Arontius of Bygelswade

.....The past week has not been all that bad in reality. I was thinking that the lead up to Serjeantry Trials would be an angst inducing and emotional train wreck. But I'm finding that I'm gaining the perspective that 'it will be what it will be' and that there isn't a whole lot more I can do to radically change it. There will be highs and lows. Ellen has done a smart job of trying to corral us into one direction, although her sanity may pay for that effort later. :-)

.....Last Thursday was my brother, Sean's, birthday. He turned 42 years old. I guess that makes him 'the answer' now. We didn't get a chance to talk, although I did manage to leave birthday greetings on his Facebook page. Which was after I had the opportunity to peruse his farm pictures. That was rather interesting. We spent part of our youth in California on a farm. We had beef, a horse, lots of chickens, a garden. Even goats. Huge Nubians with the worst tasting milk I think I've ever tasted in my entire life! When we left California, we sold absolutely everything with the intent that our farm days were absolutely behind us all. :-)

.....Which made it all the more surprising when I start seeing pictures of Sean with the horse, the bull and cows, building a chicken coop. All of this on a farm in Sunnyslope. Amazing, I say. But if that is what fascinates Sean and Dad, I'm not going to speak against it. Especially since I still collect and read Mother Earth News magazines.

.....Mom's birthday was on Saturday. We were at Yule Feast, so I didn't get the opportunity to say anything until Monday. She turned 67 on Saturday, and is still working here at the Shipyard. I'm torn about whether or not to talk to her about retirement. She would like to retire, but the finances would not work out well. Plus, I really worry about what she would do without the requirement of getting out of bed each morning, getting dressed and getting herself into work. I have visions of her spending literally years in her easy chair watching the race cars on TV. Which is entirely her prerogative, but I'm not going to encourage it.

.....Yule Feast turned out to be rather nice. There were a couple of comments of not having anything to do since we moved all the Championships off of it. But as I explained to people, we needed the opportunity just to relax and get to know our friends and family locally. We don't ever seem to get that chance as we're running our hind ends off at events trying to keep things organized and running smoothly.

.....We had a fascinating discussion on the new Arts and Sciences Championship rules. We spent about an hour to an hour and a half in dance. Which reminded me how out of shape I was. :-) Then a nice and flowing Court. The feast was absolutely tasty. Which I suspected it would since Petr Catspawz was the Chief Cook. :-) I missed being at the Aquaterra Feast to witness the step-down of Hauk and Rosamund, but our Yule Feast was nice none-the-less.

.....It was our first opportunity as well to try out our new Rotring cartridge calligraphy pen. It was fantastic! I was able to autograph all the scrolls with little trouble. There was a slight scratchiness and a little wobbliness to my name, but I still enjoyed writing it and was at least satisfied with the results. I now need to do a little checking at what lettering we need to use for the Second Age scrolls, something from the thirteenth / fourteenth centuries. It gets a little trickier I think with the flourishes, but the results will be worth it if I invest in even a little practice time over the winter break.

.....The Toys-For-Tots Challenge is turning out great. I'm actually glad that Jenae and Conchobar pushed this year on it. We collected 134 toys since last week. Aquaterra accepted the challenge, but I haven't seen any postings from them on the numbers collected. After Jenae posted the count I wasted no time in forwarding on to the Aquaterra list in the hopes that would either generate an e-mail with their numbers, or something. I haven't seen much yet. I'm not sure how much to pester them on it. I don't actually want to irritate the new Baron and Baroness. But it IS a challenge. :-)

.....Monday was the last preparation night for the Serjeantry candidates. We spoke of the Quests that each would declare should they prove victorious on Saturday. All the Quests seems to be accepted well, so no issues. I like them all as well personally. So, double bonus.

.....Last night was the regular social. TBT was not feeling well at all and so stayed home for the evening. The VFW Hall was well attended. I was pulled aside and given the opportunity to 'improve myself as a Pelican'. :-) I'll use that as the tag-line to some 'go-dos' I have to get done before the end of the month. None of them overly onerous, but if the tasking lingers too long the mold will smell ugly. Being a Pelican can sometimes be a messy job. :-)

.....Tonight is the Wednesday Night Fight Practice at the Soccer Center. I'm hopefully going to get a chance to talk Serjeantry with Sir John in the hopes that he'll undertake an errand for us. I'm crossing my fingers.

