Monday, September 24, 2007

Resumed!

Yesterday's Statistics exam awaits my professor's red pen, and I have caught up somewhat on neglected sleep and housework, so blogging can now resume. I do not flatter myself to think I am one of the cool kids, but I did miss posting.

Seamas has gained some noteriety with the Librarian's Challenge. We have received comments from four kingdoms now, which is truly flattering. He has been working on updating SCAdia this past week; I expect him to release the update soon.

Last weekend, I photographed some of the softball games at my company's family picnic. Though I usually do not engage in much action photography, I am very pleased with how most of the photos turned out. I am even more pleased with people's reactions after I posted the slideshow on our server. For example, I overheard one of my co-workers talking on the telephone about the slideshow that afternoon. She was telling the person on the other end to look at specific slides and was talking about what was going on at the time each photo was taken. A truly positive experience, and I find myself looking forward to next year's games.

So life returns to normal for a few weeks - until my next exam!

Monday, September 17, 2007

Ramble Pause

Gentle Reader, I beg your indulgance for a few days. As many of you know, I am pursuing a Master's degree and am taking a statistics course this semester. Saturday is our first exam, and I must therefore focus my attention in that direction for a few more days. The recent flurry of posts will soon resume...!

Monday, September 10, 2007

Quest XII Denizen Instructions

In Smythkepe's quests, the "denizens" are the people playing roles (parts). In order to make sure each denizen understood what was going on in the Quest and what his or her particular role was to be, we gave each a page of General Notes (which applied to all the denizens) and a page of specific notes for his or her own station. This year, we used the camp's "Fort" (Seamas called it a "Palisade") to set up a small town.

The theme of this year's MSKD was the Siege of Malta. Most activities for the entire weekend was broken into Ottoman vs Maltese, with War Points awarded for the victorious. Even Quest was worth a War Point, so Seamas and I worked the theme into this year's design.

First, the General Notes:


GENERAL NOTES FOR TOWNSPEOPLE


The teams of questers entering the town are escaped prisoners of war. There are Maltese teams escaped from the besieging Turks, and there are Ottoman teams escaped from the defending Knights. They do not know which forces control this stretch of coastline or this small town.

Frankly, neither do you!

The Turks are at the end of their resources, and will break off the siege in just a week, on September 8th - but of course you don't know that today. Although your town is obviously Christian, you should avoid offending Ottoman visitors until you are certain that the town will not be shortly invested or occupied by Turkish forces. (Just for safety's sake, the taverns have sold out of anything alcoholic.)

The town itself is a small coastal outpost with a lighthouse. The west side of town is the seafront side. The town guard has been sent out to patrol the roads, leaving the town defenseless. Hurrah!

[Seamas drew a marvelously scaled map here, which I am unable to reproduce as of this writing.]

Miscellaneous notes:

  • Please don't help the questers solve any of the puzzles or quizzes.
  • Moira calls her tavern the "Sable Falcon" but everybody else calls it the "Black Bird."
  • The lighthouse also holds the town library (although few people can read).

Sunday, September 09, 2007

Librarian's Occupations Quiz - Part 2

Huzzah! The quiz is posted!
Please visit SCAdia for the Librarian's Challenge.

Friday, September 07, 2007

Librarian's Occupations Quiz - Part 1

Tonight, Seamas put the Librarian's Occupations list into a format that lets a person input their answers and then see their scores. Unfortunately, we weren't able to get the code to work on Blogger. Tomorrow, he will work on adding the quiz to his own site, SCAdia.

Thursday, September 06, 2007

Orange Omlette for Harlots and Ruffians

Have you ever eaten a meal that was so well prepared you simply couldn't express yourself through words? I had the good fortune at MSKD last weekend to sit at the feast table served by one of the Seige Cooking competition teams. We were, in no uncertain terms, well fed both in quantity and quality of food. (Truly, I did not eat again until after 2PM the next day.) Afterward, I could find no better way to express how much I enjoyed the meal than to hug the team captain!

