I think I'm in really dire need of a weekend. Probably partly due to not having a proper weekend (or a proper rest day) due to Freienfels - which is lovely, but after a while tends to catch up with one.

Still, there are a few things I have to take care of today before the weekend can come. The cat is already very occupied with her most important late morning task: napping. Myself, however, I'm just now getting around to blogging...

...and you won't even get a totally lovely and exciting blog post, because while I have the idea for one or two (or even some more) posts, I need a bit more time and leisure to put those together.

Instead, you get this incredible example for craft skills on the street.

Obviously, not having internet access is a very good way to keep oneself from blogging. On the other hand, sitting somewhere more or less stranded and without internet is amazing at keeping distractions down and helping one get things actually... done. In this case, a few hours' worth of sewing.

A friend of ours needed a hand or, rather, someone to let the plumbers in while he's at work, so I was sitting there, waiting for them to finish their work, with my sewing kit to keep me occupied. Progress has been made (in contrast to when I was in Freienfels, where I managed to sew for about 5 minutes before something came up to interrupt my work*).

So, sorry for the belated blog post - I blame my lack of planning (I could have pre-blogged yesterday, right?) and me not being used to getting up that early, and totally forgetting that I had not blogged yet this morning. (The plumbers were a bit late, by the way. I could have blogged before leaving if I had known how much later they would be.)


* Taking the sewing kit to Freienfels was more or less just to keep me from fretting that I could have worked on it, which I surely would have done if I had left it at home. It's a rare event, though, where you actually manage to get all that done which you thought you might work on, at least in my experience. There's always something coming up - friends, some shopping, an unexpected but welcome chat, sudden hunger pangs that need to be dealt with, inquisitive people wanting to know what you are doing, you name it.

Doug asks

So maybe you have answered this before but I was wondering how you got involved in researching/making textiles.

I might have answered this before, but I actually can't remember - and since I have no idea on where to find the post, if such a one does exist...

It all started ages ago, when I was sweet seventeen years old. In a small village close to where I grew up, there was an annual "Ritterfest" (which is a medieval Festival thingie). One of my school comrades lived in that village, and she participated there, showing visitors how to make felt - so the next day, I dressed up in something not even vaguely historically correct and joined her, and the rest of the fun. I fell in love with the camaraderie and the bonfire evenings and hanging out and singing songs with other people around said fires that weekend. Shortly after, I started going to other, similar, events with a few people from that group... and that, of course, meant that I needed something to wear. The first piece I made for myself was a hood, by the way, and nothing I made back then was historically correct.

Fast forward about two years - time to decide what to do after school. After realising that the things I had thought about were not what I wanted to do after all, I sat down and made a list of stuff I would like to have included in my job. Things like being able to work outside, but also doing reading and desk work; maybe do something that involved other people; something practical, and something that had to do with the Middle Ages. When leafing through the Uni Guide, I stumbled across something that seemed to fit: Medieval Archaeology. And that's how I ended up in Bamberg. My parents were happy to support the choice I made, study-wise, and made it possible for me to become an archaeologist. (Thank you so much, you two!)

Back when I started my studies, going to medieval markets and similar events was still considered something a bit weird and thoroughly un-academic, much more so than these days. It was a growing trend, though, and I kept on going to these events, using them to try out garments and equipment pieces and crafts techniques. Now, however, I also had proper archaeological literature about medieval textiles, so my clothes did improve. (Over time - that was a longer process.) Textiles fascinated me more and more, and by the time I wrote my master's thesis, I was fully focused on textiles and clothing - a development I have never regretted.

And that is the full story of how I ended up researching garments and textile techniques - a teenage friend, a few lucky coincidences, some uni colleagues also interested in textiles who pointed me to books when I started out, and the opportunity to try out things and gain experience with cloth and clothing "in the wild", they all came together to make me insatiably curious to learn more about dress back then. (Hint: It hasn't lost any of its fascination on me yet.)

How did the weekend pass so quickly? Is it really Monday again? Well, at least the overcast skies had the good grace to come today, not yesterday or Saturday, when we could enjoy some splendid weather, and I actually managed to get some gardening done.

Speaking of splendid - if you were thinking of moving to Stockholm, you might want to watch this ad video. Or if you like card tricks.



You can also get good coffee in Stockholm... I remember the first time I was in Scandinavia, I was totally amazed at the huge cups of really decent-to-totally-yummy coffee (with lots of milk) that you could get in any 7-11, or actually about anywere. Scandinavians run on coffee. Which seems to actually be healthy.

