guenievre | Entries tagged with fighting

Thing the First: An overdue note that Summer War was *phenomenally* fun. Pics are here, and my favorite is this one. Although fighting was not *quite* as much fun as handing out cupcakes (for those who wanted the recipe - they're dreadfully simple AND tasty, though don't be shocked when the batter comes out WAY thinner than you think it should).

Thing the Second: Work is finally calming down! I can crawl out of my cave! Whee! (For those I haven't mentioned it to, several of our largest accounts all put out major rfps or otherwise wanted presentations/quotes/etc over the past month - thus the lack of Sapphire Joust and me at canton meetings. Bleh. But yay employment.)

Thing the Third: I've been sewing a lot the past few evenings, with mixed success. My sewing machine Does Not Like gambesons, but I perservered and have all except a few lacing holes done on a new one for Girard - I've never made one before, so yay me. (Though ironically I cut it out and started it before buying *either* of the recent patterns for such, so guess I'll be making another one, maybe for me, later). I'm still trying to decide whether the eyelet plates for my sewing machine are in fact more trouble than they are worth - they do not stay *on* the machine , thus I end up breaking a lot of needles. Not so good for the machine. On the other hand, there are some things I don't believe in doing handwork on. Like fighting garments of almost any sort, esp. ones that are going to get worn All The Time. Esp. not after how long the quilting takes. So...it's an interesting tradeoff. Maybe I should just make G do his own eyelets, but I tend to sew so that he has to do the housework. (Yep, I'm spoiled.)

Thing the Fourth: Speaking of sewing, had a mixed experience with that last night. I ordered

kass_rants's sideless surcote pattern when it came out, which I was rather intrigued to find that according to package directions, only took two yards of fabric (60"). I *had* exactly two yards of grey wool leftover from my grey-and-red outfit, which isn't enough (I thought) to make *anything* out of, so I said, hrm, this won't take long, and it'd be lightweight pennsic garb. The pattern, though... had pros and cons. It was definitely easy to use - with the exception of the cutting layout that didn't work for me - but I *really* didn't like the results. I *may* have mismeasured my back-length, as the flare of the skirt starts lower than I would put it, and that would certainly distort the whole thing. So there was that problem.. and of course with the minimal fabric used there wasn't enough fullness to the skirts (but I like *really* full skirts - see the red dress with the couch-eating hem, if all my dresses had that much skirt I'd be happy as a clam), but really? I think sideless surcotes just don't work on busty women with minimal hips. So, that said, anyone want a mostly finished grey wool surcote? French seamed, I'll finish the last of the gores before I hand it to you and the hems (on all sides) are up to you. Reconstructing History size G.It's free, the fabric was leftovers anyway and I only spent a couple hours on it. Edit: Jenny called dibs on the surcote, if she doesn't take it I'll repost.

Thing the Fifth: 6 week old kittens are made of fluff and squee and needles. 12 week old kittens are just made of needles. Mine is obsessed with my hair... and crawling up me to GET to said hair. Oww oww oww. So cute though!

Current Mood: bored
Current Location: cube of avoiding work

Fighting for me is a question of momentum. If I do it on a regular basis, all is well, but if I take a break, I don't seem to want to do it anymore.

Come to think of it, many things are like that - sewing, for instance. I mostly enjoy sewing, but if I don't do it for a while, it's harder to get started again. Fighting, however, is the worst of these, because on top of my natural momentum problems / easy distractability there's an element of ... intimidation, if that's the right word. Probably is, because let's face it, at the moment? I'm a baby seal out there (see icon!)

Anyway. that said, other than some persistant issues with the new body armor, and with my helm needing different padding and maybe a different chin strap, it went wel.

soucyn wanted me to work on footwork much more than I ever had in the past, which was helpful, except for the part where once I got to where I was supposed to be, I no longer remembered how to throw a decent shot. (This goes beyond rust into just needing to start over. On the upside, maybe I've lost my bad habits too?) And I did seem to at least remember how to block, a little. Not well, but a little.

