Shenanigans and Streakers in Sherwood

A Sherwood Forest Faire Story. Composed on Thursday, April 12th, 2012

 

Sherwood this year was a bad mistake for us. We were broke most of the time, held in the grasp of a boss that supported us just enough to ensure we kept working for her (whether or not she intended to do this on purpose). We never left the show, never got out and did anything, except for one trip to Houston with my blacksmithing master to grab a few things from his home shop. The drama at our job puffed itself into a big ugly, gooey head by last weekend, and we were lucky it never quite popped.

 

Well, actually, it might have, were it not for the shenanigans that happened on the very last day of the show.

 

Roughly ten minutes before cannon, a couple of girls shot through the middle of the faire butt naked and went streaking around the faire. The ringleader, a local already on probation for felony charges in the state of Texas, had no plan for doing this, but ran straight through the middle of the Seven Sisters fire circle, right past families and children and shocked mothers. She ran circles around the site, with faire security chasing her like hounds on a rabbit.

 

The streaker had security out of breath after the first ten minutes. “Get that bitch! I don’t care what it takes, catch that fuckin’ bitch!” the head of security panted after stopping behind a stage to catch his breath. Rennie rumor had them chasing this girl for over an hour. Rennie rumor also said there were about a dozen streakers of both sexes and that they caught them all and prosecuted them and they all went to jail, or that some went to jail, but for the ringleader and a few others also on probation.

 

Actually, only two girl streaked naked, and the other they let go with a slap on the wrist. The ringleader, however, only ran about site for roughly twenty minutes. She was slapped with a bench warrant and now has to serve out the two years of her previous sentence in jail. They arrested her several days after her boyfriend spent his entire last week’s pay to bail her out. That much of the rumor is true.

 

How they finally caught her is the best part, and I MISSED IT!

 

After running security around on a crazy goose chase for twenty minutes, she ran to the top of the hill to try and hide. When they found her, she bolted downhill to the first place she thought of to hide – the Dragon’s Kitchen. This tiny 100lb. chick dove butt-naked through the serving window at the front of Dragon’s Kitchen, shot through the main kitchen with Mom (our boss) screaming, “GET OUT! GET OUT OF MY KITCHEN!! GET OUT!”, dove out the back door, into the prep trailer behind the kitchen, and in one fluid motion – so I’m told – yanked the grates out of the oven, jumped inside and shut the door behind her.

 

“What?” Yes, she jumped into the oven…. “What!???” I know, I had the same reaction. She jumped into the old woman’s oven, naked, and shut herself inside. Thankfully, that oven’s only used early in the mornings for feast, otherwise security might have had to arrest a roast, LOL!!!

 

Security barreled into the kitchen, screaming for the girl. They had no idea she was in the oven and might never have found her there, except that she made a bad choice – she didn’t have friends at the Dragon Kitchen. Someone came up to the oven and banged on it. “Right here!”

 

“What!??” Security had the same reaction I did when I found out. Sure enough, there she was in that oven and they dragged her out kicking and screaming and cuffed her and dragged her to the parking lot where they handed her to the local authorities, naked as a jay bird and would not let her out of the cuffs until they had her behind bars. Security was never so pissed and wouldn’t LET the local cops take the cuffs off. “She had my guys running all over that faire for half an hour,” the head of our security reportedly told the cops, “Don’t you fucking let her go!”

 

Where was I when all of this went down? Smokin’ with a couple of guys behind their shop. See, kids, you shouldn’t smoke pot, it makes you miss all the fun stuff, HAHAHA! I found out the whole story a short while later when I finally wandered back to the Kitchen to find John and all the other employees are gathered about singing, “What do you do with a drunken [streaker], what do you do with a drunken [streaker], what do you do with a drunken streaker, late at Sherwood For-est… Toss her through the window of the Dragon Kitchen…. Throw her in the oven and bake her crispy… Late at Sherwood For-est!” (You’ve heard the tune.)

 

“What!??”

 

The most ironic thing about this is that everyone – every woman at least – in camp knew about it, knew when and just about where and who the ringleader was. Hell, I even knew about it. And everyone thought it was the worst idea they’d ever heard of. I mean, when the crazy blue-haired chick in your neighborhood that loves to run about camp half-naked thinks something is a bad idea, it probably is.

 

Yeah, we do what we call Wolf Runs, where we run naked on a full moon night, but those events happen well after dark, well after every last patron leaves, and usually in the campground where nobody cares and will probably join in if they’ve had enough beers in ’em. Not during faire, with patrons and children. She’s lucky she didn’t get slapped with a sexual offender charge and put on the list – and security really tried to nail her with that, too, since she streaked right past underage children. She got off lucky.

 

Well… not really. Worse than serving the term is the reputation she now has among the Rennies. There’s already songs and stories and rumors. Eventually, there might even be a coloring book about the streaker who hid in the old hag’s oven!

 

“What!??…. Do you do with a drunken [streaker] late at Sherwood For-est!”

 

Peace.