What I did last weekend...
Mar. 20th, 2007 04:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pensnestThe weekend started...
...actually, I suppose it probably started *months* ago, when![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
nopseud and I said to each other, we should do a Sparkly Con here in the UK. But all that is lost in the mists of time, and most of you have watched the progress from thought to booking to signups to SQUEEEEEEEEE!
So. The weekend started on Friday morning, when I got up and printed off the last couple of stories to take along with me. I took my Boy to his Physics lesson (normally he walks to school, but these lessons are in a different school) and went to Tescos for the final Shopping Session. Grinned all the way home, got a phone call fromturloughishere to confirm what time she'd get to the railway station, and packed the car. And packed the car. And packed... I have a large car. It's a Volvo estate. It was *full*. Off to St Albans railway station, on with the tiara, and there was Turlough, yay! so we shuffled some of the stuff in the car a bit, and crammed her single, smallish suitcase in, and off we went, rejoicing in the lovely bright sunny day.
We jabbered on as popslashers generally do, about favourite stories and piccies and what not, which always makes for a Jolly Good Car Journey. Got a mite off-track around Birmingham, when I didn't quite trust the directions I'd got, and ended up a little too far north on the M42. So we stopped for a sandwich and consulted the map, and found a much better route to Ludlow.
The last, oh, half hour of the journey? So pretty! So hilly! Shropshire is very nearly Wales, and a lot wilder than my home territory. Our instructions for finding the cottage turned out to be exactly what was needed, it looked simple and it was, and with great excitement we eventually turned right into a narrow gravelled driveway, past the 'Holiday Let' label, and parked ourselves by the front door. I rejoiced for a moment in the wonderful view - the cottage is high on a hillside, and we had the drop of valley, and splendid hill, covered in patchwork fields. I'd had the entry code (instead of a key) and to my joy, it worked without the slightest difficulty. And we were in.
I am quite certain that I did the Dance of Joy more or less constantly as we looked round at ground floor level. The place was BEAUTIFUL. From the hall: straight up, one of what turned out to be three staircases. To our right, the dining room, a huge table with pretty painted chairs, pale blue wallpaper with a vine-like pattern, large pieces of old wooden furniture (including two small thrones) and even a piano. And chandelier. To our left, the lounge, with mighty inglenook fireplace, and an array of comfortable chairs and sofas. Thence, a door to the pool room, containing pool table, bookshelf, and giant jenga. A little bit further, the mighty kitchen, an Aga, a range cooker, loads of cupboard space, giant fridge-freezer, and another huge table (with three cakes on it for us).
Turlough and I unloaded the mighty mountain of stuff, mostly food, and found places for it all. Then we dashed about the house admiring. The bedrooms - eight, plus a 'playroom' with convertible bed-settee - were all simply and attractively decorated, with plain, nice bedlinens and lots of handsome wooden beams in evidence. I hadn't printed off the room assignments (sigh - neither had I brought my camera) but put the floor plan onto my big sparkly noticeboard in the entrance hall, and hoped everyone would remember which room they had been assigned. Then we had a nice cup of tea, andturps33 arrived, with her menfolk and ninjetti75. More squee, and more dancing with joy.
I thinkurbanoceanix was the next to get there, and simply_fly_away and _ducks and trumpeterofdoom somewhat after 6pm. There was a holdup with the mighty contingent from Stansted, but eventually they arrived, and there was much more squee, and random hugging, and complete inability to remember names.
So I forced them all (exceptnopseud, who ran away) to play Red Ball - the passing of an imaginary (and thus easily catchable) red ball from one named person to another. It helps a bit with the learning of names. And we had the first serious eating session, and people contributed their snack offerings to the little trolley we'd found - which was, basically, overloaded with sugar. There was some fruit, and there were wholesome items like nuts and granola bars, but there were also many, many Pixie Stix, and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups (actually I'm not sure these even got as far as the trolley!) and chocolate, and chocolate biscuits, and cakes... JJ, the caretaker, showed up a couple of times to instruct us in the use of the hot tub, and a couple of other things. There were brief hiccups with the bedroom arrangements, but everyone was soon sorted out.
