I’m feeling feisty and mischievous tonight
SO much so that I thought I’d start this journal with an engaging, misleading and non-sequitur title and a pretty funny poster about children and drugs. So much so that I think I’m going to show you a pretty clever second photo from my favorite comedy website Cracked. I’m wearing a pair of weird boxer-brief shorts – part of my Ali G costume. J Edgar is putting on his mother’s dress on the big screen. I swear there’s no connection. My lovely wife is busily tapping away on her computer on the couch and my darling daughter is asleep besides her, perhaps dreaming of Norris; Her Boxer-dog friend and frequent photo companion.
This has been a weird and hectic month
But aren’t they all anymore? I’m not exactly sure what to write in this journal, I have certainly done a lot of things. This month I worked at two very significant festivals and had a few fun social engagements too. I’ve done some travelling and helped keep our burgeoning empire running as smoothly as we can manage. But I haven’t taken so many photos. Still; I bet I can hammer out an enjoyable journal this month even without the stabbing I lied about in the title. I view each journal I write as a mysterious journey I take the reader on; like a train leaving a steamy station in some noir movie, full of adventure, danger and mystery. And games. Weird, familiar games.
Bristol we’re glad you’re becoming part of our regular schedule… sort of.
My first paid gig as an out-of-town professional performer was at the Bristol Renaissance Faire about 23 years ago. Riki and I performed Robin Hood for the first time there and it is the venue where we really started to figure-out our dynamic. It’s one of my all-time favorite faires and has been a complete pain-in-the-ass to get hired back at. As I described it onstage this year, “This is our third annual audition show!†But starting this year Heather and I became official vendors at the Bristol faire, her with Nomadic Dreams and I with Spice Traders Music (My drum shop). Even if the Tortuga Twins don’t get hired back – I don’t anticipate that we won’t – this show is now on Ronn and Heather’s schedule for the foreseeable future. It is geographically, desirable and falls into a much better spot on the calendar. It has huge potential for both  our businesses and the show. It has nostalgic value and one of the best social scenes all year. I already told you about the Christmas in July event in last month’s journal. We’re looking forward to it already for next year and plan on being more significant players. There was also the Fajita Rita, the Jouster Appreciation party and Potluck on the Pad. All three are depicted in the photos below. True; Heather did organize the last two… but it’s such a lovely community and we’re tickled to be returning next year.
Our Third Annual Audition Weekend Shows looked to be successful
We have now officially worked at (almost) every stage at the Bristol Faire. I got my start on a corner spot - with no stage and a few benches - that was located beneath the Rope Walkers rope. Riki and I also worked that self-same spot until we were eventually upgraded to the “Lord Mayor’s Forum†stage. In our last two audition years we got to perform at the lovely “Midsummer†Stage, the Harbour Stage, and surprisingly enough; the longed-for Cheshire Chase Action stage. This left only two stages un-trod by Tortuga booties. There’s a quaint little stage in the Children’s Realm that we’re not holding our breath for and the biggest, baddest, stage in the whole place. The Globe stage. As you can see from the photo below, this thing is huge, beautiful, and central to the entire faire. It’s also where they hold morning meetings. Our first two shows on Saturday went pretty well. So well in fact that the management – who, with the exception of the past two entertainment Directors - have traditionally been a strong anti-Tortuga faction, actually stopped Riki in the street to tell him how impressed they were. Then there was our third show on Saturday. It tanked. The audience doesn’t know us yet and there’s a lot going on in the vicinity of that stage. In this instance even our sure-fire, never-miss Robin Hood show wasn’t very well received. I actually thought to myself at one point “SO this is what the death of our career feels likeâ€. We were shook. We had one final show for the day left, and this one was listed in the program as NC 17. There was much discussion as to what we should do. We clearly couldn’t do Robin Hood or a Minnesota-style R-rated show. We didn’t feel like doing a nice clean short-version sword show. We wanted to play a little safe so that we could work here in Bristol again; but we were listed as a naughty show … what did we do? We went with what the fans wanted to see. It certainly wasn’t as naughty as it could have been – but it was a hell of a lot bawdier than we ever imagined we would do for an audition at a show that really mattered.
It Killed!
We had fun, made some money, and impressed the right people somehow. Most importantly we MADE THE FANS HAPPY! Man we love you guys. We received a lot of positive feedback and some glowing praise and we think we stand a pretty good chance of having a longer engagement at Bristol in the next few years. Our fingers are crossed but now it is just a waiting game. Ooh, speaking of games, the folks at cracked also made a mock-game out of the song I always sing to Scarlett. Check out the precious photos below
Sometimes as a business owner you have to do the work.
