I have always wanted to do an extended fast, at least since 1973 or thereabouts, but I’ve never been able to because I have been addicted to too many substances and unable or unwilling to give them up.

I have a fast planned for tomorrow!

February 18th I stopped drinking coffee. I did, however, stock up on a powdered “energy drink” that contained guarana and taurine, so I was still consuming caffeine, though one of those packets contained less than a cup of coffee. Over the last two weeks I would use less and less of it in my water glass at work until this week when I ceased using it all together. I have gotten a very minor headache each day around noon that was easily vanquished with a couple of ibuprofens. So, lucky for me, coffee seems to be kicked.

Then I bought an electronic cigarette, a nice one, refillable. I started messing around with it and on the 25th of February I stopped smoking. I didn’t smoke all day Saturday the 25th and Sunday the 26th. However, on Monday the 27th I panicked about pooping. I’ve been dependent on coffee and cigarettes as laxatives my entire adult life. So I found Colt’s pack, took one out, lit it up, took two drags from it and ran to the bathroom. I think I puttered along taking drags from that cigarette for the next day and a half. Then, on Wednesday I bought a pack. I think I only smoked one, that same style, lighting and relighting it six or seven times over the course of a day and a half.

Thursday night, March 3rd we went to Curtis’s house and both he and Ian smoke American Spirits, my favorite brand. I smoked a whole one there. I also drank a bunch of Beck’s beer in order to say goodbye to that as well.
I had a great time.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday I continued to smoke a little here and there and I shared my pack with Colt. By Tuesday, March 7th I had five left and I didn’t want them anymore but instead of throwing them out I simply smoked them. All. In one day. I smoked one at home before work. One in the car on the way to work. Two at work. And one on the way home from work all on the premise that I would get rid of them like that, go through the evening not smoking and that would be that.

Well, unfortunately I got up this morning, got ready for work and agreed to drive Colt to school. On the way I stopped and bought cigarettes for us. We each smoked one in the car at 7 / 11 and divvied up the pack. He took fourteen. I took four. I didn’t smoke another one until just a few minutes ago. I just lit it and took a couple of drags from it but now I am really scared. I am not quitting. I am just suffering. I’m stuck between Scylla and Charybdis. If I go back to smoking I’ll be miserable. If I stop smoking I’ll be miserable! And I don’t know what to do.

Meanwhile I’ve been messing around with foods, trying to wind that down as well so I can actually fast. I have carrot juice and vegan bouillon, herb tea and oatmeal here at work. Pretty meager fare, but tomorrow I plan to drink only water. I will have the teabags, the carrot juice and the bouillon here in case I panic.

But I still smoke! GARH.

I am going to blog here everyday about this struggle. It could be very depressing, just sayin.

It’s been a very long time since I’ve been here. I don’t know why I walked off. I wasn’t mad. I wasn’t even disgruntled. I just had nothing to say I guess, though I’ve been talking to Scott and my kids like a magpie.

Perhaps I just feel that what I have to say is so politically incorrect that I better keep it secret, keep it safe…

Perhaps I keep hoping that I’ll tone it down internally, that I’ll see reason and return to an equilibrium that appears normal by other people’s standard.

I’m beginning to think that won’t ever happen.

I remember saying to Scott several months ago that I was interested in reading the authors from the European Right Wing and that I trusted my own intellect and psyche to be able to sift through the ideas, take those that were innovative and burn the rest off. I asked him to keep an eye on me because I’ve chronologically read other thinkers and watched them wander over into the righteous green pastures of the Right Wing and then suddenly take a really hard right and become ranting, hateful lunatics.

I asked Scott to keep an eye on me, because I cannot psychologically afford to take a hard right and go off roading like that. I’ll blow a tire and end up stranded in some desolate field of hate. So he’s been watching and so far I’m ok, but I am disturbed, because even if I am just a tourist in this part of the ideological world it still has a strong effect on me. Even witnessing people thinking some of these thoughts is terrifying, let alone the weird temptation to think them myself.

I have a friend who told me about her experience with meth. She said something like this:

“I really wanted to try it just so I would have some understanding of what all the excitement was about. I wanted to be able to feel compassion as well as provide support should anyone I know end up on the wrong end of that experience. So I did it one evening and I hated every damned minute of it. I felt horrible. I was jittery and uncomfortable and just miserable.

The amazing thing is that as soon as I came down? I wanted more. For THREE SOLID WEEKS I had to resist the urge to do it again! It’s an amazing drug.”

