Arontius of Bygelswade

.....I went out to dinner at 7PM and all the local bank thermometers were still reading 95 degrees, with the humidity to match. Indiana is an absolute oven right now! The air conditioner is blasting at high speed in the hotel room. The instant you walk out that door it's like someone throws a heavy wool blanket over your head, one that was just pulled out of a boiling pot of water. It's Africa hot, as in the heart of the steamy swamps hot. :-)

.....I should be in bed but I'm finding it hard to get to sleep. Wasn't able to get much sleep on the flight to Chicago last night. A couple of passengers seemed to want to party the entire time. Every time I dozed off some loud conversation or laughter would wake me back up. I don't think I was the only one though. There were a lot of bleary eyed passengers lined up at the Starbucks just outside the gate in Chicago.

.....By the time the Mid-Level Boss and I made it into Bloomington, we both said very little before heading to our rooms for a nap. I dozed for a little while, but still couldn't get to sleep, so I pulled out my notes for the Conference and started putting things together for it and making sure I had all of my facts straight. I am confident that I'm ready for practically anything thrown my way, but I'm still a little nervous that something unexpected might come up.

.....Took a break late in the afternoon and caught up with my e-mail. Some interesting traffic at home. Stuff that TBT took care of. I went ahead and finished off our State of the Barony report and sent it off to TRM and TRH. I tried to keep it succinct, but still clocked in at three pages. :-) I even went through it two or three times to see what I could do to trim it down some more. It's late, but at least we got it turned into the Crown.

.....Received some feed-back via e-mail on a bridge line we can use for our next Regional Pelican Meeting as well. Wish I'd gone this route six months ago as it was easy and cheap. With no long term commitments to make. Which seems to be the norm for a lot of the 'professional' bridge line providers. Also don't need a computer either, which is another plus. Any phone can call into the central number. So we'll give it a try and see how it works. Certainly a lot better than the Online Chat I'm betting. I need to get some e-mail out on that soon.

.....Bloomington is so full of contrasts! I drove through the downtown area and drove by three or four alternative food stores, a Whole Foods, a Trader Joes knock-off. It's interesting. But I suppose that would fit with the University of Indiana being based here. But at the same time there are also a lot of cars in the area covered with conservative slogans, lots of bible verse. And of course, the required nexus of evil, as in Wal-Mart, is growing like a cancer at the edge of town.

.....And, of course, there IS a Starbucks in town. :-) A drive through Starbucks at that. Guess where I'm stopping tomorrow morning on my way out to Crane? :-)

.....Let's try for that sleep button again.

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....Last night was the April Baronial Business Meeting. There was definitely a vibe of craziness in the air. It felt rather odd. And I've been obsessing over things from it ever since. I'm hoping that by writing some of them out here I'll pull them out of the hampster wheel of my mind and I can obsess over something else, like NORWESCON. :-)

.....One of our long time players was at the Business Meeting last night. I've seen this person maybe a handful of times over the past couple of years. But they've decided to basically 'return home' for a while and play. Which is probably a good thing for them. I've never left for any length of time, but I've always thought of the SCA as a dysfunctional family of sorts and as in any family, a good place to go to for support when needed.

.....This person may have an interesting time reconnecting with the Barony though. There were several interesting moments last night where people were confused about the questions raised or how to answer them. May have to keep an eye on this one.

.....Ever since the SCA Lawsuit recovery we've been taking an even closer look at our Baronial Finances. How we spend money. How we raise money. What can we do to improve how we do both. To raise awareness, the Baronial Exchequer put together a listing of inflows and outflows from 2011, and used it to set the budget for 2012. Then the Deputy Baronial Exchequer went through that Spread Sheet to give the numbers to the Baronial Populace in attendance last night.

.....We've done similar in the past, and I never know what to expect as it has run the spectrum. From full interest to eyes glazing over from boredom. Last night there was real interest. Which is fantastic! I wish more people were interested in how the funds were generated and spent. But the Deputy Exchequer did not have the answers to the questions raised. Neither did I for that matter. And they were good questions! The first one being if we could get more defined event costs and income by averaging out a number of years, which might be more accurate. The next question being to see some more details in what the expense totals actually were. The Deputy Exchequer is going to take those questions back to the Exchequer and get some more clarification.

.....We had our first Serjeantry Candidate withdraw last night. For good reasons. They need to concentrate on personal life and TBT & I applauded what that person is doing. We made sure to emphasize that they've submitted a Letter of Intent. If they want to start up again next year, or the year after, we'd fully support them in that.

