My Weekend.

.....The clock on July Coronation keeps ticking louder and louder. Things are coming together well and I'm confident that the event will be a success. But the details are what always get you in the end. Trying to ensure that all contingencies are covered is one of the hardest jobs of being the autocrat. The hardest being the herding of all your team members into the same direction. :-) At work you can tell your employees to go and do something and they are paid to do it. In a volunteer organization, you have to convince your volunteers that what you are requesting of them is the right thing to do. Much harder. :-) I know that sounds pretty obvious, but in reality it is always interesting.

.....Every event of which I've been a part has been different. Sure, the preparations are generally the same. But having different people take on different jobs, the mood of the venue, the general mood of the populace, unforeseen circumstances, all of these combine to make an event unique in its outcome. This is probably the most exciting aspect of an event, adding the ingredients and the heat and witnessing what comes out of the oven. :-)

.....Went to Lionhearts in Duvall on Saturday. It was freakishly hot there. But the site was fantastic! I hope that Madrone uses it for other things. There was quite a bit of space contained there. Mow down just a few more fields and I think that there might be enough space for a Kingdom Event. Maybe we in Dragon's Laire could use the site and autocrat it for them.... :-)

.....There were over a dozen horses riding in the competition. They were fun to watch. Wish I had stayed to watch more. Ran into Her Excellency Brighid and Countess Daedin almost right away. Countess Daedin is a hoot! She has something good to say on practically every aspect of the SCA. Didn't want to intrude on thier conversation, but since I always like listening to Daedin I just dealt with the guilt and stayed. :-)

.....Hung out with Their Excellencies in their pop-up pavilion. Renart hung out there as well until Dame Tamlin showed up with the J.C. scroll. He then went to the Madrone pavilion to get to work on it. He is doing an amazing job with it. Hope I get to see the completed work.

.....It started getting really hot and I had other places I had to be, so I quietly left at about 2PM. I hate saying good-bye, it means interrupting other's good time. Some actually take that as an insult although it is not meant to be at all, it is just the way I do things.

.....Made good time back towards the ferry, so I dropped into Half-Priced books and then Trader Joes. Found a bunch of of historical references for Edward, the Black Prince, that I did not already have in my library, so I picked them up. Half-Priced Books is a dangerous place for me. :-) Even more so though is Trader Joes. I love that place. All kinds of good food and drink. I keep hearing about one coming over to Kitsap County. Wish that they would hurry up and do so.

.....Made it back home around 6PM. Cleaned up and went over to meet Sir Richard, Catelin Spenser, Elsbeth and Xian over at the Mexican Restaurant that I can't spell over in Port Orchard. We were all sooooo tired. It had been a long day for me. Richard and Elsbeth had spent the day taking part in the Fathoms-Of-Fun parade in Port Orchard. Elsbeth (DeDe) is the owner of Armchair Books in Port Orchard and is a member of the area Chamber of Commerce. As part of the parade, she and Richard dressed a whole crew up as pirates on a pick-up dressed up as a pirate ship. :-)

.....Catelin had worked in the garden all day and Xian in her yard, so they were tired as well. I doubled the sleepiness by having a glass of wine with dinner. A big no-no for me, I kept trying to fall asleep all the way home.

.....Woke up this morning and cleaned up the house and did laundry. Started on the August issue of The Crier. Worked on a bunch of July Coronation correspondence. Started on this week's to-do list for J.C. Then went with a van load of signs to His Excellency Barnet's house for a sign cleaning/painting party. By the time we went through the signs and cleaned up a goodly amount of tacks, pins, tape, etc. we found a majority of the signs still usable and stacked them up accordingly. We ended up only needing to paint four signs to meet our J.C. needs. I helped with the clean up then ran up to Poulsbo to pick up Brighid to see the Civil War Re-enactment at Port Gamble.

.....Noticed a lot of people parked in town. So they had some of the same problems that we had at June Faire. But also noticed in signage and traffic flow that they had implemented many of the things that we came up with after June Faire in preparation for July Coronation. They made me feel like our plans are coming together pretty good. One idea they had that we should incorporate into June Faire planning was to use stakes and string to actually line the traffic through and out of the site. This helped to keep people moving along the right path and to help prevent them from parking in the wrong areas.

.....We discussed a couple of ideas for June Faire next year, such as alternating war scenarios (a War Moot) with the Equestrians in the bowl next year. Also moving the A&S area to where the Wedding Pavilion is now. If the Bardic Stage moved there as well (which would suit the Bardic Guild Minister, Elizabeth, quite well), that would really free up the hill top for erics, JURIED MERCHANTS, and maybe even some period encampments at the lower corner. We'll have to play with it some.

.....Came back home and worked out the second quarter Crier finances and got my books squared away and then continued working out my to-do list for the week. Made my reservations for Norwescon 30. This week will be just a tad bit slower than last. I'm hoping that next weekend will be a little slower as well. Need to get caught up on some circlet orders.

.....Itching to get another sonnet done too. Will have to work on that. :-)

.....Hope everyone has a good week. :-)

.....Arontius / Aaron.