I am having a similar experience with this particular ideology. It is difficult to resist the urge to go over to the dark side. There’s a cause over there. There’s passion. There’s something to believe in, something to fight for, a reason to get up in the morning and get one’s blood flowing. Over here, in the supposedly tolerant left why everything is just fine. There’s nothing to get upset about except the lunatics on the right and we have absolute faith that there aren’t enough of them, they don’t align with one another very well and they will someday learn to be nice and compassionate to their fellow man, look past skin color, culture and attitude and be nice, benevolent people like we liberals… you know… enlightened.

So I read this wild ass stuff, anti Christian, racist, anti socialism, anti capitalism, some of it anti everything except family and tribalism, and I get fired up on certain ideas, positions that reflect back to me my own decisions and that validate my own life.

I married a nice guy, genetically similar to myself. We had three kids. I stayed home to watch over them, their health, their educations, their growth, and basically to have fun with them and be intimate with my own family. I loved my job. Both my husband and I totally believed in its merit. But does that mean that’s right for everyone? Should everyone be straight and have a division of labor based on gender? No. It’s impossible. There is too much variety in the human experience for everyone to be so homogeneous. But there for a few seconds I do experience the urge to believe that everyone should live as I have. Even my own children won’t be able to live as I have because right out of the gate each of them has a peculiarity that prohibits it.

So it gets both lonely and frustrating to be the perfect candidate for the ranting European Right and not be allowed to play. They would SO love me, at least until I opened my mouth with pity and despair over their hatred for others. I just can’t do it. I can’t find it in me to feel that threatened by race or ethnicity.

I do, however, go around the bend on religion. Listening to the cruelty that comes out of the mouths of the American Right, all in the name of their Jesus, makes me froth at the mouth. Seeing so many people in both Europe and this country under the spell of the three Abrahamic religions, even if just to hate the Muslims not even as a “Christian” but as an “American – as a cultural Christian American”. So I do go a bit wiggy about my Heathenism and feel threatened occasionally on behalf of that, but not very often.

Really I think my message to myself, to my family and to the larger world is do what I believe, follow through on what I have deemed as right and don’t compromise –

BUT

Don’t tell anyone about it. Don’t make a lot of noise. Just ignore what I disapprove of and make no room for it in my life without ever giving myself away. If a family member or close friend engages in an activity that is totally against what I believe I can release that person from the bond of my frith, quietly and cautiously without an announcement, or I can fight it out and see if I can either be convinced or be convincing so we can align again.

It was Mary Daly, an extremely radical feminist who introduced me to the idea of unthinking what we don’t want to exist in this world, to keep painting over the reality we see with the images of something we want to see. At the time it looked like magical thinking and really weird New Age crap…

But it works. I unthought a lot of ideas and they disappeared from my life. I painted new realities for myself and stepped into them, much like Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins, and there I have lived happily for almost thirty years. I am not abused. I’ve not been assaulted. I’ve not been a victim of anything at all. Uncomfortable events that came down the pike toward me were completely traceable to my own actions. There was none of that mystery bullshit that came at me out of nowhere and beat the crap out of me.

I know it sounds whacked, even more whacked than these crazy right wingers who are so afraid of the JOOS who own all the banks and Hollywood, or afraid of the Negroes, or the Mexicalis, or the dreaded A-Rabs. At least their fear has a manifestation out there in a reality we can all share. There really are Jewish people, and Africans, and African Americans, and Mexicans and Mexican Americans and lots of Muslims, lots and lots of Muslims. There isn’t, however, any proof that if you unthink the danger you think they pose, if you paint a world in which you are not bothered by those fears, then you won’t be.

So that’s what I’ve been working on while reading the pagan European Right Wingers, unthinking them, painting over them, while also painting over some of the situations that bother me as well as them. It’s exhausting but might be worth it. The quality of my life may yet again improve.

I have been to a lot of shows in my life. I saw a lot of the Joffrey Ballet in the Sixties because my sister was a soloist with them. As a result of her career I was also dragged to Broadway shows, the Opera, the New York City Ballet, Alvin Ailey and Martha Graham. I heard the New York Philharmonic do Shostakovich at Carnegie Hall and the Grateful Dead at the Coliseum in New Haven. I’ve seen the Stones, Cher, George Carlin, the Allman Bros., John McLoughlin and the Mahavishnu Orchestra, the New Riders of the Purple Sage and I met the sitting President of the United States in 1996 but never have I been as impressed as I was this past Saturday at the Rammstein show in Las Vegas.

