one puff and the girl goes wacky? it's kind of far-fetched!
So...there are going to be muzzy details, because I've had a day of recovery mixed with the "Ooh hey, I came home sick" realization, but...this is what happened. Mostly. :)
We arrived late last Thursday, due to several factors--leaving late, plus Athena having a seizure, got us on the road about two, instead of around ten. We got to the site at five, to find it only partially set up. evildman, supposedly getting there at opening of Gate, also got there late, so we were very disorganized.
It took longer than I expected to get everything set up--our tent wasn't up, as expected, but neither was the Captain's tent and sunshade, which we were all sort of hoping to be set up at that point, Athena being ill and all. So a few of us set to putting it up, holding onto the center poles while the rest of the poles and guide lines went up.
We were right on the main dock, across from Merchants' Row, and we were between the Spanish ship La Puta de Diablo and Clan McThulhu. The ships of Dragons' Blood and Mer Serene filled out the row, with the Pirates of the Columbia pulling in late. Everyone else was not on the dock, basically. It was kind of cool. (Even though the folks on Sobriety Hill were much closer to both constant shade and the showers, as it turned out.)
After we finished setting up our tent, the Captain's tent and shade, several chairs and part of the galley, we were all exhausted, and pretty much parted out water and sat until the evening grew cool. As evening drifted into night, we met a young gentleman called Nobody, the ship's cat of Dragons' Blood, Brie, and a sturdily muscled member of Fire & Steel named Hawk. Brie got a tad intoxicated, and spent the evening gradually shedding clothing alongside three other members of our crew. Huzzah for boobies!
Friday, by comparison, was rather uneventful, but Cat and I wandered up to the Gate and volunteered to direct traffic for a few hours as celebrants entered the grounds. Along the way we stopped at the Dancing Gypsy, wherein I found a pair of vertically striped harem sailor pants for $18. We also picked up a pale lavender and a pale blue feather for my new straw hat. (Which I then spent most of the rest of the weekend loaning out to people, amusingly enough. Oddities abound.) We grabbed a couple of iced teas--in styrofoam cups--from the Gypsy, and headed back to camp. The rest of the day passed quietly until we went to see Fire & Steel's performance, and were absolutely blown away. I am officially in love with steel-wool poi fire dancing.
Saturday dawned, and Cat realized there was another wandering member of the Tortured Rose about--a young submissive named Etain. And a bouncy disobedient handful she was, for the next few days. Also, for some reason, she seemed to adopt me as...gods, I don't know, replacement mom? Aunt substitute? I have no idea. (My cousin says whatever I have that causes strange underaged beings to gravitate to me, we should bottle it...but then I remind her that if we did, we'd be arrested for something relating to that.) With Etain, we wandered Merchants' Row, spoke with several merchants--including the woman who runs Realm of Regalia, the best place ever to buy trim that I know of...about an idea she has called Reclaim the Dream. She's looking for someone to do a simple design that can be carved in stamps, so she can stamp simple badges and the like. She explains it thusly--everyone she's ever spoken to that loved the SCA, said it was because of "the people". And everyone she's ever spoken to that has left the SCA, left it because of "the politics". She thinks it's high time that the politics left the SCA, that the SCA return to what it once was--people getting together with a common interest, for fun.
I think she's absolutely right.
Later on Saturday night, the Captain and crew realized that, in addition to me, there was a fellow named Izzy (a Moorish alchemist of fine vintage who handmade ouzo of the gods and played didgeridoo), who wanted to join our haphazard crew, and Rowan's friend Amberlynn also wished to join, plus a tall rangy fellow named Scooby...which made four. So there was discussion around the fire, while much was imbibed, of how they were going to initiate us. Amberlynn got off easiest--she was quite gently flogged (by Captain Papaeus, evildman our Quartermaster, my cousin Captain Chaos, of the Weasel War Dance, and Cat, as First Mate and representative of mistress_weaver's ship, the Tortured Rose), with our horsehair flogger. Then Scooby and Izzy got whacked, this time with Captain Chaos and Cat taking turns on the horsehair, and evildman using a chainmail flogger of his own design.
Then it was my turn. I turned my back to the folks waiting, in the middle of the dock, and grabbed roomie Mike's shoulders. The cousin chose to hit me with a boffer--a decidedly strange sensation--then my Captain flogged me with the horsehair, then Cat and evildman took their prescribed twelve strokes together with the horsehair and the chainmail. And then they didn't stop, for at least twenty more strokes.
Bastards. :)
After that was more drinking, and long after that was me throwing up carefully in one of the privies, and between, there was some vocal exhortation as to who could make louder squealing noises, myself or one of the Quartermaster's wenches. (It wasn't intentional; it just...happened. Sexual synchronicity?)
