Today is National Geek Pride Day. What should you do in honor of Geek Pride Day?  Well, since the date was chosen to commemorate the release of the first Star Wars film, so you could watch that!  Heck, you can dress up like Vader all you want.  May 25th also happens to fall on Towel Day—so get your Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy out!

We at Geekadelphia are doing our own share of celebrating in our secret lair in Center City.  (Yes, we have a secret lair.  No, we won’t tell you where it is). Dave is reading and writing comics all day. Dan is locking himself in the closest movie theater he can find to watch the most grotesque foreign film.  Eric is sitting around in his Master Chief armor feeding his rabbits, and I’ve locked myself in my with season 6 of Doctor Who.

In honor of Geek Pride Day, here are some photos of our Geekadelphia staff “geeking out” in various ways.  So have a wonderful Geek Pride Day, and let your geek flag fly!

How will you be celebrating?  Tell us in the comments, or share your favorite geeking out photos!

Meet my good friend Marisa McClellan. A celebrated blogger (and now a published author!), Marisa runs the wildly popular Food in Jars blog, where she teaches the Internet how to make delicious canned nibbles.

Yesterday Marisa’s book, Food in Jars: Preserving in Small Batches Year-Round, hit stores everywhere via Running Press, a lovely publisher here in Philadelphia. The book is fantastic, the photography is beautiful, and you should absolutely pick it up immediately.

Seriously. Do it now. Here’s a link to Amazon. You’re welcome.

In honor of her book release, Marisa’s our Geek of the Week. Enjoy, and make sure you visit her blog at foodinjars.com.

1. What made you decide to launch Food in Jars? Why canning?

I started Food in Jars in early 2009 because my job as the editor of Slashfood (AOL’s now-defunct food blog) was ending and I wanted to stay in the food blogging world. I grew up canning with my mom and have been entirely obsessed with jars for years, so it was something that was always part of my life. At the time, there weren’t really any blogs out there dealing with canning, so I figured it would be a good niche for me. At the time though, I had no idea that canning would effectively become my career.

2. A lot of times when a blog lands a book deal, we see those blogs go quiet, start updating less. You? You don’t stop. How did you find a balance between writing on the blog, pursuing your other writing interests, and working on your cookbook?

To my mind, it was never an option to stop writing the blog while writing my book. One of the reasons that I got the opportunity to write the book was that I had an engaged community of readers. A large part of my value as an author was that audience. I had to continue to feed that relationship and develop that community so that there would be people welcoming the book when it was finally released. So I kept writing.

I will say that the summer of 2010 was really hard, because that’s when I was developing all the recipes for my book and was still working full time. I spent all my free time canning and making sure all the recipes for the book worked, while also continuing to invent stuff for the blog. It wasn’t so much about balance as it was general brute force.

3. The photography in the cookbook is stunning. What was it like working with Steve Legato?

I absolutely love the images that Steve made for this book. He was wonderful to work with. He spent a considerable amount of reading my blog before the photo shoot, so that he could get a feel for my style of photography. The result of that is that the feel of the book is similar to the blog. I couldn’t be more pleased with how the book looks.

4. Back to food blogs, who are some of your favorites? Any local favorites?

There are so many excellent food blogs out there these days that it’s really hard to pick favorites. If I’ve forced to choose, a few of my all-time favorites are Local Kitchen (a fellow preserver located in New York State), Remedial Eating (so much lovely photography) and Mostly Foodstuffs (a friend with a tendency to make the most delicious fruit-infused spirits).

Around these parts, I’m always on the lookout for new posts from Messy and Picky (confession: authors Albert and Kate are dear friends), Mac & Cheese (blogger Taylor is expecting her first baby!), The Cozy Herbivore (Sara May is also a pastry chef down at Franklin Fountain/Shane’s Candies) and Madame Fromage (Tenaya was my advisor when I wrote my masters thesis. Be kind to your professors, as they may turn into some of your closest friends).

5. Philly is full of fabulous foodies, many of whom likely have cookbook-writing-aspirations. Have any advice for them?

Find a niche (what could make your book stand out?). Start a blog and build an audience (you are a heck of a lot more valuable to a publisher if you can point to a group of people who are already engaged in what you do). Keep trying (Before I got my contract with Running Press, I spent nearly a year working with another publisher. When the deal there eventually fell apart, I gathered myself up and started over). Be prepared to compromise (once you do get a deal, you rapidly learn that it takes a team of people to create a cookbook. These people have worked on many, many cookbooks. They often know better than you. Figure out when to defer to their judgment and when to stick to your guns).