.....We were concerned about another Candidate and had a discussion with them last night. Modern Life is been an issue for this Candidate and we wanted to make sure they understood that they could continue the Trials through to next year's class if they needed to do so. But we were told that Serjeantry was that important to them and they wanted to continue. We certainly wasn't going to argue with that one.

.....Later on that evening, someone mentioned something that really had me obsessing. It was mentioned that the job of Baroness was actually much more difficult than being the Baron. I, frankly, have been thinking about that statement ever since. I find the job of Baron rather difficult to start. I'm not sure I'd want it to be more difficult than it is. :-) I also thought that I had the workload balanced out with TBT rather evenly. I'm thinking that maybe we should take a second look at that. Are there things we can take off of TBT's plate to make things easier for her? TBT's strengths are not mine. And I've tended to think the reverse was true as well. But it is something definitely we need to look at.

.....I need to go and finish packing for NORWESCON. We were up until midnight last night and I'm rather tired. :-) Go figure. :-) Better make a list so that maybe I'll forget less. :-)

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....It was a tough thing to get up this morning as I couldn't believe the weekend was already over! The first three days of NORWESCON had absolutely flown by and here it was time to pack out the hotel room. I was not ready to go.

.....Spent a couple of hours last night listening to music in the Evergreen Rooms. 'The Heather Dale Band' did a pretty outstanding performance of Neo-Celtic and Modern Folk, and a few other traditional songs thrown into the mix. I was absolutely transported to a different time and place. Voice, guitar, violin, cello, and even a little tin whistle thrown in for good measure. The hour and a half or so that they played I was in heaven. The room was packed as well. I think the bardic emphasis the NORWESCON staff had this year paid off. I hope that it means even more music for next year.

.....Ran through the dance areas in the Ballrooms downstairs. But after some good folk music I could not find the modern dance very satisfying. It was like drinking a cheap tequila after several shots of Don Julio. Not a good thing, so I headed back to the room for the evening. And was out pretty quickly.

.....Slept in a little this morning and didn't hit the shower until around 7AM. After the shower I went in to take a look at my e-mail. I wish that I had spent some time actually reading it then, but there was rather quite a lot of it and I decided that I would deal with it when I made it home. So I just skimmed through it and answered the ones that sort of tugged directly at myself and / or TBT. After that I started gathering my stuff from where it lay scattered in various locations of the room.

.....TBT awakened a short time later and we started packing in earnest. When the majority of it was packed away we decided to go out for our Starbucks run and make a final circuit of the convention. Picked up some souvenir T-Shirts and ran through the Marketplace. We especially looked through the Dr. Who offerings for Angharad, but there was actually less than I thought there would be. I think she can find better offerings and better prices online.

.....Checked out the Paranormal Fair. It was definitely an eclectic selection of offerings. Everything from 'Ghost Hunters' to ESP testing to healing advice to readings through different spiritual guidances. I think it really could have been helped if it had had some focus to what it wanted to do. It would be interesting to talk to the organizer of the Fair to see what their intended purpose for the Fair actually was. It could benefit from a couple of years to find its footing and some focus. But the NORWESCON staff may not give it enough space to do that. But we'll see where it goes.

.....Took a last look at the Art Show. Saw a couple of interesting mediums and styles that were rather new to this year. One artist did a set of block prints that were interesting. Another had a series of pictures in tooled and carved leather. A lot of the 'regulars' were back. I'm trying to work on TBT to show something again. I've seen some of the artwork she drew back in her college years. And as with anything TBT touches, I thought it looked pretty damned cool. I'm hoping to convince her to pull it out of storage and put it up for display.

.....After that we went back to the room to finish packing and loading the truck. TBT and I checked our e-mail one last time. Wished then that I hadn't. Received e-mail traffic that depressed me greatly. There are times when I wonder if I'm going to make it through three years as a Baron. I promised myself that I would do it when that Coronet landed on my head! But for a while there this morning I had to keep repeating to myself, '...only thirty months, twenty-three days left to go. I can make it for thirty months, twenty-three days. I know I can.' Sigh. Thankfully, things improved later in the day as we sifted through the information and gained some greater understanding of the entire picture. I need to work on keeping the positive attitude intact and concentrating on the things I can actually affect for the good. Always a hard thing on which to focus, especially when there are so many different things on which to focus.

