mia_mcdavid and I went back to the Minnesota Ren Faire yesterday. As I wrote earlier, I was there to staff the information table for Gaeltacht Minnesota in return for which we got in free. The work at the table was not hard, and I was only alone for about 1/2 hour in the morning, when the others were giving a presentation at the pavilion next to our tent. The rest of the day I had plenty of backup from the instructors and more advanced students when on duty, and a lot of free time to see the fair the rest of the day.

Unlike at colgaffneyis events, I did not wear a kilt. Irish kilts are a modern invention and have no historical basis. I wore a 16^th century style léine and a two yard plaid as a brat (mantle). Not that any one would have cared–Ren Faires are quite sloppy about historical accuracy (and seem, at least here, to be getting worse). I just have my own standards. Mia wore a Shinrone gown. Unfortunately, it was rather chilly and we should have brought another wrap for her. We ended up passing the one plaid back and forth during the day as needed.

During our free time we saw a good show by the local Royal Scottish Country Dance Society. A friend from colgaffneyis is active in that group and we had a chance to chat with her. bullettheblue and backseatgaffer also turned up and we talked with them for a while. At the end of their show the RSCDS did one dance with audience participation and I got pulled onto the stage for that. Not a problem….Afterwards my partner suggested I come to their Monday night classes in Minneapolis. This is really not an option–it would conflict with my Irish Class and in any case I already have too many activities.

There have been some bad feelings between the local RSCDS and colgaffneyis–some of our members call them the “Royal Snobbish”. I am not comfortable with this. They are really quite good at what they do, and they have always been friendly and polite to me. Their focus is is quite different from ours, so I cannot see them as competitors. I don’t really know how this feud started but I cannot imagine any reason to keep it up.

We also wandered by groomporter‘s tent and watched him give his demo on using a bow lathe. Very nice, although also a reminder that I need to do more historic woodworking (see above about too many activities).

Despite the attractions of the Fair, I spent more time at the Gaeltacht tent than I had to. The company was pleasant and interesting. One of the activities at the adjacent pavilion was the “Free Beer Tasting” (actually an infomercial for “flavored malt beverages”), which naturally attracted a crowd. We held up some handwritten signs correcting the speaker’s Irish a couple times. Everybody was quite good natured about this and after the last session he sent us some beer (real beer, including Guinness–not the other stuff he was pitching). It was a good time.