When did I last post? Must be a couple of days. OK then...

Saturday night I went to a Discworld-themed party held by a friend of mine. I didn't dress up, claiming immunity on the basis of imminent overseas relocation (everything's in boxes or sold or just too hard).

Sunday I slept in, then people came round and took away all my bookshelves. This is going to make it hard to find books for the next few weeks. Oh well.

I've been pondering for a bit about my SCA persona. For the last 4 years I've been playing a 16th century mariner, who just happens to be male. I chose to have a male persona because I was very interested in maritime history and knew that it would be historically unlikely for a woman to be a seafarer. However, I have found I tend to do maritime history things when I'm out of persona, so there's less clash than I had originally expected. Also, a bunch of other things *do* cause clashes, ranging from the simple fact that I am biologically female under the costume, to my interests in traditionally feminine pursuits such as needlework. It certainly looks odd to be sitting around at a tourney doing blackwork embroidery when one is meant to be playing a male role. Finally, costuming is quite inconvenient. It's hard to adapt patterns intended for male body shapes to suit female body shapes... and *don't* get me started on the difficulties of pointing the doublet to the hose if you can't urinate standing up.

So I've decided that, on the whole, it would be more sensible to take up a female persona. My move to Ottawa gives me a good opportunity to do this cleanly, and (conveniently!) saves me from having to explain the whole male persona thing to every single SCA person I meet there. I'm not sure I have the energy for that... 4 years ago, when I was 21 and perkier, it was much easier.

So, in light of this, I started on a new needlework project last night... a blackwork coif embroidered with lilies and little spiky things, as found in a book of blackwork that I've got. It'll give me something to do between now and when I get settled in Ottawa.

Speaking of which... looks like my relocation date may be set back by a few weeks, which means after Christmas. Some of the Australians who'd previously gone to work for e-smith had spent their first few weeks as contractors until their visas came through, then popped back here briefly in order to immigrate properly. Seems that while this has worked so far, it can cause the immigration department to be a bit of a PITA and ask difficult questions, and they'd rather avoid it. So I'm probably going to wait until the actual visa comes through.

Today I have a heap of errands to run and stuff to do... have to pay the rent, get a haircut, contact my old university for an academic transcript, contact my dad for copies of my school reports and my birth certificate and stuff, and clean the kitchen before a friend comes round for dinner.