It is so much fun watching footage with other fans. You all sigh, and laugh, and shriek etc at the same time, and the experience is wonderfully magnified. I can't even remember what we watched! I don't know when the majority crawled up to bed, I gave up quite early on, one-ish, or two-ish, I think...
Breakfast was a more flexible feast, eaten in the kitchen. There was, happily, an 8-litre urn for the boiling of water, which had to be filled up about four times a day, and people began showing up at around eight, I think. (Should have kept a CS diary!) The lurid Pink Book containing the Add Three Words story now held about a paragraph of tentative story; I am proud to have introduced the first hint of naughtiness.
We had a Programme, and actually did manage to start with some discussion, not exactly moderated, but good fun, about, um, plot bunnies, and what people wanted to read but not write, and sorta moved on along into the Canon discussion. Perhaps we could have spent a bit more time on that, as it's a great topic, but the weekend moved in fairly organic ways so we weren't formal about our discussions. A few people went into Ludlow, to investigate the market and have a look around, the rest of us continued with squee.
We used the pool room for Swaps - vast quantities of cards and odd little items were laid out for people to take what they wanted. I was charmed to find good homes for my painted mugs - at last! And it was very splendid to see people get themselves into the hot tub. Which had sparkly colour-changing lights, and a CD player, so that Nsync and Backstreet and JC boomed out happily, augmenting the party atmosphere quite a lot.
At some point we ate stuff, and watched more footage.trumpeterofdoom had prepared a PowerPoint presentation on the Joy of Crossovers! Some of us hid in the kitchen while the rest watched the Cartercest movie, because really, once is more than enough. We could pretty much tell from the squeals exactly which moment of wrongness had been reached! The cottage was big enough for there to be different things going on quite happily in different rooms, and the walls were obviously thick as there really wasn't any difficulty with noise getting across. It's great to have a kitchen with a nice big table, as of course it was the location for lots of conversation, from complete crack to intense discussion, whenever anyone wandered in for more coffee or Coke or pixie stix. I was photographed with a box of cream-filled willies, though alas, the camera battery was too low for the picture of trumpeterofdoom sucking one to be taken. There was some alcohol - JJ gave us two bottles of rather nice fizz, and there was some vodka about the place, and a bottle of Jack Daniels, and a collection of tiny plum liqueurs, and a big pink bottle that looked like bath bubbles but was something alcoholic called, brilliantly, 'NLuv', but really, we didn't drink that much alcohol. Wasn't necessary!
And the 'add five words' story in the Pink Book was making good progress by this time. Heh. I can't quite remember on which daynopseud made a serious attempt to BREAK EVERYBODY'S BRAIN. If you have not yet read the story, it is right here, and from it you can see clearly both the level of pixie stix consumption and the lateness of the hour. We finished the thing late, very late, on Sunday night, and had a ceremonial reading, by me, to all those with the stamina to be up at that stage. Followed by our tribute to JuC Day, a reading (by ninjetti75, who did a fine job) of 'Kicks', the author having gone to bed by that time. Most enjoyable.
But I am getting ahead of myself. Sunday morning was Brunch, the biggest cooking effort of the weekend, with sausages in the Aga, and bacon and baked beans and mushrooms and scrambled eggs and fried eggs being cooked on the stovetop.nopseud and I were both too scared to use the heating plates on the Aga for anything, but as the stove had eight gas rings, this really didn't matter much. The Death Cake was unleashed as well, a mixture of chocolate, sugar, sugar, chocolate, and sugar. Yum. Because we all needed more sugar at that point. Koff.
We had to say goodbye tobubbleforest and ephemera_pop after brunch, and to archie_gremlin who was driving them back to Stansted Airport. Sniff. The original plan had been to go to the pub that evening, but we had a massive store of pizzas and stuff, so abandoned the plan and stayed put. It started snowing at some point on Sunday, piffling little flakes at first, but later making a serious effort; this did not deter the hardier among us from the pleasures of the hot tub, and as a reward they were served pizza and fries as they bubbled.
