Great Western War and this time I HAVE THE HAT

Two of the big October events are now behind us: Crown, and Great Western War. I had a very good time at War, as usual was a Bad Princess and didn't bring my parasol onto the field. By the end of War, Newt was holding his Mongol hat over me for shade.

We stayed in the same area as the Barony of Fettburg, and Raven and Brenna graciously offered us the use of their Barony sunshade. I bitched a lot about where West Royal encampment was, 'cause it was on low ground right next to the horse arena. Meanwhile, Darkclaw and various other groups got the land above us on a plateau with a view of the lake and islands. The only positive thing about our area was we had a dumpster about 100 feet away, which made cleaning up a breeze. 

We used a small propane tank every night to keep warm, which was wonderful. I took several outfits, including underdresses, and didn't wear them. Yet I wore a new outfit every day. 

Gwendwyn the Silent, Corina/Karen, Rachel/Adaran, Don Tiberius and his Lady Sikuna, Newt, Shishio, and Thalen attended me. Baroness Brenna took over water-bearing duties for our group. 

I got to shop, and bought a new thin leather belt and several items from Raymond's Quiet Press, and also told the gentles at Raymond's how much I appreciated their work and their reasonable prices. I went to the Princess' Tea, and hung out with Violante, who is now Crown Princess. I also went to the EQ championship, and hung out with the Royals. I schmoozed with Else Hungrovogt. 

We went to the Royal Reception and passed out and received gifts. We processed into Court (that's the picture above) but we just walked through and didn't stay. We hosted the Oerthans for dinner in the Barony pavilion one night. 

And on the very last night, we went to the Starkhafn leftover food and booze party and spoke with Count Sir Kevin Perigrynne and Countess Patrice, who used to be Baron and Baroness of Golden Rivers back when it was a Barony. And their stories were very illuminating; plus, Kevin was asking me questions that seemed to be aimed at whether Miach was a worthy Chiv candidate and at one point in time they both announced that we had PLQs which is very very nice. Because we try. 

Miach stayed until 3 am, but Newt escorted me back to camp, then he went back to find out more about shield walls from some fighters there. And Miach got some very good advice from Duke Tamuki, one of only two black Dukes in the SCA: Never pick your friends to fill important roles on Court, because they don't think of you as Royalty. Have to say I totally agree with that! 

All that's left now for October is Coronet. The roses are ordered, and plans have been made. 

Next month is mostly easy: little feasts, GRAB, Collegium. All one day and very low stress events that we're looking forward to. December is also easy, with Yule feasts. January is going to be the next big month, with Twelfth Night, Oertha Coronet, and Winter Investiture.

Almost at The Halfway Point

We've been kind of busy, and I haven't been able to chronicle Our Reign as often as I would have liked. 

I'm feeling good now...really good. Physically and spiritually. But that wasn't true a couple weeks ago. A couple weeks ago, I LOST IT. And here's why:

• My Guard is largely absent from events. The same two or three gentlepeople seem to be doing ALL the work. 
• My Head of Court is largely absent from events. I was thinking, for some crazy reason, that she'd be organizing our appearances and coordinating with other Heads of Court. 
• The Principality Seneschal is unable, due to time and finances, to perform the duties of that office in a timely fashion. We nearly didn't have a Coronet site. The Kingdom Seneschal and the Deputy Principality Seneschal nearly had to take over. 

All of the above coalesced to form a perfect storm of paranoia and doubt. 

We talked to the Captain of the Guard over dinner at his home, and he swore to get the Guard into shape.

We duked it out with the Head of Court, but there's no winning that game. So we followed the advice of some Peers, and we're just carrying on smartly and accepting whatever she wishes to do, and honestly - I'd rather just do it and save the hassle. An interesting side note on this is that I now truly no longer care, am not offended or hurt, and actually feel somewhat relieved and more warmly towards our Knight and his Lady than I have for some time. 

I discussed the whole matter with our Artisan Wrangler and her hubby, who has been on several Guards, and they assured me that this is an ongoing issue with the Cynagua Guard that has been happening over the last several reigns. They assured me that we are actually loved and respected by the Populace. 

One thing the HoC DID do was to get the ball rolling with the Garb Wrangler. Since we actually needed garb, we had each had three tunics made by Auntie or E'taine of Silver Desert. In addition, I purchased 3 undertunics (one of which has walked off, somehow..), two apron dresses, two early period gowns, a sideless surcoat, and two tunic/trewes black basic garb outfits for our Samhain costume bases. Currently, the goal is to wrangle two more outfits from our Court and to have some of the Silver Desert peeps embellish a couple tunics. Oh, and also wrangle peeps into making two woolen coats: one Rus for Himself and probably another Ionar style coat for me -- or a Viking, they're very similar. 

Now, this is what our GOAL is. What actually happens may be wildly different. 

In fact, our experience so far is that people will only accomplish a fraction of what they commit to. Except the Artisans. They're freaking awesome. 

