TRF Trip
Friday Night
Cris and I got there early on Friday and set up most of the camp before sunset. We had Cris's tent, the screen tent, our tent, and the crappy dining fly that became the shower tent. Cris's car closed off the circle and we roped it all off with Caution tape. Not that it mattered. Row 16 only had one other campsite, and 17 and 18 were pretty much empty. After setting up, I scrounged up some firewood and built a fire. We sat around drinking and talking for a few hours. The police came by and told us we couldn't have a ground fire, so we let the flames die down until the reinforcements arrived with the fire tub. I was pretty drunk by the time Brig, Jason and Amy got there. I went straight for the fire tub, tossed in a couple starter logs with some bigger wood, and, as I promised Cris, we had a raging fire in less than 5 minutes. Then I set up the tiki torches to further mark the perimeter of our camp.
Not long after that, a really pretty girl came by our campsite looking for her friends who were supposed to be camping in row 18. I went with her to 'help her look'. The row 18 area had only one campsite and it wasn't the one she was looking for, so we walked off toward the bonfire, looking. Her name was Blake and she was looking for Taewas. She was a culinary student in Austin, and had driven down after class. She'd been coming to the faire for a long time (since she was 15), but she'd always worked there. This was her first time to camp in the patron campground. We got to the big bonfire and the crowd was sparse. The drummers had about as regular a beat as a handful of marbles dropped on a drum, and none of the girls were dancing. Apparently all the good drummers were elsewhere. People at the fire were mostly just standing around talking. She ran into a guy she knew, named Paul, who also joined us on the quest for Taewas. Paul thought he'd seen the guy over at the Chaos camp, so off we went.
After tromping through several other camps on the way over, we reached a tent with a bunch of drummers, and there he was - Taewas - the guy she was looking for, who was supposed to be camping in row 18. No, they wound up camping in row 5 or something, and he was having fun playing the drums. We hooked up with a couple other people, and turned around to go back and get Blake's car. One of the guys was a regular, who was there every week, but unlike most of the regulars who were from the Houston area, this guy drove down from Dallas every weekend. I asked if the faire was usually this sparse on the third weekend, or if attendance was just down this year, and I got into a socio-economic discussion with Paul about how the shitty economy, the raging high gas prices, and the hurricanes had really cut into people's disposable income and dropped attendance through the floor for this year. It wasn't just an off-weekend, attendance was way down.
We got back to our campsite, and I bid them farewell. While I was gone, a drunk kid had stumbled into the campsite offering to trade Sprite for beer. And he'd knocked down one of our tiki torches. I stood it back up, but the wick had slipped into the reservoir. I unscrewed the top and, still drunk, I stuck my finger in to fish out the wick. And I stuck it in a little too far. So there I was with my finger stuck in a tiki torch. I pulled the reservoir out of the torch stand and lubed up my finger with some tiki torch fuel. Then I gave it a hearty tug and out popped my finger, minus some of its skin, thanks to the rough metal edge of the hole. Well, I was properly anaesthetized already, so I felt almost nothing, but the blood cascaded down my finger in rivulets. Brig came to the rescue with some first aid - she took a picture, then cleaned it with some alcohol (I think), and put a band-aid around it. I don't remember much more of that night, although I think I sat around talking and drinking for a while, I made Amy a Midori Sour, and I made a few Ketel One-and-Tonics. After having a few more drinks, myself, including what was left of Amy's Midori Sour, I passed out in the chair. When Brig put me to bed, I didn't complain.
Saturday at the Faire
Woke up the next morning (believe it or not) hung over. Brig put on her Scottish dress-thingy with a Scottish name, and I put on my great kilt. We went over around 11am and met up with Artcat, Lost_Thought, Kaylee4Simon, and some other Houston Browncoats. Brig and I each got a Scotch Egg with cheese for breakfast, then headed over to watch the Tartanic bagpipe show. Then we headed to the Sea Devil tavern, stopping by Angel Swords on the way. We lost track of the Browncoats, and after waiting for a bit at the tavern, we headed to the Odeon stage and watched Arsene, who was funny, as always. I wandered back to the Sea Devil after the show, taking several pics as I went. I ran into Blake there, who said, "Hi, Jason!", which shocked the hell out of me. She told a couple of her girlfriends that I was the guy who'd helped her find Taewas the night before at the campground.