Maybe I won't be an *absolute* liability come War. Maybe.

Current Mood: perky

Item the first:

I started a new garb project - as I mentioned in my last, incredibly boring post, I've been hoarding some purple silk twill for *years*. I finally figured out the dress it wants to be, and the event it wants to be made for. The dress is shown to the right, and the event will be for Crown. I'm adding some embroidery/pearls around the edges of the sleeves and neckline, though, just because I wanted a bit of "bling". (Thank you,

duchesspadr, for telling me where you found the picture...) Though I'm having a bit of problem finding an appropriate bright-red lining - why is it that one can see fabric, think "hmm, that's pretty and cheap, I should get some"; not do it, then end up starting a project that needs *exactly that fabric* and thus not be able to get it anymore? I *swear* I just saw dark-red (since my purple is slightly darker than the pic, I was also going to make the lining slightly darker) silk twill for a reasonable price at fashionfabricsclub, but it's not there now. They have a few other things, though, so all hope is not lost...

Item the second:
Fighter practice is better than pilates, at least if one counts exercise as being "better" the sorer you are. Though

soucyn's theory of sore-back=crap-mechanics is probably true...though I did pick up some pointers that'll help if I can manage to make them jump that brain-body barrier...

Item the third:
The all-LJ dinner @ Chamas was as usual pricy but wonderful. Though I was underimpressed with Sirens (a pity, since it's a cool building) - if I'm going to pay that for a martini, I'd like to be able to hear people talk. (Speaking of which, ARE there any good-but-a-bit-quieter bars in Durham/CH that I don't know about? Preferences are for interesting drinks...)

Item the fourth:
FYI, if you're ever offered a free trip to Italy, get passports well in advance. Ask my boss why this is important...

Item the fifth:
BoyG is still suffering from tree bukakke, so we aren't going to the Kberg meeting tonight. Leftover chinese and calligraphy, here I come!

Item the sixth:
The Brute Squad of Doom - that is, me,

soucyn; and

3_purple_irises didn't run fast enough - we are collectively the Pennsic Land Agent. More details to come...

Current Mood: time to go home!!!

No, the two don't REALLY have anything to do with each other, other than they were both part of my evening last night.

Went to Buckston practice - had fun, but OMG!!11eleventy!!! I sucked. 'Bout the only thing I did *right* was avoid some shots/shield snatches by

suetsune, who was doing the Japanese polearm thing (I'm sure they have a name, I'm equally sure I have no idea what it is). Oh well, I suppose it wasn't QUITE as bad as it could have been, given the 6 months since I fought last, so I won't complain. Also, I'm talking to Uilleg about a new corrazina, which will be Teh Hotness if it works out. Yay. (Also, I have no idea why I'm channeling my inner MySpace denizen this morning. ::shrug::)

Came home to find Yummy Garlic Chicken. We got a new crockpot, and I had a leftover chicken that HAD to be eaten (bought for KASF on Friday). Chicken with 40 cloves of garlic (ok, and an onion and a few herbs) is a FABULOUS thing when cooked in a crockpot - it completely falls apart, to the point the legs and wings fell off the bird when I tried to get it out of the pot.

Also, new addition to the "You know you're married to an SCA fighter when..." files. (This is possibly TMI, but is funny so I'm not cutting it. Deal...)

It's amazingly disturbing when you're in bed with your husband, and out of nowhere, while, um, supposedly focused on other things, he suddenly announces "I know why people keep hitting you at practice! You're squared up too much!"

He almost got kicked out of bed for that one...

Current Mood: silly

Still, all in all, Crusades wasn't bad, really. Ages ago,

nikulai had asked me to cook dinner for the collective Royalty at Crusades, and I've been looking forward to it for a while. And there was going to be a FitzSunnyOaks Party Cabin. Unfortunately, the weather was pretty awful, several people were sick and/or otherwise not there, the pre-cook for dinner didn't happen as efficiently as I hoped so we didn't go up on Friday, overslept on Saturday so left home @ 8, and took 7 (!) hours to get to site (did I mention the rain?). Rawr. Also, I can't decide whether I'm glad or not that I didn't take my armor - we only got there in time for one battle, a 1 hour res battle, which looked very fun but very... aggressive. I'm not sure I'm practiced enough for that level of game, as none of the battles @ Pennsic, that I fought anyway, were in that sort of close quarters.

