That Looked Like A Helluva Rollercoaster Ride From Down Here on the Ground

Friday afternoon, othelianna, hislittlekitty and I went three hours north to attend Avacal's November Investiture. This is the event where the old Prince and Princess step down and are replaced by their successors. Congrats to KK and mommaquilter on a successful and well-received reign.

The ladies an I left before rush-hour so that was good. I'd have still liked leaving an hour earlier so that I'd have had sunlight for the entire trip, but I was late packing. Still, we found the place OK. It was about a half-hour west of Edmonton, so not actually anywhere near civilization.

Q: How can you tell if an event is being hosted by Borealis?
A: The words "Rural Road" occur in the event copy.

My intent was to get a room in Spruce Grove (the local town), but that never happened. Instead I hall-camped. This was fine the first night because I got pleasantly tipsy. I met some interesting pirates (who were to run the bar on Saturday).

Saturday morning was DB's archery competition. He did a good job with a microscopic range. I myself got a whopping mediocre 4 points. I chose not to let this bother me. The simple fact is that my current level of skill is nowhere near what it was a few years ago. This is about 20% my usual self-confidence issues and 80% lack of strength due to busting my shoulder a few years ago. No amount of [ affirmations | wishing | prayer ] is going to get me back into 90+ scores. Only a long concerted effort to build up strength and redouble my practicing is going to do it and it's going to take a long time.

The only really bad news of the day was learning that ishansonofbrand was in a car accident. I have no idea what the details are (I wasn't going to quiz him at an event where he was vying for a championship and his gf was made a rapier cadet). The important information was known: There were no injuries.

Step-down court was held. Lots of awards were given out, including a Princess' Knot for yours truly (squee!). Then KK invested Aiden as the new Prince of Avacal. Next up, mommaquilter stepped down as consort and Isabella stepped up.

Finally, because the Fates had decided that mommaquilter simply hadn't cried enough, she was called up once again. That's when Investiture's special guest star appeared: missymorgan1, mommaquilter's Laurel! She told no one that she had returned to Cowtown a few weeks earlier (after living abroad for over the year) so that this would be a huge surprise to everyone.

As step-down courts go, it was pretty epic!

I went out to lunch after this with assorted folks at Boston Pizza. Normally I'd bitch, but I fell in love with our server, who was adorable.

Returning, we caught the final rounds of the rapier tournament and SE's cadeting.

Next up was an early supper with othelianna, missymorgan1, cat_cetera, falashad and Blue. I ate far too much this event, mostly due to a desire to be social. Still, the company was good.

Back at the event, there were some cloven fruit floating around the hall. I wasn't expecting to ever receive it, for all the usual reasons, and yet I got it three times. All three times I used my stealth method of handing it off. It's kind of sneaky and assholish, but it works and minimizes discomfort for all parties - both me (who doesn't want to be rejected) and the ladies in question (who need to quickly come up with a way to reject me without looking like they're rejecting me). The method? I grasp their hand with one of my hands and bow to kiss it. While doing that, I slip the fruit into their hand.

I managed to hand the fruit off to a hot Viscountess and two Machiavelli girls. The second twigged to what I was doing and tried to dodge it, but was unsuccessful. She chased after me and made me give her a proper kiss (on the cheek).

So, three cloven fruits and no horrifying tales of rejection. That's a first.

I had the clear option of either drinking or getting a room in Spruce Grove. I choose unwisely and opted to drink and hall-camp a second night. This made me very melancholy (but I've since recovered). I once again became aware of my talent to be completely alone in a room full of people. Instead I drank more and got close to being sick. Finally I went to bed and apparently snored. No one has ever told my I snore before. Lacking statements from people in a position to hear me sleep while sober, I'll blame the booze. My throat and sinus did feel sore - not I've-come-down-with-a-cold sore, but I've-been-yelling-a-lot sore. Since I wasn't doing a lot of yelling (aside from huzzahs), I may have to believe them on the snoring front.

Next day I woke up, had breakfast and packed and very nearly got out of the hall before Curia started. Curia is apt to get me angry at the SCA again, so it's something I'm going to avoid unless forced to go.

The roads were shit until Red Deer then things improved, so it ended up being a fairly long drive home that required constant attention. Normally I like to just hit the cruise control and stay well-away from other vehicles, but that was not an option Sunday. No close calls for me, but wildwanderer spun out once. The only damage was to his trousers.

After dropping off the ladies I proceeded home and had a much needed nap rather then unload the car or prepare for my Oscar party.

Summary:

The good: It looked like a great reign for TEs KK and mommaquilter. You'd be hard-pressed to make their step-down better without having a Disney screenwriter handle the details.

I had several compliments about my blog from people I didn't realize read it. I need to remember that the links appear on Facebook. missymorgan1 in particular gave me a warm fuzzy feeling about this whole exercise.

The bad: The only real complaints about the event would be its remoteness and the fact that it needed to either be 50% larger, or have two more large utility rooms available for people to get away from the crowds.

The ugly: More evidence that I should never drink two days in a row. Thankfully the melancholy was short-lived and easily identifiable as brain-chemistry issues and not creepy-loser issues.

In other news, I had an Oscar party yesterday and it was well-received. Bruce described it best: Next time, team up Anne Hathaway with Hugh Jackman.