Just a day late.
The title I use for this month’s journal works on many levels. Clearly we have always considered our little loading dock home; sad and ironic as that turns out to be. We can also stretch the metaphor to reflect its baseball usage; fiscally sliding to safety under the threat of financial ruin and dissolution. And after 14 years, this festival, this wild, wild place, and the biggest crowds we work for all year certainly has become our home. Or ONE of them.
Speaking of returning home
In 1990 I talked Riki into leaving his dead-end job and going on the road. I believed he belonged in a much more creative and chaotic world than the one he had been previously inhabiting. You’ll have to ask HIM whether he wishes to thank or curse me.
Riki and I both worked odd jobs, that year. I went to Tennessee as a juggler. He went to a show in Mount Airy, NC as a squire. Eventually we met up at the Bristol Renaissance Festival, on the Wisconsin/Illinois State border. I’d been hired as a juggler there as well, but we did a little finagling, and got the powers-to-be to agree to let us do our Tortuga Twins show together. Riki then pulled some other strings, and we got accepted into the festival outside of Kansas City, our first contracted, on-the-road show as the Tortuga Twins… Our first week there (KC not Bristol) I met this beautiful, young asian girl who, in a weird twist of fate would become my wife 16 years later. It all started with Bristol. So it was with incredible joy that we returned to Bristol 20 years later.
Let me digress for a moment.
We put a lot of work, heart, thought and soul into this fan club. I tend to write six to twelve pages each time. I expose my family as well as my soul. I look for interesting articles: everything from political arguments to really amusing photos about good parenting, and bad. We are seriously contemplating discontinuing the fan club… taking in no more members, and just letting it expire. This club is expensive, time consuming, and maybe, just maybe, purely a vanity project. SO before we go on with my story this month; I want to ask you two favors. If you read these journals, drop us, each of us, a line. We could use the feedback. Secondly, please get some of your friends or family to join the Fan Club too, or buy it for someone as a gift. We love sharing with you guys, but if this thing was really profitable, it sure would make all of the work easier to stomach.
Everything about the two Bristol weekends was better.
Battle Creek, and the Silver Leaf Festival was trying, and a lot of work. Everything about the Bristol was easier. The Michigan trips were over ten hours each way; The Bristol trip was merely six hours. We did take separate vehicles, so no Star Trek, or Big Bang Theory, but it was a very pleasant ride. Silver Leaf’s hotel was run down, and the rooms had so many problems we ended up moving four times in one weekend. For this trip, we stayed in a much nicer hotel. It was clean, close to the action, in a good neighborhood, and even had a ridiculously hot woman who seemed to be on the same parking lot schedule as we were. We suspect she was a “girlfriend for hire” of someone staying in the hotel; she dressed like a hooker. He dressed like a country music star. Still, she was fun to look at. We knew very few folks at the Silver Leaf Faire, but Bristol was in so many ways like coming home. We found ourselves drinking with Jousters before we even got to the hotel. A lot of our friends, old and new, come to the Bristol show. We got to visit with folks we hadn’t seen since Georgia and some we rarely get to see any more at all.
It was so weird to be back on the Bristol site again.
So many memories, so many hi-caliber festival acts, the smell of the place, it was all overpowering. The first time we stepped back on stage after a fifteen year absence - and twenty years after we launched from here… we KNEW we were where we belonged. We hope to make Bristol one of our “Anchor Fairs”; along with AZ, GA, NC, Louisiana, and Minnesota. Don’t worry Minnesota, you’re not gonna lose us.
Hanging with the “Boyz” was nice.
We continued our trend of eating, drinking and being silly. I drank to excess at least twice, returning to the room while my more adventurous siblings partied on. We stayed through the weekend, venturing out to the on-site bar once; even staying through Monday morning for Rennie breakfast. An easy six hour drive saw me returned safely to my family… Home again, Home again Jiggety-jig.