Eventually, alas, all good things must end. Monday morning saw my brother driving several of the Stansted contingent away before I'd even achieved consciousness; people gradually disappeared in various groups. I managed to squeeze three extra passengers and their luggage into my car for the return journey, along with a couple of boxes of Stuff (I have the remaining paper Nsync napkins, and such swappage as was not claimed, ready for the next major sparkly gathering, wherever it may be) and whatever provisions remained. Yes, most of what I carried to Camp Sparkle was food, and most of it was eaten. So we said not-quite-tearful goodbyes, and there was much hugging, and I set off withturloughishere, ninjetti75, seiyaharris and saffronra in my car, en route to Heathrow Airport. It was bright and sunny, and the snow-covered landscape - for yes, there was Real Snow by this time - looked incredibly pretty as we set out. Then it snowed, and sunned, and hailed and sleeted and sunned again, good grief.
And we said goodbye at Heathrow, andturloughishere and I continued to my house. Where we both assuaged our LiveJournal cravings for a while; then after supper, we watched 'On the Line' together, for she had never seen it (what kind of a Lance fan has never watched 'On the Line'?!!!???), and agreed that though it is (a) adorable, and (b) bad fanfic, it would plainly have been a Huge Success had it been cast with Chris as the wacky friend and JC as the arty friend, Justin as Kevin, and Lance as the villainous reporter. Then we collapsed into sleep.
We spent this morning talking popslash, and I took her along to Heathrow. She should be home by now, and I must return to the real world and prepare myself for a dialogue rehearsal of HMS Pinafore tonight. Sniff.
But oh. Camp Sparkle! Guys, it was so much fun. I wish I could have spent more time talking to those of you I didn't really talk to, hell, I wish I could have spent more time with those of you I *did* talk to! It was great to get together in a big happy smooshy group like that, and be cracked and fannish and serious and silly and carefree for such a lovely time in our amazing cottage. So many laughs.
Same again next year?
...actually, I suppose it probably started *months* ago, when
nopseud and I said to each other, we should do a Sparkly Con here in the UK. But all that is lost in the mists of time, and most of you have watched the progress from thought to booking to signups to SQUEEEEEEEEE!So. The weekend started on Friday morning, when I got up and printed off the last couple of stories to take along with me. I took my Boy to his Physics lesson (normally he walks to school, but these lessons are in a different school) and went to Tescos for the final Shopping Session. Grinned all the way home, got a phone call from
turloughishere to confirm what time she'd get to the railway station, and packed the car. And packed the car. And packed... I have a large car. It's a Volvo estate. It was *full*. Off to St Albans railway station, on with the tiara, and there was Turlough, yay! so we shuffled some of the stuff in the car a bit, and crammed her single, smallish suitcase in, and off we went, rejoicing in the lovely bright sunny day.We jabbered on as popslashers generally do, about favourite stories and piccies and what not, which always makes for a Jolly Good Car Journey. Got a mite off-track around Birmingham, when I didn't quite trust the directions I'd got, and ended up a little too far north on the M42. So we stopped for a sandwich and consulted the map, and found a much better route to Ludlow.
The last, oh, half hour of the journey? So pretty! So hilly! Shropshire is very nearly Wales, and a lot wilder than my home territory. Our instructions for finding the cottage turned out to be exactly what was needed, it looked simple and it was, and with great excitement we eventually turned right into a narrow gravelled driveway, past the 'Holiday Let' label, and parked ourselves by the front door. I rejoiced for a moment in the wonderful view - the cottage is high on a hillside, and we had the drop of valley, and splendid hill, covered in patchwork fields. I'd had the entry code (instead of a key) and to my joy, it worked without the slightest difficulty. And we were in.