Still, enough complaining.

soucyn got to fight a little, which I'm glad of as I was feeling VERY guilty about not going up Friday night. The Royals seemed to enjoy dinner, and I talked

ramblingheritic and his lovely lady into bringing the dishes home with them so I could get offsite and down to

kfitzwarin's for some Laurel-time. Had a lovely brunch the next morning with them +

geniealisa,

puck_eater, and

siobhan_sca, and even got on the road at a reasonable hour. Though N wouldn't let me stop at G Street Fabrics. ::pout::

Came home, poked at some fabric with the idea of making some new stuff for WoW, went to bed.

Where did my weekend go again?

Current Mood: cold

So, when last we left our heroine, she was pondering the differences between hobbies and mental illnesses. The jury's still out on that one, but we'll assume hobby and go from there... ::looks nervously over shoulder for men bearing white coats::

( Pre-MTT Food Rambling )

( Midsummers Twilight...Before the Tourney )

( Midsummer Twilight... Almost Tourney! (aka authorizations) )

( Midsummer Twilight... Tourney!! )

Current Mood: ecstatic

So although last week was mostly a wash in terms of fighting (it rained on Tuesday. AND on Thursday. This makes Jennifer sad), I did go to Baronial practice yesterday. And, thanks to some people at work bugging me, I even remember to bring my camera:
( Picture behind cut: )
So yeah, that's me in armor. (Isn't the helm great?)Needs work though - although the gambeson that

kfitzwarin gave me is lovely, it's a bit too wide across the shoulders, thus my pauldron does something really funky most of the time. And let's not talk about the chest armor (it's possibly as old as I am) - even though you can't see it, it's a bad thing..

The problem with yesterday was that it was REALLY hot. As in half of the people out there were falling out due to the heat. Unfortunately, that included me... Just fighting wouldn't have been so bad, but we were doing melee practice and I was the "designated archer-chaser". Now, this sounded like a GREAT job when they handed it to me - after all, I'm the newbie, so not as useful on the shield wall as I could be, so going after someone I only have to touch? woot! What they DIDN'T tell me was that Steve can run faster backwards than most people can run forwards. (Most, in this case, includes me.) So, yeah, sprinting in armor. In 90+ degree heat. Did I mention I have no endurance? Long story short, even though I was drinking lots of water, the combination was NOT a good thing - after a few passes like this I completely overheated and had to get out of armor. Which, of course, I was completely embarassed by, but oh well. (Nick says I'm being silly - and he's right - but I feel very self conscious any time I can't keep up with the rest of the group. I know, I'm new, it will pass, but ::shrug::)

In other news, I got the money in my hands for feast, so I can start on some of the pre-cooking (sausages, sugar plate, etc). Time to order gum tracaganth and sausage casings!

Also, sewing is starting to fall into the "I have too much of it to do so I don't want to do any of it" category. This is bad.

Current Mood: creative
Current Location: work

So this is my arm right now:

Pretty, eh? That's several figher practices' worth of bruises, all stacked on top of each other as I keep doing the same bloody thing - banging my forearm into the edge of my shield. Well, it's not my shield at the moment, which is a large part of the problem. With luck I'll finish MY shield tonight or tomorrow, along with significantly more armor than I currently have... and maybe a pell sword that actually fits me (one of Nick's swords is a reasonable length for me, I have no idea why he has one that short but it works - however, the pell sword is NOT the right length, so I keep choking up on it, which is possible because it has no hilt at the moment. BUT... when I do that, and throw a wrap, the excess handle hits me, you guessed it, right in that bruise...)

