Merry Meet!: The Prince Tries Out the Renaissance Festival

That's not real fairy magic. Its Photoshop if I'm not mistaken.

So every now and again, its important for a man of noble blood to get out and mix with the commoners. One fine Saturday morning, I found myself amongst the splendor and magic of Revel Grove (aka the Maryland Renaissance Festival) with my sister, the Princess, and my aunt, the Duchess of Something or Other.

This was my first trip to the Festival and I was amped for some sweet-ass people watching. I was not disappointed. We started off walking through the mayhem and basically ate our way around the place starting with the Steak on a Stake.

First a word of caution. I was told that some kid had one of these and put his eye out with it when he tripped. While this is certainly possible, I think it might just be an urban legend. If there is evidence of this being true, holla at me. I can't be bothered to look it up.

If this did happen, well then I'm sorry but its a little thing called "thinning the herd." I managed to eat some of this and come out with both eyes in the process. But if you were to lose an eye this would be a great place to do it since you could go eye-patch shopping at one of the many shops.

After this we ducked into a few stores including one that sold creepy marionettes and stuff with feathers and then another that sold Gandalf staffs and shit. Most of the really cool ones were like $800 so I decided to pass.

Then we stopped off for more very affordable food including the requisite giant turkey leg and a glass of mead. Baby Sis and Auntie did not like the turkey leg which came as no great surprise. I don't think the mead was a hit either but they humored me because I bought it for everyone.

The Princess hating the turkey leg.

All this talk of food is well and good, but the real reason you head to the Ren Fest is to people watch. As you can imagine there were a ton of people to look at. I think our favorite had to be this one below. We had to be stealth with our photography so we didn't look like complete assholes.

The good news is that this isn't our first rodeo, so my family knows how to pick up on the non-verbal cues and get into position. Now the piece du resistance.

Our special decoy at work

This shot was our favorite for what is hopefully an obvious reason. This girl had her boobs pushed up so far in her bustiere that they became her shoulders. It was really an incredible feat.

Then we saw this dude who was certified bad-ass. He even had his flagon attached to his belt in case he came across some dude with a barrel of ale or went to the stand that sold Bud Light.
My sister was convinced that this dude in the costume had a boner while he was watching some chick acrobats perform. I don't see the boner, but I think its interesting that the guy behind him still hates Thatcher. Let it go, dude. Whatever it is.

When we were getting ready to leave we saw this guy on the left (doing the choking) coming in to rock the party. When he passed I quietly said under my breathe "Oh snap! A drow!" which is really way lamer than you can even imagine. Google "drow" to see how geeky I am.

In the parking lot, we saw this really giant dude loading his red leather dragon armor into his Honda Accord with some help from his loyal squire (read: patient wife).

All in all, I had a good time. I found many really dumb things to spend money on but resisted. If I head back I may not be so strong and could come out of there with a shit load of armor and weaponry.

I think my only complaint about the Renaissance Festival is that no one carries weaponry around the place. Maybe its not allowed or frowned upon, but really I think its probably just that the people come to revel, not fight. Which in my mind makes it ripe for a raiding party. I would love to come through on horseback with the creepy pig-dogs from Willow leading the way. We could just torch the damn place and loot everything before they could even raise defenses. That would be authentic Renaissance-type shit.