Cross-posted from my STA travel journal: Day 1

Wow, that was a long trip. Especially since I somehow managed to contract an eye infection either in Schiphol Airport on on the flight from Amsterdam to here. I spent that 11 hour flight wiping goop from my eye and trying to minimise my sore throat, coughing, sneezing (all of which worsened during the trip) and general misery. It wasn't all bad, though, since I was able to CHARGE MY LAPTOP ON THE PLANE and therefore play games :) I also watched Invictus (for the first time!) on the in-flight entertainment and was suitably inspired for my upcoming work at the Mandela Museum.
I plan to spend today healing. Thankfully I allotted a few days in Joburg for just that. Thankfully also, unlike in the US, you can walk into a pharmacy here (as you can in many places in Europe) and get drugs over the counter without a scrip. The pharmacist down the road from my guesthouse took one look at my eye and shoved three kinds of medications at me! There is also apparently a walk-in doctor's office across the street from the pharmacist's, or chemists's as they call them here. I was told this by Heidi, who runs this guesthouse, who is quite nice.
Speaking of the Melville House, where I am staying, it also is pretty nice in a quaint way. There was a teddy bear on my bed when I arrived and I when I lay down to sleep I noticed the wooden birds hanging from my ceiling. My only complaint about this place so far is that it isn't nearly as close to the main drag of Melville as I'd supposed - but that might be OK, since that probably makes it cheaper.
Ok - gonna re-goop my eyes with antibiotics and lay down to zone out. Love and peace to you all!!

Stuff, and things

Again, a guilty hasty blog post after realizing I haven't been updating. Oh well. I have done lots of other stuff recently instead, like attend Pennsic War, teach a class, and try to prepare best as I could for four months abroad. So here I am, three days before getting on that plane and still wondering what I need to do. I intend to make this my travelog for while I am away, so check back once in a while. I may actually remember to post things here!

What I Made This Weekend

Friday evening I biked down with Cooper to Crunchy's,  and although we ended up leaving almost immediately to join up with Deon to celebrate her birthday, that bike ride was enough to inspire me to spend several hours at my sewing machine this weekend.
See, I was determined to ride my newly-repaired road bike, having been relegated to my old hybrid bike all week due to a flat on the Trek roadie (sorry, hybrid, I love you and all, but you're not a speed demon). However, riding the Trek requires that I bring along my giant U-lock. I don't have a rack on it, since that would be blasphemy, so I therefore need some sort of bag. However, I didn't feel like carrying a big old backpack around while bar-hopping, so I cast around my bedroom for a suitable messenger-type bag. The closest I could find was my SCA retaining bag, so I dumped my stuff in that and was off, only to find that the bag kept swinging around to hang most awkwardly in front of me. I quick fixed it by attaching the bag strap to a pants loop via a carabiner, but the whole scenario got me thinking that I could really use a more functional bag - function, of course, being the key to fashion and comfort, and those in turn being necessary to socialize properly on a Friday night in East Lansing.
So long story short, I designed and then put together a custom reversible messenger bag. Start to finish, I'd say it took me about 8 hours (not including, of course, the internet breaks, the beer break, the going-to-Schuler's-to-read-comics break, and sleeping).
The moral of the story is that, to paraphrase Saint Francis, once you own one thing, you find you need a whole bunch of other shit to go with it (which is why I have a houseful of stuff).
Voici les fotos:
The bag, completed:

Some close ups:
The front (note the personalized monogram! Which means it's MINE!)

The back (these are loops to attach the bag to a belt or something to keep it from slipping around while riding), and side:

The interior:

 
...which reverses into a total party bag! Woo!

The bag also received the official seal of approval from the household feline committee:

The end.