Brig and I were supposed to meet up with Cris, Jason, and Amy for the Ded Bob Sho at 1:30, but I was having more fun taking pictures and people-watching, so I was late getting to the show. Aside from Old MacDonald's Dysfunctional Farm, I think everything was same material I'd seen about a dozen times. It's a funny show, don't get me wrong. But it's the SAME DAMN SHOW every time. I don't get the people who go time and again and again and again, and claim that it's the best show evar. Naturally there is some variation in the zombies that get picked from the audience. This day, in particular, he'd snagged a really cute blonde girl. It was funny, but not funnier that Arsene. I guess, maybe, some members of the audience really do get Bob-mo-tized. The Browncoats were at the show, but again I lost them. Brig and I split a King's Beefy Bun from the nearby food stand.
We were thinking of going to the Joust to the Death (which we later heard was LAME), but although it was a fairly nice day in the shade, it was too damn hot in the sun. And that's where the joust was - in the sun, with no damn shade. So, after sitting in the shade by the Sea Devil for a bit, Brig and I headed off to Sherwood forest. Now, I'm pretty sure I remember a time when Sherwood forest was tiny (and about a foot deep in water), but now there's a huge area back there that we never seem to go to. They got lots of carnival games along the lines of throw the knife/axe/throwing star/wench/etc. Shoot a longbow, catapult a frog, push a penny, fish for duckies, throw a tomato at the asshole, and so on. They've got a bunch of giant swings (four adults across) powered by a wench (the other kind), and they've got a spinning ride called the Dizzy Dragon or somesuch. There's also a den of Italian food back there. And the big surprize deer that drops down on unsuspecting patrons. Heh heh.
We'd partly gone back there to hear Cast in Bronze - imagine you play an instrument that no one has ever heard of... that weighs fourteen tons... that's impossible to put inside and difficult to put outside... imagine that you want to play it at renfests with other instruments recorded on a soundtrack... for the first time in the history of the world... imagine that you're over-the-top-flamboyant and dress in all black with a Clockwork Orange mask... Well, you don't have to image all that, just go see Cast in Bronze - a freaky guy who plays all kinds of cool stuff on a big-ass carillon. I didn't actually watch the show (I'd seen it at Scarborough), but I wandered around Sherwood and listened (it does carry a bit).
I'd just gotten Brig an Italian ice orange and played a game of push penny (shuffleboard meets skeeball) when I hear "Hey there's an arcbat!" It was the Houston Browncoats again. I went and got Brig, and we all headed into the magic garden together. That was another reason that I'd headed back to Sherwood - I'd never been to the magic garden. We strolled though, took a Browncoat group pic, and sang a bit of The Hero of Canton as we walked. We headed up to the front, stopping at a couple of shops along the way. Brig got a TRF ambigram pin from the gift shop. Then we headed to the nearby food court, and after a bit of walking, we went back to the front. Once we'd reached the gate, we all sat down in the shade at the base of a tree. The dragon puppet place was having a drawing to give away prizes, so we got tickets and waited a few minutes for the drawing to begin. They gave several prizes, but nobody that we knew won anything.
We called Cris and found out that she was already back at the campsite with a splitting migraine, so it being around 6pm, Brig and I were about ready to head back as well. The Browncoats were also ready to leave, so we bid them farewell. Brig and I made one last use of the running water, where I found out that having 8 yards of kilt can be pretty cumbersome in the bathroom. I also pulled the band-aid off my finger to clean the wound really well, and the skin was looking all puffy and nasty. As soon as I got back to camp, I dug out the first aid kit and Brig and I worked on cutting off some skin, applying some anti-biotic and wrapping it with some actual gauze, which would allow it to heal a lot better than a band-aid could. The fire was built up, the tiki torches lit, and after the fireworks, Jason and Amy arrived at the camp.
Saturday Night at Camp
The fire cooked down a bit to coals and we set up the grill. I put on a pot of coffee, using our new camp percolator. Cris made some potato, cheese, pepper and onion pockets that turned out very tasty. Jason wanted to have some breakfast sausage and eggs, and we came up with the idea of having breakfast burritos. So Jason cooked up a whole roll of sausage, then Brig and I made a bunch of cheesy scrambled eggs, Cris heated up some tortillas, and I sauteed some onions. The end result was some truly awesome breakfast burritos. It was pretty late when I ate my first one, so I was pretty hungry and it turned out to be one of the best breakfast burritos I ever had. Cris and Jason had some s'mores.
