It Takes a Viking to Raze a Village

We went to our first Renaissance Festival in Atlanta in the 1980s, back when it was a simple little thing held at a pavilion at Lake Laneir.  There were some members of the Society for Creative Anachronism bashing each other on the head with padded swords and a few artisans selling period clothing and jewelry.  Over the years it grew and grew until it covered several acres, involved hundreds of characters, thousands of visitors, and consumed turkey legs by the ton. 

This year we visited the St. Louis equivalent, the Greater Saint Louis Renaissance Faire, which, not surprisingly, has a French flavor.  The grounds were beautifully wooded; the booths and performance areas seemed to wind forever through the forest.  There are serious exhibits, such as the charcoal burner’s encampment, and downright silly places, like “Arrbucks Coffee” (there’s a huge overlap with the current pirate frenzy).  The men frequently indulge their fascination with weapons; the above gentleman greeting people at the gate was armed with a rapier, a short stabbing sword, a dagger, a fighting axe, and a flintlock pistol, all peace bonded with zip ties.  The women frequently indulge their fascination with breast presentation, cramming them into corsets that display them in all their jiggly glory.

The Faire is mostly family friendly, but every now and then, you encounter something that’s not quite Disney.  Some of the leather artisan’s products cross the line into S&M territory, you have to be over 21 to buy some items, and there are usually several booths selling fully-functional edged weapons.

There is a huge overlap between the SF-Fantasy community and the Renfest folks.  It’s not uncommon to see the same people in the same costumes at SF conventions and the same bumper stickers in the parking areas (“Republicans for Voldemort” “It Takes a Viking to Raze a Village”).  There’s an oft-stated sentiment that Renfest participants are creating “The Middle Ages as they should have been,” meaning: no open sewers, burning witches, flogging peasants, or putting the boot to the scullery maid.  It’s also come to mean elves with pointy ears and fairies with wings.

Both SF Cons and Renfests are for people who’ve never grown up or accepted the limitations of so-called “reality,” people like me.

And here’s the obligatory food shot, California Pizza Kitchen’s Wild Mushroom pizza: Cremini, Shiitake, Portobello and white mushrooms, Fontina and Mozzarella cheeses with a wild mushroom walnut pesto.  . . . .mmmmm. . . .

- Poppa

Returning to the Scene of the Marriage

Several months ago, Nan bought tickets to a Gipsy Kings (yes, that’s how they spell their name) concert at Powell Symphony Hall.  She bought them for the evening of June 5th, our 33rd wedding anniversary.  The date was purely a coincidence; June 5th was the only night they were in St. Louis.  Nan is a Gipsy Kings fan.  I’m not, particularly.  I don’t dislike them, I find their music enjoyable, but I don’t feel about them the way I feel about Led Zeppelin, Dread Zeppelin, or John Prine. 

We had planned to have a pre-concert dinner at Vito’s, a good restaurant convenient to Powell Hall, but bad planning on my part and scarcity of parking caused us to seek dinner someplace closer to the venue.  We walked down Grand Avenue, looking for alternatives, and settled on a place called Wm. Shakespeare’s Gastropub.  Since we like both gastronomy and pubs, we decided to give it a try.  I had a snort of Jameson’s and excellent fish and chips, and Nan had a serviceable curry.  It wasn’t until we paid our bill and walked across the street that we realized we’d been dining in the Old University Club building.  We were married in this building, 33 years ago to the day.

We were married at Seminex, the Concordia Seminary in Exile.  In 1976, Seminex occupied the top floors of the Old University Club building on Grand Avenue.  Our officiant was Father John Damm, the founding academic dean of Seminex and an old friend of Nan’s family.  Nan grew up calling him ”Uncle John.”  We were married on the 10th floor and had our reception on the top floor.  We were amused that we were oblivious to where we were having supper.  We never fail to point the building out when we’re with friends.

We finished our walk to Powell Hall and found our seats, third row center.  The King’s percussion gear was extensive.

