http://search.deviantart.com/?q=by:Flashgriffin&section=today deviantART RSS for by:Flashgriffin en-us Copyright 2009, deviantART.com Fri, 18 Dec 2009 09:29:04 PST deviantART.com http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://s.deviantart.com/minish/widgets/apple-touch-icon-precomposed.png http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/28675651/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/28675651/ Mon, 30 Nov 2009 16:35:51 PST
I have a goal. An attainable goal. Basically my goal involves building my skill at heavy fighting to the utmost pinnacle of my ability, and beyond if necessary. The eventual outcome of this goal has two parts. I want to be a Knight. And I want to win Coronet by my own hand.

I'm mainly pleased that for the first time in my life, either mundanely or within the Society, I have a goal. It's a big goal, which will have amazing results and require a lot of hard work to achieve, but hey... I love fighting.

As my Master at Arms Reme has told me a few times, I have a warrior's spirit. He is firmly of the belief that I can make it, although he seems compelled to constantly remind me of all the work it will take to do it. As if I don't know. I'm am fully cognizant of the work it will take, and the dedication, discipline and integrity involved. And in order to become a Knight, I will have to first become a Squire, which means that I will have to make friends with at least one Knight who will be able to teach me what I need to know, who will recognize the drive within me, and when the time comes, will speak on my behalf in the Knight's Council. At this time, there are few Knights I can think of who will do that, but it is not important at this stage. I'm not even carded for Heavy Fighting at this point. But when I start coming out, and start showing my skill, Knights will take note of my ability, and someone will come to me and offer a position as their Squire.

This has been in the works for a few weeks, but a large part of the decision to be a Knight came about this past weekend. I recently returned from November Coronet in Saskatchewan, with Seumas and John as passengers. Basically, as they are both Heavies, and we were all on our way to win the Tournament and become the next Prince of Avacal, we had an excellent opportunity to discuss fighting. Seumas has been helping me with my armor and fighting skills, he is as dedicated to my cause as I am (I think he really likes me), and it doesn't hurt that all three of us have the same goals. All three want to be Knights, and all three want to win Coronet.

All Fighters entering the Lists for Coronet have to have an inspiration, a Consort to share the throne with when they win. Seumas asked me to inspire him for this tourney. Apparently I did a good job, because he mentioned about 4 times that I was the best inspiration that he has ever had, and he's been in Heavy for about 6 years.

When asked to do a job, such as being a Guard or Inspiring a Fighter, I take it seriously. Someone is counting on me to do something, and for the most part it is stuff that is not disagreeable to do. As an Inspiration I took it to mean that I should always be around, watch all his fights, and make sure he knows where I am so that he knows that I'm watching. I should have his extra armor available in case he loses his right arm and has to fight with his left. I should make sure that he has water, and if I see that he is faltering, shore him up with inspiring words. I did all these. I also took care of 'mundane' things like keeping his belt pouch with his phone and wallet on me so that they weren't stolen, I fetched and carried, and basically tried to make things easier for him. Apparently I did a good job.

While at this event, I was also able to work on the relationship that seems to be growing between me and Her Excellency Countess Inga. She is an amazing woman, very talented in a wide range of things including sewing, Scribal work, bead making, and fighting, and I am honored to be on her Guard. She and I have agreed to meet for coffee in the not to distant future to talk about many things, and I am looking forward to it. It has been hinted at that I may be able to become her Man at Arms, similar to my relationship with Reme only for Heavy Fighting. I left that decision up to her, for a point in time after she's seen me fight. But she seems to have a high opinion of me, and will introduce people to me and go on at length about things that she thinks are amazing about me. Needless to say, I am quite pleased and humbled by her opinion of me. It has occured to me that if I am taken on as her Man at Arms, I could concievably call myself Grioffa Ingasdottir, which I would be very proud to do. Of course, I will discuss it with her first, before I even consider making it a true part of my name.

I consider myself blessed by the support group I have already created for my goal. Between Reme, Seumas and Inga, I should have nearly all the outside motivation... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/27484234/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/27484234/ Tue, 29 Sep 2009 11:15:55 PDT
It's been a while since the last time I wrote, Investiture being the last event I wrote about. I haven't been to too many since then, as the summer came to an end, and the number of local events dwindled down. Besides, after Her Excellency Eirika was no longer Princess, and I no longer her Guard, not much interesting stuff happened to me at events. I go, I hang out, I play with swords, I eat feast, I sit through Court, things are so much more interesting when one has a job. Which is basically why I volunteered to be Her Excellency Inga's Guard, when I was at Harvest Feast a few weeks ago. I don't know if Baronesses need Guards, but I asked and she accepted, so the next time we're at an event together, I will have something to do. I may also have to volunteer to help in the kitchen more often. Vinfest was this last weekend, and I was the only volunteer to help serve the feast, and one of the few to help clean up the kitchen afterwards. It is much more satisfying to actually have something to do.

As I said, Harvest Feast a few weeks ago, and then Vinfest a few days ago. Both good events.

Harvest was a day trip, Tora and I left really early saturday morning to drive to Red Deer, got there ages before everything started, with tons of time to write letters of intent and get ready for the Bitter End Rapier Championship tournament. I did fairly pathetically in that tourney, and in the end, Ansgar Stormbreaker is the new Rapier Champion of Bitter End.

Other than that, not much to say of Harvest Feast, other than the offer to Inga as a Guard.

On to Vinfest. Long, long trip to Grande Prairie, Tora and I left friday afternoon and hung out there playing cards and listening to people talk, perusing the merchants, and snacking on the lovely fruits and crackers that the Feast Stewards provided.

I felt like death warmed over the next day. I had been coming down with a cold, and it hit with a vengeance saturday morning. I didn't fight rapier, I barely felt like I could stand. So, I slept through it, and got up in time for lunch.

Like always, Vinfest has a Combat Archery tournament, and unbeknownst to most people, I was planning on competing. I had been working for some time to get my armor up and going, and brought it out for the first time for the Combat Archery tournament. I put it on a bit early, and walked around in it for about an hour before the Tourney actually started, but it was so comfortable I barely cared. It's absolutely gorgeous. Black shortsleeve gambeson with gold trim on the hem, blue baggy fighter pants covering my armored legs, and a chestpiece that is a work of art. It's woven out of two inch strips of thick leather, and dyed to a kind of dark gold color. I recieved so many compliments on it... it's amazing. Will post pictures on Facebook when I get them. I had to borrow an elbow, because I just didn't have time to make it, but it worked.

I had three fights in the Combat Archery tourney... I didn't win any of them, and didn't even hit anyone, but it was still fun. I did a fairly good job of dodging, but even so, I still took four hits, one of which didn't count. Still, lots of fun.

It started raining during my last turn up, so Deicyn called off the tourney. I have fought and shot in the rain before, but apparently Deicyn didn't want us too. *sigh*

Oh well. I still haven't actually done the grape stomp at Vinfest, which they do every year, because the idea of putting my feet in a barrel full of cold grapes doesn't sound like fun to me.

Like stated before, I was the only person to volunteer beforehand to serve feast, so I got to serve the head table. It was nothing like serving was when I worked with Elizabethan Catering... I just put plates on table and took away empties... nothing more. Although, Her Highness Gemma did give me a coin from the Reign as thanks for it. Like most of my other bling... I sewed it to my hat.

And that was it. Court was small, as the only Royals that were there were Their Hignesses Stein and Gemma. I did get to watch a Herald become invested as a Principality Herald... I never realized that they actually poured water over their heads. Nifty. Jean de Chauliac got to be 'stand in Herald' for that, that was his only part of that court. I bet it was fun, I had a front row seat, and everyone except the poor woman getting douced with water looked like they were having fun. She cringed as it ran down her back, kind of amusing.

After Court I went to help in the Kitchen, helping to clean up. Bjar came too, and the Head Feast Steward seemed very grateful for our help. We were done by midnight, and I went to bed basically right after.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/26658567/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/26658567/ Mon, 17 Aug 2009 20:05:28 PDT It rained most of the way there, except when we were actually at the event, which was good. And very handy. I went with Tora, Tristram and a friend of his from work, a newbie. We arrived on site about half an hour before opening Court, the last time I'd get to stand Guard on Her Highness Eirika.

We processed in, I took my place, which ended up actually being behind Their Excellencies, the Baron and Baroness of Borealis, Vik and Inga. And I got to hold Her Excellency's banner, which was cool.

Court was court... up until I was awarded the Princess's Knot. It's the favor she gives out to those who make her job as Princess easier. Jean de Chauliac called me up... and himself, cus there was a list. We were the only two actually there from the list. But yeah, we went up, knelt before Her Highness in one of the last things she got to do as Princess. Jean recieved the Knot on the traditional necklace with the suggestion to add it to something more fitting for his time period. I recieved the Knot as attached to a bundle of feathers, to be used as a decoration on my Cavalier hat. Her Highness apparently wasn't aware that my period is actually 10th Century Irish, not 15th Century Italian, but then she rarely saw me in my proper garb. Oh well, it's still very thoughtful, and looks awesome on my hat. She made it herself.

As part of her speech, she basically denounced Malcolm as one of her Guard, saying that I *was* her guard. Makes me sad for Malcolm, but he made the choice not to be on her guard, by not showing up.

I got to stand in court for the rest, until Stein and Gemma were Invested as the new Prince and Princess, and Her Highness Eirika became Her Excellency Eirika. And my job was over. I left with her. And sewed my feather onto my hat.

The Championship Tournies to determine the new Principality Champions of Heavy and Archery were just after court, and I kind of sort of watched them. More the heavy than the archery, although the Combat Archery component was pretty neat. I hadn't realized that all Principality Champions had to be Combat archers now... although it makes sense.

In any event, His Excellency Vicount Vik Vikingsson, Baron of Borealis is now the Principality Heavy Champion... apparently there were no Knights in the Tourney, so he got special compensation to compete... probably knowing full well that he'd win.

And Coriander of Vinjar, the best Combat Archer in Avacal, is now the new Principality Archery Champion. I think I'm gonna dig out that little gryphon with the arrow belt favor I was making for Genic when he was champion, and present it to her to add to the regalia.

There was a Cadet's tourney after all the fighting. Nine fighters, including Robert, Tristram and me... obviously. I was the only un-scarfed fighter... again. I'm going to have to do something about that. Although I think I'm going to have to stop wearing my red sash, I think I'm confusing the Dons. I didn't win anything, but according to the list of Most Fights, I came in third. So that is the placement I shall use. I came in Third out of 9 fighters and I was the only un-scarfed one. Not too shabby.

Dead tired and needing food, which was scarse on-side, we left to find food, and head back. It was a short event, but a good event.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/25309112/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/25309112/ Sun, 14 Jun 2009 12:46:31 PDT
Last weekend was June Coronet. I managed to get a ride at the last moment with a lovely gentle by the name of Finna, who basically talked the whole way down. It shouldn't have been last moment, but I hadn't been planning to go to Coronet. Robert twisted my rubber arm into going. But that's okay, it was a good event.

There was a Cadet's tourney in the morning before the Coronet Tourney. Out of a good dozen rapier fighters, I was one of the few that wasn't scarved, but that's okay. I put in a good showing for myself anyway. Out of 30 fights, I managed to win 11 of them, including against Don William Bennet and Don Robert of Clan Gunn... twice in Bobby's case. I probably won't have it so easy against Don William again, I suspect he wasn't expecting me to be as good as I am. Anyhoo, so I was pleased with myself. I had named Her Highness Eirika as my inspiration for that tournament, and she watched me fight a few times. She seemed quite impressed. So... Yay!

I still didn't win nothing though... oh well.

In my position as Princess' Guard I was busy most of the day, helping to stake down tents and carry stuff and... I was asked by Her Magesty to get the Crowns from Vik and Inga's tent... I didn't touch the actual Crowns, I kept them in the boxes, but hey, I was impressed that I was allowed to do that!

I had to stand behind the thrones basically through the entire Coronet Tourney, to determine the Heirs to the Thrones of Avacal. That was cool... I was out of the rain, which was nice. I had three cloaks on, so I wasn't frozen, but if I did get cold, I could go to warm up at the braisier in front of the thrones.

After the Coronet Tourney was done, and Their Excellencies Stein and Gemma were chosen as the new Heirs, there was archery and the Squires Tourney, for all those Heavies who didn't get enough fighting in during the Coronet Tourney. I didn't watch the Archery at all, and didn't participate. I checked Bobby's crossbow bolts, and went to have a nap while pretending to watch the Squire's tourney. Didn't really work, and so I went on a quest for food before Court. That almost didn't work out the way I wanted it too, if I had eaten slower I wouldn't have made it to Court in time, because I had to stand behind the thrones again... as always.

Court was Court... basically AoAs and stuff. No one I knew.

After Court while Her Highness was looking through the largess they had acquired, she gave me my first offical piece of bling, a very pretty necklace with purple and white beads on it. She said it was a token of her appreciation for being on her Guard. I have since put on it the coin that Inga gave me last year for helping with the Estrella Gift Bags.

I conned a couple other Rapier fighters into having a little impromptu fight practice after Court, after I had been relieved by Her Highness. That was great fun. There was Bjarr, Francis and Caophis, all Cadets from Montengarde... and me... no one from Borealis. We had to go out past troll in order to do our practice, because it was technically illegal, so we had to be off SCA land... but it was still fun. It was raining while it was going on, and I discovered that you can have rain come in through a fencing mask. Odd kind of distraction. We had fun stabbing each other, making the ground really muddy and slippery. Caophis kept stealing my sword, because apparently he likes it more than his own... sneaky bastard.

When the sun went down, we had to stop, and so we went back to the campfires and stuff... eventually I went to bed... frozen stiff.

And we left early the next morning.

And now on to the second SCA Event! Silverwolf!

It was held yesterday. I was competing in the Rapier Championship, to determine the new Borealis Rapier Champion. It was bloody hot. Way too hot to be out fighting in the sun, in black clothes. And a lot of us had black clothes.

There were ten of us vying for the Championship, out of 15 fighters. I started out on a roll, but I think I tired myself out too fast, and ended up losing quite pathetically. Although I did manage to get a few good kills in later on.

To make a long story less long... Genic won. Genic is now the Borealis Rapier Champion.

The Archery, Heavy and A&S Championships also went on later in the day, one after the other. Baeldrick of Newt is our new Archery Champion, Fenrick Vikingsson is our new Heavy Champion, and I don't know the name of the man who won A&S.

Her Highness showed up later in the day, which was good cus it gave me something to do for the rest of the day, even though most of House Amaranth was there, and I got to hang out with them, it was good to have her aro... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/24830779/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/24830779/ Mon, 18 May 2009 21:08:40 PDT
I was the first of House Amaranth to arrive, at least that I know of. I had a bit of trouble finding a way to get there, as Reme had to back out of giving me a ride when his Aztec died, leaving him with a small car to get there with. So, I eventually found a ride with Tanwen. So, that was fun, I got there about 2 o'clock friday afternoon. Set up camp, all that good stuff. I was camping with the other 6 members of House Amaranth, being the newlyweds Genic and Quinn, Tristram, and three others I hadn't met yet. We had a nice plot of real estate set aside for us, with a few trees in our area. The campground was in a forest-like area, with semi-cleared areas for the campsites. I put my tiny little tent up in the back corner of our plot, so that people would know the boundaries when they arrived, if I wasn't there at the time.

