After the events detailed in my last blog
post ‘The Longest Journey’ (which you should read first if you haven’t already
– it’ll make things clearer and of course is destined to be a modern classic) we
found ourselves ensconced at Sudely Castle and absolutely dog tired. Speaking
purely for myself I set up my tent and went straight to sleep, only being woken
in the night by the flock of sheep which had got out of its field and was wandering
around ours.
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| This is the field, the fence and the tree where it happened |
Just so you know, getting out of your tent
and yelling ‘MINT SAUCE!’ at a flock of sheep and waving your arms around like
a demented windmill doesn't do much. You’d think that such a graphic reminder
of a sheep’s ultimate fate would at least cause it to run for this hills but
clearly sheep share a collective brain and the more there are of them in one
place the stupider they get. (I have noticed that football supporters demonstrate
a similar phenomenon by the way, a fact particularly relevant to this tale.) Anyway
the ‘mint sauce’ war cry didn’t endear me to the people who had been woken by
said sheep, though I have to say it did raise a laugh or two. Back to sleep I
went, being woken again by the local Society of Sheep ‘Shearers’. Being in the
Cotswolds and surrounded by axe-murdering madmen this was clearly what passed
for normal behaviour round here. BAAA!
That morning we were setting up for the show,
and the lovely lady who ran the castle told us we couldn’t have our usual spot
by the wooden fort and we’d have to go round the back of the castle in a field
full of thistles and stuff deposited by animals who eat thistles. Awesome!
After yesterday that was exactly what I needed and this woman was not going to
be taken alive if I had anything to do with it! I had a preliminary statement
all prepared which had to do with sex and travel (if you get my meaning) and
had my membership application for the local axe murdering nutters society all
ready. Being at that point a fully-fledged ‘Wild-Eyed Nutter In Dodgy Kit’™ I
felt it was a natural progression. I even had a convenient axe to hand. Fortunately
Mark, the society’s show coordinator was on hand and was able to convince the
poor woman to act in her own best interest, decline the free membership of the
Henry VIII wives Club that I was about to offer, and let us play in the castle
grounds. That was a lot more like it!
So we set up in a wonderful, intimate location inside the castle grounds, arranged other elements of the show in other equally wonderful places and off we went for the day. It started quite well. I wasn’t quite as graceless as usual in the dancing and I even managed to get a willing partner for the ‘have a go bit’. To put that in context, in my entire re-enactment career that happened about twice. I managed to cheat death yet again as we danced ‘La Volta’ which was a minor miracle (and the subject of another story) which meant that once again I could again put my career option of singing falsetto for the Bee Gees on hold. Phew! The script was great and we had a really good appreciative audience for it so all so far was good.
However. You knew there was a ‘however’
coming right? However, being in charge of fighting and fight training for the
society I was in had a curious effect on some people. Some would fall before
you like wheat before a scythe and others would be infected with the
invulnerability virus and wouldn’t go down no matter what. So what happened
today was my first opponent in the melee was one of the former. He fell to my
Yoda like abilities with me even touching him with my mighty blade. Thus, in
the immortal words of Samuel L. Jackson .............
The second (who shall remain nameless) definitely was in Main Battle Tank
mode as he faced me and nothing in my vast arsenal of Jedi Powers or Ninja Moves
was going to make him go down no matter how many times I hit him. It became
therefore a matter of picking my moment to take one and go down myself. Of
course, as you know, I was in no way angsty or egotistical about the whole
thing.
No really.
Honest.
I took one on the head, reasoning that it
would miss my brain by some feet as we’ve previously discussed and down I went,
observing the battle playing out around me as if I’d been poleaxed (which has it
happens was closer to the truth than I realised at the time). You see my
tankish foe had put really quite a huge crater-like dent in my helmet, making
it resemble the moon even more than it did before, and while of course I hadn’t
noticed it, oh boy was it there!
In due course I recovered from my death blow
and stood up. For the record, previously having had my balls trod on when I was
dead absolutely, definitely and indubitably in no way influenced my decision to
get up again.
And it was glorious.
I had several great fights with the then Top
Swords These fights, as I write about them, are playing out in my head. I was
totally focused and felt truly vital in a way I really don’t have the words
for. For those flashing instants I felt at one with everything around me, and
while I know it’s a cliché its one that happened to be entirely true. I still
feel the palest shadow of it when I ‘fight’ today and its pretty much the only
time I even feel vaguely alive these days.
Inevitably it came to an end. My end came in
the shape of Sir William Marshall, the icon of English Chivalry, who’s been the
subject of his own documentary and played a huge part in the Plantagenet saga
(also the subject of a documentary).
(I’d like to mention that ‘our’ Sir William
Marshall very nearly emulated the fighting history of his namesake, and only
retired from the craft at the age of seventy, only two years less than the
original, after having had to endure an dastardly assault from behind by a
signpost which fell on his head while he was fighting evil hordes at a nameless
battlefield in some high street or other. Huge respect Trevor. I’m sure your
namesake didn’t have to put up with that!)
