gurdymonkey (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
gurdymonkey) wrote2007-05-20 06:41 pm
gurdymonkey) wrote2007-05-20 06:41 pm
Making Noise at Maker Faire
if you expect 20,000+ people to show up at an event and you have three gates in your parking lot, why is only one of them open to take money for parking at 9:50 AM when the venue opens to the general public at 10:00 AM? I'm just askin', you know?
Having dropped a veil and hat on my head, I marched (if a bit swishily in cotehardie and turnshoes) to the main gate hauling two instrument cases and the Haversack Of Amplifier Camouflage. I relentlessly queue jumped to the front of the Will-Call ticket line to ask a man with a badge how exhibitors were supposed to get in at this point? I discover that Galen is standing there (in t shirt and jeans with armor bag) and nobody seems to have "SCA", "Society For Creative Anachronism," "Barony Of The Westermark," or "Westermark, The" on any official list. However, the Will Call Guy does actually know that there is an SCA tent, where it is and waves us through the gate when we produce valid Maker Faire tickets.
I cringed my way past this massive industrial smokestack thing that looks like they swiped it from one of the refineries on the Jersey Turnpike. Every so often the thing went "WHUMP!" and shot a gout of flame into the air. All day. All freaking day. There was also a giant automaton of a head which periodically stuck a finger into its massive nostrils. Tech, useless tech, weirdness, whimsy, and the occasional Thing That Works. I saw a disturbing number of people wearing tin foil on their heads. Art cars. Mento and cola fountains. A procession of giant cupcakes rolled past several times. The one with the Prozac "sprinkles" was just plain Wrong On Too Many Levels.
I stood on our corner and cranked. A lot. Alternately, I might pull out a pennywhistle and play that for a bit. Behind me various members of the Westermark were set up under a sun shade with spinning wheels, drop spindles, embroidery, armor bits, and so forth. I had a lovely tree on the corner, which I used to good effect in the hopes of attracting visitors to our corner of the fair. I am glad I had the amp. I had to compete with a Caltrain line, street noise, fair noise, amplified music. If the guy on the bike with the speakers mounted on either side of the rear wheels is not stone deaf by the time he's thirty, it'll be a miracle.
I engaged in a mutual geekfest with the hand-cranked toy guy. He had a barrel organ mounted on the hood of his pedal-powered "model T." Unlike my medieval "wheel violin," the crank operates a bellows and feeds a punched paper roll over a roller with pins in it, telling the organ what tune to produce.
I got lots of people who walked up and knew what a hurdy gurdy was. The general question level was intelligent, the people who asked about how they were made were not the sort to be dissuaded by the amount of tinkering a gurdy requires, and I was able to hand off a few copies of my list of links to builders, kit manufacturers, etc.
Their Highnesses of the Mists were there. Her Highness remembered me as having been in Japanese at Investiture and was very sweet and friendly. She gives me hope that the next six months will not be a complete disgrace after all. His Highness seemed completely unaware and uninterested in my presence and will probably continue to do so unless I ever lose my mind completely and decide to put on armor.
I didn't really explore the fair much, except two trips to the rest room and a disgusted and fruitless attempt to search for something to eat that wouldn't make me regret eating it. The healthiest thing I could find was a small cup of ice cream. Yes, really.
http://new.photos.yahoo.com/wodeford/album/576460762402145738
Other people's Maker Faire photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/makerfaire/?page=10
I cringed my way past this massive industrial smokestack thing that looks like they swiped it from one of the refineries on the Jersey Turnpike. Every so often the thing went "WHUMP!" and shot a gout of flame into the air. All day. All freaking day. There was also a giant automaton of a head which periodically stuck a finger into its massive nostrils. Tech, useless tech, weirdness, whimsy, and the occasional Thing That Works. I saw a disturbing number of people wearing tin foil on their heads. Art cars. Mento and cola fountains. A procession of giant cupcakes rolled past several times. The one with the Prozac "sprinkles" was just plain Wrong On Too Many Levels.
I stood on our corner and cranked. A lot. Alternately, I might pull out a pennywhistle and play that for a bit. Behind me various members of the Westermark were set up under a sun shade with spinning wheels, drop spindles, embroidery, armor bits, and so forth. I had a lovely tree on the corner, which I used to good effect in the hopes of attracting visitors to our corner of the fair. I am glad I had the amp. I had to compete with a Caltrain line, street noise, fair noise, amplified music. If the guy on the bike with the speakers mounted on either side of the rear wheels is not stone deaf by the time he's thirty, it'll be a miracle.
I engaged in a mutual geekfest with the hand-cranked toy guy. He had a barrel organ mounted on the hood of his pedal-powered "model T." Unlike my medieval "wheel violin," the crank operates a bellows and feeds a punched paper roll over a roller with pins in it, telling the organ what tune to produce.
