Week of Stories - Great Western War was a wonderful event; Yom Kippur with friends was meaningful and enjoyable; and I've made it home from everything safely. I took a few photos at GWW, not as many as my normal excessive event photography habits, but some of them reveal things that are being revealed to someone later, so I cannot post them yet. All cryptic things will be revealed later when it's safe. Someone who was not able to attend GWW might be reading this post. *grin* But to sum up, here are some of the things that I enjoyed last week.

Best Laid Intentions - I wanted to get on site Saturday, October 4, to help with setup and land allocation marking. I also wanted to have Coffee Bar for all the setup crew, but one thing after another filled my Saturday (including last minute updates to the event website which only I could complete), so I thought maybe I'd make it to the site on Sunday. Early Sunday morning it dawned on me that it really wasn't shaping up to be a day on site, and it would ethically wrong for me to show up early when the only people allowed on site early were setup crew. If I wasn't actually helping with setup, I shouldn't be there before the normal pre-registration arrival time/day. Having concluded this, I stopped panicking and running around crazy, and just settled in with event preparation and house-cleaning. I finished scrubbing the kitchen. I moved furniture in the living room, to make room for the new loom I bought from Kim. I vacuumed. I did laundry, put away clean laundry, packed garb, and prepped my camping equipment. I caught up on computer work. I finally copied some shows from my Tivo to VCR tape, to loan to some friends as promised ages ago. And I actually went to sleep at a reasonable hour.

Marking Time with Work and Holidays - Monday, work as usual, then off to the Baronial council meeting. I arrived on time (yippee), took notes (as usual), and enjoyed just seeing friends. Then at home, I finished more event prep and packing. Tuesday morning I finished packing my car for the week, arrived at work by noon, and worked until about 9-10 pm. I had a major project to complete before leaving for the week, and I was pleased to not only have the slides finished for the Monday presentation, but the presentor was also working late and so I was able to go over the issues with him before handing off the file.

My plan had originally been to leave from work on Tuesday evening and arrive on site for set up. But since it was so late at night, I made arrangements to stay at my sister's and leave early in the morning instead. Wednesday morning I was on the road by 5:30 am, coffee and breakfast in hand, and was on site and unpacking my car by 7 am. By 11 am I was back on the road, leaving site and heading home in time to share in Yom Kippur with friends. Adrienne and Jeff had invited me to join them (and their synagogue) for a dinner before services. And then Melissa (Meala) and I met at my apartment and went to Kol Nidre services together. Afterwards we just hung out for a bit at my place, until we were really just too tired to chat any further and she headed back home. Thursday morning, I caught some of morning Yom Kippur services, then headed out for the last grocery shopping before GWW.

While I was headed to the store, I received a text message from Theresa to share in their Yom Kippur Break Fast (literally to "break the fast" after a 25-hour fast for Yom Kippur), at their new house. They are first time home owners!! The wonderful timing of Alan and Theresa's invite meant that I would beat the after-work drive time on the freeways, AND be already north of downtown LA after having dinner. So besides the creamers for coffee bar, I picked up some challah, cream cheese, lox, tomatoes, cucumbers, and capers to take as my donation towards our dinner, and hit the road in early afternoon. Their new home is absolutely adorable, and we had a lovely late afternoon hanging out and looking around the place. Theresa picked up some pasta, salad, pizza, and bread from her favorite local Italian restaurant, and we were happily surprised at a box full of brownies thrown in to the order. So after a fantastic dinner of Italian food and lox/cream cheese, I left my donated food for their breakfast in the morning, and headed back to the GWW site.

Finally Onsite - I arrived around 10 pm, and was buried under the hugs of about 10 guy-friends as soon as I was out of my car. What a flattering and exciting way to arrive! They all helped me unload the groceries from my car. Good news: I thought my air mattress was developing a bad leak, since it wouldn't hold a good pressure at Highland War. But changing the batteries in the air pump fixed the problem, and the bed was in wonderful condition. I cannot remember what else I did for the night, but I remember chatting until nearly 2 am, before finally heading to sleep.