I am quite certain that I did the Dance of Joy more or less constantly as we looked round at ground floor level. The place was BEAUTIFUL. From the hall: straight up, one of what turned out to be three staircases. To our right, the dining room, a huge table with pretty painted chairs, pale blue wallpaper with a vine-like pattern, large pieces of old wooden furniture (including two small thrones) and even a piano. And chandelier. To our left, the lounge, with mighty inglenook fireplace, and an array of comfortable chairs and sofas. Thence, a door to the pool room, containing pool table, bookshelf, and giant jenga. A little bit further, the mighty kitchen, an Aga, a range cooker, loads of cupboard space, giant fridge-freezer, and another huge table (with three cakes on it for us).
Turlough and I unloaded the mighty mountain of stuff, mostly food, and found places for it all. Then we dashed about the house admiring. The bedrooms - eight, plus a 'playroom' with convertible bed-settee - were all simply and attractively decorated, with plain, nice bedlinens and lots of handsome wooden beams in evidence. I hadn't printed off the room assignments (sigh - neither had I brought my camera) but put the floor plan onto my big sparkly noticeboard in the entrance hall, and hoped everyone would remember which room they had been assigned. Then we had a nice cup of tea, and
turps33 arrived, with her menfolk and ninjetti75. More squee, and more dancing with joy. I think
urbanoceanix was the next to get there, and simply_fly_away and _ducks and trumpeterofdoom somewhat after 6pm. There was a holdup with the mighty contingent from Stansted, but eventually they arrived, and there was much more squee, and random hugging, and complete inability to remember names.So I forced them all (except
nopseud, who ran away) to play Red Ball - the passing of an imaginary (and thus easily catchable) red ball from one named person to another. It helps a bit with the learning of names. And we had the first serious eating session, and people contributed their snack offerings to the little trolley we'd found - which was, basically, overloaded with sugar. There was some fruit, and there were wholesome items like nuts and granola bars, but there were also many, many Pixie Stix, and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups (actually I'm not sure these even got as far as the trolley!) and chocolate, and chocolate biscuits, and cakes... JJ, the caretaker, showed up a couple of times to instruct us in the use of the hot tub, and a couple of other things. There were brief hiccups with the bedroom arrangements, but everyone was soon sorted out.It is so much fun watching footage with other fans. You all sigh, and laugh, and shriek etc at the same time, and the experience is wonderfully magnified. I can't even remember what we watched! I don't know when the majority crawled up to bed, I gave up quite early on, one-ish, or two-ish, I think...
Breakfast was a more flexible feast, eaten in the kitchen. There was, happily, an 8-litre urn for the boiling of water, which had to be filled up about four times a day, and people began showing up at around eight, I think. (Should have kept a CS diary!) The lurid Pink Book containing the Add Three Words story now held about a paragraph of tentative story; I am proud to have introduced the first hint of naughtiness.
We had a Programme, and actually did manage to start with some discussion, not exactly moderated, but good fun, about, um, plot bunnies, and what people wanted to read but not write, and sorta moved on along into the Canon discussion. Perhaps we could have spent a bit more time on that, as it's a great topic, but the weekend moved in fairly organic ways so we weren't formal about our discussions. A few people went into Ludlow, to investigate the market and have a look around, the rest of us continued with squee.
We used the pool room for Swaps - vast quantities of cards and odd little items were laid out for people to take what they wanted. I was charmed to find good homes for my painted mugs - at last! And it was very splendid to see people get themselves into the hot tub. Which had sparkly colour-changing lights, and a CD player, so that Nsync and Backstreet and JC boomed out happily, augmenting the party atmosphere quite a lot.