May Crown site was an amazing place, a campground by Fort Macleod. It was fully capable of holding the 1100 people that were there, and was very nice, with lots of trees and hills, and a real meditation labyrinth. I wandered aimlessly, bugged the few of my friends that were there, and waited impatiently for the others to show up. During that time I found out that Her Highness the Princess wasn't going to be there, so my presence as Princess' Guard wasn't needed. *Sigh* I was looking forward to that.

Finally Genic and Quinn showed up, coming from their Honeymoon in Jasper, they arrived about 8ish. I helped them set up camp, and we waited impatiently for the others to arrive. Tristram and the others were supposed to get there about 10ish, at least that's what he had told me... apparently they operate by SCA time, and the time they state is about 2 hours earlier than the time they will eventually arrive. They actually did a little better than that, arriving at 11:30. It was fully dark, and Genic and I had built a nice fire to light their way by the time they got there. Genic laughed about their inept tent-building skills, and I sat and made sure the fire didn't explode.

And I slept in my own tent for the first time in the year I've had it.

There was a Cadet's Tourney the next morning, stupidly enough at the same time as the Archery tournament. Both Genic and I went into the Cadet Tourney instead of doing Archery. It was way too windy for Archery. Of course, Tristram and Quinn also went into the Cadet Tourney... being the other two Rapier fighters of House Amaranth.

A Cadet Tourney is different than a regular rapier tournament in that it's technically only open to Dons and Cadets, and anyone else who wants to get in has to get a Don to sponsor them. Genic, Quinn and I asked Don Rodrigo, a proper older Spanish gentleman to sponsor us. As a difference from other Dons, he required that we go to him after the tournament and recieve lessoning from him. If we failed in our end of the bargain, he would never sponsor us again. Fortunately we all did go to him. I was the last, unfortunately having no time to do so until noon Sunday. But I still had lessons with him, and learned a great deal.

Anyway... there were 42 Rapier fighters in that tournament, from all over the Kingdom of An Tir, including most of the Champions of An Tir. Reme as the Borealis Rapier Champion (with the brand new sash that I made for him), Tristram the Principality Champion... even the Queen's Rapier Champion, an amazing fighter from the States was there. We stood in a circle before the tourney started, and introduced ourselves. There were a lot of Foreigners, and a lot of Dons... there were at least a dozen. Tons of Cadets as well. I felt rather humbled... there were people there whom had been wielding a sword as long as I have been alive (as in the case of Don Rodrigo). The four of us from House Amaranth stood there together and when it came time to introduce ourselves we stated our names, which included our House affiliation, our inspiration, and the Don which sponsored us. T'was fun. I realised later that I was the only fighter who still had my mask on while the introductions were going on, but hey, whatever. So what if no one knows my face. I'll be the mysterious faceless rapier fighter.

I think that tourney was cursed. Two fighters got hurt, one badly enough for an ambulance to have to come, and as for me, I got pezzed in the throat about 4 times, really hard, and then once very stiffly in the ribs, so that I could barely breathe. I opted out about three quarters of the way through the tourney. Also, there were too many fighters in too small an area, so it just wasn't fun.

I wandered, got out of my rapier gear, got food, communed with the other members of House Amaranth, bugged Robert, Reme and my other friends... randomly mentioned the thought of going into Fort Macleod... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/24562232/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/24562232/ Sun, 03 May 2009 08:55:19 PDT
(Incidentally, the picture of me with the sword in my new Deviant ID is from this tournament. I am fighting Reme, my Instructor, in this shot.)

After the feast, before Court, my friend Malcolm (whom I made devices for him and his Lady) came to me and asked me if I wanted to stand behind the thrones, protect the Princess and represent Rapier. I looked at him, thought 'Huh?', and basically said 'but I've only been in rapier less than a year...'. He said that didn't matter, and added that if I felt inclined, join the Processional before Court started. I thought a second, said 'heck yes', stole Reme's hat, and went to join the processional.

So, I stood behind the thrones, and tried to look like I belonged there... not exactly easy when you're not sure what you're supposed to be doing.

I didn't get a chance to talk to Her Highness until after Court was over, but when I did I said thank you for the opportunity, and she said 'wanna do it at May Crown as well?' I thought 'May Crown? With Their Majesties, possibly the Royal Couple of Artemisia and Coronets of Tir Righ there? They want me to stand in Court?' I said yes, of course. And essentially floated on air for the rest of the night...

Then yesterday I was at Beltain in Montengarde, and I was telling Robert about the events at Silver Arrow, and he said 'Oh, so you're on the Princess' Guard.', and I thought, 'Huh? How'd that happen?' So, I went and talked to Her Highness, and she confirmed it, and apologized for the informal way it had happened. So, as it turns out I'm officially one of Her Highness' Bodyguards.

My duties include standing behind the thrones, ostensibly to protect Her and His Highness during Court, to fetch and carry, to put up and take down thrones, encampments, and whatever else needs done. I also have the 'official' bodyguard duties... at Camping events (like May Crown), I should be with her when she goes shopping in Merchant's Row, or when she talks to anyone on a one-on-one basis, to help keep misinformation and rumors down. And keep people who are really annoyingly persistant away. And occasionally act as Hitman... which I am of Da Union, so there could be two people telling me to shoot or stab people... hopefully there won't be issues between them.

I am on Her Guard until She is no longer Princess, so the middle of August. Which means I will be on her Guard through May Crown, Silverwolf, TnA War, Quad War, Hidden Treasures... all the good events. Yay!

I think I'm the only Rapier fighter on Her Guard... all the others are Heavies... and the only other one I know of for sure is Malcolm. I don't know how many of us there are. It is odd though, that the Princess should have a Guard that is mostly Heavies, because Rapier is traditionally the Guard of Her Highness... but whatever.

I told Her Highness about the fact that I shot His Highness Hjalti in the throat last year at TnA War, before he had become Prince. She was quite amused by that.

Oh yes, and I finally won a prize in a Rapier Tournament! At Beltaine there was a tourney, with a tough bit of competition. There were three Dons and 4 Cadets, and 3 of us without scarves. I am, needless to say, without a scarf. However, apparently I put up a fairly good fight, because I managed to kill one of the Dons. I got him in the neck. He went on to teach me a little afterwards.

During Court, where I was of course standing behind the thrones, protecting Her Highness, I got called up to accept a prize for being tenatious in the face of such adversity and taking my many, many deaths graciously. (Although there was one point where I was sick of getting pezzed in the face 5 seconds into each fight I was in, and was thinking of leaving, until I talked to Robert and he explained to me that I was an unknown to the Dons, and they were pezzing me to prevent me killing them. I make a good enough showing for myself that I guess I come across as more dangerous than maybe I really am... or something like that.)

Anyway, I got a slingshot with one rubber ball... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/22669219/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/22669219/ Mon, 19 Jan 2009 09:08:36 PST
]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/21557806/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/21557806/ Tue, 18 Nov 2008 20:11:10 PST
]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/20621615/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/20621615/ Mon, 22 Sep 2008 15:11:04 PDT
1. The phone rings; who do you want it to be?
Joel or Litton
2. When shopping at the grocery store, do you return your cart?
I’ve never used a cart, but I would if I did.
3. In a social setting, are you more of a talker or a listener?
I listen.
4. Do you take compliments well?
I think so.
5. Do you play Sudoku?
No.
6. If abandoned alone in the wilderness, would you survive?
Probably not.
7. Do you like to ride horses?
Yes, I love anything to do with horses.
8. Did you ever go to camp as a kid?
Yes
9. What was your favorite game as a kid?
Let’s Pretend.
10. If a sexy person was pursuing you, but you knew he/she was married, would you go for it?
No.
11. Have you lied to get out of a date?
No.
12. Could you date someone with different religious beliefs than you?
Yes, and I have. It’s not easy.
13. Do you like to pursue or be pursued?
Be pursued.
14. Use three words to describe yourself?
Quiet, Silly, Energetic.
15. Do any songs make you cry?
Sometimes
16. Are you continuing your education?
Yes
17. Do you know how to shoot a gun?
Not unless it’s similar to using a bow.
18. If your house was on fire, what would be the first thing you grabbed?
My computer, my bow, and my arrows... I can’t leave any of them behind.
19. How often do you read books?
As often as I can get away with.
20. Do you think more about the past, present or future?
A little of all three.
21. What is your favorite children's book?
Goodnight Moon
22. What color are your eyes?
Blue-green
23. How tall are you?
5’4”
24. Where is your dream house located?
On an acreage
25. Do you have a secret fetish?
Not that I’m aware of.
26. Have you tried Sushi?
Yes, it’s great stuff.
27. Have you ever taken pictures in a photo booth?
Yes
28. When was the last time you were at Olive Garden?
A couple years ago.
29. When was the last time you were at Church?
Summer last year.
30. Where was the furthest place you traveled today?
To work, on Whyte Ave.
31. What was your favorite job?
What I am currently doing... either that or Elizabethan Catering.
32. Do you like mustard?
Not really.
33. Do you prefer to sleep or eat?
Depends on what I’m eating, and what time I have to get up in the morning.
34. Do you look like your mom or dad?
Mom
35. How long does it take you in the shower?
20-30 minutes, maybe a little more.
36. Can you do the splits?
Not really...
37. What movie do you want to see right now?
One that’s currently playing, none.
38. If you could fast forward your life, would you?
No.
39. What did you do for New Year's?
Played poker with my room-mates.
40. Do you think The Grudge was scary?
Didn’t see it.
41. Could you relate to a character in Mean Girls?
Didn’t see it.
42. Do you own a camera phone?
Nope!
43. Do you have an "ex box" with pics and letters from past lovers?
Gods no!
44. Was your mom a cheerleader?
I highly doubt it.
45. What's the last letter of your middle name?
N
46. Do you like your middle name?
Yeah, it’s not too bad. Works well with my last name.
47. How many hours of sleep do you get a night?
7 or 8, preferably.
48. Do you like care bears?
No
49. What do you buy at the movies?
Nothing usually
50. Do you know how to play poker?
Sorta not really
51. Do you wear your seatbelt?
Yes, all the time
52. What do you wear to sleep?
Track pants and tank top
53. Anything big ever happen in your hometown?
Yeah, a few things
54. How many meals do you eat a day?
5 or 6
55. Is your tongue pierced?
No
56. Ever meet anyone you met on myspace?
I’m not on Myspace.
57. Do you read myspace bulletins?
I’m not on Myspace.
58. Do you like funny or serious people better?
Funny people.
59. Ever been to L.A.?
Nope.
60. Did you eat a cookie today?
Nope.
61. Do you use cuss words in other languages?
Yes, all the time.
62. Do you steal or pay for your music downloads?
What music downloads, I buy CDs.
63. Do you hate chocolate?
Are you insane? I love chocolate!
64. What do you and your parents fight about the most?
My lack of motivation and intelligence.
65. Are you a gullible person?
I used to be, I hope I’m not anymore.
66. Do you need a boyfriend/girlfriend to be happy?
Anyone who says yes to this question needs their head examined. No, I don’t technically need a boyfriend, but he does make things... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/20419292/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/20419292/ Wed, 10 Sep 2008 08:10:28 PDT
I was really not impressed with how I was shooting in the Archery, so I'm not even going to go there. The rapier was much more interesting.

I put my name down for the Championship in Rapier, even though it was my first Tournament. I figured it would be awesome if I won it. Obviously I didn't win... I lost every fight I participated in, except for one.

There were about a dozen fighters, and we did a Round Robin format, in which we had to fight everyone once. Probably best for my first tournament. About half of us were from Borealis, and were people that I regularly practice against, being Reme, Ansgar, Somerled, Jamal, Robert, and... I guess I would be the other person from Borealis. The only fight I won was against Jamal... we took out each other's legs, and while we were sitting there, I snapped up and got him in the chin... I think. But I got thoroughly beat in the other fights. Ansgar got me in the face but good, Reme got me in the chest, Robert toyed with me for several minutes before slashing me across the face. Somerled was using his nice shield that I painted for him, which threw me off cus I'm not used to fighting people with shields, and he got me but good as well. (I was looking forward to fighting Somerled, because I can usually take him, when he's not using his shield.)

The pick up fights after were more fun that the tournament itself. There were less rules in the pick ups, and a bout could go for as long as you wanted, rather than just to the death. I got some pointers from a couple of other fighters, and danced with Somerled a little.

I can't wait to do Rapier at Vinfest, September 27th in Grande Prairie. And the Archery up there is always fun. If I happen to have armor by then, I probably will go into the Combat Archery tournament as well... but we'll see.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/20219003/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/20219003/ Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:11:48 PDT
]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19788284/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19788284/ Tue, 05 Aug 2008 10:47:13 PDT
Quad War is a large SCA event that takes place on its own private site outside of Marsden, Saskatchewan. It’s usually a few days long, and is a great deal of fun. This year it went from Thursday July 31st to August 4th.

I went down with Somerled. We wanted to head out fairly early in order to get our campsite up and ready before the war actually started. It’s a 4 hour drive from Edmonton, and we got there mid-afternoon on Thursday. We found a place where we could set up tents in the bush at the bottom of a hill in the Quiet Camping area, and set about ripping a whole bunch of grass, little trees and raspberry bushes out of the ground in order to get enough space to put our two little tents up. Between the two of us we have too much stuff for Somerled’s little three-man tent, what with the fact that we’re both fighters in the wars, and archers, and he’s a rapier fighter. So, we had two armor bags, which are hockey bags, two sets of arrows and bows, and a golf case with swords and rapier armor. That’s a lot of stuff, never mind all the other things like food and garb and other stuff you need when camping. Consequently we put all our gear in one tent, and sleep in the other.

I had made him my favor for him to wear, and offered to be his inspiration. I offered it to him after our campsite was set up, and he accepted, letting me tie it to his arm. Now, when he wears it, he fights for my honor and in my name (just like knights used to back in the middle ages). Of course, if he does something un-chivalric, mean, stupid or just plain rude while he’s wearing it, then that would show on me as well, because by giving him my favor, any actions that he does ‘in my name’, represent what I would want him to do. But he won’t do anything bad, it’s not in his nature. For a picture, go here -> [link]

Nothing was really happening until Friday, so we wandered aimlessly, tried to get some archery in (I had to borrow Somerled’s bow because Litton’s is falling apart and needs to be fixed). Thursday was pretty calm. I think I broke one of my arrows on Thursday, if I remember. All I know for sure is that the tip came off one of them… but I don’t remember when it happened.

Friday was a little more animated, although I didn’t really want to do archery because I was having bad luck keeping arrows intact, and usable. I needed as many as I could get for Saturday, but every time I practiced I ended up losing or breaking an arrow. At one time I was down to 6 usable arrows, minus my new dozen.