Back to the story. He caught me quite nicely
over the head and frankly that would have been a great way to finish my part in
the melee except that he caught me right in the huge crater-like dent in my
helmet. Even with my brain being several feet away from the point of impact, I
felt that, and down I went, observing the rest of the melee playing out around
me in a trance like stupor from my usual position, though I’d had enough
presence of mind to fall on my side this time. You see, even I am capable of
learning given sufficient incentive!
I would like to say at this point that my
being a dribbling fool later in the evening was of course entirely down to this
head blow.
I honestly can’t remember who won the melee –
not that it matters really but I know a good time was had by all, and having merely
been hit over the head a couple of paracetamol had me sorted in no time flat.
Having your brain in another place does help sometimes.
The party that night was just awesome. I
think we had complaints about the noise from 5 miles away and as we did our
usual epic sing-song around the campfire I am certain that the Crimes Against
Music Division of the local force was called constantly and were entirely too
afraid to approach us lest they bleed to death from their ears, or possibly
were afraid of being beaten to death by a frozen chicken whilst stood on a
barrel of radishes. The jury is out on that one.
When we got sufficiently drunk we decided to
play a couple of games. The first was The Blanket Game, in which someone had to
hide under a blanket and name an article of clothing. If it was the wrong article
of clothing it had to be removed and thrown outside of the blanket. It’s a
great game if you’re sufficiently drunk and can’t figure it out, because of
course the correct article of clothing was the blanket. I will say no more than
Rebecca (not her real name) was a fantastic sport about the whole thing and gave
us guys a wonderful ‘it is good to be a man!’ moment. Sometimes it is just good
to be a man. Oh yes.
Then we played the ‘Court of Silent Justice’ (which
of course is the point of this blog) and my good and dear (also at that time very
young) friend Barney was picked to be the accused. Actually my memory says he
volunteered but I wouldn’t want to swear to that, in the interests of truth and
objectivity of course and also because I am absolutely certain that genuinely
genius level intelligences like his would never willingly fall for something so
totally daft.
So who the hell is Barney? I suppose I had
better introduce him. I first met Barnaby when he came to a Lion Rampant show
when he was fifteen. He was a gangly youth with very silly ears which were to
have dire consequences for him later in life, but I will tell that story in a
little while, and if you think you know what's coming there, think again! His
nervous laugh was also something which he became famous for, especially when he
went through his regrettably brief 'Barnaby the Barbarian' phase. I hope its
been transferred to DVD, in which case ask my brother-in-law for a viewing. RAAAR!
It's a classic. (More about Barney in the postscript.)
‘THIS IS THE COURT OF SILENT JUSTICE!’ we all
yelled. ‘YOU, BARNABY WALLACE NOW STAND BEFORE US. YOU ARE ACCUSED OF HAVING
VERY SILLY EARS! HOW DO YOU PLEAD?’
Barnaby was of course a genuine genius who understood
the nature of his plight straight away. He knew what he had to do.
‘I plead GUILTY!’
he declaimed proudly. The evidence was clear, after all. Just look up!.
‘YOUR PLEA IS INCORRECT!’ Said the court. ‘AS
PUNISHMENT YOU MUST REMOVE AN ARTICLE OF CLOTHING AND STAND BEFORE US AGAIN!’
Barney looked confused. Even a genius would
struggle with such a conundrum. Off came his shoes.
‘THIS IS THE COURT OF SILENT JUSTICE!’ we all
said. ‘YOU, BARNABY WALLACE STAND BEFORE US. YOU ARE ACCUSED OF HAVING VERY
SILLY EARS! HOW DO YOU PLEAD?’
At this point Barnaby was understandably
flummoxed. Given the nature of the evidence how could he be anything other than
guilty as charged? However plea options were limited so after a pause for
deliberation he spoke.
‘I plead INNOCENT!’ He declaimed, not quite
as proudly as the last time. Logic, even-p*ss*d-out-of-your-brains logic
dictated that this was the only other option.
‘YOUR PLEA IS INCORRECT!’ Said the court. ‘AS
PUNISHMENT YOU MUST REMOVE AN ARTICLE OF CLOTHING AND STAND BEFORE US AGAIN!’ Off
came the socks.
I don’t doubt that all of you reading this
have figured out the correct plea by now. It is after all The Court of SILENT
Justice, right?
However, poor Barney could not figure it out.
So more and more outrageous pleas were brought before the court and each was
rejected in turn. In no time it seemed he stood before us, clad only in his Y
fronts, an expression of abject terror on his face.
‘FOR THE FINAL TIME, BARNABY WALLACE, THIS IS
THE COURT OF *SILENT* JUSTICE!’ we
all said. ‘YOU, STAND BEFORE US ACCUSED OF HAVING VERY SILLY EARS! HOW DO YOU
PLEAD?’
You really can’t say we didn’t try, can you.
The penny finally dropped. Unfortunately a
passing coachload of football supporters happened to come within critical networking distance and even Barnaby’s enormous intellect could not stand the massive
drain and all conscious thought just vanished down the proverbial plughole. The
poor guy really had no chance. At all.
