Sometimes, with all the bad news coming in from all sides - climate change, weird politics and even weirder politicians, wars, people drowning in the Mediterranean, insects dying - I feel like anything I can do is just so small and so insignificant I might as well give up.

That's not true, though - and one reason I enjoyed the weekend excursion with the BUND so much was that we heard a lot of success stories. Yes, wild cats are still very rare, but they have a better chance now. Yes, it is still too dry in the summer, and water scarcity will become an even bigger problem in the next decades, but there are ways to keep trees alive without wasting water. Yes, there were new roads and new railroads built in the last years that made a huge scar in the landscape, but at least some measures were taken to give the wildlife a chance to cross those roads, and protected areas were enlarged to lessen the impact at least a little bit.

Sometimes it's just small things - small steps. But I try to remind myself that small steps are steps, too. We've switched from carton-packed milk to milk in glass bottles a while ago, and I'm amazed at the difference this made in the amount of our waste. There's still a lot of things you cannot get in returnable or re-useable packaging, especially a lot of dairy products, but every carton not bought - helps.

We've been bringing our own bags to buy loose produce for ages now, re-using the flimsy plastic bags that you get as often as possible. There's still one coming in occasionally, so we won't run out soon; they are small and lightweight, so I tend to stash one or three of them in backpacks just in case I need one when I'm somewhere. There's a sturdier folding bag in my handbag as well, also just in case. Some of the plastic bags, when they start to give out at the handles, get a last use to collect used cat litter or as trash bags for otherwise yucky trash (we usually don't use a bin liner bag).

As paper bags are not so much better than plastic bags, I've been trying to cut down on these too, recently. Most of the paper bags we have coming in are from buying bread at the bakery, and that is very easy to avoid: I just bring a clean cloth bag, and the baker drops the bread in there. No trouble, no fuss, no paper bag. There are still a number of paper bags coming home with me from bakeries, for instance when buying sticky, cake-y things that won't do well in a cloth bag, and they get re-used as liners for the compost bin.

Every bag counts. Every step counts. Even if it's a small one - it is still a step. If we all do the little steps we can, the world will move into the right direction. And while we might not be able to reverse every damage done to the planet, we can still do our bit to save as much as possible!

I've spent this weekend teaching weaving to six wonderfully enthusiastic people - and I can tell you that while everyone enjoyed it (as I was told so) - I think nobody had more fun that I did.

Tablet weaving is one of my favourite teaching topics. It's simultaneously easy and brain-bending. There's simple rules to follow, and within those rules, you are completely free to do as you wish. Mistakes are easy to make, but they are also easy to spot, and after a while you make less and less of them. And for teaching purposes, with the system that I have developed for weaving both "normal" patterns and twill patterns, it's even not relevant whether someone has been doing tablet weaving before or not.

So everyone gets the basic explanations, then we get to work making a warp, and then weaving starts. Which, about inevitably, results in a room full of very quiet, very concentrated people, exploring the structures and possibilities of tablet-woven bands, conjuring up patterns. It actually was so quiet that I could hear a pin drop. (Yes, I actually tried. It was only just audible, but that was because the floor in the room was relatively soft, so the pin made very, very little noise.)

In my course description, I purposely did not promise that we'd get into twill, as this can be hard to gauge. While a weekend course is usually enough to at least touch the basics (the plain background, and the principle of how to weave a motif in that), I can't guarantee that more will be covered, as this very much depends on the individual group. In some groups, the weavers want more time to explore diagonals patterns, for instance, and that, of course, is a wonderful thing as well.

This weekend, however, everybody was keen on getting some twill shenanigans done, and so we did. I can tell you that for me as the teacher, seeing that first line in everyone's band move first there, then here - that is the most exciting simple line that I know. Also, it means that I get to tell one of my favourite teaching stories: The one about the little renegade tablet that wants to start a revolution.

That is another thing teaching in this style has taught me - if you work paperless, without drafts, stories and mnemonic aids are wonderful tools to help explain things, and to help remember them. I don't know how pattern instructions were passed on in medieval societies, but I could well imagine a teacher tell a story to the pupils to help them remember what needs to be done at a given place in a pattern. It would probably not have been the story about a little tablet being a revolutionary and turning everything around (which is something that would not have latched onto basic cultural knowledge and background as it does with today's people), but it might have been something else fulfilling the same purpose. Songs and stories make wonderful tools for keeping things in minds, and I thoroughly enjoy teaching with stories. And daring little revolutionary tablets that prepare their revolution in the underground, quietly, looking like every other tablet for a while... until, suddenly...