It was kind of amusing, I found, that Somerled and I had to borrow each others equipment. He has his own bow (which is 40#, too heavy for him and just about too heavy for me), but he only had 4 arrows because of accidents and losses. I couldn’t use the bow I had been using all along because it’s falling apart, but I have almost two dozen 40# arrows. So… I used his bow, and he used my arrows. Fortunately I hadn’t gotten around to painting the little gold hearts onto my new batch of arrows yet, because while we were shooting at the same target, it made it somewhat difficult to tell who got what points. If they all had hearts, it would have been impossible.

My mom showed up Friday morning. She got to meet Somerled for the first time, although she remembered seeing him before, at other random events she had been to. So, that meeting worked out well, hopefully when he meets my dad it will go just as well.

Friday afternoon there was a Water Jug Tourney. That involved hanging 2L milk cartons full of water off of both ends of a string, suspended on a frame. If one became lighter, the other jug would hit the ground… which was the point of the tourney. Two people went up, one for each jug, and tried to shoot their jug. It was rather entertaining because not a lot of people actually managed to make the jug empty enough to sink to the other to the ground. One pair of people shot a couple dozen arrows each, as everyone behind them (including Somerled and myself) kept supplying them arrows as they ran out.

When I got up I shot 7 arrows (because that’s how many my opponent and I had), and I hit my jug twice. It didn’t sink the other though, I hit it too high. Not enough water got out. But I guess I ‘won’ that, because Xiao Bao didn’t hit his at all.

We rested up, had supper with my mom, and pretty much waited for the next day when the war would start.

At 11:00 Saturday morning there was something called the Champion’s Team Shoot. This is something that is set up by the Principality Archery Champion and the Iron Arrow, the first and second place winners in the Championship Tourney which happened last year at August Investiture. Quad war is the last thing they do a... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19550435/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19550435/ Wed, 23 Jul 2008 07:14:10 PDT
Then he gave me a few half-finished shields, and I painted on them. One is his device (a green dragon on a blue background with a silver bar across, diagonal), and one is mine (background split diagonally into two pieces, one blue and one gold. On the gold is a black heart and on the blue is a gold gryphon). I painted them on the shields, and to my complete and utter surprise, they not only looked half decent... they actually looked pretty darn good. The dragon particularly.

I'm completely shocked by the seeming ability I have to paint, as the last time I did any painting of this type was in High School... many moons ago. And I certainly wasn't that good back then. I dunno...

I think I prefer the medium of paint on wood, over paint on paper. Wood is forgiving, paper is not, from what I remember of school.

Anyway, at some point today I'll take pictures of the shields I have done (there are three now, as I just spent literally all night painting the massive war shield that Joel uses to protect me in the wars), and I'll post them when I can. I think I can officially say that I'm back from whatever art-limbo I was in.

And at some point I have to remember to get the commission I just did for my room mate back, so I can scan it and post it as well.

I think I enjoy painting shields enough, that hopefully I can get commissions of them as well. I wouldn't mind that at all. Of course, Joel has 8 more shields he wants to build (don't ask, long story), and I'll probably end up painting on all them. I have my work cut out for me.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19378485/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19378485/ Sun, 13 Jul 2008 19:41:15 PDT
I have never done Dragonblinder, even though out-of-towners can shoot in it, I really much prefer Hidden Treasures. It's much more fun, besides being much less structured.

I was supposed to go down to Hidden Treasures (which is in Calgary), with Genic and Naomi, because I thought I was going to have to work on Friday. They were leaving after work on Friday, which was just fine. But then I found out I didn't have to work on friday, so I went down with Somerled, who was planning on leaving about 1:00. So that worked out just fine. We ended up leaving the city at about 1:30-2:00 or so, and arrived at the site about 5:30-6:00. After that time I have no ideas about what time anything is, because I turn my phone off at events, and I don't own a watch.

We were camping with a few other people from Borealis, who had also brought their parents with them... they were chinese, so there was a lot of conversation that neither Somerled nor I understood. Oh well...

There was a thrown weapon's tournament, which is the reason why Somerled wanted to get to Calgary so early. Anyway, he competed and did a halfway decent job... but Ellias was also in the tournament, and no one ever beats him if he doesn't want to be beat, so Somerled didn't stand a chance. Too bad.

I tried my hand at throwing knives... I think I shouldn't have borrowed Somerled's, his are probably too heavy for me. I did horribly. Oh well..

Before the sun went down, the archery range opened up for practice and royal rounds. After the sun set, there was going to be a night shoot. We went out to shoot as the sun was setting, just to get some practice in. My elbow hadn't been doing so well, so I was rather miffed at how badly I was shooting. I almost decided not to do the night shoot, but in the end I pulled out the last three of my old, black arrows and gave it a go.

For night shoots we tape those thin little glowsticks onto our arrows, and shoot at a target which is illuminated by black light. We have to put the glowstick on in the right place, on the right side of the cockfletch, or it catches on the bow as it goes by. It took a lot of trial and error on some people's parts before they figured out why they kept losing their glowsticks.

The target for the night shoot was a griffin. Go figure. I took one look at it and pretty much said 'I can't shoot it.' I still did though, although only one arrow hit it, and it got it in the wing. I was quite upset about that. Somerled insisted that it was an enemy griffin, and that shooting it was a good thing. I guess so... I still felt bad about shooting it.

We also did volley fire, otherwise known as medieval fireworks. In other words, all the archers lined up, took aim and fired up at the sky at the same time. Watching all the glowy arrows against the black, star-strewn sky is really something. Also the Northern Lights came out to honor the people who have taken them as their namesake... the people from Borealis (Me!) since they're the Aurora Borealis... *grin*

And then came the fun part of trying to find all our arrows... When we walked out into the field, there were glowy arrows standing up out of the grass... they looked so cool. It kind of looked like a cemetary full of thin, glowy headstones.

I even managed to find one of my arrows. The other two came back to me as well, but out of the hundred or so shot, I'm rather surprized I found mine first.

It was bloody cold by the time we finished the night shoot. Everyone was all bundled up in cloaks and blankets, and we could all see our breath (which was interesting as we couldn't really see much else.) I have no idea what the temperature was, but it was cold. So, everyone meandered away to go hang out around campfires, to drink, talk, carouse or do whatever they do at camping events.

I got a shock the next morning, just before the Hidden Treasures shoot started. I was standing around eating breakfast when I got randomly tackle-hugged... by Allister. I never expected to see him there, and I certainly never expect to randomly get hugged by him. And he proceeded to tell me that we were shooting with him on the roving range. So... being the slow-thinking and odd person that I am, I agreed. Somerled didn't say much one way or the other, so we got our stuff together and headed out. Of course, this being the SCA, and Alliste... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19124286/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19124286/ Mon, 30 Jun 2008 09:23:46 PDT
Consider yourself forwarned. If you don't want to read about SCA Wars, people you don't know, places you've never heard of, and aren't interested in reading a thousand (slight exaggeration) pages about the best war I've fought in to date... Then this journal probably won't interest you. I write this for a few specific people, so I don't have to repeat myself several times, and for posterity. I have a horrible memory, and I like to be able to remember things. Since I can't be bothered to write in a paper journal, I prefer to write here. Consider yourself warned.

That said... Gotta be AT War! That was the slogan they were using. I recieved a free t-shirt with that on it. Anyway... Oh yeah, AT War stands for Avacal vs Tir Righ War. Avacal is the Principality I live in, which is essentially Alberta and Saskatchewan, and Tir Righ is British Columbia, and I think part of Washington state, but I don't know for sure.

The site was the Trophy Mountain Buffalo Ranch, about 25 km from the little village of Clearwater, BC, which I think is about an hour from Kamloops. We got there at about 7:00 pm. Our campsite was in a horse pasture that had been free of horses for some time, so was grassy and dry, but still had the occassional old pile of leavings. Not the cleanest, but not too bad. There was a small herd of buffalo in the neighboring field, and an even smaller herd of horses across the other side of the driveway, which was nice. The ranch itself had a little bed and breakfast which had a little restaurant, some cabins, and showers! The restaurant had fairly decent prices, and they even had SCA specials for us. It was pretty cool, I really liked the idea of a restaurant on-site, and I imagine everyone else did too. Of course the Mundanes that were staying at the B&B probably thought we were nuts, but hey, that's the point of the SCA, right?

I got my tent set up in about 10 minutes flat, it's a simple little thing. I set it up in the shade under a bunch of pine trees, after physically writing my name on the spot with a stick, so no one would take it while I was transporting my stuff there. As I was doing that, I was collecting neighbors, and by the time I was done, I was more or less in the midst of someone else's encampment. I didn't even know the people.

I wandered, found people I knew, and eventually ended up getting my rubber arm twisted into bringing my little tent over to an encampment of some of my friends. Kintair and Somerled took my tent over to where they were, with Nasheeta and Jamal from Rapier. That was okay, I liked being with them more than being either by myself, or with people I didn't know (which would include the Vikings for the most part).

I didn't have all my stuff with me. Because I came with Robert and two other people in a little VW Jetta that Robert rented, and because we had underestimated the amount of stuff we ended up taking, our armor bags ended up with Toryn in his trailer. And he didn't show up until 2 in the morning. I didn't have my bedroll with me, because it was in my armor bag. So I used my sleeping bag as a mattress, and wrapped myself up in the two blankets I had with me. I was fairly warm, but I could have been a lot better. I didn't get much sleep, although I must have gotten some, because I didn't hear when Robert came around at about 2 am, called out my name, and dropped my armor bag in front of Somerled's tent... I don't know why his and not mine... I guess in the dark all tents look the same? Although his was grey and blue, and mine is bright orange... slight difference.

The next morning was the war! I was awake at about 6, I think. My phone didn't work (cus there's no cell service in the mountains), and I dont' own a watch, so I didn't really know what time anything was going on. But when I got up it was still cold. I huddled in my blankets until it was warm enough for me to uncurl, and got breakfast. I even gave Somerled some, cus he was there when I was eating, and he didn't have any food with him.

I went to do Archery when they called us. The field we were in for that looked like some crazy giant had reached down and ripped all the trees out of the ground, broke them into pieces, threw them all over the place, and then set off some land mines, just to make sure that no one could walk across the field without tripping. That was the field we were supposed to have the War in later. Someone had set up a couple of hay bales and stuck the targets to them, so they were very low. And they paced out distance lines for 15, 20 and 25 yards and set up surveyor's tape so we would know where to stand while shooting.

Before I start describing the archery, I should mention something that really got me annoyed at the archery practice on the thursday before AT War. Morrigan Cl... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19036107/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/19036107/ Wed, 25 Jun 2008 09:58:15 PDT
Needless to say, I didn't win.

The event was a good one. There were lots of people there that I knew, and it was a nice day. I broke out my new Viking garb for the occasion, along with an arabic headdress thingy to keep the sun off. I was cross-culture, but I wasn't going to get heat stroke. Oh yeah, it was 30 degrees Celsius out, so bloody warm. And there was very little shade.

Litton and I showed up at about 11:00, and almost immediately we went to the archery range (of course after paying Troll and all that good stuff) The rapier tourney was going on, so Litton had to set up her Chirurgeon stuff and make sure she was available if anyone got hurt. Fortunately the eric was very close to the range.

I went to the range and got to practicing. I had recieved new arrows two days before, and I knew they flew amazingly at 20 yards, I just didn't know about 30 or 40 yards. As it turns out, they are beautiful at long distance as well, not to mention the fact that they're beautiful when they're just sitting there... the shafts are half black and half blue, with a metallic gold bar where they meet. The fletchings are yellow and blue, same as all of my arrows, and they have black nocks. I had used a tiny little rubber stamp and made little gold hearts on the shafts, below the fletchings. They are beautiful.

Anyway, I was practicing along, doing just great, and I figured I had it in the bag. I was gonna win Silverwolf. The weather was great, there wasn't a breath of wind, everything was good.

I watched a bit of the Rapier and Heavy tourneys. My friend Remy won the Championship for Rapier, which was awesome. We kind of hoped that Ragnar would win for Heavy, and that I would win for Archery, because Ragnar and Remy are brothers, and I'm going to be Ragnar's thrall when I join the Vikings. And Talyn had several amazing pieces of Leatherwork in the A&S competition, and since he's going to be joining the Vikings as well, we thought it would be awesome if he won too.

Ragnar didn't get the Heavy championship... unfortunately. He got to the finals, but got ousted in the second round. *sigh*

Talyn probably came close in the A&S, but there's really no way to know. He didn't win either.

And by the time that the Archery Tournament started, the wind had kicked up, and we were trying to shoot against a crosswind that must have been at least 10 mph. grr...

I got 17 points overall. There were 12 of us shooting for the Championship, out of 21 archers in the tournament. I think I placed 7th in the Championship, and in the Master's category there were 4 of us. I placed 3rd in that.
Somerled got 21 points, and Mika won the Championship with 25. At the beginning of the Speedround, each of them had the lead with 14 points. I had 11 going into the Speedround. I could have beaten them, if I'd taken my time and shot better. The wind didn't help for the 30 and 40 targets, but on the 20 and the speedround, I should have done a lot better.

So, I will probably try to go to August Investiture, and attempt to win the Principality Archery Champion position currently held by my friend Genic. Or I could wait until September and go to Harvest Feast, and attempt to win the Bitter End Archery Championship. Since I probably won't have the time or money to go to Investiture, and I fully intend to go to Harvest Feast, I'll probably go for Phelan's position.

So, yeah.

As the Title says, Three years and Counting... Silverwolf was the first SCA event I ever went to, three years ago now. Technically I shouldn't count it as three years until August 20th, because that was the date of the Silverwolf I went to in 2005, but I go by the events, not the date. Maybe I'll have two anniversaries...

In two days I am heading off to British Columbia to go and shoot the warriors of Tir Righ, in the first ever Avacal vs Tir Righ War (known to people as either AT War, or TnA). I'll also be bringing Litton's bow, so I can shoot their targets as well. It sounds like it should be fairly fun, I'm just not looking forward to the weather. So far the weather I've found on the internet for that area says it's going to be 30 degrees Celsius with a 0% chance of rain. But time will tell.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/18749755/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/18749755/ Mon, 09 Jun 2008 13:50:28 PDT Mistress-Jaeden's journal, and I thought I would steal and use it myself. So, here we go.

Did the one person who hurt you the most in your life apologize?
No.

Are you in a good mood right now?
Yeah, more or less.

The phone rings what do you say?
What do most people say? Hello…

Whats wrong with you right now?
Other than my elbow and my knee being in pain, nothing. Not a damn thing.

Are you mean?
I don’t think so…

Do you talk about your feelings or hide them?
I only talk about my feelings with one person, everyone else I try to hide them from.

What are you drinking?
Almond Joy Green tea from Steeps.

How is your hair?
Long, fluffy, and blond

Last time you had a sleepover?
Years and years ago.

Latest you stayed up in the past week?
3:30 – 4:00 am.

Do you care if people hate you for no reason?
Yes. I would prefer that there be a reason for someone to hate me.

What are you wearing?
Track pants and a haltertop.