6. Is there another cookbook coming up? I’ve heard from a reputable source it’s going to be called Food in Jars II: Jar Harder.

Love that title!

Right now, I have a couple ideas for future cookbooks, but nothing is official yet. Working on this book has been so engrossing that focusing my energy on a new proposal has been more than I’ve been able to manage. I’m hopeful that soon, I’ll get my act together and get those ideas down on paper.

7. Anything else you’d like to share?

Just two things. The first is that if this canning thing intrigues any of you readers out there in Geekadelphia land, don’t forget that I teach canning classes. You can find me at Indy Hall and Greensgrow all summer and fall (schedule here). The second is that I wouldn’t be where I am today without the support of my husband and fellow geek, Scott McNulty. You should buy his books too!

If you have ever starred blankly at your Kindle because it wouldn’t work right or tried to figure out how to set up a TypePad blog and went to the bookstore to get some help, then you probably know the name Scott McNulty. The author of several books about everything from Google + to WordPress, Scott has been helping people get in touch with their technology for years.

Scott was nice enough to answer a few questions about writing, being a foodie and giving writing advice to your wife.

So tell the Geekadelphia readers about yourself. Have you always been a tech guy?

I’ve always been a geek, even in the Dark ages when that wasn’t cool, but I haven’t always been a tech guy. I spent most of my childhood/teen years reading about elves and spaceships, but I wasn’t really interested in technology. In fact, I didn’t even own a computer of my own until a year after I graduated from college in 1999.

What’s the hardest part of taking something like, say, the Kindle Fire, and making it easy for anyone to use?

Probably getting people to realize that tech books offer up useful information that you won’t find in the manual. Technology companies spend a lot of money trying to convince people that their products are “intuitive” and “easy to use.” In some cases this is true, but I find that lots of people still turn to the geeks in their lives to answer a variety of questions.

When I write I try to image myself in that role of tech confidante, answering the questions people have but might be hesitant to ask because the gadget they’re using is supposed to be so simple to use.

Other than that it is all about judging how much your reader knows vs. what they don’t. Will they know what “tapping” and “swiping” on a screen means? Surely they’ve heard of apps, but do they really know what apps are?

You are also something of a foodie. Are there any similarities between writing about food and tech?

I don’t do a heck of a lot of food writing, but I can tell you that people really into food, just like those really into tech, have strong opinions and aren’t afraid to share them.

Your wife Marisa McClellan just published the Food in Jars cookbook. As someone who has written a whole bunch of tech how-to books, did you have any advice for her?

All writers have a natural enemy: the deadline. My biggest piece of advice for Marisa, which she ignored, was: start writing as much as you can now even though your deadline is months and months away. When I wrote my first book I had something like 7 months to write it, so I spent the first month thinking about how cool it was I was writing a book.

I spent the second month thinking maybe I should start. The third month was devoted to really getting that outline fleshed out while the fourth month was all about organizing my desk (I can’t write this all these distractions!). Then I freaked out because I only had a few weeks to turn in the first half of the book, so I spent as many of my waking hours as possible feverishly writing.

I hoped to spare Marisa this experience, but you really have to live through it to understand.

So what’s next for you in terms of writing?

I’m sure I’ll write another tech book or two that no one in my family will read.

If you had a choice, get your hands on the next-gen iPad a month before everyone else or dinner at a brand new high end restaurant so you could write a review, which would you choose?

Assuming the dinner was free, I’d go with the restaurant. It would be neat to play with a next-gen iPad, but you have to return those review units so I’d end up buying one for myself. However, I don’t think the restaurant would want me to return my meal.

Scott’s Website
www.blankbaby.com

Fork You
www.forkyou.tv

Carving up a turkey

This week’s Geek of the Week is a man of varied interests, my pal Brian Lim.

Philadelphia foodies might know Brian from his food blog Bridges Burgers Beer, where he rambles about local nibbles, or from his work with Foodspotting as a Philly Foodspotting ambassador. Those driving in and out of thte city… well, you probably don’t know him, but he’s the gentleman who helps engineer those bridges your car zips over.

Bridges. Burgers. Blogs. Brian does a lot. Read on to learn about this geeky gentleman.

So when you aren’t busy at your day job, you run a food blog. Tell us a bit about it.