I had wanted to see them in LA but the ticket prices were exorbitant. Not so dear in Las Vegas, we managed to get through the doors for a hundred sixty for the two of us. At the intermission we strolled around and put ourselves in unsold two hundred and sixty dollar seats for the rest of the show. And what a show!

I understand fully why the reviewer for the New York Times described Rammstein as “music to invade Poland to” but that reference only adds to the mystique that …. “shhhhh – they might be Nazis.”

One of the qualities of art that I cherish the most is that it makes me think. The very first time I heard Rammstein I did think. And what did I think? I thought – “These guys must be Nazis!” But a quick scope of the translations of their lyrics, their personal records, the complete lack of any reference to politics in their lyrics or in the activities of their private lives leads me to believe that my thoughts are simply that, my thoughts.

So why do I think “Nazis!” when I hear a bass voice fitting for a Wagnerian opera? Why do I think “Nazis!” when I hear rolling R’s and guttural gh’s? Why do I think “Nazis!” when I hear a military march rhythm? Why do I think “Nazis!” when I hear music that inspires me to run, march, stomp, and do all kinds of physical things? Why do I think “Nazis!” when I feel seduced by a deep and high testosterone voice singing a ballad to me in German? And why do I feel a secret, but pleasurable, guilt about that?

Because someone taught me to. All things German are suspect. Anything fit, powerful and seductive is absolutely dangerous if it is German. I read a piece online that claimed that because Till Lindeman is fit and doesn’t wear a shirt he’s a poster boy for the Aryan Master Race. Because the lyrics make reference to the sun and the swastika is the rune for sun, then obviously they aren’t singing about the sun! They are singing about the swastika! AND – apparently they like fire. Guess what!!!!! The Nazi’s liked fire too! Omigod ! It’s proof!

So yes, I had to think. Do I really believe that all things German are Nazi? Do I really believe that a German man being powerful and beautiful and undeniably German has to be a Nazi? There’s nothing else he could be? He couldn’t just be a talented and hot German guy? I mean… we let Italians be talented and hot Italian guys and as I recall they were on the wrong side too. How about Russians? Mikhail Baryshnikov, it’s harder to get more talented or hot than that! Do we think “bad evil Commie” when we see Mikhail Baryshnikov or do we think “Holy crap all that talent, sexiness and straight too?” Aw crap, see another kind of prejudice, but this isn’t about gays today, it’s about ethnicity and history.

So Rammstein is probably pushing all our Nazi buttons on purpose and being exceptionally careful to not cross the line, but hell, someone HAS to do it! It’s been sixty five years! Isn’t that long enough for us not to fear Germans anymore? Can’t we let them be undeniably themselves? Can’t they sound and act like Germans? Powerful, even scary Germans without a back lash? Can’t they be angry, violent and even dominant without bringing out our bigotry and bias against them?

Apparently not. But – about the show, the guilty pleasure that is listening to and reveling in something conspicuously German and clearly exceptionally good art –

The sound quality was excellent. It was as clear and seemingly coming from inside my body as it is when I listen to it on my IPod. The light show was varied and interesting, and only occasionally did I think, “Man, I’m glad I’m not an epileptic.” The pyro-technics as usual, according to all the old reviews, were great and by the end of the show they had thrown so many flames there wasn’t any oxygen left in the room and we were all high on nitrogen and CO2.

And the music, it went on and on for hours. I love you so much one of us has to die. I am so angry that one of us has to die. I am marching up this hill and when I come down the other side someone is going to die. I’m laughing now but I’m laughing so hard one of us will probably die. Hours and hours of threats and fear and sexiness and head banging and tight, tight arrangement, lyrical composition and military rhythms. Best show evah!

And as I already told you, I’ve seen a few shows in my lifetime.

It was about three weeks ago that Scott said, “Is there anything going on in the pagan community? We haven’t done something like that in a long time.”

So I checked out my email lists and local calendars and lo and behold there was a fundraiser being held to benefit some poor gal who needed surgery and didn’t have insurance. The event was comprised of a potluck, some music, and for the fundraising part – a raffle, an auction, and readings whose proceeds would go toward the surgery.

We had no idea who the gal was that needed the surgery, but that didn’t matter to us. Scott said, “Done. We’ll bring a dish and a 20 and see what it’s like.”

I made potato salad and put it into a bowl I could afford to do without and picked a serving spoon I wouldn’t be heartbroken over losing and off we went to North Mountain Park. We are on a first name basis with exactly one person in the local pagan community so of course I sought him out.

