Em N Ru: Oregon Renaissance Faire

Singing for the Queen (I'm there somewhere)

With Ruben at his dads I indulged in adult time. Sadly I couldn't sleep all day which was what my body and mind wanted to do, instead I was obligated to sing with the Salem Madrigal Singers at the Oregon Renaissance Faire in Canby.

So with a positive attitude I laced up the corset and his the road. I arrived to find my fellow songsters and we all congregated in the unopened pub. We were a few minutes early but we stated singing anyway, for the workers who were getting ready for the day. We sounded good, three altos and four sopranos all pretty secure on our parts. We have about an hour's worth of material and after singing in the pub for a while we took a break then sang near the front gate. The line to get in was huge, trailing all the way around the jousting arena. It stayed that long the entire time I was there.

As soon as we were finished my friend and I went back to the Cat and Fiddle outdoor pub and used the free tokens we were given for a cider (or two) sadly, as we drank and watched the shirtless Scottish knight doing feats of bravery in the arena, large drops of water fell from the sky accompanied by the boom of thunder. We drank faster. Soon the Scottish knight fell from his horse and landed in the dirt which stuck to his chest... I mean soon the rain came down harder and with the first strike of lightning we were evacuated to a large (I mean giant) tent out from under the trees.

The evacuation was surreal. A little tipsy, a little damp, and a lot cold in my costume, we followed the trail of people from the relative dryness of the trees through the downpour and into the soggy tent. My friend and I were joking that it was like a scene from a horror movie, and that with our luck the tent would collapse, or lightning would strike the metal frame of the tent instead of the mammoth trees we were just under.

Apart from being forced to listen to the howling of many unhappy children it wasn't a bad experience We slightly buzzed, kid free individuals took selfies and did some close quarter examination of how people handled strange situations. We also admired the many costumes. There were fairies, druids, people with horns, wings, tattoos, face painting, body smells, fur, (lots of wet fur) skin, cleavage, (somehow they must have secured the nipples but it seemed like the entirety of the breasts were showing otherwise) renaissance maidens such as ourselves, men with armor on their shoulders wearing jeans and Nike shoes, lots of beards with adornment, hair in braids... I could go on.

Soon we were freed from our confinement in the giant metal tent of doom, the rain had stopped and the damp crew all made their way back to the faire. My companion and I made our way back to the pub for a while before we sang for the queen. She declared our voices "the voices of angels" and we disbanded to pursue our own endeavors.

I left faire and spent a lovely afternoon shopping at the outlet mall in Woodburn, buying shorts and tops for the summer. On my way home I had a craving for coleslaw so I stopped at Winco to buy groceries. I had two choices, buy ingredients or buy pre-made, and being health minded I bought the cabbage, lemon, onion, carrots, light mayo, and yogurt for my favorite recipe and a multitude of other items (working 12 hour days puts shopping on the low priority list and I was OUT of food).

All the way home I was dreading the nasty, dirty, smelly, pile of dishes that awaited me in the kitchen, and the nasty dirty smelly pile of laundry that was lurking in the downstairs bathroom. I came in and set the bags of groceries on the counter. The counter NOT covered in dirty dishes, dirty rags, or peelings of various produce. I looked in the dishwasher. Empty. I looked in the sink. Clean. I looked at the counter. A note. Cab had cleaned my kitchen. Cab had done my laundry, and folded it, and put it away. Cab had changed my sheets and remade my bed.

I literally sat down on the floor and cried for a few minutes.

He later told me he had to come by 3 times to run the laundry and dishwasher.

Sunday was a repeat of Saturday, but without the rain, with less cider, and when I had finished singing for Her Majesty I went to meet Jeff and get Ruben. Sunday night I didn't do much.