Wanting?
Um… lots of things, money, education, a new bow, to win Silverwolf next weekend, more free time…

Do you remember your dreams?
Sometimes.

What do you hate?
Working. Or at least working at jobs I don’t like.

Orange or apple juice?
Neither, I prefer water or tea. But if those were the only two options, orange juice.

Do you love someone right now?
Only in the best friend kind of way.

Where were you at 2:02AM this morning?
Sleeping

What are you doing for your next birthday?
Going to the museum, and hopefully going to dinner with a friend.

Do you tend to rip the paper off water bottles?
No

Have you ever changed clothes in a vehicle?
No

Do you cry easily?
Not anymore

Do you have unlimited texting?
No

Are you excited about anything?
Silverwolf next weekend, and the possibility that I will be going to University this fall.

Do you have any text messages saved on your phone?
No

Do you enjoy life?
I do now.

Do you still talk to the person who hurt you the most?
Gods no.

What's on your mind right now?
What should I do for the rest of the day…?

Best summer?
Last year, so far. Hopefully this one will trump it.

Do you think you'll be married in 10 years?
Gods no.

Are you having a good day today?
Not too bad, but for the pain.

Did you like anyone last summer?
Reluctantly as I will admit it, yes.

When do you go to sleep?
Usually about 11 pm.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/18341496/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/18341496/ Thu, 15 May 2008 18:28:36 PDT
Anyway... Beltain was on May 10th.

I'll try to keep this short... but no guarantees.

Beltain was in Calgary. I drove down the night before after work, acting as chauffeur for Justina. We were supposed to convoy with Genic and Naomi, but they didn't make it out of the city until nearly 8:00, we left at about 6:30, almost 7:00. Naomi must drive very quickly, because they made it to Genic's sister's place (where we were all crashing) about 20 minutes after we did. It was 10:30 or so, full dark, when we all arrived and were set up at Genic's sister's place... from now on, perhaps I'll call her Jessica. It is her name, after all.

Archery the next morning was at 9:30. We were supposed to arrive there half an hour early to set up and get ready. And supposedly it takes half an hour to get from Jessica's place to the Archery range. So, we left at 8:30 to get there. We grabbed some breakfast from Wal-Mart on the way, and got very lost when we got closer to the range. I will never understand it, I've been to the Calgary Archery Center at least a dozen times, and I get lost nearly every time. And all except this latest time, I wasn't the one driving! That place is so hard to find!

We were shooting on the range upstairs, which is 20 yards. They have a 40 yard range downstairs... believe me, this place is massive! It's an amazing range. Anyway, we were upstairs, which is good, cus I can shoot 20 yards very well. If I do say so myself...

The first target were ships. There were three pictures of ships, two Vikings and one tall ship, like the Santa Maria or whatever. Each category, Novice, Intermediate and Master, got their own picture, which was slightly different than the others, depending on skill level. There were sails, ropes, and people we were supposed to shoot at, but we weren't supposed to hit the shields or the hull of the ship. Or the mast, or the peoples' weapons. And the fun thing is, depending on the skill level, we got different numbers of specialized arrows. I was intermediate, so I got one Fire Arrow (denoted with a piece of red tape around the shaft), two Rope-cutting Arrows (white tape), and three normal arrows (no tape). The Fire arrows were only allowed to hit the bottom half of the sail for 3 points (which was marked off, so there was no ambiguity about where the target part of the sail was), the Rope-cutting arrows were only allowed to hit ropes for 10 points, which were highlighted in yellow, and the normal arrows could only hit people for 3 points. We had two rounds of this target, so in essence I had two Fire Arrows, four Rope-cutting arrows, and 6 Normal Arrows. Out of my two rounds, both Fire Arrows hit the bottom half of the sail, and one of my normal arrows hit a guy right in the heart. Two of my other normal arrows came within millimeters of hitting the same guy, but I didn't get those points. However, I got 9 points on that target alone. Apparently I had also tied for first place on that target. I think one of the Masters was the other, but I don't know who.

The second target was the speed round, but it was different. The taget itself was a guy in a red shirt, playing a bugle. The target points on him were his throat, his eyes, or his heart. But, his heart was only penciled in, so we couldn't really see it from the line (which is period, cus come on, people don't have targets on their chests...) The fun thing about this target was that we were sitting on chairs while we shot. The Novices got to sit sideways on the line, like they would stand normally while shooting, just sitting. We intermediates had to sit at a 45 degree angle with our backs towards the target, and the Masters got to sit fully backwards to the target, so they had to twist around to shoot. We also got less time than normal. The Novices would start their 30 seconds, then 5 seconds in Tim would call for the Intermediates to start shooting, and then 5 seconds after that, the Masters would start shooting. When Tim called Hold, we all had to stop. I never got more than three arrows off, and we did it three times. Although, my aim got better. The first round my arrows were below the edge of the paper, the second time they were around his belly button, just above the edge of the paper, and the third time they were only a few inches from his heart. So, I got no points.

The third target were willow branches, long, leafless sticks. They were different thicknesses for different skill levels, very thin for masters, not so thin for Novices. The poi... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/18106111/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/18106111/ Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:39:42 PDT
The archery tournament was at 1:00. It was unusual, most of the time our archery is in the morning. So, I had several hours to kill before then. I wandered around, talked to friends, checked out the merchants, all that fun stuff. I managed to find a beautiful piece of black material that looked like it was embroidered all over. It was $5, and it was about 4 meters long. I couldn’t pass it up. I also found a large bag of trim, which is about two inches wide and is black with gold geometric patterns on it. It was $8 for 5 meters. I bought that as well. They are currently being made into a cloak, along with a large blue piece of material I found at Value Village later.

The archery wasn’t too bad. It was outside, which kind of fubared me a bit, because I’m not used to shooting outside anymore, but that’s okay. The targets were dragons, one large dragon for each target at 20, 30, and 40 yards. There was a fourth for a speed round at 20 yards. The large point areas were their chests (5 points), their eye (10 points) and the mouth on the one (5 points). The rest of the body was worth one point, and the wings weren’t worth anything. If you hit a horn, it was -1 point. I managed to get one arrow into the 40 yard target, which is pretty darn good for me, usually I can’t even hit it. I must be getting better. I got one point, having hit the body. On the 30 yards I got two points, both in the body. On the 20 yard, all 6 arrows hit the target, but unfortunately one of the arrows hit a wing, and one hit a horn. So, I got three points on that target. I really fumbled on the speed round, and only got off 5 arrows. Only 1 hit something worth points. Only one point. However, three hit one of the wings, and so I was trying to explain that a dragon with holes in it’s wings wasn’t going to go too far… but no one listened. So, I got 7 points on the tournament over all.

Later on I did a Royal Round, which is what determines the ranking system for the Archers. We have 60cm targets, one at 20, 30 and 40 yards, plus a speed round at 20 yards, 6 arrows at each target (except obviously as many arrows as you can loose in 30 seconds on the speed). If I remember correctly the ranking goes 40 points is Archer, 60 is Bowman, 80 is Master, 100 is Grand Master, and 120 points is Ludicrous. We only have one Ludicrous Archer in Avacal… Ellias. Oddly enough, the rankings for Royal Rounds don’t actually determine what category you shoot in for tournaments. After you’ve been a Novice for a year, or won a tournament, you move to Intermediate. After another year, or after you’ve won a Championship, you move up to Master.

Anyway… I got 37 points on my Royal Round. And since I got 21 of those points on the 20 yard target… it says I need to practice 30 and 40 yards more. And speed rounds. Although, I did manage to get 3 points on the 40 yard target. I was impressed.