…Including this time an unexpected trip to Minnesota and back. As I am sure I have mentioned this has been a busy and entrepreneurial time for Heather and me. Our business has required (amongst other things) buying back the trailer we sold to friends; our former drum trailer that had become superfluous when we upgraded. Heather’s Honda has very limited towing potential so we loaded it with light-but-bulky stuff; predominantly the swords and shields stock for the trip to Wisconsin.  A few weeks in the trailer got hitched to the truck to transport stock and whatnot to Blackrock and I then brought it back to Bristol to use for storage. Deciding it was going to be too heavy to transport to Minnesota attached to the Honda, we determined that I’d need to make the day-trip to bring it to Minnesota with the truck. I was on the road for over 14 hours there-and-back. I dropped the trailer off at the RV park where we stay during this show and also stopped by the Minnesota Festival site where I was greeted by scenes of destruction… er I mean construction!. The kitchens across from Heather’s shop burned down in a Friday morning fire for Minnesota’s last weekend last year. Apparently there’s been some delay in rebuilding it. As you can see in the series of photos below, there was a hell of a lot of chaos in the vicinity of our stage. The stage itself seemed alright, but we just recently learned that they are going to be installing a new, alternate entrance to the fair and it is going to apparently pass right through our audience. *sigh*
Minnesota Renaissance Festival 2012 opened to a slew of changes.
We lost the services of our usual babysitter and had to replace her with one that - amongst other things; was an hour late for opening day. I had to bring Scarlett to the performing cast opening meeting – which was fun and she charmed everyone – because not only was the sitter late; Heather won’t be here on the weekends for the majority of the show. With her business concerns in Bristol and the Kansas City show requiring one of the owners to be present for at least two weekends of THAT show, Heather is commuting each Friday morning and returning each Monday afternoon. I’m enjoying the extra Daddy-Daughter time, though I sometimes loathe all of the extra work. I salute each and every single parent out there in the world – I genuinely don’t know how you do it. I naively expected the new kitchens to be finished by opening day; though I was unsure what miracle they’d have to perform to achieve it. As it turns out, I am apparently spoiled by the managerial abilities of folks like Jeffrey Siegel in Arizona. The Minnesota festival management did manage to pull the place together more than I feared they might, though the havoc they caused by upgrading the stage right next to my drum booth was disconcerting to say the least. Next month I’ll try to include some photos of our current parking situation at the festival: In the pit. We’re parking each morning in a muddy quarry literally five or more stories below the level of the surrounding ground. We’re soldiering through. The kid gets fed, bathed and watched through the day. The kitchens are open and selling, if ugly and unfinished. There seem to be fewer shuttles running to the parking lot this year but Scarlett is walking easier and more happily. In the end it is all made better by the huge, enthusiastic Minnesota crowd.
This is going to be another one of those stupidly-busy times of my life.
With Heather’s commuting and our combined work schedule, we have had no time for any real dining out or social functions. I haven’t managed a kayak trip yet, but I did take Scarlett to a movie. I made a trip to downtown, but it was to have a business meeting with a friend on a new web venture and to box-up and ship all of the surplus Swords and Shields stock back to my supplier. We had to cancel a trip to the State Fair, but we have managed a sushi dinner; take –out. I’ve spent loads of time in front of the computer. I’ve been writing, promoting pages and Kickstarter campaigns and even occasionally finding funny graphics about my favorite Mormon temple. I’ve been scrimping and saving every business penny. I’m deeply in debt with the drums. I hope that the business has better success in Kansas City than it has in Bristol. This weekend is the pinnacle of how spread thin I'll be; Spice Traders is open in three locations, Nomadic Dreams is open in two locations and not only are the Blue Team performing to huge, excited crowds in Michigan (with a replacement guy no-less!) but I am also managing what looks like it is going to be a very successful rose business there too. I have contracts to write, websites to create an advice column to do each week – which I am also turning into a Kickstarter project and a book and that is all before things get really crazy when I get to Charlotte. As if that weren’t enough – We successfully funded our Kickstarter project for our Christmas show… Now we have to finish writing, producing, selling tickets and perform the damned thing.
That’s going to wrap things up for this month.
It very much looks like I won’t have a moment to relax until December 16th or so. I need to find some kayaking time, some shooting time and some time to go hang out and shoot both photos and zombies with my friends in KC. There are restaurants here in the Minneapolis area that I look forward to eating at all-year-long that I need to squeeze in a visit to. In ten minutes or so (It’s morning by the time I complete this) I will have to put on clothes, pop on down to the festival site and begin some repairs on Heather’s booth and get some parts for rv repairing as well. Even with all the stuff on my plate I have been managing to go swimming with Scarlett at the campground pool about four days a week. Even at its worse it’s a great life… but sometimes I just wish a big black car would come take me away for a little vacation. I’ll see ya right back here next month.