Last night's practice was interesting - it was somehow much less fun than the last two. Nick and I were the only fully armored fighters there, and the way he was trying to teach me vs. the way I actually learn was not matching up very well. ::shrug:: Such is life, I have an idea of some things I need to work on at any rate...namely everything. Things that make perfect sense on the pell all FLEE out of my head when I am against a real person... so yeah, where I said interesting before I really meant frustrating, but at least I stayed in armor when I *really* didn't want to, that was my victory for the evening.

Current Mood: contemplative

So I got back in armor today - went to the baronial practice which was much less attended than I figured it would be. I figured it would be sparse, given that it's Easter and all, but somehow (having never been a member of a practicing religion) I'm always surprised, somehow, at how many people end up at church or doing family stuff on holidays. ::shrug:: not a big deal, really, whatever makes people happy, it's just always odd given that I don't take many holidays at all very seriously. Either way...

So we showed up 45 min late for practice - took longer than I thought to get the Pennsic reg. forms printed - but much to our surprise we were the first people there. In the end, there were only 4 heavy fighters (including me) and 3 rapier fighters there. I fought a bit... and died a lot. (Not a surprise). And I have some very pretty bruises on my arm now. (Poor Athos! I don't, at the moment, wear any upper-arm armor, and he hit me full force there and then started apologizing, which really wasn't necessary - if I didn't intend on getting hit, it'd be REALLY stupid to walk out on the field, but oh well. I suppose I have a slightly different idea of fighting that some new people, given that I've watched my husband for a few years now.)

The baronial meeting was quite quick, nothing major to report and it went quick, so we came home to shower and then back out to dinner. The interesting thing (and the only reason I am posting this, really) was that I realized something about fighting. One of the reasons I'm having such fun doing this is because it's the one thing SCA-wise that I've really given myself permission to suck royally at, as a beginner. Most A&S stuff I somehow expect myself to have some level of competence with, just on an... academic level, if that makes sense. (The theory being if I can learn enough about something, I can make up that way for not having done it before - thus I tend to jump in on the deep end of any project I do.) This, on the other hand, is SO outside my realm of experience - having been a very bookish child who didn't like getting dirty/sweaty (still don't, but I'll make exceptions) that I have *no* expectation of being good ANY time soon... not that I won't work at it but I won't beat myself up if I'm not.

But then, I have everyone else to beat me up... thus the icon...(seal...seal...seal...club!! or actually tourney sword from rene d'anjou's tourney book) EDITED TO ADD - The icon is back!

Current Mood: introspective
Current Location: procrastinating at work

Guess what? I just got back from fighter practice! Go me! (well, technically I'm writing this after a sub from Jimmy John, most of an episode of The Practice and one of my husband's notoriously strong G&T's (with another on the way! woot! not that I usually have two drinks on a weeknight, but then I finished a project at work today and alcohol goes well with endorphins).

So practice was fun - as it turned out there were only Chow and my dear husband there, and I ended up just fighting Nick and hitting the pell some, but it was FUN. I don't know why I haven't gone in so long, I think I was just being silly. Though getting hit will certainly take some getting used to. It's weird - the first time I tried this, getting hit didn't bother me. This time it was a little different, I don't know why. Still, though apparently I think really light shots hurt, it wasn't that bad, and it was something I could certainly get used to.

Weirdly enough, though, I'm oddly conflicted about fighting, at events, anyway.. fighting is a BLAST in terms of it's sheer fun. And yet, so is having N fight for me! and somehow having him salute a me that's in armor and not "pretty" and feminine, etc, is just wrong, somehow... (though I'm working on having the world's most feminine armor, given the helm and the intensely BLUE armor).

Eh, well, maybe eventually I will authorize, we'll see - given this was a 1st practice in 3 years, I don't really think I need to worry about it at the moment...