I started my blog, Bridges, Burgers & Beer in October of 2009. It was sorta created out of boredom. I like to eat, drink, and cook. I’m also somewhat of a bridge geek. I hoped to combine my passions for all those things in my blog.

You party down with the Philly Foodspotting community quite a bit. Tell us about that group.

I got hooked on Foodspotting a few years ago when my friend/fellow blogger, Amy Cao, started to work with them. Because I take photos of my food normally and it was a fun, neat way to find food, I figured why not contribute to Foodspotting.

Since then, a Philly Foodspotting community developed and I became one of the two Philly Foodspotting ambassadors. We hold a food eatup or crawl every month, open to everyone.

Since you go to a lot of restaurants, tell us… what are three restaurants geeks absolutely have to go to in Philadelphia.

People would be shocked if I didn’t mention my regular spot, Khyber Pass Pub. They’ve got tasty Southern food, several craft beers on tap, and a chill atmosphere. Another place I’ve been really into lately is Loco Pez, a Mexican bar/restaurant up in Fishtown that has a real neighborhood feel and some delicious nachos and tacos.

Lastly, I really enjoy the food Mitch makes at Supper on South Street. The Supper Burger is one of the best burgers I’ve had and the same goes for his homemade bagels he serves for weekend brunch.

Building bridges

Now back to that day job… why? Why engineering? What made you fall in love with bridges?

I chose engineering because I became obsessed with roller coasters and theme parks when I was younger. I aspired to become a roller coaster/theme park engineer and even worked at Six Flags Great Adventure and Dorney Park. Eventually, I came to the realization of how difficult it was and how lucky one had to be to even get involved in the engineering side of rides and attractions.

After giving up on the theme park engineer dream, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with my civil engineering degree. I’m a firm believer in the quest for finding a job you truly love so that you don’t look at work as work. Lucky for me, the first company I worked for was a consulting firm who specialized in bridge inspections and design. On day two, I was wading through the Raritan River in Central NJ while inspecting a historic truss bridge that was built in 1870. On day three, I was running across 11 lanes of heavily traveled Interstate 78, safely of course, in North NJ to inspect an overpassing bridge.

I couldn’t believe that this is what I happened to fall into. In my mind, this was the best job an engineer could have; the perfect balance of field and office work. Since then I’ve done some work in Pennsylvania and am now involved with railroad bridges and subway tunnels! One day in the future I hope to climb to the top of the Brooklyn Bridge or walk through NYC subway tunnels.

Why do I love bridges? Growing up 40 minutes outside of New York City, I was always fascinated with the bridges and tunnels in the city. Mainly, the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, connecting Brooklyn and Staten Island, always made my jaw drop in awe as I passed over it on my way to grandma’s growing up. She is so massive and so beautiful. When she was completed in 1964, she was the longest suspension bridge in the world! I’m still in awe to this day.

Brian Lim: A geek since childhood

You tweet about gaming every now and again. What are you playing these days?

I really do love video games. As a child, I used to give my parents a multiple page Christmas list full of video games. Unfortunately, post college, I’ve found myself to be too busy to play. In the past couple years, I’ve fallen in love with the Uncharted series on the PS3. It’s too damn addicting and it sucks you in.

My PS3 unfortunately died earlier this year, leaving me console-less and I ended up getting an Xbox 360. I don’t have many games since I am quite busy as I previously mentioned. I recently friended Geekadelphia co-founder, Eric Smith, on Xbox Live and he immediately texted me to mock my extremely low gamer score.

Confession 1: Okay, don’t laugh. Within the past month, I’ve been playing Grand Theft Auto IV: The Complete Edition. I’m aware it’s pretty old but I never got the game before and it’s a fairly simple game to pick up and play now and then.

Confession 2: (again, please don’t laugh), post Goldeneye/Perfect Dark first person shooters make nauseous. I will never join your COD party. I will, however, destroy you in Goldeneye. Just ask Collin Flatt and Mikey Ilagan.

—

To learn more about Brian, visit his blog and follow him on Twitter.

Want to join the Philly Foodspotting community? Follow their events through our Twitter and Facebook page.

It’s been over 50 episodes/a year and a half now. How did this all begin, why did you want to start a local podcast?

