simplestgift: (Just a little idle talk of this and that)
Archie Kennedy ([personal profile] simplestgift) wrote in [community profile] lucetilogs2011-11-30 10:14 pm

Comfort and Joy

Who: Come one, come all! ...In formal attire.
What: A Christmas ball, old world style.
When: December 1st, beginning around five in the afternoon and ending when the last person leaves.
Where: The rec center.
Summary: Earth's eighteenth-century peeps are throwing one hell of a party.
Rating: Well, considering no one is serving water? Probably PG-13 for alcohol consumption and the results thereof (there's coffee and hot chocolate!).

The recreation center has been utterly transformed.

The doors open to a host of candles and a warm, old-world smell and feel. The scent of food and spices hangs in the air—mulled wine, wassail, evergreen boughs, fresh bread and roast meat. Cream brocades, simple but elegant, are draped over the walls. Traditional red rugs have been thrown over the floor. Gone are the billiard tables, ping-pong, and foosball. It looks like a different place entirely, every table impeccably dressed with light linen cloths and set with fine china and crystal. At least one-half of the room is cleared and ready for dancers.

The tables are lit with candles, and five chandeliers have been temporarily added to the room for more light, giving the room a golden glow instead of the sterile luminescence of fluorescent lighting. On the tables, boughs of evergreen and holly surround the candles, and mistletoe has been hung discreetly here and there. In one corner of the dancing area, by a large and beautifully decorated fir tree (Buffy’s insistence), the musicians are set up to play, unobtrusive to the diners but essential to the dancers. Leading them is Frederic Chopin himself, and few here can say they have had anyone better play for their pleasure.

Things will begin with a grand dinner late in the afternoon, with a light supper (mostly consisting of cold meats, bread, and other lighter fare) at around nine o’clock. The selection of food on the tables is enormous. Most of it is meat-based and some of it is simply meat. Roast beef with mushrooms, goose in giblet gravy, herbed chicken, baked salmon, and a whole pig are among the choices. There is some hope for vegetarians, though, with spinach mixed with bread crumbs and cheese on small toasts, turnips (or rutabagas if you speak American), onions, carrots, parsnips, mashed potatoes, asparagus in breadcrumbs, and savory onion and wild mushroom pies. There is hot fresh bread and rolls with butter and heaps upon heaps of small mince pies filled with fruit, molasses, and yes, a little minced lamb. Moreover, there are fresh winter fruits like oranges and mikans and many different desserts, such as Christmas pudding, a rum chocolate dessert, and spotted dog with custard. Sit and help yourself. For a complete list of the food offered, take a look here.

Among the drinks throughout the evening are wassail, tea, hot chocolate (less sweet and much more intense than most modern characters would be used to, made with cinnamon, vanilla, and a hint of cayenne pepper), coffee, brandy, wine both mulled and plain, port, sherry, and gallons of rum punch. Even though the food is fantastic, overseen by Jack Aubrey, the conversation is the point of the game, and who knows who they will wind up sitting beside. At the center of each table is placed a pineapple as a sign of welcome and wishes of prosperity.

There is dancing light as the music itself, with Archie Kennedy and Elizabeth Swann teaching the steps of each dance before striking up the music and letting everyone go to town with it. They are poised and elegant but relaxed and seeming to glide as they demonstrate the motions with an effortlessness that comes with years of practice. They were both raised on these dances and this sort of social function and seem completely at home here. The dancing begins after dinner with the minuets and continues after a light supper with some informal English country dances. Anyone unused to dancing like this may find that it’s harder than it looks, but when one gets used to it, it feels very graceful, beautiful, and…fun! The activity will only end when there are too few dancers left to continue, and will continue all night if possible. As dancers pass each other or move hand-in-hand, eye contact can be made, quiet words exchanged, subtle (or not) messages passed as they spin through the room, or perhaps the room spins while they remain still.

It might depend on how much they’ve had to drink.

Those who do not wish to dance have other activities to participate in. In one corner, card tables are set up with multiple decks of cards stacked up, and there is even a box or two of dominoes and a handful of dice. The tables themselves are round and made of polished rosewood or mahogany. This area is well-lit and on the opposite end of the room from the musicians and dancers, probably as a mercy to the tone-deaf Horatio Hornblower who loves cards but can’t abide music. Here, discreet (or indiscreet) gambling is inevitable. There may be no money here, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing to wager.

Are you lingering at the dining tables, drinking and talking loud and laughing with friends, or will you shyly sit and watch the dancing and games and hope to be invited in? Are you sitting quietly alone and listening to the music as your foot taps on its own, or are you unable to sit still and ready to dance all night if they’ll let you? Are you playing cards with a few new acquaintances, or are you hanging on someone’s arm and helping them cheat?

Whatever you do, have fun.
semper_cogitans: (:|a)

[personal profile] semper_cogitans 2011-12-07 08:13 pm (UTC)(link)
Robert nods slowly, consideringly. ... Yes, that sentiment is starting to seem slightly (frighteningly) familiar. Don has done this with his brothers. Not something he likes to see, but... it's become easier to tolerate, and try to approach, over time.

