Post-Event, Pre-Holidays

I gave myself a day off, today, between crazy event stuff (and the crazy getting-ready-for-event stuff that came before it) and crazy getting-ready-for-Halloween stuff, and all the other crazy stuff that comes after that. The plan was to relax, to rest, to . . . I don’t know, not nap because very rarely (if ever) can I manage that when the girls are here with me. The plan, I guess, was to pretty much do nothing. Maybe play a bit, maybe just play around with my new Sims2 expansion (I did that, a bit), talk to some friends (most of whom are feeling about as chatty and cheerful as I, it seems) – I just wanted to do pretty much nothing today, because tomorrow (or maybe I can put it off until Wednesday), it all starts again. I have to make Morgen’s, Jerry’s and my Halloween costumes. I have to start baking, and maybe learning how to can so I can give out jars of applesauce, salsa and other yummy treats as presents to people. We’re leading into the holidays, and my time for ‘just relaxing’ will be even less than normal – but I think I don’t know how to just relax, anyway. Friends of mine are (sort of) upset at each other, and this, of course, makes me upset. It’s tiring to be able to feel it before they talk to me; at least one of them knows it from up close and personal experience. I doubt they’re projecting, at least not on purpose . . . but this is my time of year. Even more than usual, I can’t seem to help it; it just happens.

But anyway! The event. I know that’s what you’re all waiting to hear about. The boat (or, really, a stage that looks vaguely like the aft end of a pirate ship) got finished and looked beautiful, the girls’ garb got done completely and looked super cute, especially when all three of them (Morgen, Liana and Zoe) were together, my garb got done most of the way and looked pretty nice, I like to think (I didn’t get any pictures of me, and I don’t know if anyone else did), and . . . everything was great, despite the usual penchant for Michigan weather doing everything it can to fuck things up. Friday, we didn’t get out there (as a family) until fairly late because of sleeping children, but Jerry’d already gone out earlier to help with some of the big set up stuff, and to put up our tent and so on – so there wasn’t much to do other than change into garb and hang out. When it was the girls’ bed time, he took them to the tent and I got to stay up and drink . . . man, I’d almost forgotten how much fun it can be to just sit up around a bonfire, drinking and telling stories and singing songs. It’d been ages since I’d been able to.

Saturday, I ended up with the girls most of the day, which would have been fine if the plan hadn’t been for Jerry to take care of them so I could help with stuff since he’s far less of a volunteer type than I am. I can help and help and help until I collapse, but he wants to just make beer, cook, and do other stuff he considers fun. Running troll and stuff like that? Not his idea of a good time. I, however, like to help. I do it all the time for events-not-ours, and it makes sense for me to do it for BotIS too. Someone has to, after all. Anyway, yeah. Things didn’t go as planned on Saturday, although Michael, Ruth and Erich all showed up and checked it out, so that was fun. All in all, it was a good time despite the weather and despite things not going the way they were supposed to. It makes me ridiculously happy that the turn out was so good.

This weekend, there’s another camping thing but not an event – it’s just a normal camp out at the park. There’s only two times a year you can do it, once in the spring and once in the fall, but I think it’s going to rain. Don’t know for sure, but I have a feeling . . . and I’m right about the weather far more often than your average weather-person, Doppler radar or no. The weekend after that is Squires, out by Lansing, and I think we might try to go to that if I can convince people to have the clean-out-Mike-and-Becky’s-garage-and-wash-all-the-dishes party/tavern on Sunday instead of Saturday. And I know we’re planning on heading up to Traverse City for Vikings – yay! – though I can’t imagine we’ll be camping with the girls there this late in the year. It gets really, really cold at night.

What else? I got a new exercise DVD, and it looks like a lot of fun. Yay for dance-as-aerobics! I also have to write a note to my mom and thank you notes to Eoin and Baldric for helping out last weekend. And I have to clean my living room so I can mess it up again making Morgen’s Halloween costume and so on. Also, I have to do at least one CbN scene (I’m one of those people who’s feeling little interest these days, I’m afraid, though it’s not the game that’s not holding my attention, or my characters) to run (not play, people need the NPCs) and . . . ugh. It’ll be alright.

Oh, shit.

I just realized it’s almost November.

I need to figure out what I’m going to write about. I WILL hit 50K again this year. I WILL.