This fall I had the opportunity to visit an entertainment venue that tops all others I have visited in my short 24 years on this planet, western New England’s pride – KING RICHARD’S FAIRE.For those of you unfamiliar with the Faire (yes the extra “e” is needed to ensure visitors are aware the park is old-timey), the website describes it as “a vivid recreation of a 16th century English marketplace at festival time. Actors, dancers, puppeteers, jugglers, minstrels, mimes, magicians and musicians perform each weekend for the favor of his Royal Highness King Richard.”In layman’s terms, King Richard’s Faire was a breeding ground for weirdoes and perverts.Know those kids who got really into playing dungeons and dragons in the 80s and 90s?Well they grew up and spend their autumn weekends at the Faire.
Until my visit, I was unaware of the term “LARPing”—which stands for “Live Action Role Playing” or someone who enjoys acting out fantasy stories.LARPing abounded at King Richard’s Faire.I was unsure whether the majority of people at the park were actually employees or just a bunch of middle-aged virgins who had got all gussied up to enter a play world and play make-believe for an afternoon.Regardless, everywhere I looked I had the distinct impression that I was surrounded by people who had forgotten to take their meds.For my own informational purposes, I surveyed the “boothes” (yes another old timey “e”) to familiarize myself with the cost of LARPing.Believe you me, LARPing is NOT an inexpensive past time.Most of the costumes cost no less than 500 dollars.When you top your outfit off with the obligatory chalice, some ornate weaponry made of foam rubber, and of course other needed gizmos and gadgets, you are lucky to get off for less than a G.But think of what you gain -- The chance to enter a secret real life “World of Warcraft” land where you run around in tights and blow powder in wizards’ faces.
Now you may be asking yourself why I decided to subject myself to such an odd venue on my free Saturday.The answer is simple – I was tempted by the ax throwing, the unlimited meade, and the novelty of the park.Armed with 5 alcoholic dudes (sadly, none of which were R Von D and the Fridge) at my side, I figured, what is the worst that can happen?Needless to say, loud, obnoxious, drunk twenty-somethings stand out like a sore thumb in a re-creation of the Renaissance.For instance, while watching the last joust of the afternoon, one of my companions was on his 10th yard of ale.A large female teenager dressed from head to toe in black velvet Renaissance gear started taunting my clearly intoxicated pal.(Think the “freaks” who used to hang out all Friday night at the mall – you know, black lipstick, black fingernails, chains, the works.Only these teenagers had channeled their freakiness into the historical outlet that is King Richard’s Faire).My pal’s quick-witted response “Let me pull out my sword and slay your dragon.”Just an example of the type of “humour” which was not welcomed at King Richard’s Faire.
Overall, I would not have been so disappointed in my afternoon if it were not for two things:
1.) The toilets.Since toilets obviously did not exist in the 16th Century, King Richard’s Faire opted to maintain accuracy by placing toilets in old motorhomes as far away from the rest of the park as humanly possible.Not only did these small, overcrowded facilities reek like the dickens, but they were small and unsanitary.Thank you King Richard’s Faire for giving me a real memento from Medieval times, Syphilis.
2.) The highway robbery.Riddle me this, since when did everything in the 16th Century cost you an arm and a leg?Not only did I have to pay 25 dollars to enter the park, but once inside I was forced to buy tickets in $5.00 increments in order to purchase food and drink.Since the geniuses who devised the entertainment venue know how to really swindle their patrons, none of the delicacies actually cost $5 or $10.Thus, I was left with $3 worth of extra tickets I had superfluously purchased.And if this were not bad enough, pretty much all the rides, exhibits and games (essentially any way to pass the time amid the LARPers) cost more and more modern day American dollars.
I left King Richard’s Faire a little poorer, a little wiser, and a lot more frightened of the people who spend their weekends in Wal-Mart parking lots pretending to be a level 15 night elf with the ability to self-heal.
For those of you who do not know my brother, Peeje the Steeje recently proposed to his longtime girlfriend. As we celebrated this past weekend with both families in attendance, my mother (once again) expressed her concern with the fact I could quite possibly be dateless to my brother's wedding. In order to make my mother happy as well as to ensure that I am not the first Best Man in history to attend a wedding sans date, I have come up with the following application. If you feel as though you have what it takes to hang with me on the ceremonies nuptials, please feel free to answer candidly the following questions. Or, if you're bored at work and would like to see if you are compatible with me for later consideration, please do not hesitate.
