Pirates in Paradise 2009 - Key West, Fl
Chapter 6th, 12/6 Day - More about the inevitable fate of Fayma's bike, the unexpected benefactor, what the Surgeon learned about Chrispy, breakfast with a beautiful redhead, the girl from Siam, concert pianists who drive race cars and helping Mr. Cooper to raise the storm-fallen flag. This among other Hardy Boys mystery book titles.
Photo:
Redbeard or Ratbeard, who picked
your lost surgeon up on the
way to the fort
Photo: Jamaica Rose of NQG Mag.
One of Ratbeard's rats, Bonny.
Regular readers know that I
can't resist
posting animal shots.
Not having Fayma's bike stolen the day before made
me complacent. As payback for my laxness, it was stolen today. So I had to
hoof it to the fort. Fortunately, as I mentioned, the Pegasus is about as
close as you can get to the fort for hotels. Even more fortunately, I ran
into a guy in a kilt about two blocks up the road who was fussing with his
van - which had a missing side window. "Are you walking to the
fort?" he asked me. "Unless you give me a ride." So he did.
Despite their unusual appearance, most pirate re-enactors I've
come across are just like that.
My benefactor said he was Redbeard or Rat beard. "Rat beard?" Turns out he had two rats sitting in a cage beneath a tarp between the seats. He had been fussing with his van because he had locked his keys in the car the night before but was unable to jimmy the door. So he either took out or broke the window to get the keys before I showed up. This explained the missing window. You don't have adventures like this outside of PiP…at least not all piled on top of each other!
Photo: Mission
(Photo: Jessica Bagley
When I arrived at Mercury HQ, I found Cannibal Chrispy there. You may remember from
last year's surgeon's journal that he repairs guitars. It turns out he
had also toured with various rock bands for over 17 years.
The highlight of this was when he was flown to Japan to fix a problem on a guitar being used by Stevie Wonder's band. Stevie is very sensitive to sound and a slightly out of tune guitar had been bothering him for weeks. So Chrispy was called to the rescue. He brought his own guitar-fixing equipment which he used. After the concert, someone came up to Chrispy and said, "Mr. Wonder would like to see you." Chrispy said he was thinking, "Oh, crap" as they led him to the superstar's dressing room. But Stevie was effusive in praising Chrispy and hugged him, thanking him for fixing a problem that had eluded all the technicians touring with him.
Photo: Mary Diamond
Right: "Right here in River City.
Trouble with a capital 'T'!"
When Chrispy learned he was going to be the auctioneer this year, he watched and studied auctioneers on YouTube and practiced for the role. This was probably why he did such a good job. He told me that he had been the guy at concerts who says, "Ladies and Gentlemen, put your hands together for Mr. Barry Manilow!" So he had the voice for it and he didn't mind getting up and playing the role in front of everybody. ( I'm certain he toured with Barry at sometime in the past.)
Photo: someone out there who loves Barry.
Chrispy read that last sentence and responded with, "Ummm, No I never worked
for Barry Manilow........... However the mention of it brings this to mind......
You write the blogs that make the pipsters sing
millipedes stolen bikes and everything
You write the blogs that make those who missed it cry
You write the blogs
You write the blogs."
Gee... Now I'm just embarrassed...as well as being slightly queasy. (Although, they're not blogs, they're accounts!)
Left: Barry loves you! (You know, I went out on the web to find a weird picture of Barry for this page and, by God if it didn't appear right at the top of the search list! I know! It's really quite astonishing, isn't it?)
Anyhow, Red Jessi and I had agreed to have breakfast at Blue Heaven that morning. She had been getting dressed while I was talking to Chrispy. Those corsets have 3000 eyelets in them which must be re-laced every time you put them on or take them off – this is the real reason the population was so much smaller in the 17th/18th centuries.
(Photo: Jessica Bagley
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 (Photo: Jessica Bagley |
Photo: Mission
Upon the completion of Jessi dressing, we headed out in her cool vehicle
Sarge. (For more on Sarge, see last
year's journal.) Finding parking was a chore and a half and we wound
up walking several blocks once Sarge was parked and resting. On the walk,
she spotted a large yellowish-white flower in someone's yard called an
"Angel's Trumpet" which she showed to me. It turns out it is a deadly
flower which you are not even allowed to grown in some counties in Florida. I also learned from her that apple seeds could kill you (if you ate
about 500 or them.) Such curious facts that she recalled about deadly Florida
flora!
Right: A lovely flower.
Photo: Mission
The place was crowded, so we had to wait, but people
actually invited us to take their seats at the bar. It's good to be a
pirate in the normal world...well, as normal as Key West gets. Several people came up to us during the meal to ask questions about
our outfits and what was going on at the fort. You definitely get to be
the center of attention in garb. It was a very good breakfast, made
even better by the company.
During breakfast, I learned from Jessi that she had spent two years learning about American Indian customs from a local medicine man in training. She was able to attend several of their tribal functions, despite the fact that the tribe usually shunned outsiders. She got in so well with them that they gave her a tribe name: "Many women." This was because she was involved with so many different things in her life.
