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I got off of work at noon Friday and had one of the fastest drives home from work ever.

38 miles. 38 minutes. It would be nice if it was that way more often.

I said "I will even have time to do some laundry before we leave". But, I found one of the people in the other apartments left their laundry soaking in the washer all 6 apartments share.

So, I packed the car instead.

I went back. Still soaking.

The woman doing came in from the parking lot and apologized. So, I guess she tied up the communal clothes washer and then left the building for more than an hour.
Well, all kinds, right?

Tom showed up only 20 minutes late, had only 2 bags and we set off.
We picked up my wife just at 4 as she got off work and we headed out of Worcester urged on by Orson the giant polar bear.

The weather on the drive down was quite good.

Traffic wasn’t great near NYC, but what do you want. We’ve had MUCH worse.

This sign always makes me think that they are announcing the religion of route 87.

I don’t think that’s what they mean. But, I can’t say I’m sure.

We got to New Jersey just as the sun set.

We got to the hotel about 10:30. Often we don’t get there until midnight or later, so that was quite good.

I did think their pool regulations strange.

It is a state regulation not to have lifeguards? Very strange.

Anyhow, 8AM Saturday morning we were next door at the faire site for rehearsal.

Since we are one of four groups that comes together for the shows, none of which get to rehearse together before the show, that morning run through is important.

Our god kids and their family showed up to help us at the show. Not just to help carry things and such, but get on stage and perform.

I can not express how fantastically happy this made me.

But, poor Louie the dog had to stay in a cage when the show was on. Poor Louie. I’m sure he would have helped too.

There was a light rain on and off all day. It didn’t really rain badly on any of our shows, but there weren’t a whole lot of folks who came out to see the show either.

At 1:00 in the afternoon, our adopted family had their stage debut.

My wife and Tom played the bad guys working for the evil nannies.

The kids, their dad and I were the good guys.

Sadly, first show, the bad guys win.

Fantastically happy and proud.

For the second of our big acts, it was raining quite a bit just before the show. A bunch of ducks too refuge under Tom.

But, the show must go on. Right?

You’ve got to roll with the changes.

And, get back up again.

This time, the good guys won and Tom was bagged.

Every year when we finally defeat the bad guys the Baroness of the East asks me if I would like any boon for saving them. I always say no.

This year, I changed that.
Hey, it was raining.

(I didn’t keep her umbrella….)

My cohorts led Tom from the field. Maybe not as well as they should have.

Evil defeated, we returned to our tent for our last show of the day.

As we did our last show, the rain began to get worse.

And worse.

Not that we stopped performing.

But, there weren’t a lot of folks left.

Just after we ended, it REALLY began coming down.

Note, at this point the ground around our tent was not overly wet…

The weather radar indicated it was not going to stop any time soon.

We put the swords and other less rugged things in the cars, sealed up the tent and headed to the Chinese buffet restaurant we all go to each year.

We got back to the hotel about 8:30. Soon after we got a phone call saying "your tent is under water" from the faire organizer, then one of our other friends at the faire.
The storm was still going.