At that point there wasn’t very long until the feast. The feast was good. There were 4 removes. One was salad, flatbread and some kind of chickpea stew. Two was bread, butter, pork stew (which tasted like Curry and was very good), and some weird little potato thingys… I don’t know what they were. Three was ‘meat on a stick’, pork or beef, teriyaki or barbeque meat skewers, and a rice and vegetable mixture which wasn’t very good (and was even worse later when it was cold, at 2:00 in the morning… Dessert was unfortunately chocolate-free, but there was baklava (Yum!! Best Baklava Ever!!!), some weird little ball thingy that was kind of cookie-ish, with cinnamon and raisins inside, rice crispy squares with something in it I didn’t want to inquire of the identity of, and ginger snaps. With actual candied ginger inside. I was shocked when I bit into that. All in all,... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17753738/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17753738/ Tue, 08 Apr 2008 19:02:34 PDT
~~~~~~~~~

On April 5th I fought in my first War with the SCA. It was called Winter War, and it seemed the weather agreed that it should be still in winter, for all that it took place in April. The night before it started snowing, and then the morning of it was quite disgusting. We had a blizzard. In April. What the heck?

I stayed the night before the event at Litton’s place, because my car lives at her place, and because I was going to convoy with Mika, who was taking her and all the archery gear. I was supposed to have only one passenger, Justina, but Genic had called me just before we left asking if he could bum a ride. I agreed, and we made our way down to Whyte Ave to pick him up. The roads were very icy, and I discovered to my great delight that my car has ABS. Otherwise I probably would have run into the back of Mika’s car a few times while trying to stop. The snow was coming down so hard in some places that I couldn’t see 10 feet in front of my car. It was pathetic. I almost wished I had done like Robert and gone down the night before. But eventually we made it out of the city, and of course the weather was much nicer once we got to the highway.

We got to Pipestone with plenty of time before the tournament started, so all was good. I recently became a Jr. TAM (Target Archery Marshal), so I was told by the Royal Archer, Aeðelred, to be the Line Marshal and to check weapons. I checked Aeðelred’s arrows and had to tell him not to use two of them because they were cracked. He needs to get new arrows. After that I was running the line so I didn’t do much else in the way of checking arrows, but I did manage to teach a girl who hadn’t shot in a very long time. And I flubbed up a little bit by not watching properly when the resident cat almost wandered into the line of fire, and confused a poor little girl, but all was good.

I shot fairly well in the actual tournament. The first target was a William Tell shoot. Mika got his hands on some dummy heads used by student hairdressers, and built stands for them so they stood off the ground about 3 feet. His wife went and bought 25 apples that were as close to the same size as possible. We then used wooden skewers to keep the apples on the tops of the heads. The point was to hit the apples and not the heads. Only 3 people hit the apples (I don’t know how many of us there were, but there were a fair number of archers… about 20, I think.) Ellias hit one, which wasn’t surprising, Mika hit one and Phelan (the current Archery Champion for Bitter End) hit one. I gave my dummy a hair cut, and missed the apple by about a centimeter with each of the three arrows I shot. Genic, the current Principality Archery Champion, had to triangulate his, apparently. His shots were all a good 6 inches away from the apple, the first too high, the second too much to the right and the third too much to the left. He joked that if he had a fourth arrow, he’d have hit it. Apparently he didn’t listen to the quote that Litton read before the shoot.

Since I don’t remember it word for word, boiled down the quote went “an Archer should not have two arrows in his quiver. If he has two arrows, he will not pay enough attention to the first.” I loved it the first time I heard it, and I kept it in mind while I shot.

The second target was a blue sky with snowflakes all over it. Litton had also drawn 4 little icons (about 4x4 inches or so), a Viking, a Helm, a Robin Hood Hat and a Quiver of Arrows which she painted and stuck to the target. The point of the target was to hit the icons, which were worth 5 points. If a snowflake was hit it was -1 point and the blue was worth nothing. I was aiming for the Viking, and I thought I hit it twice… but nope, my arrows ended up less than a centimeter away from it, and one hit a snowflake. So I got -1 point for that target. I think because I’m going to be joining the Lost Vikings, the spirit of the Vikings were protecting that little icon. I should have shot for something else, but he was the biggest, and more or less in the middle.

The third target was a stone wall with lots of white spaces between the irregular shaped bricks. The point was to hit the white, which was 1 point. The black bricks were -1 and there was a little pink arrow in a square, which was worth 10 points if hit. I hit the white with two arrows and the wall with the third, so I got 1 point for that target. I didn’t even try for the little pink arrow, but Mika did, and he hit it.

The fourth target was the speed round, essentially as many arrows as you can loose in 3... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17387814/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17387814/ Mon, 17 Mar 2008 22:10:54 PDT
The neat thing is, St. Paddy's is also my friend Genic's birthday, so I got a couple little cakes and crushed up mint Aero and used the crumbs to write a '2' on one, and a '5' on the other, since he turned 25 today.

Everyone liked the food, which is good. I have stew and bread left over, but it's healthy, so I'll take it for lunch.

Robert brought me a helmet and legs for Combat Archery, which I got to model, and I discovered that I'm going to have to wear the helmet to Archery practice on thursday so's I can learn to shoot in it. Eep.

After supper we retired (all five of us) to my bed, where we watched random Rapier fights on my computer. And had tickle fights, where I attempted to protect Litton with my collection of knives, (which is silly because of the five of us, I know the least about swordfighting... Robert being the best as the Principality Rapier Champion...) and talked about random fighters and looked at my armory... yeah. It was fun.

It all ended way too soon. They left about an hour ago, and I got to clean up the dirty dishes and put away the leftover food by myself.
And my next party will be Halloween! It'll probably involve the same people.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17290367/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17290367/ Tue, 11 Mar 2008 17:13:42 PDT

Just thought I'd say that... and get the thing about Investiture off my page.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17046187/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/17046187/ Sun, 24 Feb 2008 17:30:11 PST
It was held in a beautiful hall in Thorsby, Alberta, which I thought pretty cool concidering there's a lot of Vikings and Norsemen in our branch of the SCA. The hall had three levels, a basement with Merchant's Row and the Kitchen, the main level with the Great Hall, in which the tournaments, feast and Court took place, and the upper floor, where the A&S competition was held. There was also a silent auction up there.

Also, there was an Archery tournament, which was not held at the hall. It was at Pipestone Creek Archery Range, which is near Millet. I did pathetically bad at the tournament, with a whopping 2 points. It probably didn't help that my ride to Spruce Grove was late, my car didn't start properly, I got it stuck on ice, and I got lost on the way to the range. I got there 20 minutes late... and I completely lost my zen focus because of it. *sigh* Oh well. Mika won the Novice category, which is cool.

When I got to the hall I spent most of the day in the kitchen, helping make feast. It was a huge affair, there must have been close to two dozen dishes for it. I don't know why people make so much food, we can't eat it all.

I got to eat at feast, which is good, because they started the main Court in the middle of feast. (There had been a little Court with the stepping down of Prince Kvigr in the afternoon. I only saw a little of it as I went upstairs to get something out of my bag. Yay for Catla and Stragin for being given the honor of the Gilded Griffin!)

The feast was horrible. The soup was burned, and for once I wished that I had carried spices in my feast box, because it was so bland, even under the burned taste. It was a split pea and ham soup, usually something I like. You couldn't even taste the ham in it. The whole feast was all period dishes, and each course was from a different period, Anglo-Saxon, Anglo-Norman, Middle English and Tudor. If I was ever actually transported back in time to the Middle Ages, I think I'd starve to death. Very little of the food was edible, at least to my standards. Give me plain old bread and cheese, if it has to be period. Sheesh.

The Court was cool. I got to go up three times! Once I was Litton's helper, I carried up her box of gifts for the winners of the Archery Tournament, and put it next to her.

The second time I got to go up was when Baroness Inga called up everyone who had helped make things for the Estrella Gift Bags, and I got to kneel in front of the King with about half a dozen other people, and get a heavy metal coin stamped with Vik and Inga's names and a sword on one side, and the head of a Griffin on the other. (Which is the badge of Avacal... Inga said they were leftovers from when Vik and herself were Prince and Princess, so it makes sense, I guess.) Somehow I'm going to drill a hole in it, right between the points of Fluffy's ears, and create a necklace to hang it on, using some of the handmade beads that I've gotten from Inga in the last couple months. Then I'm going to show it to Inga, I think she'll like it. She's such a nice lady, I like her as Baroness.

The third time I got to go up in Court was when they asked anyone who wanted to swear fealty to the Prince Einar to go up and do so. So, I went up with the masses (there were about 20 or 30 people who went up). I decided to do so, not because I like Einar as a person, but because I'm going to be shooting for him at Quad this year, in the Champion's shoot. I got to kneel and put my hand on the shoulder of the person in front of me, who had his hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him, all the way up to the person in the front, who was holding hands with the King and Einar. And at the appropriate time I said 'I so swear' along with everyone else, and it was very cool. I don't remember the exact words that the King and the Prince said, but it sounded like they were speaking to each person individually, rather than as a crowd.

And... after all that excitement... Kvigr got Knighted! I wrote a story once about a guy in the SCA who got knighted, and when I wrote it, I used a ceremony from the SCA that I had found online. The one the King used was very similar, and used many of the same lines. It was so surreal. It was like watching Kian getting Knighted, like my story come to life. Very cool. At the end, as the 'Last blow he shall recieve unanswered', the King slapp... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/16807648/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/16807648/ Sat, 09 Feb 2008 21:20:07 PST That was tonight.
The show was supposed to start at 4, I was there about 2, and the show actually started at about 6, I think. I didn't have a timepiece on me.
There were four areas where we were doing our 'acts'. The first two were more or less together, along the entry way into the dining room. The area was kind of set up like a tavern on a beach, with a wooden walkway and a mermaid grotto and stuff, and we were along the walkway, so the guests could see us as they went in.
All the pirates seemed to think that drunken-ness is the way to be, cus everyone was tipsy. There were a couple guys divvying up coins, crouched around a barrel acting as a table, and a guy with a drum (who accidentally broke his drum), some people were dancing, and there was a serving wench with a tray and some tankards. I had a rum bottle, as I was going to be acting as a really drunk pirate later.
A fight broke out over the coins, someone was stealing some. He was kicked back, doing a roll over his shoulder, and his bandana came off his head... which spilled the coins all over the place. I snatched a few up.
Remy, the so-called Captain, insulted one of the 'ladies', calling her a wench, and so she started an argument in which she insisted that she was a higher rank than him and that she should be called 'sir'. That started a fight between him, Nasheeta and Idamay (who are all rapier fighters in the SCA). The ladies beat him, and we applauded their use of the swords. The 'wench' called him a cabin boy, and insisted that he should meet her in her cabin in five minutes.
Next we moved into the dining room (which was huge, there were a thousand guests there). At the entrance there was a replica of a ship built, stern with steering wheel on one side, bow on the other, sails on both. The stern side was higher than the bow. The walkway ran between them. I was instructed to sit on the bow side railing with my bottle of rum and act drunk. Not too difficult. With the bottle in my hand, I was in character. It was damn fun. Captain Grant (who was also the guy with the drum) climbed up onto the stern side and insisted that people should be loading barrels onto the ship. One of the guys sat on a barrel and said 'I'm on top of it.'... pun intended. We threw insults and jibes at each other, and started singing 'What do you do with a drunken Pirate?' and had a blast. Grant jumped off the ship and started an argument with Remy.
Then we moved on through the dining tables, stealing chocolate coins off the tables, and concidering stealing the silverware (since it would be the piratey thing to do), and eventually made it to the stage. We had to clear the deck, because some of the guests were on it, and eventually we were able to get into our last show, a big swordfight/fisticuffs/skirmish. I got thrown around a bit by the 'wench', and fell down, landing on my sword. Painful. Grant got stabbed by Idamay when his gun didn't work, and Remy got nutted by both ladies. And the coordinator of the event became our new captain, and was carried out by a couple of the guys.
Afterwards, we got pictures taken on the ship. It was cool, and great amounts of fun. I just wish it could have been longer. It took a couple hours, but it still went way too fast. We should have done more.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/16491910/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/16491910/ Sun, 20 Jan 2008 14:42:14 PST
But... I tied for first place. And I got to do a tie breaker, which was so easy. There were 5 big round targets in a row, and we got 6 arrows, one for each target, and a spare for whichever target. The arrow closest to the center won for that target. I practice stuff like that, so I easily won, hands down. It was awesome!

So... I got to go up in Court later, and be recognised for winning the Intermediate Category for the Archery Tournament. and as a prize I recieved a stone arrow-head on a sinew necklace. It's very cool looking.

However, we had to get through the Feast first. It was the Feast of Fifty Dishes... I think we got through about 30 before the kitchen staff realized that we weren't able to eat anymore. 30 might seem like a lot, but they were counting each different kind of butter as a dish, and there were 3 of them. Each table got a huge loaf of amazingly good bread, the butters, and cheese. That took care of 5 dishes. There was also soup, 7 different pies, meat, raisin, cheese, egg, turkey, turkey and something else, and apple. They were good, but there were too many pies. I started singing, "47 pieces of pie on the board, 47 pieces of pie..." because it seemed like every dish was going to be pie for a while. Then they broke it up with peas, sweet potato, some kind of rice dish, brussel sprouts, mashed carrots, something wierd, orange and spicey, more peas... And that's when I stopped eating. I couldn't get through anymore. There was a stew, some kind of concoction that looked like butter chicken that I was tempted to try but was too full, and some other stuff after that. After Court, the kitchen people were putting huge trays of food out on tables, I guess to showcase what else had been made. I didn't go look. I feel sorry for the kitchen people. They made all that food, and no one ate it. *sigh*

But all in all it was a good day.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/16004929/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/16004929/ Thu, 20 Dec 2007 21:42:52 PST
I live with a roommate that I met on Facebook, she's very nice. She plays Warcraft all the time.

My job is kinda cool, in that I have one. We could do with one less supervisor and a management group that actually knows what they're doing, but that's okay. I just do my work, and don't worry about what other people are doing.

I'm getting back into Archery and the SCA. I've made more good friends through Archery and the SCA, and it's all good. Also, I'm going to be getting some new arrows soon! I need new ones because I recently got Archer Crack, and found myself down to 3 usable arrows. I've had these ones for two years, so it's about time I got some more.

(For those that don't know, Archer Crack is the smell that is emitted when a cedar arrow gets broken. It's created by Robin Hooding an arrow. When you Robin Hood a cedar arrow - meaning hitting and breaking it with another arrow - the broken wood gives off a smell, which is known as Archer Crack. I didn't know this until I Robin Hooded my arrow. When one of my friends smelled it and passed it to me, as per tradition, I smelled it. I thought it was just a thing people did, I didn't realize it smelled.)

My embroidery is picking up way past what I can safely manage... I think. I have finished one commission... finally. I have the other to do before April. It's good that I have so much time before I have to finish it because I was silly and volunteered to help make gift bags for the Royalty attending Estrella War, which is in February, in Arizona. I have a bunch of embroidery to do for my gift bag. So far I have a lion's face all drawn out, eagerly awaiting embroidery. I'm not completely sure what else I'll do for it. Hopefully I'll get it all done in time. I also want to make favors for some friends of mine, and make myself a favor, and make a new quiver for my new arrows, and I have to make a patch for a pair of my pants that have a hole in the knee. *sigh*

EDIT: I had an amazing time at Archery tonight! I was using loaner arrows, because mine were pissing me off. (I was using my last three wood arrows and three of my carbons... bad idea. The two kinds fly so different, and nock differently to the string that it just messed me up.) When I switched to the loaners, I started shooting so well! I got two bulls-eyes, one right after the other, like Bam, Bam... and on the next end I got a grouping about 6" across with 8 arrows! And we did speed rounds, and on the first one I got 5 arrows off and recieved 17 points, and on the second one I got off 6 arrows and recieved 20 points! YAY!! I was so amazed!

And I'm getting new arrows soon, so hopefully they'll be good! Jack Kempf prepared the shafts, which if you know anything about Archery in Alberta, Jack Kempf is the one to go to. I'm waiting (patiently and impatiently) for the day when my bow is no longer useful to me, so I can get a Jack Bow, because they are friggin' awesome bows! And his arrows are just as good, so hopefully my new arrows will do good things for me.

