Pennsic day IV

Well, I took care of my obligations today by volunteering to help setup the performing arts tent and some things at East Kingdom royal encampment.  The first part was physically demanding,  the second emotionally demanding.   Grief is such a fickle thing, one moment in denial, the next in pain or anger or compassion for those that had a closer relationship and are experiencing these stages even more acutely.   So the day ended with tears and a drink.

The evening ended after much conversation about life and the SCA and I think it was good.  Perhaps because the tears were earlier or maybe the alcohol, the conversation went in better directions then it could have.  It ended with a campmate showing me the moon, while it was raining.  That is my happy for today.   The moon shining while the rain sprinkled on my head.  If the sun was out, it would be a sun shower.  With the moon out, does that make it a moon shower?

K, on her way to bed with her lighting.

Moon shower. 

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Pennsic Day 3- Sunday

It has only been 3 days and I have already lost track of time.  This morning some lovely people came by our encampment and helped to setup the common tent.  One of them stayed and helped us work on the shower.  We needed some parts and picked them up, but ran out of light before it could be finished.  One lady in particular has been the best with getting the shower to work.  There have been tools being borrowed and people coming together to give us a hand. 

I keep seeing people that resemble in some way friends that are absent and I have a moment where my heart is lifted because they are here, but then they will turn or step more in the light and I am saddened again that they are not here. 

My happy are those friends I do get to see and the ones I am just starting to meet.  Now if I could just remember to take more pictures.

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Day 2 Pennsic, Saturday

Many things got partially done.  The tent I am using is up, but I forgot to put the pear finials up and I haven't finished arranging everything.  The shower is up but no hot water until the morning because we had to get propane tonight.  Some of the furniture is put together, but not all.  The solar seems to work to charge things but the battery either isn't or I am doing something wrong.  I stubbed my toe on a tent stake while only in my socks but didn't look at my foot until 10 hours later to see that there is a small cut.  We rested during the heat of the day,  but didn't nap.

These are all good things and is, in my opinion, a huge amount of stuff for 4 people who have used all these things before but not necessarily set any of them up before.  We did have one other helper come by and help late in the day.  The kitchen is still not set up so out to dinner we went.  While waiting for our food I sat down and a hat of some kind was placed on my head which I promptly forgot about until my daughter started taking a picture.  Had I been drinking something I would have snorted it when I saw what was on my head.   There is a picture of me with the person who slipped it onto me below.  It is my happy for today.

This is a difficult time, but I am confident that K & I will be able to find a way to power through.  Tonight that will include sleeping with the sound of drums in the distance. 

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Pennsic day 1-land grab

With last night's exhaustion I managed to fall asleep, phone in hand, without writing.  We got through all the initial Pennsic land processing without a problem.  The other people on our block seem nice.  One was especially helpful in guiding me through the steps. 

K and I eventually got her pavilion up and took a short nap in its shade.  One of the other campers brought me to get the water softener tanks when he got his.  He is an exchequer (treasurer) in my region.  This gave us something to talk about.  K and I went to town to get a few things and food. 

During the day a few friends stopped by to offer assistance later, but the entire encampment is pretty sparse right now.  This will be the first year in quite some time that I will get to watch the city grow.  One thing that struck me as I was going through sections on my way to our area was the amount of people all doing the same thing, measuring their plot of land.  We all get our land allotment based on the number of people we camp with, so there is much measuring.

My happy for today is the moon.  It was full and shined down to help guide camp setup when other people arrived at the end of the day.  With a new phone I have finally figured out how to add pictures,  and I believe data plan to allow for them.  So some random shots ending with the moon.

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Drive

Cry, ride, sleep, ride, text, cry, drive, text, cry, ride, cry, drive....

But there was a lovely sky with an extended sunset as we drove west.  More when I am not trying to sleep in a rest area.

All photos by K.

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Grief

Today I learned about the passing of a dear friend.  There are no words to describe the grief felt by his family, friends and myself.  Over the next few days I may write more about this, but not today.  Things are too fresh right now.  No happy for today, but a thankful... I am thankful that I was able to go and share hugs with the grieving family and friends and that I belong to a community of people that are there ready to lend a hand or hug when tragedy befalls us.

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Change

What is the universe trying to tell me when the stereo in the car turns on all by itself?  I suppose it didn't quite turn on all the way, it got to the point of where music should start and then the screen went blue and random beeping happened.  I should say that there is a remote control for this stereo and I did check it to see if anything was leaning against it, and there wasn't.  My curiosity is wondering if a nearby car also had a stereo that uses a very strong  remote and mine was interference.

We got new phones this afternoon.  I had to leave and go to rehearsal before the rest of the family and so left without my charger.  One of the good things about smart phones is the internet will still work even when the phone doesn't.  So my old phone is usable for most things still, except calling people.  The new one kind of reminds me of the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey. 



Tomorrow I hope to figure out the new phone a little.

One of the performers injured himself a couple days ago and at tonight's rehearsal I met the replacement performer.  He has performed with them before, but it has been a while.  The way this type of improvisation works is that there is no script for the shows, just an outline.  Each performer has to develop the character (based on parameters) and what the character will say.   We give each other ideas and themes that correspond with the outline, the character's personality and that seem to make sense.  Tonight I was given an idea as to where to take my character and when I got to the scene the person I was performing with changed what he said and I rolled with it instead of using the suggestion as that suggestion no longer worked.  The scene went well.  Any how, every time we do this there is a new challenge, tossing a new person in is probably my biggest challenge with this so far.  We only have one more practice the day of the show, we got this.

