DS, Turbo Grafx 16, Turbo Xpress, Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo, Super Famicom (Japan), Sega CD, Sega 32X, Neo Geo Gold, Panasonic 3DO, Atari Jaguar, Sony Playstation, Sega Saturn White (Japan), Sega Dreamcast, Nintendo 64, Sony Playstation 2, Nintendo GameCube, Nintendo Wii, Microsoft Xbox, Microsoft Xbox 360, and Playstation 3.

My favorite series to this day is Metal Gear, and all of its many incarnations. Hideo Kojima was the first game designer to bridge the gap between games and movie productions. He pushed the technology to its limits, and created a real culture and universe where Solid Snake lived. Character development, dialogue, directing, and epic set pieces were his M.O.

Collin and HughE Dillon of PhillyChitChat.com

What’s currently your favorite spot in town?

I have a soft spot for Zahav, as Mike Solomonov is one of the most talented chefs I’ve ever met, and more importantly he’s one of the nicest people on the planet. My other haunts are Bibou, the French bistro in South Philly, and Barbuzzo, Marcie Turney’s place on 13th. The best bowl of soup is at Cafe Diem, the pho joint on 8th, where I eat lunch two times a week. For beer, I head to Varga Bar, Monk’s, SPTR, Good Dog, and The Standard Tap, but my homebase is definitely the P.O.P.E.

What’s your favorite dish (or drink)?

I have a few favorite dishes. The Chicken Liver Rigatoni at Osteria, The Bun Bo Hue at Cafe Diem, Stuffed Pig’s Foot with Foie Gras at Bibou, Twice Cooked Eggplant at Zahav, and David Ansill’s Steak Tartare.

Drinkwise, our local beer scene is chock full of amazing stuff. My favorites are Troeg’s Nugget Nectar, Sly Fox Pikeland Pilsner, Flying Fish Exit 4, Yards ESA, and Stoudt’s Scarlet Lady. I also have a soft spot for Bear Republic Racer 5 I.P.A., and Russian River Supplication. I do have a tattoo of Brasserie Cantillon Brouwerij on my shoulder. I’ve got a thing for sours.

—
Thanks for chatting with us, Collin. To read up more on his latest food adventures, check out The Feast – Philadelphia. In the meantime, we wait excitedly for pictures of your complete video game collection. As the old adage goes, pics or it didn’t happen.

Their latest and greatest idea for encouraging us to share our stories with each other comes in the form of a slick little Tumblr page.

The idea is simple: monthly themes are announced and YOU get to submit a story that goes along with it. At the end of the month, a favorite is picked. Even better, in celebration of their 10th anniversary, the stories are limited to just 10 words.

The 10 word limit yields some pretty creative use of language. If you aren’t the wordsmith, you can always share a video or picture instead.

Go on then, tell us your story.

First Person Arts Tumblr
firstpersonarts.tumblr.com

Welcome to Geek of the Week, where we highlight and profile a special geek in our wonderful city of Brotherly Love. This week we talk to Conrad Benner of Streets Dept, contributor to Phrequency.com and former blogger with Philthy.us.

So, Conrad, I’ve known of you for quite some time. I’m a big fan of your blog. You were with Philthy Blog for a while, how and why did you start that?

Well back in 2007, Paul Thorson (creator of Philthy.us) told me he was going to add a blog to his nightlife photography site, and he asked me if I wanted to run it. I had known Paul for about a year prior, mostly from him taking mine (and everyone else’s) photos all the time at different bars and clubs. And Paul had always liked my little blog, “Ugh News,” that, among other things, made fun of photos of drunk hipsters at clubs, so he asked me to do a similar thing for him. It was a match made in heaven!

Over the two and a half years, [Philthy] turned into a great soapbox for me to voice my opinions on everything. I bought a Flip camera one year and went to Barack Obama’s inauguration, then I’d interview a vegan bakery owner, then I’d go to First Friday with my friends and talk with artists.

It was really just an extension of whatever I was interested in at the time, and it really helped me build a bit of an audience that, I think, has followed me to Streets Dept and to my other freelance writing.

Why did you end up making the change to StreetsDept? How is it different than Philthy?

