And the only note I made for Wed Jun 1st was:

Recently listed to: Prog Sampler made by my keyboard player when I first joined the band, including some great tunes by Ten Jinn, Echolyn, Isildurs Bane, and others I’ve seen play in Mexico at Baja Prog.

I’ve heard that Ten Jinn broke up, which is a bummer because I really liked them. And Isildurs Bane is *amazing*—too bad they’re from Sweden or something like that. But a rock and roll band with a mallet player? I’m in heaven.

Steve, my keyboardist, made me some ecclectic CD samplers to get a sense of the progressive music scene, and I still enjoy listening to them every now and then. I must have brought my bag-of-CDs to work back on June 1st, to have mixed up the sound tracks so much. *grin*

Getting caught up on the notes I had made for the past several weeks, the only entry I had for Tue May 31st was:

Recently listed to: Prog Sampler from Progressive.Net, including some very silly music from Five Fifteen, a bizarre band from Finland.

To explain a bit: Five Fifteen performed at Baja Prog years ago, the first Baja Prog that I ever attended. Their music is silly and fun, and the memory alone just makes me smile. I’ll have to dig up my concert reports from this event, because I just have this strange memory of the singer wearing “goggles” at one point that looked like wire kitchen strainers painted with gold paint.

I did say they were a silly group.

I woke with a start at 5:12 am this time. This is ridiculous. I’ve never been shown more clearly that I’m naturally a morning person than by how I sleep when I’m camping and there’s no TV to stay up late watching, no excessively comfy covers to burrow under, no snooze button, no morning traffic to try and avoid.

But again, I had a lovely shower (no shower lines!), dressed, trekked back across the site to our camp, set up coffee bar, and had my own cuppa before anyone else was up. I love living like this, and it reminded me how much I enjoy getting up before dawn to have coffee and putter around the house cleaning. Yes dear, I know, I’m absolutely bonkers.

Then we all started to break camp and pack the cars. I was glad to have my big car-toolkit in the hatchback, because a neighboring gentleman had problems with his truck. So I was able to loan them the right sized wrench (I think it was a wrench. I have no idea!) so they could get it running again.

Once everything was all packed, I stopped off for a full tank of gas, washing all the windows, and then stopped at a Rubio’s down the road for lunch. Turns out that Mina, Cat, and Lot were there too, so we got to spend one more meal together before going our respective ways.

I only had to nap once on the long drive home, just to cool down for a bit after driving into the setting afternoon sun (I am *so* much more a shade plant! No direct sunlight!) and then managed to stumble into the house. Geoff, bless his heart, really did get the loft bed put together in my bedroom and it’s really, Really cool. He even helped me drag the old box spring (hmm, no springs, it’s really just a box) out to the back alley so someone can either claim it or we can get it taken away. The loft is REALLY tall, and I can just barely sit up on the bed by ducking my head about an inch or two from the ceiling, but oh! the floor space this will give me!

It was *quite* exhausting to still have to crawl around making the bed with all the sheets and blankets (some of which really didn’t want to tuck under the mattress) but all done it’s really pretty. And I’m MORE than grateful that I bought the teak folding camp chair, because I only had a rolling desk chair in my room. And it’s easier to climb up and down the ladder to the loft if I have a solid chair next to it. A rolling chair would NOT have been a good idea.

So now the car is unpacked, I’m refreshed from a late evening shower, and it’s time to collapse.

The Captain isn’t allowed to have rum anymore. The whole crew agrees, and most especially his wife. And what she says is law in that household, so he meekly agreed that drinking for all the crew members who weren’t there wasn’t one of his best decisions.

The “Coffee Bar of SPLEN-dooooor” was an even bigger hit this morning than yesterday (because there were more people on hand), and there’s probably a comic book character in there somewhere. Yesterday I sat up with a start at 5:45 am, today it happened at 5:42 am. Something about sleeping outside, on a wool rug, on the ground, in a canvas tent, with the sun coming up—it’s hard to hit snooze.

My legs are exhausted today, and most notably I’ve developed a huge blister on the bottom of my left foot from yesterday’s shoes. But I’ve gotten to shower, dress, and have my own coffee before it was even warm out so I’ve enjoyed my mornings immensely.

Today I took even more time to just be on my own—not that I didn’t enjoy being with everyone all day yesterday, but there’s something lovely about browsing merchants along versus with a gaggle of friends you can hardly keep track of. Most notably, I really wanted to buy a chair, a NICE chair, a wooden, sturdy PRETTY chair, all for myself. And I found one, right back where we got the Turkish coat yesterday. It’s a solid teak, and does that folding-interlocking thing to make the seat. Rhieinwen has several, but I always feel like the seat is a little too small for my back-end. This one is really spacious, comfy, and easy to carry around. So even though I’d gone a little over budget yesterday, I couldn’t resist spoiling myself a little and getting the chair. It has, of course, been dubbed my “Chair of SPLEN-dooooor” and we’re all getting a little silly.

