Americaaaaaaaa, Americaaaaaaaa

Gorgeous silly person.

Well, that was a very nice week that was. Six days in the company of my very beautiful and very silly friend Ashley, aka Iso Suicide aka Papyrusaurus aka Fishstixandcustard aka assorted pseudonyms. Six days of hanging out in Erie, Pennsylvania, with her and her two tiny boys, the very awesome Finn and Cabbie (aka the Super Mankoski Bros).

Super Mankoski Bros.

This is actually my second trip to the States, but my week in Boston, Massachusetts was almost ten years ago, and was not nearly so fun, since I had no pink-haired friends to enjoy it with. Erie is a beautiful city. It has Lake Erie, of course, one of the Great Lakes (read: huge bloody inland seas) which is stunning. Sometimes afloat in the lake is the USS Niagara, the flagship of the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812, between the USA and the British Empire. Nowadays it's a museum ship. We chose to spend our money on the ExpERIEence Children's Museum, which had magnets and train sets.

Americans are very good at BIG food, although I am better at eating large amounts than Ashley, which calls into question what kind of stomach training we've both been receiving. Ashley does, however, make fantastic empanadas and quesadillas, and can pick out the best places to buy gigantic burritos. However, the finest place to feed is ThreeB's, which promises "Beer, bacon and barbecues." You receive sweet bacon with your first beer, and it only gets better from there. We hurt our stomachs. Erie has many fine beers, but not enough tea. There was a day in which I almost missed having a cup. Don't worry, I sorted it.

Between many trips to the park with the kids, we explored some of downtown Erie, ate more fantastic food, met up with some very cool people and spent a great deal of time in the largest second-hand bookshop and comic store I've had the fortune to visit in many years. I stocked up on some classic Trek, and Ashley presented me with some vintage palaeontology and anthropology tomes. But most of all, I took a much-needed break from my everyday life and chilled out with my friend and some old sci-fi. There's nothing better than watching City of Death with a beautiful woman, probably.

The British Aisles

Lighthouse at Presque Isle

Snazzy tourist bus

Lake Erie

They have unusually large acorns here.

And unusually large and happy frogs.

Blogs I Like (I Like Blogs)

Fish Stix and Custard  The extremely beautiful and rather wonderful Ashley, aka Fish Stix aka Iso Suicide aka Papyrusaurus, blogs geeky stuff. Frequent awesome crafting updates. Occasional rudity.

Little Weirdos  A blog that explores the wonderful world of tiny plastic critters. Monster in My Pocket, Mini Boglins, MUSCLE etc, plus new lines being manufactured today. Cool stuff.

Yog-Blogsoth Michael Bukowski's eldritch illustrations of Lovecraftian monstrosities and creatures from myth. Good for nightmares.

The Theropod Database  Amateur palaeontologist Mickey Mortimer analyses the latest theropod finds and sees whether the main papers stand up to scrutiny. Pretty in depth and not easy for the layman, but still fascinating.

Written Worlds  Author Christopher L. Bennett talks about his own work and the shows he loves. Lots of Trek, Mission: Impossible and Godzilla.

E.G. Wolverson  Former supremo of The History of the Doctor, now finds time between child-rearing duties to read books and play with Lego, then blog about it. Particularly worth reading are his 'Prose vs Pictures' pieces.

Doc Oho Reviews  Doc Oho, aka Joe Ford, has been reviewing Doctor Who books, audios and episodes forever, along with Star Trek DS9, Voyager, The X-Files, Buffy and lots more. Reams of stuff on this site.

Doyleockian An excellent blog dedicated to all things Sherlock Holmes, with a special focus on the man himself, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Life on Magrs  One of my very favourite authors, Paul Magrs, blogs about his own work, what he's been reading, and his cat. And if there's one thing the Internet loves, it's cats.

Peculiar Times  Another great writer, Phillip Purser-Hallard, the creator of The City of the Saved and the editor of the upcoming Iris Wildthyme of Mars. Especially worth checking out around Christmastime, for special stories.

From a Story By...  Obverse Supremo Stuart Douglas reviews stuff and bibbles about anything that takes his fancy. Not updated very frequently, but worth reading whenever it is.

The Further Adventures of Bret M. Herholz  Bret's scratchy line drawings are unique and wonderfully characterful. He has a particular penchant for Doctor Who and Sherlock Holmes, but he illustrates all sorts. Definitely worth checking out.

KitchenFoyle Michael Kitchen/Foyle's War Tumblr. Lovely.

PAPYRUSAURUS

Yes, you're probably pronouncing it wrong. Don't worry about it.

If you're following my blog, you're probably into either Doctor Who, or dinosaurs, or some other bit of geekery. In which case, you could do worse than checking out the crafting genius of Papyrusaurus, if you have failed to do so already.

Ashley, the Chief Executive Dinosaur of Papyrusaurus, reclaims old books and transforms their pages into works of nerdy art.

She does Doctor Who tributes

and Monsters Inc. stuff for kids 

and Firefly stuff 

and she does pretty amazingly cute things with dinosaurs.

Check out the whole store. There's a lot more - not just prints, but Christmas decorations, wreaths and rosettes. She designs tributes for Supernatural, Harry Potter, Ghostbusters... all the geeking best.

You can check out her store at CraftStar through the link above, or on Etsy here. Papyrusaurus is US based, but ships worldwide.

And seriously, check this out. It's the Bakersaurus Rex.