I asked him if he had organized the event since he’s very active in the community and he said no and pointed out who did. Then I changed the subject and asked if his wife was there since the only time I met her was about five years ago and I don’t remember her. He said no, she had to be in stress free situations. When I queried as to why.he made reference to her upcoming surgery and I started to put it together. It was HIS wife who the benefit was for.

I was absolutely astounded. We so very rarely do anything in the pagan community, which is why we know no one, and here we were, at Scott’s instigation, at the fundraiser for the wife of the one person we know!

“Well no wonder we’re here today! Oh my goodness!” I remained a bit stunned and muddled for the rest of the day, simply amazed that though we’d been willing to simply pitch in for a fellow heathen regardless of who it was, who it was indeed for was someone that’s rather important since we’re very fond Grimmel, though he may not know that.

So we watched the auction and toward the end I bought a rune reading from a really interesting guy named Chris. He had just mentioned that I might want to be “pouring water for Odin” when Scott showed up with his winnings from the raffle, a rather plain but charming beaker with a round cork stopper. “You need to do THIS” – “And here’s what you need to do it WITH”, bing bang boom. Once again I’m stunned. We finish up and head home, without the potato salad bowl or the spoon of course, and ready ourselves for the second event of our weekend, a trip out to the lake to visit with our friend Curtis and spend the night on a boat he has for sale.

So off we go to the lake. The evening was just lovely – good conversation, good food, good weather and when we finally crashed below deck on the rather stiff little bed. We slept soundly until five AM when I woke up having to pee, as I usually do at dawn.

I kicked open the cabin door and sat there aghast. In the deep blue of the pre-dawn sky was a pair of gold headlights shining just atop the horizon. I woke up Scott who said, “There’s a third one, I think the mast on that sailboat might be in your way of seeing it, come over here a bit.”

So I did, and there it was, smaller and not as bright but equally as golden, a third orb on the horizon. As I straightened back up a fourth one twinkled in on my side. We sat there for a few long minutes just gazing at this stellar event. It literally took our breath away. They shone like yellow citrine aloft above the mountains, between the swaying masts of the sailboats, the two on either end blinking in and out of view as the sky grew a bit more blue. I finally found some clothes and wobbled down to the loo at the end of the wharf, watching the stars dancing along side me. I knew they were Odin (Mercury), Freya (Venus), Tyr (Mars) and Thor (Jupiter) and was impressed that such a cast would show up to help us make the decision about the boat. It seemed pretty obvious that we should buy the boat, if for no other reason than to provide for us the opportunities to be so close to the earth and her heavens so we might witness more celestial events to take our breath away.

We’re still not sure how strapped the transaction will leave us. We’re going to Vegas this weekend to a Rammstein concert and Scott will play some Craps. I am not a very clever gambler but he has his moments of being excellent. We’ll see if we can make up the balance of the cost of the boat there. That would be another irrefutable sign for us.

We’re going to name her Skíðblaðnir, Tyr’s magical boat that always gets where it needs to be, carries all the gods and their gear and when he’s done it folds up like a bandana he can keep in the rear pocket of his Levis.

We’re excited but holding the lid on it until after the weekend in Las Vegas. I am convinced I will have an Odinic experience at the concert since it was him who told me to go there but I don’t know if he’ll be pleased to see me there since I haven’t completed the tasks he gave me… Oh heavens… I guess I’ll just have to plug along and see what happens.

All in all, as the title relays, it was a very auspicious weekend, but now that I think of it, next weekend may be more so!

It appears our Beltane celebration went global this weekend. I made several preparations for the Royal Wedding that included taking a vacation day and cooking for ten hours straight. We had a big dinner party complete with meat pies and wedding cake and a great time was had by all. Especially me! Here’s why.

I am a shameless fan of European royals. I am not sure if I fully believe they are “different” from commoners in any substantial way, except perhaps less healthy and leaning toward being downright homely, but there are some circumstantial differences to be sure. First of all, most of those families are simply swimming in money. Money is fascinating but having grown up in close proximity to piles of it I don’t really have a lot of respect for it. However, literacy and family legend are two things that are very important to me. The European royals have been signing their names for a long, long time, and they know who their grandparents were. Currently they know who their grandparents 20 times removed were.