This was one of the dishes we were served. In my own interpretation (read "guess") that I cooked for dinner Tuesday night, I used 2 Tbs orange juice, and 1 tsp honey for each 2 eggs. Not quite the same as her proportions, but pretty close. More importantly, my children (including the finicky eater) loved it and have asked that I make it again this weekend. Yippee!

Down

A lady within my company died over the weekend. I didn't work directly with her, or even know her well, but she lived and worked closely with a dear friend. That, coupled with the fact that the circumstances surrounding her death are virtually identical to how I lost Mom, has really got me down.

Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Bruce

I have referred in the past to the "Brandr factor." This is the theory that, no matter how thoroughly you predict and prepare for the ways a Quest team can react to an element in your quest design, someone will do something totally unexpected. When we think we have nearly completed a quest design, Seamas and I will sit back and ask ourselves, "What Would Brandyr Do?"

This year, however, I found myself thinking, "What Would Bruce Do...and How Can I Trip Them Up?"

"Bruce" is a perinneal Quest team, captained by Kat the Strange, that usually does very well in our quests. They don't always win, but they certainly know how to play. (Note to self: perhaps they could be persuaded to guest-design a quest one year and give Seamas and me a much needed rest?) Kat herself has collected more bits of screwball knowledge than I would know what to do with, and the rest of the team is just as bright and just as eclectic. This year, Bruce did not leave the Quest village with the most gold. Bruce did not get the most correct answers on the Librarian's Occupations list. They did OK in those areas, but they excelled because Bruce knew heraldry, knew history and geography, knew kindness and charity to the less fortunate. As Bridget told Seamas, they not only knew the answers to all the Peddler's questions, they knew a song about each one!

Gentle Reader, I had to look up the answers to most of those questions!

So should other teams lose heart from the successes of Bruce? NO! In fact, knowledge of previous quests may be a liability to the team who thinks that because they remember something from a previous quest, they know what is going on in this one. Each Quest is different, and arrogance in a pilgrim is never kindly rewarded. Each of our quests is designed to be winnable by any team that gets into the spirit of Quest and really tries. We are, at heart, a group of people who believe in chivalry, learning, and fun. As the song goes, "...that's what it's all about!"

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Another One Down

There is nothing like the adrenaline rush that comes from the successful completion of a much anticipated, and somewhat dreaded, event. No, I don't mean "event" as in this past weekend's MSKD; I mean another successful Quest. Seamas and I worked together again this year, but for some reason, our ideas didn't gel easily or quickly, so our last minute preparations were even more frantic than usual. I don't remember ever being so worried about a Quest before, including last year when I soloed for the first time. Still, everyone involved - denizens, pilgrims, and spectators alike - had a great time.

Seamas and I had fun with it, too. He did a fantastic job putting together and painting the signs (they were made from wood salvaged from a fence we'd torn down in our backyard years ago). He also really, as always, got into the details of fleshing out our rough ideas. I think he was proudest of his map, though. From a single site visit, he was able to use the photos and a few measurements he took to create an accurate map and plan exactly what to put where to take best advantage of the available space...and the available shade at that time of day. That's quite a feat!

Me, I had a blast researching Tablero de Jesus and creating a variant that could be played reasonably quickly. I am tickled at how many people enjoyed the game and want to get together to play again soon. Making the boards and pouches for prizes was also a good way to wind down at the end of a mundanely busy day. We nearly went too far with the Barber's station, though. It's probably just as well that I couldn't find a mannequin limb in time and had to use a crock for the pasta and jello mix instead. But the mix turned out well! I was going for "Yuck!" and was pleasantly surprised to discover I had achieved "Ewwwww!" Even I, knowing what it was, didn't want to stick my hand in it! I initially resisted the idea of requiring the teams to sculpt a falcon from simulated horse flop. However, others liked the idea so much that I had to go along with it. It didn't take much research to find a good homemade playdough recipe, but coloring it brown was another matter altogether!

I will be posting Quest-related stuff over the next few days, including the Librarian's Occupations list. Seamas wants to try to format it as a form so folks can take it as a quiz, then see their scores. I told him he has until the end of the week.