‘Yes, I am a girl. Yes, I like beer’

Craft beer lovers united at San Diego Brew Fest Feb. 22 at The San Diego Hall of Champions in Balboa Park. The event celebrated craft beers from California and featured live local music. The event benefited Outdoor Outreach and the San Diego Mountain Bike Association (SDMBA). Guests were provided a tasting cup and a map that listed all the breweries with space to make notes after tasting each beer. We saw a few breweries that we’ve frequented such as Thorn St., Yard House and Hillcrest Brewing Company. It provided us a great opportunity to try other craft breweries like Pizza Port, 2×4 and Avery. We did get some side eye from some breweries when we asked for stout. Apparently, a woman asking for stout beer requires them to remind us the percentage of alcohol it contains. Maybe we should have worn that shirt that says “Yes, I am a girl. Yes, I like beer.” If you missed out you’ll want to mark your calendars now for next year’s event. Brew Fest was created by a group of friends who formed RightOn Productions, LLC and had their first event in Denver, Colo. We’re glad to see them expand to San Diego. Where else can you try 30+ beers in one night in a museum? For more info, visit www.sandiegobrewfest.com

Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination – The Exhibition

Science meets pop culture in the highly interactive 10,000 square foot touring exhibit of Star Wars. We didn’t want to miss the final leg of the $5 million extravaganza so we made sure to visit The Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose. The exhibit launched in 2005 in Boston, garnering more than two million visitors worldwide during nine years.

The gallery has 80 artifacts from Tatooine to Hoth as well as prosthetic limbs and a hands-on hovercraft. The exhibit shows the engineering behind robots and the physics of space travel. It includes authentic props, costumes and models from all six Star Wars films including the Yoda puppet, R2-D2, the Chewbacca costume, the three-section Darth Vader helmet from Revenge of the Sith, Luke Skywalker’s original landspeeder, models of the X-wing and the Millennium Falcon. There are also costumes for Mace Windu, Princess Leia, Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Stormtroopers, and lightsabers belonging to Luke, Obi-Wan, Darth Maul and Count Dooku.

There’s a “naked” C-3PO, a protocol droid that Anakin Skywalker built entirely from scrap parts to help his mother with her work. He never quite got around to finishing his project, so C-3PO remained uncovered for years.

For these final months of its tour, Boba Fett joins the exhibition. It is the only time that the renowned bounty hunter has appeared in the 20-venue international journey of the Star Wars®: Where Science Meets Imagination. This is the last chance to see the exhibition so if you are a Star Wars fan, plan a trip to The Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose, Calif. before March 23. As Yoda said, “Do or do not … there is no try.” For more info, visit www.thetech.org

Lesbians Who Tech Summit

We joined 800 queer women at the Lesbians Who Tech Summit, which was held Feb. 28 in the Castro Street Theater in San Francisco. Founded in 2012 by Leanne Pittsford, its focus is on increasing the visibility and tech participation of queer women. The conference highlighted the next generation of queer women that are technical leaders as well as those who have paved our way.

The summit featured an amazing lineup of speakers including Kathryn Finney (managing director, digitalundivided), Ann Mei Chang (former secretary of state Technology Advisor), Sara Sperling (Diversity & Inclusion, Facebook), Lisa Sherman (former managing director, LOGO, MTV Networks), Danielle Feinberg (director of photography, Pixar), Kronda Adair (a programmer who crowdfunded her way to the summit), Kathy Levinson, (former COO, eTrade), Heather Hiles (founder and CEO, Pathbrite) and Jana Rich (managing director, Russell Reynolds).

There were also a couple of pitch sessions where spokespersons/founders had three to five minutes to give an elevator speech for their organizations. The, “Social Good Pitches” gave five social good organizations several minutes to share how they are using technology to change the world for women, the LGBT community and people of color. It resulted in an impromptu “crowdfunding” from the attendees. Megan Smith (vice president at Google[x]) offered $25,000 with one caveat which was that each conference attendee gives to the non-profits for the rest of our lives. The funds were split equally between Code2040, AllOut, Chicana Latina Foundation, National Center for Lesbians Rights and Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice.

At the Entrepreneur Pitch session, five amazing lesbian entrepreneurs got a chance to pitch their companies and the applications they are building in front of a panel of judges that included investors and fellow entrepreneurs. The presenters included Allie Esslinger (Section II), Krys Freeman (HellaRides), Roby Exton (Dattch) and Rachel Wolan (YadaZing). Dattch, a dating and social network for lesbians, bisexual and bicurious women won the $2,500 prize. After honing its product in London, it officially launched in San Francisco the day of the summit. It draws comparison with Pinterest in user interface with its emphasis on photos. Unlike Grindr, it’s not a proximity-based social networking app.

It would be incredible to have the next summit here in San Diego. In the meantime, we are hosting the first Lesbians Who Tech happy hour March 27 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Bamboo Lounge. Come and join us! To find out more, visit www.facebook.com/events/443011255832019

High School is a Drag: But it Doesn’t Have to Be

The night before we drove back to San Diego, we attended the production of High School is a Drag: But it Doesn’t Have to Be at Mission High School. Performances included contestants from RuPaul’s Drag Race, local “Queens”, students and teachers from the high school. All proceeds benefited LGBTQ youth.

The hilarious Shangela from RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 2 and 3 hosted the event. The production was presented by the Queens of the Castro, which was founded by gay male drag queens Darla Gayle, Honda Hybrid and Jenna Talia to raise awareness in the San Francisco Bay area about diversity regarding gender and sexuality. They decided to increase their presence on high school campuses due to the many recent teen suicides and the “It Gets Better” movement. The excitement of the attendees during the VIP meet and greet was really inspiring. We chatted with Tammie Brown who expressed that all they needed to participate was to be asked. They are more than happy to be part of such a great production for a great cause. Our favorite part was the performance by the teachers. They had dance choreography, costumes and lip-syncing. The students in front of us were clapping wildly while some of us were thinking back on how cool it would have been to have our teachers be that accepting and supportive in such a fun way. Keep up with The Queens of Castro by visiting http://queensofthecastro.com/