Part of me wants to admit how much of a control freak I am, and say it was all because I wanted to control every aspect of the site’s design and format. (And I guess that’s largely true.) But I think it really all started when I bought my first digital SLR back in December. While I had previously had a decent point-and-shoot, and was constantly taking photos of sunsets and stuff, I had saved up for nearly a year to buy this DSLR, and I told myself I was going to put it to good use. And I did.

Within the first few weeks in fact, I had so many photos that I wasn’t even sure exactly what to do with them all. I knew I wanted more than a Flickr page though, so I figured I’d start my own photo blog. And considering that the vast majority of my photos dealt with street art, I figured I’d start a blog devoted mostly to highlighting its ever-changing, vibrant life in Philadelphia.

The name alone was a big thing though. It took me about a month to pin it down. All of my friends hated me because it was all I could ever talk about.

How do you seem to be everywhere at all times? Do you, or have you ever, had any contributors to your blog(s)? How do you do it?

Well firstly, I walk around a heck of a lot. After breaking my leg in a bike accident in 2009, I’m still kind of freaked out about biking in the city, so I walk almost everywhere I go. And I always have my camera on me. So a lot of the time I just get lucky.

But, yes, I definitely have people who email me with either photos of street art in their neighborhood, or just details on where I can find some new stuff. I usually get at least a dozen emails a week with hints or photos, and it’s only getting better as more people learn about me.

Lately I’ve even been getting emails from the street artists themselves, telling me how much they like the site, and letting me know where to find their newest work. Gaia, the internationally renowned street artists, recently made a trip to Philly and emailed me the location of a few of his wheat pastes that I otherwise would have never found.

In a few cases, I’m even teaming up with the artist to shoot them putting up their new work. Ishknit’s contacted me a couple of months ago about yarn bombing the seats on a few of the Market-Frankford line trains, and I of course followed her along. Since then, those photos have blown up so much, she was even just interviewed by the New York Times! Insane.

The site’s growing really fast, and I think people are excited about it and are fantastic about helping me.

—
Thanks, Conrad. To experience his love of Philadelphia, his wonderful photography and see his Apartment Complex features and more, please visit StreetsDept.com

“A long time ago and far far away,
A story was told of an epic space fray
The good and the bad
In the life of a lad,
How he was lost but then found his way.”

So begins the journey of one man to encompass the entirety of Star Wars into limerick form. But how can one person contain all of the Star Wars universe into a few stanzas with rhyme and meter… and in a format usually reserved for dirty poems? Well it is possible. I have seen it. And it is good. Surprisingly so.

This Death Star sized project is currently right in the middle of Attack of the Clones and is moving along at a clip.

Prepare to experience Star Wars like you never have before… and I’m not talking about the Special Editions with Han Solo stepping on a digital Jabba’s tail. Ugh that squeal.

Check it out.

Star Wars Retold in Limericks
starwarslimerick.blogspot.com

As a native of Atlantic County and a 7 year Philadelphia transplant, I am beyond pleased to learn that the local Philly startup, DrinkPhilly is covering their bases for weekend vacationers with the launch of DrinkJerseyShore.com.

After turning 21 in Philadelphia, the nation’s beer capital and living next to The Foodery, I lamented my first trip back toward the beach that summer, upon discovering the average swig in my hometown was Corona. Many bars supplied a laundry list of crappy domestic light beers — all significantly overpriced. This left me appalled… since when does being on the beach have to equate with terrible taste?

Forced to interrogate my friends from around town to get a single name of where I could go to find oatmeal stout, a local microbrew or a bartender who knew how to make a Brandy Alexander, was painful, and I found myself seeking an online guide that simply did not yet exist.

I have faith in Drink Jersey Shore, as the first place I noticed featured is the Boardwalk Beer Garden, which quickly became a favorite upon a recent visit home. In addition to drink specials, they will be featuring Bar Reviews, an Events Calendar, and a page that rounds up posts from local bloggers (amen!). Drink Jersey Shore will be available all summer long, and I certainly hope it will also be available year round.

So, whether you’re just visiting for the weekend during a heat wave– or a local returning home, looking for a cold one– fear not: DrinkPhilly’s Drink Jersey Shore has you covered.

In today’s Geek of the Week, we talk to Chris Illuminati, celebrated author of Assholeology and Assholeology: The Cheat Sheet, out via Adams Media.

He’s also well known for his popular Message in a Bottle blog, articles in countless magazines, and for being a surprisingly stand-up gentleman, despite his book titles.

