Valhalla Renaissance Faire
It’s been a while since I’ve done a “From the Front Lines” post. It’s been a rough year so far. I won’t go into the specific details, but so far, with a few exceptions, 2015 has not been all I hoped it would be. Not so much with Valhalla. Valhalla racked. My new story, “How the Men in Ireland Lost Their Common Sense, and How Their Wives Gave it Back to Them,” is coming along very nicely. Had lots of tried and true members of the #GallowglasArmy stop by the show, and met lots of new fans. Feeling invigorated for the rest of the year. Here are some awesome pictures and videos from both weekends, with a quick blurb about each one.
Here are the “before and after” pictures of packing the car.
Before
After.
Note that I have a mini-cooper, and that’s two layers deep of gear and boxes of books.
Here’s the crew. Jenni Brush and Cody Parcell really go above and beyond to make my events, both ren faires and conventions, spectacular. Aside from helping at events, Jenni does the website, and Cody handles 95% of my graphic design. He also rocked out the new Dead Weight covers.
Daybreak Crepes and Coffee is the official Renaissance Faire Sponsor of the Bard’s Cloak of Tales Show. They have been keeping me fed and caffeinated over more years than I care to count. Dave an Lizzy take great care of me, and the family when they show up. If you enjoy my show, you should definitely show patronage to these fine people. Dave might get a little irritated with me for mentioning this, but, much like In and Out Burger, these guys also have a secret menu.
And then we have the official whiskey of the first weekend Mibiki. I got this very fine Japanese whisky for a birthday present from my darling wife. It is extremely yummy. From now on, we will have the official #GallowglasArmy whisky of the weekend, providing the event isn’t “dry.” Keep an eye on my various social media in the days leading to an event to see what it’s going to be.
Sharing is caring… Right?
Of course it is!
Here are some pictures we took of a some of the great people marching on the front lines of the #GallowglasArmy!
This is Katie and Rachael. They’ve been fans of mine before I was published. They’ve sat through my show even in the pouring rain, they like it so much. They suprised me with those little bone pins. You can’t really tell very well in this picture, but the pins say, “Where is your lantern?” This is kind of the slogan of the Halloween Jack books. Seeing those made my soul happy.
This is Ruth. We fiorst met Ruth at the Sonora Celtic Festival. She drove four hours round trip to come to the faire because I bugged her over Facebook. She picked up all of my books. I could use a few more people like this coming to the shows. That pays for a lot of ballet lessons.
This guy (and I feel terrible that I don’t remember his name) first saw me at a small little faire in Willets California of all places. He told me that he used to be that awkward geeky guy in school that nobody liked… until… he saw my show and started telling stories. Then he made people laugh and got popular for being entertaining and funny. So… again… like I say at the show…
PLEASE DO WHAT I DO AT HOME!
We stayed at the APEX in, mostly because I’m reading APEX by my buddy Ramez Naam. If you’re not reading his books, you should be.
At the end of the weekend, I always take the crew out for “Victory Dinner” before we head home. We’ve discovered a new favorite up in Lake Tahoe: Burger Lounge. Great food for very reasonable prices. We at there several times. When they asked what name, we decided to tell them it was for, “Bard’s Cloak of Tales.” This is what they wrote on the receipt:
That’s all for now, story lovers. Did you miss joining us at Valahalla? Fear not! I’ve got lots more events over the rest of the year. Check the schedule page to see if I’m going to be anywhere near you. If you have an event happening close to you that you think I should attend or should have my show, let me know, I’ll see if I can work it in.
Until next time: May all of your stories have happy endings!