It was a good day.  We got out and did things and saw people.  Gideon had an eye doctor appointment and will be getting glasses.  Prescriptions got filled and errands completed.  With all the bustling around my happy for today are the beautiful puffy clouds.

Cloud pictures and my daughter driving.

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Food-short

This evening was spent visiting with a friend who graciously loaned me her tent for the next few weeks.  She lives in a beautiful area and showed me around town on our way to and from dinner.  Dinner was at Cowbell Burger Bar and was delicious.  Good food and great company are my happy things for today.

We filled out our polling forms today for the Baronial office and Gideon decided that he wanted to write a note on his in the comment section.  

Some of the beautiful fields I saw today. 

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Small Stuff

The to-do list I made for myself still has too many things not checked off.  Out of the 14 things on the list, eight of them were worked on, so more than half.  Some of the things I decided not to do, like laundry can wait a few more days and some things I need to work with others in the house to complete and that didn't happen today.  When I get all those thoughts out, I think I accomplished enough for the day.  There were also things that I didn't anticipate, of course. 

My happy for the day are some of the accomplishments:

• The meal plan for next week now has both lasagna and shepherd's pie frozen and packaged.
• So many dishes are clean.
• The sewing I wanted to do got done.  It isn't quite right, but what I set out to do got done.
• I remembered to eat and drink water.
• I did my general household bookkeeping.

Lately it is the small stuff that counts.  😊😊😊

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Quick happy for today

Last night I helped with the stamping and stuffing of envelopes for the polling for the next Barons of our local SCA group.  Today, those envelopes were mailed to the populous by our local chapter president (called a seneschal).  This is today's happy.  Knowing that the polling is happening and that there is a date (September 6th) that people should respond by and that there is an end in sight (at least a little bit) to finding out who the next people or person to hold the office of Baron/Baroness will be and what role I will play in that future, is good.  September 6th is when the ballots are due so maybe they will be counted within a month or two of that?  The investiture is at the end of January so hopefully the decision will be made with enough time that whoever steps up will have time to prepare. 

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Pink Flamingos!

As I set out to walk home from craft night tonight, I couldn't help but wonder what has been keeping me inside so much lately.  There are no good answers to that thought.  The weather is nice tonight, there was music coming out of some downtown establishments and the not downtown sections were peaceful with a half moon and Jupiter shining bright.  It was a thoroughly enjoyable walk.  I almost jogged a little, it felt so nice.

There is a walkway off of the downtown area that leads to a parking garage and a few shops.  Last year there were umbrellas hanging overhead and during the winter there were lighted icicles.  Tonight there are flamingos hanging overhead.  😎

The entire walkway wasn't covered so I am not sure if there will be a larger flock in the next few days or if this display is being kept small this year.  Either way, it is good to see something new there. 

It was a good day; Z is back from his visit to Oregon, I did a little bit of stitching, I helped move SCA things to storage, visited a little with friends and got out to craft  night across town.  My happy for today is the floating flamingos though.  I have been watching that area since spring, waiting for the icicles to come down and signs of summer to go up.

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Silly Bug Eyes

This is all.  These glasses went on my face and my daughter laughed at me.  I tried to post this picture to my Facebook and Instagram but technology failed me.   I imagine that my original post is out there in that computer never-land that is found by random strangers.  If I try to send it the same way again there will be 15 identical in a row show up like spam onto friends feeds.    😂

😂  Just some comic relief.  😂

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Just a Happy

There are a few minor accomplishments that I made today.  I ordered new glasses.  It took me WAY too long because either the site is poorly designed or I kept hitting some wrong button that kept putting me back at the beginning, but they are ordered and if I am lucky they will work well, look good, and be here by the end of next week.  The other thing I did was to start sewing lacing rings onto the bodice of the gown K is making for me.  These are my happy things for today.  Small things are better than no things. 

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VR

This morning I went to a class for work on learning to use the new virtual reality computers at school.   It was a pretty cool experience.  They have the ability to seemingly pull an item off the screen and hold it closer to view more detail or to take apart the layers of a frog and view the body's systems individually-without a scalpel.  There were ways to tell a story and many other things I didn't get a chance to try.  It will be interesting to see how the school and students use them.

In the afternoon my daughter and I worked on making a new outfit for me to wear at events.  The new gown has a lined bodice that was challenging us until we found an online tutorial that helped.  It has been such a long time since I have sewed with any seriousness, that I am very grateful for the internet and its vast library of knowledge.

Rehearsal was tonight.  There were a few sections that we ironed out and made flow better.  It will be interesting to see how the performance comes out when we get to the actual day of.  It is improvised and any character could come up with something on the spot that could end up changing how the story will end up.

There were some wild thunderstorms today that I got to drive through.  The smell of the rain hit me first driving home from work.  The rain came down hard for a while and the lightening and thunder cracked.  It was a summer day full of rain, thunder and lightning.  That smell, just before the rain is my happy for today.

The stormy sky...

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Chore Day

Chore Day may sound a bit more motivated than I was today.  I made a list and I got through about a third of it.  One of the things on the list was a nap, which I did. 😁  There were some errands I had to run in the middle of the day that weren't on my list, because I forgot what day it was, that got done too.  So it was a productive day, but I know I could have gotten more done had I not allowed myself to get distracted now and then.  One of the things was to go through some boxes, which I did.  There were some pictures from 2002-2003 ish and that trip down Memory Lane is my happy for today.

From our trip to Niagara Falls September of 2003, I think.

C, then a rainbow in the mists followed by K.

My daughter's first BIG haircut.

She thinks she was 11, so around 2002.

Many years ago Plimoth Plantation had a week long day camp for kids during the summer.

This is K when she did that, prior to the haircut.  😛

My two kids on a ship for a whale watching tour.

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