.....Went to Zoopa's in Tukwilla for lunch after checking out of our rooms (and reserving rooms for next year. Huzzah! :-)). The drive home and exchange of cars with Richard and Gwen were pretty uneventful. They gave us lots to think about though concerning the summer schedule and An Tir - West War. Summer is just around the corner and plans need to be finalized as soon as possible.

.....The next six weeks are going to be a zip line ride straight to June Faire (with a side loop-de-loop through May Crown). The 'to-do' list is in the preliminary stages and will be something I need to finalize tomorrow and is epic in size. I'm glad I took tomorrow off from work! :-)

.....Ups-And-Downs From NORWESCON:

* Up: All the inspirational writing advice. I've really approached the writing thing from the wrong angle for years. It's less about form and structure and more about the actual doing of the writing. Definitely some inspiration to write something on a more regular basis.

* Down: Didn't get to spend a whole lot of time talking with friends at NORWESCON. Buzzed by Bjorn and Alys several times and said 'Hi' briefly. But never connected for any real conversation.

* Up: The music! It was absolutely fantastic this year. Need to pull out my recorder and gemshorn and practice some music for June Faire. I was inspired. Will definitely be busy during the day with the Baron gig, but can sit down and play a little in the evening. Maybe even have TBT sing with accompaniment? Hmmm, will have to think that through some more and implement a plan.

* Down: The return home. I wonder if there is some way to mentally prepare yourself to transition from NORWESCON back to 'reality'? :-).

.....I think it is time for bed. I'm falling asleep at the computer. I think I've caught up with the e-mail, but I'll double-check real fast and make sure.

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....Things have been really busy for a while now, which is a contributor as to why I haven't been posting much lately. The other being a sensitivity towards the things I say these days. I have been surprized on a number of ocassions lately with something I've said being taken in a way that was not intended in the slightest. Even to the point of my going back and re-reading the things I wrote trying to figure out just how they were interpreted they way they were. :-)

.....But that's whining I suppose. So I'll stop. The main reason I AM posting this morning is that the Shipyard Intranet is down at the moment and I can't get into a lot of my usual programs and am at a standstill for about a half hour. So what do I do when I have a few free moments? I go and Live Journal. :-) Which I actually miss, to be honest. I wish people posted more to Live Journal. I wish *I* posted more to Live Journal. But that time thing, you know. I'm going to have to figure out a way to clone myself. :-)

.....The Baron and Baroness gig are still a very full time job. I am in constant awe of Cedric and Brighid these days. I don't know how in the world they were able to do all the things they did. I can barely keep up with the priority items on the Baronial 'to-do' list. I am learning the fine art of 'priority surfing', which means you do what you can with a project as quickly as possible before moving on to the next issue, crisis or Project. The nice thing about this method is that you can 'touch' a lot of things. The bad thing about this method is that you never actually FINISH anything. Which means that satisfaction is fleeting at times.

.....But progress still happens. Serjeantry is finally starting to move forward again. We had originally wanted to accept letters of intent at Candlemas. We had to push that out to June Faire as our vision wasn't lining up with any sort of written process. It still isn't in concrete yet, but we have enough on paper to start the process. We have an organizational kick-off later in March and will accept letters at June Faire. We have at least a couple of people with solid intentions of participating and being our test subjects. So let the party roll!

.....Her Excellency Inga of Avacal sent me a copy of their Serjeantry Program. There is a lot of good stuff in there! If she let's us we're going to steal sections of it for inclusion in our program. I liked the way it was worded as well. It follows my own philosophy to a large degree. I grokked it immediately. I've got an introductory broad sheet ready to pass out to potential candidates now. I've got our kick-off meeting of March 23rd as my deadline to have the in-depth pamphlet of Serjeantry ready to pass out to candidates. After that the next deadline will be June Faire, with the letters. The following step will be the Trials themselves, which will be scheduled according to how many candidates we have and what their intent is. Yes, this year will be the year of learning for Serjeantry. :-)

.....This weekend is Candlemas. Still on the learning curve with regard to running Courts. We learned much from Yule, mainly dealing with processionals. So we now have a written processional (thanks Tsuruko!) that will be easy to follow. Our Court is scheduled and written and relatively short (less than an hour). So we're good to go there. The learning curve for this Court was our own preparation. Her Excellency and I kept making our own internal assumptions on having all the 'stuff' ready to go and realized yesterday we were missing a few key elements. One more lesson learned for the NEXT Court. But THAT Court is June Faire, so we'll take the extra time we need to prepare for that one.

