[Sca-cooks] Re: Feasts

[Siegfried Heydrich]

    We're having a similar problem in Trimaris with daytrippers who leave
site early. The fact that the camp we use for kingdom events is within a 3
hour drive of probably 60-70% of the populace may have something to do with
that. And as the SCA grows older, people are less inclined to 'rough it',
preferring their televisions and beds to staying up late and partying like
in the good ol' days . . .
    I suspect that if it became standard for feast to come before court,
people would adjust to it. After several episodes of people discovering that
they had been called up in court after they had left site (and perhaps a few
comments of Royal displeasure regarding this), they'll stick around. After
enough folks DON'T get their awards because they left early, they'll learn
to stay. This is one of those situations where the Royal Word comes in
handy - if a name is called and they've left site, should the King say
something to the effect of 'oh, well, perhaps my successor will hand this
out, as this person obviously doesn't care enough to attend My court', this
will immediately become known kingdom-wide. And the person(s) who skipped
court to hit a MacDonalds will be kicking themselves, as well they should.
Let this happen a few times, and BELIEVE me, court attendance will increase.
    Another thing that would keep interest up in feast and also shorten
courts would be to take care of non-essential business during feast; things
like gift presentations, taking associates, schtick, announcements, and only
doing 'official' business during court. Courts that are short and
expeditious are very few in number, and anything that shortens them is OK in
my book.
    A trend I've been observing for a while (which is trending upwards) has
been the number of 'attendees' as opposed to 'participants' at events, which
daytripping encourages. Highly visible volunteers (especially those basking
in the reflected glory of the Crowns) are plentiful, but there are fewer and
fewer volunteers for the behind-the-scenes scutwork. We suffered from a
severe shortage of kitchen volunteers last weekend at coronation . . . While
this may be a topic for another thread, I'm seeing a lot more of the
'medieval fair' attitude, where people feel that since they paid to get in,
they're entitled to wander about and be entertained. And work, well, that's
for the host group.

    Sieggy

-----Original Message-----


>Greetings.  Siggy put forth his case for feast first and then court.
>The "ideal order" may well depend on who the Crown is.  Both
>Valharic and I dealt in food of one sort or another.  He was
>mundanely a chef and I'm a kitchen scullion.  We disliked having
>feast start late, but we also have been the victims of the
>"never-ending feast" that takes three to four hours to serve.
>Having court start after one of these marathon meals would be
>disastrous.
>
> In the Midrealm, many folk seem to be leaving site and not eating
>feast, regardless of when feast is served.  If feast is first,  they
>don't get back on time (or ever) for court and aren't there to
>receive awards.  So, our policy was court first and then feast.
>Admittedly, we ran fast courts.  We did one 60+ award court with two
>peerages in less than two hours.  (I think it was a little more than
>1.5 hours.)
>
>The way I see it, in the Midrealm, having court first lets folk who
>don't eat feast be able to join in the fun and celebration of court,
>then go out and have a leisurely meal.  It's a "bummer", however, if
>there is Royalty who take forever to do their awards and who don't
>respect the fact that cooked food can't sit around waiting for them
>to get done with court.
>
>Alys Katharine
>
>
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