.....Thursday is a FREE DAY!!!! I won't know what to do with myself, having a free night at home. It'll feel like freakin' heaven!!! :-) But I'll probably fill it up with anxious wanderings on the computer in preparation for Serjeantry on Saturday. :-)

.....Friday is a house-warming. It should be low key.

.....Then Saturday is the Serjeantry Trials. The schedule is set in as much stone as possible (although I'm sure it is going to shift on the day of :-)). We'll do the best we can, we'll wing the rest, and we'll make it through the end of the day. I'm still glad we finished a bunch of the testing over the past month. I look at what we have scheduled on that one day and picture us trying to get an entire set of Trials done and see in my mind's eye a twenty four hour day of non-stop action. I hope we never get to that point!

.....December is also probably the absolutely worst time in the world to hold a Serjeantry Trials, just sayin'. I'm grateful for Blatha An Oir and others coming to our rescue to help with the testing.

.....I hope that the day turns out magical, at least a little bit. If that magic is being able to put my feet on a footstool at the end of the day with the thought that we at least made it through the day with everyone more-or-less satisfied, I'll be happy with that too. But a little magic would sure be nice! :-)

.....Then, WINTER BREAK. Three weeks with only the usual SCA meetings schedule (and several of them canceled as well!). And two whole weeks off from work! I can hardly wait!!! :-)

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....I suppose that Thanksgiving is defined in as many different ways as there are people. For my mother the meaning of Thanksgiving is very much different than mine. :-) As has become traditional I was all set to pick her up from her apartment and take her over to Gwen's house with Tamm and Rhys for the big Thanksgiving Dinner. She was really hesitant on the phone and I finally asked her if she really wanted to go. She tentatively asked if I would be very upset if she just stayed home today. At first I was determined that she get out of her apartment and come to dinner with us, just to interact with other friendly humans. But really? Happiness for her was a comfortable cushioned chair, a body wrapped by a gigantic and warm quilt, a purring kitty on her lap, and NASCAR racing on the television. :-)

.....I relented at that and she was relieved. I think she also was not looking forward to a cold drive on icy roads and several hours on chairs over at Gwen's house. We're on the look-out for a comfortable wheel-chair that is a little bigger in stature where she would be comfortable for a long while. I thought for a little of transporting her cushioned lift chair over to Gwen's. But the hassle would have been astronomical for all involved, including Mom. So I abandoned that idea. I packed some food for her from Gwen's and made sure she was fully stocked on Diet Cokes for the day. :-)

.....NASCAR? I never understood the excitement of NASCAR as a spectator sport. :-)

.....Starbucks was open today! That made it feel like a real holiday! :-) TBT and I shared coffee flavored milk and discussed plans as we always do. Then went back home to finish last minute preparations for Thanksgiving Dinner. Or, TBT did most of the 'preparations', I just did a little clean-up, then when a brain flash hit I went and finished up an article for the Flames and sent it to Rycheza. I was productive, I was. Just wish I could make that a regular thing. :-)

.....Dinner at Gwen's was superb, as usual. She cooks the best bird of anyone I know. I could eat her turkey until I explode, which I almost did. Also as usual. :-) TBT's cooking was excellent as well. Between Sweet Potato bake, pumpkin pie and spice cake, all sugar free, I felt no lack of sweets. Petr and Kierran came over with a fantastic smoked turkey (I've got to convince him to do a feast sometime again soon). Eileen cooked a ham that was delicious. Although by that time I was so stuffed, I nibbled ham and packed a bunch away to take home with me for snacks tomorrow. :-)

.....Madrun and Dillon joined us for dinner this year. I hope that our somewhat dysfunctional family was not too dysfunctional for them. :-) Lots of good conversation was had, which meant that by the time we looked up at the clock many hours has passed and TBT and I were on the verge of falling asleep. This was a shame as I had wanted to go and watch a game of 'Werewolf' played at Talon and Jenae's. Maybe at Christmas, if I can persuade them. :-)

.....The power had gone out again sometime during the day as I returned home to the Television on and running in the living room and all the clocks blinking away furiously. This time I made sure the sprinklers were turned off first thing before I started turning everything else off. No ice sculptures thank you! Althought the roads are already becoming much better to negotiate. The ice is melting away at a pretty good clip.