Kishwer: I was listening to an acquaintance, the talented jazz composer and pianist, Vijay Iyer, talk to Terry Gross over on NPR’s podcast, Fresh Air and it struck me that writing really sucks. At the time, I was doing a number of Q&As for MTV Desi and I found it especially challenging to encapsulate people’s words in neat, 500-word blog posts. I wanted people to be able to tell their stories in their own words and using their own voices. Words can sometimes strip people of their personalities.

Plus, I missed the connection I felt to Philadelphia when I used to blog regularly from my own site. So on October 14, 2010, I tweeted: “I want to do a podcast. How do I do this and who wants to be interviewed.” And 10 seconds later, Gino, my then-boyfriend, called me. He was on board with the idea from day one. He really made it all happen.

Gino: It was all her idea. I just do what I’m told.

Listeners of the podcast will know that you guys are law school students. What else would you like to say about yourselves?

Kishwer: I have an unnatural affection for bacon.

Gino: I’m a comic book geek, a sports nerd and a movie nut. If they made a movie where the Avengers played football, I would self-combust.

Who’s been the most interest, favorite or notable guest you’ve had on thus far?

Kishwer: I really enjoyed talking to author Lorene Cary. She was someone I’d read since I was in high school and it was such a treat to find out she was as animated in person as she is on paper. And of course, it was a thrill to interview Philadelphia Inquirer food critic Craig LaBan. And let’s not forget Mayor Nutter. He has quite a sense of humor.

Gino: Obviously, no one can top our second ever guest, noted novelist Eric Smith. What’s that you say? He has something to do with this outfit? I had no idea!

What future plans do you have for the podcast?

Kishwer: As long as people still engage in our content, we know they’re listening and want to hear from us. As for future plans, well, we’ve recently become members of PhillyCAM and I think it may be neat to someday include a few video clips of our interviews.

Gino: What we try to do every night, Pinky. Try to take over the world!

Who are some people you’d like to interview in the future?

Kishwer: Bill Cosby. Nothing more Philly than Bill Cosby. I actually did interview him for my high school paper when he came to visit. But he just dodged all my “serious” questions with jokes. Somebody hook us up!

Gino: I’ve always said my dream interview would be Will Smith. I would make him sing the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air theme song on the podcast with me. I might settle for Tina Fey, though.

Have any upcoming events that we should be keeping an eye for?

Kishwer: On Thursday, April 26, we’ll be at PhillyCAM from 1PM-2PM for Philly Tech Week, taping a live, streaming episode of Talkadelphia called “The Future of iOS Games,” featuring Yis Goodwin and Jeff Hsu of the iOS game Catball Eats It All and William Stallwood and Andrei Marks of Cipher Prime, a Philadelphia-based game studio as they talk about the next phase in iOS gaming. Come join us!

Gino: What she said.

This week we talked with Koreen Olbrish, the founder of Tandem Learning.

Koreen started Tandem Learning in 2008 to address an unmet need in the learning space using technology with an emphasis on performance improvement and behavioral change. Koreen has strong ties to education and Philadelphia, having received her MS in Curriculum and Instruction from Penn State University and helping start Freire Charter School in Philadelphia in 1999.

Recently, Koreen’s experience has been in the development of learning solutions, with particular expertise in simulations, serious games, mobile learning, augmented reality and the application of virtual worlds for learning.  That means she’s a serious gamer, readers!

Tell me about Learning in Tandem.

Koreen:  Learning in Tandem was the blog that I started when I started my company, Tandem Learning, four years ago. I thought when I started that I would be writing about being a female entrepreneur and all of the challenges of founding a tech services start up. Over the years it evolved into a journal of sorts, and I write about all kinds of things, but I try to always tie it back to learning, design or other business-related topics.

When my company was acquired by Ayogo Games last fall, I realized how varied the topics I write about are. I started writing for myself, assuming no one would ever read it, but its amazing how many times I’ll meet someone and they’ll bring up a specific blog post or say, “oh, I read about that on your blog!”

Realizing I wasn’t just talking to myself has made me try to bring meaning to my personal experiences and make my lessons learned (hopefully!) relevant for other people. Only very rarely do I talk about my adorable children or hilarious anecdotes!

You’re a self-proclaimed gamer, tell me about your favorite games.

Koreen:  Ugh, I am a gamer that doesn’t play nearly enough games! I think that’s probably fairly common with game designers. I was having a conversation recently about my gaming “style”…basically I play a new game for an hour or so and figure out if there is anything new that I could incorporate into one of my designs. If there is, then I’ll play more to figure out how it works. If not, it gets shelved. I was told that I’m a deconstructionist. I interpreted that as a shade of gamer snob…but I’m ok with that.

