Dwarf Planet in Purple

In the waning hours of 2023 I wrote a post on my Lady Patricia of Trakai blog: https://ladypatriciaoftrakai.blogspot.com/2023/12/wrapping-up-calendar-year.html. I probably should write another post about more SCA stuff.

I hope everyone had a good New Year's holiday. I did things a little differently: after the Rose Parade (gotta watch that on TV per family-of-origin tradition), I went to a banner-painting session here in Storvik. We painted a couple of silk "Inspiration" banners for our current Queen to bestow upon people who inspire her in her service. (The artist, Dame Emma, had already drawn the outlines of the artwork on the silk, so it was like a giant group coloring project.) It was tons of fun.

In a way, the activity served to commemorate my personal milestone as of yesterday: the 20th anniversary of my first SCA event ever. Last night I also gave a Toastmasters talk on my late heraldry teacher, Pedro, who was one of the people I met that momentous day.

So ... what have I been doing with the rest of my life, the part that isn't constantly doomscrolling about politics?

(Doomscrolling ... another word that has entered the language in the past year or so.)

The boy toy and I are still in good health. Although neither of us has been tested for covid-19, I don't think we have it. Certainly we have had no symptoms. I have had a dry morning cough for years, long before the pandemic started, but I wouldn't be surprised if it is an early marker of heart failure, compounded by years of exposure to second-hand smoke. I am my mother's daughter.

(On both sides of my family, I have many more male relatives than female relatives. My mother's only sister drank herself to death at age 60. I'm 61.)

Julia the cat is in good health, too, although I should probably take her for a checkup, as she is getting up there in years.

We still haven't heard whether we will be getting Stove #3, so at some point I'll have to decide whether to pay to have Stove #2 repaired. But we are still eating well around here. On Sunday I baked a tourtiere -- French Canadian meat pie -- from the late Alex Trebek's recipe. I have no shortage of tourtiere recipes in my French Canadian cookbook -- it's one of those things that each family makes slightly differently. But Alex's recipe tasted awesome, and I'll certainly make it again.

On Thursday the 14th, the boy toy and I dared to travel to Delaware for a few hours. It was the first time I'd set foot outside Maryland since the last week of December 2019. We drove on I-95 as far as a certain rest stop so I could take the obligatory tourist photo.



Next, we drove around the University of Delaware campus, which reminded me somewhat of the campuses of the University of Maryland and UMass-Amherst. The opposite thing but the same thing, as one of my past housemates would have said. We ate lunch at a socially distanced Irish pub in Middletown before heading home.

Church is ... church. We have our Zoom-based services every Sunday morning. We are asking the UUA to consider us for a developmental ministry, in which we would spend several years trying to fix our problems.

The SCA is plugging along in virtual space. On the 9th we had Kingdom Twelfth Night; I need to finish writing that up for my "Lady Patricia of Trakai" blog. This coming weekend we have another "needles and fiber" weekend where we challenge each other to get a sewing or fiber-arts project done. Their Majesties will also hold a virtual court, streaming on YouTube.

Toastmasters is ... Toastmasters. Our local club has meetings on the same nights of the week as we did in the Before Times, and most of us have adapted pretty well to the Zoom life, I'd say.

All in all, I feel about as busy as I did before the pandemic. I'm just not burning as much gasoline to get there.

And I am THRILLED that we are down to the last 24 hours of the orange cheeto's administration! It's the Final Countdown!

Over and out.

First of all: Happy Birthday, wookiemonster!!!

The year 2020 is rapidly going away, or at least the parts of the year that spice up life. The SCA's governing board made it official today: no in-person events in North America until next February. That relieves some of the stress associated with uncertainty. Also, it heads off any possible problems with people flocking from state to state in search of that one event that didn't get canceled. And virtual events are perfectly permissible, so we in Atlantia will have an online "Pennsic in Your Backyard" weekend in August and another virtual University of Atlantia in September.

But still. This is a long, long time for an organization that relies so heavily on interpersonal social events to pause those events. How will this affect membership numbers? Obviously people like me are hardcore diehards, but what about the people who usually attend events once or twice a year and don't have time for a lot of the activities that happen between events?

So, no SCA events for the rest of 2020, and Chessiecon (which didn't happen in 2019 because the hotel's management imploded) is apparently going online only, though this hasn't been widely publicized yet. And no Christmas pageant by the Washington Revels because the group would have had to start rehearsing a couple of months ago. The huge Toastmasters international convention will be virtual, not that I could have afforded to go to Paris, even though I have a valid passport.