(I'm waiting patiently for my bow to become less than useful because I love my bow. It's an antique, I inherited it from my mom, and it has a lot of sentimental value. And it's pretty, and... yeah. I love it. It works perfectly despite the fact that it's 40+ years old. But, I would like to have a Jack Bow. They are a status symbol, besides being gorgeous, excellent bows. Also, they are very expensive. Basically, there's a 6 month waiting list for his bows, and pretty much if you pay him 100 dollars a month, by the time you've paid for it, he's done making it. Yes, he makes the bows by hand. It's amazing.)

The guys at the archery range we shoot at are making my arrows. They'll be done in a couple days, so basically the next time I make it out for Archery, I'll have new arrows! Yay! They're just going to be blond shafts, for now, because Jack dipped them with the lacquer. They're so smooth and pretty... But I love black arrows, so, I might paint them later. We'll see. Maybe I'll just do black designs on them, I don't know. I can't wait to get them! I guess they're my Christmas present to myself, since I know no one else is going to get me arrows.

Anyway, I just had to share that! I'm going to go to bed now, and dream about becoming an Archery Champion... I don't care which one. Maybe I'll get every Champion position there is for Archery... wouldn't that be cool?

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/15602495/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/15602495/ Wed, 21 Nov 2007 09:28:36 PST And it all started because I couldn't keep my big mouth shut. If I hadn't said anything, if I'd let his mother keep talking about me behind my back, and if I'd just been the nice (Christian) girl that Curtis wanted, I'd still be with him.

Two years. We were together for two years. And now it's gone, and I'm alone.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/14107071/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/14107071/ Fri, 10 Aug 2007 14:42:04 PDT
On July 27th we got there, set up our tent... and went to the Wierd Al Yankovic concert in Calgary. It was friggin' hilarious! He played a whole bunch of his old songs, as well as new ones, including most of my favorites (Yoda, The Saga Begins, Smells like Nirvana, Amish Paradise... etc). A lot of his songs were done in medley form, playing only one verse then moving on to the next. And, he changed his clothes between each whole song, wearing something appropriate to the song (Jedi costume for the Star Wars songs, Amish outfit for Amish Paradise... so on and so forth). For 2 and a half hours he sang, and we laughed and cheered and sang along. There were only about a thousand people there, as the concert was in a little hall in a casino next to a bowling alley. But it was great!

Hidden Treasures is and will probably always be my favorite SCA event. This is likely because it is an insanely long archery shoot, roving through the woods, and because there are no marshals telling people not to talk, or to stay behind the line, or whatever. Hidden Treasures is fun. Most Archery Tournaments are not fun. Curtis and I went out with a couple whose names were Stragin and Catla. It was awesome because Stragin is a bard, and Curtis is kind of like a bard, so they were singing and telling bad jokes most of the time, trying to mess each other up. Curtis hit a fallen branch with his arrow once, and couldn't get it out without breaking the arrow, so we brought it along, everyone taking turns carrying it... and Curtis made bad jokes about people touching his wood. But it was fun. It was damned hot that day, but I brought water and cookies and apples, and all was good. Out of our little group, Curtis got the high score, I got two points less than him, and Stragin and Catla were below me... but I don't remember what their points were.

Right after Hidden Treasures we went on to Radium, British Columbia, where the Radium Hot Springs are. We had a spot in a little camp ground, with a fire pit and a picnic table, and all was good. We were there four days, and in that time we went to the Springs, went horseback riding, went to an historical town called Fort Steele, and did a lot of hiking. And I took a few pictures. I managed to get some sewing done, and relaxed a little. Relaxing is boring though, as I found. I like to be doing something.

Then we came home. Curtis had to go to work, and Quad War was starting... so I continued on to Quad. That is another SCA event, this one in Marsden, Saskatchewan.
I forgot my hammock on the way there, so a trip that should have taken an hour and a half took 4 hours... but that's okay. Once I got there I found my friends, Litton, Thorgeir, Genic, Stragin and Catla (eventually, after getting over the 'lost' feeling and the 'wow, this place is huge' feeling). I found a place to put up my tent (which was next to the Viking encampment... not the best place to go), and about two hours after I got there I got stung by a wasp. Up till now I had been told that if I got stung I'd have about 20 minutes to get to a hospital before I died. Apparently, I grew out of it. I'm fine, and pretty much was fine the whole weekend. Luckily my friend Litton is the Chirurgeon (doctor), so I was able to go to her, and she gave me some pills and pain-killer ointment.
And oh yeah, right after I got stung, I met up with my mom, who came to check out Quad.
Quad was fun. There was a pathetic archery tournament (in which I got to shoot 12 arrows...) and a massive merchant's lane, and a castle, and whole bunches of things. Mostly my mom and I wandered around and talked about stuff... although because I was with her alot, I didn't get to see my friends too much. *sigh* (Oh well, Harvest Feast is in a month, and they should all be there, I'll be able to see them then.)
The first night I couldn't sleep, what with the party at the Viking's place, so I took my blankets and went to sleep on Litton's doorstep, until the sun came up. After that, I moved my tent to Litton's encampment. That didn't help, cus she was about 40 feet behind Dante's Tavern, where drunken parties happened all night... So, I had to take a sleeping pill the second night to get to sleep. Felt like shit the whole next day. (that's what sleeping pills do to me.) Didn't get to bed the third night till very late, cus I was up talking with my friend Thorgeir all night. That was fun.
And then I went home.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/13782408/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/13782408/ Wed, 18 Jul 2007 13:20:07 PDT
In the future though, I won't be around at all. Curtis and I are going on holidays for 12 days, starting on July 27th. First we're going to an SCA event held in Calgary, then we're going to the mountains for a few days, to camp and swim and relax. Then, I'm going to another SCA event, this one in Saskatchewan, and I'm not sure yet if Curtis is coming with me or not.

I'm in the process of working on making a website. It will be devoted to my artworks, writings, pictures I've taken and embroidery works I've made. It will also have links and things dealing with my SCA persona, and stuff like that. I have no clue when (or if) it will be up, or what it's going to be called. I'll let you know when I do.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/13093436/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/13093436/ Fri, 25 May 2007 20:24:39 PDT
]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12637810/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12637810/ Tue, 17 Apr 2007 21:00:29 PDT Iheria was a cute, happy kitty. She was a little distrustful of people, and was the hardest to get ahold of, but when she did let you pick her up, she purred like a little engine. She didn't meow like most cats, she made a cute little chirruping noise. Ravenshleigh does it as well, but not quite the same. When the other cats would be chasing each other around the barn, Iheria would usually chase her own tail. One time, when I was sitting with Raven and Iheria in the barn, sitting on a pile of straw bales, Iheria was above me and Raven on my lap. He crawled up to her, curled up next to her, and she started washing his ears. It was so cute, and loving.
I'll miss you, Iheria.

In other kitty news, Guen is pregnant again. I belive Raven is the father, since I'm sure it was after Treyvan was killed. I hope these next ones fare better than the first ones did. Only one of the original litter still lives here.

And if Raven is the father of Guen's next litter, it will be the last children he has. He's in the process of being neutered.

Now all the barn cats are black cats... Interesting.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12523984/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12523984/ Mon, 09 Apr 2007 11:42:57 PDT TNHawke who jacked from ~frigga who ganked it from ~f0xyme who doesn't say if they ninja'd it from someone else or made it up on their own.

Rules:
- Choose a few of your own characters, five at the most.
- Make them answer the following questions
- post and tell who took this from who

Characters:
Griffin Galanodel – Genetically engineered super soldier
Kian Weverynn – Etir/Karda Knight
Anaiyar Meican – Shaere Mastrasi
Renatus Hothar – Etir, Member of the Four Horsemen
Maghtira Pearlbeam – Mystikos Hippogryph child

How old are you?
Griffin – :snort: Older than you.
Kian – I am 23 years of age.
Anaiyar – Now now, it’s not nice to ask that of a lady.
Renatus – I have seen many ages go by, many civilizations fall.
Maghtira – I’m only 8…

Height?
Griffin – I may be short, but that doesn’t mean I can’t kick your ass.
Kian – about 6 feet tall.
Anaiyar – why don’t you tell me?
Renatus – :stands up to full, impressive height: Ask me again?
Maghtira – Why would you want to know?

Any bad habits?
Griffin – Of course I don’t have any bad habits. I’m perfect.
Kian – Well, I’m a bit of a workaholic, and I’m an overachiever…
Anaiyar – Sometimes I let the Rochorians live. :sigh:
Renatus – Gods don’t have bad habits.
Maghtira – I chew my talons… mommy always told me not to… :tears up:

Are you a virgin?
Griffin – God no!
Kian – No.
Anaiyar – Not for a very, very long time. :grin:
Renatus – What does that have to do with anything?
Maghtira – What’s a virgin?

Who's your mate?
Griffin – Nathaniel. You better stay away from him.
Kian – Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to find someone I would want to stay with.
Anaiyar – Whomever I’m with at the time.
Renatus – I’m much too busy for all that.
Maghtira – I don’t understand…

Have any kids?
Griffin – Not of my flesh, but yes.
Kian – I don’t think so…
Anaiyar – Nope, not yet.
Renatus – Yes. I don’t know where they are though.
Maghtira – Dolly! :holds up tattered ragdoll:

Favorite food?
Griffin – Coffee. It’s a food.
Kian – My mom’s homemade bread.
Anaiyar – Anything that the Rochorians haven’t bled on… :wrinkles nose at memory:
Renatus – The blood of my enemies.
Maghtira – Those little fruits with the seeds… yum!

Favorite ice cream flavor?
Griffin – Coffee flavored. Or Chocolate.
Kian – Mint chocolate chip.
Anaiyar – What’s eyescream?
Renatus – I don’t like ice cream.
Maghtira – I don’t understand…

Killed anyone?
Griffin – Duh. Yes.
Kian – Not intentionally.
Anaiyar – yes. And not all Rochorians, I’m afraid.
Renatus – Of course I have!
Maghtira – No!

Hate anyone?
Griffin – Where to start… Prowse, Keren, Wyvern… :keeps going for some time.:
Kian – Not for long.
Anaiyar – Yes, of course. Do I need to reiterate it? Their species name starts with ‘R’… and it’s not the Relira.
Renatus – The so-called ‘Gods of Toloronta’. I should be in their place, but they keep driving me back.
Maghtira – Should I?

Any secrets?
Griffin – I know it’s cliché, but if I told you I’d have to kill you.
Kian – A few. I’d prefer not to say.
Anaiyar – Well, I’ve got a birthmark in a very interesting place… Would you like to see it?
Renatus – If I told you, you’d tell the ‘Gods’, so, no.
Maghtira – I’m good at keeping secrets! Like the time mommy told me that she burned daddy’s supper, but she didn’t want him to know, so she went to the market and got something else… he didn’t even know!

Love anyone?
Griffin – Only one man.
Kian – Laine, Faye, Mom, Dad, and of course Star and Ravenshleigh.
Anayiar – Yhevienne… but not in that way! Gods!
Renatus – I can’t afford to.
Maghtira – Mommy, Daddy, Lios, Dolly… I miss Mommy and Daddy and Lios…

TACOS?
Griffin – They’re okay. I guess.
Kian – The way my mom makes em, they’re to die for!
Anaiyar – You are a strange person.
Renatus – What is this frippery you speak of?
Maghtira – Taco? Tacotacotaco...

Ever slept in all day?
Griffin – Only when I’m too injured to do anything e... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12297638/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12297638/ Fri, 23 Mar 2007 14:05:03 PDT
Unfortunately, the first little one, the black one, she was born to one of the heifers, which is a full grown cow that hasn't had a baby before this. They become cows when they have their first calf. Anyway, the little black one was born to one of the heifers, and since she was in a pen with about 30 other heifers, they all had to go and have a look at what this new arrival was. Unfortunately, she got stepped on, and got a broken leg. So, she was loaded in a crate and taken off to the vet, and now she has a spiffy purple cast on her back leg. All is good though. She's with her mom in a pen with a stupid little bull, and another cow that lost her calf, and Joker the horse. And she's up and walking around and everything. All is good. Joker's afraid of her, but that's okay.

I'm trying to get on Joker's good side. He's not really wild, he's trained to be a roping horse, for real, not just the rodeo. But, he hasn't been ridden since last summer, so he is a little wild. I've been talking to him, and petting him, and today I spent half an hour grooming him, trying to get his winter coat out. I'm not sure what color he is, he's either a chestnut with a darker mane and tail, or he's buckskin, but with his winter coat, it's hard to tell. Also, his hooves are stripey, which I believe is only a trait that Appaloosas have, and he has a few, hard to find spots, so he might have some Appaloosa blood. But yeah, I'm going to groom him every day, and when it comes time to use him for riding, hopefully he won't be such a pain to catch.

Anyway, I should go see if I can get in the way outside. The guys are vacuuming grain out of a bin... I wonder if I can get yelled at again...

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12229828/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12229828/ Sun, 18 Mar 2007 08:50:53 PDT Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I threw a party yesterday for the green occasion. Curtis' parents, sister and brother-in-law came, dressed in their green finery. I spent all day yesterday making tons of food, all from scratch and using recipes I found on the internet. Curtis and I decorated the house in shamrocks, and I filled a cauldron with chocolate gold coins and put a little plushie Leprechaun in with it, which was just cute. And we bought these funky green hats, that we forced everyone to wear. Curtis' mom had a plastic green hat, which we taped gold from the chocolate gold coins to, and took out to the hay bales to shoot arrows at. When we came back, Curtis played his juice harp, and then we watched a really sad movie called 'The Colt'.

T'was my first St. Paddy's Day party ever, and hopefully not the last.

I'm sort of already making plans for a Halloween party, seeing as how my favorite holidays are St. Patrick's Day and Halloween.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12146377/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12146377/ Sun, 11 Mar 2007 16:17:05 PDT Anyhoo... *grin*

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12057389/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/12057389/ Sun, 04 Mar 2007 17:13:59 PST
]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11844965/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11844965/ Fri, 16 Feb 2007 16:36:11 PST I'm sorry little one. I'll miss you.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11687446/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11687446/ Sun, 04 Feb 2007 17:21:32 PST
So, what I would like is... Any suggestions on what kind of pictures I should do?

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11506495/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11506495/ Sat, 20 Jan 2007 14:09:58 PST
]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11105690/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/11105690/ Mon, 18 Dec 2006 13:47:04 PST TNHawke took the survey I had on here before and mixed it up a little bit, and since it was so much fun to do the first time, I decided to give her version a go, with a better selection of characters. So, here goes, Character Survey 2.0, Hawke-style!

List 12 of your original characters:

01: Nathaniel Gauthier (GES – General in the Spike Resistance + Griffin’s Hubby)
02: Renatus Hothar (Etir – Member of the Four Horsemen)
03: Shaymala (Ferran character from Wars of Matharnen)
04: Femi Leith (Karda character from MLE: Heritage)
05: Ghannes’beher (Arrhria’luko – Leader of the Pack)
06: Sayashan (Gryphon Sagart, allied with Hephastyn)
07: Maghtira Pearlbeam (Mystikos character, no real story yet)
08: Hunter DuFour (Etir/Vatra cross - Member of the Trysian + Renatus’ brother)
09: Alantora Miandor (Karda character from The Maiden’s Spell)
10: Kris Johnson (Human member of the Pack)
11: Jeroen Chrys’Anthos (Karda – rogue Mastrasi)
12: Renee Lansle (Etir character from TSOI)

01) Who would make a better college professor, 12 or 7?
Renee or Maghtira. Either of them, actually, although Renee would have an edge, seeing as how she actually went to school...

02) Do you think 3 is hot? How hot?
Shaymala? Sure, I would think so, if you like Appaloosas.

03) 6 sends 9 on a mission.
Sayashan sends Alantora… It could happen… Sayashan is allied with the Syrroth, and Alantora would ‘technically’ be one of his followers. Although I’m not sure on what kind of mission she could do.

04) What is or would be 5's favorite book?
Ghannes… War and Peace?

05) Would it make more sense for 1 to swear fealty to 8, or the other way around?
Nathaniel or Hunter? I would say 8 to 1, as Nate is a leader of the Spike Resistance, and Hunter is a narcissistic womanizer who spends most of his time in Taverns in Toloronta.

06) For some reason, 2 is looking for a roommate. Should s/he share a studio apartment with 4 or with 11?
Renatus with Femi or Jeroen… I could actually see all three of them together, as long as Renatus likes elves. But if it could only be one… Femi.

07) 10, 8 and 6 have dinner together. Where do they go, and what do they discuss?
Kris, Hunter and Sayashan go to a steak house, and the topic wanders between human dominance, the art of womanizing, and gryphon feather care… lol

08) 5 challenges 11 to a duel. What happens?
Ghannes and Jeroen fight for a long time, until one finally drops from exhaustion.

09) If 10 stole 4's most precious possession, how would s/he get it back?
Kris stole Femi’s possession, she would probably seduce him into giving it back.

10) Suggest a title for a story in which 9 and 1 both attain what they most desire.
Alantora and Nathaniel… It’s the end of the Wars as we know it…

11) What kind of plot device would you use if you wanted 12 and 7 to work together?
Renee and Maghtira. They both join either the Pack or the Spike Resistance.

12) If 3 visited you for the weekend, how would you get along?
If Shaymala visited, It wouldn’t be too bad, all things considering.

13) If you could command 2 to perform any one task or service for you, what would it be?
Renatus, Give up on your evil ways. Repent!

14) Does anyone on your friends list write or draw 5?
No, no one draws Ghannes.

15) If 8 had to choose sides between 1 and 11, which would it be?
Hunter had to choose between Nathaniel and Jeroen, he’d probably go with Jeroen. They’re both ‘outcasts’ to society, they look at things the same way… and Nate is generally opposed to everything they stand for.

16) What might 9 shout while charging into battle?