Current Mood: somewhat tipsy

OK, so I have a dress - some of you have seen it, if not there's a fuzzy shot of me in the outfit here. It's green/blue shot linen, with great big circular cuffs over the hands. Well... when I made it, and the pink wool dress that goes with it, apparently I was too gentle with the fabric in prewashing, as the hot-pink wool dress of brightness is now a size that would fit a somewhat busty 12 year old (speaking of, anyone know any very small girls or women who might want a dress? they'd have to be VERY short, as it's about 5 inches short on ME). The green dress? well, it's now not-quite-ankle length (it previously just touched the floor) and no longer can be closed in front. (And yes, I've gained weight since I made it, but not THAT much).

The thing is, though, I adore the green fabric, and especially the cuffs on the sleeves. So the question is - do y'all think it would be silly to make another GFD, out of some fabric I don't care about, and put a wide guard of the green fabric on the bottom and attach the sleeves from the current dress? Thus making a dress I can still wear under another gown? Or should I just kiss the dress goodbye and find someone who it will fit to give it to? (or perhaps cut it up and make accessories out of it...)

While I'm on the subject, how do you, dear readers, wash your garb, both before and after you make it? I've had SUCH mixed results - I wash things in hot before I make them then never wash it in anything except cold water, and it STILL shrinks (this is the 2nd GFD I've lost like this). I don't REALLY want to go to drycleaning, and while handwashing is an option (one I try and use when I remember to prepare/pack for events in a timely fashion), I've had other dresses that I wash all the time and it's not an issue. I know, I know, I shouldn't be cleaning things all the time anyway, I should just wear proper smocks and wash those. But... I'm a klutz and spill things for one. And even if I manage to have a "neat" day, I still have hem issues (and am too in love with puddle hems NOT to have hem issues). And while yes, I could just take stuff to the drycleaners... it just seems wrong somehow...

Also, pondering more fighting stuff for N. I want to make him an actual appliqued heralidic surcoat (because, well, fighting stuff is fun to make, and his current one looks good from across the field, but if you get close to it, not so much - the paint is flaking and it was only made for Ymir). The thing is if I'm going to make a fancy appliqued one, I don't want to use cotton trigger, so I'm pondering what variety of linen/wool would actually hold up to being hit...

We went to Buckston last night - would have stayed for dinner, but it would have been the 3rd time I had mexican in 4 meals, so that would have been a little much. OK, a lot much. But I had lovely henna done on my hand, and *almost* got the smocking done - would have gotten done except for the henna, and except for going outside to watch the new trebuchet being fired. 1 liter waterbottles make interesting splashes if they land straight down from about 50 ft...

Current Mood: inquisitive

Someone, I have no idea who, put the latest Abercrombie and Fitch catalog, displayed to some young hunk or another (quite hot, actually - shirtless guy with muscles who apparently fell over in the ocean while catching a football) in the women's bathroom. This is not a bad thing, even if A&F is kind of creepy, but it seems somewhat unfair as I'm SURE someone would complain if the guys did something equivalent...

But then, I'm feeling very random today. Last night I got a lot done, but ended up waiting for Nick to get done attaching his aventail to his helm before going to bed. Unfortunately, this occured sometime around 2. And so even after a giant cinnamon latte with extra expresso, I'm kind of dead. Actually the caffiene is making me perky but my brain isn't actually working. It's kind of entertaining, except for the part where I can't focus on anything. (ooh, shiny!)

Meanwhile, all I *have* to do for Ymir is finish the neckline of and paint N's new heraldric fighting houppelande, and sew myself some hosen (yay warm feet). Also go grocery shopping/clean house, but that's not too bad. I gave up on new garb for me, so I"m going to wear the same thing I wore last year :-(. Oh well, with luck I'll even have some time to work on KASF stuff. Though as a side note, I'm feeling vaguely perturbed that my husband's fighting garb is nicer than my real garb. ::sigh:: I mentioned I love my husband, right? If y'all ever needed proof of THAT, well, here's exhibit A:

It's roughly based on orle's seen here, here, here (this one's fun!), here and here. Yes, I expect to be resewing pearls after every event. Although I may make another one, this one is a LITTLE bigger than i wanted it to be, it ends up looking vaguely turkish.