I went to check out the bonfire, and found that a few drummers were drumming (badly) a few girls were dancing, and nothing too crazy was going on yet, so I headed back to our camp. After hanging out until about 11pm, Cris and Jason and Amy all went to bed. Brig and I said that at least they partied harder than bikers on a Saturday night. Brig was pretty tired, too, but I was determined to get as much enjoyment as I could out of the gathering at the bonfire, so I headed back over there. It was a sparse crowd. There were at least four cops that I saw wandering around the bonfire, at least one of which had a jacket that said "Sheriff". I joked that there were almost as many cops as patrons. A few girls were dancing, none of them topless. Having that many cops around, you could sense that not much was going to happen that night. I wondered if that was the way it was going to be from now on - the bonfire, now heavily patrolled by the cops, would no longer be the main attraction, and the wild crazy party that had happened there in 2002 would not be happening again.
You could tell that the best drummers were not at the fire circle. A couple of guys tried to do a fire dance thing with a staff lit up at both ends, but they sucked. They looked more like they were practicing than performing. I could have done better... with a cut up finger. It was about 2am, and soon they would break up the fire circle. I mused that sleep should never be the better option on a Saturday night, but after a couple hours of being bored, I headed back to our camp. I stoked the fire a bit, put on my baja jacket and sat in a chair by the fire. Warm and cozy, I very quickly dozed off.
I woke up around 5am, sitting in the chair by the bucket of coals, no longer toasty and warm. I stirred up the fire a little to regain some warmth. I still heard some sparse drumming from the main fire circle, so I wandered over to see what was up. Nothing, really. Although, the fire from the large bonfire felt good in the coolness of the early morning. The moon was nearly full, so there was no need for a flashlight in getting around the campground. I was wearing my baja jacket, and apparently in south Texas that's a sign that I do drugs. Even though I don't. But it wasn't long until a guy asked me if I needed some weed. He told me about going to Laredo to get steroids, and other drugs, and cheap tequila, and baja jackets. He told me that if you spent the night in a hotel you could cross the border twice on two different guard shifts and bring back double the limit. Then a couple pretty girls showed up and he was distracted by them.
A fight almost broke out between two drunk guys, but a couple of big tough guys talked down the aggressor before anything started. One heavily tattooed guy told a girl about the time he got his ass beat so badly by some rednecks at a bar in south Texas that he'd been sent to the hospital - the rednecks at the time had thought he was gay because he'd been dressed like a goth. People were talking all around, but not much else was happening at the bonfire. And the pretty girls, the few that there were, were neither topless nor interested in me, so I called it a night and headed back to our camp. After toasting myself by our own campfire for a bit, I went to bed, just as the eastern sky started to glow.
Sunday Morning
I woke up around 9am, sore from the preceeding day, but not hung over. Brig was making coffee. I had some coconut-covered donuts. And we started breaking camp. Cris quickly pulled down her stuff and the shower tent and hit the road. The rest of us spent a couple more hours taking stuff down, packing it up, and loading the van. One thing we had to do was make room for an extra passenger, since the van had made the trip down with three people but would be making the trip back with four. We'd burned nearly all of our firewood, which freed up a lot of room, though. There were only three sticks left and we dropped them by a small tree for campers to find later in the season. Brig and I carried our fire tub over to the big bonfire (which had died down a lot) and dumped our coals there, so we wouldn't have to worry about putting them out. Gradually, we got everything taken down and loaded, and we headed out around noon, just an hour later than we'd planned. My gauze-covered index finger now looked like a 2000-year-old mummy's finger from all the grime it had accumulated.
We had a lot of fun, even though it was a disappointingly small, tame crowd at the faire and at the campground. The daytime weather was also too hot for my tastes, with a really brutal amount of sunshine. I remember now, that's one of the reasons we like to go later in the season. We were really well-prepared for camping this year - prepared enough for somebody who forgot to bring a sleeping bag or a blanket. Although, next year, I'm going to try to remember an oven mitt and a fireplace poker. We made it fine without them, but they add a level of convenience. It was neat having a shower, even if I didn't use it. And the screen tent worked great for food prep and storage. I also liked getting there on Friday, before sunset to set up camp. We never had even half as nice a camp by 8pm, and 75% of our supplies weren't even there by then. All in all, things worked out well. It was cool camping with Cris, Jason, and Amy, and it was fun hanging out with the Browncoats in the faire.
And my finger will be fine in a couple of days. It's the kind of injury that's more amusing than troublesome, although it looked nasty when it happened. When Paul asked me Sunday night at the Mensa meeting about the highlights of the trip, I showed him my tiki torch wound. That's a highlight?! Well, it's not the best thing that happened, by far, but it was interesting and memorable. I consider that a "highlight".