That said, I have some favorites that really expanded my own game design and what I teach my grad students. Scribblenauts… brilliant in its design and potential for learning. Heavy Rain is an amazing example of decision-making impacting storyline. Portal 2 is maybe the best puzzle-based game I’ve seen. I do tend to prefer the more immersive storyline driven experiences; Myst is still the only game I’ve ever finished. I have SkyRim waiting for me to play…I’ve “gamified” finishing my book, Immersive Learning, so I’m not allowed to play until I submit all of my chapters, which thankfully is any second now. My guilty pleasure game is Endless Ocean.

I’m also playing a lot of mobile games, since they tend to be shorter and I can play easily when I travel. Lately its Jetpack Joyride and Zwonks, which was recently released by Rude Boy Games, a division of my new company. I’m not sure they know how much I’ve been playing and I have hesitated to bring it up in any of our meetings. I guess they know now

Any other geeky interests?

Koreen:  I’m trying to think of what interests I have that aren’t geeky…I’m a huge comic book fan and try to make it to as many ComicCons as I can every year. My favorite comics in the last year have been Kill Shakespeare (I used to be an English teacher, so its the perfect intersection of my geekiness), Chew, and iZombie. Zombies in general are kind of a big deal. Bacon. I’ve recently taken up photography with my iPhone, so I have more pictures and photo apps than I know what to do with.

I could tell you more than you’d ever want to know about virtual worlds. I spend most of my time investigating new technologies and how they can be leveraged for learning, so anything tech-related is exciting. The coolest stuff I’ve been playing with lately is augmented reality and how to use it in alternate reality games. I don’t watch much TV but I’m counting down until Season 2 of Game of Thrones. I’m also holding my breath for The Avengers; I hope that the movie lives up to the trailer. And football! (but that’s not geeky, is it?) I’m originally from Michigan, so I’m still a Lions fan.

What are some of your favorite places in Philly?

Koreen:  I’m dying to go to Barcade! I can’t believe I haven’t been there yet…sigh.

I don’t get into the city nearly as much as I’d like to, but when I do, I tend towards places like Amada for cava and cheese or Village Whiskey for burgers and duck fat fries and, of course, whiskey. I love food and trying new places, Zahav and Vetri are amazing but there are so many smaller BYOs in Philly that are opening up all the time, I don’t usually go back to the same places twice. I’ve historically been a hardcore wine drinker, but in the last couple years I’ve acquired a taste for beer. This is actually making me sad that I don’t get out more…

What’s going on next for you?

Koreen:  My book! Yay! The title is Immersive Learning, the tentative publication date is August this year and I’m so excited to have it done and out there. I’m always running around doing speaking gigs on leveraging games for learning, so I’ll be traveling throughout the year…you can always find out where I’ll be next by following my on Twitter @koreenolbrish. Yes, I tweet a lot. I think I’m teaching a graduate class on learning game design this fall again at Harrisburg University. And I’m hoping to actually go on vacation this year. I hear that’s what people do?

To learn more about Koreen, follow her on Twitter and scope out her blog! 

One of my favorite places to hang out is Redcap’s Corner, a gaming store that recently relocated from 4040 Locust Street to 3617 Lancaster Avenue. I’m there every Wednesday for Dungeons and Dragons Encounters, most Tuesdays for board game night (we’ve currently got a Blood Bowl league going), and, when I can make it, Saturdays for Living Forgotten Realms.

The owners of the store, Adam Friedman and Benn Roe, are two of my favorite geeks in all of Philadelphia. After playing some King of Tokyo with them, I got them to answer some questions for me.

So tell us – what’s a Redcap, exactly?

Benn: A redcap is a cruel and unforgiving faerie who springs into existence in order to commit murder on nature’s behalf. He looks like a slightly goblinoid old man, usually found carrying a scythe or an iron pike and always found wearing a red hat, dripping with the blood of his victims. Being the savvy businessmen that we are, we knew right away this was the creature we wanted to identify with our store.

Adam: What he said.

What was the driving force behind you opening a board game shop?

Adam: I’ll let Benn cover this one.

Benn: After college, it slowly began to dawn on me that a political science and philosophy double major with a minor in English didn’t actually point toward any sort of career, and I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do with my life. In high school I had wanted to open up a political bookshop with a coffee shop attached to it, so I started thinking of entrepreneurial sorts of things to do.