So I've gotten tagged twice by the guilt meme. I suppose I REALLY ought to do it now - I started to before but I think I got hung up on the fact that I really don't feel "guilty" about liking any of these things. ::shrug:: I like what I like, including fluff fantasy and southern cooking...
( Guilt! )
Now I tag:-

zihuatanejo

island42

melaniesuzanne and

ramblinheritic
to complete this same Quiz, Its HERE.

Ugggh. Coffee wearing off, leaving crankiness in its wake. This is bad. Must continue to hide in cube and avoid all coworkers... :-) Otherwise....

Current Mood: blah
Current Music: None. I wish I had my iPod here.

( Pictures of the speed-cote, and one of Girard fighting as a bonus! )

Current Mood: busy

So it's been a few days since I posted - one of these days I'll get better about that. Meanwhile... on to what I did ~~this weekend~~ this week (ok, I admit, I've been hopelessly remiss!) Of course, nothing particularly interesting happened last week, so I suppose that somewhat explains it...

So Friday night we ended up not doing the Fayetteville demo - it would have required that we get off work an hour early to get there on time, and sometimes we can sneak out early, but it just wasn't in the cards for Friday. Oh well. We ended up going to dinner and hanging out with

Jenny and Owen and

Other Jenny - that was fun, even if there was an overabundance of Jennifers! We made fun of silly fashions at Nordstrom's, played Apples to Apples and experimented with random drinks from my bar...

Saturday I got up early, and finished (mostly, anyway) Girard's new fighting houppe/tunic thing (basic a-line-ish tunic with flared sleeves, done in blue cotton with the sleeves lined in white mystery fabric from the stash (I THINK it's cotton, but...???). It was just a prototype (want to make some fancier, dagged ones later) but he got at least one complement on it, so yay. As soon as I finished that and got dressed (yes, I was sewing in my bathrobe), we wandered down with

Beatrice to the Eagle's Vale demo/practice/revel/thing. It was fun, not a lot of people came down but

Girard got some fighting in. The most amusing part was probably when the fighters were playing on the bridge (there was a small bridge over a ravine in the park, which was sturdy enough and had good railings, so the fighters were like "oooh! real bridge fights!". First, Sir Falcone took possession of the bridge, and made a Grand Proclamation of how he was willing to share the bridge with any man, but if any one took more than his fair half (ie, stepped over the crack in the bridge) he would have to protest strenuously in a martial fashion - needless to say, the fine gentlemen arrayed to fight didn't take this sort of challenge lightly! Eventually, Sir Andras took the bridge, and instead of taking a position in the center, took a position towards one end. Girard was up to fight next, and noted that Andras apparently didn't mind sharing the bridge, and proposed since they had no conflict, they should have tea with the ladies instead of fighting. (G has always been a lover not a fighter, lol - apparently when he was in kindergarten, he was one of the only boys willing to play house with the girls...smart man...). Andras agreed, but said that in that case, he had to claim that his lady was fairer than Girard's. My wonderful husband wouldn't let that stand, so they fought, and Girard ended up winning! (Andras's shiny new armor, while quite pretty, makes a lovely target...). I wish there was more schtick like this (yes,

Solvarr, I just advocated schtick - it's a very specific KIND of schtick, however...). But half the time they don't even bother with salutes at tourneys...that's ok though, if I'm feeling too cynical, I can always go read the Philosophy of Chivalry at Armour Archive - that always makes me happy, somehow...

Anyway, came home from demo, played Warcraft, ate really awful chinese delivery - the cat liked it better than we did.

Sunday was planting day - I have two plants I keep on my desk at work (well, one I've had since last June, one that Girard just bought me randomly. They were both in desparate need of new potting, so I took them home with me this weekend. Now they're happy plants:

Of course, in the process I ended up arbitrarily deciding that plants are good, and maybe I don't kill them as badly as I thought I did. So now I have a herb/flower garden in front of my apartment - I've got all sorts of herbs, and a few pepper plants - I think I'm going to add some tomato plants next weekend, as there's still space.