Hey Chris, how about you tell me a little bit about yourself.

Well, let me give a super brief overview of how I got where I am; which is in my career, not how I got into my office wearing boxers and a wife beater. That’s a different story.

I always wanted to do something creative, and writing was something I was good at, but I think more because of imagination than anything else. It was very easy to write how I talk which is great for storytelling but awful for grammar. I did writing for personal enjoyment and to pass the time at many, many crappy jobs I had out of college. I also wrote long emails to friends as a way to pass the time.

I started a personal blog and a sports blog with a friend. Had fun doing it and one day was I was reading phillyBurbs at a crappy job and thought, “I can blog just as good as these people.” I sent an email to the general inbox, which found its way to the head of content. We talked on the phone and they brought me on as a “Citizen Blogger.” It’s a nice way of saying, “You can blog for free.”

After about a month, a full-time job opened up and they offered it to me. At phillyBurbs, I created a blog called “9 To Fried”, which was an offshoot of their Jobs section. It was basically a blog dedicated to people that hated their jobs. It took off after just a few months and at one point was the most popular section of the website (besides the obituaries and police blotter).

And that was my phillyBurbs time.

So, how did Assholeology come along?

Ok, so while at phillyBurbs, I started to branch out into freelance and started writing for AskMen.com. My articles tended to be a “jerk approach” to situations and relationships. Some of the early articles were “How to Sleep With Your Neighbor” or “Signs Your Girl Will Still Look Good in Ten Years.”

The articles caught the attention of someone at Adams Media (a book publisher) and they emailed me. At first, I thought it was a friend screwing with me. They had a manuscript that needed help. It was Assholeology. They wanted me to clean up Chapter 1 to take back to the executive board. I ended up rewriting the whole chapter. They liked it and asked if I wanted to work on the book. If I did a ton of work on it, they’d put my name on the cover.

And so, that’s how I asshole my way onto the cover. The first book ended up doing very well and that led me to my second.

The sequel to Assholehology, written exclusively by Illuminati

Regardless, that epic name of yours got assholed onto the cover of not one books, but also its sequel. I’m waiting for your Pulitzer.

Well, that happened through my writing, not by any asshole type move. They came to me and said “Want to write the second?” and I said of course. With the first one, they gave a month to edit. So, on this one I had grand ideas of research, interviews, etc. They gave me a month [for everything].

Writing and advice is one thing, but how much do you practice what you preach? How does an asshole end up with a wife and kid? Alternatively, on a scale of Ghandi to Tucker Max , where are you?

It [the wife and kid] happens because of tricks, chloroform and brainwashing. Basically, I say this to people, just like in fiction writing, Stephen King isn’t a monster and that woman that writes books with numbers in the title isn’t a private eye. You don’t have to be an asshole to write about assholes.

I’ve been around more than my fair share to write some pretty good character study pieces. But writing these books has made me reconsider my approach to some things. I don’t let people get the better of me anymore. Case in point, I just canceled a writing assignment because it’s not what the hell I wanted to do. The old me would have written the piece and just sucked it up. So while I’m not an asshole, I certainly adopt some of the ideas.

Don’t get me wrong though, I can be a fucking prick if provoked. *wink*

Has anybody ever confused your book for one about proctology? (Does asking this question make me an asshole?

Yes they have. No kidding, a person emailed me that they went to Barnes & Noble when the first book came out and asked for help to find it. B&N couldn’t find it in the computer so they got walked over to the medical section.

—

For you folks out there, interested in learning the mystical ways of the Asshole, read more in the book he co-authored: The Assholeology: The Science Behind Getting Your Way – and Getting Away with It and the follow-up Assholeology: The Cheat Sheet that he wrote solo.

Visit him on the web at chrisilluminati.com

Attention local artists!

Our good friends ALBOTAS (A Little Bit of Awesome on the Side) are putting together a custom toy show at the 1UP Collectibles comic shop out in Reading, PA. It’s a great collectibles joint about 45 minutes outside of Philadelphia.

Right now they’re shooting for early July, and need custom toys sent in by the end of June. Artists will be able to sell / display their work in the shop, and the works will be up in the store the entire month.

Interested? Drop Rob a line. And be sure to follow ALBOTAS and 1UP on Facebook for more information as it comes.

ALBOTAS
www.albotas.com/contact