At some point we ate stuff, and watched more footage.
trumpeterofdoom had prepared a PowerPoint presentation on the Joy of Crossovers! Some of us hid in the kitchen while the rest watched the Cartercest movie, because really, once is trumpeterofdoom sucking one to be taken. There was some alcohol - JJ gave us two bottles of rather nice fizz, and there was some vodka about the place, and a bottle of Jack Daniels, and a collection of tiny plum liqueurs, and a big pink bottle that looked like bath bubbles but was something alcoholic called, brilliantly, 'NLuv', but really, we didn't drink that much alcohol. Wasn't necessary!And the 'add five words' story in the Pink Book was making good progress by this time. Heh. I can't quite remember on which day
nopseud made a serious attempt to BREAK EVERYBODY'S BRAIN. If you have not yet read the story, it is right here, and from it you can see clearly both the level of pixie stix consumption and the lateness of the hour. We finished the thing late, very late, on Sunday night, and had a ceremonial reading, by me, to all those with the stamina to be up at that stage. Followed by our tribute to JuC Day, a reading (by ninjetti75, who did a fine job) of 'Kicks', the author having gone to bed by that time. Most enjoyable.But I am getting ahead of myself. Sunday morning was Brunch, the biggest cooking effort of the weekend, with sausages in the Aga, and bacon and baked beans and mushrooms and scrambled eggs and fried eggs being cooked on the stovetop.
nopseud and I were both too scared to use the heating plates on the Aga for anything, but as the stove had eight gas rings, this really didn't matter much. The Death Cake was unleashed as well, a mixture of chocolate, sugar, sugar, chocolate, and sugar. Yum. Because we all needed more sugar at that point. Koff.We had to say goodbye to
bubbleforest and ephemera_pop after brunch, and to archie_gremlin who was driving them back to Stansted Airport. Sniff. The original plan had been to go to the pub that evening, but we had a massive store of pizzas and stuff, so abandoned the plan and stayed put. It started snowing at some point on Sunday, piffling little flakes at first, but later making a serious effort; this did not deter the hardier among us from the pleasures of the hot tub, and as a reward they were served pizza and fries as they bubbled.Eventually, alas, all good things must end. Monday morning saw my brother driving several of the Stansted contingent away before I'd even achieved consciousness; people gradually disappeared in various groups. I managed to squeeze three extra passengers and their luggage into my car for the return journey, along with a couple of boxes of Stuff (I have the remaining paper Nsync napkins, and such swappage as was not claimed, ready for the next major sparkly gathering, wherever it may be) and whatever provisions remained. Yes, most of what I carried to Camp Sparkle was food, and most of it was eaten. So we said not-quite-tearful goodbyes, and there was much hugging, and I set off with
turloughishere, ninjetti75, seiyaharris and saffronra in my car, en route to Heathrow Airport. It was bright and sunny, and the snow-covered landscape - for yes, there was Real Snow by this time - looked incredibly pretty as we set out. Then it snowed, and sunned, and hailed and sleeted and sunned again, good grief.And we said goodbye at Heathrow, and
turloughishere and I continued to my house. Where we both assuaged our LiveJournal cravings for a while; then after supper, we watched 'On the Line' together, for she had never seen it (what kind of a Lance fan has never watched 'On the Line'?!!!???), and agreed that though it is (a) adorable, and (b) bad fanfic, it would plainly have been a Huge Success had it been cast with Chris as the wacky friend and JC as the arty friend, Justin as Kevin, and Lance as the villainous reporter. Then we collapsed into sleep.We spent this morning talking popslash, and I took her along to Heathrow. She should be home by now, and I must return to the real world and prepare myself for a dialogue rehearsal of HMS Pinafore tonight. Sniff.
But oh. Camp Sparkle! Guys, it was so much fun. I wish I could have spent more time talking to those of you I didn't really talk to, hell, I wish I could have spent more time with those of you I *did* talk to! It was great to get together in a big happy smooshy group like that, and be cracked and fannish and serious and silly and carefree for such a lovely time in our amazing cottage. So many laughs.
Same again next year?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-03-20 08:39 pm (UTC)And there will be Sparkly Cluedo, and perhaps a wacky writing game, and The Lava Lamp Story shall be read aloud (perhaps early on, as I'm sure the Sequel to The Story (does it even need another title, at this point?) will ALSO prove even crackier than poor Lamp's origin.
Y'know, that fact amuses me rather greatly...
no subject
Date: 2007-03-21 03:52 pm (UTC)