Alantora? What, her charge into battle? She’d be more like “Run away, Flee!!”

17) If you chose a song to represent 10, which song would you choose?
Kris… The Boys are Back in Town…

18) 12, 2, and 7 are having dim sum at a Chinese restaurant. There is only one scallion pancake left, and they all reach for it at the same time. Who gets to eat it?
Renee, Renatus and Maghtira reach for it together, Maghtira would fall back and gesture that someone else can have it, then Renatus might do the same, indicating that Renee could have it, then he’d snatch it from her fingers and gobble it down.

19) What might be a good pick-up line for 4 to use on 6?
Femi for Sayashan… What beautiful, shiny feathers you have! Can I stroke them?

20) What would 3 most likely be arrested for?
Shaymala would have to be arrested on trumped up charges of Treason or something stupid like that. She re... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10893048/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10893048/ Wed, 29 Nov 2006 16:56:25 PST MommySpike

List 12 of your original characters:

01. Griffin Galanodel (Genetically Engineered Soldier “Powerless”)
02. Kian Weverynn (Etir-Karda cross “Summoned to Tourney”)
03. Tahno’mena (Arrhria’luko “The Wars of Mátharnen” – not on DA)
04. Gheyrard Deulwyn (Karda “At First Sight”)
05. Hephastyn (Syrroth to Soravne “Maiden’s Spell” – not on DA)
06. Wyvern Moreloke (Genetically Engineered Soldier “Powerless”)
07. John Keren (Human leader of Lib Army “Distractions” – not on DA)
08. Amber Braun-Weverynn (Soravne “Maiden’s Spell” – not on DA)
09. Jahannah Chrys’Anthos (Karda-Wier “Nineveh” – not on DA)
10. Saenna Walthers (AlaMaoi-Hlockin cross “Nineveh” – not on DA)
11. Raydes’beher (Half Arrhria’luko “Surrender” – not on DA)
12. Royal Prowse (Human leader of Lib Army “Nineveh” – not on DA)

01) Who would make a better college professor, 6 or 11?
Wyvern or Raydes… Definitely Raydes. Wyvern would end up teaching Assassination Techniques 101… and that’s not a good class. Raydes at least went to school.

02) Do you think 2 is hot? How hot?
Oh yeah, Kian is hot. Damn hot. (But don’t tell him that, it might go to his head…)

03) 12 sends 8 on a mission.
Royal Prowse sends Amber on a mission? Is that before or after she becomes Soravne? If it’s before, she’d just flip him off and leave… if it’s after, she’d probably kill him.

04) What is or would be 9's favorite book?
Jahannah’s favorite book might be Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice.

05) Would it make more sense for 2 to swear fealty to 6, or the other way around?
Kian and Wyvern? If Kian is swearing to Wyvern, we’ve got problems. If Wyvern swears to Kian, well, it’s a good thing someone finally knocked some sense into him.

06) For some reason, 5 is looking for a roommate. Should s/he share a studio apartment with 9 or with 10?
Hephastyn and Jahannah or Saenna? I think Jahannah would be better off with Hephastyn, partly because of personality, and also because she wouldn’t mind living with Sayashan as well. I could see Jahannah living with a Gryphon. Saenna, despite being married, would clash with Hephastyn I think.

07) 2, 7 and 12 have dinner together. Where do they go, and what do they discuss?
Kian, John Keren and Royal Prowse… Oh god. Keren and Prowse are both Big-Wigs in the Liberation Army, and Kian is a Spike (Etir-Karda cross)… This does not go down well… I see them eating steak, and what else would they talk about but the War?

08) 3 challenges 10 to a duel. What happens?
Tahno challenges Saenna… They’re both warrior types, both Weres… big fight, particularly if there’s something big to fight about.

09) If 1 stole 8's most precious possession, how would s/he get it back?
Griffin stole something from Amber… It would be sold and the money pocketed before Amber knew what happened.

10) Suggest a title for a story in which 7 and 12 both attain what they most desire.
If John Keren and Royal Prowse both attained that which they most desired, the probable title for that story would be “The End of the World as we Know it.”

11) What kind of plot device would you use if you wanted 4 and 11 to work together?
Gheyrard and Raydes actually already do… They’re both part of Griffin’s Resistance in France.

12) If 7 visited you for the weekend, how would you get along?
Keren? Very Badly.

13) If you could command 3 to perform any one task or service for you, what would it be?
Tahno, teach me to fight!

14) Does anyone on your friends list write or draw 11?
Nope. No-one really knows Raydes exists.

15) If 2 had to choose sides between 4 and 5, which would it be?
Kian, Gheyrard and Hephastyn… Probably Gheyrard. They’re pretty similar. And I think Kian and Hephastyn are going to have a fight in Maiden’s Spell.

16) What might 10 shout while charging into battle?
Saenna might shout “This is for my mom, my dad, my brother…”

17) If you chose a song to represent 8, which song would you choose?
Amber? Who Wants to Live Forever?

18) 1, 6, and 12 are having dim sum at a Chinese restaurant. There is only one scallion pancake left, and they all reach for it at the same time. Who gets to eat it?
Griffin, Wyvern and Prowse. First of all, they wouldn’t be eating together. Probably, if they reached for it together, Wyvern would grab Griffin’s hand, she’d grab him and throw him to the floor and start beating on him… and Prowse would mutter “Dumb spikes… how they ever thought they could beat us…” and eat it.

19) What might be a good... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10562831/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10562831/ Mon, 30 Oct 2006 18:12:31 PST
That was when we headded off to Edmonton, for the second half of the surprize weekend. We spent the night at Carrie and Todd's, (Where Curtis and I weren't allowed to sleep together... Phooey.) and the next day we went out to breakfast, then went back, got all dressed up, cus apparently it was something that you had to look nice for, and headed off to West Edmonton Mall to kill time until 5 when the second thing was to happen. I got my hair trimmed, to get rid of the split ends ("38 dollars, are you nuts!!") and the crasy hair stylist made my hair ultra poofy, then incredibly straight... sheesh. Now I know why I don't like getting my hair cut... other than the fact that it gets shorter when it gets cut... and I want it to be longer!!! anyhoo... Then we hooked up with Curtis' parents again, and for some unknown reason, I got talked into accepting Connie's help with looking for clothes... and ended up looking quite nice, I guess... At least, that's what everyone said. An hour, about 2 dozen changes of clothes, and 88 dollars later, I had an outfit that showed cleavage, with non-baggy pants (which also had nowhere to put my wallet and cell phone) and made me look nice. Brown jacket, tight brown t-shirt underneath, and low-rider khaki pants with a brown leather belt. I just can't believe they cost 88 dollars!! I spent 13 dollars on my leather jacket!! I buy most of my clothes from thrift shops!! 88 dollars for an outfit seems a little exhorbitant. But I bought it... or rather Connie bought it cus my card wouldn't swipe. I paid her back today.

Then we went on to the second part of the surprize weekend. It was a dinner theater show at Jubilations in West Edmonton Mall. The show was the Gerry Steinfeld Show, obviously a parody of the Jerry Seinfeld show. I hate Seinfeld, I quite enjoyed Steinfeld. Curtis got completely into it as well, talking with the servers, who were all actors, and in outrageous characters. Our server was pretending to be Dennis Leary. Of course, Curtis knows Dennis Leary's work, and downloaded the whole lyrics to one of his CDs on his phone/computer during the show, and showed it to our server. All in all, it was quite fun. There was lots of singing and dancing, and Connie and Carrie were tapped to go up and dance in a conga line with some of the actors. It was a good weekend.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10476018/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10476018/ Sun, 22 Oct 2006 12:39:23 PDT [link] , The Griffin's Talon -> [link] , and Serenity -> [link] have all been re-scanned and made prettier! Serenity is nice and shiney white now! It's not grey anymore! And I had to download a program called Google Picasa to fix The Griffin's Talon, cus the original picture was way too dark for the scanner to see. But it looks better now too. Go see!

Of the other pictures that I still have the paper copies of, Sexiest Man on Seefra, aka the pic of Telemachus Rhade from Andromeda -> [link] , is all mushed up. My mom was mean and did some bad things to it. It's all still in one piece, but it's smudged and wrinkled and has other random black marks on it. So I can't re-scan that one anyway... It's not that bad a pic, so I guess it doesn't matter. The Struggle Within -> [link] couldn't get much better in scanning, and I'd have to crop the fingerprints out again anyway. Of the other three I have on my wall, Remembrance -> [link] I might have to re-scan... maybe. Blood -> [link] I might re-scan cus the scanner cut off his foot, but other than that, it's good. And the last pic I still have in paper, that's not in the bottom of some box somewhere, waiting to be unpacked, or given to someone as a present, is Atanar -> [link] and I really like the scan of that one, so it stays the way it is...

And now that I've gone on a dissertation of 8 of my favorite pics on DA, I dunno what else to say, other than... I like free time! I've written a Dramatis Personae for the story I plan to write for NaNoWriMo -> [link] and cleaned up some of the stuff on my laptop. I read some of my old stuff, remembering what I used to write like. And I dug out some of my boxes from the basement and pulled out my pictures to stick on the walls. And that was only in the last few days. When I have free time, I have to use it well, cus I don't get much of it. Yay for Free Time!!!

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10324621/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/10324621/ Sun, 08 Oct 2006 11:31:35 PDT
I seem to be in the throes of inspiration. I've been going over a few of my worlds and the people that live in them, and changing them. The Karda are getting more definition and culture, and Toloronta has nearly completely changed, gaining more countries and peoples, and cultures and religions to go with them. It's a lot of fun, and I'm not nearly finished yet. There are a few story ideas sprouting out of it as well, so hopefully someday in the future I'll have something new to post after over a year.

I have a job, but all the deities willing I'll be quitting or fired from it soon. I don't know what I'd do then though.

And... I finally got my Driver's Licence! Now I just need a car.

EDIT: I have very sad news. Today, at about 6:00 pm, one of my kittens, Carbonelle, was hit by a car and killed. She was only 4 months old. Curtis and I buried her in the backyard, while her mother, brothers and sisters ran around our feet. Guenhwyvar, her mother, gave her a parting sniff before she was interred to the ground. I'll miss you Carbonelle.

]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/9679738/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/9679738/ Thu, 10 Aug 2006 15:16:54 PDT
The kittens are a month and 5 days old now, and they're so cute! Unfortunately they're sick with something that gums up their eyes, so I'm going to have to take them to the vet and see what can be done. Their parents will have to go as well, so they don't get sick as well, if they aren't now. I named two of the kittens, a black male with white paws, chest and face, his name is Ravenshleigh (although Curtis wants to call him Sandy after a cat he had when he was younger), and a little black girl with a white spot on her stomach, her name is Carbonelle. As per my tradition, i'm trying to keep to literary names for all the cats, like Farli is a firelizard from Dragondrums by Anne McCaffery, Tristan is the guy from that old story of Tristan and Isolde, and Guenhwyvar is the panther companion of Drizzt Do'Urden from RA Salvatore's books (possibly the best named of the bunch). Ravenshleigh is the kesani companion of Kian Weverynn from my story Summoned to Tourney, and Carbonelle is named after the King of the cats from Carbonel, an old british book. I STILL haven't decided if I'm going to bring Farli here or not... And I told my mom before I moved that I was going to. Sheesh. At least the kittens don't live in the house, so I could now, even though Guen and Tristan and him wouldn't get along very well... I dunno. *sigh*

I have had a job at the UFA (United Farmers of Alberta) gas station here for over a month, almost two. I can run the place by myself now, so it's good, I guess. I still get sick going in there, the smell is disgusting, of oil and grease and dust, and I HATE getting up at 7:00 every morning. I'm getting very tired. Gotta think of some alternative to being sick and tired all the time.

I haven't written anything in a very long time, if anyone was wondering why I haven't posted anything since Summoned to Tourney. I can't write anymore. I don't have the time, I don't have the inspiration, and I don't have the inclination. *sigh* oh well.

Anyway, I guess that's about it, other than the place is a mess again, although the cupboards have all been painted now, so that's one thing off my shoulders. Now we just have to get it clean! There's mice in here now, we've been letting Guen in a little, but we need a housecat to keep them under control. Maybe Farli would work, but he's never been a mouser, and that's Guen's job, so I dunno...

Anyway, gotta go now! I'll try to update more often! ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/9020188/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/9020188/ Fri, 09 Jun 2006 15:40:16 PDT
I don't have much of my stuff here, just some of my clothes, my laptop, my bow and arrows, and some other odds and ends I had at Curtis' place in Edmonton before we came here. I think on monday I'm going to be able to get the rest of my stuff, but I don't know. Also, I don't know what to bring. I could either bring just the other random things that I want, as well as the rest of my clothes and my armory, but then I could also empty out my old room at my dad's house completely and bring everything I own.... I don't know yet. I don't know.

I'm not even really sure if I want to bring Farli now. I don't know what he's going through living with just dad and my brother, but I'm not really sure I can bring him down here. Besides the fact that he's probably depressed there, he might get killed down here. Also, there are two (soon to be more) other cats here, and I think they both have things I don't want them to give to Farli. There's a cute little black cat that I've named Guenhwyvar after the panther friend of Drizzt Do'Urden in RA Salvatore's Forgotten Realms books, and a tabby tom cat I've named Tristan because he reminds me of a tabby tom cat that was living in our garage a few months ago in Spruce Grove. My mom and I named him Tristan, then took him to the vet and never saw him again. Also, Gwenhwyvar is pregnant, and I kind of want to bring her inside, partially for her safety, and partially for the kittens' safety. If/when I bring Farli down, I want to take the two kitties here to the vet first to make sure that they aren't going to infect Farli with anything. And I don't know how the three of them are going to get along... *sigh*

I've had an interesting job since I came here. Curtis' father is a cattle farmer, as well as growing wheat and canola and stuff. Anyway, one of the cows gave birth to twins, and wouldn't feed one of them, so I was given the job of feeding the poor little guy that she kept kicking away. It's kind of sad knowing that the little guy is going to be eaten some day... but I try not to think about it.

However, now I have to try to get a job around here. There's a place called Chevreaux Career Consulting that helps people get jobs, and I went there, and they gave me a few ideas.... but then told me "GET YOUR DRIVER'S LICENCE FIRST!!!" So, I guess I will... *sigh* Curtis and I have been working on a vehicle for me. There are three options... I guess. One: a Chevrolet Impala that his dad has, which is a bitch cus the seat's too low for me to see over the dashboard with... and it can't be adjusted, at least not easily. Two: The Gopher Killer, a Ford Ranger F-150 that's been sitting in the bush for a year. It drinks more oil than gas, and has bald tires and is very dirty... and has who knows how many other kinds of problems... but I can drive it. I did so today when we were seeing if we could fix it up. And Three: Buy something else. So... I dunno what I'm going to do about that. I'll let you know if something comes up.

But, Curtis is yelling at me to get off the internet now... so I guess I have to go now. I'll be back when I can be. I don't know when that will be. If Curtis can find an appropriate can, it could be within the next few days... if not, I don't know. And about the can... don't ask. I have no idea what he's thinking.

See ya'll when I see ya!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8797778/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8797778/ Wed, 17 May 2006 20:01:18 PDT
It doesn't feel like I thought it would, moving so far away from my family. Of course, I don't really have a 'family', so I guess I shouldn't be so surprised. For years my 'family' has been just 5 people living in the same house together, connected by blood and by name and that's about it. My parents hate each other, and pretty much have for the last 20 years, they just never realised it. I don't talk to my brother, and he doesn't talk to anyone, although I should be getting some pictures from him that he took during Patty's last walk, if I can get his email, or if he can get mine. My sister and I have always had sort of an on/off relationship, mostly because we're so different. We were planning to move in together, but when I lost my job at the Equine Center, and decided I didn't really want to be in Edmonton anymore, that idea flew out the window. I never really wanted to live with her anyway... I'd much rather live with Curtis. And of course, my mom just left completely.

Despite the fact that my mom was about the only person I was really close to for the last 21 years of my life, I don't really care. I think it has something to do with the fact that I met Curtis just before she left to visit her parents for a month the first time. She hadn't met him until she got back, but she had heard of him before she left. I remember, because I had gone to my second SCA event Ever (Harvest Feast - partially documented in the Journal entry "The Tale of Stoneheart") on September 10, which was the day after I met Curtis, at the archery range in Spruce Grove. It was his first SCA event. Anyway, I had gone back home, not really thinking much of that guy I had met, who sure, I liked a little, but wasn't really thinking much about, and Allister sent me an email inviting me to the waterpark in West Edmonton Mall the up-coming weekend. It was his wife's birthday. Anyway, I don't like water, so I didn't really want to go, but Allister replied with something like "You should come. Curtis wants you to come." I wish I'd saved that email. I replied to him with "Curtis wants me to go?" And Allister's reply was "Yes, he likes you." And that weekend, when I went to the waterpark, Allister officially named Curtis and I an item. (For anyone that wanted to know. I was trying to remember that, and I use my journal on DA partially to tell people what goes on, and partially for me to remember what happened.) I remember most of that, the emails in particular, because right after I read the one from Allister saying "Yes, he likes you." I went upstairs and told my mom about it. That's all she knew of Curtis before she left for her parents' place. Which is what all that had to do with what I was writing about in the first place. Man, I digress a lot...

And now for more random remembrance about the beginning of me and Curtis... I guess this part probably doesn't matter, so if you don't want to read about the beginning days of our relationship, don't bother reading this. I guess I'm just in a nostalgic mood.

