The House of Cheerful Monkeys

Posted Monday to my kingdom's e-list: 

"Risen yeast is cast
Into the purest waters
Pearls of rice entombed
Ten days in darkness dwelling
Strain jollity for one's cup.

Take your ease, o friend,
Among bright lanterns and taste
Nihon's true delights.
In harmony we gather
To celebrate the harvest.

In the spirit of harmony, this person humbly wishes to invite you to
the House Of Cheerful Monkeys for a sake tasting on Saturday evening
of Mists Coronet. Green tea will also be served to those who prefer
not to imbibe. Poets and tellers of tales most welcome!"

( Backstory )

( Party planning bits )

Why The House of Cheerful Monkeys? Well, I figured if the name had monkeys in it, folks would know it was me.  I also have a lovely hanging scroll with a mother and baby snow monkey that will be displayed.
Cheerful Monkeys will also be open to entertain guests Friday night of Great Western War and quite possibly at Estrella if it proves workable.

This is being posted while I am letting my fingers recover from punching holes for the hiogi. I've got about half the slats pierced at this point. Again, this project is going into the A & S competition as part of my obligation to educate His Highness and His Subjects about the arts and culture of Japan. 
EDIT: Holes are punched. My fingers feel like hamburger. May try to lace it together in a bit. Need to do some sanding, but I appear to be out of sandpaper and don't feel like diving out to the store right now to get some because I'm still a bit beat from the ECW trip yesterday. 

Oh, good!

Gentle readers, you may recall a binge of shopping in San Francisco to fulfill some giri about a week ago. I just got an email from Solveig-hime letting me know that her "care package" had arrived, complete with multiple thank yous and lots of exclamation points. (I now have this rather disturbing image of a middle aged math professor in pigtails and a schoolgirl uniform jumping up and down and squeaking.)

When I think back on the fact that this woman has driven me up the wall via e-lists for a solid four years now, it still pleases me that I was able to do this for her. She has this intensely frustrating habit of being unable to see the forest for the incredibly interesting drop of dew on the underside of this leaf right here, which makes electronic communication with her crazy-making. Then I met her and while she's still difficult to get a straight answer out of, all the assurances from friends that she was a lot easier to take in person came true. After all, I was raised by a flaky, absent-minded, disorganized academic....

I just hope the hat in the oversized box makes it to its destination in Colorado without misadventure.