It's My Life

Quick Mead Update

So tonight is the official "drink me" night for the quick mead. The first bottle sat on the counter, sorta moldy on the outside cause of the closed box van had them in. I wipe it off, and pop the top.

A good 20 inches of foam flew out of the bottle; the carbonation was so severe that only an inch of liquid was left in the bottle. Incredible. Lots of laughing.

Van was very careful with the next bottle. slowly released the fizz. It clouded up a bit but we didn't loose any of this bottle. It is just a bit peppery, sweetish with just a hint of citrus and a blandish aftertaste. Van says it is a bit like ginger ale and I can see that. Taste that.

I don't want to take something to Autumn Rose that may get everything covered in ooze. So may just drink it all myself.

I'm sorry I'm not writing more but it would be mostly either just a laundry list of things I'm doing or a maudlin sad song about what is going on in my head/heart and that probably cause i'm drinking.  I'll try to do better after this weekend, the last camping event I have.

Nýr Heida, the founding member of The Vikings -NA!

Link: Welcome to the homepage of Nýr Heida, the founding member of The Vikings -NA!.

Seems to be a Viking group that is building a village in Missouri. Interesting. I wonder if those Rolla members are in the SCA too?

"Nýr Heida (New Hedeby) is a Not For Profit organization which focuses on Viking Age Living History. While our group is based in the state of Missouri (we have members in Columbia, Rolla, Kansas City and St Louis) we also have a few members as far away as Iowa and Nebraska."

SCA Meme

1. Mundane Name: Jonya Pacey

2. Mundane Job: IT Help Desk Manager

3. Persona name: Sorcha inghean Maille

4. How did you come up with your name? I wanted to be a member of the family that produced a child that became Grace O’Malley. So having a family/tribe to start from, I researched period names for Ireland, and picked my favorite.

5. Where and when did your persona live? Western Ireland, early 11th Century just before the Anglo-Norman invasion.

6. What is your Known World Location? Shire of Silfren Mere

7. What kingdom do you consider to be your home? Northshield

8. How long have you played? 4 years

9. How did you get started? I’ve wanted to do this since the early days of my marriage, 1982, when a group was doing a demo in Springfield MO, in a park. It was finally time four years ago!

10. Why did you join? Reenactment, research and friendships.

11. Have you registered a name? no

12. Have you registered a device? no

13. What awards have you been granted? Cygnus - Service AoA

14. How many events do you attend each year? 15-20

15. What is the best event you have ever been to? This year has been wonderful. Poor Mans was great, Lillies was my favorite until that one occurred…this has been my first full year of just going lots of places and fighting as much as I wanted. My first Boars Head has special memories but really, please don’t expect me to say “that one” and stick to it.

16. What is the worst event you have ever been to? WW 2006

17. What event do you make it to every year? Boars Head

18. What event do you refuse to go to? Pennsic.

19. Who is your favorite person to hang at an event with? The person I am with. Lately that’s been either Anplica or Lucertola, sometimes at the same time!! Then it’s people!!

20. What activities do you participate in? heavy fighting, A&S, feast serving, camp-parties, set up and tear down of whatever you point me at. Organizing and prep work.

21. What activity would you like to learn? That’s too general a question. I got lots of areas I want to explore in A&S…I think period ale would be cool. Also dying.

22. Are you a marshal? No

23. How many tents have you had destroyed at events? 0

24. Has your garb ever caught on fire? No

25. Have you ever woken up in a strange person’s tent? No

26. Do you have a pavilion? No, I have a geteld

27. Are you a peer? No

28. Do you ever want to be a peer? Yes

29. Is it a coincidence that peer rhymes with beer? It’s useful for the bards’ sakes

30. Are you a squire, apprentice or protegee? no but I hope to be some day.

31. Who would you like to be squired, apprenticed or protegee'd to? That would be presumptuous.

32. What is your war cry? That was fun! Let’s do it again!

33. Have you ever been pulled off of the field for your safety? No

34. What is the funniest thing that has ever happened to you in armour? Now if you’d said “Funnest thing…” I’d have chattered on and on. I think people are amused every time I kit up, though.

35. Have you read Corpora? No

36. Circlets, how do you feel? They set off a veil nicely

37. What household(s) do you belong to? The camping support group Tramontane

38. If you could change one thing about the SCA what would it be? We don’t drop into persona and play our secret identities enough. At least I’ve not seen that as clearly as maybe it is happening around me.

39. What is your favorite part of the SCA? That I’ve found a group of people wherein honor is not just a concept but is a living concept. That a person will do the right thing for the right reason and not expect praise and petting for that. That a person can study, can teach and can take part in this wide encompassing wealth of skills and knowledge and research and application, and be recognized for their own efforts, by others doing the same. And I’m not that naïve, I know we all are at different spots on the line where 10 is this sort of person and 1 is Homer Simpson. It’s great fun and I’m safe here. This Known World resonates with me like no other community of interest ever has and I really like being here.

40. What is your SCA Goal for the next 7 years? See #39. I want to keep doing that. If I get asked to do more, I’ll probably take that on, too.

