Renaissance Festival War Stories Aug 17/Aug 18, 2024

It's been 320 days since last year. The Sidequest Players (SQP) return for their sophomore season with three new team members bringing us to 10. Let's see what Tinka Boudit and The Sidequest Stop Brings us this year.

The Twins

Last season, somewhat late in the season, a pair of fraternal twins came upon the SQPs and went on about a dozen sidequests. At the end of the day, their mother, in happy tears, stopped Peter at the gate and thanked him for our team helping her and her children find the magic of the festival again. She was ready to be done, for 2023 to be her last huzzah and call it quits. She thought with her twins being 17 at the time they had out-grown it and the magic was gone...

Cut to this past weekend. The twins returned with their whole family, excited to see us. They were now old enough to attend the Feast of Fantasy, and more. They came back to see us and go on more sidequests. At first I didn't recognize them; it first it was just the girl with her mother and the girl was wearing a wig, then her brother approached and the memory of their faces came back. They brought the magic to me too.

This is why we do it: to help people find the magic that exists in this realm. We at The Sidequest Players are not purveyors of magic, but the guides to help the patrons find it.

Spread the Magic

From where the Sidequest Stop is, there is a certain range of places we can see. On Sunday, it was getting hot and uncomfortable. It may have been 83 degrees, but there was no cloud cover, no breeze, and the humidity was high. It was getting close to the top of an hour when I noticed a Magic show was about to start at The Wizard's Cote and no one was seated for it. A group of young women approached for a sidequest. When I saw that the magician was starting to prepare for his show, I knew what I could do. "Your Sidequest is to see the magic show starting right now, and tell us one of the tricks he did." The next time I looked, those ladies were sitting in the front row of that magic show, and the audience grew from there.

If that's how you really feel

While I consider Tinka an all-ages entertainer, adults seem to be easier for me to handle. Shaking off the rust of opening weekend can be difficult. It's a high volumn of people in a short amount of time. There aren't a lot of chances to practice being in character prior to the season and sometimes I don't know how to react. One of my challenges is children. They're wonderful, chaos creatures. I don't know what they're going to say or how they are going to react. They might be shy, disinterested, confused, weirded out, or something else entirely. One little boy this weekend was with his parents, and they were all dressed up. He was excited to trade trinkets. Afterwards mom prompted, "What do we say?" Normally you would expect a "Thank you." He said, "I love you." And I nearly collapsed from cuteness. I felt it in the place where my ovaries used to be. Dang it, that's cute!

Biggest Fans

We SQPs decided to become the premier keepers of trivia on Our Lord King Henry. On Sunday, we saw King Henry with his guards and no patrons- we saw a golden opportunity. Some people came up to sidequest with us, I pointed out King Henry, and asked them to see if the rumors were true about him: he's so strong, he goes jogging with a horse on his back. They patrons go onto do that. Now we can't hear the conversation, but we can see it. King Henry's gesture's and reactions and the guards laughing. While he was talking with those patrons, we sent MORE patrons to do the same: ask King Henry if it's true that he found the last digit of pi. This goes on several more times until he can't help but look in our direction and see six Sidequest Players behind their giant fans not-so-discretely hiding. He is finally able to approach and he confirms the rumors, it's all true, except the one about him inhaling the seagull, that didn't happen...allegedly.

See you in Weekend 2!

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Our first weekend has come and gone. Find The Sidequest Players for lots more fun!