Sunday dawned, I rose and had breakfast, then realized if I wanted it to stay down, I had to go lay back down. A couple hours of laying quietly and breathing, and taking small sips of water, calmed the rebellious stomach and I was able to get up and get on with my day. Sunday featured the second hottest day on site (Thursday being the hottest, equivalent to breathing liquid metal), and I must have walked back to our little water-hose (in the center of our encampment) and soaked my head about eight times. I gave up on headgear and hat, and just lay in a limp bundle until night arrived, bringing with it cooler breezes.
Also, about one that day, a runner came and found us and presented me with a certificate for the Knotty Court--Cat and I were summoned. When we got there, the staff of the event spent some considerable time handing out presents for everyone who'd worked the Gate--for any period of time. Cat and I both got a little star-shaped box with a magnetic lid, hand-painted. Cat's has butterflies, terribly symbolic, and mine has stars and flowers. Cat also won the raffle for the treasure chest that had been going for the entire weekend, and since one of the staff women had begged, if we won, to give her the butterscotch amber ring--that fit neither one of us--we promptly did so, striking the bargain that at next year's SeaDogs, we'll be receiving drinks and snow cones for the entire weekend. Damn. She's planning on giving the ring to her sister; we get hydration for five days next year. I think we both came out ahead. :)
That night, a huge bonfire was set up on one side of the boffer field, and flared high into the night until dawn. Folks sang and danced and played tablero and generally had a great deal of fun burning all the firewood left on-site. And then it was Monday, and everyone dispiritedly started breaking down--because none of us, in any encampment, wanted to go home. evildman and his wenches had already left, as well as Drake and Rowan and Amberlynn, on Sunday, and early morning Monday, Praxis and new cabinboy Scooby and the gang from the old same place took off--leaving my Captain, Athena, and Cat and I to break down the galley, our tent and the Captain's tent and sunshade, and clean up everything left on site. It was a singularly arduous task for four tired people, two of us still hobbling about on canes--but we did it. I was quite proud of us for doing so, too.
And that was it, really. We stopped by A&W on the way home for cold drinks and hot food, and off we went to return to reality. Which, you know, doesn't feel quite as real as SeaDogs did.
And this:
is going to be the new ship's symbol of the Wayward Wench. Skull and crossed floggers. It's oddly apropos. :)
Since this got really long, I'm going to post linky-stuph and fashion pics later. Sorry, but I have this length thing. Also, I now have this "overtired" thing, because it's now 5:33 in the morning--I've been typing this in for a long-ass time. I gotta go sleep!
We arrived late last Thursday, due to several factors--leaving late, plus Athena having a seizure, got us on the road about two, instead of around ten. We got to the site at five, to find it only partially set up. evildman, supposedly getting there at opening of Gate, also got there late, so we were very disorganized.
It took longer than I expected to get everything set up--our tent wasn't up, as expected, but neither was the Captain's tent and sunshade, which we were all sort of hoping to be set up at that point, Athena being ill and all. So a few of us set to putting it up, holding onto the center poles while the rest of the poles and guide lines went up.
We were right on the main dock, across from Merchants' Row, and we were between the Spanish ship La Puta de Diablo and Clan McThulhu. The ships of Dragons' Blood and Mer Serene filled out the row, with the Pirates of the Columbia pulling in late. Everyone else was not on the dock, basically. It was kind of cool. (Even though the folks on Sobriety Hill were much closer to both constant shade and the showers, as it turned out.)
After we finished setting up our tent, the Captain's tent and shade, several chairs and part of the galley, we were all exhausted, and pretty much parted out water and sat until the evening grew cool. As evening drifted into night, we met a young gentleman called Nobody, the ship's cat of Dragons' Blood, Brie, and a sturdily muscled member of Fire & Steel named Hawk. Brie got a tad intoxicated, and spent the evening gradually shedding clothing alongside three other members of our crew. Huzzah for boobies!
Friday, by comparison, was rather uneventful, but Cat and I wandered up to the Gate and volunteered to direct traffic for a few hours as celebrants entered the grounds. Along the way we stopped at the Dancing Gypsy, wherein I found a pair of vertically striped harem sailor pants for $18. We also picked up a pale lavender and a pale blue feather for my new straw hat. (Which I then spent most of the rest of the weekend loaning out to people, amusingly enough. Oddities abound.) We grabbed a couple of iced teas--in styrofoam cups--from the Gypsy, and headed back to camp. The rest of the day passed quietly until we went to see Fire & Steel's performance, and were absolutely blown away. I am officially in love with steel-wool poi fire dancing.