Photo: Mission
Photo: William
Back at the fort, I talked with Vintage Sailor (left)
who is Shay of
the Key's son. He has worked with the Commodore casting cannon and is
now involved in making his own guns. He crews on boats which is where he
met someone who introduced him to his wife Sansanee, who arrived in the
States from Siam two months ago.
Sansanee (right) – who helpfully spelled her name out for me - taught English in Siam, so you hardly knew she wasn't born here to listen to her. She and Anne Coates-Sharpe were busily marinating chicken (below right). I was delighted to find that many of Sansanee's ingredients appeared to be printed only in Thai. Too bad I'm a veggie. She actually told the group that she liked me, which I considered a very good thing in that she was holding a very large knife when she said it.
Photo: Mission
Sansanee and I talked for quite a long time about how
dramatically her life had changed coming here. She told me that she was amazed by
the paperwork and bureaucracy involved. She did mention that she liked the
little entertainment centers built into the backs of the airplane seats in
business class. (So do I, actually. They're particularly well thought out
for international travel.)
One of the biggest things she had to learn was not to be so direct when talking to people. I guess they say pretty much what the mean in her country. In some ways, I actually suspect we might benefit from a bit more of that. She noted that switch from her culture to ours was still quite overwhelming for her. She said that she wasn't at all sure about the piracy thing yet, but it reminded her of being in Girl Scouts. It will be interesting to talk to her next year after she's had time to take it all in.
(Photo: William
Shay of the Keys is a very fascinating woman. Like Duchess (another
fascinating woman) she is a pilot. She also races antique cars and was a
member of a club of people who re-enact with their cars being the center of
the period they re-enact. The way I understand it, you buy an antique auto
and then you have to go and buy all the authentic gear (no re-created
items that would go with your car. This includes clothes, luggage and all the
little details. If they find you have something non-authentic, you are
banished from the club. Now THAT is seriously enforcing some rules.
Shay also has a vintage car somewhere in California that she drives in races. She was a concert pianist, so Vintage Sailor is making a clavichord for her to play at events. She showed me pics of a model they are using (below) and the box Vintage is designing. It has all authentic woods and designs, although they plan to put a modern electronic organ inside because a real clavichord is too quiet to be heard. She hoped to get a chance to play with Diosa at the Hide later.
Left: Shay of the Keys, her very long rifle and the 12 Apostle cartridges.
Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
Right: Diosa and Mission, settlers in the new world.
Speaking of Diosa, I espied her and wandered off to hug her (again) so that she could once again lecture me on just how bad I was about being willing to hug her. I told her that the reason for this is because I always get this lecture about not being willing to hug her. She just rolled her eyes. I get that a lot.
I must say that she had a really neat set-up (below - with D.B. Couper in the photo). I believe this may be all the paraphernalia from the Katt & Fiddle from previous year.
Photo: Mission
Photo: Mission
Photo: Mission
She then introduced me to D.B. Couper. Mr. Couper said
the he had been a pirate for the last 40 years, it just took him until
this year to find a group of people he could pirate with. He has done a
yeoman's job of putting together his beautiful bamboo and wood tent poles.
Amazing for having only been doing this for a year.
I wondered how he had attached the wood to the bamboo and he told me it was "with glue, little nails and a lot of patience." He had a really cool mast-like flagpole which I helped him set up so that I could take these pictures (below right). DB had decided to take his creative setup down when the threat of the storm arose yesterday.
Left: Now that's a tent pole! Right: D.B. Couper showing off a favorite lantern.
Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
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PhotoMission
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In addition to the Fort vendors, the campsite and battlefield re-enactments, a group manned the Forge this year, making period accurate items. The forge was headed by Wasabe (below left) He was assisted by Scarlett Jai (showing him a lantern holder) and Leatherback (below center - hammering out the shape on an anvil). I believe Deadeye Rick was also there at times, although I didn't see him when I was there. They had several products (below right...in addition to a certain item that is more forgery than forged) that they made during the weekend. It was a nice addition.
Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
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Photo: Ivan Henry
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Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
Photo: madPete
One of the more evolutionary ideas at PiP this year was
the Buccaneer's Camp. I didn't actually spend a tremendous amount of time at the camp,
so I'm afraid my descriptions will not be the best you've ever read. However,
since this is the sort of quality you're used to finding in these, your ship's
Surgeon's Journals, everything should come out aright.
The camp itself consisted of several tents (above left and at the bottom of this little picture block) which was fronted by a strange canvas thing that I can only guess at the purpose of (above right). Defense? Cooking? Aerodynamics?
Photo: William
Photo: William
Unfortunately, they did not actually get a cow to cook on
a spit as far as I could tell, however they did do a lot of cooking of
meat, something appropriate for a group of boucainers (means to cook
meat).
The buccaneers were colorful characters including (starting from above left) the estimable prince of pirates, Patrick Hand, (moving right) Shay of the Keys, (down and left) Sergeant Johnson and (Peter, I'll take the lower right square for the block) Doug, whom you may remember from last years PiP Surgeon's Journal. They made for a lively addition to this year's event.
Photo: Mission
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Photo: Mission
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