You’d be surprised how few people I speak to know anything about their grandparents. My family was very big on telling stories about their own lives and the lives of their ancestors. I found the stories to be entertaining and enlightening. When I discovered I could dance I immediately knew it was derived from seven generations of musicians coming down my maternal grandfather’s paternal line, the Mullalys. If I were glib with words or quick with numbers, why that would be the Clears – my inate snobbery, the Cranes – my love of fine things had to be from Paul Revere. I don’t think one can be a successful silversmith without finding glamour in the gleam, and then of course, the kingly gene, O’Brien. Yes, I too descend from one of the thousands of kingly bastards of Brian Boru. What? Was there only one guy in Ireland who knew how to please the ladies?

But enough about me, let’s talk about the German lizards who sit on the throne of England. Oh my, did I say that out loud?

Interesting isn’t it that Prince William and the commoner Kate would plan their wedding for Beltane, the spring fertility celebration? I scanned the internet schizophrenic conspiracy theory sites for what the spin on this might be and was justly rewarded.

There are too many kings in England, too many kings. Someone has to be sacrificed but who? Were Charles, the Prince of Wales, to sacrifice his son in order to become king it would be too reminiscent of God the Father sacrificing his son Jesus to remain God and of Odin sacrificing his son Baldr to remain God. When a God, or a King, sacrifices his son he ceases his act of Creation for he has instead turned onto a path of Destroying and as both legends have it, the unmaking finds it’s climax in the Pox Eclipse or Ragnorak, respectively. So we really don’t want Prince Charles to join in the unmaking. Still I was worried all night as I sat glued to the television that Prince William was going to suddenly have a dark, red hole in his forehead. It’s not good when the son sacrifices the father in order to become king either, as was so adeptly pointed out by Oedipus.

Perhaps it’s just best for Prince Charles to remain the Green Man and keep scaring the Bible thumpers. Let’s encourage him to not engage in any sacrificing. He’s had a hard enough time with his public relations over the years.

Some sacrifice was going to have to be made, however, if the ritual was to be successful.

Let’s do some sleuthing – what was the intent of the ritual? Oh several things:

1) Not of most importance but most obviously, the young royal had to be spiritually and legally wed to his girlfriend in order to make a legitimate heir to the throne.

2) She had to be hollowed out of all personal ambition and transformed from a commoner into a royal whose only ambition is to serve England. This is why Prince William was made the Duke of Cambridge, to create the legitimization of Kate being transformed from plain ole Kate to Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge. Kate could not become a Princess because all Princes and Princesses have to be directly related to the reigning monarch. She’s not. The one exception is Prince Charles who is the Prince OF Wales. That place name is very important. As next in line for the throne he automatically has the moniker Prince of Wales which is why Diana, who was not directly descended from the Queen, could be the Princess OF Wales, because she was married to the Prince OF Wales. When the Queen dies, if Prince Charles is made king then Will and Kate will become the Prince and Princess OF Wales. Until then, however, she needed a title so she could be hurled into the weird occult world of royalty. We can’t be having any unstained peasants witnessing the blood drinking and Satan worshipping that we all know the royal families are into.

3) The May Queen and the Horned God had to have wild and crazy monkey love on Beltane to insure the prosperity of the Commonwealth. In addition, the rest of the country had to go out into the fields and have wild and crazy monkey love as well. Get them all drunk at faux weddings all over the world and the entire Commonwealth will be spilling their seed everywhere. It’s probably the only way to get the English laid. Tea and crumpets just aren’t sexy.

4) And this is just a suspicion but…. I think there is a substantial population that would rather see Prince William ascend to the throne than Prince Charles. If that’s the case then some BIG MAGIC would have to be performed to break the pattern of primogeniture. Prince William has served in the Army, the Air Force and the Navy for Britain. He has proven himself to be a good warrior and was even allowed to see active duty in Afghanistan under the nickname Willy the Fish, though his active duty only amounted to picking up a fallen soldier there and bringing him home. As a trained officer in all the branches of the military, youthful, fit and obviously not mentally impaired or socially awkward, he just might modernize the monarchy enough that it can be trusted with the Ministry of Defense or some other official government office. At least that’s what I would like to see. Stealing the throne from Charles might not be such a good move, though, perhaps he should serve a little while as king and then abdicate to Will, if that damnable Queen would ever die…. Weird old witch that she is. The two of them – the Queen and her consort the Duke of Edinburgh – with their alchemy are going to live FOR – EVAH

So that’s a lot of magic. We’re going to make a soulless, egoless vehicle out of that pretty, skinny, flatchested girl. We’re going to pump her full of “rule by divine right” babies and make her spit them out like marbles. We’re going to ensure the prosperity of the Commonwealth, and we’re going to try like hell to get William on the throne before the year 2050.

