Diary of a TRF Performer... the 2011 Season!

[mpullen]

See ya Saturday Blue. Save a hug for me.

[maeven]

See you tomorrow, WC. Much luv.

[FaeHollow]

Diary of a TRF Performer during the great TRF flood of 2011-

Performing in the rain sucks. But getting even one smile or laugh from someone who is braving the rain to experience TRF makes it ALL worth it.

[Tink]

WC, Fae, what is the best way for a patron to interact with the cast?

[dbaldock]

WC, Fae, what is the best way for a patron to interact with the cast?

Bring them Chocolate?    

[FaeHollow]

Come up and say hello who are you... we will play back! We don't bite!

[Blue66669]

I suppose it depends on the character. Strike up a conversation with the person based on who they are. Transylvanian? Talk about world domination, torture, and spooky things. Remember that everything is backwards. French? Discuss cheeses and perfumes, and surrender LOL! Elves? Discuss the rights of elves and how they're NOT leprechauns. Barbarians and Germans? BOOZE! LOL! It all just depends on who you want to interact with.

[Blue66669]

I had considered letting the diary go after Rehearsals, but why? Don't you all want to know what we do as performers??? OOOOO YEAH!!!!

Saturday
Woke up at 6:30 to get dressed and makeup'd. Miss Kelly and I sat in our wardrobe and readied ourselves for the masses. 8:30 and we were prepped for morning meeting. 9am... PLACES, THE CANNON IS GOING OFF!!!!! We began with our morning proclamation, then headed to get iced tea for the day. After tea, we swung through Mask Parade to drop off a care package for Meg. By 9:30, we were in our area, waiting for the first patrons to arrive. I still had no idea what I was going to do first, but I thought a rousing game of Transylvanian Risk would give me some time to figure it out. I sat in front of that map for awhile until we had some children arrive and play. They LOVED IT! We played Risk for almost the entirety of the morning. We attempted to recruit patrons to our military forces, and gained a couple of good soldiers for the fight. The only drawback was that I had no idea that I was sitting in a pile of fire ants... AGAIN! I now have bites all over my calves. Parade time came, and we mosied that way. Afternoon proc went off, and we made our way back to Transylvania. More Risk, then we performed Romeo and Ghouliet. Our group was spread thin through the afternoon, but we made it. I spent some time on the joust hill with Scotland, just to shake up the distribution. We made it to the Barbarian area by about 3:45 where we fought, we jousted, then we wrestled. It was at that moment that I realized that I was most definitely a "heel" character LOL! Evening proc happened, there was dancing and music and frivolity. We processed to the joust arena to watch the laser show, which was interesting. That evening, I got out of my costume, ate a quick bite, ambushed Jack for his birthday, showered, then went straight to bed before midnight.

Sunday
Woke up at 7, cursing being late. Kells and I got dressed just like the day before and headed out to meeting. During our morning proc, it started raining. By the end, it was POURING. There I was, soaking wet and wholly cranky. I spent my morning talking to patrons underneath cover, and sitting out in the rain. I was wet already, what the hell did it matter. The dress got heavier and heavier, and by parade time, I believe I soaked up about 50lbs of water LOL! I picked up my hoop and CARRIED the damn dress all the way through parade in the pouring rain like a BOSS! EVERYTHING on me was soaked straight through, and my court said that I literally had a river running from behind my dress. I made it back to the EB and got out of the wet thing, only to not be able to pick it up due to all the water. We wrung it out and hung it to dry with everyone else's costumes and I went to one of the seamstresses to ask if I could put another dress on. Thankfully, they gave me another dress and I was able to go back out on path and work for another couple of hours. I had to finally give up when my boots were soaked all the way through and my body was weary from carrying all the extra water weight (the cloak I wore soaked up A LOT). About 4pm, I was released and came home. When I got back, I realized that my insteps were bruised, my hips and thighs were WRECKED due to the weight of the first wet dress, and EVERYTHING HURT! You know what? If I would have had another pair of boots, I would have been back out there in a heartbeat.

Tune in next week to get the "behind the scenes" LOL!

[FaeHollow]

Well since Niki posted I guess I will too. Here is what it is like to have a THEME weekend. She gets one of those in 3 weeks... they are... interesting.

I am so happy the weekend is over. It is a double edged sword. It is fun to have your own weekend but it is also the hardest work you have to do all season. I really tried to keep my character going but when keeping up with all my responsibilities I found I had to push her back a bit... or more like... she had been given the job of contest manager... and she takes jobs bestowed on her very very seriously!

I made it. I took the yellow contest book... I wrote down all that entered the contests... I found people to enter the contests... I begged I pleaded I threatened to stake them and we actually had a decent turn out at the Polka on Saturday... 5 couples I believe. Masskrugstemmen ( the bavarian stein holding endurance contest) and Bratwurst eating  were filling up fast on Saturday.

I hosted the Polka... I was SHAKING... I had NO IDEA what I was doing but I just tried hard to remember what I had seen the mistress of the revels do the past 2 seasons. The great king was walking around and I asked if he would judge the contest. He agreed and then we had a brief snag when I told all the contestants to follow me to where Gypsy Guerilla Band was. I thought it was QUITE obvious they were setting up over by the feast hall... but apparently 2 of my group members and one set of contestants didn't quite get the information and they walked all the way to Scotland. I lost a LOT of my contest running confidence after that hang up.


