Pennsic Wrap Up

There are so many sights at Pennsic, so many things to see and do. The bookstore gets alot of my business, in fact I went there first among stores, except for buying my ropes and stakes!

We have our own post office, too. Open from 1000 to 1400 weekdays of War Week. With our own postmark! They really do like us there.

There's a great fresh fruit and veggie store, AND it has fresh bread! I only had to make one trip to the GiantEagle for the two weeks.... perfect.

The fancy tent is the royal dinner....

pretty fancy digs! The royalty all have banners behind their chairs. It makes for a very colorful setup.

There is lovely chainmail for sale too, and armour, and so much more. Too much to show.

One of my friends had a new bed made for her this year.... and along with the bed, came this HUGE chair, which was promptly christened Edith Ann. Anyone who doesn't remember Saturday Night Live needs to look up the reference! Meg and I both fit in it!

Friends are the most important thing I see at Pennsic, and so I saved a few photos of them for the last.

Pennsic is chock full of fabulous entertainments....

first, there was the goat. Yes, I know I showed it before, but this is a way better picture! The next night, it was baconwrapped lamb on the spit.... but I didn't get a picture of that, I just ate it up! Yum!

Marion of Heatherdale is one of my fav performers, she absolutely radiates her love of her music, and everyone around her catches that enthusiasm. Here, she is singing a wonderful, dark, creepy, hauntingly beautiful lullaby to Mordred. There was a dance correographed to this that I learned earlier in the week. Beautiful!

I think the absolute best show this Pennsic was the Evening with the Masters, a group of instrumental musicians who set up a vignette in 14th century Spain, as music teachers meeting after classes at University to discuss their students, eat a little, play the new (!) music and have a little fun. They played a musical game where one began a short phrase, then completed it, and the other had to play that then add a phrase. They went back and forth until one made a mistake, then he had to take a drink of wine. After about ten minutes, it was pretty funny! Midway through the vignette, in walks one of the best medieval vocalists I know of, Owen Phyffe. Fabulous!

The same night there was the Kenneth and Adelaide show. They do modern songs of historical events and filk as well. My favorite of theirs is Band of Brothers, based of course on Henry V's speech. Very very powerful.

Duke Moonwolf also sang, as he does every year, and did our favorite Pennsic IV anthem, as well as I Wish I Was a Flying Monkey (while wearing a flying monkey hat). If only I had a picture of THAT!

Sort of Random Pictures

The days are filled with entertainment! The Clan Tinker does fun stuff like juggling, unicycle riding, sword swallowing and (at night) best of all, fire dancing! Good stuff!

The shop below is where I purchased my pots and lamps, and has the best potter! He is very good about research, and will make whatever you wish of accurate stuff.

The wooden fort sits on the battlefield, and is the setting for several of the battles. This first of the war is a valley battle, deliniated by haybales, and fought in front of the fort. Some battles are actually fought over the fort. There are swords and pikes, of course, arrows and axes, but there are also larger weapons: trebuchets, mangonels, catapults, ballista, even arbalesti.....siege engines of war made not too dangerous! :)

Nights are filled with music and friendship, Duke Moonwolf led off my shows with his annual Benefit Concert.

There were no Cobra Helos this year from the nearby reserve base, just a couple C130 transports, but we did have a couple ultralights show up this year.... really sorta cool. Okay, more later!

The Tale of the Tent

So, when I got to the storage shed, and started pulling out all the various things that make my life easier at Pennsic, I pulled out the 12' x 12' pavillion, loaded the poles into the car, and began looking for the lines and stakes. Then I realized that the lines and stakes that I thought belonged to the OTHER pavillion in my basement actually belonged to THIS pavillion. Oops. I had the setup package for one tent, and a very different tent. Oops. Oops. Okay, so what now? Well, surely, I will just go to Panther Pavillions, and buy a new setup package. Right. So I trucked back to the site, dropped off the stuff, and walked to the merchant area. Yep, they had everything I needed, and at a reasonable price, too. Except they weren't allowed to sell it to me until MONDAY at 10 am. Oops. That left me Saturday night, and Sunday night. What to do? Well, luckily, Lili and Friedrich had rented a big tent from the site and it was already up and empty. Phew, temporary safety. What a cluster! Monday bright and early, I went to Panther and bought what I needed, but still couldn't get it put up until Tuesday, since I had to wait to get help pounding in stakes. Thank you, Guy and Tormunder! So Tuesday I slept safe and secure under my own tent, snug and happy! Lesson learned, match up pavillion with setup FIRST!

And oh yes, the roast chicken was positively delicious!

Wow, what a trip it was!

Arriving at the Pennsic gates, I wouldn't have thought there would be so many cars! It was the first Saturday, and it was packed! Four, or was it five lanes of cars waiting to enter, and by threethirty there were 3400 on site. That is alot of processing, for the trolls!

Waiting wasn't hard though, some played games, some visited friends, some slept, some facebooked... the weather was good, so no complaints there. We waited in line about an hour, I think, then moved into the troll line, and waited abit longer. For those of you who don't know, that is troll as in, stop, pay troll. Then someone said welcome home, and it began.

We camp with Ostgardr, a Crown Province of the East Kingdom, centered in NY city. They are so very gracious and welcoming, and have been for the last 13 years. I love staying with them.
Meg hasn't been there in five years, so therewere the obligitory "holy cow, who is THAT?"s and the inevitable warnings and protective stares. I LOVE the SCA uncles!

I will probably do more than one post a day to get up lots of photos and stories, but I have tons of laundrey to do, lunch to fix, and a fan to buy (the bedroom one died last night). Setup was, well, not smooth. But at least it didn't rain. More later....