home again, safely

[[Note: This was written yesterday around 2:50pm. Since then, LJ has either been completely unresponsive or my computer has hung, preventing me from posting it until now.]]

Had a mostly uneventful trip home, with only one hiccough. When I checked in at Pittsburgh, my bag weighed 79 pounds (I have no idea how that compares to when I went out, because they didn't actually weigh my bag at Schiphol), which is 29 pounds over the limit. But that wasn't really a problem because I'd double-checked Delta's baggage allowances before leaving, and knew that in this situation, I could just pull the bag of books out of the bigger bag and check both separately, without having to pay any more. So I did just that (grabbing a few chemises to stick in with the books to keep them from sloshing around quite so much). The bag of books was 32 pounds by itself; the lady made a comment about how heavy it was when she loaded it up onto the conveyor belt and I told her it was all books. The other bag then weighed about 46 pounds, and before she lifted that one, she said "I hope these aren't books, too" -- as if 46 pounds of books would weigh more than 46 pounds of other stuff! Strange.

I had only 35 minutes to make my connecting flight at Cincinnnati as scheduled, but we ended up getting in about 15 minutes early, so I made it to my gate 10 minutes before boarding even started. The flight was again not particularly full, so I got a window seat with an empty seat next to me so I was able to curl up on both seats, with two pillows and two blankets, and sleep a bit.

We landed about 45 minutes early, which I thought would be nice because then I'd get home sooner, but it turned out not to be. I waited at the baggage belt for my two bags and was happy to see the green one with all the books in it show up after not too long, but I waited until the bitter end and the black bag never arrived. So I dug out my baggage claim ticket, went over to the service counter and started the lost baggage claim process. To be honest, I wasn't too bothered. I figure that it probably just missed the connection in Cincinnati, and if one of my bags was to go astray, I'm sure glad it wasn't the bag with the books. And since this was the end of the journey, not the beginning, there wasn't really anything in the black bag that I couldn't wait a few days to get. This morning the airline called and said they found it and would be delivering it between 1:00 and 4:30 today, so it all turned out OK. And honestly, given how much I travel, I was bound to get a lost bag at some point; this is the first lost luggage I've ever had.

Finally made it home around noon (I just missed a bus from the central station, so had to wait 15 minutes for the next one), and then spent the afternoon sleeping while Joel went out to the office. The tickets I'd gotten for the Crüxshadows concert last night were actually for the entire day of the Summer Darkness festival that the concert was a part of, which started at 4:00, so when Joel came home a little after 5:00 we decided to head out to Utrecht right away, find some place to eat, and then head over to Tivoli earlier and see if any of the preceding bands were any good.

I've always had a little bit of a soft spot for the goth fashion style, and when I need to I can turn myself into someone who looks appropriate for at least the fringes of that scene. When I was 16 I got a pattern for a long sleeved long-lengthed sheath dress (the sort of thing that a woman in her 40s or 50s would wear to dress up nicely), for which I bought black stretch velvet and cut the length down to about eight inches above my knee. My poor parents. I don't know what they ever did with me growing up. I could visibly see my mom a number of times not making a comment about the dress. I only wear it occasionally, but it came with me to Amsterdam, so out it came, along with my two-toned pinkish/purple striped tights, my Paris boots, the pewter heart choker I got from Grandma Friedemann years ago, and the make-up. I've had the same make-up kit since, oh, I was 14? The mascara is getting a bit clumpy but it still does what I need it to do, and the rate I go through deep pinkish/purplish lipstick and purple eyeshadow is pretty low. (I think this is maybe the second time I've put make-up on since moving here). And then the hair goes up in two poney-tails. :)

We stopped at a restaurant that was on the way to the venue, a place we'd never been before but had a lot of yummy-looking things on the menu, including antelope in a cinnamon pear sauce! I had lamb dopiaza, which came with rice and a marinated/sauteed vegetable salad, and Joel had a fish trio (salmon, tuna, and butterfish) in a rosemary sauce, with the same type of salad, and then we also got a portion of fries. It was absolutely excellent food, and altogether (that, plus two glasses of wine) cost us under 40EUR. We were really impressed and will definitely go back there in the future; the place is within walking distance of the central station so I'm sure we'll be able to find it again.

We arrived at Tivoli about three songs before the end of the previous set (Tyske Ludder), which was a bit on the shouty-side for my taste. But the Crüxshadows set was great. I love their concerts, though I was disappointed that they didn't end with "Marilyn, My Bitterness", like they usually do! It's such a good song to end on. I was also surprised at how many of the songs in the set I didn't recognize -- guess it's time to go see again what albums/singles I'm missing! We did go across the canal to the Trianon and picked up the new single, "Quicksilver", and also the new re-issue of "Night Crawls In". Afterwards we did go back in to hear the start of the next group, Covenant, since a couple of people had told us they were really good, but we didn't stay too much longer; it was after 11pm, and suddenly I got really tired, and my feet hurt, and they also started using strobe lights in some of their songs, which I simply cannot stand, so we left. We got home a little after midnight, and I ended up sleeping until nearly 1:30, oops. Joel's now out at the office working, but when he leaves I'll get the pizza started and we'll be back on our normal, regular routine.

Next on the list: Raglan!

[[EDIT: The courier arrived with my bag around 3:15 yesterday, so that's all good.]

Pennsic photos

They're finally all uploaded. Some of them are from Herald's Point (where I spent ~14 hours every day), some of them are from the field battle (I watched just enough to see my first "whomphf", and was lucky enough to be right in front of the Drachenwald contingent so I got some pictures of them), but most of them are from the three hour tour of site that Olwynn, Istvan, and I took, looking for good examples of heraldic display. You'll see lots, along with some pretty cool tents, and other living structures. I also took some shots looking down from Mount Eislinn to try to give an idea of the scale of things.

more Pennsic photos

math5 just emailed me some of the photos she took of the roadshow on Monday, of which this one is my favorite:



We all look so serious and ready for business and it's so incongruous with our wonderful crowns.