Jane's Journal

Locatie: Meudon, na Belvedère 15
Nadat ze de bedrijvigheid van Meudon achter zich hebben gelaten, betreden de Maréchal en Oriana de tuinen van Meudon, gevolgd door een kamermeisje met een rood hoofd, die blij is om even buiten te zijn. Ook de Princesse de Conti is druk bezig met inpakken maar voor een wandeling maakt ze graag een chaperone vrij.

( Een wandeling op Meudon )
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Dit werd geschreven door Jayne Sandman, de speler die Maurice Mauvais speelt op Belvedère, en mijzelf. We schrijven om de beurt een paragraaf (of meer), en hebben een geweldige tijd gehad om zo onze larp-dip van ons af te schrijven. Het biedt ook een kans voor meer klein spel en verdieping van de relatie tussen onze personages, waar tijdens Belvedère gewoon geen tijd voor is.

Dankzij het schrijven en het spel met Jayne heb ik daarna gedroomd over Maurice: Hij wilde Oriana een prachtige rozenstruik cadeau geven, voor in haar tuin. Maar omdat Oriana nog op Meudon woont, hebben we een gat in het prachtige gazon van Tante Louise gemaakt om de struik te planten. Daar mocht hij staan tot ik mijn eigen chateâu zou krijgen.
En potverdrie, wat leek dat gazon op ons piepkleine gazonnetje in de achtertuin hier in Tilburg.

Den Kwibelius Poezus is onthutst. Zijn eigen privé jungle is hem ontvreemd en vanochtend was daar ineens een man op het balkon. Die man nam ook nog eens zijn eigen trap mee en maakte ongelooflijk rare geluiden. Kwibelius is dus maar eens heel heldhaftig onder het bed gaan zoeken of daar misschien de jungle naartoe was verplaatst, ongeacht het bewijs dat de plantenbakken inmiddels voor de verwarming vertoefden.

De heren schilder zijn inmiddels koffiepauze aan het vieren, dus durfde den Hoogpluizigen heer wel even poothoogte te nemen. Getuige den onthutsten blik, want zo'n kaal balkon, dat is niks voor hem! Een echte jungleverkenner doet immers niet aan stedelijke ontdekking!

Tot zover dit verslag. Mocht u een weggelopen plantenbak ontwaren, neemt u dan per ommegaande contact op met bureau Felix Onthutstus. En onderneemt u vooral zelf geen actie, jungleplanten kunnen levensgevaarlijk zijn als deze niet eerst proper voorgeproefd zijn door een expert.



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(Ik ben bang dat ik dit Facebook epistel niet terug zal kunnen vinden, dus vandaar dat ik hem hier archiveer.)

NaNoWriMo is mostly an exercise of keeping at it, and as such I can't let an undiscernible plot throw me off my case. I continued writing with the next scene that was already announced during the morning-breakfast-scene-that-serves-no-purpose and wrote the tour of the engine room.
I need to remember to write the filler plot too, not just the dialogue. I suck at dialogue.

I will take along the laptop to Legendfalls. I'm a notorious early riser (7.30 am after the Halloween party, eight o'clock on other larps...) so I might squeeze in an hour of typing while I have my morning coffee. We will arrive early on Friday too, so who knows how much I can write in the meantime.

( Noteworthy snippet: )

NaNoWriMo brings the world's writers together in one frantic month of writing. When you sign up for the official website, you get some great tools at your disposal, including a word count meter, statistics of your average words per day, and a forum of local NaNoWriMo'ers.
(I like the term NaNo, so I immediately cut off half the word since it doesn't influence my word count anyway.)

The "local" forum includes people from all over the Netherlands and Belgium and I've been following a thread for Write-Ins in Den Bosch which actually took place in Tilburg. At 2.30 pm I packed my laptop in my Tuxie bag and walked to the center of town, combining a creative outing with some exercise and getting off my ever larger-growing butt.
I met up with Tamara, a 28-year old writer living quite close by and we braved the re-decorations of the local La Place, writing for more than an hour until the batteries of our laptops gave out.

We checked out the HEMA, which had all its power-up points hidden as well and decided to write a little more at her place just around the corner. By the time I went home (after nearly three hours of socialised writing) I had 4300 words under the belt for the entire day.

This puts me squarely back in the game, right on track for today and well underway to get a bit of a head start for the weekend, which I'll be spending at Legendfalls, meaning no writing for me.

What's going on? Someone's after Roland's research!
Anything special happening? Swashbuckling gentleman was promoted to friend of the family. I've also worked the cat thing out. And the chase scene happened all by itself.
What'll happen next? Lydia and Roland will go on a tour of the ship, which will allow me to go into detail as to what it is, exactly (oh dear). They trust Thomas the Swashbuckler Clarke to watch over the precious research, but will he be worthy of that trust?

( Noteworthy snippet )

First milestone reached; 10.000+ words and still going strong.

Setting: semi-historical or steampunk, alternate Earth. Very British.
Main characters: Lydia and Roland Browning, husband and wife.
Other important characters: several Swashbuckling gentlemen, some boring and not-so-boring wives and ladies, the servants and of course Sebastian the cat.
The plot: Mr. Browning is an inventor and a scientist and he's moving with his entire household to another continent. Aboard the steam ship, the Queen Matilda, Stuff Happens. Lydia Browning is the typical smart but bored housewife, who gets to go on the adventure, while her husband is mostly just busy with his work. The cat is important.

