Stormhold Invest

To our left, the fine Stormhold Singers, with Master Daffydd, Mistress Elayne, Dame Miriam and her lovely chap Paul. Let them sing us into the tale of the Stormhold Investiture, June AS 41.

I have to confess that I was ambivalent about the Stormhold Baronial Investiture. In our last reign as K&Q and in our P&P reign, the Melbourne groups were the source of most of the problems we encountered. There are reasons for this, some of which I will blather on about in a minute. I made one big mistake in telling J about the terribly witty wags in Krae Glas who heckled me in Court last time I went down there as Queen. They were fairly painful as well as being frustrating, because people only get their AoA once (usually) and the last thing you want is Peers and Co doing the Old Men Muppets routine from the balcony. My favourite part of that night was when one of the kids, who would have been all of three, said "Be quiet, Daddy! It's rude." Mr P is a great kid. So J wants a few of the locals to be slapped with fish and finds it almost impossible to be patient with them. Oh it was all so promising ... and then I had bird flu ...

Anyway, some background. The Melbourne SCA -- it's incomprehensible. I have never met a series of people who have so much going for them who spend so much time focussing on the negative. When the leaders of the groups put their grown-up heads on, they do these amazing things. Some of the best dance, research, fighting, planning and medieval 'stuff' in Lochac comes out of those three groups. But when they leave their grown-up heads off ... well, I'd like three-year-old Mr P to be in charge because he was more reliable and less self-focussed (he's even better now he's five.)

They had a B&B that a section of the barony did not like. Parts of the nearby shires really disliked them. Now this B&B were a little wacky, but no more so than many. They did a lot of things really well. They promoted pageantry, they strongly supported the fighters, they had Big Plans. There was some personal bullshit from both of them in that they had acrimonious ex-relationships within the local area, and had been spectacular in burning bridges connected to those, but this could all have been dealt with.

The peers who did not like them (and you know, it's OK to not like, or even to hate, people in game, you just have to be able to work with them) made this face every time they spoke of or to them. It's the face that you make when you bite into what you think is a butterscotch only to find that it's a sour lemon wine gum. It wasn't good.

So the B&B cut themselves off from big sections of the group and became reactionary, which irritated the lemon people even more (and I can sympathise, but still ...), and both sides started to alienate the new people who really didn't give a rat's and just wanted to do some SCA. Everyone forgot how to communicate, small problems became Grand Sagas, genuine problems weren't adressed because My People Hate Your People, battle lines were drawn, tanties were tanted and before you knew it, the B&B had quit in a huff, the lemon peers all had their soured noses out of joint and the few quiet peers who had just been beavering away doing stuff were left saying, "What the?"

Obviously there are another 100,000 words to this story, but the big point, the important point, is that fewer people acted well than think they did, and that no-one acted quite as badly as some of the stories have made out.

And then there were the repercussions ... ai ai ai! Let's just back away slowly. The only person that I ended up wanting to congratulate was one of the MacAndreas lads who had the balls to apologise to Margie for a balls-up in Marshallate business and subsequently dropping her further into the mank.

While all this was going on there were two groups of people who tried to keep everyone calm and when they failed to work miracles, they stepped off to the side and just did stuff. The first was people who just wanted to go to practice or to hang out, so you had most of Cairn Faill, Rioghan and Muley and many of the younger set just doing things. The second was the small section of leaders in the group who had remained fairly above it all and who were tasked by Stephen and Mathilde to rebuild as much as they could. Miriam was given the Vicarage and Lorenzo either took up or stayed on as Seneschal. I remember that Karel was pretty good about the whole thing, too, but he has had other issues steal him away of late, which is a great shame because he is lovely. Several other peers and leaders including Eleanor, Konga and Alaine (who may have expressed that he thought certain people were pillocks, but did so even-handedly and continued to work with them because he is an adult), Nadje, Bliss and Miss Dawn provided Good Examples, too.

Fast forward 14 months. Things had Settled Down. Cornelius and Morwynna had selected Rodrigo and Sara to be the new B&B. These two are very gentle people who are good at a wide range of things from frocking and music to cooking and ambience. R can waffle even more than J, but he is so charming that it's all fine. Lorenzo had done a good job of Seneschalling enough to keep things happening without doing so much that it looked like Politics. The three Melbourne groups are all beset by people who think they are good at politics when they are actually good at drama. By keeping things low-key, there was nothing to create problems from.

Miriam the Vicar is a genuinely gracious woman. She is kind and considerate, and restrains her arghs! to private audiences. She is also optimistic and encouraging, and so was exactly the person they needed at the time. When people 'politicked' at her, she would use her patented Look of 'Hmm, seems to be rubbish, oh look, I'm needed over there.' When people were doing something interesting, she would encourage them with genuine interest, which has made her very well-liked among the younger set that I was able to chat with.

