Yesterday was Festival of the Rose, the biannual celebration of the arts in honor of the Queen. It was a wonderful, relaxed day of performances, art displays and chatting with friends both new and old. There were not many people there from my immediate circle of friends, so I spent the day with people I normally don't get to spend a lot of time with. I chatted with Aoelwigg and Antionette, Allan, Inga, the Cleir and many others along the way. I even got to meet some new people (well, new to me) which was great. I haven't done that in a while.

Inga gave me a mini-crossbow and marshmallow ammo with the directions to "shoot whomever the Queen says." I had a lot of fun attacking Cormac and True as well as many other unsuspecting peoples. The crossbow made the rounds and found itself in the hands of many people eager to shoot friends, family and (in Megan's case) anyone with a hat, basket or other accoutrement that the marshmallow could conceivably fall into to be found later.

True did a great job as MC (even if he did make me wear that huge turban of his for shooting him) and everyone enjoyed both his quips and the performances. There was a good variety of performers: original poems, stories and legends from both near and far, dancing, songs, instrumentals. Additionally there were static arts displays from a number of artisans. At the end of the day, Lady Catherine (I think, there's more to it, a good Elizabethan name) won people's choice for the performance competition and THL Njall won for the static display for his knifes. Njall was a made an official herald of some sorts (scottishdm would know exactly what it was and what it means). Njall hagerson and Allesaundra are moving to Meridies (eastern Tennessee) in March, so this was one of their last events here. They will be missed.

I think I managed to get at least one picture of every performer there.

www.nettleleaf.net/SPFOTR

As usual, if anyone wants a honking big file of a particular picture, comment with your email address and which picture number you would like and I'll send it to you. They're about 2MB each and will print a very nice 8x10.