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My friend, Roma, created something absolutely gorgeous with my work, WOW! <3 

My friend, Roma, created something absolutely gorgeous with my work, WOW! <3 

Spanish Kitchen   -     Mati Klarwein,  1954

Jamie, arms crossed, was leaning against the door, watching me with both brows raised. “I am improvising a brassiere,” I said with dignity. “I don’t mean to ride sidesaddle through the mountains wearing a dress, and if I’m not wearing stays, I don’t mean my breasts to be joggling all the way, either. Most uncomfortable, joggling.” “I daresay.” He edged into the room and circled me at a cautious distance, eyeing my nether limbs with interest. “And what are those?” “Like them?” I put my hands on my hips, modeling the drawstring leather trousers that Phaedre had constructed for me—laughing hysterically as she did so—from soft buckskin provided by one of Myers’s friends in Cross Creek. “No,” he said bluntly. “Ye canna be going about in—in—” He waved at them, speechless. “Trousers,” I said. “And of course I can. I wore trousers all the time, back in Boston. They’re very practical.” He looked at me in silence for a moment. Then, very slowly, he walked around me. At last, his voice came from behind me. “Ye wore them outside?” he said, in tones of incredulity. “Where folk could see ye?” “I did,” I said crossly. “So did most other women. Why not?” “Why not?” he said, scandalized. “I can see the whole shape of your buttocks, for God’s sake, and the cleft between!” “I can see yours, too,” I pointed out, turning around to face him. “I’ve been looking at your backside in breeks every day for months, but only occasionally does the sight move me to make indecent advances on your person.” His mouth twitched, undecided whether to laugh or not. Taking advantage of the indecision, I took a step forward and put my arms around his waist, firmly cupping his backside. “Actually, it’s your kilt that makes me want to fling you to the floor and commit ravishment,” I told him. “But you don’t look at all bad in your breeks.” He did laugh then, and bending, kissed me thoroughly, his hands carefully exploring the outlines of my rear, snugly confined in buckskin. He squeezed gently, making me squirm against him. “Take them off,” he said, pausing for air. “But I—” “Take them off,” he repeated firmly. He stepped back and tugged loose the lacing of his flies. “Ye can put them back on again after, Sassenach, but if there’s flinging and ravishing to be done, it’ll be me that does it, aye?”

Aegidius Timmerman   -   Jan Toorop   1900

Dutch 1858-1928

Part 3

Before I go ahead and write about our “up close and personals” with Sam and Caitriona I just remembered something worth sharing from the Amazon part of Q&A. I think it was when the interviewer asked about the show international success and the fame that comes with it. He also mentioned Golden Globes and Sam said to that,

“Yes, at the Golden Globes, when we arrived, there were all those famous people around like DiCaprio and such, but there was also this big group of Outlander fans and when they saw us, they started chanting really loud Outlander!!! and cheering for us, so everyone there was suddenly checking us out…”

“Yeah” Cait added, “ they were wondering who we were and I was like, yup these are our people out there, move over DiCaprio!…”

For the full effect you really have to see Cait’s face while she was saying that!

Why we couldn’t take picture AMAZON, oh why????

Now back to when I left off…

After a few minutes waiting, we were asked to follow somebody to get us to the bar. We went back through the same hall that had all those Outlander posters on each wall and after a while entered a quite specious bar area.

Cait and Sam were already sitting behind their respective tables with huge portraits of Claire and Jamie behind them.

Since my friends and I were sitting in one of the front rows at the Q&A session, we were pretty much the last to arrive there, which was all good, more time to prepare. First I couldn’t see very well what was happening up front but after a while it was clear that people were getting exactly what was promised, little chat, photos and autographs. While waiting, except from chatting with all the nice people standing in line next to me, I occupied myself with a mental “caption this picture” game while looking at Cait’s face expressions in reaction to what people were saying to her.

Finally we got close enough to see the routine. Caitriona would get up from her chair, walk to the next person waiting and ask “How are you, what’s you name”, with a big smile on her face.

OK, I can do that! I’m fine of course and as for my name… come on I do know my name!  How hard can it be? Got it covered! Piece of cake!

