Saturday activities
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Tag Archives: clann
New Tool
After my computer class finished today I went to the local Woodcraft store, which is in the same part of the Metro. wolfsword was working there and was in at the time. I had a discount card, so I did something I have been wanting to do for a long time: I bought a Lie Nielsen block plane. Lie-Nielsen makes some of the best hand tools for woodworking available today. Perhaps some day I will be able to get one of their larger planes as well. Meanwhile, a good block plane is a very useful thing to have in a shop, and I expect this one will serve me well.
Memorial Day
I spent much of the morning working on colgaffneyis newsletter. The hard copy is printed and almost ready to mail. All I have to do tomorrow is buy stamps and mail it.
After finishing that I went by the graves of my grandparents. I took the wrong exit from the expressway and corrected myself, to my surprise, by reconstructing the directions from their old house, rather than from our home in Roseville. I cleared the grass and debris from the grave stones, and afterwards I drove by their house in NE Minneapolis, not far away. The house is being well kept up. Sometime in the past decades one of the owners repainted the trim brown. The contrast with the stucco looks good. Two houses on the block had For Sale signs. I hope that does not mean there is a problem with the neighborhood. Everything I could see looked OK.
I came home and had a sandwich for lunch. Then mia_mcdavid, our son James, and I went to see the latest Pirates of the Caribbean. I carefully avoided every temptation to make sense of the plot and just sat back to enjoy the action and the scenes. Of course, I noticed the gear and clothing ranged from c. 1600 (e.g. a helmet similar to the one I am wearing in this userpic) to the mid 1700’s (the infantry uniforms). Some of the wigs were typical of the latter period, but others were more suited to 1690. One of the firearms was quite similar to colgaffneyis grenade launcher (if you imagine it being upgraded to a flintlock) and there was a boarding axe quite similar to one I own. So it actually was rather amusing :-)>
Saturday
mia_mcdavid and I went to the St. Paul Farmer’s market in the morning. A pleasant outing.
We spent the afternoon at a clothing workshop (“camp drill”) for colgaffneyis. It was held at the home of c_nocturnum. A lot of patterns by kass_rants were being used there. I spent most of the time working on a pair of period shoes that I had made last year–just maintenance, repairing some seams. I have a very similar pair of shoes I purchased, but I realized at last weekend’s Scottish Fair that while the workmanship on the commercial pair was better, the homemade shoes were perfectly useable, looked OK, and were more comfortable.
Connections at the Fair
haddayr and I were pleased to see two of our friends from our Irish Class stop by colgaffneyis camp. We introduced them and showed them around. c_nocturnum showed one of them how to wear a greatkilt, and bullettheblue sold him a bonnet that twolodge had made.
Another visitor was a computer consultant I know from work and his wife. Recognition was delayed a second because of unfamiliar dress: I had never seen him in shorts and T-shirt, and he had never seen me in a kilt. One of those “he looks familiar…” moments, then I recognized the corporate logo on his shirt.
I also saw one of my Carleton folk dance connections, who came by with his wife and child. He works for the college now, but Farmington is at least as easy to reach from Northfield as from the Cities.
The Scottish Fair
… was great! colgaffneyis put on a great show, worked well with the other participants, and everybody had a good time. I must have worked hard, because I am already feeling muscle aches all over. Usually that does not happen until the next morning. Tired now. I may post more tomorrow, if I can move.
Night before the Fair
Setting up camp
Busy Week
Out every evening ….
Monday — Irish Class
Tuesday — Loading colgaffneyis trailer, and a belated birthday dinner. See here
Wednesday — colgaffneyis Dance Guild. Also begin packing for the weekend.
Thursday — Set up colgaffneyis camp at the Minnesota Scottish Fair.
Friday — Go to the Fair. Dinner there and camping out for the night.
Saturday (All day) — The fair itself. The weather should be much better than last year.
Work and relaxation with friends
After I got home mia_mcdavid and I went to colgaffneyis work party to load our newly repaired trailer for the Farmington show this weekend. There were enough people, all in good spirits, so this went well. Just took a while because we had changed how we pack for shows, and twolodge had to rethink how to load the stuff. Since he will be towing the trailer with his truck, he gets to have it loaded just the way he wants :-)>
Afterwards c_nocturnum, her husband, Mia, James, and I went out to dinner at the Bulldog Restaurant a couple miles away. This was a delayed birthday dinner for me. Excellent beer, food, and company. I had a Kobe beef hamburgers (rare) and French fries with Parmesan cheese and truffles. First time I ever had Kobe beef, and it lived up to expectations. Kobe beef and truffles–I was reminded of a line from one of Poul Anderson’s SF stories about Dominic Flandry: “What is the point of living in a decadent age if you don’t know how to enjoy the decadence?”
From Hilbert Space to Dilbert Space, and beyond 