We’ll need a sacrifice for that much magic, a big one. So the finger of God came down and scrambled up the southeastern United States and picked off a few Tea Partiers, what was the total? Somewhere near 300? It drew some attention but not much, as sad as that is. Had 300 Celts been sacrificed 1200 years ago that would have made quite an impact.

Then the shuttle was planned to go up, and oh there were many layers of power in that sacrifice were it to go down. Representative Gabby Giffords? The gal from Tucson here in Arizona that got shot in the head? Her husband was scheduled to be on that flight. The nation would have been riveted had he been sacrificed just as she’s coming out of the dark from her wound. But President Obama to the rescue – “We’re not going to sacrifice our billion dollar machine and the lives of our astronauts so you lizards can play at king and queen over there. I have enough trouble with my own tea party over here, keep yours out of NASA, I don’t care if you do think that all our base are belonging to you.”

So they found out where the gremlins were in the shuttle and cancelled the launch Friday AND Monday. So what to do? Who to sacrifice?

I know, we say collectively, let’s kill that motherfucker Bin Laden, he’s a king in his own right, he has big mojo! We’ll give him a triple death – We’ll shoot him in the head, gut him and drown him.

And that’s exactly what we did.

And in the United States people were partying in the streets. That’s one way to get us to celebrate May Day!

Happy Beltane Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, may you live long and prosper.

The Sunne in Splendour
A War of the Roses Novel by Sharon Kay Penman
Reviewed by the Anachronistic Antiquarian

Historical novels are one of our many resources for anachronistic information in the SCA since most historical novels are anachronistic. Sharon Kay Penman, however, gets a pretty good review by more serious folks and still manages to tell a good tale, so the history buffs among us will also be satisfied by her work.

The War of the Roses is a particularly violent and interesting time but also full of romance and mythology. Though Amazon describes the book as being about Richard III of Shakespeare and Princes in the Tower fame, my experience as a reader was that it was primarily about Edward IV, the his older brother who took the throne of England from the Lancasters. Edward is more my type anyway, being tall and blonde and prone to excesses. His queen, Elizabeth Woodville, is treated fairly, neither glorified nor villainized, though her ties to witchcraft are mentioned, a part of the War of the Roses I find particularly amusing.

The novel opens with the boys’ pastoral life in York right on the cusp of what was to become seething ambition and unchecked vengefulness. They are treated fairly and compassionately in this rendition of the tale. Edward is forgiven his lustiness and love of good food and drink because really, if you were tall and blonde and gorgeous and could steal the throne of England not once, but twice, wouldn’t you be a bit of a lush too?

And Richard, the poor old hunchback of boring English classes and more boring plays isn’t portrayed as a hunchback at all, but just the runt of the litter with a very serious disposition and a tendency toward black and white thinking. Both love their wives and their children and their kingdom. Both are brave and smart and capable of garnering great loyalty from people.

The writing is very good and the descriptions of their homes, their clothes, their meals and the countryside around them are very rich. I love the late Medieval period, just as we were learning to print books, build towering cathedrals, draw in perspective and actually attribute cleanliness to health and longevity rather than to paganism and lasciviousness. Ms. Penman creates attractive, complex characters, dresses them beautifully, puts them astride thundering war horses, overcomes villainy and treachery and then sits us down for a great meal of mutton and ale in a breathless and exciting 936 pages that go down as easily as a horn of mead on May Day.

Every April Arizona celebrates what we call bike week. There is a big commercial event over on the east side of town called Cycle Fest. Custom bike builders and purveyors of accesories for your bike or your body create literally a small town. Over the years the bike bars and the dealerships have capitalized on this event and throw big parties with good bands and have vendors of their own.

Every year I buy a new black leather backpack/purse and stock up on groovy socks. We also buy four pairs of glasses, day and night for each of us and Scott usually buys something for the bike. We aren’t big spenders but we are reliable customers. We usually go to the Cycle Fest event twice over the course of the five days it’s set up so we eat and drink there as well.

This year, however, we looked into the weather report and it said it was going to be 100 degrees on Saturday so we decided we’d only go on opening day and stay home in our air conditioned house on Saturday and finish painting the dining room or something.

