The End Of A Long Week.

.....Today was one long and crazy day at work. We're madly getting our Team together to depart for Georgia. We've got many thousands of pounds of gear packed in a multitude of storage boxes. Travel orders by the dozen are being issued daily. All the final technical aspects of the job are coming together into its final form.

.....This one seems a little more chaotic than normal. All week I've been chasing down how to get gasoline on site for our equipment. For most of us, it is an easy thing to do. You go down to the local gas station and put your cash card into the machine. Voila, gas! There are at least fifty, it seems, in any given direction. You don't even really have to think about it much. For the government though, it isn't quite that easy. Money is not money. Many agencies do not recognize the money of other agencies, and it is essentially against the law to use one type of money for an expense that requires a different kind of money. So I've been trying all week to get our type of money talking to the type of money that can be used in Georgia. Ack!

.....My head is still spinning madly. I'm trying to take a few moments to calm down and make it go into one direction.

.....Huntsman's Challenge started today. An archery themed event Stewarded by THL Loric in the Uplands of Port Gamble. We're going to take a drive up to the site here in a little bit and see how the set-up went today. See if we can lend a hand at all for anything. I suspect that things will already be rolling smoothly. Loric had a vision of what he wanted to see last weekend at the picnic. Essentially, this weekend is almost a repeat. I'd still like to be out of there though before the mosquito Air Force starts bombing us. It was wickedly bad last weekend. I'm very, very glad that the September Crown site does not seem to have that problem.

.....Tomorrow we can sleep in a little longer than last Saturday, but I'd still like to be up there by around 10AM or 11AM. It'll be a day of archery, which I think that TBT might be interested in trying. I should see if I can pull out my bow. I think I still have arrows as well. But they are so old now they will probably break apart on impact with anything even semi-solid.

.....Arion wants to talk to me about a proposal for a September Crown site lay-out. It sounded good by description. But tomorrow he has graphics to illustrate it. Arion is one of those smart people who can figure things out, so I'm looking forward to seeing his ideas in black-and-white.

.....There is a pot-luck for dinner on Saturday. Need to remember to pick something up for it. Either tonight or tomorrow morning on the way. I'm hoping that we get an early start as, again, I would like to be away before the Air Force descends.

.....Need to talk to Barnet about the possibility of moving hay bales on Sunday. It's become a running theme. The more we can get moved earlier the less we have to do on August 19th. Plus, there will be some help to at least load the bales at the Uplands. No guarantees on the unloading part, or even loading again next weekend. Which reminds me that we'd better make arrangements through OPG to be able to get onto site on the 19th. I would not want to lug hay bales from the field to the locked gate! :-)

.....The interesting questions are starting to uptick for September Crown. Was just reading an e-mail about a merchant who wants to put his camping trailer behind his booth. I don't know if he included this on his Marketplace Application or not. I also don't think he realizes that the Marketplace is on the edge of the hill. If he didn't include his Camping Trailer in his application, he'll have to go on the Parking / RV level. I don't think he'll be happy if this turns out to be the case. The hill is rather easily navigable, but if you have to use the road because of some disability, it can be something of a hike.

.....I'm preparing myself for unhappy people. No matter how much you prepare or how many contingencies you have in place, there will be things that make people unhappy. It's just the nature of humans. But the unknowns of a new site are making me a little nervous. At Port Gamble, we've been there so long now that we know practically every single square inch of site. If someone is unhappy with this spot or that spot, we usually know instantly where to put them next. If this area doesn't work for this activity, we know instantly where we can move it. We don't have that kind of familiarity with the Norseland Site. It'll take us time to figure things out. And people who have just traveled hundreds of miles are not usually in the mood to be patient, nor be flexible.

.....I'm in one of those moods tonight. I need to shake it off. I kind of felt this way last Friday as well. I think I need to get off of the computer and get out of the house now for a while and spend some time with TBT.

.....Aaron / Arontius.