.....June Faire is looking good. There is the usual chaos of course. But I don't think that you can ever escape chaos completely when planning something on the scale of June Faire. What you do is manage the chaos to the best of your ability and be ready to punt as necessary when something unexpected happens. My favorite phrase from 'Shakespeare In Love', 'It's a Mystery.' :-)

.....I'm liking where things are going with June Faire though. The Marketplace moved to the top of the hill. This reduced the number of merchants by a few because of the amount of territory availble. But we are still going to get a decent variety. Plus the fact that Poppa Thorir's camper is better hidden this year on top of the hill behind the barn, instead of sticking out in the parking lot at the bottom of the hill. Improvement already! I'm also liking how all the 'demo' aspects of the Faire are being concentrated around the Modern Gate, to make them as visible to the modern attendance as possible. We still need to work out the bleachers and their dressing around the Erics as that has the potential to be an eye-sore if not covered properly, but at least we're thinking of it now.

.....And Sir Raoukinn's Tourney Circuit is coming through June Faire this year! FANTASTIC! We need to do more to advertise this, and make it something special for the fighters who will be in attendance. TBT and I are musing over different ideas on this, but need to come to a decision soon. Wow! Only three months left! Ouch!

.....Something else we need to work out are our 'progresses' through site. I know it is very Rennaissance Fair-ish, but when 'Queen Elizabeth' walks through the Faire with Her Court and banner bearers and trumpeters and pomp & circumstance, people really go gaga for that scene. We think that something along this line would work well for June Faire. Now, can TBT pull it off in style? Well, it'll be a challenge. But we'll do our best. :-) Sigh! We may even want to ask Trumpet Man to take a tour with us. Although TBT has a line on a good piper as well, so maybe a 'progress' with bagpipes would be fun. :-)

.....Then it is off to July Coronation. Dragon's Laire is taking care of the Marketplace for the event that is officially being hosted by Aquaterra and Midhaven. I put together a Marketplace Application and am about to launch. But I need to do more to see if I can get someone else to work with me on the Marketplace. Someone who has a little more spare time than I do. I can still do a lot of the heavy lifting, but if someone else can become 'the face' for the work, it would be nice. The people I've approached so far are all super busy with five hundred things of their own already, so I'm still looking.

.....Still have to make it thorugh KAS / KBC though. Dragon's Laire is hosting again, for the third time at the Silverdale Beach Hotel. The Autocrat is having life issue, which made me a little nervous at first. But after taking a step back and looking critically I relaxed a little:

* It IS our third time at the same venue, with virtually the same staff at the venue.
* The current Kingdom Minister of Arts and Sciences lives in Dragon's Laire AND is the Deputy Autocrat (Go Ellen! :-)).
* No Marketplace to worry about this year.
* No series of classes or lots of extra meetings to worry about this year.
* The competition schedule is already pretty much set and the Competition Staff looks all ready to go.
* The hotel already looks great. We could ditch decorations all together and the place would still look fantastic.

.....The more I thought about things, the less I worried. KAS / KBC will happen and it will be great. So let's roll with it! :-)

.....Sigh! Time to go and do battle with the IT Deities again! Wish me luck!

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....It's the start of a three day weekend, and I'm happy about that. This past week has been rather frustrating. Both at work and in dealings with the SCA it's been like everyone around me is speaking English and I'm speaking some bastardized form of Pig-Latin. The more I try to get myself understood, the less I seem to be understood.

.....Yesterday was the worst and culminated in e-mail traffic where I had to go back and read what I wrote several times as the recipient took what I had sent and interpreted it in a way that was not intended in the slightest. I read the response and stared at the computer screen going, 'Huh?'. Then proceeded to try and pull the remainder of the hair off of my head in frustration.

.....I've complained bitterly about this several times already, but its still there. As a Seneschal, you can point to rules and processes and say 'Yes, this is right' and 'No, you can't do that'. But as a Coronet, things are so much more nebulous. You have to balance egos and styles and wants and desires with the ultimate needs of the Barony and try to move the whole mess forward while maintaining as many egos intact as possible. It's not easy!

.....This morning TBT and I went and did our normal Starbucks run. I was still feeling strung out and frustrated. When we sat down a Journey song came on the radio and for some odd reason the first thing I thought of was a scene from 'Heavy Metal'. The one where the warrior girl puts on her armored boots and climbs aboard her 'Sparrow of Doom' to do battle with Evil Incarnate.