.....I've never been 'Anti-Thanksgiving' as it has always been more about food for me than Plymoth Rock and the Pilgrims. :-) But I am grateful for having TBT in my life and a lot of good friends. The past year has had a lot of challenges, but I survived them all with my sanity relatively intact. Next year looks to be even better than this last one, if just a tad more busy. :-)

.....The one thing I did forget to do was to call Sean. I'm supposed to go to Mom's tomorrow to help with some clean up, so maybe we'll give him a call and put him on speaker. It'll be like a mini-family reunion. :-)

.....YAWN! Time for bed.

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....Today is the birthday of my brother, Sean. He turns 39 years old.

.....I'm not sure just how many of you have met him, but for those of you who haven't, you would be somewhat surprised just how different he is in some ways. He stands a good six inches taller than me, maybe even an inch or two taller than that. He is definitely solid, but not BIG. Except for his hands. Don't get into a fist fight with him. His hands are easily twice the size of mine. Just freakin' huge. He's got a temper as well. So, yeah, just as a repeat, don't get into a fight with him. :-)

.....He's got this flaming red hair that he inherited from Mom. Although the last time I saw him it had thinned out considerably. I actually ended up with just a little more hair on the top of my head than him. Which isn't saying much I suppose. :-)

.....Where you can tell though that he is my brother is when he laughs. It is a wild laugh, with abandon. Very distinctive. We both have always found the oddest things in life humourous. :-)

.....Sean was always wild in a lot of ways. He hated school, and finally dropped out in tenth grade so that he could take on a life in the forest. He actually lived in a self-built shelter in the forest for over a year. At that point he decided that he wanted to live in Alaska and took on a job on a fish processor. His ultimate goal was to homestead in Alaska. I think he lasted one winter in the wilds of Alaska before joining a couple of friends from the floating fish processor in an apartment in Anchorage. You see, it gets kinda cold during the winter months in Alaska. :-)

.....Sean spent a handful of years in Alaska before deciding it was time to come back home to Washington. He worked a number of years at Eagle Hardware and at Lowes before starting a job at a local landscape outfit in Poulsbo, where he was working when I last saw him. The thing that amazed me though is that he lives in Sunnyslope and commutes every day, rain or shine, from Sunnyslope to Poulsbo, on his 10-speed bike. Wow!

.....It's been over a year since I saw hime last. Our family is not exactly the 'close knit' variety. But I always tried to keep an eye out for him if I could, especially when we were younger. He always knew that he could come to me if he needed a hand, or more likely a place to stay for a short time. He has been living with Dad on a piece of property that they bought together. *I* would not be able to do that myself. Dad and I would have mutually annhilated each other early on. But Sean always had a better relationship with Dad than I did. :-)

.....I have missed hearing from him and hope that he is doing well. Happy Birthday, Sean! :-)

.....Aaron / Arontius.

.....Looks like things are better than even I thought. Here is the story from the local paper:

"A collision involving a car and a bicycle at the south end of the Warren Avenue bridge Tuesday closed half the bridge to afternoon traffic for an hour and sent a man to the hospital.

Bremerton police initially believed the wreck at the south end of the bridge was a hit-and-run, initial reports said, but the driver called police and flagged down an officer shortly after the wreck, said Bremerton police Lt. Pete Fisher. No arrests have been made and the crash is still under investigation.

The bicyclist, a man, was taken to Harrison Medical Center in Bremerton with injuries that were not life-threatening, Fisher said. The name of the man was not released.

The bicyclist and the car were traveling on the same side of the street when they collided, Fisher said. A witness told investigators that the car was traveling at about 40 mph, but Fisher said that witnesses usually overestimate speeds.

"Until we really do analysis of collision scene we don’t know what we have as a speed," Fisher said.

The crash was reported at about 3:45 p.m. A southbound lane and a northbound lane were closed for about an hour afterward for the investigation.

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.....Aaron.