Merchants and Friends - Day One: Friday morning, I served my first "Coffee Bar of Splendoor," headed to the showers, cleaned-up around camp, and nibbled lunch before spending a day in Merchants. I went straight away to Morgan's to buy a Pelican pin, which I'd been planning since I was surprised with my peerage in August. The exact pin I bought isn't on her website, but if you look at the Silver Pelican Pin with Pendant Pearl, imagine it without the pendant. That's the pin I bought, and wore the rest of the weekend. Then I swung over to Hroar's Two Hearts Entwined Pottery. He's just started selling mortar and pestle (not even on the website yet Edited: Here it is, under "Painting Tools"), and he made two of them in my "bright vanity yellow" glaze for me -- one small and one large, since he wasn't sure which one I'd like best. I absolutely ADORE my little mortar and pestle now, and can't wait to try it out at home. Then I wandered past one of the leather merchants, where I found "bright vanity yellow" leather and couldn't resist buying it to make shoes in the future. Here come "Boots of Power" someday! The rest of the afternoon, I wandered around and saw a tons of friends in Merchants, before heading back to camp for dinner. We had a fairly large household dinner for White Star, for the first time ever with small babies since both Ciar and Gabriel were there with young Nathaniel, and Lot and Caterina were there with young Benito. By evening, I found myself looking at my watch as early as 7:30 pm, so I decided just to go to sleep by 8 pm.

Early Coffee and the Day - Saturday morning was the first time I'd ever set up Coffee Bar in the dark. I had to hold a flashlight in my teeth to get everything arranged, but by pre-dawn's light, there were hot drinks available! Meala was running a "Stay up or Get up" list for the Rapier Fencing, and it was being held next door at the Inn of the Crimson Spade. I'd promised to support her list, which is the other reason I went to sleep early on Friday night. Hot tea, hot coffee, hot chocolate, and hot spiced cider was greatly appreciated by the half-dozen folks who actually made it to the 7 am Lists, including two people who actually managed to stay up all night before the List. Meala was exhausted from her night of no sleep and before light swore this was a bad idea, but after the event spoke happily about how it went well and how she'd like to do it again in the future. I'm not sure whether to remind her she said "Don't ever let me think this is a good idea ever again" or to just be there again and serve hot drinks for the next Dawn Lists -- I'm sure you all know I'll be up in the dark with a flashlight in my teeth, any day. *grin*

After several rounds of friends coming through Coffee Bar for several hours, some time enjoying breakfast, and another quick line at the shower truck, it was just another morning cleaning up and staying in camp for lunch before going on walk-about on site. I wandered to several camps of friends, to finally visit and see more than just my camp and merchants, until it was time to head back for dinner. The household dayshade arrived on Saturday, so we had a large gathering for dinner, toasts, and some special household business. I took quite a few photos, and they'll be posted later.

We hurried through an early dinner so that we could get to Baronial court on time, as it had be STRONGLY communicated that EVERYONE wanted to be there for a special announcement. Our Baron and Baroness first gave a lovely gift to the Camp Mom who'd been running the kitchen, and then "Green Cards" to our own Philip and Marion who are moving to Northshield. To all my peeps in Nordskogen, bring them treats! Treat them wonderfully!

Baronial Announcements - Our Baron and Baroness said they would always do their best to fill the full term for our barony, but if it were time for them to go, they would go. So they announced an appointment of a Reeve and Reevess, after consultation with the Crown, with the intention that the Reeve and Reevess would soon be our new Baron and Baroness. If they mentioned *when* the position would past, I completely missed it, but my "apprentice cousins" Jon Thomme and Eva are now the baronial next-in-line of succession. For the most part, this announcement was very well received, although there is a bit of a shake up for anyone who would normally expect a period of "accepting applications to be considered for the position" rather than a direct appointment at the time of announcement. It's been done both ways in our Kingdom, and I'm not well-versed enough in our own local barony's history to tell you if it's been done *here* before, but it reminds me of the immortal words: "You cannot please all of the people all of the time." I've heard a few things here and there, but mostly I've seen massive support for this announcement. I look forward to helping support our barony in any way possible, and I happen to live a block from JT & E, so I imagine I might be able to help more than if it were anyone else, in addition to them being my "cousins" within the context of our supporting Laurels. It makes Pentathlon that much more of a crazy juggle now, but I'm sure we can still manage the schedule.