The Gipsy Kings are an amalgam of two families backed by two drummers, a keyboardist and a bass player.  They were introduced as some of France’s most popular musicians.  I had no idea they originated in France, I assumed they were Spanish or Latin-American.  Turns out, they were born in France, but their parents were Catalonian.  They’re credited with introducing Rumba Catalana to a worldwide audience.

The introduction of the Kings was the last English we heard from the stage that night.  Being monolingual, Nan and I couldn’t understand a word the Kings were singing.  It could have been, “Spam-Spam-Spam-Spam-Spam-Baked-Beans-and-Spam” for all we knew.  The sound system wasn’t doing a very good job of projecting the vocals, but it didn’t seem to matter, those who understood the words were singing along from memory.  During the last couple of numbers, fans poured down the aisles to gyrate in front of the stage.

The Gipsy Kings put on one hell of a show.  I may not be a fan of their recordings, but I loved seeing their performance.

- Poppa

The Inflatable Television

The Downtown St. Louis Partnership is always looking for ways to entertain and engage the downtown St. Louis residents.  One of the latest projects is the showing of movies at the Old Post Office Plaza, downtown’s latest public space.  We went to the first movie Thursday evening, a showing of Jaws.

When we arrived at the Plaza, we were met by the sight of a twenty-foot tall inflatable TV.  The “inflatable” aspect applied to the frame, the image was displayed on a standard projection screen with the projector working from behind the screen.  Before the movie started, the organizers passed out ballots to determine what the next film would be.   After Jaws was over, they announced that the next movie would be Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

I’ve probably seen Jaws a dozen times, but it was still fun to see it again.  That movie freaked me (and everybody else) out when it was released in 1975.  I had nightmares for months about seeing Ben Gardner’s head.

The Plaza event was fun.  There was a hot dog vendor there and he was doing a brisk business; he sold out of dogs and sausages before the movie was over, though he’d been there since 10 AM, so he didn’t sell them all at the movie.  The weather was great, cool and low humidity, low for St. Louis, anyway, and our folding chairs were comfortable.  We’ll probably go back to see the next movie unless it’s too hot and sticky.

- Poppa

Pork Steaks, Beans, Bacon, Peanut Butter, and Corn. And Little Nan. And Cats.

You know it’s Spring in St Louis when the Pork Steaks can be seen in back yards around the city.  They’re usually be found where Cole Slaw, Pea Salad, and Baked Beans are also emerging into the sunlight.  This one was captured at the home of Joe and Marie last weekend.

For several years, we’ve been trying to replicate the  Unwritten Corn-on-the-Cob Recipe of H. Earle Moore.  Earle was the Moore Family Patriarch and the Maternal Grandfather of Leah and Erin.  At one memorable back yard barbecue in the mid-seventies, he grilled corn-on-the cob using a method I’ve never heard of before or since.

 He smeared peanut butter on a raw ear of sweet corn. . . .

. . . .wrapped it with raw bacon, rolled it in aluminium foil, and cooked it on the grill for X amount of minutes.  When he judged it to be done, the bacon was cooked, the peanut butter was melty and delicious, and the corn was perfect.  We haven’t quite recreated it yet.  We may be using too much peanut butter, or maybe we need to blend it with regular butter.  But we’ll keep trying. 

The post-Pork Steak entertainment was sorting through boxes of old 3-D slides from the Moore 1950s and 1960s.  We only got through about 5% of the total.  They were divvied up based on who was striking the cutest or most embarrassing pose.  This is Nan in the foreground, stealing the scene at Mary-Jo’s 4th birthday party.  Our flatbed scanner doesn’t do the slides justice.  We’ll either need to get a new scanner, one equipped with a back-light to handle slides, or have them digitized professionally.

It’s been a while since I posted a Cute Cat © picture.  Here’s Rufus, looking very sly and devil-may-care, like a real bon vivant.  He’s actually just so blissed out he’s about to drool on me.

And last, proof of McGregor’s full recovery from his spinal injury.  Rufus is cuddling him again.  While he was still sick, Rufus wouldn’t have anything to do with him, probably because McGregor smelled like a cat box.

- Poppa