Right now the only thing still "on, as normal" is Philcon, and I wonder how long that's going to stay that way. I know that it's a pretty small and cozy convention these days, and the urge to memorialize the late Hugh Casey (a pillar of the Philcon community) will be great. But, despite the name, Philadelphia's SF con happens in Cherry Hill, NJ, and both Maryland (where I live) and Virginia (where R. lives) are both on New Jersey's list of travel restrictions. So we would have to self-quarantine for two weeks to attend a two-day convention. Uh, I don't see THAT happening....

On Monday, Labor Day, I posted the following tribute on Facebook. I *meant* to copy it here too, but I got tired later in the day.

One hundred years ago TODAY, my Uncle Rene was born. Yes, my father and one of my uncles were born just four days apart in the same year. Uncle Rene was my *maternal* uncle, just so you're not totally confused.

Most people pronounce "Rene" as "reh-NAY," same as "Renee," but my family of French Canadian Americans always pronounced my uncle's name as "RAY-nee." At any rate, my Uncle Rene was the third of six children born to a couple of residents of a heavily French Canadian neighborhood in Fitchburg, Massachusetts.

Rene grew up to be the tallest of his siblings and was always a big high-strung. His hair stood up straight on top of his head, and he wore thick glasses. He left school after the eighth grade because by then it was the Depression. At some point he lost the tip of his right middle finger to some sort of tool or machine. He had only the tiniest stump of nail on that finger.

As you can see from the [Facebook] photo, Uncle Rene joined the service during World War II, but I don't think he stayed on the front lines long. My mother always said he had "shellshock." I think he was shipped home to recuperate. I have a little satin pillow that is printed with the words "For Mom from Fort Belvoir."

Rene never married or had kids, but lived with his mother (my grandmother) and took care of her as she aged. She signed the house over to him before she died, so he would always have a place to live. He worked as a janitor at Fitchburg State College (as Diane N*** [a former member of my church who attended Fitchburg State] can attest) until he retired.

My Dad and Uncle Rene were good friends and were in a bowling league together. One Sunday afternoon they scared my Mom -- they went down to the local airport and convinced someone to take them up on his small plane for a cruise around southern New Hampshire. Better to seek forgiveness afterward than to try to get permission beforehand....

By 1987 Uncle Rene and my mother were the last of their siblings left alive. They were the third and fourth kids in the family, and I think my mother was closer to him than to her other siblings. He died at age 79, and my Mom died four weeks later.

Happy 100th Birthday, Uncle Rene.

* * * * *

On Monday I had gotten up early to march in the Labor Day parade as a member (really, president) of the local Toastmasters Club. I should really start a DW/LJ tag for Toastmasters, as that's probably going to be a bigger part of my life for the rest of the "club year" (i.e., until next June 30). The town where I live was built as a New Deal project 80 years ago, so yeah, we love our Labor Day festivities. It's traditional for marchers to toss candy to the children on the sidelines, and some of them bring bags, almost like Halloween trick-or-treating.

This is the third year I marched in the parade with the Toastmasters. It's really quite fun, and it's not a lengthy parade at all. This year's event had a TON of entries for local politicians. The area is so heavily Democratic that next year's primary (I think it will be in June) is tantamount to election. So, yeah, everybody wanted to "press the flesh."

At the elementary school book sale at the Labor Day festival, I scored three books, including The Civilization of the Goddess by Marija Gimbutas -- list price $60 when it came out. I think I paid $8 for the three books and the reusable tote bag to carry them in. Deal!

At the parade I scored coupons for a free Mission BBQ sandwich and a free slice of Three Brothers pizza. So I think I came out even, more or less.

* * * * *

I was supposed to have a small surgical procedure today (to remove a small BENIGN lump), but the hospital arbitrarily rescheduled it to next Tuesday, without bothering to TELL me until I made inquiries late yesterday afternoon. *grumble*

I had explicitly made no commitments to anything for the coming weekend, because I figured I was going to spend the weekend loafing around and sleeping off the painkillers. Now, however, what to do? In addition, money is a bit tight again, since I paid off some crucial bills.

Although I've been invited to attend no less than three different SCA events in three different states, I think I'll stick closer to home this weekend. Maybe I'll catch up on some projects here. I really hadn't planned on going to an event until Battle on the Bay, which is the weekend of Sept. 22-24.

* * * * *

I haven't been in touch with Tall Dancer a lot lately, but he called twice this afternoon. Apparently he is on a long drive from Georgia to Tennessee for a small relax-a-con with friends. And he just got back from Florida to celebrate his grandmother's 95th birthday. I do hope his relatives are safe during Hurricane Irma.