While we were at the Waterpark, Curtis and I were racing each other down the slides. He won every time, probably because the t-shirt I wore slowed me down. Anyway, at one point I was trying to jump onto a tube thingy to ride down one of the slides on, and whacked my head on the top of the slide. It was an enclosed one called the Corkscrew, if anyone knows anything about the rides there. I whacked my head good on it, opening up my scalp in a line across the part in my hair. It gave me a massive headache, and bled quite a bit. When I got to the bottom of the slide, blood was running all over the place. Curtis of course had gotten down before me, on the other slide, and was celebrating his victory when he saw the blood. That put a damper on things, and rushed me out of the water. One of our friends, Robert, was also nearby and ran to get my clothes... minus my underthings, annoyingly enough. I was taken to the lifeguard's station, where they did tests and things to make sure I wasn't going to get a concussion, Curtis ran for his truck, and then I went to the hospital. I got three stitches in my head, after about an hour of sitting with a bloody tow... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8754016/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8754016/ Fri, 12 May 2006 21:41:32 PDT
So, the Equine Center fired me. For being lazy and slow and talking on the cell phone all the time. I think it was more about the stupid internal political shake ups than anything. They fired the Herd Manager as well, for less. Stupid people.

I'm getting kicked out of the place I'm living. By the end of May, I have to be out. It's a good thing I think I've still got a job at Domo, cus otherwise I'd be screwed. But I haven't worked there in a week, ever since they called while I was in Calgary at Beltane, asking if I could work, and I said I was in Calgary and couldn't. So, I don't know if I'm even working for them anymore. But no one told me if I'm not.

My mom is moving to Saskatchewan for good. As of this Sunday, I will most likely never see her again. She sold all her stuff, is going to rent a trailer for what's left, and is leaving on tuesday, I think. I get Farli out of the deal, but if I don't have anywhere to live, its going to suck.

The cherry on the top of that is, my mom is putting the family dog down. She's not sick, she's not even that old. She's going a little blind, but that's not that bad. She's only 10 or 11, she's not that old. No, the reason Patty is being put down tomorrow is because mom is moving to Saskatchewan and she can't leave her alone with my dad and my brother. I'm not sure it's fair. I mean, she's not putting Farli down, why Patty? And I found out less than 12 hours before it was going to happen. Tomorrow morning, as my mom put it, in her very words "I'm going to take her for her last walk, then I'll take her to the vet for the last time, then I'll put her in the ground." That seems a little harsh. Too harsh. And I won't even be there to say goodbye, because I'm stuck in the city. So, I guess I have to do it cybernetically, even though Patty will never know. Good bye Patty. I'll miss you.

There might be a ray of sunshine... maybe. One of the stables around Spruce Grove is hiring barn staff, and is giving them room and board as well. I'm going to try to get on there. If not... I dunno what I'll do. Curtis has sort of asked me if I want to move to Hardisty with him... and on one hand I'd love to, and on the other hand, I'm not sure it's a good time to. I don't know what to do.

I'm going to go cry now...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8709265/ Mon, 08 May 2006 14:42:40 PDT
One target was a vine, with blue and red flowers and big green leaves. The vine was worth 1 point, the leaves worth 2 and the flowers worth 3. Sadly enough, I didn't hit a thing on that one, although I was aiming for the big flowers. Curtis got 5 points off it, hitting a flower and a leaf.

Target two was a woman holding two shields that were divided into four quadrants of yellow, blue, red and white. The point was to hit the shields, not the woman. If you hit one arrow in any color on the shield, you got one point for each arrow, unless you hit the same color on the other shield. Then you took those two arrows (or 4 or 6) and multiplied by two. So, you could technically get 12 points off that target. The only way to get 16 points would be if you hit the exact center of each shield, where the lines crossed between the four colors. But that would be damn near impossible. And the fun thing was, if you shot the woman, you got Zero for that target. Curtis was doing good, he hit the red on one shield... then accidentally missed and hit the woman. So, he gave up and just killed her good. So, he got nothing. I shot the yellow on one shield, missed the target completely on my next two shots, and then hit the yellow on the other shield. I decided to call it quits for that target, and didn't shoot my other two arrows. I got 4 points out of the deal.

Target number three resembled a cross-section of an orange, but it was red. It was called a ring, but it was actually a circle, devided into triangular sections. At the wide end of each section was a gold medallion. The center was open, to fool people. For most practice targets, the center is where people want to shoot, so thats mostly where people are able to shoot. On this one, shooting the center would be bad, although not as bad as shooting the woman in the previous target. The red was 1 point and the medallions were 2. The center was nothing. Curtis hit with three arrows, taking out a medallion and two in the red, so he got 4 points. I got pretty much the same, but I hit with four arrows, giving me 5 points.

The next target was the most fun of all. It was completely different than anything we have ever shot at before. It was a kind of a grid, with words printed in each space. There were odd words, like pirate and robot and ninja, but also good words like love and adore and my and you and want and stuff like that. Around the edges was the alphabet, one letter per space. The point was to make up a sentence with the words that you shot. Curtis got a wierd collection of words, that I think eventually he made into a sentence like 'Go Elvis, be robot, stop breath' or something like that. I got something a little different. Two of my arrows missed, so I only got 4 words. One of my words was actually the letter U, so I got to make up a word. So, I came up with 'Unfailing pirate ninja love' There were no points awarded to anyone in that, although the judges would chose the best poems.

And the last target was the speed round. It was a boy holding a bird. The white around them was one, the boy was two and the bird was three points. The point of a speed round is to try to get off as many arrows as you can in 30 seconds. Curtis got off 5 arrows, and hit the bird in the tail, and a white space, giving him 4 points. I, however, only had 5 arrows left after the nock came off one of them when I was shooting at the ring, so I took it slow and steady. I got off four arrows. I hit the boy twice, and missed completely twice. I got 4 points. Now, Curtis and I getting 4 and 5 arrows off is actually kind of slow, as both of us can usually do about 6 or 7 arrows. Then there's our friend Allister, who's record is 13 arrows. So... yeah.

After it was over, and the judges had tallied up the points and decided on the best poems, we recieved our prizes, which were live flowers. One carnation went to the winner for each target for each group (the three divisions - Beginner, Intermediate and Master - were each split into 2 groups. Curtis and I were in group 6 - Beginners). There was also a flower for most points over all. So, about 31 flowers were given out. I got more flowers than anyone else. I won in our group for most points in the woman with the shields, the ring and the speed round targets, however Curtis should have gotten one for the speed round as well, cus we tied. Also, the judges decided that my poem was the best from my group.... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8662115/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8662115/ Wed, 03 May 2006 12:48:48 PDT
As it mentioned in my last journal entry, I have gotten a job at a local stable, and I am having fun playing with the horses. However, they could not hire me for the wage or the hours that I needed, so I had to find an alternative occupation. And so, I did. On the urging of my boyfriend, I sent in an application to a local gas station. It was called Domo, Canadians might recognise the name. Anyway, I sent in the application more as a way to get Curtis off my back about it... and so, undoubtably, I actually got the job. It's always the filler applications that I get... grr...

And so, I went in for orientation. Almost the second I sat down I realised that something was a little off here. There were three other people in my 'class', and all of them were trailer-trash/ druggies/ drunks... it was horrid. And I am none of those things. The second thing I noticed was the absolutely disgusting way Domo expected their employees to act. All bright and cheerful, jumping around with a wide grin on their face, and saying the most disgusting line ever to every 'Guest' that comes to the station. "Can I fill it for you?" And yes, they call their customers 'Guests'. *shudder*

I went home after the orientation and told Curtis that there was no way in hell I was going to act like that, I could not do the job. I fully intended to do as horrible a job as I could just so I would get fired. Curtis told me to just see was it was like, it might not be as bad as I thought. So I sighed and went to my first shift... at 7:00 in the morning. I am not a morning person. I don't do well with mornings. I figure the day shouldn't start till about noon. Anyway, I went, and found out that Domo employees are not nearly as 'happy-go-lucky' as the corporation wants them to be. Can you envision my happiness when I discovered the cut corners and slacker attitude of my fellow employees! I mean, we still jumped to the pump, but we didn't follow every little step of everything the orientation had said we had to do. Also, I have never once said 'Can I fill it for you?'.

I've now worked 5 shifts there, and in about 10 minutes I should be heading off for my 6th. Today is my last official day of training. Tomorrow I have to run shift, and do all the idiotic managerial things, by myself, with supervision. They want me to be a back-up manager, in case neither of the actual managers can be in. I hope I'll get a little bit higher wage as a manager, cus since I'm only part-time I only make 8.50 an hour. It's a little more than I make at the Equine Center, and since there's rarely a day when I'm not working at one place or the other, I should be making not too bad money. The awesome thing is, somehow the Equine Center and Domo's pay periods end on alternating weeks... so I get a paycheque every week!

But I have to go to work now.

*sigh* That line is the story of my life... I want to go back to writing and drawing, but I just don't have the time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8139878/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8139878/ Fri, 24 Mar 2006 14:32:19 PST
~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/8121041/ Fri, 10 Mar 2006 11:56:40 PST
I need a job, this is a given. For the last three weeks I have been out of work and running steadily out of money, and now, today I go to 5 different places, and three of them seem to want to hire me. I've got interviews with each of them on the same day, and the one place I actually do want to work has the lowest salary. Fuckit. I'm going to go live in my bacement and not come out.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/7827079/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/7827079/ Tue, 07 Feb 2006 10:08:40 PST
~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/7508079/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/7508079/ Wed, 04 Jan 2006 12:57:33 PST
I hope this means I'll be able to talk Curtis into watching the Lord of the Rings with me... the whole Trilogy... at once... ::rubs hands together, chuckling diabolically:: hee hee hee...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/7158578/ Sun, 27 Nov 2005 13:31:28 PST
The feast that night was abyssmal. It was 5 courses, of bread and soup and pork and roast beef and desert. Now, it sounded good on paper, but when it came down to it, the feast Sucked! There was about a half hour to an hour between each course, and each course was so friggin small that by the time the next one came, everyone was starving again. And no, it wasn't one of those gourmet fancy 5 course meals. It was just pathetic. The only way I managed to get through the night without starving was to eat a good half a loaf of not-so-good saffron bread. It would have been nicer of course if they had chosen foods that everyone would like, instead of butternut squash soup and turnips and stuff. yick. And not only was the food pathetic, the way the hall was set up was stupid as well. There were about 200 people there, and for some reason the feastocrats decided that they would only seat 6 people per table. They were long rectangular tables, and could seat 8. Of course, since they had so many tables in there, there was no room for anyone to move around. It was horrid. To top it off, they had court during the 'feast', so no one was quiet when the herald or the King or whoever was speaking. I couldn't hear anyone at all, other than the people around me.

However, His Magesty Uther, the King of An Tir, seemed to be a pretty nice guy. He played this trick on all the guys at Morning Court by asking all the men with a lady in their life to go up and kneel before him. Curtis of course, went with them. The King then proceeded to essentially say that chivalry was dead, and then challenged each guy up there to do something nice and romantic for the lady in his life that day. I was laughing my head off when I heard that. but it seemed to work. I have to hand it to him, Curtis did try to be romantic. He bought me a necklace with a small chunk of quartz on it, and a little bronze ring in the shape of a snake. Oddly enough, the only finger it fits on is the ring finger on my left hand... Later that night he was a little more romantic, when during Evening Court during the 'feast' the King asked all the guys back up again. Of course, not all of them were able to go up, because no one could hear what His Magesty was saying, and with all the tables in the way, they couldn't have gotten there anyway. Curtis missed his cue. But a little later he went and chatted up the King, at His Magesty's own request. He was all mysterious about it. Just as we were about to go, while I was saying goodbye to Allister et al, he snuck up behind me and handed me a single long-stem red rose. That was damn romantic. So, all in all, it was a good day. Too bad Curtis and I won't get to go to another SCA event together for a while, cus tomorrow his schedule changes so that he has to work on the weekends. *sigh*

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything t... ]]> ~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/7049332/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/7049332/ Mon, 14 Nov 2005 20:29:14 PST The wireless thing doesn't work super good, but it did work for a while. Even though Brennan has had a major overhaul, being completely wiped clean and rebuilt, he still doesn't really have the power to get jacked into the internet by himself. (and if anyone reads this and doesn't know who, or rather what, Brennan is... this could be kinda confusing.) To make it even more confusing is that he talks to me now... in my boyfriend, Curtis' voice. When he boots up, he says "Good morning Kim, I hope that you treat me well today." and when he's shutting down, he moans and wails, "Noo!!!! No, I'll be good, really! Nooooo!!!" Curtis programmed it to say that while I was having a shower a few days ago. Completely out of the blue. It was quite a shock the next time I booted up my laptop, I can tell you. Actually, it was kinda funny, cus I asked him if it would be possible to make a computer talk, and he said no. Then a day later he asked me what I would want it to say if it could. I didn't know. Then he made it talk. It still cracks me up when I hear it.

wow... long journal...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

~Flashgriffin http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/6663263/ http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/6663263/ Mon, 03 Oct 2005 21:25:33 PDT
EDIT:
In other news, I think I've officially lost the writing bug. For over a month now I have had no urge whatsoever to write anything. My best quess is that when my life started looking more interesting, when I joined the archery club, writing took the back seat of my life. And I'm not sure that I like that. I also don't know what to do about it...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/6477510/ Sun, 11 Sep 2005 14:08:35 PDT
Yesterday I went to Harvest Feast, and participated in an archery tournament. Out of twelve archers, including a few Masters, I scored third over all, highest of the beginners. As prize, I won a cool little leather pouch on a string, with a tiny little stone heart inside. Ellias gave me the nickname Stoneheart from it.

Oh, and I'm also now a Damp Archer, in the club of the Drenched Archers. It was raining yesterday. But it was a heck of a lot of fun regardless.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/6418126/ Sun, 04 Sep 2005 22:21:19 PDT
Over the next month, and part of October, there is something cool to do every weekend! This coming Saturday is Harvest Feast in the Shire of Bitter End, next weekend is another Archery Training weekend in Montengarde, and the weekend after that is a fund raiser event some folks I know are putting together to raise money for the Scadians in the Hurricane. So lotsa stuff to do over the next while. And in october there's Samhain, again in Montengarde, complete with costume party!

The only problem is getting all those saturdays off work...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.

http://Flashgriffin.deviantart.com/journal/6372748/ Tue, 30 Aug 2005 19:50:11 PDT
kill me now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a wonderful author named *purgatori who is writing the best LotR fic I have ever seen. It is set a few years after The Return of the King, and in it there are vampires and unicorns and shapeshifters, everything that Middle-earth should have, but Tolkien never told us about. It is called The Darkening Age, and the first chapter is found here [link] She's in the process of re-writing it, and the new first chapter is officially up now!! Go, check it out!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'My Life as an Elf: First Meetings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf: Realm of Summer' -> [link] WIP
'My Life as an Elf: Heritage - Beginnings' -> [link]
'My Life as an Elf' Chapter List -> [link]
'At First Sight' -> [link]
'Summoned to Tourney' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'My Adventure - Flashgriffin Style' -> [link]
'My Return to Nausador' -> [link] WIP
'Powerless' -> [link]
~~~~~~~
'Of Toloronta and the Creators' -> [link]
'Tolorontan Mythology' -> [link]
'Races Overview' -> [link]
'History of the Etir' -> [link]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patches I have made:

Fire Crow Patch -> [link]
Stargate SG1 Shoulder Crest -> [link]
Inu-Yasha Patch -> [link]
Soravne Priest Crest -> [link]
Watcher Symbol -> [link]
Gil-Galad Family Crest -> [link]
Lothlorian Mallorn Leaf Patch -> [link]
White Tree of Gondor Crest -> [link]
Phantom Mask Patch -> [link]
Erin Go Braugh! -> [link]

If you're interested in getting one of your own, that can be done, for a small price. These ones are not for sale, but with a color picture and an idea of size, a custom patch can be created.

Support the Arts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The folks I Stalk, and those who Stalk me.