I ran into a friend at the showers around 6 am who said I really REALLY ought to be at court this afternoon, and so I decided I would definitely stay for the entire thing. The friend didn’t tell me who would be getting an award, but I am glad I stayed. I just wish I’d known how LATE it was going to go!

I got there early (with my lovely new chair and plenty of spinning to work on) and set up in the shade in the heat of the day. There’s this gal who was once the Princess of our Kingdom (well, before it was a Kingdom back when it was a Principality) when she was only 10 years old. [They changed the rules after her, because of her, although many agree she was a better Ruler than many after her] …and she happens to only be about one year older than me. In the past year, we’ve become fast friends, and she joined me in the audience for court. We had a blast, passing the hours together, which made some of it that much more bearable.

It was a LONG court, and it started REALLY late. It was supposed to start at 4 pm, the king postponed it until 5 pm, then it started late, and it went until about 8:15 pm. They even took a break for the Royalty to sneak off for a bathroom break, and at one point the visiting King and visiting Prince were handed sausages-on-a-stick for dinner. But worst of all, it got really cold and breezy, the later it got, and I was there in my sleeveless-over-dress-because-I-still-haven’t-finished-it-yet. Fortunately Larissa had a piece of cloth in her basket that I could use as a make-shift shawl and shiver and huddle until the very end.

But there was an amazing presentation in the beginning of court that had us nearly all in tears for nearly 15-20 minutes straight. Apparently our Queen has been having the names of all the active duty military personnel on deployment from our Kingdom read aloud in every court, at every event, for Her entire reign. She wants to make certain we never forget those who are away and at risk, in harms way, in service to our Country. In response, there were active, retired, and former military who made a presentation of recognition and thanks to the Queen for Her Service to them all reign. They gave Her tokens of their service, and did a detail salute to Her, in Her honor. She, of course, was sobbing through the entire presentation. Afterwards, She addressed the populace, and told them about her own family and household members who’ve been on deployment.

And then She had us participate in a little six-degress-of-separation experiment. For each of the following, She had people stand from the audience to be recognized: Those who were active duty who’d just done deployment. Those who were active duty in general. Those who were former military who’d done deployment. All retired military. All former military. All spouses who ever had to wait through deployment of their loved one. All children who’d waited through deployment of their parent(s). Anyone with a household member who’d ever been on deployment. At the end of this, I would estimate 80% of the audience was standing, and nearly 80% of them had tears running down their faces. It was so moving and so amazing.

And then to the rest of the court, presentations, and awards…. I was very glad I witnessed True Thomas getting his Award of Arms (so now he’s officially “Lord Thomas”) and then Alyce was given “A Harp in Harp.” There’s this award for excellence in artistic or scientific endeavors that is called a “Harp Argent” (the medal has a white harp on a blue background). When someone is given/awarded a Harp, they always mention what the artistic or scientific achievement is. Alyce really is a harp player, and has been an inspiration to aspiring new harp players for the past several years. She is well-deserving of this award, and I was glad my friend at the showers tipped me off to be there. There was much more, but that’s all my brain can remember at this point.

I staggered back to camp—sore, tired, freezing—and very VERY grateful that my camp saved me some dinner. Bless them! I’ve never enjoyed cold couscous and veggies more in my entire life! I couldn’t be bothered to fire up a stove and heat the dinner, which was fine with me. And tomorrow morning they’ll be needing my stove for any breakfast heating since apparently there was a mishap with their stove during dinner. All hail the fire extinguisher! There was a leak from the tubing and the propane bottle, and there was some kind of mini-explosion and/or fire or something. But they got the fire out quickly and easily, and we’ve got three stoves in camp so we’re fine for future meals. I was mildly sorry I missed all the “excitement.”

Finally we all retired around the campfire, where I got to be the “goddess of the hearth” and actually get the fire to catch and hold. [Thanks to Eichling for naming me that years and years ago when we would camp on the beaches near Big Sur. It’s a much nicer nickname than “Pyro.” All those years stoking the Franklin Stove in Ohio have really paid off.] We all sang songs around the fire for hours—including my roomie Mel/Mina, who apparently has *written* nearly half the songs I heard sung by the White Star. That was really impressive—I’d never seen that side of her. (In fact, she and I haven’t spent as much time together in ten months in the apartment as we did in three days camping. We liked it!)

