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Pirate Fest, June 2013 - Put-in-Bay, OH
Chapter 2: Detailing what happened on Friday Afternoon, beginning with Setting up camp; Trying to get the mast raised on the Persephone (pronounced 'Purrs-eff-hone'); Starting things with a bang - literally, of course and Having dinner and riding out the storm at Pasquales.
With
Jim, Richard Conroy and Mary Diamond Set the Shipyard
a meal under our belts, we ambled back towards camp. I stopped off to check in to my hotel and by the time I got to the site, the second wave had arrived. So - and I know you're going to find this hard to believe, but it's true - I helped put up tents. I did! Seriously! I don't have any proof because no one else had a camera handy, but I pitched in (and pitched tents) with the best of them.
The most notable of these was Jim Shipley's tent/art project which Mary Diamond called the Shipyard, a name happily adopted by Jim. Jim had bought a huge piece of canvas and then basically stretched it between two trees and started distributing poles and lines to the gathered to prop the monster tarp up. (This was definitely a multi-person operation.) Once he had figured out how he wanted it, he brought out one of the largest hammocks I've seen at an event and put that in the center of the thing. With that, he decided to climb into his mammoth hammock... and promptly fell out of it. (I didn't have the camera handy for this unfortunately. However, Michael got into the hammock and managed to do the same thing of which I got a series of images as you see below.)
 Michael Gets In... |
 Gets Comfortable... |
 ...and Tries to Get Out. (Jim is 'Helping'.) |
 Michael Overboard! |
The third wave of pirates arrived, bringing overcast skies with them. (This included the Sos Boss Collective, which is where that shot of Mouse Island came from on the previous page.) The clouds began to look threatening, so there was a mad scurry by the new arrivals to get their canvas raised. However, Kate Bagley had brought her sonic screwdriver with her and the clouds magically began to split over the island and we dodged the raindrops for the most part. (If I'd have remembered, I would have said, "We're not hosting an intergalactic kegger down here!"5)
5 But I didn't.
 Photo: Mission "Storm Off the Larboard Tent!" |
 Photo: Michael Colossimo Kate Drives the Storm Away |
 Photo: Michael Colossimo The Magic of the Sonic Screwdriver |
The tent setup phase of the operation began to wind down, meaning it was time to set-up Site B - the camp for the tourists in the park in downtown Put-in-Bay. Now I know what some of you are thinking at this point: 'Shouldn't Site B be the primary campsite where all the actual work was done while the tourist camp in 
Site B
the Park would be called Site A?' Of course, you're correct, but since I've completely lost most of the normal readers at this point, let's not worry about it. (They're all sitting there thinking, 'When are we going to get past all this tedious set-up stuff and get to shooting or something?')
I went with some of the group and started helping to set up the Blue Lion Coffee shop. Actually, I really just got in the way of Dawn and Walter Loomis who were setting their shop up just fine without any assistance from me. But I felt like I was helping. Then the Logsdon contingent appeared and started unloading their gear from the Persephone, looking as if they were ambitiously going to join the setup festivities, but they got distracted and decided to go put the Persephone in in the water.
 Stephen Priddy and Marcus Cain Arrive |
 Site B - The Logsdon Contingent Sets Up |
 Site B - Blue Lion Coffee |
Marcus and Mission Tangle with Untangling
Having sufficiently gotten in Dawn and Walter's way, I decided to go and see if I could get in Nathan's way while he and his crew attempted to install the mast on the Persephone. They already had several people in the boat when I arrived and I saw no reason to inject myself into that melee. However, there were a bunch of ropes on the dock which had been thrown quickly in the boat in preparation for the trip. Nathan had spent long hours the week before this event replacing the rotted keel of the craft, which was why he told me they had just thrown everything in higgledy-piggledy, causing the ropes to tangle. Someone suggested I might untangle them, so I thought I'd try that.
This is a task I can really sink my teeth into. (Not literally. I'm sure those ropes would have tasted nasty. Who knows where they've been all winter?) I have a bead curtain at home which I have spent many worthless hours untangling, so the rope job was for me. Marcus was also on the dock, so he started helping and we eventually managed to get them straightened out.
 Photo: Mission Stephen Installs the Persephone's Bowsprit |
 Photo: Mission Marcus and Mission Untangling |
 Photo: Sos Boss Raising the Persephone's Mast |
Pirates Prepare to Fire
With that completed, I looked around and saw Michael Bagley lining pirates up on the seawall. So my attention wandered over there and my feet followed. They were firing volleys in lieu of staging a battle. (The Friday water battle had been cancelled because of the uncertain weather.
