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The rest of PantheaCon and Monday caching
When we left our diarist, she was going home to bed at a reasonable hour on Saturday. Sunday morning saw her back to see Sia's summer vacation pix from Ephesus. Unfortunately, her computer had died and she had to talk from postcards and tour books. It was still fun to hear about her travels. Then it was back to the suite to do my interview. Afterward we were sitting around and my coven brother D. got to talking about how he got into the Craft and generally about his history. We have circled together for close to two decades and I still learned things. Rachael wants to interview him, of course, but he wanted to talk off camera and I am so glad I was able to sit in and hear it. Of course this did mean I came in about half way through Don's talk on Recent Discoveries in Pagan Mesopotamia. I had seen the pictures when Don & Anna and Glenn got back from Turkey but I wouldn't have minded hearing the presentation. The site, whose name I can't recall, is older than Catal Huyuk and dates to just after the last ice age. There are representations of many animals and the stonework is of very good quality and precision.
After Don, Philip Heselton spoke on Gardnerian History. It was mostly things from his books but he also shared some of the poems and other things from his research. It was interesting to see the photographs of the people and places Gardner knew. They had a DVD with the 4 minute clip of the BBC interview with Gerald but they couldn't get it to work through the projector. Hopefully, I'll get to see it on someone's computer sometime. I think I saw it back in 1984 when visiting the Farrars in Ireland. We heard the audio for sure and I'm not sure about the video.
Then it was time to start preparing for the "Brighid ritual, Brigid's Forge/Brigid's Well". We dressed and grounded together and then headed in small groups to meet up at the elevator lobbies. We processed through the hotel chanting from the Carmina Gadelica as planned. I'd be interested to hear what folks thought about that. I thought we did very well and it was very moving for me... until we hit the stairs. We had gone from three ranks to single file to pass the Coffee Garden which made it harder to hear each other... and then the effort of climbing stairs just knocked us right off our lines. We firmed up as we reached the top but I'm not sure I'd plan it that way again. OTOH, I can't think of a good alternative.
We arrived at the doors still chanting and I think it must have taken us less time than we imagined because people were still very much coming into the room. We stood in the doorway and declaimed a bit more and then came in to hallow the space. My impression is that the room was uncomfortably full. We were in a single small ballroom and our attendance was good. I had been worried that the ritual to too theatrical and that we would carry the non-rehearsed participants but I could hear appropriate reactions and certainly the feedback I got afterward indicated that folks were moved. It was a wonderful culmination to months of work for me and I'm glad it is over. It was a pleasure working with people from so many different traditions.
Afterward![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
erynn999, lysana, blackfyr and I were going to get together. They went for sushi in the "quiet bar" area which was anything but quiet and I retreated back to the suite for some cold cuts that the Elderflower folks had donated to us. Summer sausage and cheese on crackers was much more what I needed to ground than a bar with olympics playing in the background. Erynn came up later and we got a bit of a chance to visit. I am so glad she was able to attend this con! My friend slackerstalker also arrived on Sunday (having gone to a stitcher's convention on Saturday) and we got a bit of hang out time. I stayed up visiting quite late but still make it back to the hotel Monday morning at 9am for Erynn's talk on Celtic Reconstruction 101. After that and a quick trip through the dealer's room where I seriously depleted my cash reserves (and got one of my own georged bills back but can't hit it, of course). saffronrose said she saw someone get a georged $2 in change but I didn't get any wilds myself.
slackerstalker and I headed off caching and did the series along the San Tomas Aquino Creek trail. There are some pictures in my logs - Bridge to the Past, Great America Station and just a silly one at San Tomas Aquino Creek Trail: End of the trail. I loved the burrowing owl coming to check us out! It was a beautiful, beautiful day for being out walking and caching.
Monday night Russell and I watched (well, skimmed) the Olympic opening ceremonies. Wow, that was surreal. Dancing cows?! *laugh* I liked that the Olympic flag was carried in by women activists/celebrities. And that Yoko Ono was there talking about peace. On another Olympic topic, I was really moved that US speedskater Joey Cheek donated his prize money to a Sudanese relief project for Darfur. I did a really bad job of taping Olympics this year. I only caught bits and pieces. I really liked the French ice dancers who skated to Les Mis last night. Beautiful program!
And on to today - those who hang out with me in realspace know... I play a lot of the game Bookworm on my palm device. I have even posted my high score to the Astraware site over the years, though it doesn't look like my previous high score was really my highest which was in the 540,000 range. Today I found out that above 600,000 one goes from Grand Archivist to Vocabulist. I assume that above 650,000 one will be a Grand Vocabulist. Perhaps I'll find out sometime.
Your previous high score (Bookworm) was 501850, ranked 20.