But best of all, I got a chance to be innovative with percussion. The Capt. had the only drum in camp, and Lilya and Miryam were planning to do some Middle Eastern vocal improv for us, like they had done at Royals the night before. So I grabbed two pieces of lumber from the woodpile, probably 1 by 4’s each about 2 feet long, and created a drumming technique from them. I’d hold one flat in my lap, and smack it with the other piece. It worked amazingly well, and after a while I got 3 or 4 unique sounds from each stick (a full DUM, a strong Tek, a lighter tek, and some trills), and could even switch hands a little when I was tired. I had to play primarily right-handed (left flat, right striking) but several times I was able to switch to left-handed play, to give my right hand a short break. I couldn’t do the more complicated finesse notes left-handed, but I could do the DUM-Tek just fine. It was an absolutely blast, and I’ll have to remember that for future campfires.

All in all, a wonderful day.

Yesterday I joked on the phone with Lilya about finding the ship in the dark. She planned to find them easily because, “They’re the loud group” and I reminded her, “Everyone’s loud at war.” And I suggested, “It’s not like you’re going to see masts and sails and know you’re at the docks.” I was wrong. The group next to us actually brings a huge mast and sails, a wooden dock, ropes, and other dock-decorations and sets them up in camp. Sadly they weren’t up last night when I was looking for them, but they’re up today and look amazing.

The “Coffee Bar of SPLEN-dooooor” was a huge hit this morning, although there weren’t really that many people in camp. I actually had to go “hawking my wares” with the neighboring camps. They, of course, were very grateful and I seem to have made best friends with the little 5 & 6 year-old girls who were happy to have hot chocolate with marshmallows for breakfast. There were even some adults who were thrilled to have marshmallows for breakfast, too.

The biggest task today was to go shopping with Lilya and Dillon, since their garb was mostly trapped in their truck [a long story involving a brother, a boat, and no brake fluid on the boat trailer] in a shop somewhere. Since Lilya will be doing my vocal coaching, we’re doing a trade. We found an amazing wool tunic at Ceridwen’s that was so perfect for Dillon, and then after looking at the entire site and finding almost nothing for Lilya, at the last stop we found a treasure trove. There was a choli and pants in silk noil, the thinest linen blouse you’ve ever seen, and the perfect Turkish coat in a flannel lining and a heavy embroidered outer fabric. On walk about we also found a purple and silver metal-thread head wrap.

So they were dressed for the weekend (since Lilya had the sari I gave her last weekend for when it was hot, the new coat for when it was cold) and we could just enjoy whatever we wanted. Lilya had a friend out from Utah (who also knew a mutual friend of ours from Oxnard that had moved several years ago) and she was a blast to hang out with too.

Lots of shopping and some wonderful food court stops later, we were relaxing around the camp for the rest of the afternoon. It was really hot (we are near the Mexican border!) but it wasn’t completely unbearable, and Catriona brings a shaded kitchen when camping, so we all sat around there, relaxing and chatting.

I did take the time to do the afternoon announcements as my volunteer shift for the event, and had a lovely time going camp to camp, delivering the announcements right up close, without shouting. Several people were impressed at my heralding shift, since they’re used to either (a) being ignored and no one comes all the way out where they are or (b) heralds just stand on the road and shout, and never come right up and talk conversationally. And in a brewers’ household, I was offered the yummiest lemonade I’ve ever tasted, since I had to decline the alcohol (“Sorry m’lords, I’m on duty right now.”).

Dinner was on our own this evening, so those of us who didn’t have household dinner arrangements wandered back to the food court where I had the yummiest custom food ever. There was a muscled, slim, good-looking man in a kilt serving Corned Beef and Cabbage who was very sweet and allowed me to substitute chicken for the beef and still get all the veggies that looked so good. It was the most generously portioned meal I’ve seen sold on site, and the yummiest chicken I’ve had in forever. Hats off to Tamlin’s!

Finally, Lilya was planning to sing at the Royal encampment some time that evening, and while we were waiting for everything to get started, we hung out at Duke Edric’s encampment for a while. They were serving “Turkish Coffee” (for real!) and it’s given me some ideas about getting the same for future events.

And I finally got to chat with some folks from Isles that I’ve met in passing and never got to know real well. Ximena is just facinating, and I can’t wait to get to see them at other events in the future.

When everyone finally went over to Royals, there were other bards performing first, and I was just exhausted and frozen. So I begged off and went back to camp for my cloak, but just couldn’t make myself trek across the site *again* for the performances. Instead, I joined the White Star (the ship’s crew) around the campfire to listen to stories and songs and sagas, watch the captain get *way* too drunk on rum, and then collapse in bed for tomorrow.