So, the time came to head down and invest the new B&B. It was a week after our traipse to lovely Aneala where everything was brilliant except that one of my favourite young women gave me an appalling dose of flu. The trickiest court of the entire reign, in a group that J wants to slap a large part of, and I spend four days beforehand unable to talk and go down with a raging fever and hacking cough. Need I mention that I looked just fabulous?

The hall was a very attractive church, but the wind outside was gruesome. A very bright local had set up a coffee shop and had hot beverages a-plenty. There were many people in flash frocks and a flock of cute kids.

Court began a bit late because we had all forgotten to tell Lorenzo that he was essential to it, and he was off picking up Leta who had been delayed by fog. Come to think of it, we were delayed by fog in Sydney, too, and so I had spent the morning standing in a queue developing a raging fever. It's all a bit of a blur ...

We began by calling up Miriam, who was wearing a spectacularly toasty houpelande:

She looked brilliant and was very gratified to hear all the nice things everyone had to say about her. Not half so much as we were all grateful to her for all the nice things she'd done for the group, of course. We made her a Court Baroness and gave her a Grant of Arms. I seem to be saying "Who's a pretty Baroness, then?" in this shot, but I'm sure it was more sensible than that. Note the way my nose gets redder as the sneezing and coughing become more violent during the course of the day.

Many of the visiting B&Bs had brought gifts for the outgoing Vicar as well as the incoming B&B. Here Innilgard (looking JUST spiffy!) are handing over a very loot-filled bundle of goodies.

Innilgard are a very generous group whose B&B do good courtly presence. Blod is a usefully dramatic person rather than someone who just uses drama for attention. Although I did have to laugh when she told me about her secret blog so that she could snark about people who read her regular blog. Snark loud and proud, I say! Although be sure to mention the good bits as quickly as you mention the bad. Unless it's been a really bad day and you just need to vent now, be reasonable later.

As I mentioned, there were stacks of cute children. I have no idea who these ones are, although I think one of the little girls is Elspeth and Cormac's, but they were very sweet and giggly all day.













Soon it was on to the big part of the Court, and Sara and Rodrigo came forward to be invested as B&B. They made a little oopsie in terms of the sides (usually it's King to Baron, Queen to Baroness), but I don't think it mattered. They did a lovely job of their oaths and the procession, and they were purposely invested in plain garb, since they were part of the populace.

At their request we had them fetched from the masses by the Seneschal so that it was clear they were a part of Stormhold called forth to rule the group. I think this was good theatre on their part. We rewrote the ceremony, too, so that it spoke very clearly of the role of the B&B as representatives of the K&Q. I think that some peers who would never dream of being rude to the K&Q had forgotten this in the last Baronial term. Although since some other peers seem to feel that heckling is OK, grrr! (In fairness, it seemed that the heckling, like many of the local problems over the years, was more poor judgement than spite.)

They looked very dignified and there was rousing applause at their investiture, which seemed to bode well. I hope so, it's not easy holding J back from the fish option.

Rodrigo and Sara had trumpeters to play for them at crucial moments, who were mostly good but a little under-rehearsed. They made up for it in style whenever things went a bit off-tempo. You will note that Sara is tall and Rodrigo is carrying a silly hat. These are constants of their personae. Their kids all played useful roles at various times, too. Tamaly (no idea of the actual spelling, I'm afraid) was a star all weekend as usual, while Ebenezeer was quieter but very thoughtful. If I hadn't seen that lad turn into a boffer-wielding demon at Festival, I'd say he was too introspective, but he has an appropriately fiendish side, too.

There was a break, and then the second part of court occured, beginning with R&S appearing in their new robes to fit their new estate. Miss Dawn did S's sideless surcote and it was brill! More bunny than you could poke a pie at.

Note R's many tassels. He used them to good effect all evening. He gave a lovely speech in which he talked about his wishes to have the group unite and go forward and focus on their many great qualities. This wasn't just rhetoric, they do have many great qualities. All that passion that can be used for dumb things works even better when used for good. Some of my fave Melbourne SCA bits have been Margie's theatre, Auntie Nic's amazing kiddie wrangling, The Fearsome Stormhold Archers ... it goes on. Suffice to say that when they use their powers for good, they're amazing.

Lots more court went on after this. A couple of highlights:














Young Mr P came up wearing his First Queen's Militia baldric (nice one, Hanbal!) and was made a member of ther Mouse Guard in recognition of his services to the Crown and his sheer usefulness. He looked very startled the whole time, but I was told later that he was very happy about it all. Mr P's dad rubs J the wrong way, and I can see that because he has a talent for the grandiloquent, but he has a great kid, so he must be doing something right.

Master Thorfinn finally received his Pelican scroll, 20 years after he was made a Pelican and about nine years after the scroll was completed. And people wonder why I'm getting involved in Scribal sorting ... It was a very nice moment and J made Thorfinn stand while people applauded his anniversary. Great scroll, too. I think it might have been by Richard ... someone very good at any rate.

