The Pennsic Report

Tuesday, Aug. 20, 2002
4:54 PM

Well, like everyone else we're back from Pennsic. We're catching up on sleep, enjoying air conditioning and wading through the piles of laundry. It's odd this year to be coming home but not going back to work. I don't have to either fix all the stuff that someone else screwed up while I was gone, or feel like nobody even noticed I was away (I've done both in previous years). I guess that's good in a way but I feel a little purposeless... got to get working on more mosaic projects.

Sounds like most people had a pretty good Pennsic. Mine was just sort of eh. It wasn't spectacularly bad, but it wasn't spectacularly good, either. Maybe it was the weather - too freakin' hot. I think maybe my heat tolerance was shot after doing all the moving in the worst of the heat earlier in the summer. Most days at Pennsic I didn't feel like doing anything. I blew off a lot of the classes I'd planned on taking, just because I didn't feel like walking down to the A&S tents or getting properly dressed (shoes and socks). Only two or three of the classes I did take were really worth it. A couple were OK and one was a half hour of my life I'll never get back. The class was an hour but I left halfway through. Oh well. I'm thinking about teaching next year, if we go.

The rest of Pennsic for me was pretty much hanging out in the common tent with folks, reading, sewing and/or soaking my feet (I quickly figured out that if you let the cooler water warm up a bit first, the bones in your feet don't ache as much). We went to a few parties, but nothing really wild. Helped Francesca set up for the Crossing tropical party, but I didn't stay as long as I'd have liked since my stomach decided it was unhappy. Francesca gave me ginger ale and sent me back to camp to go to bed. Sigh. Thanks, sweetie.

I didn't do a lot of shopping either, given my current limited financial situation - I did buy one book and some very reasonably priced wool, plus a few other small things. I didn't really miss shopping all that much, though some more fabric would have been cool - I just didn't see that many things that spoke to me. That's probably a good thing, or my Pennsic might have been more depressing.

It was very nice to hang out with lots of people, though - folks that I don't necessarily get to spend enough time with at a one-day or weekend-long event. That for me was the best part of Pennsic. And seeing cool people get awards. Congrats to Moira, Balynar, MENG and Padraiga! Sorry, Padraiga, I missed seeing you get elevated, but by Friday night I was done-done and we went into town for dinner. Though, it sounds like Great Court was so late we still could have made it! I wish I'd known that at the time.

I'm very glad to be home, though - being in the heat 24/7 was really draining my energy. Packing out went very smoothly and quickly for us, thankfully, but I had to take water breaks and sit in the truck with the A/C every so often so I wouldn't over heat. It's always a danger for me on packout day. My first Pennsic I really did overheat as we were loading the truck and that really sucked. So I do whatever I can to avoid that.

Anyway, now that we're back we still have plenty to do - a bit more unpacking, some painting (baseboards and trim, mostly) and mosaics for me and jobhunting for Kevin. Oh, I got new license plates for my car. (Segue with me, won't you?) I decided that since I'm not going by Muireann anymore, it wasn't appropriate to have it on my plates. So now I have MOSAICS on my car. Yay! I wanted MOSAICI, which is the Italian word, but that was already taken. Oh well.

Kevin has popped Amadeus in the DVD player, so I'm going to sign off for now.