I FINALLY received the Harp tokens that were supposed to be given out at Investiture. What I received wasn't what we agreed on, but at this point I'm going with the flow. Himself has yet to receive his Prince's token rings, other than Uther's. I'm seriously debating with myself on taking up jewelry and metal casting, and the only thing keeping me from it is the cost of a kiln. 

We're down to our last available 2 K in fundage, and I'm considering taking out a small loan on my 403(b) plan to get us through January, when we're going to Oertha and we have Twelfth Night to deal with. 

On the upside, we really are having fun. We're giving away a LOT of beautiful work on the part of our Artisans. We're getting excited about archery again, and we're promoting a Cynagua Archery Championship for the first time in years. We've gotten to know some admirable and awesome people: Master Edward le Kevere, Mistress Michaela McCollum, Robear de Percival, E'teen and E'taine, Elizabeth Margarete, Mum, Angus, Eibhear, Farleigh, Treasach, Rachel (I always forget her SCA name), Don Tiberius, Don Coronado, Aradonn, Sir Vincenzo....some of whom have been supportive of us for years, but many of whom were not on my radar at all and have surprised and overwhelmed us with their service and support.

It more than makes up for the people who we thought we could count on that dropped the ball, or never had any intention of carrying the ball, or didn't even realize there was a ball in play. 

Morgan and Siobhann have been very helpful, both as confidants and also in that they have given us a lot of largesse over the years and we've finally been able to give it out. And it's very remarkable largesse: circlets of leather, bracers, jewelry, games, wooden wasters in a variety of styles. Petra has supplied us with jars and jars of jellies, and Stephen of Burgundy has supplied us with excellent cordials. 

Gregory of St Albans has taken on the Chirurgeon position, despite being active duty and overseas frequently. 

The current Prince Heinrich and Princess Inara of The Mists are wonderful, wonderful people and have been a blast to work with. 

Argos West, the household led by Viscount Sir Loclan  and Viscountess Vigdis, was a wonderful asset during the Cyn/Mists War. 

The Incipient Canton of Fitzraufia (Miles and Alfar and their squires and ladies) was also a great boon to us, did us great honor and provided much entertainment that was sorely needed at the War. 

When this is all said and done, Miach will be offered Knighthood, I'm fairly certain of that. And we'll start our own household, and it will probably be much more like Chataeu de Camville than we would ever have thought prior to this reign. There will be rules, and expectations, and standards and protocols. 

We've seen what happens when there aren't clear expectations, and we have thanked the Gods and Ancestors many times since stepping up, that Miach is a Herald and that Miach was the perennial Guard member for so many reigns. We've both come to appreciate the work that we have done. I have realized that I'm actually not a crappy Court member, I'm an average Court member. And while we always knew that Miach was a good Captain, we now know that Miach was so far beyond the norm for a Guard member and a Captain that he was truly excellent. 

Sir Geoffrey Scott and Catherine of Wessex are the Lord and Lady of The Mists as of today's Coronet. We will work well with them, as we enjoy their company already. 

It's almost October, we're going to Crown, we're going to Great Western War, and we have our Coronet - all in a whirlwind month. And then we can ease up for the last two months of the Reign, do some feasting and save some time off and some money up. October is the Big Month. Bring it on.

Princess of Cynagua

The Investiture went great! It's amazing what you miss when you're waiting to process in. I had to run up and listen outside the door while Miach was swearing his Oath. I totally missed Uther's introduction of Miach, which evidently was awesome. I missed Geoffrey of Clan Fergus' poem.
Kitty and Treasioch braided my hair, and people thought it was awesome. Discovered today, while trying to take out the braids, that my hair is getting very thin on top, which is upsetting but really there's nothing I can do about it. I'm taking supplements and drinking protein drinks. If it continues, I may have to just cut it all off, which would make me sad, but I could start over from scratch and try to keep it from breaking. Right now, it's got lots of split ends and broken ends.
The garb was great, and everyone pulled together for Investiture so very well. We DID wear woad!! Juliana painted our faces. I "stained my nails with berry juice" (food coloring) then washed them and buffed them and that was interesting.
Arnold decided he wants to join the SCA, and he came out this morning wanting to shoot archery....
We have so much largesse that we had to put up a storage shelf unit in the family room.
And the REALLY hard part is now over -- No more lines to memorize!

Tuesday

3 more days to Investiture. We ran through the ceremony several times last night, just the two of us, the dogs and Norman the parakeet. I am having a real hard time remembering the funky verbiage. It doesn't flow.
Tonight, it will be baked beans and pork, some protein drink, and sewing pearls on Miach's fabric belt.
Tomorrow, likely meeting the Prince and Princess, and I'll try to find out what their plans are for their Court on Investiture day, so I know whether to tell Morgan and Siobhann to come early or not and ditto for my family. The kids' garb still hasn't arrived. I'm so spoiled by two super-speedy deliveries that I really expected it by Friday or Saturday!
We also have been debriding necrotic tissue out of a bad joint wound that T.Rex Rooster sustained, and then re-dressing the wound, the past two days.