The Bookworm high score table has been updated with your new score of 632580.
You're now at ranked 12 in the high score table!
Of course the highest scorer is at 1,860,560 so I potentially have quite a way to go!
Saw a variation of this limerick in a sig line of fellow cacher Phoenix Rose, Kurt & I cleaned up the scansion a bit but we just loved it so I'm putting it here to remember.
An amorous Vampire, Von Stroom
Had a Succubus in his bedroom,
They argued all night
Over who had the right
To drain away what
And from whom
After Don, Philip Heselton spoke on Gardnerian History. It was mostly things from his books but he also shared some of the poems and other things from his research. It was interesting to see the photographs of the people and places Gardner knew. They had a DVD with the 4 minute clip of the BBC interview with Gerald but they couldn't get it to work through the projector. Hopefully, I'll get to see it on someone's computer sometime. I think I saw it back in 1984 when visiting the Farrars in Ireland. We heard the audio for sure and I'm not sure about the video.
Then it was time to start preparing for the "Brighid ritual, Brigid's Forge/Brigid's Well". We dressed and grounded together and then headed in small groups to meet up at the elevator lobbies. We processed through the hotel chanting from the Carmina Gadelica as planned. I'd be interested to hear what folks thought about that. I thought we did very well and it was very moving for me... until we hit the stairs. We had gone from three ranks to single file to pass the Coffee Garden which made it harder to hear each other... and then the effort of climbing stairs just knocked us right off our lines. We firmed up as we reached the top but I'm not sure I'd plan it that way again. OTOH, I can't think of a good alternative.
We arrived at the doors still chanting and I think it must have taken us less time than we imagined because people were still very much coming into the room. We stood in the doorway and declaimed a bit more and then came in to hallow the space. My impression is that the room was uncomfortably full. We were in a single small ballroom and our attendance was good. I had been worried that the ritual to too theatrical and that we would carry the non-rehearsed participants but I could hear appropriate reactions and certainly the feedback I got afterward indicated that folks were moved. It was a wonderful culmination to months of work for me and I'm glad it is over. It was a pleasure working with people from so many different traditions.
Afterward
erynn999, lysana, blackfyr and I were going to get together. They went for sushi in the "quiet bar" area which was anything but quiet and I retreated back to the suite for some cold cuts that the Elderflower folks had donated to us. Summer sausage and cheese on crackers was much more what I needed to ground than a bar with olympics playing in the background. Erynn came up later and we got a bit of a chance to visit. I am so glad she was able to attend this con! My friend slackerstalker also arrived on Sunday (having gone to a stitcher's convention on Saturday) and we got a bit of hang out time. I stayed up visiting quite late but still make it back to the hotel Monday morning at 9am for Erynn's talk on Celtic Reconstruction 101. After that and a quick trip through the dealer's room where I seriously depleted my cash reserves (and got one of my own georged bills back but can't hit it, of course). saffronrose said she saw someone get a georged $2 in change but I didn't get any wilds myself. slackerstalker and I headed off caching and did the series along the San Tomas Aquino Creek trail. There are some pictures in my logs - Bridge to the Past, Great America Station and just a silly one at San Tomas Aquino Creek Trail: End of the trail. I loved the burrowing owl coming to check us out! It was a beautiful, beautiful day for being out walking and caching.Monday night Russell and I watched (well, skimmed) the Olympic opening ceremonies. Wow, that was surreal. Dancing cows?! *laugh* I liked that the Olympic flag was carried in by women activists/celebrities. And that Yoko Ono was there talking about peace. On another Olympic topic, I was really moved that US speedskater Joey Cheek donated his prize money to a Sudanese relief project for Darfur. I did a really bad job of taping Olympics this year. I only caught bits and pieces. I really liked the French ice dancers who skated to Les Mis last night. Beautiful program!
And on to today - those who hang out with me in realspace know... I play a lot of the game Bookworm on my palm device. I have even posted my high score to the Astraware site over the years, though it doesn't look like my previous high score was really my highest which was in the 540,000 range. Today I found out that above 600,000 one goes from Grand Archivist to Vocabulist. I assume that above 650,000 one will be a Grand Vocabulist. Perhaps I'll find out sometime.
Your previous high score (Bookworm) was 501850, ranked 20.
The Bookworm high score table has been updated with your new score of 632580.
You're now at ranked 12 in the high score table!
Of course the highest scorer is at 1,860,560 so I potentially have quite a way to go!
Saw a variation of this limerick in a sig line of fellow cacher Phoenix Rose, Kurt & I cleaned up the scansion a bit but we just loved it so I'm putting it here to remember.
An amorous Vampire, Von Stroom
Had a Succubus in his bedroom,
They argued all night
Over who had the right
To drain away what
And from whom