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Kings and Queens of Geek Proms past are charged each
year with the awesome task of choosing the new bearers of
the crowns and sashes. The names and credentials of the 2011
judges are listed below to show that we're not messing around
here.
Rachael Gilman is a poor graduate
student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, focusing
on history, library science and museum studies. Her career
goal is to be a collections manager at a museum and work in
a basement all day. She founded the DND Club at University
of Minnesota-Morris back in her "college days."
She also does technical theater work like lighting, sound
production, makeup and costumes. A Twin Cities native, Rachael
also enjoys reading books, and says she is "striving
to become a crazy cat lady."
James Ellingson is a social worker
for St. Louis County and a memorizer of random, useless facts.
He will play any kind of game, but favors strategy games like
Stratego, Risk and Settlers of Catan. He’s had a video
gaming system since age 8 and also digs cartoons and anime.
Growing up, he was frequently mistaken for Jonathan Ke Quan
(Richard "Data" Wang in The Goonies and
Wan "Short Round" Li in Indian Jones and the
Temple of Doom). In high school he played the trombone
in band upon band — jazz, symphonic wind and pep. He
was also in his high school chess club and plays a wicked
game of ping pong. A bit of a hoarder, James keeps old electronics
— cell phones, computers, cassette players, etc. —
just in case he might need them in the future.
Lawrence Lee, the 2008 King Geek,
was born and raised in Wapakoneta, Ohio, the hometown of Neil
Armstrong. He started playing D&D in 1977 when players
still had to use crayon to color in the crappy plastic dice.
He learned BASIC on a TRS 80 and FORTRAN using a card reader.
In high school he was salutatorian of his class, medaling
in the state Mathletes competition and also serving as a library
assistant. In college he studied physics, mathematics and
philosophy, and worked as a civil engineering lab assistant.
In graduate school he ran the A/V department. His current
interests include HTML, blogging,
board games (especially Settlers of Catan), World of Warcraft
and helping his kids learn math (which he insists is fun).
He works as a Presbyterian minister, and his study is decorated
with a lava lamp, an original Chris Monroe painting and Star
Wars paraphernalia. As Geek King he would like to decree for
all time: “Han shot first.”
Shari Hartshorn is the 2006 Queen
Geek. A science fiction and fantasy nut, Shari enjoys staying
up late reading (or re-reading) a great book or watching sci-fi
TV. Currently, she's enjoying Stargate, Doctor
Who and Torchwood. She laments the passing of Farscape,
Firefly and Invisible Man, and soon will
"suffer great anguish when SG-1 finishes its
stellar run." Shari loves to play the card game Munchkin,
especially epic style with all the sets. She has worked at
the Minnesota Renaissance Festival and still volunteers there
for Gaeltacht Minnesota, the Irish language group she's involved
with. "Mostly we spend our time letting people know that
there is in fact an Irish language and it is not just English
with an Irish accent," she said. In college, Shari took
more calculus than she needed, just for fun. She lives in
St. Paul with a cat and five birds.
John Cavanaugh is the 2005 King Geek and
may be the original geek. Growing up in the 1960s, this bookish
boy was fascinated by all things science. He wore his horn-rimmed
glasses proudly into his 20s, until his wife wisely updated
his wardrobe. As a kid, he built both an analog and mechanical
digital computer from kits. In high school, he built a semi-conductor
laser communication device from an article in Popular
Electronics. A wiz at all things audio/visual, John can
thread a 16mm projector with ease. He served 20 years in the
Minnesota National Guard, most of it as a weather technician.
He is an amateur radio operator, a sky warn volunteer and
a huge Star Trek fan (nicknamed "Spock"
by his friends). While he was walking out the door to go to
Geek Prom, his son remarked, "Gee Dad, it looks just
like you're dressed for work."
Zoey Cohen is the 2004 Geek Prom Queen and
also the 2004 Geek Prom female spaz-dancing champion. She
is known around Duluth for collecting old socks to make sock
monkeys. She asked a boy to her high school prom by wearing
suspenders that she had written "Prom?" all over,
and her first kiss was at church camp. Zoey is fascinated
by hamsters, Tom Jones and puns, and has anecdotes to go with
all three. 1) Her first hamster was named Hammie the Hamster.
2) She once won $40 singing Tom Jones karaoke songs in Thunder
Bay. 3) Her favorite pun came in college. She had a friend
who constantly wore slippers and another friend who teased
her for it. When Zoey saw one day that the teasing friend
was wearing slippers, she called her a slippocrite.
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