.....'Ca-Caw! Ca-Caw!'

.....I start laughing and giggling hysterically and it did the trick. The frustrations of the week finally slid away and I was able to let it go. The problems are still there, but I don't need to own them. I'll do what I can to help resolve them. We'll work to make things happen and the Barony to move forward.

.....TBT and I have a lunch date with Madrun today. That will be fun. We'll probably start talking and then four hours later we'll look at the clock and wonder what happened. Having resolved all the World's crisis of course. :-)

.....TBT and I also have to pick out silk dyes today from Dharma Trading. THL Anne is taking lead on the banner making. Excellent! She is ready to move forward on purchasing, with a group of us contributing to the kitty. She just needs to know what colors TBT and I need for our banners. We've decided we want to get four done. Instead of two really large ones, we'll do four slightly smaller ones. We want to do one each utilizing our primary devices (python and fleur-dy-lys). One utilizing my winged cat. And a fourth one using the combined device banner that TBT made for our step-up. I can't wait to do these. We have a day scheduled for February to actually get together in Anne's garage to draw out the banners and dye the silk.

.....To-Do List:
.....Pull out Silk.
.....Rough Draft of four banners (decide on final elements).
.....Anne is going to get the remainder of the dyes that Conchobar has to see what is already available.
.....Get Anne the colors that we need.
.....Anne will let us know how much we need to contribute and what supplies we need to acquire.
.....Anne will order supplies from Dharma Trading.
.....Banner making party at Anne's.

.....Retinue meeting tomorrow. Must remember to go through my notes and make a list of things I want to make sure and talk about. Definitely need to make an agenda for Candlemas.

.....Time to clean house. I hear TBT in the kitchen and the cat boxes definitely need cleaning.

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....I actually had a good time at Last Chance this weekend. I'd been anxious for the past couple of weeks about a.) the weather reports which became increasingly gloomy as we approached the date of the event, and b.) the site of supreme anxiety, the Uplands of Port Gamble (based on the Epically Nightmarish Swamp Faire of 2008). But the event was, in the end, a success.

.....Saturday was bright and clear, and HOT, all day long. With all the rain we had over the week, the humidity was really high, which was a little uncomfortable at times. But it was never unbearable. Certainly nothing in comparison to a hot, Georgia, afternoon. I was glad I dressed in layers though, with a light linen tunic as the bottom layer. I could lose layers as needed, and then put them back on as the evening slowly cooled down.

.....We were on site by 1000 Court. As the Heirs we were expected to sit next to Their Excellencies in Court. They warned me that the view and the 'feel' was a lot different when looking out at the Populace as opposed to being a member of the Populace and watching Court. They were definitely right. Sitting up in front there you are the focus of a lot of attention. I watched Their Excellencies to see how they did things, how they acted, and how reacted to cues from the Populace. It was interesting as I had never paid that much attention to those kinds of details in the past.

.....I definitely want to change some of the Ceremonials. I think that TBT does as well. I wrote a lot of the original wording for Their Excellencies when They first stepped up. I was somewhat proud of the words at the time. But they have not stood up well to the wear and tear of history. For one thing they are far too wordy. By the time all the words are read so much time has gone by that people get distracted. We really need to tighten things up. Their Excellencies had already started that process. But we want to convert these to an even more Anglo-Saxon feel. I'd like to also do some conversion to a style closer to a period feel. Which is problematic. If no one can understand what is being said, than they are less inclined to be interested in any part of it.

.....What would be really cool would be a conversion from the current prose to a more poetic format. It really isn't skaldic, although that style is close, but an early anglo-saxon style of poetry was really sing-song in execution. I've listened to scholastic representations of what they most likely resembled and it has a really cool sound. The only trick might be to convert modern english into that style. The nice thing is that in reality an anglo-saxon poetic scroll and ceremony might be easier for a herald to read and say than the current verbiage. We'll see what we end up producing.

.....The final Court was rather emotional. Being Their Excellencies last Baronial Court They had a lot of words They wanted to say, and tokens to give out. I only hope that TBT and I can engender the same loyalty and dedication that Their Excellencies have produced in the Populace.

.....The feast was really good. The Culinary Guild did a fantastic job with the Port and Chicken they grilled during the day. Add that to the side dishes that everyone contributed to the table and certainly no one went away hungry, that's for sure. After dinner, lots of good conversation was had, some music and revelry under the Poof-Ka (the 'Pavilion Formerly Known As'). I wish we could have stayed longer, but TBT and I were tired and wanted to make sure we could pick up Rhys and make it home while still coherent enough to drive.