And I finally managed to strip all the rosemary I had drying in my kitchen (the leftovers I snagged from

Mistress K after The Flood Also Known As Coronation) off the branches, so now I have like a quart (no, really!) of fresh-dried rosemary. Yum. I think some of it will be used for the Next Henna Adventure (details to be forthcoming shortly). Then there was a meeting of people who are going to help with Buckston's Shakespeare-themed "upside-down event" in June - looks like a tasty feast and fun, what with Mistresses Roz and Claire H running it.

Side note: You'd think, reading my journal, if you didn't know anything about the title structure of the SCA, that I was in some odd S&M group...

Now off to home, to play with an arming cote for G - I realized last night that he didn't really *need* a padded gambeson, and doing both a pourpoint and a gambeson was silly, so now I'm just going to do an arming cote type thing and see how that works - part of it is inspired by the one Tasha posted on the Armour Archive (yes, I have been hanging out on there too much)...though I still need to work on the AOTC project (I've made progress, as in I've gotten the software running, now I just have to a. get it to look good and b. add content).

ETA: Sorry 'bout the pictures not posting properly at first - it helps if one actually shrinks ones pictures before posting them... oops!

Current Mood: accomplished

So I was thirsty and went to get a Diet Coke out of the drink machine. I should have known it wasn't "good" coke when I opened it, as it fizzed all over me. OK, fine. Then I put it on my desk, where it promptly tried to turn itself over into my computer. (Obviously it didn't get the 'puter, as I'm typing this.) I've decided I must have a can of hyperkinetic diet coke on my hands... maybe it's the extra caffeine they put in the diet stuff...

So why is it that whenever I have something that I *absolutely have to do*, that's when I have the least ability to focus on it?

Meanwhile, I'm cranky today - yay sunburn. Oh yeah, and I was cranky / antisocial yesterday, so apologies to

ramblingheritic,

zihuatanejo,

thatursula, and

harleenquinzell, and of course my dearest

soucyn who had to deal with me at dinner. Sorry! I should have just found another book, and stayed home with it. On the up side, The Fairy Godmother, which I read at Barnes and Noble while

darklordmoeser and

soucyn were at Sin City (which I decided not to see because of the gore factor, even though the cinematography sounded interesting), was quite good for Mercedes Lackey fluff - the story telegraphed what was going to happen at 30 paces out, but hey, the whole book was based on *fairy tales* - this is not a surprise. I quite recommend it, even for those who have sworn off Lackey because of the travesty she's made out of some of the Valdemar books...any of the ones she's done lately have improved. She is, of course, still fluff, and I don't think that will ever change, but that's good once in a while...

Saturday was fun though - went to Novice Tourney, got to watch Girard fight. (Yay! and he even fought to win me a rose from Sir Bryce, who is doing the most gorgeous challenge in honor of his soon-to-be-wife. The odd part of this was when Bryce asked G to introduce him to the lady he was fighting for (me), he said he already knew me - and I don't think we had ever met before. Oh well, maybe my name had gotten to him some other way - there aren't any other Guènievre's in-kingdom that I know of - or maybe he was thinking of someone else. ).

We interrupt this ramble to go "squee!" over the new cookbook that just got delivered to my desk. "The Quick Recipe", from the Cook's Illustrated people. I see much yumminess in my future!

Anyway, so the real reason I went to the event was because Elchenburg Castle (which is looking much better!) is a great site for cooking in a primitive environment - and there was no feast planned for the event. So, I got to play with food - yay! I did both lunch and dinner for Girard and I, Jenny and Owen, Trephina, and their Excellencies. ( Cut for food info - this will get a bit long... )

Current Mood: scattered, but content

I do wonder how this would go down if repeated now... something I ran across on the Rialto..

Blow Calibration test

I got it! It's gorgeous!! (Well, that was a given, since Master Eldred made it, but then again, I wasn't expecting it to be as pretty as it is). So now I have no real excuse not to fight, once I get the other bits put together. Yay, I think- though that also means I have to start exercising... ...So I'll put pictures up as soon as I get batteries in my camera, but meanwhile, happy dance!!