Pirates Firing
The last thing you want to do when you go out on the water is get wet, after all.) Since the goal of firing on land or boat was to raise the awareness of the many-headed mob on the island to the fact that the Pirate Fest had started, it was all good.
This didn't sit well with Matt Vincent, who was in charge of Bob Gillmor's cannons at the event this year. (Bob was off at Gettysburg participating in the massive sesquicentennial celebration of some civil war battle that had taken place there. Matt was helpfully filling in because he knew pirates were far more interesting than the blue or the grey.) Upon hearing the puny pops of the pirate rifles and handguns, Matt started double or possibly even triple loading the cannons in the park and firing them. If people didn't know the event had started before that, they knew it had started after. (Either that or the city gas main had exploded.)
 Photo: Mission Pirates Loading Their Weapons |
 Photo: Mission Matt Vincent Readying the Cannon |
 Photo: Michael Colossimo Pirates Firing (Look at Kate's Face!) |
Photo: Michael Colossimo
One of the new faces on the seawall was Richard - a new face to me. He had accompanied Jim Shipley to this event and was, I believe, wearing boots and a hat he had borrowed from Jim. This was his second pirate event, having been at the Santa Maria pirate weekend the month before. He seemed a pretty quiet sort, but definitely looked the part of an itinerant sailor who may have wandered or been helped across the line into a life of piracy.
Photo: Jim Shipley
When I asked him why he decided to get involved with pirate reeancting he said he enjoyed a lot of the elements of the sport including "the battle reenactments, and the joy of entertaining spectators". He also noted that he liked the fantasy aspect of playing a pirate, which makes perfect sense to me. He explained that some of his interest came from films such as Yellowbeard, the Pirates of the Caribbean movies and "The Pirate Movie from the early 1980's." I didn't ask him which pirate movie he meant, but I am going to guess that he really did mean the imaginatively named The Pirate Movie with Christie
Paul Revere and the Raiders... And their Coach
McNichol and William Atkins in it. I believe this is the first time I've seen this one mentioned and it's certainly the first time it's appeared in the Journals, so that makes it significant. (Well, not really, but it's still interesting, no?)
The other interesting thing I noticed about Richard is that he has automatically-darkening glasses, which sort of makes him look like the bass player for a rock band. Maybe Paul Revere and the Raiders? Hmm. No, probably not. But some rock band, surely.
 Photo: Michael Colossimo Ready... |
 Photo: Michael C. Aim... |
 Photo: Michael Colossimo Missed! |
 Photo: Michael Colossimo "There was no bullet in that gun..." "Nope." |
Since I was near my hotel after checking out the cannons, I decided to go change my shoes. (I know this is why many of you read this Journals - to get updates on my footwear choices for the day.) See, the ropes on my sandals were starting to rub on my feet and I didn't want to start the weekend with sore feet. Put-in-Bay is a walking town. (Plus it was an excuse to go hang in the air conditioning for a bit.)
When I came back down to the street, the battle noise-making was finished. Mary Diamond, Cheeky Actress and Bryan were in the park across from the hotel talking with Matt Vincent. So I wandered over there. Mary was interested in eating something. Since we were right across the street from event organizer Ty's place, Pasquales Italian Restaurant, we went there. On the way, we were asked to pose for a photo with a family of kids so large that I am certain they had borrowed a few of them just for this photo. This naturally called for a reciprocal photo by way of payment which you see at right.
Ty in His New Jacket
Once ensconced inside Pasqueles, we ordered drinks and pored over the menu. Mary was delighted to discover that they had Bosco sticks. Now Mary is a very particular eater, so I knew this was significant. However, I had no idea whatsoever what a Bosco stick was. (All I knew is that we were getting some. You don't argue with Mary when she finds something she likes.)
While we were sitting there waiting for our order, the desire for Bosco sticks on the opposite side of the table being palpable, who should appear but restaurateur and Pirate Fest spearheader Ty? He was decked out in a fine blue brocade jacket that he told us was new for this year. When he found out we were having Bosco sticks, he warned, "Oh... these things are addictive!" So I guess everyone knew about these but me! (Then again, naturally Ty knew about them - he had bought them for his restaurant.)
As it happens, Bosco Sticks are basically soft-bread cheese sticks that you dip in pizza sauce as you see below left (We have this picture thanks to Cheeky who insisted I take it.)