Scott took all of Wednesday off and I took half the day off. We rode out there, got in line at the ticket counter and started eavesdropping on what was going on with the customers ahead of us. This year they weren’t offering a one day pass, just the five day pass. It was going to cost us 80 dollars for us to go shopping. No concert. No special event. Just shopping. So Scott kind of lost his temper, argued with the poor cashier for a minute or two and then said “Good luck, you’re going to lose a lot of money this year.”

So with a weak economy their answer is to make it prohibitively expensive for us to get in to spend our money. It’s like everyone has lost their damned minds here in Arizona. When there’s not enough money to go around you have to really encourage people to spend, not gouge them at the damned gate! If you take our last dime just to get in we have nothing to spend at the vendors inside, who are also paying the promoters of the event! It’s just bad business.

But there’s a lot of bad business going on right about now. It’s all rather depressing when viewed as a big picture. The small picture for us though is a deeper commitment to spending the money we do have at local shops, including grocers and clothiers.

I am really kind of sad that this last quarter of our lives is going to be spent with so much disruption, bitterness and hardship. It just seems kind of unfair. But that’s just me whining. For all I know our kids are going to spend the last THREE quarters of their lives in disruption, bitterness and hardship.

I’ve been reticent to post because I honestly have had no idea what’s going on with me spiritually, politically or sexually and that’s what this blog is supposed to be about.

Recently, however, I seem to have experienced some clarity and a little bit of energy so I’ve taken some action and actually have something to report on.

I’m on a stringent diet for both health and weight loss purposes. I’m committing to fixing and finishing my paintings, furniture repair and doo dad refurbishment instead of spending my weekends sweeping, mopping and swabbing out toilets. I’m going to get out more, become a more active member of both the pagan and bike communities, and I think I’m going to lessen my obsession with politics.

I also desperately want to acquire a massage table. I think both Scott and I would be happier if we were taking turns giving each other full body massages (maybe with happy endings, eh?) in the evenings rather than plopped on our couch like a couple of slobs watching the liberal news.

I also spent a few weeks, yes! A FEW WEEKS writing an eight page rough draft of a piece on Eir for an anthology of essays someone named Galina Krasskova is putting together. I sent it off and haven’t heard back from her yet. I’m not pleased with it. In fact, I’m very uncomfortable with it, which is highly unusual for me. Being a Leo and a fairly gifted writer I usually just bang things out and smile upon myself with great approval and amazement. I haven’t heard back from her yet, so we’ll see what someone who doesn’t know jack shit about me thinks.

It really bothered me that I couldn’t write it fluidly. I felt a little dishonest but on close examination of the piece the only thing dishonest in it was a willingness to be naming things that I have no clue what their names actually are – things including feelings, opinions, other worldly entities, experiences and so on. I’ve been very unsure of even my own eyes and ears. Just this morning there was something small bouncing along the street on my way to work and I avoided it just in case it was alive, in this dimension or another. I’m experiencing that kind of doubt in reality every day lately and it serves as a mute button. How can I report on something if I have no idea what it is?

I was rewarded for that careful swerve on my commute by two little baby bunnies on the road as I pulled into work. Itty bitty things, frozen with fear as I zoomed toward them. The poor little things didn’t know I’d be turning into our parking lot before I got to them anyway so they did their bunny thing – FREEZE! They were backlit by the rising sun and just so sweet and cute that they made me smile.

It’s always good to start a Tuesday with a smile.

Scott and I went to an Eluveitie concert ten days or so ago and had an absolutely marvelous time. I was worried that I would be physically challenged because I had sprained my left ankle two nights before. If the place were to be too crowded that could pose a problem for me.

Luckily enough the Nile, which can hold six hundred people, was sparsely populated with a hundred fifty to two hundred. There was plenty of room for both my ankle and a mosh pit should people want to participate in that activity. The local bands were all done and Eluveitie would be on in fifteen minutes the gal at the door informed us.

We found a ledge to sit/stand on, got some bottled water and settled in for the show. Of course we were sitting there for maybe six minutes when I saw a very familiar set of dreads walk by.

“Brie?” I asked. She turned around –
“Oh my GOD! It’s you guys! This is so weird, just as we were coming in the door I turned to Andrew and said, ‘Vicky’s parents would probably love this band!’ and here you are!”

“And I love this band” I said smiling. Brie was a friend of Vicky’s in Junior High School.