I didn't drink coffee until I was something in my twenties, when I slowly got fond of the taste, and now I do love a good cup of coffee, preferably with milk in it (lots of milk). A few years ago, we bought an Aeropress for our home, which is quick to use, makes lovely coffee, is easy to clean and does not take up much space. Like any German household, we have an electric water kettle to heat water anyway*, so it's one less appliance to find room and a socket for. Our coffee consumption, needless to say, has increased noticeably since introducing the Aeropress... small wonder.

Writing so much about coffee makes me want one. I think I will go have one now. Yum.

* The water kettle is about sixteen years old now, it would probably get totally jealous if we brought in another gadget that can heat water!

The day has not even stated properly, and I'm already feeling scatterbrained. That's not good, especially not since I have a stack of reading work to take care of today, and a trip to the library on my to-do list.

So in best scatterbrainy tradition, here's stuff for you to look at:

Mediävist Jaques Le Goff died on April first (not a joke). He was one of the big guys (here's his Wikipedia page).

Medieval Manuscript blog has horses fighting so their owners don't fight alone. (They also have lots of other fun stuff. That blog ought to be on your reading list if you are interested in manuscripts and quirky pictures therefrom.)

There's a tumbler about People of Colour in history (including medieval times), with interesting links.

And here's a collection of pictures for long late-medieval hose.

Finally, in case you have a vacuum cleaner that seems to have lost some of its initial amazing sucking powers over time? Try cleaning the hose that connects the vacuum to the tube and nozzle. Ours turned out to have accumulated much more clogging dirt stubbornly clinging to the inside of the tube than we would have believed possible...

We have friends (yes, really, we do) and a good number of them - almost all of them, in fact - are as fond of a nice boardgaming evening as we are. So it's a small wonder that we have a night gaming with friends quite frequently.

If you are involved in gaming and know your way around a bit, the term "euro-game" or "German-style board game" will mean something to you. If not, here's the thing in a nutshell: typical European or German games have the players aim for victory by competing for victory points or a similar progress measurement, often with a catch-up mechanism for the stragglers and a brake mechanism for those way in the front. While luck plays a role in most of these games, you also need to evaluate which approach you want to take, and there may be an end accounting that can severely shift player order (and thus have you win more or less unexpectedly). If such a game is well-made, it is very intense gameplay and a huge lot of fun - and as there's no player elimination, you can take part until the very end.

Relatively recently, there is a craze for co-operative board games, and we (as well as a good number of our friends) love those a lot. It's the "all of us together against the board" approach, where Bad Things happen after every player's turn, determined usually by roll of dice or cards drawn. I like not competing against each other, and sticking heads together to figure out how to solve a tricky situation... only to face an even trickier one after the next draw, or next die roll. Yesterday, we managed not to defend the realm... so if an orc or demon turns up on somebody's doorstep, it might be our fault. Don't come to blame us, though. We did our best.

If you are totally interested now, here's some of the co-op games that I myself really like:
"Defenders of the Realm" is a typical fantasy-themed co-op game with quite a bit of luck; you have to defend the realm and the main city against the four generals marching in, and - of course - their minions.

For those that want less fantasy and a little less luck as an element (though not much less), "Pandemic" also makes you defend the world - against viral illnesses spreading across the globe and threatening to kill us all.

Not hot enough? Then you could always go check out "Flash Point Fire Rescue" - you are a firefighter, called to a building to rescue the persons inside and keep the flames in check while you are doing this. This is quite luck-dependent, and if you have a tendency to botch dice rolls... well. It will get hot.

There's also the really hard "Ghost Stories", where you are a taoist trying to defend your village against malevolent ghosts.  I think this is one of the hardest, if not by far the hardest, of the games listed here - even in the most relaxed setting, you will need flawless cooperation, really good use of everyone's special power, and more than a touch of luck to win.

Finally a very different co-op game: "Hanabi" is a little card game where you try to put on some nice fireworks together. The twist? While all the others can see your cards, you yourself can't. Which means you will have to get hints (limited number available) to know which card to play... this is tricky, and intriguing, and should not be attempted half asleep.

So in case you are looking for a game a bit different from the usual "Hah, I won and you didn't", maybe one of these will delight you, too!

When I'm not bursting with my own ideas to blog about, I usually take a look at the blogs I follow - only that they seem to be in spring quiet (spring tiredness?), too!

There's one very interesting post about printing designs on cloth in the 14th century, though. The text is German, but you can look at the pictures (there are plenty) over here.

Otherwise, not much new hereabouts - spring is going on, work is still piled high, stuff is happening albeit not fast enough. I think I might add a second cool superpower to my wishlist - writing really good papers in an incredibly short time, and possibly several of them parallel. (The first one on my list, in case you want to know, is being able to read, understand and speak every language there is.)

Any more suggestions for really cool and useful superpowers, while I'm making that list?