It was on 11-14 September at Lady Margaret Hall, and it was great fun!
The picture here features
Squatter of Amon Rûdh,
Poison Ivy,
Kath, yours truly,
Hookbill,
Estelyn and
Faramir Jones. Absent are
Pervinca Took and
Bungo, who also attended Oxonmoot.
Team
Bingo Baggins (the bravest little hobbit of them all) -
Esty,
Kath, me and three other girls (who will hopefully join the Downs in the future) - came
third in the Thursday night pub quiz. It was incredibly difficult and there were so many wonderfully knowledgeable Tolkien Society people that I'm quite frankly amazed!
Squatter and
Faramir's team (which didn't score) was called
Even Dimmer, which I think was great.
Friday, mostly spent with
Esty and
Hook (because responsible adult
Kath was at work), was full of very interesting lectures, creative things and a lovely afternoon
tea party. In the evening we had the reception and the banquet. We
misbehaved. I finally managed to claim the Chairman's badge and carried it very proudly for hours before
Kath stole it from me.
On Saturday after a short rest, we -
Kath as Mr Dwalin and me as Fili Son of Dís - prepared for the
Masquerade with
Bungo's amazing daughters (Idril and Gimli). We had a brilliant
hair dressing moment with Thranduil, and it's my favourite picture from the entire weekend. Gimli threw an apple at me, which wasn't nice at all because as you know, Fili hates apples, but we punished him by carrying him off the stage (after Idril had very kindly tripped him). However, we left a banana skin for
Hookbill, who was
the Fall of Arthur.
Esty won the awards for the best costume and best performance with her
hobbit lady, which wasn't very surprising.
Esty is amazing.
We also had the privilege to see
the fantastic Aratalindalë costumes that won the WorldCon masquerade!
After the Masquerade there was chilling out, pizza, Ceilidh, Telerin Circle, and a tea party. Sadly
Kath and I had to move our room party elsewhere because the college had messed up the room plan, but it was fun to poison people with my self-made Finnish salty liquorice vodka anyway.
On Sunday, after even less sleep, we got up for the Enyalië at the grave. The TS chairman (who had got his badge back by now) read the Song of Eärendil which is one of my favourite poems in LOTR. Then us Downers headed to the Bird and Baby for
lunch, and eventually, too soon, it was time for goodbyes.
I had a really good (if quite intoxicated) time, and it was especially lovely to see
Esty again after two years.
Until next September! ♥
(or hopefully sooner)