So I haven't been to Pantheacon in four years. The first two years I ended up being broke in January/February and the third year I had car trouble and the friend I was going to go with bailed, so I took the hint from the universe and didn't try to go then either. This year I didn't have lightning strike me down, so I decided to sneak in at the last minute (I also get a room that isn't associated with the con so I can GET a room whenever I want) and go. I had the improv workshop already booked, so I went down on Saturday morning. Here's all the workshops I went to:

Saturday's outfit: a rainbow tie dye top and rainbow bunny skirt, the latter of which I made myself. People there really liked it.

* Palmistry for Fun and Prophet:
This was...not my favorite workshop because it was such a confusing mess. Unfortunately she decided to START the class with "let's read/talk to your neighbor" (note: as far as I'm concerned, NEVER a good way to start a class, if you do that it all devolves into chaos), and sure 'nuff, that is what happened. Though I did like conversing with my neighbors, one of whom did astrology and got my personality pretty nailed and the other used to work at the giant org I work at. She used to work in a section that has been in the media lately and when she asked me how X was, I was all, "Oh, X got fired!" So... anyway, she's happy she's out of there.

Back to the class, the teacher eventually attempted to vaguely teach about the lines on your hand, but the room was such a confused ruckus that people kept asking over and over again, "Which hand line is which?" Another neighbor of mine was all, "I literally already knew all of this stuff." Yeah, me too. I am in no way an expert on palmistry--I find it a hard thing to learn anything about because if you don't have real life pictures of how the lines look it's confusing as hell--but this kind of thing is why it sucks to try to learn. Uck. Remind me never to go to a class of hers again, it's a waste of time trying to learn from her.

Also, I went to the next workshop in the same room and the instructor was very grumbly about how the uh, psychic room hygiene had been left behind to be cleaned up afterwards. I was all, yup, it was a mess in here.

* Reading Tangled Threads: A method of divination:
I'm not sure if I can describe this one too well, it was along the lines of trying to figure out the connections between you and other people by using yarn as a metaphor. Interesting but I'm not sure how well I could try it myself since I'm not too visual-ish.

* Divination workshop about reading with two decks:
I went up to the divination suite for this one and really enjoyed it. She was talking about how to use a tarot deck and an oracle deck at the same time to complement each other in the readings. I did not bring *any* card decks with me to the con, which I totally regretted since it turned out they were having a card deck swap and I would have liked to have done that. But that did mean I could borrow some decks, so I borrowed the two decks I already owned there, a Quest Tarot and a Gypsy Witch oracle. Why did I buy that last one? Boy, did I not enjoy working with it. I got very weird readings. However, I do like the idea of using two decks if I use a better deck...more on this later.

I also ended up talking to a girl who's being bullied in a college class (and of course the bully is being allowed to get away with it) and then the same bully showed up at the con and was harassing her. However, it sounds like reporting it to the con folks went well. (Huzzah for con.) I told her how to basically turn invisible in public if need be. I hope that helps.

(Note: for those of you wondering why I don't do that at work...dear lord, the drama any time someone can't find me.)

I ran into Merry in between sessions! I hadn't contacted anyone I know who might be coming since I did this so last minute and since Merry hadn't gone the last few years either I didn't expect her to come. So that was a happy surprise for all. We said we'd try to get together tomorrow.

* I am We: The "We're All In This Together" ritual:
This was a short but fun one done by the "Rainbow Warriors," in which we got rainbow con ribbons to hand out to people and they had an awesome rainbow altar with lights and bling. That made me happy. As for the subject matter, you can probably guess that on your own :)

I was a good girl and did NOT stay late into the night and made myself go home after that and go to bed early. I was pondering going to the Oracular Seidh (where Asatru folk who channel will answer your questions), but I know that's a crowded, locked-in event and I didn't have any specific questions to ask and I didn't want to be locked in till like 1 a.m. or whatever. Why did they schedule this so late, anyway? Though that said, they had very few events scheduled at 11 this year--I think they had less events in general. But that did help me go to bed like a good little girl.

Sunday:
I wore my peacock dress and bathrobe that day, which was also well received. I also got a ribbon advertising me as one of the "peacock posse." Huzzah!

* Practical Ancient Greek Divination: This was okay but not as exciting as I thought--this dude researched this topic for a book and showed some props, but actual divination didn't go on, probably because they're not sure how it was done.

* Excavating, Exploring and Rejuvenating the Royal Road, by Thalassa
Thalassa is my favorite tarot person and she never disappoints when she lectures. She's random and fun and funny and researched and awesome. She's the kind of person who is all, "They scheduled a lecture by Mary Greer at the same time, y'all should go see Mary Greer." I did type up the notes from this but I'll spare them here. But it was great.

I spent the lunch hour with Merry since her husband was back in the hotel room. We went shopping and she got some pants and I got a sparkly dress. Sadly, that's all I got to see of her because all attempts to see her later were basically thwarted by her husband. I'll restrain myself from saying more on that, but it was typical for him. Sigh. Oh well, got to see her twice at least.

* Guardians of the Crossroads Ritual:
I think this one would have been cool had I not been well, me. The idea behind it was cool, to have some conversation with a crossroad deity about your path. However, that part wasn't very guided and I spent my time kind of spaced out expecting to be walked through it, and the leader did not. I realized halfway through "oh, I'm supposed to be doing something here" and uh...I had no idea, I was getting nothing, I was a blank.

You know, some psychic shit works for me (i.e. props) and some does not work so well (channeling, meditation) when it comes to reception and/or accuracy. This is what led me (between this and the card divination class yesterday) to come up with some whopping huge divination system for what to do when you're blank. I'm working on it...

* Key Magic: I was debating going to three workshops at the same time and picked this one and it turned out it was one I'd been to 4 years ago, with the same dude (who has since changed his name from when he did it the last time). Still a good workshop, mind you, but I was kicking myself for the repeat. I got some new stuff though, I think, upon comparing notes from the last one too. And I got some free keys.

* Pop Culture Tarot: This was a lot of fun, it talked about various decks (legal and not) based off of various pop culture fiction, and also had some cool tarot layouts, and the ladies had us design our own pop culture spreads. We did The Hobbit since one of us had a Hobbit themed deck. A lot of people did Star Trek. My favorite was the Hamilton layout, themed to "Burn."

* Seidh Dojo: This one was kind of a "working on your magic skills" workshop about working with energy, including energy balls, which I enjoy.

Monday:
I wore a super ruffled dress I got at the Pirate Festival. People still liked that one too! Always fun to wear what you wanna at these things.

* Fear as a Source of Magic:
This was the best workshop I did this year and the one I am still plugging to other people, a lot. The guy made some very good points about how we think fear is supposed to protect us but really it's just past and future imaginings, more or less.

* Ho'opono Pono Ke Ala (Making right the path)
Hawaiian one! Yes! This one talked about a lot of Hawaiian history, had us doing a hula and making a bracelet, but the theme was a process for working on forgiveness with other people. I should really do that.

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