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Revisiting the Battle of Clontarf
Mar. 30th, 2008 11:17 pmWhat a way to ruin your face! Or, maybe just my face since Eadric and James deB. and everyone else seemed to have fared well. I, on the other hand, am sun & wind burned bad enough that my face is blistering and swollen. My nose right now looks as if I'd gotten in a fight. It's good that I'm not vain about my looks. (Didja note the qualifier?)
The demo was small, really small. In a little national park in Havre de Grace, MD. I got lost every time I left the event grounds but could always find my way to it. It just took me a while to find my way to my hotel. :) The weather was cloudy with the highs in the high 40s. I don't think we topped 50 degrees fahrenheit but with garb on, who noticed? As long as your ears were protected from the breeze it was pretty darn comfortable. The visitors were all bundled up in poofy jackets and hoods but the reenactors seemed fine. There is something to be said about linen and wool.
I confirmed in the first hour that my fears about attempting to cook while going without my glasses were spot-on. Thank goodness for Thyre and Mandy (she came from Indiana), who took over the fire and the knives so I didn't hurt myself or give a type of show for the tourists that we wouldn't want - "Bleeding and Burnt Viking Wife" wouldn't play as well as other things I think.
We had fun experimenting with the cooking forms and Eadric, bless his heart, used our fire to cook his mid-day meal so we got a nice primer on how to use pottery in the fire. Mandy was enthralled - she is a really good demo cook but had not attempted that before. He surprised her with a pot as a gift for coming out from Indiana for the demo - I think it will not be pristine for long.
( Attacked by a seawolf )
We were visited by some SCA folks and of course, I didn't recognise them in their civvies. The Longship Company camped next to us, which was great, and the VMAA closed the arc that was the Viking Camps. The Irish camped opposite us, naturally. And in a bid to be historically accurate ('cause it wouldn't be laziness, would it?) the Viking folks bugged out Sunday morning leaving the more-local Irish folks to hold down the fort for the second day of demoing. (Actually, except for James, the Viking folks were all from no less than 6 hours away, some 12 or 20 hours away and except for me, all of them have work tomorrow. So.... but it made me grin to see we were being historically accurate. As it were.)
So that's it, sort of. I had fun, got to see people I haven't seen since last October and got to hang out with local ones I rarely get time with. We experimented with read-about-but-not-tried cooking techniques (clay pot cooking wasn't the only thing we tried) and hung out Saturday night with reenactors telling hilarious stories until some of us were at the shivering-and-can't-stop stage of the evening. Apparently, we should have drank with them - they were feeling no pain!
It was allllllll-llll good.
Oh, and I finally passed my history test. :)
The demo was small, really small. In a little national park in Havre de Grace, MD. I got lost every time I left the event grounds but could always find my way to it. It just took me a while to find my way to my hotel. :) The weather was cloudy with the highs in the high 40s. I don't think we topped 50 degrees fahrenheit but with garb on, who noticed? As long as your ears were protected from the breeze it was pretty darn comfortable. The visitors were all bundled up in poofy jackets and hoods but the reenactors seemed fine. There is something to be said about linen and wool.
I confirmed in the first hour that my fears about attempting to cook while going without my glasses were spot-on. Thank goodness for Thyre and Mandy (she came from Indiana), who took over the fire and the knives so I didn't hurt myself or give a type of show for the tourists that we wouldn't want - "Bleeding and Burnt Viking Wife" wouldn't play as well as other things I think.
We had fun experimenting with the cooking forms and Eadric, bless his heart, used our fire to cook his mid-day meal so we got a nice primer on how to use pottery in the fire. Mandy was enthralled - she is a really good demo cook but had not attempted that before. He surprised her with a pot as a gift for coming out from Indiana for the demo - I think it will not be pristine for long.
( Attacked by a seawolf )
We were visited by some SCA folks and of course, I didn't recognise them in their civvies. The Longship Company camped next to us, which was great, and the VMAA closed the arc that was the Viking Camps. The Irish camped opposite us, naturally. And in a bid to be historically accurate ('cause it wouldn't be laziness, would it?) the Viking folks bugged out Sunday morning leaving the more-local Irish folks to hold down the fort for the second day of demoing. (Actually, except for James, the Viking folks were all from no less than 6 hours away, some 12 or 20 hours away and except for me, all of them have work tomorrow. So.... but it made me grin to see we were being historically accurate. As it were.)
So that's it, sort of. I had fun, got to see people I haven't seen since last October and got to hang out with local ones I rarely get time with. We experimented with read-about-but-not-tried cooking techniques (clay pot cooking wasn't the only thing we tried) and hung out Saturday night with reenactors telling hilarious stories until some of us were at the shivering-and-can't-stop stage of the evening. Apparently, we should have drank with them - they were feeling no pain!
It was allllllll-llll good.
Oh, and I finally passed my history test. :)