Saturday dawned, and Cat realized there was another wandering member of the Tortured Rose about--a young submissive named Etain. And a bouncy disobedient handful she was, for the next few days. Also, for some reason, she seemed to adopt me as...gods, I don't know, replacement mom? Aunt substitute? I have no idea. (My cousin says whatever I have that causes strange underaged beings to gravitate to me, we should bottle it...but then I remind her that if we did, we'd be arrested for something relating to that.) With Etain, we wandered Merchants' Row, spoke with several merchants--including the woman who runs Realm of Regalia, the best place ever to buy trim that I know of...about an idea she has called Reclaim the Dream. She's looking for someone to do a simple design that can be carved in stamps, so she can stamp simple badges and the like. She explains it thusly--everyone she's ever spoken to that loved the SCA, said it was because of "the people". And everyone she's ever spoken to that has left the SCA, left it because of "the politics". She thinks it's high time that the politics left the SCA, that the SCA return to what it once was--people getting together with a common interest, for fun.
I think she's absolutely right.
Later on Saturday night, the Captain and crew realized that, in addition to me, there was a fellow named Izzy (a Moorish alchemist of fine vintage who handmade ouzo of the gods and played didgeridoo), who wanted to join our haphazard crew, and Rowan's friend Amberlynn also wished to join, plus a tall rangy fellow named Scooby...which made four. So there was discussion around the fire, while much was imbibed, of how they were going to initiate us. Amberlynn got off easiest--she was quite gently flogged (by Captain Papaeus, evildman our Quartermaster, my cousin Captain Chaos, of the Weasel War Dance, and Cat, as First Mate and representative of mistress_weaver's ship, the Tortured Rose), with our horsehair flogger. Then Scooby and Izzy got whacked, this time with Captain Chaos and Cat taking turns on the horsehair, and evildman using a chainmail flogger of his own design.
Then it was my turn. I turned my back to the folks waiting, in the middle of the dock, and grabbed roomie Mike's shoulders. The cousin chose to hit me with a boffer--a decidedly strange sensation--then my Captain flogged me with the horsehair, then Cat and evildman took their prescribed twelve strokes together with the horsehair and the chainmail. And then they didn't stop, for at least twenty more strokes.
Bastards. :)
After that was more drinking, and long after that was me throwing up carefully in one of the privies, and between, there was some vocal exhortation as to who could make louder squealing noises, myself or one of the Quartermaster's wenches. (It wasn't intentional; it just...happened. Sexual synchronicity?)
Sunday dawned, I rose and had breakfast, then realized if I wanted it to stay down, I had to go lay back down. A couple hours of laying quietly and breathing, and taking small sips of water, calmed the rebellious stomach and I was able to get up and get on with my day. Sunday featured the second hottest day on site (Thursday being the hottest, equivalent to breathing liquid metal), and I must have walked back to our little water-hose (in the center of our encampment) and soaked my head about eight times. I gave up on headgear and hat, and just lay in a limp bundle until night arrived, bringing with it cooler breezes.
Also, about one that day, a runner came and found us and presented me with a certificate for the Knotty Court--Cat and I were summoned. When we got there, the staff of the event spent some considerable time handing out presents for everyone who'd worked the Gate--for any period of time. Cat and I both got a little star-shaped box with a magnetic lid, hand-painted. Cat's has butterflies, terribly symbolic, and mine has stars and flowers. Cat also won the raffle for the treasure chest that had been going for the entire weekend, and since one of the staff women had begged, if we won, to give her the butterscotch amber ring--that fit neither one of us--we promptly did so, striking the bargain that at next year's SeaDogs, we'll be receiving drinks and snow cones for the entire weekend. Damn. She's planning on giving the ring to her sister; we get hydration for five days next year. I think we both came out ahead. :)
That night, a huge bonfire was set up on one side of the boffer field, and flared high into the night until dawn. Folks sang and danced and played tablero and generally had a great deal of fun burning all the firewood left on-site. And then it was Monday, and everyone dispiritedly started breaking down--because none of us, in any encampment, wanted to go home. evildman and his wenches had already left, as well as Drake and Rowan and Amberlynn, on Sunday, and early morning Monday, Praxis and new cabinboy Scooby and the gang from the old same place took off--leaving my Captain, Athena, and Cat and I to break down the galley, our tent and the Captain's tent and sunshade, and clean up everything left on site. It was a singularly arduous task for four tired people, two of us still hobbling about on canes--but we did it. I was quite proud of us for doing so, too.
And that was it, really. We stopped by A&W on the way home for cold drinks and hot food, and off we went to return to reality. Which, you know, doesn't feel quite as real as SeaDogs did.
And this:
is going to be the new ship's symbol of the Wayward Wench. Skull and crossed floggers. It's oddly apropos. :)
Since this got really long, I'm going to post linky-stuph and fashion pics later. Sorry, but I have this length thing. Also, I now have this "overtired" thing, because it's now 5:33 in the morning--I've been typing this in for a long-ass time. I gotta go sleep!