I quickly realized that I was driving out to the suburbs to play games at Alternate Universes, even though I lived in Philadelphia proper, and it all just sort of fell together. Philly needed a game store and I needed something to do with my life, plus starting a business where I could get paid to play games meant I didn’t even have to give up being a kid.

What made you decide on your first location in West Philly at 40th and Locust? And what made you decide on the new location up at 36th and Lancaster?

Benn: We knew from the get-go we wanted to be located near Penn and Drexel. Having recently been college students ourselves, we were pretty confident that students wouldn’t travel any significant distance to reach us, but made up a big percentage of our likely clientele.

Honestly, as goofy gamers with no business training, we jumped at the 40th and Locust location, just because it was quick and easy. The move to 36th and Lancaster represents three years of overriding our liberal arts backgrounds with real world business training. It’s just a better location in almost every conceivable way.

Adam: As far as the new location at 3617 Lancaster goes, the majority of our customers that are in college happen to go to Drexel. 36th and Lancaster is just two blocks away from Drexel and three blocks away from the subway. It just seems like the perfect location for us.

What’s your favorite part about being a board game store owner?

Benn: My favourite part of owning Redcap’s is never having to grow up, but knowing that we’ve helped bring people together has been really rewarding too. Redcap’s has helped build so many friendships, and it’s been really humbling to be part of that.

Adam: I’ve been playing RPGs and building models for almost 25 years (I swear I’m not that old, I just started very young!), so getting to do what I love everyday makes all the other parts of owning and running a business a little less horrible.

What’s your favorite board game, and why?

Adam: Right now my favorite game is Small World: Underground. It’s just like Small World, only more fun.

Benn: Pandemic. Hands down. It has an art style I really like, it’s non-competitive, it’s reasonably priced, it usually lasts around 45 minutes, it’s really challenging every single time, and it’s about saving the world from viruses! What’s not to like? As an honorary mention, I also really like Battlestar Galactica, but that has a lot to do with having fun doing Colonel Tigh impressions for hours at a time.

What’s your favorite night at the store? Blood Bowl Tuesday? Friday Night Magic?

Adam: Warmachine on Monday Nights at 6pm. No Contest.

Benn: I’m mostly playing Pathfinder (Wednesday nights) and Warhammer 40K (new night to be figured out soon) these days. Friday Night Magic will always have a special place in my heart, though.

To learn more about Redcap’s Corner, visit their official website.

Sure they might’ve removed fighting in NHL ’94, but it’s still celebrated as one of the greatest sports video games of all time. It supported four players at once and introduced first-timers to hockey video games. Nearly twenty years later, this gem of the 16-bit era lives on.

Flyers Faithful and Orange and Black Breakdown have teamed up together to do a fundraiser for the Ed Snider Youth Hockey Foundation. Later this month, at the interactive sports bar PLAY² Parx Casino, 26 registrants will be playing each of the 26 teams on pixelated ice for bragging rights and for charity.

Attendees will get a free retro hockey-themed t-shirt from DavesGeekyHockey.com but the winner will be receiving a $100 prize and a trophy. For those at the intersection of being a geek and hockey fan, you’ll definitely want to see Dave’s Game of Thrones, Futurama and Doctor Who-themed jerseys for sale on his site.

Other stuff to know: this is a 21+ event, there will be a 50/50 raffle, they’ll be giving away three copies of NHL ’12 courtesy of EA and it’s also rumored that there’ll be some Versus/NBC swag as well.

NHL ’94 Tournament
PLAY² Parx Casino
Sunday, April 22 @ 8-11pm*

To register/learn more, visit Flyers Faithful as they’ve got all the details.

*Time subject to change depending on the Flyers’ playoff schedule

Arguably one of the biggest comics event of 2012, Marvel pits two of its most popular teams against one another to save the world. Avengers vs X-Men is a 12 issue series that written and drawn by some of the most popular artists today.

While you might be able to pick up the first issue on Wednesday, April 4th, why not get it a day earlier and not risk having someone on twitter or ruin the surprises of the story? Many comic shops will be selling the first issue of Avengers Vs X-Men April 3rd at 8pm. Captain Blue Hen in Newark, DE and The Comic Book Shop in Wilmington, DE are two such shops.

