Meeting Minutes - September 2007

Present:  Ahlwin, Alyssa, Brigid, Kudrun, Maewyn,Vettoria, Vitaliano, Wulfram

Brilliana called the meeting to order at Brighid's house at 2:08 p.m. on Sunday, September 16th, 2007.

Officer Reports

Arts and Sciences

• The A & S list was passed around by Kudrun.
• In England, but we’re not jealous.

Chatelaine

• There will be more demos! Stay in touch.
• An A & S night for making loaner garb is in order.

Chiurgeon

• AWOL. Ransom for his hat has just doubled.

Exchequer

• Can’t print checks right now as computer is down.
• Reported Autumn Rose numbers:
  • 183 attendees (23 minors)
  • 117 campers
  • 78 Feast sold
  • 35 non-members
• Total receipts (including $20 brought to meeting by Ahlwin) $2297.
• Expenses included $500 for site, $50 for kitchen, something for trash pickup (maybe $300), $63.49 for Porter, a little for bathroom supplies. So we made a few bucks.
• Gavin refreshed his supplies with officer funds.
• Totals haven't changed since 8/31. (Webminister's Note: Totals not currently available.)

Herald

• Her Autumn Rose court report was in on time.
• There was little field heraldry at A.R.
• Reported on HE Astrid's reason for not being at Autumn Rose as planned, namely a fussy grand-baby.

Rapier Marshal

• Ahlwin may have a line on a site for winter practices.

Seneschal

• Nothing new.
• Kudrun passed off the role to deputy Maewyn, so she could chronicle for Ariella, who is in England and we’re really not the least bit jealous! Right!

Thrown Weapons Marshal

• Good attendance at AR.
• Will be at Siege the Day this coming weekend.
• Will announce practices if rain is needed.

Webminister/Chronicler

• Also in England. We’re still not jealous. Much.

New Business

Autumn Rose (post-mortem)

• Weather was perfect!
• Hornets were baaaaad. Hole in men’s room must be sealed and traps put out early.
• Grass was long for campers and archery. Need mowing closer to event (or less rain).
• It would be better if armored & fencers each had their own shelter.
• It was suggested that TW and archery be placed back-to-back again to share one canopy. (Although the archery area was packed, so the event Archery Marshal may try to veto.)
• We should talk up combat archery and get people up here for it next year.
• Children’s activities were successful, especially trivial pursuit and bocce.
• We dropped the ball on publicity. Posters for local coffeehouses (for example) would be good.
• We really need a volunteer coordinator.
• Autocrat (or someone to accept for her) must be in the Northshield/Rokeclif communications loop.
• Kudrun, Vettoria, and Vitaliano discussed a calendar for AR. Kudrun printed a draft and left them in the printer. (Sigh!) She will post as Yahoo document for group comment.
• Observation: We don’t have enough members! This thread will be continued below.
• Next year's Autumn Rose staff:
  • Event Steward – Brilliana
  • Feast Steward – Vitaliano
  • Other staff, including an assistant steward, will be worked out later.
  • Marshals (including boffer) need to be contacted this fall.
• Vitaliano made the observation that we really don’t have enough members to do AR. Yet we have two colleges that teach history and performing arts (not including those in Winona) to draw from. There are 32 students studying 13th century garb! Obviously, we need a chatelaine to make contact with these folks!
• All the other mice piped up, "But who will put the bell on the cat...?" We cleverly convinced Vitaliano that he needed to put his grill back in the van, and elected him Chatelaine with six ayes and one abstention (Alyssa).
• We also need to get out location on the website – Vernon County is not identified as Rokeclif.
• Practices would make better demos if we had a sign identifying us, and if there was a person who was not engaged in practice to chat with people.
• An ad in the newspaper was considered until the cost came up.
• Pictures of A.R. on our website would be nice. (Webminister's follow-up note:  Although permission to publish photos of SCA members at SCA events is not strictly required, we are strongly encouraged to obtain written permission from anyone who is recognizable in a published photo. Needless to say, this can take a lot of legwork, particularly in a group photo. And so my preference--apart from sheer laziness--has been to respect the privacy of the guests of our events.)
• A blog was considered.

Future Event: "Need Meat?"

• Vitaliano has been itchin’ to have an archery event at Tremplo Archers.
• The site has 60 acres of woods with several target areas, including 3-D targets. There’s a new clubhouse with 12 roaster circuits!
• Unfortunately there’s no running water, and we’d need porta-potties.
• Vitaliano will be in contact with the club to see if thrown weapons might be OK.
• This would be a good opportunity for classes, such as the required MiT/Chirurgeon class and a class on running tournaments.
• The theme would be a spring hunting party – seeking a new supply of meat as winter’s supply dwindles.
• We voted to hold the event, named "Need Meat?" on April 26, with Vitaliano as Event Steward.
• Many options for food were discussed, including inviting other Shires.
• It will be a demo/event, since we can’t keep members of Tremplo Archers out – but we could invite them in to see how the SCA does archery.
• Site fee by donation, with a set charge for lunch was considered, since non-member surcharge would be a major nightmare if locals were allowed on the range (they’d have to sign waivers and pay site plus surcharge).

Possible Future Event:  Northshield Coronation

• Ahlwin will investigate potential sites to hold a spring coronation whenever it comes around on the rotation.
• This fall’s Coronation (at The Mead in Wisconsin Rapids) used the resources of the hotel for many of the jobs (cleanup, setup, waterbearing, feast, etc.) that we do ourselves at AR. We might be able to pull it off!

Other New Business

• Brighid has been talking with the Kingdom Seneschal about becoming Kingdom Youth Minister. She’s researching period children’s games, stories, garb for the Kingdom youth website.
• The next Populace meeting will be at 2:00 p.m. on Sunday, October 21st at the La Crosse Public Library meeting room (downstairs). This is tentative, as the Library and Kudrun are playing phone tag.
• Populace meetings for November 18th and December 16th are also set in Jello. Locations to be determined, but we are hoping for the La Crosse Public Library.

The meeting was adjourned at 4:22 p.m.

Wolfram brought a wonderful period cake covered in honey. We (and Brigid’s bees) were grateful. Thank you, Brigid, for hosting and feeding us!

Webminister's Note:  Many thanks to Kudrun for taking such thorough notes at the meeting, and also thanks to Maewyn for running the meeting as Deputy Seneschal, which freed up Kudrun for her chronicling.

Page last updated:  29 September 2007