Monday: Got my new bicycle! As recent entries have noted, I quite enjoy getting my wheels back on the road, but I am impressively out of shape.
Great Council. Not quite as record-breakingly quick as some recent meetings, but still efficient. Meeting was briefly enlivened by The Incredible Flying Sushi -- my first biking in years left me tired enough to be literally twitchy, and dinner suffered as a result. Fortunately, I don't seem to have gotten soy sauce all over Morwenna, who was attacked by the sushi.
There was a new member present by the name of Aemil, who just moved here from An Tir; being the only newbie around at this time of year, she quickly became a major center of attention in the chatting. I reassured her that having a cross-gender persona was not going to be a problem locally. (And pointed her to
jdulac if she needs help finding a good mustache.)Need to start thinking about Demo Season. I've decided that it needs to be a bit more organized this year, to make sure that the boroughs get appropriate amounts of support. A number of people have expressed interest in helping out; I need to figure out the best way to leverage them. (I also need to think about how the recent discussions of guilds and their chicken-and-egg relationship with boroughs plays into this.) Reminder to myself: I should put together a mailing list of people interested in helping out with Demo Season, at least a month beforehand. Maybe earlier, given Pennsic.
Tuesday: Dinner with Grandpa Supnik. We found out a couple of days before that he was travelling around the northeast, and had arrived at my Uncle Bob's. Aunt Martha invited us over for dinner (a rather nice salmon with mustard sauce), so we could have a chance to talk.
He's doing fairly well, especially for 91; frankly, since Grandma passed away, his spirits have lifted considerably. They loved each other dearly, but the last five years, with her body and mind steadily decaying, were clearly very hard on him. Now he's actually fairly chipper, and his wits are still sharp. He's having some physical ailments, but he's still walking around decently well on his own, no small matter for a man of his age. So we had a good meal, with him regaling us with stories of his youth. (And cats. I think he's a smidgeon lonely, and is clearly looking for a companion; I think he's likely to get a kitten to take care of.)
Wednesday: Dance practice. I only danced about half the evening, being a bit wiped from the biking of the past couple of days. Fortunately there was a decent-sized crowd, so I didn't feel too horribly guilty.
Thursday: Slightly tense day -- a friend was dealing with some personal issues, and I was on tenterhooks until that resolved (fortunately, with an acceptable outcome). Decided to have a quiet evening at home rather than go gaming; I just didn't have the brainpower for it.
Friday: Dinner with Dad. He IM'ed me on Thursday to say that he was going to be visiting clients in Boston, and asked whether we were interested in going out. Friday is normally our date, but chatting with Dad is a nice change of pace; besides, he always likes taking us out somewhere good, so it wasn't exactly a difficult sacrifice.
I decided that I wanted to go back to La Campania;
msmemory and I had eaten there once, more or less by accident, and immediately put it on our "take Dad here someday" list. (This list is comprised mainly of restaurants that are good enough for his tastes, and usually expensive enough that we can't afford to eat there often ourselves.) As always, I was a bit nervous taking him somewhere new -- Dad is a true restaurant connoisseur, and I hate taking him somewhere disappointing. But things went quite well from the moment we entered and he noticed the Zagat's rating of 26, which marks it as one of the best restaurants in town.We did a bunch of flying forks, which is a tradition in my family. We split the La Campania antipasti sampler (a collection of cheeses and marinated veggies) and the scallops (real scallops in the shell, more like mussels than what normally gets called a "scallop" locally) for the appetizer. For the Prima course, we split the gnocchi with mushrooms and white truffle oil, which was as luscious as expected. For the Seconda course,
msmemory got the rack of lamb, I got the veal chop with gorgonzola sauce and risotto, and Dad got the fish special (Bonito, I think? It was a B-name that I didn't recognize). For dessert, msmemory got the chocolate souffle, which has to be ordered in advance; we wound up splitting that over decaf cappucini all around. And to accompany it all, Dad ordered some scarily expensive but very good wine whose name I forget.Excellent meal all around; I do enjoy introducing Dad to the better restaurants in the area. And it gave us an opportunity to schmooze about the current state of the networked world, and where things are going. Chats with him always remind me of just how fast things are progressing -- it sounds like we're no more than a few years off from serious high-speed wireless packet data availability. My current Treo is just a toy compared to what's coming next.
Saturday: Quiet day, doing chores at home. Worked up the music for the next couple of dances for Accademia. Went out for more biking, wandering around the back streets of my neighborhood and doing laps in the elementary school parking lot. Bit by bit, I can feel my legs coming back to life.
Hit the laptop crash problem that
msmemory had described to me -- an actual bluescreen crash under Windows Explorer, making the machine near-useless. Spent much of the rest of the day fiddling with that, and trying to figure out what to do about it. Eventually found the original reinstall CD for the machine, and decided to rebuild it from scratch. Did that, which mostly proved that the problem is (as I suspected) the new D-Link 802.11g card -- as soon as I reinstalled the card, the problem came back. Okay, I think I need a different card, but I should check for fixed drivers first. *Sigh*. Oh, well -- at least the hard drive's nice and clean now.Sunday: Also pretty quiet. Got a little hung up on the timing of one phrase in Este Gonzaga -- the timing given in the lute tab clearly doesn't make sense, and the measures of the melody line don't match the lute tab. Eventually got a solution that I think is at least plausible, but not until the end of the day, so the piece still isn't finished. Oh, well -- we probably won't get to it this week, so it's *probably* not a crisis yet.
Upcoming Events:
Tonight: Lodge. We have a third degree tonight, which is a big deal; my part is relatively small (it's Past Masters' Night, so everyone does a little bit) but does include one of my favorite bits of symbolism.
Tomorrow: Accademia. We've decided to go back to the beginning of Caroso and start working through everything that seems within our abilities. I expect us to get through one or two new dances.
Wednesday: Dance practice.
Thursday: Maybe gaming at
mindways's, maybe a quiet night at home if I need a night off.Friday: Presumably head down to Vinland Raids.
msmemory and I are pretty much winging this one: we haven't even decided yet whether we're camping or taking a hotel room. We've talked about day-tripping, but I think that's unlikely -- she needs to be there early in the morning for Curia, and I generally prefer to stay late if possible. But given that this summer is being a good deal less relaxing than originally planned, taking this event semi-easy has some appeal.