'Zoo Day 2
May. 12th, 2007 11:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hrjMemo to self: If you plan to use the Treo as an alarm clock to get up in time to hit the treadmill before breakfast, remember to turn the ringer back to "audible" after the last session of papers.
Fortunately, I did wake up in time for breakfast on Friday. Friday's sessions were all DISTAFF all the time. (DISTAFF is the organization that sponsors textiles & clothing sessions, including the one my paper was in.) I'm trying to remember specific details at this point. A lovely paper on changes in high fashion reflected in ivory writing tablet cases, combs, and mirror cases. My mind's going blank on the rest of the papers in the other sessions, but I shared the last session with a presentation on hook-and-eye type fasteners in medieval Scandinavia, and one on a set of embroidered Sicilian undergarments. I got several compliments on my paper and did a boisterous show-and-tell session after the papers were over, pulling out my various engineering experiements on the different styles of shepherds' purses and showing how I used them to try to interpret the artistic representations.
Dinner was a great mass of DISTAFF folks going out to a Middle Eastern restaurant, then we adjourned to a room party with much computer geeking, squeeing at books and pictures, and consumption of alcohol. The party lasted long enough for people to wish me happy birthday (and sing various incompatible celebratory songs). As I was wandering back to my own dorm around 1am, I heard the sound of singing wafting out through the night air from one of the conference rooms. Through the window, a circle of people were sitting around a guitarist, energetically (and in many cases, drunkenly) belting out "Yellow Submarine". Now, it's not at all unusual to stumble across people singing or playing music at the Medieval Congress ... medieval music, that is. But this was more along the lines of "ur-filk" -- that stage when people gathered for another purpose are just singing for the sake of singing together and running through whatever repertoire the guitarist and most of the singers have in common. In this case, the source music seemed to consist of the entire Beatles inventory, significant quantities of blues and gospel standards, and a good sprinkling of '60s folk music. I stayed and sang for the better part of an hour before toddling off the rest of the way to bed.
Fortunately, I did wake up in time for breakfast on Friday. Friday's sessions were all DISTAFF all the time. (DISTAFF is the organization that sponsors textiles & clothing sessions, including the one my paper was in.) I'm trying to remember specific details at this point. A lovely paper on changes in high fashion reflected in ivory writing tablet cases, combs, and mirror cases. My mind's going blank on the rest of the papers in the other sessions, but I shared the last session with a presentation on hook-and-eye type fasteners in medieval Scandinavia, and one on a set of embroidered Sicilian undergarments. I got several compliments on my paper and did a boisterous show-and-tell session after the papers were over, pulling out my various engineering experiements on the different styles of shepherds' purses and showing how I used them to try to interpret the artistic representations.
Dinner was a great mass of DISTAFF folks going out to a Middle Eastern restaurant, then we adjourned to a room party with much computer geeking, squeeing at books and pictures, and consumption of alcohol. The party lasted long enough for people to wish me happy birthday (and sing various incompatible celebratory songs). As I was wandering back to my own dorm around 1am, I heard the sound of singing wafting out through the night air from one of the conference rooms. Through the window, a circle of people were sitting around a guitarist, energetically (and in many cases, drunkenly) belting out "Yellow Submarine". Now, it's not at all unusual to stumble across people singing or playing music at the Medieval Congress ... medieval music, that is. But this was more along the lines of "ur-filk" -- that stage when people gathered for another purpose are just singing for the sake of singing together and running through whatever repertoire the guitarist and most of the singers have in common. In this case, the source music seemed to consist of the entire Beatles inventory, significant quantities of blues and gospel standards, and a good sprinkling of '60s folk music. I stayed and sang for the better part of an hour before toddling off the rest of the way to bed.