.....Today went along rather nicely. We were on site by 9:30AM and the Captain-Of-The-Guard Tourney was already in full swing. It was a lot of fun to watch and the combatants were intent on doing their best. Caius finally won and anyone who took the time to watch the Tournament could not doubt their sincerity and desire to want to be Captain of TBT's Guard. TBT may have been reluctant to actually have a guard before we began this process, but watching the dedication of those vying for the Captain's position brought home the beauty of what they did. It was very cool.

.....Break-down of site started around 11AM and we were off site by Noon, which is wonderful for a Last Chance. We ran stuff to the Storage Unit, had lunch, did chores and are now getting ready for the work week. There are lots of things to think about. But right now I'm thinking of one thing at a time and doing my best to stay awake long enough to get laundry for the week. :-)

.....Need to check the 'to-do' list. The next couple of weeks are going to be busy.

.....Zzzzzzzz, Aaron / Arontius.

.....So, I'm on the phone with His Excellency Cedric the other night and he starts talking about preparations for a Baronial Polling to happen at the end of this year. I stop him and say, 'You mean, your confidence polling, right?' To which he replies, 'No, our polling for Baron and Baroness.' I'm REASONABLY SURE that he was pulling my leg, but for a few brief moments it threw me into a panic. As Seneschal, I certainly do not look forward to wrangling a polling.

.....But after that conversation and for a day or so after I started thinking about how much things have changed under Cedric and Brighid and how much they would change under the next couple, whomever they would be. That is neither good nor bad, it just IS. When Master Ralg and Tsuruko Sensei stepped up as Baron and Baroness, they had their own style and it fit our needs at the time. We were a broken Barony trying to repair itself and being given one last chance. I doubt that anyone else at the time could have pulled it together like they did.

.....Then when Cedric and Brighid stepped up, they took us into a new direction and it has worked wonderfully. Sometimes it is tiring being the Labrador Retriever Barony of the Kingdom. But it is a good feeling knowing how much we've contributed to the overall well-being of the Kingdom. We've done Kingdom events at a moments notice, contributed tons of largesse, physically supported Kings and Queens whenever needed, supplied the Kingdom with officers when the call went forth. We do it all and part of that is due to the energy that Cedric and Brighid put forth on everything they touch and every person with whom they connect.

.....So, when His Excellency brought up the subject of a change I started thinking about who would succeed them and how much things would change around here. Without a great deal of thought I could come up with a large number of couples who'd make outstanding candidates, who would bring their own unique style to the Barony and take it into a new direction. I personally think that is a sign of a healthy Barony, that ability to field a large number of viable Baronial couples.

.....TBT and I have discussed being considered as B&B. If Their Excellencies are serious in wanting to step down in the next year, we'd have to say no to even the possibility. But we talked about our abilities and what we'd bring to the Barony. We talked about what direction we'd take the Barony and what goals we'd like to achieve. It is rather exciting to think about those possibilities. If you have a strong group of seriously motivated and good-hearted people, there really is no limit to what you can accomplish.

.....But there is a real down side as well that has to be considered. It takes a LOT of REAL WORK to be Baron and Baroness. It really is a full time job in and of itself and you really almost give up your social life in the 'real' world if you actually want to do a good job as Baron and Baroness. I've worked pretty closely with Cedric and Brighid on a number of things and the amount of committment that is required is unbelievable. I don't think that most people take that into account when they think about the job. I think that most people see the good parts only.

.....And, to be honest, if a Baron and Baroness are doing a good job what the majority of people see only is the good parts. They don't see all the hard work, angsting, frustrations and fatigue that sometimes happens behind the scenes. Think of any play of which you've ever taken part. Think about the chaos that happens behind the scenes. It's the same thing in the SCA.

.....I first thought of being Baron a while back and ran with Catelin during the polling when Master Ralg and Tsuruko Sensei were selected. I had NO CLUE of what I was thinking of doing. I had a little better clue when I ran with Talia, and the thinking process on my part was considerably more intense before deciding to throw my hat into the ring. And now that I'm thinking about it for a third time I am actually thinking, 'Do I REALLY want to do this? I just don't know.'

.....HOPEFULLY, His Excellency was pulling my leg and plans on staying put for a number of years still. I'm not sure I want to handle the obligatory drama at this time. :-)

.....Aaron / Arontius.