And now, the much anticipated R Von D wedding date application:
Name:
Age:
Gender:
Relationship status:
Height:
Body Type (underline one): Slim, athletic, voluptuous, curvy, skinny bitch, fat bitch
Short Answer (Easy difficulty)
1. What is your favorite condiment?
2. What time of day do you arise after a long night of drinking?
3. Briefly describe your family's lineage.
4. If you could remove one species of animal from the planet forever, which would you choose?
5. What do you typically wear to bed?
6. Does the thought of somebody else getting marred make you more or less inclined towards physical activity with your date? Why or why not?
7. If you could have any super power, which would you choose and why?
8. Other than for the purposes of this application, have you ever visited this website (www.pen15blog.blogspot.com)
9. Briefly describe your feelings regarding Dane Cook.
10. Are you doing this because you feel bad for me, or because you think I'm a stud?
Short Answer (Hard difficulty).
1. How often do you use the phrase "That's what she said?"
2. How many mixed drinks could you have before you cannot walk a straight line (circle one): 1
2
4
8
More than 8
3. If the older men in my family begin to make passes at you, how would you politely decline their advances.
4. Describe yourself to me in haiku form (if you don't know what a haiku is, you should stop answering questions now).
5. How many cocktails must you consume before forgetting the words to "The Wild Rover"
6. What, in your eyes, is the greatest piece of American cinema produced in the last 15 years?
7. What is the name of my hetero-lifemate?
8. Are you prepared to pretend as though you are my significant other for an evening in order to make me look better in the eyes of my extended family (this includes hand-holding, getting the third degree from aunts, occasional kissing et al.)
9. The wedding reception ends. How do you plan on spending the rest of your night?
10. If somebody told you that you could cure cancer, but you would have to kick a dog to death inside of five minutes in order to do it, would you do so?
DESCRIBE IN A BRIEF ESSAY THE WORST DATE YOU'VE EVER BEEN ON.
IN AN ESSAY, EXPLAIN WHY YOU SHOULD BE CHOSEN FOR THIS DATE, AND GIVE DESCRIPTIONS REGARDING HOW YOU FORESEE THE NIGHT GOING FROM BEGINNING TO END.
Please email completed application to penfifteenblog@gmail.com
So here I am, scouring the net during class time when I'm supposed to be teaching and I find this: Now, to the untrained eye, one sees a seemingly happy Indian family, with the father looking like he needs a drink. Not too far off from any normal American family right? Take a closer look, the little one there, the girl, has eight, yes eight arms and legs. That broad with the dot on her head gave birth to a human squid. Honest to God when I read the headline I thought I was going to see Stewie from Family Guy, the one where the world ends at Y2K and they have to find the Twinkee factory. If you haven't seen that episode, just picture Stewie Griffin's head on a purple squid body. I couldn't find a google image to accompany what I was trying to do so back off...now back to what I was talking about.
So I read on and found out that this girls extra arms and legs were actually a part of a headless conjoined twin. Seriously, that is some shit I've seen in B-Horror movies my whole life. Not only that, but the doctors who were interviewed on MSNBC claim that despite the extra arms and legs, the girl was "totally normal." Is that right, professor? I think the fact that she looks like Dr. Octopus (a name that is even funnier given the fact that her conjoined twin is coming out of that region. Not sayin', but I'm just sayin'.) makes her the LEAST normal person in the world. The article went on about how there was a marathon surgery to get the extra body parts off of her, yadda yadda yadda.
But this got me thinking, this wasn't the first time I had seen something like this. I used to watch that show Ripley's Believe it or Not and that shit was littered with Indian people. I honestly do not get what they are putting in the water over there to produce an inordinate amount of weirdos. Take this guy for example.
This is Sanju Bhagat. He comes from Nangpur India. You might think to look at Sanju that he either needs to lay off the Miller High Life, or he is the first pregnant man you have ever seen. Well, my dear reader, you are not that far off. You see, Mr. Bhagat has been housing the mutated body of his twin inside of himself for thirty-six years. Yes, he has his fucking twin inside of him. Not only that, but read this:
“To my surprise and horror, I could shake hands with somebody inside,” he said. “It was a bit shocking for me.” One doctor recalled that day in the operating room.
“He just put his hand inside and he said there are a lot of bones inside,” she said. “First, one limb came out, then another limb came out. Then some part of genitalia, then some part of hair, some limbs, jaws, limbs, hair.” Inside Bhagat’s stomach was a strange, half-formed creature that had feet and hands that were very developed. Its fingernails were quite long.
At first glance, it may look as if Bhagat had given birth. Actually, Mehta had removed the mutated body of Bhagat’s twin brother from his stomach. Bhagat, they discovered, had one of the world’s most bizarre medical conditions — fetus in fetu. It is an extremely rare abnormality that occurs when a fetus gets trapped inside its twin. The trapped fetus can survive as a parasite even past birth by forming an umbilical cordlike structure that leaches its twin’s blood supply until it grows so large that it starts to harm the host, at which point doctors usually intervene.