The second weekend, Heather and Scarlett came with me
I was missing them with all of this travelling, I wanted to show off Scarlett to some folks, and Heather remembered Bristol from her “Pre-Ronn” days. Before we left, we had to do some rapid cleaning. We had given the crib away before ever we left Kansas City; Now it was time to pile all of the crazy toys on the couch clear even more toys and furniture from the rear of the trailer so our dear friend Larry Pogue could come in for his annual carpet cleaning. As I have mentioned before; some of our fans have transitioned from fan, to friend and even becoming like family. Larry and Tracy are CLEARLY some of those; But it sure doesn’t hurt that Larry works for, and used to own a carpet cleaning company. After the sand of Phoenix, mud of Charlotte, and the red clay of Georgia, and Louisiana, not to mention tiny daughter and menagerie of pets, our house really needs its yearly carpet maintenance.
As promised on Facebook…
For weekend number two of Bristol, I walked in pushing a stroller. The day was hot, long, and tiring but this is one of those times… A bad day at my job is better than a great day at most folk’s jobs. Heather and Scarlett spent the majority of the time in Misti’s “Tree house” over the Sky Chair’s booth. She didn’t even bring herself and Scarlett out for Sunday. When I finally returned to our hotel – the cheaper and more run-down Value Inn, we first had to record the commentary track for our New DVD! if you listen to the track, the ice-in-a-cup noise you’re gonna hear is me with my cocktail. Monday AM saw a business meeting with the Boss in Bristol (keep your fingers crossed!) and a trip back to our lovely loading dock home in Minneapolis.
Did you know you can hire us for private parties?
We are available to make your party special, and for right now, we’re even on sale! There’s a very nice, and generous Doctor in Glendale AZ who not only knew this, but went to great length to have us come to the Phoenix area for his daughter’s sweet sixteen. He flew us out; an easy painless flight. When we arrived we immediately hit the town for cocktails and sushi. As soon as we walked into the restaurant, the hostess, recognizing us called out our name. While there we were joined by our dear friend Wendi. The doctor secured us not-only a VERY nice, comfortable, swanky room at the Hilton, a room with all the best features; but he took us to dinner on our arrival, made arrangements for the party to take place right there in the Hotel, and was just plain nice to deal with.
It was in all ways, both a whirlwind trip, and a smashing success.
After dinner we hit the town with Yo-Yo wiz Julius. We joined him, and another dear friend of mine at a Charm School for Wayward Girls in Scottsdale AZ, we drank, a lot. The girls treated Julius like a rock star, and we, amusingly enough, were his entourage. We slept late, ate a nice breakfast, and endured or enjoyed the three-digit temperatures in Phoenix. We shopped, ate a nice lunch, and performed for the very charming Rachel and her friends. The show was great; the parents laughed, and weren’t offended. The young girls laughed, and were neither bored, nor felt condescended to. The girls were mostly ballet dancers from Rachel’s dance class, and performed and impromptu balletic performance to Solja Boy’s “Superman That Ho” . By one AM Riki and I were on a flight back to Minneapolis; Jef on his way to Florida for a much needed visit to the wife. Easy, peasy!
The week before Minnesota opened was hectic, of course.
My wife has moved from the stained-glass she was selling last year, to the products she really wanted to be selling all along: some of the most beautiful clothing I have ever seen. Setting up her shop took LOADS of work. I did some sawing and drilling, and mostly stayed out of the way. I’m proud of her hard work, and her vision, and I KNOW she’s going to be a success with this line, she has to! Someone has to support us when I am too old for this shit!
As it has for us, for the past 14 years, Minnesota opened with a bang!
I won’t say it was our easiest or most pleasant opening weekend in Minnesota. It was hot, humid, and miserable. The crowds were sparse, they were grumpy, and they craved the shade so much you’d have thought they were the stars of True Blood. But what they ALSO were is the Minnesota Audience! We drank, swore, fought with swords AND a walker (I still bear the bruises from THAT bastard). We made money; we drank too much and sweated it all out. PLEASE come back COOL WEATHER!
We’ve managed to resume our busy social schedule
It is Thursday as I write this, and we’ve already managed to go to a birthday party for one of Heather’s business partners - Ethiopian food. We’ve also managed a going away, albeit temporarily- party for frequent subject of these journals Robert. He departs for two months of advance schooling in Houston on Saturday, and this was the only time we’ll get to see him.
So that about wraps up this journal…
Go back and read the link under the paragraph about “Hanging with the Boyz” if you haven’t done so already. Keep your fingers crossed that we get cooler weather, and soon. Write us if you read these things, and please make your friends sign up… Remind me next time to tell you why we won’t be staying at our loading dock home for much longer, or ever again…