From an IM exchange at work

Mike "Evil PC Duke" Flores: You're out!!

Jonya: cool

Mike "Evil PC Duke" Flores: A new wave of control washes over the help desk, as the age of Jonya of the Help Desk comes to an end and is replaced by Mike the Useful

Yeah, we had some water...

About all that happened at my house was some water in the basement. We killed a shopvac pulling water out but as Van still has the rainbow, we were able to keep working. Also, dancing on towels helps, lol. It is also an amusing story to tell on yourself!

I just keep thinking about how so many people are stuck without their homes, their jobs, their daily routines totally uprooted. Monday was a bad day and yesterday wasn't much better. I think about volunteering but how do you know when to stop? How do people do that, walk away and return to their own lives when the time they can spare is done?

I went up last night to Lyulf's and got my armor rehammered together. The pauldrons were sorta tied on, lol. I've got a couple of other places too, that I need to work on. Tonight! Van will be out of town so I can do this.

I think a cat peed in my car. At lunch, I'm going to PetMart and look for some of that OUT! stuff. Either it happened at Brenda's when I left it open OR I dragged a bag through a puddle and transferred it to my car. Either way, yucky.

I got more to write. Later.

Well, this is the pits. I'm missing two of the poles for my geteld!! I assume the siders did something with them but it's hard to be certain. And not the end of the world. I can use my mundane this weekend but sheesh. Giovanna is going to think I don't really have a period tent, lol, as the silly thing never shows up at the same events she does! This is a women's weekend at Brenna's, not really an event, but still it's camp.

I'm finishing up my oatmeal before heading out to work. Yum!

Nordskogen Fighter Practice - August 14

Jacques and I drove up to Nordskogen last night, taking the opportunity to plan crown tourney out a bit. <oh, note to self. Make banner stand...> I've got to research 11th C French male garb now, for the fancy and pretty. Less than two months to go.

Anyway, it was a great practice. I fought Simonis and Zadok and Jacques and Beth and someone who is new...I think I fought him, anyway. LOL. I did a lot of fighting. And I owned the ground under my feet. I was focused, totally, on overpowering and dominating the fight. It was awesome. And my reward was a classtime with Lars - he pulled Beth, Simonis and I aside to do some work. Now I just need to find some pell time... missed fighting Vlad. Humm.. someone else. But it was still a good fighting-time to reflect on now.

Heraldshill Fighter Practice - August 12th

I was so wanting to fight but not willing to drive to Duluth, that I contacted the Hillians and asked if they were holding practice for sure, with people at War and the like. They were, so I sent it out to the SM list and got a group of five Merians and one wandering fighter from Falcon's Keep, John of the Jade Phoenix.

Good fighting down there, folks! But even more pleasing to me, good company! They are having a game night on the 25th.... http://www.heraldshill.org/  is the main calendar. I need to get that out to the Silfren Mere list. They are pumped about starting planning for Ages of War, too. And so am I!!

I fought sorta sucky, not enough and not claiming the field as I've been trying to do mentally. I blame having Lyulf along, lol. It's really lack of pell time, lack of weight lifting and doing other stuff, but it's just fun to blame him.

BBC NEWS | UK | Northern Ireland | How Bronze Age man enjoyed his pint

Link: BBC NEWS | UK | Northern Ireland | How Bronze Age man enjoyed his pint.

This is lovely! Read the whole article and no..I'm not going to be getting stone pots for brewing ale.

Mr Quinn said it was while nursing a hangover one morning - and discussing the natural predisposition of all men to seek means to alter their minds - that he came to the startling conclusion that fulachts could have been the country's earliest breweries.

Fighter practice August 9

So I got to the park to find a charity fundraiser had taken over our fighting area. We had to move to the park by the swimming pool and mmmm...better spot imo. Green grass, lots of shade, flushies with hot water and doors on the stalls and classical music piped in, and parking was easy to access as the pool was closed at that time.

I'd done something really dumb and forgotten my phone in the morning at home. So I couldn't call anyone. I stood for about 30 minutes on the side of the road until people started showing up.

Tom, Bob, Liz, Nick and myself kitted out. Jess, Katie, Julie, Matt and Cooper were our supportive audience/hecklers and then Mel joined us a bit later. Most of us went out for blizzards afterwards. Yummy!

Fought Nick and was pleasantly surprised to not be overwhelmed as I was last time. Man can throw quickly and consistently. He likes to fight at a distance and I need to work on judging my range PLUS his range, lol. Tom and I had a good fight. Tom likes to fight a bit closer than I can manage so I move a lot, keeping him where I want him until I see an opening and then come in. Fought Bob but didn't get anything past his guard. I did realize that I really need to be working on arm strength if I ever want to use that round shield. LOL but it's heavy!  Warmed up and then honestly fought Liz - had a great time there! Then we took a long break and then we did some two-on-two pairings which I love to do.

Just a brief update! I'm at home today, working around the house and having a mental health day. It's fun. And good. But I'm fighting an urge to go eat all the chips in the house.