Gathering of Fools Notes 2004

• Clan Risio, as we are now known, means Clan of laughter, and consists of: House of Fools, House of Cards, House Lunasin, House of the Crescent Moon, Wolves Den, NT Pirates, and Spartikus. (although Spartikus will not be camping on the island with us at Egil's)
•  All heads of houses will be considered heads of Clan Risio. Katherine Wells de Risio (your webmistress) will be the coordinator.
  
• Katherine, Moonlaidie, Airna, and Nazerlith all contributed to the Clan Risio banner (that hung behind the podium) and Katherine is working on a Clan Risio website (Ed note: Website now up at https://www.angelfire.com/or3/clanrisio ).
  
• Council of Households now consists of Clan Risio, House of Alchemy, House of Heresy, and House Nightshade. Drover Home has dissolved, manyof it's members absorbed back into the Clan.
• At Egil's we will be camped on "MacPherson Island" in the center of Principality Loop. Spartikus and Risio families with smalls will camp away from but nearby main encampment. In exchange for sharing the island with us, The MacPherson Formerly Known As Max (herefore to be referred to as Scott) has asked that we try to present as period a front as we are able. So the period tents will be on the outer perimeter and mundane tents on the inner perimeter, with green sheet walls covering spaces on the outer perimeter where there are no period tents. Period tents include Ben's square/rectangle, Jeremiah's round pavilion, and Thorn's kitchen tent. We may have one more as well, as I have a canvas tent that is not *necessarily* period, but Darius said he could fix it up so it would look more period. If anyone else will be bringing a period tent *please* let me know ahead of time so I can work it into the map. If you for some reason can't let me know ahead of time, that's fine too.
  
• Each house is encouraged to bring their house banner or flag, and we will decorate the kitchen tent with them, but only the Clan Risio banner will hang at the entrance to camp.
• The Master of Lands has asked me to be a land steward again, so I will be helping place people on Friday. I am also on Scott's setup crew. We are still waiting to hear if we will be able to have a setup crew for Risio get in on Thursday night of the event, I believe it has something to do with permits and insurance and whatnot. More on this as I receive infomation. (Ed. Note: We can get into setup on Thursday, but as of yet, still unable to stay the night.)
  
• Because of my other duties, I will need to (like last year) appoint someone to direct camp setup, preferrably a head of household, but someone who can get there EARLY on Friday (or possibly Thursday). They will need to work with me on mapping prior to the event and also need to be available to go to the work parties on May 8th and 9th (either or both). (Ed. Note: Jeremiah and Kevin have volunteered for this position)
  
• We will be modifying the House of Fools meal plan to account for the larger group, and those who want to participate need to sign up to sponsor a meal. If all the meals get sponsored and there are still people who want to participate, a turn at dishes will be an acceptable substitute.
• Spartikus will be holding a potluck EgilsSaturday, if you would like to participate, please sign up on the signup sheet. So far, Isaac and Victoria signed up to bring meat.
  
• Portland folk need to collaborate on transportation to the event, we still have people who need rides.
• Eden Celeste of House Daos has invited us to Boogar, a Daos event being held April 30-May 2nd. I intend to go, and so far just Darius has signed on to go with me. Let me know if you'd like to attend and we'll work out some kind of carpool deal. Site fee is $10 per person for the weekend, with no discounted rates for late arrivals or early departers. (Ed. Note: Kate, Annie, Darius, Colen, and Luke attended and had a great time, the Daos were very gracious.)
• Another HoF crossover is the sober night signup. Basically, if so inclined, you choose one night to not drink and be responsible for caretaking the encampment and it's inhabitants, including extinguishing the fire pit and tiki torches, be the person to go to if there's an emergency, and so on and so forth.  Kate signed up to be the sober responsible person in camp on Friday. Saturday will be Jodi, and Sunday will be Ted. Thorn, Wendy, Naz, Ben, Tabbie, Nathan, and Debbie signed up as possible backups if they choose at the time to not drink.
• Yet another (sorry guys, I think we just have some really good ideas.. :) ) HoF crossover is signing up for service to the Barony/event. Volunteers this year will be limited to 2 hour shifts (gee, you mean I don't have to direct traffic for 13 hours this year??) and all volunteers will be entered into a raffle. Not sure what the prize is yet. So far, Kate and Kayla have signed up for campmaster/setup, and Tom, Annie, Ted, Jeremiah, Kevin, Quentin, and Ben signed up for a tour of constab, Ben and Misty *might* do a shift at chirugeon, and Tabbie signed up for parking. No volunteers yet for: herald (town crier), water bearing, and gate.
  