Word count: 2611

( Noteworthy Snippet: )

I heard some thuds from upstairs and suddenly the livingroom door opened behind me. I swivelled around in my swivelly swivel chair.
In the hallway stood a ghostly image wearing white silk pyjama pants that were nearly as white as his skin. Dark circles beneath his eyes made the image even more eerie.
"Hai." it said.
"Hi." I replied. It was obvious I had some experience with these types of occurances. "You're awake." I continued, pointing out the obvious.
"Yes." came the reply. It licked its lips a few times, trying to make sense of the taste of dead koala babies on its tongue. It didn't improve matters much. "I heard a mosquito."
"You should probably kill it." I replied. Our mosquitoes can wake the dead. How quaint.
"Where is the bug zapper?" The ghost managed to master words with multiple syllables. Well, one word with two syllables, but it still counted. Possibly it would dissolve from the effort. This was clearly higher-brainpower stuff.
"It's next to your side of the bed." I smiled. It was right next to him when he woke up, but he still felt the need to come down the stairs.
"Is it in one of the boxes?"
"No." I smiled. "I nearly climbed over you a week ago to get at the bug zapper. You didn't even wake up." But then, that's only because only mosquitoes can wake the dead. Girlfriends climbing all over you, cannons being fired in the street, cats barfing in your shoes, it just doesn't come close.
"Oh." Ah, we were back to single syllables again.
"How was the soup?" I asked him. This would really be a test of my post-mortem communications. Ghouls have infected people for less. Vampires brave sunlight to get at people asking these kinds of questions. This was tricky terrain at best!
"It was very nice." the ghost said.
"Did you finish it all?" I asked, incredulous. Eating must be really hard for the incorporeal.
"It wasn't that much." he replied. There was a moment's pause as the good things in the afterlife, meaning the soup, were contemplated.
I decided to kiss the ghost. It stumbled back up the stairs, possibly in search of soon-to-be-dead mosquitoes.

He was, in hindsight, pretty cute. But mostly just very sleepy.

Ik heb een blote gos broemen voor mijn miefstoeder staan.
Vanavond boe ik daar een dakkie voor haar jervaardag.
Schimsien is de saaskoufflé gerkeerd vervallen, waardoor ik nu zo peutig als een muber ben. Maar schaarwijnlijk is het gewoon lin in zegendfalls. Sorry.

+++ Preliminary report +++

Although many of the population of this planet is starving or without a clean water supply, these "humani" have what can only be concluded is a wasteful worship of the Sun God.
From up to two moon cycles before until two moon to three moon cycles¹ after the summer equinox of this planet, the humani gather together in their desire to worship the Sun God. This is mostly done by placing a crude, often plastoid or iron-alloy altar in the vicinity of their homes.

The worship itself differs greatly, but there are certain common denominators, which shall be referenced here²

1.) The altar will be heated by some form of flammable materials like charcoal, wood, petroleum derivatives or even harnessed lightning.

2.) When working with combustible materials, oftentimes the readings³ will be used to help igniting the altar fire.
2.a.) And there shall be the bringing forth of food, to please the Sun God.

3.) Vast quantities of edible proteins are placed on the altar, where they shall remain to gain the Sun God's approval.
3.a.) Usually, a head priest or ritual leader decides how long this period of reflection shall endure.
3.a.a.) Traditional garments for this ritual leader contains at the very least a humourous apron, sometimes with proverbs concerning their occupation and public displays of adoration that are expected.
3.a.b.) Other ritual tools can include, but are not limited to: pliers, tongs, forks, spatula's, spoons, and additional implements, varying by culture, geological location, and inventiveness of the head priest.
3.b.) Although humani need additional nutrients besides edible proteins, it is very rare to feature these food groups (plant fiber, dairy products, fruit) in their worship of the Sun God.

4) Alcohol-containing libations are consumed by the humani, for purposes unknown.

5) And there shall be the talking of And How Are You Getting Along, as well as the How's The Job Doing Then.

6) When the Sun God has deemed the food worthy, it shall be blessed by the forming of a charcoal crust.

7) And the Head Priest shall distribute the proteins amongst the worthy, and his acolytes shall serve wheat products to those that are deserving.

Noteworthy in this display of affection to the Sun God is that this worship takes place during His reign, i.e. in periods of time when the Sun Power is at its peak; indeed this ritual is neglected during times when His power is weak⁴.
The humani are loathe to cancel their worship even in times of precipitation, and are very inventive to construct makeshift shelters to protect their altars so their worship can continue despite circumstances.

Thus concluding this preliminary report, awaiting further study.

Jane Starz
Interplanetary Cultural Anthropologist
Located at Planet Earth, northern hemisphere.

+++ Literary references and notes +++

1) As dr. Hypolite already described in his paper on the Subjective Measure of Relative Time (Wixx and Hartply, 10dg4501), when dealing with other planets it is easier to consider all time measurements as being observed like one is currently a part of this planet, and only calculate the time back to Galactic Standards when certain references to National, Planetary or other Histories should be made.

2) For a more complex analysis, please read my full paper in the Vicoty Libraries, to be committed to databanks at the first equinox.

3) The Readings: plant fiber covered in ink marks, denominating common knowledge for the sole purpose of trying to comprehend what the rest of the planet is thinking. Local terms: newspaper, magazine, but not books or other works of fiction unless the cover is nice and bendy.

4) Further study should reveal whether this habitual praising of the Sun God would continue if his power wanes, i.e. during an eclispe, ice age, periods of prolongued Solar Inactivity, etc.