I got lots of people who walked up and knew what a hurdy gurdy was. The general question level was intelligent, the people who asked about how they were made were not the sort to be dissuaded by the amount of tinkering a gurdy requires, and I was able to hand off a few copies of my list of links to builders, kit manufacturers, etc.
Their Highnesses of the Mists were there. Her Highness remembered me as having been in Japanese at Investiture and was very sweet and friendly. She gives me hope that the next six months will not be a complete disgrace after all. His Highness seemed completely unaware and uninterested in my presence and will probably continue to do so unless I ever lose my mind completely and decide to put on armor.
I didn't really explore the fair much, except two trips to the rest room and a disgusted and fruitless attempt to search for something to eat that wouldn't make me regret eating it. The healthiest thing I could find was a small cup of ice cream. Yes, really.
http://new.photos.yahoo.com/wodeford/album/576460762402145738
Other people's Maker Faire photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/makerfaire/?page=10
Zen and the art of knowing when to quit.
Despite having stayed up late to enjoy every last minute of the delightful "V for Vendetta" on cable last night, I got up early and struggled for the better part of an hour with my shibori kimono and purple satin obi in front of the mirror before giving it up as a bad idea in view of the fact that the satin kept slipping loose when I moved and that I'd woken up with my period. A shame, that kimono FITS and I have a 54" wingspan. I just need to find an obi that works with it more harmoniously.
Instead I put on my 16th century kit and drove down to Saratoga for the Hakone Matsuri (50 minutes in moderate Sunday morning traffic).
Because of the event organizers complete lack of clue, there is NO signage in Saratoga directing drivers to park at the high school and take a shuttle to the gardens. Instead, one must drive all the way through town, avoid causing a three car pileup on a winding road to make a left turn into the gardens' driveway where a jolly volly in an OSHA orange vest tells you to drive all the way back through town, hang a left at the light on Big Basin and drive until you see the high school on the right. At this point, you can stand in a very long line in the blazing spring sun. Ignoring the stares of onlookers, I threw my striped kosode over my head. After a solid half hour, a shuttle pulled up. Not a bus, a shuttle. Seating for maybe 20 people at a time. Another shuttle pulled up behind it - but did NOT pull to the curb so people could actually get on the thing until the first one pulled out. I calculated that there were at least two shuttles worth of people in line in front of me at the forty-five minute mark. I considered what the rest room situation at the top of the hill must be like, calculating additional load on the ladies' room given the number of families with small children observed at the shuttle stop. At the fifty minute mark with no sign of any other shuttles and fifty people still in front of me, I put my arms through my sleeves and cheerfully informed the man whose place in line I had held while he went searching for a rest room that I was going to spend my afternoon doing something a lot more Japanese. I drove back to Alameda, changed into jeans and a T-shirt, picked up some bento and ate it on the beach.
Despite having stayed up late to enjoy every last minute of the delightful "V for Vendetta" on cable last night, I got up early and struggled for the better part of an hour with my shibori kimono and purple satin obi in front of the mirror before giving it up as a bad idea in view of the fact that the satin kept slipping loose when I moved and that I'd woken up with my period. A shame, that kimono FITS and I have a 54" wingspan. I just need to find an obi that works with it more harmoniously.
Instead I put on my 16th century kit and drove down to Saratoga for the Hakone Matsuri (50 minutes in moderate Sunday morning traffic).
Because of the event organizers complete lack of clue, there is NO signage in Saratoga directing drivers to park at the high school and take a shuttle to the gardens. Instead, one must drive all the way through town, avoid causing a three car pileup on a winding road to make a left turn into the gardens' driveway where a jolly volly in an OSHA orange vest tells you to drive all the way back through town, hang a left at the light on Big Basin and drive until you see the high school on the right. At this point, you can stand in a very long line in the blazing spring sun. Ignoring the stares of onlookers, I threw my striped kosode over my head. After a solid half hour, a shuttle pulled up. Not a bus, a shuttle. Seating for maybe 20 people at a time. Another shuttle pulled up behind it - but did NOT pull to the curb so people could actually get on the thing until the first one pulled out. I calculated that there were at least two shuttles worth of people in line in front of me at the forty-five minute mark. I considered what the rest room situation at the top of the hill must be like, calculating additional load on the ladies' room given the number of families with small children observed at the shuttle stop. At the fifty minute mark with no sign of any other shuttles and fifty people still in front of me, I put my arms through my sleeves and cheerfully informed the man whose place in line I had held while he went searching for a rest room that I was going to spend my afternoon doing something a lot more Japanese. I drove back to Alameda, changed into jeans and a T-shirt, picked up some bento and ate it on the beach.
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