 Still Life - Bosco Sticks at Dinner |
 Mary and Cheeky at Pasquales |
 Mission and His New Mug |
Back in the comfort of my own internet, I decided to brush up on Bosco sticks. 
Johnny B - Looks like a Cartoon from the 60s
According to an article entitled "The Truth About Bosco Sticks" from the Londenderry News (out of New Hampshire), they are made in Warren, Michigan, which about 50 miles from where I'm sitting writing this. The Bosco Pizza Company sells 85 million of them every year and (according to the article) "Half the High School Students select them for lunch". While your author wonders about the sample size used to produce this statistic, he tends to believe it since it's probably as close as you can get to junk food without actually being junk food in schools these days.
The article followed this revelations with a whole section of filler information about the company's mascot, Johnny Boscoe, which the Londenderry News blatently admitted was taken from the company website. (So this appears to be a puff piece.) According to them, "Our mascot, Johnny Bosco, looks like a kid who knows how to have fun, and he sure does!"
Bryan's Collar, Too Close For Prime Time
Since I quoted them quoting this, I guess that that makes this page a puff piece for Bosco Sticks as well.
As we were eating, the sky outside the window darkened measurably. It was that sudden, blue/black sky that means high winds and torrential downpours are in your future. Sure enough, just as the waitress brought our bill, the skies opened. Here we were in layers of wool and linen and water was just pouring down outside. Apparently Kate's sonic screwdriver wasn't working any longer. So we decided to have coffee and dawdle in the restaurant..
I also chose to use the rest room, apparently leaving my camera on the table, which produced the series of photos you see below. These appear to be images of Donna re-tying Bryan's collar thong, although why Cheeky decided to provide me with extreme close ups! of this, I have no idea. I can only report on what I found in my camera. (We should all be happy that it wasn't something much more disturbing given that my camera was in Cheeky's charge at this point.)
 Mary Explains Tying a Collar to Bryan - I Think (Notice How Dark it is Outside at This Point?) |
 Then She Actually Ties It For Him Despite the Fact That He Can't See It |
 Bryan Feelin' Pret-ty Smug With His New, Perfectly Tied Collar |
Photo: Michael Colossimo
Dan Curtis Standing in a Deep Puddle
While it was certainly fun loitering in Pasquales for two hours, we started getting restless. I wanted to wander and find the rest of the group. Everyone else wanted to go back to camp and see what disasters had befallen their tents. They were worried because in addition to the rain falling in buckets for a good ten minutes, the wind had given of its all and blown impressively, Mary and Cheeky had staked their tent at the bottom of a hill in the campsite and were expecting a river to be running through it when they got back.
I was a bit more sanguine on that point. The hill they were worried about was well covered in grass, so the water probably wouldn't be forming rivers in quite that short a time. We later learned that all the tents had remained standing back in camp. Although there had been an impressive rainfall, no one had gotten too wet, other than some sleeping bags and clothing that the wind/rain combination had managed to soak by pushing rain through the tent door flaps. Those in camp managed to keep things together for the most part, however. Dan Curtis did manage to find an especially deep point in a puddle the formed in the dirt road bordering our campsite.
Photo: John Raad
Imagine THAT River Running Through Your Tent - Or Carrying it Off...
Now, had we been in the Australian Outback, it would have been another matter entirely. There's precious little ground foliage there and when it rains, the water runs whereever it wants.
I say this with some authority (but not very much) because we happened to be hiking in King's Canyon when the skies opened up back in 2005. The guide said we were seeing something amazing because it only rained a few days a year here. We know this because they kept telling us that.
It made for some mighty impressive waterfalls as you see in the photo taken by my brother-in-law at left. However, obtaining these lovely shots was small comfort when we returned to find that the dry creek bed we had crossed to enter the canyon had became a knee deep torrent of raging rapids about 30 yards across. But we all got through the new river OK and it became a story to tell.
Now you may be wondering why I put that in here (because I was sort of wondering at first, myself.) It seems to be one of those "Any story you can tell, I can top" sort of things, but it's really not. (Honestly. Well, maybe a little...)
See, I have this mental image of our group crossing that 'Instant River - Just Add Water!' which looks something like the photo of Dan Curtis above. I have always thought photos existed of this. In fact, I believe this is the third time I've looked for those photos on the CD of my brother-in-law's images and not found it. This is because there is no such image. Maybe if I put this in here, I will remember that the next time I think it exists. (Probably not, but who knows?)