Well, let me tell you, when my turn came, I did remember that I was fine  (which by the way was a big fat lie, I couldn’t be further from that, shaking all over…) but when it came to my name… Well, let’s just say Cait had to give me one of those… “Come on, you know that one…” look, before I got it out of me. Right when we were about to take the picture my phone rang. Of course, what else! It was my husband. Don’t know how he does it but believe me he is the master of bad timing… The women who held my phone asked if she should dismiss it or I was gonna answer…

“Are you kidding me! You really need to ask…”

That got Cait laughing and I wasn’t so shaken anymore.

When we got to the table, first I thanked her for letting us have this fantastic experience. Then I showed her the card my 11-year-old daughter wrote for her. To make the story short Nikki’s dream is to become an actress when she grows up and since (due to her mother’s slight obsession) Outlander surrounds her from every corner of our house, she picked Caitriona as her role model in pursuing that dream. I took her to the last day of RingCon in Germany in November. She brought a letter she wrote to Cait with her and asked Sam to deliver it safely. Ever since then, she kept bugging me with questions like “Do you think she got it?” “Did Sam keep his promise?” “Do you think she liked it?” over and over again. Obviously I couldn’t answer any of those. When she learnt I’d won that trip to London to finally meet Caitriona, she got really upset that she couldn’t go. When I showed her the e-mail from Amazon that said, only one person and you have to be over 18, she exploded…

“Seriously! Why do you have to be18 for everything in this world!”

(She knows she needs to wait until she is 18 to be allowed to watch Outlander!)

When she calmed down a bit she decided to write again, this time knowing Cait gets it for sure. Gotta say the card turned out pretty funny and Cait had a good laugh reading it but as for the first letter she couldn’t remember if she ever got it.

After that I wanted to talk a bit about her hiatus project #TrustNoOne that had just been successfully funded and so much more, but I’ve heard the women who were there to keep the line flowing asking me to move on to Sam.

What??? I’m not done here! I cannot just leave her like that! With the corner of my eye I saw that Sam was already free. Come on the person before me, how can you be done already, come back and ask him some more questions, like what he had for breakfast or something! No such luck! So I grabbed Nikki’s card from Cait, gave it Sam, and said “Here read it, it’s from Nikki”

“Who is Nikki?” his response was.

Jesus H Roosevelt Christ!

“The little girl from RingCon that gave you a letter for Cait. By the way have you ever delivered it?

“Yes, I did”

“Hmm…” that was Cait

“Come on, I gave it to you!”

At that point I looked back at the “security” women behind me and gave them a

“See, I am engaging them both! Cool, huh?” kinda look.

They gave me the “not impressed ”look back.

Anyways, Sam was reading the card and Cait got to signing the pictures for us. I’ve heard one of the women behind me saying

“Come on you have to get her moving”

and the other “ I’m trying…”

And that point I knew my time was really up, other people were waiting, but I just had to do something more, so I asked Cait “Can I just hug you?”

“Yes!” she said with that most beautiful smile of hers.

I didn’t see many people hugging her but come on, how can you look at her and not want to hug her????

When I finally moved to Sam it was all about Nikki and bringing back memories from RingCon. It was the second time I met him and for all of you fans out there that haven’t had a chance yet, if you ever do, don’t be shy, he is just the nicest guy you would ever meet!  He wrote a really cute Birthday note for Nikki and after taking a picture I wished him to have fun in Australia.

That was it! I was done with both of them! And let me tell you, it went way too fast! There were drinks and food there, lots of various toppings pizzas but even though I haven’t eaten since I had a little snack on the plane, I couldn’t even think about food. Managed to get some water down though.

Before I knew it Cait was getting up saying goodbye to us, shortly after that Sam finished with the last person and was gone as well.

It was really over!

I and my newly found Outlander friends were ones of the last to leave, so we kinda walked Sam to the elevator and then were on our way thinking we will not see them anymore but…  it turns out we were wrong! When we got to the front door, there they were, right behind us! We were all like “Hi, here you are again!” “Nice to see you!” “Long time no see!” and then… they got into a waiting van, waved us the last goodbye and were gone…

This time for good…

THE END

From the generous feedback I received about this blog, I know that many people enjoyed it and quite a few said that they felt like being there while reading. To make you feel like you were there was my ultimate goal and believe me, nothing could make me happier than knowing it worked!