We paraded and then it was straight on to hawking the Masskrug. Masskrug filled up and I explained the contest got them all organized and then ran it. I gained back ALL my confidence after that because it ran very well.

After that I still had 2 spots on my Bratwurst list open and no alternates so I started trying to fill that one up, I don't need to mention that my Germans were FANTASTIC and were constantly sending people my way and signing people up. Bratwurst eating contest ran pretty well. Last years mistress of the revels was there to give me tips which I super appreciated. I stepped up on a tree ring to start the contest and saw Mr. Entertainment director himself. I FREAKED. I was all bubbly in my stomach, nauseated and I was shaking and nervous. I did NOT want to do this in front of him but... it was happening. I sucked it up and pretended as hard as I could he was not there and hosted. We got through it and TADA. No one died or threw up on anyone and there was a winner. I suppose I did alright.

Apparently other than not being able to scream over all the bratwurst contestants and spectators ( my voice was shot) and herding my contestants instead of having them find me ... I did fine. I swore to make Sunday WAY better. I felt like I could do it.

I had a good afternoon. I went and got my wooden roses. And I talked to a guy who had fangs and tagged him with my business card. I talked to patrons and FINALLY really got to try out my new character. She is a blast and a half!

Evening proc. was AWESOME. We got to premiere "Beer Beer Baby" something we are quite proud of... it seemed to go over well.

At fireworks I played a drunk and was being all sacrilegious and drinking my Holy water and pretending it was much better than beer. It was great and the patrons around me loved it until I hit my bottle against a bench and legitimized it and made it true "hole-y" water.

Sunday. Well my pigtails were perfect and I was ready to rock it. THEN it rained. A LOT. We couldn't do the polka... because our mother Christmas had already broken her arm and we deemed it unsafe. I told my group leader I did not want to march parade because breathing in all the wet colder air would no doubt increase my already increased chances of bronchitis and I am asthmatic. She told me to sit it out. I got to dry off a little... when everyone came back all the Germans started stripping and the rain was still pretty heavy so I just sat in the EB... I assumed going out wasn't a good idea. Well I heard the Masskrug was a go and at 12:45 ish I started demanding Germans get dressed and head back out there to hawk it seeing as we had NO CONTESTANTS.

I SHOULD have left our Princess Amelia alone. I saw her shivering and I demanded she get dressed anyway. I sent all the Germans out and we found her a new chemise and bodice... I gave her 3 cloaks and we went back out. Props to my group leader for gathering contestants for the competition while I tried to get Princess Amelia squared away. She didn't last. We sent her back in after the Masskrug. I feel so bad for even making her come out but I thought the change of costume pieces would help.

Anyway. The Masskrug in the rain was actually wicked fun. I enjoy that competition.

After that 2 of my group members took me to the joust. We ended up walking through the middle of the arena. Papa almost slid down the hill and I kept getting stuck in the mud. I didn't lose a shoe but I did have an inch of mud in each shoe when I finally got to the dais. No worries... I dealt with my muck shoes until the joust was over and then I washed them out with the jug water behind the dais. Jug water that is FREAKING COLD. I had been going barefoot since after parade. So now I had a 10 pound cloak that was muddy and I carried it all wrapped up and I had freaking freezing feet along with the fact that my skirt would have fallen off if it weren't for my hip bones... but DAMN it was trying to prove that it was stronger than my hip bones.

We had heard the Bratwurst competition was cancelled before we left for the joust. We came back and suddenly it was back on. I had been told all kinds of mixed up information about everything all day and was at the end of my rope. We managed to scrape up 6 contestants. Once again someone won no one died but someone did puke... he made it to the trash can though so all was good!

I enjoyed that. Apparently contests in the rain make my day.

After that I filled out the yellow book... which I had kept all day at the info booth to keep it from getting destroyed so it would be usable for all other weekends. I got the book returned and I took a break for 15 minutes and then headed back out and mucked about down by Scotland for awhile and then ate some cheesecake and had some cider before the very brief evening proc. It was sad to see how many people on cast had been dismissed by the end of the day.

We had lost 2 members of the court to being cold and sick. 1 had been released with our joust maiden and Jack...her kids. 1 had been told to be at proc at 5:45 and we ran it at 5:30 so it was me  and 2 others at the very end.

But we did it. We got through it. I know now how INSANE the rain can make everything and am glad that if it happens again this season we just have to be German in it. Not THEME GROUP. But we did it.

And I now bow down to the former mistress of the revels. I cannot express how unappreciated and undervalued she was. I think at least 7 other people will understand her a lot better by the end of all of this. Maybe they won't who knows!

But I DID IT!

It's easy sailing from here!

[KiltedPrivateer]

Sorry we missed the contests.  We spent most of our day hiding in shops.  Fortunately for the shop keepers, we were spending money there as well.  We finally hit our rain limit about 2.  We let the little ride the ponies then we sloshed our way back to our camp.