Saturday

Today I went to Patti's and she sewed and adjusted the ionar, while I sewed amber beads onto the my leine. She is going to keep Miach's tunic, and she's taking the mostly-finished ionar to Sorcha to hem and embellish. She needed to put gores into the ionar, but she's pleased with the way that it hangs and thinks that once the embroidery is on it, that will pull it down a bit more.
I was surprised to find that I'd finished putting the beads on with most of the day still left, so when I went home I sewed up the large woven band that Patti had given me from she and Gunther's stash, into a fabric belt for Miach. Meanwhile, Miach was down at Auntie's being fitted, and then she finished his trews and hand-sewed their hems while he waited. She also made him a pair of tight, short Book of Kells soldier trews.
Countdown Day 7 very productive.

One week to go to Investiture

I'm starting to have trouble sleeping.
The Investiture garb project hit a huge snag when Miach's tunic arrived and was too tight. Miach didn't want me to tell our artisan/tailor, he just wanted to have someone local fix it. However, I felt that would be very disrespectful, as I know that our tailor put all her energy and time into this and it was her creation. I wanted her to basically give us her blessing.
What ended up happening was she pulled entirely out of the project. So here we are, one week before Investiture, with the key component of MY garb (an ionar jacket) incomplete and totally un-embellished. She did send us all the embellishments she had made, and a very large quantity of embroidery floss.
I'm still kind of in shock, and emotionally somewhere between mortification that I've hurt her feelings and anger because she abandoned the project. If it was just a regular SCA person, I'd be angry, period. But this is someone I consider one of my best friends, someone who has done so much for us, someone who knows how much this Investiture means to me. And I really feel the project meant a lot to her, too, and she just burned herself out on it, and was very protective of the ownership of the artistry of the garb.
Plus, I'm not sure where this puts our Court for the Big Picture, because she is an integral part of our Court and I truly do not want to stress her out for the next big event: Great Western War and camping for a week, and food! We already had potential for emotional trauma with that event, as most of the former members of our household and our current Ri and Rian are at odds, and we were going to try to meet with both groups on different days/nights but the chance of insulting our Ri and Rian by that was high.
Not to mention that we have family going to Investiture, kids clothing being shipped to us, worry about them being confused or bored by what is a very long day even for SCA geeks, worried about what to feed them during the break between Courts.
I haven't learned my lines.
What if I have a sudden attack of Dumping Syndrome?????

On the positive side, I've lost a lot of weight since the GBP. And my joints mostly don't hurt, except my thumb joint where it joins my hand. I have started walking faster, and I don't become short of breath any longer. I THINK I've stopped snoring, because I no longer wake up choking. Although I sometimes wake up at 6 am needing to go to the bathroom, I no longer wake up every 2 hours needing to go. I can cross my legs - but I mostly don't. My shoulders feel sharp. My wrists look thin, and so does my face. My knees are palpable. My ankles and feet are still fat, and still swell at times. I bought two pairs of sandals that fit, but don't look good because of the fat feet and ankles, but the Crocs are now way too wide and floppy.
I lose about two small handfuls of hair per day, and have been for about 3 weeks. I'm taking Biotin for that, and I also have horsetail and nettle but to be truthful haven't been using the herbs.
I also have discovered that sadly, I can eat all manner of stuff I'm not supposed to without feeling really full: bread, noodles, rice, potatoes, chips, cake, ice cream, etc. The only healthy things I can do that with are yogurt and cottage cheese! But meat? About 5 or 6 bites, and I'm full. I did discover a fairly good protein, 100% whey isolate, at Costco (again). They only stock the Vanilla flavor, but mixed with orange juice it tastes very good. 30 grams of protein a serving. And after only one unfortunate incident, I can eat protein bars without dumping, and those are 20 grams per bar. Plus, we just went through the worst heat wave in decades, with temps in the 110 - 120 range, and I stayed really well-hydrated by drinking at least 40 oz of protein drink during the day. I only got dry mouth once, and it used to be a daily thing in just normal summer temps prior to the surgery. That was my biggest fear, dehydration during the summer.

The Run-through Father's Day Potluck in the Park

It was wonderful. Roz came up and Teresa came over the hill, and we all gathered at Patti's house and plotted and cut out garments and bees. That was Saturday. On Sunday, we had the Investiture practice, but first we smoked meat and cut up fruit and people brought side dishes and we all ate. I have no idea how many people were there -- as many as for a small SCA local event. And everyone ate their fill, and we still came home with about two meals worth of meat, some fruit, and most of a cake (there had been three cakes).
It was great to talk with people and hang out, a real bonding experience for the Court and Artisans. Bjorni and Finna came, Their Highnesses of Cynagua came. It was just lovely, sitting under a giant walnut tree, rehearsing in a shady, relatively remote arbor in Rusch Park.