"... Ah, w-well... I suppose as long as it is conducted with, e-er... caution, then it... is not a problem...

... Terra's celebrations are... much different from this. For one, we m-might not even all have to be in the same building..."

And honestly, he might've preferred it.
dragoneer: (Breadmaking vikings!)

[personal profile] dragoneer 2011-12-09 11:08 pm (UTC)(link)
"Ah, well--that's the thing. It was...definitely not conducted with caution. B-but! No one ever died from it. Vikings usually only die from really...grisly things. Tough as nails and all."

Watch Hiccup be the first to succumb to death by the common cold.

"Oh, really? We'd always have ours in the Hall. Big enough to fit everyone around. And...relatively fireproof."
semper_cogitans: (:/)

[personal profile] semper_cogitans 2011-12-10 06:25 am (UTC)(link)
... No one ever died from it. Well. Robert supposes that... is better than the alternative. Somewhat. Perhaps.

And how exactly does Robert explain this...

"... The a-advent of the Internet in... the f-form used on Terra meant that... much physical c-cohabitation was... rendered relatively unnecessary... w-well, except in specific cases."

You still can't touch somebody through the Internet 3.0.

"... G-Granted, megatropolises are... m-much more dense than Luceti is..." And in a way, that sort of mass congregation of people allows for more anonymity than a little town.
dragoneer: (Yup. There you have it.)

[personal profile] dragoneer 2011-12-12 05:48 am (UTC)(link)
"...Ooookay, you lost me at internet."

Seriously. Hiccup can operate the oven. That is about as technological as he's ventured. He doesn't quite trust the microwave yet.
semper_cogitans: (:|a)

[personal profile] semper_cogitans 2011-12-12 04:43 pm (UTC)(link)
"... Ah, my apologies... I, er, sh-should have t-taken that into account."

It isn't often Robert is so glaringly reminded that what he takes for granted is completely unknown to a lot of people.

"... The Internet is... e-essentially a technological and... i-informational linkage between computers - d-devices, in my world, that... s-store and quantify information electronically - that functions s-similarly to how the journals do here..."
dragoneer: (Hopeful)

[personal profile] dragoneer 2011-12-13 07:12 am (UTC)(link)
...Yeah, this explanation doesn't help much. Hiccup's taken it upon himself to really understand how the journal works--even then, the whole idea of storing information is completely foreign to him.

...But it sounds interesting, at least?

"I...think I've heard of a computer, before? It, uh. Sounds neat!" Nodding. Yeah. He totally follows this. Not.
semper_cogitans: (:/)

[personal profile] semper_cogitans 2011-12-14 08:32 am (UTC)(link)
Whelp. Poor Hiccup. Robert is going to have to break down the idea of computers a lot more, isn't he?

"I... have a n-nanocomputer myself, here in Luceti... from Terra. I would... b-be happy to show it to you sometime... it would help with our l-lessons, in fact."
dragoneer: (A golden ticket!)

[personal profile] dragoneer 2011-12-16 06:48 pm (UTC)(link)
Yep, that's for sure. He'll catch up on technology sometime. But there are far more fascinating things he wants to learn about first.

"Really? You'd do that?" He knows enough to realize these are at least rare commodities in Luceti. "That'd be great!"
semper_cogitans: (-w-)

[personal profile] semper_cogitans 2011-12-16 10:57 pm (UTC)(link)
"Of course..." Robert smiles, almost brilliantly when compared to his more awkward smiles from before. "In f-fact, I... would be delighted. You are exactly the s-sort of person who would... appreciate it."

Even if Robert has to explain as much as he can about its workings. Some of it even he isn't entirely sure about...
dragoneer: (Hopeful)

[personal profile] dragoneer 2011-12-17 06:25 am (UTC)(link)
And Robert is right. Once he gets the handle on how they work, Hiccup is pretty much convinced he'll become as much a tinkerer with electronics as with anything else.

"That sounds great! Otherwise, I don't know how I'll ever really learn."
semper_cogitans: (:>)

[personal profile] semper_cogitans 2011-12-18 03:55 am (UTC)(link)
And Robert would be more than glad to nurture Hiccup into something of an engineer of electronics as well. In fact, he's got an engineer he'd love for Hiccup to meet...

"I would... w-welcome you coming to my home one of... th-these days. My... close friend, Donatello, has... e-expressed interest in meeting you, as well... he is a fellow i-intellectual."
dragoneer: (A golden ticket!)

[personal profile] dragoneer 2011-12-21 04:27 am (UTC)(link)
"Really?" Whoa, whoa. Someone actually wants to meet him? That's odd. Robert must have talked him up or something. He's not cool enough for that. "Well--sure! Yeah, I'd love to meet him. Great minds should...work together! And all."
semper_cogitans: (-w-)

[personal profile] semper_cogitans 2011-12-23 03:14 am (UTC)(link)
To Robert? Hiccup is, indeed, quite "cool". As cool as he can consider anybody, actually - a bright young mind, worthy of attention.

"I am... c-certain he would feel the exact same w-way... He is primarily an e-engineer, so his specialities lie e-elsewhere from mine, and thus you would... have a greater opportunity to learn..."