The band started and I was unhappy with the mixing for the first two or three songs which were all pretty much straight metal anyway, not my favorite sound from Eluveitie. The female vocals and acoustic intruments – whistles, a violin, a hurdy gurdy and a mandolin like guitar – were not nearly loud enough and I missed the crystal clear quality I hear on my ipod. But after a few songs I grew used to it and wandered around from corner to corner in the hall to discern if maybe the mixing was better in other spots. It was but not enough to forsake my seat on the ledge so I returned to the wall and hung out for most of the rest of the show. Toward the end we moved right up to the stage and Scott took some video that I’ll try to embed here.

We rocked out the whole night and just loved every minute of it. The only regret I have is that I missed Finntroll about a week earlier.

We’re hosting a feast Saturday night and we should draw between ten and twelve people. We’ll be eating around ten-thirty or so to accommodate the restaurant workers in the family so they don’t always have to lose a lucrative Saturday night for feasting.

I hope to do a standing rib roast, some twice baked potatoes, herb breads and some baked apples. The last time we did a huge hunk of meat we didn’t put any plates or forks on the table and everyone just ate with their knives, Barbarian style. We did have bowls and spoons for a cauliflower soup I made but it was totally gross, virtually unpalatable, so I’m not bothering with soup this time. If I get a good deal on the roast I might also indulge in some sea scallops, and saute them wrapped in bacon and leeks.

I read a blog entry on my favorite site El Haz Ablaze that raised a good question. Why do we only revere our ancestors from a thousand years ago when we certainly had ancestors in every century since then? Of course I felt a little shamed by this because I do so dearly love to play Viking and it really is nerdy and hokey no matter how much money I spend on a standing rib roast…

But it got me thinkin`……

Why am I attracted to these robust parties I throw and what is the basic theme?

I like the Equinoxes, Solstices and Cross Quarter Days because they keep me rooted in the cycles of the earth. Just two nights ago we were watching live reporting of the protests in Egypt and their real time was 5:45 AM. The violence was apparently going to continue until dawn. Scott said to me, the sun won’t come up until after seven and I was able to correct him by saying that they were closer to the Topic of Capricorn and the sun was slowly crawling up from there so their sunrise would be earlier than ours by about a half hour.

Now it’s just scary that I know that, but between astrology and earth based celebrations I have learned an awful lot about how our planet moves through the sky, how it tilts and twirls and what effect that has on people. As recently as a hundred years ago my grandparents were more subject to harvest bounty and midwinter frugality than I am today. If I have an appetite I can walk into a Sunflower Gorcery and for a pittance pick up a rotisserie chicken and eat myself sick no matter what time of day or what day of the year.

But my ancestors? They weren’t necessarily afforded such luxuries. My current relations are incredibly adept at acquiring fortunes so some of my ancestors were probably sitting pretty throughout the year but not all of them. There had to be a few like me who survived more on cunning and wit than wisdom and hard work. They may well have suffered some feast and famine episodes.

At this time of year in Northern Europe the stores would be getting a little low. There was grain put aside for both people and livestock but if it had been a lean year there wouldn’t be enough of it to feed them both. They’d slaughter an animal, eat the best cut fresh and then preserve the rest for what was left of winter. Feast and famine.

We don’t have markers for feast and famine in our lives anymore so we don’t have the psychological tools to deal with it. Our forebears experienced a lot of it on very basic levels so when other types of feast and famine occurred in their lives they knew not to run off half cocked with victory or to succumb to doom and gloom when times were spare.

Today we experience feast and famine in areas like relationships. We can go months, even years without a meaningful significant other and be whiney babies throughout the whole ordeal or be good stoics, cherish the friends and family we do have, cross our fingers and hope for the best.

Sometimes we have a job we don’t like but it’s not prudent to quit at the moment, again, stoicism might be a handy characteristic to have. We might not have the car we want, or a car at all and find riding the bus to be a bit humiliating.

Maybe there are no fun events to go to or there’s nothing on television we want to watch. These things sound silly but I really have seen people who slat around for want of something to do, some easy form of entertainment. Hel, I’ve probably done it myself.

So with this feast I want to mark the waning of winter and the return of the sun but also initiate a period of abstinence afterward. I want to celebrate what we do have and then pick something in which I over indulge and just tone it down until the Spring Equinox. I will be suggesting this to our guests too. If you eat too much, drink too much, smoke too much, spend too much time on the computer or in front of the tube, if you find yourself being a glutton for sex or shopping or even sleeping, well cut it out! Be spare. Be an ascetic. Put yourself into hard times for a month. Train yourself to keep your spirits up, to creatively problem solve to get your needs met without that activity or substance. Look at it as preparation for sacrifice to a greater good.

One day you might have to. It would be good if you knew how to do it with some grace.