Grand Court - Then we were off to Grand court. I knew that the first order of business was the Pelican ceremony for Jeanne Marie, who was offered the invitation on the same day they surprised me with my peerage. So it was the first time I was there for "Their Majesties command the presence of all members of the Order of the Pelican." It was really amazing to hear the lineage of the heraldic peerage medallion that was presented to her, and brought a tear to my eye. The first thing I ever volunteered in was heraldry, so although I don't do nearly as much with it now, it's always held a special place in my heart. For my non-SCA friends and family, working in the field of heraldry means helping people pick historically accurate names for themselves which has a lot to do with the history of languages and linguistics; helping people design their personal shields or "coats of arms" in the SCA, which is not quite the same as the "my family's arms is XYZ" in modern life, but a tiny bit similar; and helping shout announcements on the fighting field, shout announcements in the streets at camping events, and helping speak loudly enough to conduct a court when the audience can hear what's going on up front, plus add to the pageantry of the court ceremonies.

But there were several more wonderful awards at grand court that really excited me. My dear friend Kelebek (as in Kelly and Richard in Santa Barbara) was offered her Laurel (I'm assuming in Persion and Turkish dance, costuming, history, and/or research). They offered her the accolade in the afternoon, and arranged to do the ceremony at Grand Court the same day. And after the excitement of her laureling, our own Marcos from my household was given his Dolphin, the Caidan Award of Arms order for Service. Richly deserved and well done!

I had to hurry off to be a part of Patraic's squiring ceremony, to Sir Phillippe de Tourney. And although he'd asked me to herald the ceremony for him, I didn't arrive early so they had found someone else to conduct the ceremony. No problem, I was happy to be there just as a witness. His wife Fausta sang an amazing song for him, and I'm going to have to tease her more often to sing for us -- she has a lovely voice! *grin* The neighboring camp was drumming at their fire, so I slipped next door to ask if they might lower the volume for 10 minutes so we could hear the ceremony, and they were kind enough to stop drumming completely and just tell stories for a while. This didn't work *completely* as well as I'd have liked, since now the neighbording camp was laughing very loudly and telling stories in booming voices, but it tapered off a bit and we were able to hear just fine after all. And I wish I'd realized there were *two* squire ceremonies, because I'd thanked them at the end of Patraic's ceremony, and there was one more to complete. Fortunately when the drums started again, they weren't that loud at first.

And then later I found out that I missed the last award at Grand Court, when Oliver Dogberry was inducted into the Order of the White Scarf of Caid -- the highest award for fencing in our kingdom. I was exceptionally proud of him and his achievement, since I'd written a very long letter of recommendation after watching Oliver's fencing at Pennsic. It's always exciting to see someone get an award for which you'd personally written a recommendation.

Bardic Challenge - Back in camp, several of us gathered to share in Havdalah together -- the Jewish celebration of the end of the Sabbath, where you reflect on the nature of the boundaries between light and dark, special and mundane, and how without those boundaries you would never know the sweetness of something set apart and different. It always reminds me of how some of the friendships in the SCA are that much more special because we set aside time to be with one another for a short time, and then must leave again to go home.

Then it was time for the Bardic Challenge that Lot had arranged with Baron Thomas. I must say, I never get to listen to Thomas's music enough. Never enough. I wish I could listen to hours and hours more of his music. He'd set the theme for "Love Lost" and gave Lot the first song. Then they alternated, to a total of 3 songs each. Lot conceded the win to Thomas at the end, and we were treated to six wonderful pieces. It was well worth the experience.