• Ready for one more HoF crossover? Signing up for camp chores. Running a encampment smoothly involves everyone pitching in to help. No one person should get stuck doing eveything (ok, so before I learned my lesson, I sure tried! ;) ) So far, Mouse, Eddie, Wendy and Tom have signed up for dish duty, Isaac signed up for getting water, firewood, and ice, Ben signed up for getting water and taking trash to the middens, Nathan signed up for getting forewood and ice, Kayla and Briana signed up for bottle and can duty, Kate, Tabbie and Dot signed up for keeping the kitchen tent clean (although everyone who uses it should clean up their own messes), and Thorn, Ben, and Tom signed up for being general helper guys. Ted and Jodi will do the final middens run. In a related note, I expect everyone to make their area IMMACULATE before leaving site on Monday. (or whenever you leave). I am extremely adamant about this. There is no excuse for leaving a bunch of trash behind. Anyone who leaves a mess will be barred from camping with us at the next event.
• Tabbie (who was unable to attend the meeting due to work) came up with an idea for cigarette butt disposal. She has several large coffee cans that she's going to paint to look like wood on the outside and place them at various points throughout camp. We will have no excuses for ciggie butts all over the ground. :)
• Regarding minors drinking: word on site is that they will be "really cracking down" on drinking minors. Officially, Clan Risio does NOT condone underage drinking. Any minor (under 21) obviously intoxicated will be escorted to their tent, where they must remain until they are sober. Second offense, they will be asked to pack their gear and leave once they've sobered up. This is serious guys. One underage drinker caught = we all get kicked out.  No one wants that.
  
• In common areas visible to the public,  beverages in period containers only from Friday night through Sunday night, so Friday until nightfall and Monday after sunrise, the rule is not in effect. Exception for tablero games. This is part of striving torwards having a totally period encampment. And of course, I wouldn't make the rule if I didn't have plenty of loaners. :)
  
• CAMP SAFETY - The people in charge of Egil's want every attendee to attend a camping class, covering the basics of camping ettiquette and safety. While a noble effort, it is not an entirely implementable one. So to make sure everyone in our group is of the informed, I converted the "Personal Committment To Safety" from my work into "Personal Committment to Camping Safety" and covered everything that I could remember from the camping class (Kayla and I took it at one of the work parties). I am hoping that it can substitute for the camping class for those unable to take it, and because it's all written down and you sign it, I can take it to the autocrats and say, see, this is what we covered andf this is who was there, we're all good. :)  As far as I know, me, Kayla, Ted, Jodi, Tabbie, Nathan, and Jeremiah are the only ones in the group to have taken the class. Isaac, Victoria, Tom, Wendy, Sprite, Misty, Kevin, Dot, Ben, Annie, and Briana all read and signed the committment to camping safety. If your name is not on this list and you have taken the class, let me know. If your name is not on this list and you have *not* taken the camping class, please contact me to arrange a time for you to read and sign the Personal Committment to Camping Safety, or go take the class. (Ed. Note: I spoke with the autocrat , who read the PCtCS, and he said it looked good and should be fine.)
• We will have at least one dog in camp. She (and any other dog) needs to be leashed at all times. Do not do anything to the dog(s) to aggravate her or cause her to become hostile. The last time we had a dog in camp we had a problem not with the dog hiumself but with someone who was being stupid, and the dog got blamed for reacting to it. (If any of you wondered why they now have that pet registration thing at Egil's...)
  
• I don't remember what I put in last years HoF House Drink, Boobs. Unfortunately, no one else remembered either. SO I'm just going to make Spankings this year.  If anyone does remember, please let me know. :)
  
• We are trying to start up our own little "Gold Key" for our members (and guests they might bring) to use. So far Annie and I have contributed a bunch of clothes to it, and I spoke with Glyndon by phone (she, too, had to work and miss the meeting), and she's sure she can come up with some donations. If anyone else has donations, just let me know, I seem to be costume mistress for the time being. I will however, like someone at the event to take over this position and keep track of who borrows what and make sure it comes back!
  
• Colen brought up the need for an "entertainment staff" so Annie and I appointed him in charge of it. Firedancers, belly dancers, musicians, etc, please contact Colen about being entertainment.
  
• I brought up the idea of posting a guard at our entance, and when someone wants to come visit us, they say "Halt, who goes?" and the visitors tell the guard who they are,  the guard then turns in to the encampment "My Risio Clanmates, pray attend.." and indroduces the visitors.  We'd also need something to block the entrance when there was no guard posted, like how we had the HoF flag on the entrance at Egils and AWW 2001.  Ben, Erik, Thorn, and Mouse have all signed up or been appointed for shifts.
• Annie came up with the idea of doing a "secret Santa"-type thing for Egils, where everyone who attended the Gathering of Fools gets their name in a hat and then everyone pulls a name and gets a gift for that person. After the meeting we did just that.
  
• In other safety notes, I wanted to make sure everyone aware that there isn't much shade on the island so we should all take necessary precautions to stay safe. We will have some created shade, what with canopies and tarps.
• I bought some thin black satin ribbon the other day, and I will have it available if anyone wants some to put their token on with.
• Egil's 30 tshirts are for sale on the Egils website, and I printed and copied the order form in case anyone wanted to order one. They are $12 beforehand, and $15 at the event, however many don't sell online. They had a pic there too, it looked pretty cool.
• We will have some fun activities to participate in, including a Scavenger Hunt, with a prize to be awarded for the most creative interpetation of the list of things you have to find (and/or whoever gets the most things on the list) and the Foolish Hunt, which is what House of Fools has used as it's initiation for new potential members.