Attack of the Pirate Peeps

“Attack of the Pirate Peeps”
Or “The Fyne Art of Feast Warfare”

By “True” Thomas Whitehart, Bard of Strongbow

For The Tower, the Siege Tower of Strongbow

I have to admit, I was never all that excited about official feasts. I vastly prefer the more boisterous household affairs that lent themselves far more to hilarity than heraldry. As a bard, it’s always been one of the nicer perks of the job that when people have feasts, you often get invited to perform at them! Personally, I can tell you that at many of them the food has been incredible. I’ve eaten perfect steaks with the 9th, sampled Master Quinn’s incredible beef stroganoff, and so much more. In Dreiburgen’s unmistakeable “Big Blue” pavilion, I’ve see an array of beverages that would rival any four star restaurant. It never fails to amaze me how many of my fellow SCAdians are multi-talented. It’s pretty cool when you have friends who can knock you out with either Crème Brulee, a ballista, or both! For several years, I was lucky enough to be adopted by House DeSteele, whose focus was on cooking. I knew from the moment I performed at their camp and was rewarded with “Death by Chocolate Brownies” that these were people who were inspired by the very gods of cooking.

After I mooched my way in I told my other jealous friends…”When at war, camp with the hobbits! They understand ‘Tweensies!”. Since then, I’ve moved on to House Strongbow to be with my Lady, and have kept agitating for wartime culinary competitions with some success. We’ve lured one of Atenveldt’s best cooks over to our camp, and I hear now that a barbeque competition is in the offing, and I, for one, am waiting with a stack of wet wipes!

When my Lady told me that we were going to 12th Night this year and I found out that many of the culinary conspirators in kitchen were from House Desteele, I was both delighted and saddened. When you friends are chefs, it is often a mixed blessing. You miss sharing their company (as they are busier than maddened badgers), but you get really great cuisine.

Now, for those of us who’ve been to 12th Night feasts, you can see some incredible table decorations. This year was no exception. This feast had a theme that centered on Venice, and the winning table looked like something from Renaissance Masters, complete with perfectly dressed matching maidens. Wow. I can only say this: if the SCA ever did a Rose Bowl Parade Float, it would be the most ornate and well documented thing ever seen on TV. And, of course, involve a lot of duct tape. Can you imagine the announcer? “Ah yes, Bob, and now we have “An Illuminated Age”, a float submitted by the SCA. It is covered with millions of flowers all carefully documented back to the Middle Ages, grown from heirloom seeds, and embroidered onto hand made silk. Those people on it, whom seem to be fighting with the folks from Medieval Times, are the “Dancing Dukes”. According to this, this float is completely powered by Pelicans. How fascinating!”

But I digress….Now, on our table, we had a less ambitious but more militant theme going. My Lady has a small replica siege tower, to match the much bigger one she keeps in her driveway. Around it, we have miniature fighters, cavalry, and, of course, archers, both crossbow and longbow. On the top it has a small working catapult, which, when aimed correctly can lob a Hershey’s Kiss just far enough to hit nearby other banquet tables. This year on the table next to us, we were “horrified” to realize that there was similarly militant table setting, albeit in a nautical vein. This table had a ship, complete with mast and prow, and it was manned by Peeps. In case you don’t know, it is one of the secret missions of all good and right thinking people to defend our kingdom from these marshmallow-y menaces. Attempting to defend our banquet citizenry from Horizon’s End’s piratical peeps, we opened with a broadside of chocolate, and I can only say, our first shots were..”sweet.”

Things escalated quickly from there. Very quickly our tower was assaulted en masse by these fluffy fiends, resulting in a series of retaliatory raids. Ransom notes were sent, candy filled the air, other tables got involved and somehow our miniature captain of the guard for our little tower ended up with the Royal’s Captain of the Guard. Little did we know that our Lilliputian Lothario had a thing for the Ladies, and, indeed, unrequited love had sprung forth! So, as the feast progressed, our talented and hilariously patient Knight Server, dutifully picked up our miniature horse to rush missives back and forth between the two tables, complete with clopping noises. At one point, in order to to win the heart’s desire of our poor champion, we were tasked with the quest of providing one Unarmed Sloth to the beautiful lady in question. When this missive arrived by way of our gallant Server Knight on a miniature horse, I sat at my table, pondering just exactly how table decorations had somehow led to me having to either try to get His Royal Majesty involved in this nonsense, or embark on an ill-conceived scavenger hunt. Wisely, I opted for the scavenger hunt.

In short order, a stuffed hedgehog doll was found, tied upside down to a Hogwarts wand, and duly presented to the Lady as an “Unarmed Sloth”. This, in turn, now had to be ransomed back from Her Majesty. Fortunately for us, we had at our table some diplomatic and wealthy merchants (Amicia’s Amenities) who by dint of chocolate filled gold coins ransomed back our newly designated Sloth (if the Queen says it’s a Sloth…then it’s a Sloth!)
I wish I could say at this point that all accounts were settled, but it quickly became even sillier from there, involving mass negotiations and hastily written bad limericks. Fortunately, by the end of the evening, I was able to return the transmogrified hedgehog/sloth to its proper owners, informing them that, by Royal decree, this creature should now be more properly displayed inverted.

For those of you pondering what feast decorations you will have at your next banquet, I would recommend the following: “Wet Wipes” and large plastic bags are very handy for a quick clean up of your feast gear afterwards. And, just in case the feast turns militant, you might want to bring additional supplies of chocolates, quill and parchment for writing ransom notes (or peace treaties, or love poems, etc.), and just possibly a sloth. Just in case. Many thanks go to all the hard working people who make such events possible!

Bon Apetito!

THL Thomas “Human Target” Whitehart is also known as “True Thomas the Storyteller”. His website is http://www.truethomas.com.