Thu Mar 2 - One thing I miss the most, post-camping for a week, is having an organized and clean kitchen, stocked with lots of cooking ingredients and fresh produce. I really need to go through the fridge, make a thorough shopping list, and spend a couple of hours browsing slowly from one of my favorite "hug-a-tree" grocery stores. Then cooking and assembling salads. I miss having my "food is already made, just grab them, and head out the door" boxes in the fridge.

On the way home last night, I opted to get take-out from Pickup Stix just to have dinner, breakfast, lunch, and dinner for tomorrow. Then I just enjoyed a quiet relaxing evening in front of the tv, eating yummy chinese food, and going straight to bed. Ah. Yum.

So work was fairly relaxing, since we're in "bounce edits back and forth from one another" stage. Instead of working on a book for a class, right now I'm working with a sister-company and updating their online exams for Certified Instructors. I'm just facinated with how the internet has finally come into its strength. It's amazing what can be done online now.

Then after work it was time to drive up to my Shire, deliver my report as the webmistress (and say a sad goodbye to my dear partner in crime on the website, since she and her family have finally sold their CA house and are moving to Missouri). The gang from the meeting all descended on the local coffee shop, and this time we took up a hallway in the back of the joint, including not only all the chairs and tables, but lines of friends just sat on the floor as we all socialized. I hang out with some of the funniest people.

Dayle came over after the Styx concert in San Diego, and although it was nice to see her early (at midnight-thirty instead of 2 AM), it was sadly because one of her fellow concert goers had to leave early when she got the phone call that her mom had just died during the concert. And by coincidence I had my laptop set up in the kitchen for a change, so I was able to give Dayle a place to login immediately and start sending some rather important emails. And I made her a sandwich, since she hadn't eaten since 2 PM.

Fri Mar 3 - Then strangely enough, Dayle accidentally left her cell phone in my apartment when she locked up and left for the next Styx concert of the weekend marathon. So I picked up her phone, some take-out dinner for myself, and went over to Adrienne's for a quiet evening together. Then around midnight I headed up to West Hollywood to wait for Dayle and friends to come home from the Hollywood concert they were attending, to hand off her phone. I'm thankful my car runs so well.

Speaking of running well, I took the car in for a tune-up during work, and they found out why my heater/cooling-fan doesn't always turn on. The blower motor needs to be replaced, so they've ordered the part.

Sat Mar 4 - I got home from the cell phone errand a bit after 1:30 AM, but still got enough sleep for the drive to Vegas. My step-brother got married Saturday, although more properly he "held his wedding" Saturday, the one-year anniversary of his actual marriage in front of the justice of the peace last year. It was lovely to see my family, and we got some wonderful photos of "the girls' club" at the wedding.


Some of us girls

Then I had promised to stop by the M&M's World Store for a co-worker, which took =way= too long because of the evil traffic that is the Las Vegas strip on a Saturday night. Remind me not to do that again.

Sun Mar 5 - I managed to drive part of the way home from Vegas after the successful custom M&M's shopping trip, but at the border of NV and CA I just decided to stop driving and sleep in my car for the night. My heater still doesn't work in my car, but I had my wool-and-corduroy cloak with me in the car, which worked beautifully as a blanket. Coffee and breakfast at the coffee shop in the casino at 5 am, then back on the road again for a lovely morning drive home. There is really something beautiful about driving at sunrise.

I got home around 9-9:30 am, showered, dressed, and met Michelle for brunch with Deja. Michelle called me last night while I was getting ready to go to sleep, to ask me to perform some music for her marriage (handfasting) next month. Of course I said yes, and so we agreed to meet for brunch to talk about details. She and JB are going to put together notes for me to draw on to write them a custom song based on their relationship. I'm quite honored to be involved in her ceremony.

Then I headed home, intending to do some laundry, but tackled the house clean-up instead. It was far too hot and sunny to run around outside, but it was freezing cold in my apartment. So I kept warm by moving furniture, vacuuming underneath everything, and generally picking up the mess in the living room of all our camping equipment still just dropped everywhere. I set up a permanent sewing table for myself, rather than using my computer table in my bedroom, and rearranged the looms, the great wheel, and the credenza so that my roomie can start using the credenza for her sewing materials and I can use the back corner for some cube-shelving with my sewing materials. I even created a new drawstring bag for my air mattress, and am going make matching bags for my camp stove and a new bag for my pavilion poles.


See? I really can get around to sewing again!


My new air mattress carry bag (with long shoulder strap)


The bag, all tucked neatly in the cupboard


The lion (or leopard) lies down with the lamb in our house

Then at the last minute I remembered that we were having a debrief at Lot & Cat's house for post-Estrella brainstorming and chatting.

To sum up last night, I've written the story from the perspective of my "character" or my "persona" within the SCA. You can read about it here: http://www.catellen.com/eilidhswann ... I'll continue to pen more "Letters to my sister" as a method for telling the tale of this 14th Century lady, my persona in the SCA. (For those not in the know, "Eilidh" is pronounced AY-lee, and is Scots Gaelic for Ellen.) My real-life sister's name is not "Marie" but in my persona story, she is. I plan to pull elements from real life, tweak them a bit, and embellish for the art of the story.

In real life, they really did invite me to be part of their household last night over dinner with friends. It actually happened a little bit like the story, including my confusion because I really thought I read a different name at the bottom of the letter and then figured out how mistaken I was.

Mon Mar 6 - So I spent a little time this morning creating the persona version of the story, and the home on the web for my persona stories. I hope you enjoy them, and visit them regularly to see new stories. I'm contemplating stories to tell about all my years in the SCA, from my involvement in college, when I was married (which in the story is now a tale of becoming a widow, rather than my real-life divorce), the shire that I love so much and am still a part of, the tale of moving south into these Baronies and the urban life rather than a rural life, my participation in the Bardic competitions in the past year, the four courts I've served on for different Queens in our Kingdom, the arts I've pursued, the camping events I've attended, and of course the trip to Estrella just several weeks ago, which I alluded to in today's "Letter to..." as "in my last letter I told you about..." since it was the most recent event I participated in.

I'm having dinner with Adrienne this evening, to ask a few more minor questions about what it means to be part of their household. And so far, she loves my persona story version of the whole tale.

I hope you enjoy it too.

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Today's Blessing That I'm Thankful For: What can I say? I'm thankful, excessively thankful, for the honor of being invited to be part of the White Star.
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Weight Loss This Week:
Thu 3/2 - 12.0 lbs (down -0.4 from Wed)
Fri 3/3 - 13.6 lbs (down -1.6 from Thu)
Sat 3/4 - 13.6 lbs (no change)
Mon 3/6 - 12.6 lbs (up 1.0 from 2 days ago) - Time to shop and cook again!