#OutlanderEvening with Sam and Caitriona was the most wonderful experience any Outandr fan could ever wish for and I will be keeping my fingers crossed that everyone gets a chance to be a part of something like that at some point!

Part 2

When I say, by fan Q&A things got interested, I certainly do not have myself in mind as one of those making it so. I do carry about 100 Outlander questions in my head at all times but I will never be caught dead asking them in front of an audience because that might just be the outcome. So I set back, relaxed (as much as possible considering the circumstances) and let the brave ones take the floor.

The session actually started with not a fan, but Sam asking the first question. He wanted to know if we all read the books. That was met with bunch of enthusiastic yeses from pretty much all of us, only one person yelled from the back… “except for such-and-such’s (sorry, can’t remember the name) mother!”

After that Sam went on saying, “In that case if that’s OK with you, lets just skip worrying about the spoilers, kinda hard to discuss season 2 constantly being careful about them…” Everyone eagerly agreed, to which Cait added, “Sorry such-and-such’s mother, you will have to leave now…” That of course caused outburst of laughing.

I’m afraid I do not remember every question that was asked but I’m sure I have all the important ones still safely stored in my long-term memory. First one that comes to mind was about episode 16 traumatic experiences and how Jamie and Claire were coping with the struggle to bring their life back to normal. Sam and Cait agreed that the whole process was a very difficult and challenging experience for both of them. Obviously for Jamie, but also for Claire being pregnant and not able to fully share the joys of it with her beloved husband, even though as Sam pointed out, there were three of them in that relationship then. Instead, she needs to focus on finding ways to distract him from all those hunting memories, the major being the whole changing history mission but not only that, as Cait put it,“You know, she needs to come up with all kinds of things to make him stand up in the morning…”

Well, with “dirty minds” of Outlanders working 24/7, you can only imagine how that was received! Someone yelled, “Can’t believe you really said that!”, to which she started blushing and making those innocent faces of hers, Sam added his own famous facial expressions, they exchange THE LOOK and we just couldn’t stop laughing… When we finally did stop, Sam added that he thought what helped Jamie the most was learning that Black Jack Randall was still alive.

Second question was about their appearances at the con type of fan events and filming plans for the hiatus. Everyone knows by now that Sam had to cancel his appearance at Cologne due to Oxford filming schedule, which at the end fell through due to Outlander taking longer to film than originally planned. Turns out Oxford is not a 100% no-go just yet, according to Sam there is still a chance he might be able to appear in it, if nothing more unexpected happens. So fingers crossed for that!

Caitriona was asked why we don’t see her at any fan gathering events. She said that she would absolutely love to attend but her working schedule is so tough that she hardly gets a day off and when she does, she just needs to focus on recharging her batteries, but she promised that if it ever becomes any lighter and she gets invited, she will most certainly consider coming. So again FINGERS CROSSED!

Next question and the answer to it brought pretty much everyone down to tears…

MAJOR SPOILER ALERT! IF YOU DON’T KNOW THE BOOKS AND DON’T WANT TO GET YOUR HEART BROKEN JUST YET, PLEASE STOP READING NOW!

    The question was how Claire dealt with Faith’s death, how hard it was to portray that part of the story and how/if the whole experience effected Caitriona personally. The room went completely silent and we could see that it’s not going to be easy for Cait to answer that question without getting her own emotions on the subject show. She said that for Claire that was obviously one of the toughest experiences she had to ever encounter, not only the physical and emotional pain of losing a child but also the fact that this child was such a miracle, with her previously being convinced she couldn’t have one, and not only was she pregnant but also the baby’s father was none other but the love of her life. She said the episode was beautifully written by Anne Kenney (I hope I am remembering correctly) and it took them a whole week to film it. Parts she found most challenging but uplifting at the same time were shot in Glasgow cathedral. She added that she is not a very religious person herself even though she was brought up as one, but she fully understands why people are drawn to such places when they go through most traumatic experiences in their lives. Sam agreed to that and said what Cait did with those scenes was absolutely amazing!

