Monday at Pennsic was fabulous. We came into the site around noon, knowing we would be there all day. The weather was fine but cloudy to start. There was a moment of “you have to be kidding!” when it started to rain as we approached the site, but the showers were very light, and lasted only a minute or two. So the site actually got a day (sunny even come afternoon) to dry out. This was a good thing. They had opened a arking lot up by the battlefield, as the main parking lot was too muddy to be passable (something we could attest to after our nnarrow escape the night before).
After getting some food in Ye Olde Food Court we split up. Judith went to hook up with Anne and do some shopping, I went off to prowl on my own. I spent a good chunk of time chatting with Yumi and Kay. Kay (his wife) is really interesting. She just wrote a book on thumbrings (picked up a copy), and she is an academic with a specialty in anthro/history of religion. Many long and enjoyable conversations ensued. I was also looking for advice on good packaging materials so I can take the bows as checked luggage. Looks like I will be out looking for empty muffler boxes this morning before heading into the site.
At 6 PM we (Anne, Judith, Elizabeth and Marion) went to a bellydance performance by the Desert Moon Dancers in the performance tent. It was very interesting. They had a male dancer (Dinsdale) who was quite good, and it was interesting to see how differently his performance was choreographed, even though he was using the same basic moves. He had much better shoulder control than I, something I must work on.
Then we made our way over to Locleven for dinner, a very tasty beef chili. We hung out chatting until dark, at which point Anne and Karl headed back to EK Royal to put the kids to bed. After another 30-40 minutes Judith and I followed. We hung out at EK Royal until the kids were finally asleep. (Listening as Lucan had a conversation with his household about the differences between Masters at Arms and Knights, and the meaning of oaths and featy- deeply fascinating. It also made me think a good bit about the horde and our own internal honor and loyalty structures.)
Then Anne, Judith and I got dressed up, and went out dancing. At this point those of you who know me well will start to think that I was either (A) under the influence of too much coffee, or (B) an imperfect alien-clone replacement. The three of us walked around looking for dance parties. We started around the lake where we found Mardi Gras going on. I walked up to their gate gaurd and announced “we are dancers, let us in”, and they did! The fire circle was packed tight, the fire was hot, and the drums seemed to have two competing tempos. Even so it was fun for awhile. People were very drunk. I danced with one woman for awhile who was enthusiastic, but didn’t know much bellydance. So she tried to follow my lead, laughing all the while. It was a hoot. There was also a guy who kept yelling “use manly hands!” at me. Every time he did so I danced at him in a girlier and girlier fashion. It was a hoot!
After Mardi Gras we stuck our heads into another packed party, but decided to move on. We evntually found a smallish party (40-60 people, 6 or so drummers) up on the hill near Locleven (what was formall Tuchux hill before they were banished). We probably spent a good hour there dancing. Most of the women were just dancing with themselves, though one woman early on was willing to dance with me. So Anne and I started dancing together a good bit. A year of classes where i had been trained to follow her lead meant that I could match what she was doing in so-close-to-realtime it looked planned. It was really fun. Though at one point we were doing a banding-over-backwards snake arm, where I was behind Anne. Unfortunately the fire was behind me. As I straightened back up I whispered “burning! Burning!” to Anne, and quickly cameled to a cooler location. But all good performances have the risk of imolation, right? :)
Once the drummers left, we headed out to the sarengeti in search of more parties. It was after midnight at this point. But it was dead quite, no sounds of drums to draw us in. So we called it a night. I went back with Anne to EK Royal to pick up Judiths basket, which had the car keys. Lucan was still talkign with a bunch of his household people as we came in. Anne told them that we had just gotten back from fire-circle hopping, at which point I gave a quick shimmy. The knight I was standing behind bent his head back to give me a look, and gave a jerk of surprise saying “that wasn’t what I expected”. Hoot!!! Pretty darn funny.
Today we will bring the digital camera again and try to get some more Pennsic pictures.