Seriously you have got to be fucking kidding me. Have you ever seen that movie "The Thing" if not, check this shit out, and this is what I'm picturing right now:
Note to self: Whenever you find yourself in India, arm yourself with a flamethrower, or just take a young Kurt Russel with you, and tell HIM to bring the flamethrower. I think the responsible thing to do would be to go over there with him and make sure no bear-trapped stomachs are being outsourced as our customer service representatives anymore. All I'm sayin' is I don't want to bail all of you out with the millions upon millions of these people start making their way over here with hidden people on their person, either that or we should charge them two plane tickets or something. Better yet, why don't we just put a huge circus tent over the entire country and I'll stand on a little box with my red petticoat and take two dollars from you to come in and see the show. They have elephants over there anyway right?
And one more thing: "CHOCOLATE RAAAAAAAAIN! SOME STAY DRY AND OTHERS FEEL THE PAIN. CHOCOLATE RAAAAAAAAAIN!" - Tay Zonday
I'll leave you with this, just so you know I'm not totally down on all Indian people. Here are some great examples of what they have offered me over the past couple of months:
**I move away from the mic to breathe in, R Von D (aka Spicy Curry)
The Juice is settin' in court today. Juice thought you might want to know what was gwins-on inside my huge head, so I'm just gonna blog the whole she-bang-a-bang out in live time for all y'all fans of the juice out in the world.
-Shit. Feel like home. I wonder if Vegas has chicken as good as the LA courthouse did?
-Unarmed robbery is for suckas and hos.
-Where Lance "The Mosquito" Ito at?
-Mo' better nickname: Lance "Mint Mo" Ito.
-If da glove don't fit, just stick inna pink butt raw dogg.
- Where's that ugly white lawyer bitch?
- Who's this DA on the other team this time? What happen to my boy Jackie Childs?
- Someone call Frank Drebin. He'd solve this for me all right.
-Go USC!
- My name shoulda been John David Booty. OJ get more white woman ass than a toilet seat.
- Oh shit. That Goldman asshole is back again. He want my money? He aint getting shit from me. Tell him if the automatic weapon don't fit, Vegas will acquit.
- The Juice be free and hitting the links in a few weeks man. I know dis. Get me 9 holes with Tiger in the morning the day after Thanksgiving and an afternoon lunch with Fuhrmann, Juice needs some money so we gonna write a book.
- It's a good thing they didn't see the dead asian ho in my trunk underneath all the stolen football shit.
- Shit Juice Like: Heisman Trophies, White Women, Trojans
- Shit Juice Hate: Snitches, Kato Kaelin, White Women who act a fool, Ron Goldman, The Vegas Po-Po
- Only reason po-po caught Juice was 'cuase he got a charlie horse on the previous play.
- Where Al Cowlings at with the Juice Mobile? We need to set this bitch off and take another trip. Ride or die homey.
Since our readers were so impressed with our romance advice and found it so useful, we've broadened our horizons and are now offering advice on all walks of life.
TO THE EMAILS!!
Dear Pen15 Club, I'm writing a resume for the first time and thought it was really tough trying to come up with the skills portion. What type of skills would you include on your resume? Fridge:
My skills include: - Creating Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwiches. - Making social interaction with females awkward. - Getting sunburned.
R Von D:
Other than the fact that I can type over 100 words per minute, I like to tell potential bosses that I can kill them with one punch. Also, I like to tell them that I can handle two women at the same time. This shows them I have the ability to be a "valued member" of a team (that's what she said) and have the ability to multitask and delegate responsibilities.
Dear Pen15 Guys, Why do guys always say they're going to call and then never do?
Fridge: Because you gave me a fake number. Is this that girl from The Skellig?
R Von D: Probably because you didn't put out. Either that or you did put out, and you raked. Learn some manners.
Dear Fridge and RVonD (and that guy who used to write for this thing, I forget his name), If you lost your hetero-lifemate/co-author, what would you do?
Fridge:
I'd build a Ron Von out of cottage cheese and other assorted meats and cheeses and cart him around like he was the real thing. I don't have problems with reality.
R Von D:
Firstly, what kind of question is this? Hey Pen15...if your family was in a serious car accident, your whole family, who would you want to survive? Grow up. All I know is if my man-slave died, my life would have to be all about hitting on girls, being socially aware and polite to people, and that's just not a world I want to be a part of.
Dear Pen15 Studs,
A lot of my friends are graduating from colleges, grad schools and getting married and having kids. I've been spending a lot of time considering all the fun I've had with my friends over the past few years? What is your top moment?