Captain Blue Hen Comics and The Comic Book Shop will each host a party based around the team they hope will come out on top.  More information below:

The world’s greatest super heroes enter an unforgettable battle. Avengers—Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Black Widow, Spider-Man, and more go up against X-Men—Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Magneto and others. Avengers are the big public heroes of the Marvel Universe while the X-Men are underground, outcast mutant heroes. Only one side can emerge victorious!

Captain Blue Hen Comics on Main Street in Newark is on the side of the Avengers. The Comic Book Shop on Marsh Road in Wilmington is on the side of the X-Men. It’s a rivalry for the ages as Earth’s Mightiest Heroes go up against Marvel’s Mutant Misfits.

“The Avengers and the X-men are the two premiere superhero teams of modern mythology- they even have competing movie franchises” says Captain Blue Hen Comics owner Joe Murray.  “It’s an emotionally-charged rivalry that ranks up there with Eagles vs. Cowboys, Yankees vs. Red Sox, Mac vs. PC or Chocolate vs. Vanilla. Fan speculation on the outcome of individual battles will be heated. Obviously the Avengers will win, but it should still be an exciting face-off. Our parties will celebrate the excitement and fun of comics with the atmosphere of the big playoff game.”

For more information on Avengers Vs X-men, you can visit marvel’s website for the event here. For more information, check out the Captain Blue Hen website.

Philadelphia is rife with comic book talent, thanks to creators such as our newest Geek of the Week, Bryan Glass. Glass is most notably known as co-creator of the indie hit Mice Templar, an epic comic where mice are as a brave as men and cats are the enemy. But he has also lent his talent to Marvel, most recently reworking the origin story in Thor: The First Thunder.

In 2009, Glass won comic’s prestigious Harvey Award for “Best New Talent.” The best part? Glass calls Philly his hometown and still lives here! Geekadelphia has the chance to ask him a few questions.

Tell me about Mice Templar.

THE MICE TEMPLAR is a series I co-created with [Marvel creator] Mike Oeming back in 2003. As its title suggests it is an anthropomorphic medieval fantasy. It’s of the high fantasy/dark fantasy genre, so it deals with magic, legends, prophecies, ancient evil and destiny.

Along the course of the story our hero, the young mouse Karic, is trying to find his own place in the larger scheme of things, he’s coming to understand the complexities, both good and bad, of politics, of religion, of the impact of both on his culture. It’s also a coming of age adventure wherein Karic is coming to terms with childish perceptions of the world clashing with adult realities.

So the series has been around since 2003? What’s next for the series?

Well, together, we’ve been producing regular issues of MICE TEMPLAR since 2007, and are currently developing the climactic fourth volume of our saga to begin sometime in 2012!

What do you geek out to?

I love all forms of storytelling, most notably books and movies. Little by little, I’m seeking to replicate the theater experience to the best of my ability (and budget) within my own home — you, yourself, were a participant in our Halloween Fright Fest of Films! Hopefully I can keep improving on the experience.

And what a movie night it was! And what books are you into right now?

I’ve always been a fan of Stephen King, and I’ve been so for so long that I can now see how his popularity has ebbed and flowed in waves. I’m really enjoying the uptick he’s experienced of late.

In comics, I’m digging DC’s “New 52.” The DC Universe has always been a bit impenetrable for me, so this endeavor is the right thing for a potential new reader to come aboard. Highlights for me thus far have been ALL-STAR WESTERN, ANIMAL MAN, AQUAMAN, BATMAN, GREEN LANTERN, I, VAMPIRE, SWAMP THING.

Glad to hear you’re enjoying DC’s newest endeavor. But now let’s talk about Philly! What are your usual haunts in our fair city?

Have always been a big fan of our Philly museums: Art, Franklin Institute, Academy of Natural Sciences, Mutter…I love the various art galleries that are scattered from South Street to the suburbs. One of my favorite bars is the Grey Lodge Pub in Northeast Philly: great food, great atmosphere!

Lastly, what projects do you have coming up?

I’m currently developing a slate of different comic miniseries in varied genres. The challenge at this stage of my career is to break the expectation of fantasy guy, so my new tales are a little bit of everything between Supernatural Horror to Sci-Fi to Superheroes, as well as crossing genres in a few unexpected mash-ups. I got a lot to get to before the end of the world!

—

Find Bryan Glass and Mice Templar on Twitter and the web:
@BJLG
@MiceTemplar
http://hiddenrobot.com/MICETEMPLAR/
Mice Templar Trailer (by M. Sean McManus): http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=4lLWW_mE-Q0