We also gave out some much-deserved AoAs, including one to Isobel my stunt lady-in-waiting, but sadly the shots of those were rubbish. I'll see if K has anything good on her camera. Isobel and Tamsyn the herald were extremely kind and thoughtful to us, and I liked them a great deal. I subsequently found out that Tamsyn was the person who thought that Casa Celi was evil, but I think that she's only met their reputation and would quite like the actual people. Although Ms Waters and Spyd now both know who she is and what she looks like, so perhaps she should go on thinking that they're evil in order to never be alone in the same room as them. Because it would end in either tears or red wine and singalongs, and neither option is pretty.
[Edited to Add: New news on this development! See above posting: Secret no more!]

We had the wonderful KT and Freiderik helping us, with more stunt LIW-ing from Katje. They were amazing. At one point during the court I started to shiver like a rabbit. Next thing I knew my coat had been slipped over my shoulders, KT's cloak bundled over my lap, she forced her pre-warmed gloves onto my hands and Katje secretly smuggled tissues in and out of the Royal Presence (brave, brave soul!! and so kind!) I have only a glimpse of KT in the shot above, wearing a truncated hennin behind Blod and her furry hat. Freid is much more obvious because he was the tallest person in the room. Anyway, I clearly owe them all major favours and will be starting with Katje's buttonholes any day now.

Margie was there, and looking much more relaxed than I have seen her in a long time. She has had an utterly crap year and I wish that the universe would be a bit kinder to her. Vandel seems to be cheering her up more, and this is a good thing. I would love to see her be able to focus on the things that make her happy and proud, because she has a lot of them.

She and Nadje were the stars of the series of performances that went on through the night, all with moral tales. Sadly I was half-dead by that point, so it's all a blur. I remember laughing a lot, though.

The actual feast was a bit strange. I remember it as being quite good, in fact I felt very revived by the food and went from being in imminent danger of collapse to able to get through the night relatively well. It was certainly more than enough for me to feel full and happy.

Other people had a different experience. The spit-roasted chicken was raw; now this was just a blunder, when will people learn the important rule of spit roasting? Better serve it cold and fully cooked than hot and inedible! Stick 'em on early! The fish, though, was excellent and everyone who tried it liked it very much. Katje had a very bad time with the food, her vegetarian friends (who had given the steward warning of their vegetarianism) found that many of the vegie bits had been cooked in chicken stock. Her friend who eats white but not red meat was stymied by the chicken being stuffed with bacon (although in the end it didn't matter, since raw). And K herself was unable to find out what did and didn't have almonds in it, so didn't eat for fear of allergic reaction.

It seemed that, one disaster aside, almost all the other problems were the result of communication problems. If there had been an itemised menu, all of those allergy/restriction people could have gone to it. As it was, there was no-one who they could ask because the servers had no idea. I think that this happened because the poor old cook was run off her feet and the steward had changed at short notice. The person who ended up stewarding was not someone who is used to feasts and so it would not have occurred to him that this was important.

I do wish that K had said something on the night, because we could have sent a runner to the kitchen to ask all the pertinent questions and then had a herald announce things through the evening. Plus I had pig-free food on High Table. However, I was too manky to notice, K was too polite to want to bother anyone, and the servers were too young to realise that they could make a difference there. It was, in a funny way, a very Stormhold thing. At the end of the evening people went home with wildly divergent experiences of the event depending on where they were sitting. We went home before the last remove came out (that was simply late) but were still very well fed.

This is a very nice shot of Clarice, Sui and Katje. Clarice is one of those divine women who makes things better around her. In fact, I am sure that she would have solved the Great Food Crisis if she hadn't been distracted by the Great Portia and Sui Saga. Sui is a lovely young chap who is dead keen on lots of stuff. He has been very good for Portia in keeping her more in touch with reality and her own smartness and usefulness, rather than just keeping her on a pedestal as a trophy, but he does need to remember that we all need a bit of niceness, too. One overly brusque moment that evening saw it all end in tears. They don't call it tired and emotional for nothing. Katje is our resident bubbly Canadian and she is very lovely. She is off to Pennsic soon, and I need to wrangle her sleeves what need buttonholes from her very soon!

The evening ended in a blizzard of tissues back at Miriam's, and apparently I sounded so appalling that night that she left me in bed while they all went out for breakfast at Mis Dawn's the next day. This was a shame because I like that crowd very much, but on the whole it was probably a good idea due to me being plague-ridden.

At the Sunday Tourney, J was on community TV, Freiderik was a Fighting God and Hrothgar won the tournament. Go Rowany! It was a very good tournament filled with imaginative ways of fighting thanks to Hanbal and co. I have no idea who ended up as the Baronial Champion, though ... blur, again ...

In all, I left the weekend quite optimistic for R&S. They are both very cool and will do a good job. It just remains to be seen how many people leave their grown-up hats on around them. Perhaps we actually need to create a mythical crisis nearby so that the people who believe they Must Be Involved will all have something to do? The problem with that is threefold: a/ it's very cynical, b/ it's very Waugh in Scoop and c/ it's buying into, rather than solving, the problem.

Would be funny, though.