Fridge:
About 5 Christmases ago, Booski had a formal party at his house. Ron Von was videographing the entire thing and we snuck in on our friend ffeH while he was diddling the Doppler Effect. Once ffeH caught wind of 8 dudes standing in the corner of the Champagne Room watching this, he became very perturbed with us and chased us all through Booski's house. Ron Von and I hid outside in the bushes while ffeH choked out a dozen people and we giggled the entire time.
R Von D:
That was awesome. Mine was the same moment, but more specifically the way the girl in question (who was wearing a very fancy negligee by the way, very odd for a 16 year-old by the way) shrieked "OH MY GEEYOD!" once she saw me and Fridge in the doorway. Also, the sound of Fridge giggling as we filmed from outside was priceless.
Dear Pen15, What is the ideal way to tell my child that there is no Santa Claus?
Fridge:
Shoot a deer. Put a red nose on it. Cut its' head off. Place head in the child's bed on Christmas morning like they did in The Godfather. Problem solved. R Von D:
Slap him in the head, tell him to finish his steak because it'll put hair on his ass. Then, tell him to "be a Bruin" and make him do laps around the house until he stops crying. You should probably expect to pay a significant amount of therapy bills, but hey, beats payin' for his ballet lessons.
Dear Fridge, Why do you blast horrible devil music out of your cube at work? You're disturbing everybody, and you are now offensive to all five senses.
Fridge:
Rather than killing you all or bringing a semi-automatic weapon to the office, I vent by tapping my feet to the double bass drums of death metal. If you have a problem with that, take it up with Ronny James Dio.
Dear Pen 15, I've been struggling to find a quote for my Facebook profile that will impress people, any suggestions?
Fridge:
Ladies: Rather than picking some Colby Callatt song lyric or some lame ass line about how stupid guys are from Sex + The City (I'd hit SJ Parker, just sayin') I would go with something like "Don't ever leave me, cause I find you!" Any man worth his weight in goldt will a) be amused because it's from a great piece of American cinema and b) not be scared off because that chick was hot.
Guys: We get it Scarface, we understand you "have the world coming to you, chico." Find something that really hits at the heart of how challenging life can be. I would suggest "It's easy to grin, when your ship comes in, and you've got the stock market beat. But the man worthwhile, is the man who can smile when his shorts are too tight in the seat." R Von D:
"See, chicks dig me because I rarely wear underwear...and when I do it's usually something unusual." -Bill Murray in "Stripes" and R Von D to Fridge over several Miller High Lifes.
Dear Pen15 Men,
My boyfriend is a bit of a hairy beast, a Sasquatch, if you will. His chest looks likes one of Dr. Huxtable’s best sweaters. And I love it. The thing is, he is very self conscious and insists that I nair his entire body fortnightly. Now I love my man and would do anything for him, but the smell of the nair and the sight of his hairless body makes me want to vom. All I want to do is rub my face in a chest full of hair, but every time I tell him this he calls me a liar and locks himself in the bathroom. What do I do?
Sincerely, Nair-Free in CT
Fridge:
Dear Nair-Free in CT, Drop that zero and get with the hero Love Fridge PS: I haven't shaved anything on my entire person since I was 13. It's a veritable forest down there. PPS: Except for my head. Hair on top of the head is distracting and often forces guys to use "product" which is illegal in manly countries like Hungary. PPSS: Please feel free to groom yourself before we "know" one another.
R Von D:
Thank you for your question, madame. Look at it this way, you don't want to be dating a guy who doesn't want to feel like a man. I like looking into the mirror in the morning and admiring the squirrel pelt between my nipples. If your man ain't into it, then he ain't shit. Also, if you're into hairy guys, grizzled, burly men, please email us at penfifteenblog@gmail.com, or answer Fridge's personal ad on craigslist.
Dear Fridge and R Von D, My boss has been driving me nuts at work lately. Any suggestions on some subtle ways to drive him to insanity?
Fridge:
I would start alternating referring to him as "Pig Vomit" and "Lumberg." Those two names carry enough horrific connotation to drive a sane man to jump out of his own office window. R Von D:
Chicken and Milk Bomb. Take a disposable tupperware container, fill it 3/4 of the way with milk, put a raw chicken breast into the milk, then seal. Leave in a place near a heater or somewhere he/she won't find it for weeks. Eventually this concoction will form a gas that will force the lid off on its own. From there, the stench of rotting milk and chicken flesh can only be described as "grim death". You might have to smell it too, but pretend it's the smell of victory and you'll be the only one in the office not puking your eyes out.