Now that you've heard the gist of my adventures in Dublin, it's time for some other news: I've been doing a newsletter in German for a good while now, and I've finally decided to offer one in English as well. So if you're interested in hearing about news from the pallia online shop once a month, with a spattering of other information thrown in (such as most popular blog posts of the past month, or information about exhibitions or other possibly interesting things), you can subscribe to the English newsletter by clicking here. (You can also subscribe to the German one via this link, should you be interested.)

The newsletter, like the German one, will come out monthly, so September will be the first time - and I'm very much looking forward to this, as there will be a few new things in the shop for it!

 

So what else is there to tell about my Dublin adventures? There was a talk about medieval textiles and textile crafts, which was very well received according to what I heard afterwards. I had the pleasure of sharing that panel with Jeannette Ng, who later during the convention accepted her award for Best New Writer (congratulations again!).

I also enjoyed my two other panels (proper panels, not talks, this time) about archaeology in SFF, and about costume research and documentation.

I also got to meet (and hold, for a short time) this guy:



and I got to meet a real Lady Astronaut, as Dr. Jeannette Epps was at the convention. Which was a "wow" moment as well.

There also was cake (because life is better with cake, even if it is only store-bought chocolate cake from Tesco's), and weird chocolate both from Ireland (Cadbury's Mint Oreo. Delicious, if you ask me.) and from Germany (I brought some Knusperflocken for people to try) and from New Zealand (which will host next year's convention) and, if you are generous in what you count as chocolate, choc-covered malty caramel Timtams from Australia.

Finally, one of the really nice things about WorldCon is how easy it is to meet people, and chat with them, making new acquaintances and learning things about their bits of the world. I was delighted to see again quite a number of people I'd last met in London, back in 2014 (one of whom saved my voice by bringing me a pack of Fisherman's Friends). Even though there's never a load of time to catch up, it was wonderful to see them again and chat. It was also totally delightful to see so many authors, whose work I love to read, and it felt like so many of them stopped at my table in the hall and enjoyed seeing (and, in some cases, buying) something completely different. (Which were the moments when I silently went "squeee!" in the back of my head. As you do. Right?).

All this would never have happened if not for Gillian prodding me to come to London in 2014 (because apparently, London is right around the corner from Erlangen, if you ask an Aussie) and for my wonderful Irish friend helping me out at the table, making it possible for me to sneak away to my programme items, the Escape Artists Live panel, and, occasionally, even to the toilet:



Thank you! (Also, I'm still bad at taking phone selfies. Obviously.)

 

I mentioned badge ribbons in yesterday's post, and some of you may have wondered what that is. This is one of the things I was introduced to back in London, at my first WorldCon, and I had so much fun with them back then already, which was repeated this year in Dublin. But I should explain first...

When you have an attending membership and turn up at the con registration, you are getting a badge with your name on it (or a badge name/alias/nick, whatever you put in the form when you got your membership), where you come from, and your membership number. This is your pass to enter the convention and all its panels and so on.

Underneath that plastic badge, you can stick ribbons - which are printed textile ribbons with a sticky stripe, (hopefully) in the width of the lower edge of the badge. You get "official" ribbons if you are a programme participant, dealer, or otherwise involved with the con; or if you are a Hugo finalist. You can also get ribbons from various other places - from authors, groups or societies, and from individuals who had an idea for a ribbon, had some made and now hand them out to those who ask.



There are some people (especially children) who make it a game to get as many ribbons as they can, and I've seen some kids walk around with a trail of ribbons that was about three times as long as they were tall. My haul was not huge - tiny in comparison, in fact - but each of them made me ridiculously happy. I got the "lack of yarn" handed out of the blue by someone passing my table, and thus could not even tell others who had given it to me, having no clear memory of the person in question. That was different for the "shiny" ribbon, whose maker walked around with a Kaylee parasol, and thus was relatively easy to spot. The TANSTAAFL came, of course, from the Heinlein Society table - it's one of my favourite bits of Heinlein's writing, and I was looking forward to getting one of these even before the con started... and the Cast of Wonders ribbon, obviously, also makes me happy, being one of their narrators.

So. Ribbons. Some don't care for them, some collect them, and it's definitely a thing at WorldCon. Plus they are a good conversation starter should you need one!