Then it was just a night of song and story around the fire. I started us early with the Caidan Kids' Song, and since Duke Edric arrived while I was singing (hee hee), he requested that I switch to "the song that fixes it" and gets the Kids' song out of his head. So of course we all sang the Caidan Fight Song, to follow. I remember singing the "Widow and the Devil" (also known as "The Bargain," a folk song written by Mick Ryan. And it was requested that I tell the "Pansy-Pink Viking A-Frame" (a Cautionary Tale), which I enjoyed telling. I'm not sure if I sang anything else that night, but I finally turned in around 12:30 am, when a bard I didn't know showed up and wanted to sing "bawdy songs" for us but hadn't previously learned the difference between "bawdy" and "blue." We prefer to keep the songs suggestive at most, but not out-right disgusting or so raunchy that it crosses the line of good taste. We actually told him "No" to a few suggestions, and okay'ed a few others. It's unusual, this "a stranger comes to our fire and wants to assault us with music" because it doesn't often happen at the fires I attend. I'd *heard* of it happening more often than I've witnessed, and this time it was our turn to try and steer him into more appropriate selections.

I must admit, I'm spoiled sometimes by good music at our fires.

Sunday Coffee, Tea, and Packing - This was the biggest Coffee Bar morning the whole war. I really sat back a couple of times saying, "Wow, this just makes me so happy" as dozens and dozens of friends came through for hot drinks, socializing, and spending the morning together.

I'd run into Duchess Faizeh in the shower line, and she suggested I'd be appreciated at the Princess' Tea that afternoon. I took some time to re-memorize some lyrics, brush up my memory, and be there early, but I never did get asked to sing for the assembled ladies. I did steer a drunk friend towards his own bed and tent, to sleep off the rum. I helped shuffle dirty dishes away from the Tea, and support the support staff who were feeling a little overwhelmed at the end of the event. And I got to escort Duchess Faizeh, the Princess Safiye (from British Columbia), and Comptesse Albra back to Faizeh's camp, helping carry pillows and serenading them with "The Queen's March" from Pennsic. It was worth spending the afternoon hanging out.

Back in camp, there was a combined dinner for all the stay-till-the-end campers, and they were kind enough to feed me a delicious veggie and lentil stew and some of my favorite Rose Lemonade from Pel. I broke down my tent and encampment through the waning sunset light, and wandered through my Barony sharing hugs goodbye and a few parting words before hitting the road by about 10 pm. I was *way* more tired than I thought, so I decided to grab a hotel room once I finally hit the 5 freeway, and the last major exit with amenities before going over the grapevine. I turned on a boiling hot shower and just soaked for a bit, before enjoying sleeping in a *warm* bed for the first time in days. It was REALLY cold at GWW this year!

Fire Season Starts - Monday morning, I was back on the road by 5:30 am, and was surprised to find out that Fire Season had just started in California. As I came down the heights from the 5, the smoke was looming in the dark blue sky. By the time I got close, the sunrise light made the smoke look like flames, so I stopped at the side of the road to take a few pictures. When I first started drafting this journal entry yesterday, there were only two major fires in Southern CA. As of this morning listening to the radio, there were four.

As I was driving home yesterday, I was driving past / through the smoke from the Marek Fire. You'll see that on the map, it's located north east of the 210 Freeway, and as I drove past on the 5, there was a portion of the freeway that passed under heavy, black smoke.

 


Other than that experience, those photos, the fires are not affecting me. Some of my co-workers are affected, since my work place is just 20 miles from the Marek fire. But there's not even any smoke near my work, since it's been Santa Ana conditions, sending everything west instead of east or south. I'm sure it'll be a problem later. But otherwise, we're doing fine.

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Today's Blessing That I'm Thankful For: Fantastic new friends from a very small world: Sean (Ian's brother, and Ianuk/Ivan's predecessor); getting to see Kissa and Gunnar more; getting to know Fearghus better; meeting Yon and Keg's End; Sir Mathius and his squires in 3DC; meeting "gurdymonkey" and the Bard of the West; witnessing Kelebek's Laureling.