At this point tears seriously clouded my eyes and I could see that hers got glassy as well. Sam took over and said that for Jamie the hardest part was being separated from Claire, not knowing what happened and no being able to do anything about it. Cait finished saying that we need to focus on the most positive outcome of the whole experience which is finding out that their love is deep enough to survive even such horrendous trauma and the fact that they will go on building their relationship and the bond between them becomes stronger than ever.

Gotta admit that I’ve never doubted that this is going to be one of the hardest episodes to watch but after what I heard them say I am petty sure my chances of surviving it significantly dropped.  

Next person wanted to know if they would change anything in their characters or storyline if they got a chance to do so. They both said that they wouldn’t really change anything. They fully trust the writers, who in their opinion, are delivering a great story but then again Sam added, `’If I really could change a thing, I would not have Randall die.” That got a loud “whaaaat???” from the audience. He started defending himself saying, “Come on, he is such an interesting character, brings so much to the story…”

Cait just looked at him and said, “Right…”

Next question was about all the new characters joining in season 2, how they feel about them and if season 3 is a go, are they looking forward to ageing on the show.

They both like the “new blood”, all the French actors and Roger and Bree of course and they are looking forward to their characters to mature, as Jamie and Claire go from their twenties to their fifties. Cait is wondering how motherhood will effect Claire, as well as her career as a seriously accomplished doctor, and “Jamie…” she added, “he is in a cave, isn’t he…”

Sam, ”Yeah, what is he doing in that cave?”

Cait, “No idea…”

Sam, “and then he marries Laoghaire!”

That of course got a laud “booooo…” from the audience and to see Cait’s face at that point was just priceless!

Sam, “I know, right…”

When we were done laughing, the last question I remember brought us back to the subject of writers. Someone asked if they ever can make any changes in the script when they look at it and think “this is just bunch of crap”…

Cait answered it saying that if they ever said, “that’s bunch of crap” they would be most likely thrown out of the room… and then added quickly… “well, sometimes, I do look at something and think, “No way! Claire would NEVER do that!!! But as I said, we trust the writers to know our characters better than we do and the results had been fantastic so far, but yes they do make us feel like they value our opinion, let us have our say but not necessary apply it to the final product.”

That was it. Q&A come to an end and we were ask to stay in our seats until they have arranged everything ready in the bar area. Cait and Sam got up and left the room, Cait waving gracefully to us like a queen she is, Sam following closely. When they left the room felt suddenly empty, even with all of us still there, and you could pretty much hear people thinking, 

“OMG, this is it, we are going now to be close enough to touch them, talk to them, get autographs… Holy crap! THIS IS REALLY HAPPENING!”…

Yup, it really was, but I’m going to tell you all about it tomorrow…

This text will contain major season 2 spoilers so if you haven’t read the books and wish to stay spoiler free please do not read it.

I’m not a writer or a blogger and English is not my native language so I apologise in advance if my writing turns out to be not a very smooth read, containing occasional spelling and grammatical mistakes.

PART 1

A promise is a promise so as promised ;) I will try to recall as much as I can from the absolutely FANTASTIC evening with Caitiona and Sam organized by AmazonVideoUK last Tuesday.

Even though it already happened I still can’t quite believe I was actually there. It might have something to do with the fact that the whole thing came absolutely out of nowhere (I was pretty much convinced my e-mail address didn’t even register since there was no “thank you for entering” reaction) and carried that extremely “last minute” vibe with it. When I saw the message saying I was one of the lucky winners, I had less than 12 hours to organize childcare (my husband was away on a business trip), plane tickets and accommodation in London. On regular basis my dealing with such situations leads to a complete chaos but this time everything went surprisingly smooth and before I knew it, I was sitting on a plane making two total strangers promise me they will check #Outlander out! A Brazilian girl vaguely recalling something about the books and an English gentleman who at first drew a total blank but after a while said, “Wait a minute, I think I’ve heard something about it on Radio4, a guy, rolling naked in the mud in 18th century Scotland…” Yup, sounded like #Outlander to me!