Dublin was... exciting, and wonderful, even though getting there was a tiny bit scary - I knew I'd be travelling alone, and taking two large suitcases. Plus a backpack. Plus a handbag... maxing out my luggage allowance on all counts.

[caption id="attachment_4776" align="alignnone" width="412"] Tell me again who is going to be lugging all this to Dublin?


Because I was rather nervous about not making the airport in time, I took a really early train, which meant, of course, that everything went smoothly and I arrived with plenty of time to spend knitting at the airport. Changing trains was also going well - I did have a helping hand for all exits and entrances that involved stairs, and a very friendly couple helped me (and a group of fellow travellers from Taiwan) to pick the right S-Bahn to get to Munich airport, as there were currently construction works going on, mangling the usual schedules. (Things like that are wonderfully reinforcing my belief that most of the human beings on this our planet are lovely people who are willing to help, and happy to make the world a little bit better by their actions. Thank you.)

So... everything went smoothly, we landed in Dublin wonderfully on time, I collected my things and went straight to this place:



which is the Convention Centre Dublin. And then I started getting to work, as in getting my stall set up. I had some help from Gillian Polack, who was one of the volunteers in the Dealer's Hall, helping everybody to find their way around and to get set up. (Of course, as always, I had to hand-write a few of the labels. And also of course, as always, I finished set-up the next morning.)

In the end, the table looked like this - at least it did so at one point, things changed slightly in their layout as some stuff was sold out:



Being at a WorldCon is something lovely, and special, and exciting - and for me, being part of it by having a stall in the Dealer's Hall is something extra-special on top of all the "normal" WorldCon excitement and enjoyment. Every show and every fair has their own distinct flavour, so to say, but I think that the WorldCon flavour is far, far different from any of the other fairs that I have done until now. And personally, I find it very, very tasty.

Speaking of tasty - I was totally delighted when I found out my accommodation came with breakfast included, and actually treated me to the possibility of having a Full Irish Breakfast each day, complete with white and black pudding:



That set me up nicely for the day to come - which was good, because between the programme items I was on, the programme items I got to see, and standing at my table meeting so, so many wonderful people (plus looking at their t-shirts and badge ribbons) did not leave much time for eating!

 

I am back home, the summer break is over, and it was wonderful. So wonderful, indeed, that all the happenings should be good for several blog posts.

There was a bit of holiday things (we paddled down the Elbe river), there was also the WorldCon at Dublin, which was wonderful and exciting and utterly, utterly glorious, and now I'm sitting here doing this quick get-back-into-things blogpost before hauling a huge stack of parcels off to the post office, which takes care of the orders that came in during the break, and of those I got at Dublin when I ran out of some of the things to sell. (Such as gold embroidery books. And spinning fibres. I also almost ran out of "I knit so I don't kill people" badges... but only almost.)

A Worldcon is a special thing - it's full of people getting to meet and chat with other people, and enjoying common interests. There's panels, where several people discuss a topic (usually with help of a moderator, who asks questions and makes sure things stay more or less on track); there's also talks, shows, singalongs, films, dances, theatre plays, concerts, readings, and opportunities to meet authors or have them sign your book(s). Plus there is the Hugo Award ceremony. And, of course, the dealer's hall...

This time, I ended up as a participant on three panels, in addition to having a table in the dealer's hall - made possible by an Irish friend who volunteered to come along and mind the shop while I was off having fun. And fun I had! One of my programme items was a talk to give an intro to medieval textiles and textile crafts, supported by the wonderful (and Campbell-Award-winning) Jeannette Ng. There were a few technical problems, but in the end, everything turned out allright. My second programme item was a "proper" panel, together with Alyc Helms and Marie Brennan, wonderfully moderated by Ehud Maimon, where we got to talk about archaeology and its use for worldbuilding in SFF literature. In the third one, I again got to sit at a table together with Jeannette Ng, as she was moderating the panel about costume research and documentation; my co-panelists this time were Kerri-Ellen Kelly and Kevin Hewett. I had a blast on all three of my items, and as far as I've been told, the audience generally also enjoyed them, so that was definitely a success. (I really need to work on my shameless self-promotion skills, though...)

And now it's time already to prepare for the next events coming up: the weaving workshop this weekend, first of all; the MEDATS conference in September, where I will be giving a paper; the Nadelkunst fair at Weikersheim. Certainly I'm not getting bored here!