‘I PLEAD SANDWICHES!’
He said, clearly desperate.
‘YOUR PLEA IS INCORRECT!’ Said the court. ‘AS
PUNISHMENT YOU MUST REMOVE YOUR LAST ARTICLE OF CLOTHING!’
And he was off like his arse was about to be spanked
with a frozen chicken, pursued by 3 lovely women motivated by the sole aim of
ripping off his last vestiges of clothing and having their evil way with him.
I have a couple of observations to make at
this point. The first is; from the shrieks, cries and wailing I could only
assume that the banshees, furies, maenads and/or the wild hunt (pick the wild
women of your favourite religion, they were all there) had come to earth and
that very moment were riding the wind like the elemental forces they were.
The second is that, speaking as a lesser
mortal, my reaction to having three beautiful women pursuing me with the sole
intention of removing my last vestiges of clothing and having their evil way with
me would have been to take that as proof as the existence of a benevolent
divinity and surrender to my dreadful fate.
Alternatively I could I suppose take it as a
second ‘Its good to be a man’ moment. Two in one evening would be an event of some
note in my experience. I’ll leave you to take your pick but I must say I do most
strongly prefer the first option!
However, Barnaby was and is not a lesser mortal had other ideas. Faced with
the prospect of having his clothes ripped off by visions of pulchritude, he
tried manfully to outrun the pursuing Maenads and rather than surrender to
their tender mercies ran through about 15 feet of very active stinging nettles,
a barbed wire fence and from there ran straight into the very flock of sheep
which had shown no reaction whatsoever to my ‘mint sauce war’ cry the night
before. I’d consider this as solid evidence of my theory that there was at
least one coach full of football supporters in the vicinity, or possibly that
Barney had joined the local sheep ‘shearers’ society on the q/t and was expressing a
preference. I really shouldn’t speculate but you know this is my blog so I will do as I please!
The wailing of the Banshee ceased and some
semblance of normality descended on the field. They returned with their trophy.
You know what it was right? That’s when we heard about the 15 feet of nettles
and the barbed wire; oh and the sheep. Even extreme measures like these weren’t
enough to stop these amazing women and if I didn’t believe in the Sidhe riding
the wind before then I most certainly did after that.
Barnaby turned up soon after with some
semblance of his dignity restored, and a bloody great wound (from the barbed
wire) all down his front, which was not so tenderly dressed with neat dettol. By
that time he had regressed evolutionarily to probably about the level of a
sponge (which has no nervous system) and just laughed uncontrollably at treatment
which at any other time would have had him writhing in enormous pain. He still
carries the scars of that encounter by the way.
I did pick up a few words from his nurses
which I didn’t understand. Something idiot possibly? I have no idea what they
were talking about..
And from there we partied the rest of the night
away. I had been getting quietly drunk on mead and after I consumed all three
bottles I’d brought for use over the whole weekend I was buzzing pleasantly. Of
Ken Bennett (from the previous story) there was no sign but he came back from that
weekend with a whole girl so I can only guess he was happy. I guess he had his own
‘it is good to be a man’ moment. Oh yes.
Just so you know that the account is totally
unbiased and humiliation is spread wherever it is deserved you should know that
I made the mistake of not stopping after three litres of mead. I followed all
that up with a diet coke. Pretty harmless you’d think – except that is
dissolved the honey lining my stomach and all that alcohol hit me at once. I was
so far out of my tree that I circumnavigated whatever world ‘my tree’ lived in
and was back in it (my tree I mean). I was evolutionarily regressed to a state
far worse than a sponge at that point and possibly had about as much
intelligence as a whole stadium full of football supporters –which is to say
less than your average single-celled organism. I most certainly crashed and
burned in epic style but thankfully the two girls looking after me bore the
whole episode with commendable grace and didn’t remind me about it at every opportunity. Not quite every opportunity..
And I woke the following day feeling refreshed
and not at all hung over. That is not even slightly exaggerated. My first
hangover was thankfully years away back then. We had another glorious day in
the sun, and topped it all off with a visit to a wonderful little place on the
way back home which dealt with 30 or so people descending upon it all at once without
any sort of warning demanding huge steaks with
surprising aplomb. A fine way to finish an amazing weekend.
As well as having a great time, I learnt a
couple valuable life lessons over that weekend.
One was that being a slobbering idiot only makes you more attractive or witty in your own mind. Others will not share your opinion. Trust me on this.
The other was that just sometimes the best
endings come out of the worst beginnings, which I guess is really rather the
theme of this blog.
POSTSCIPT.
On The Dangers Of
Having Very Silly Ears
Barnaby is really a genius. He still has very
silly ears though. However, after a solid grounding in the Lion Rampant he went
to Canterbury university prepared by us to make a fool of himself in a way
which the word epic does no justice to whatsoever. I am certain that it is
still remembered in the annals of that august body! Here’s a little of his
story after the trauma of the Court of Silent Justice
While the Great Lamppost Destroyer of Old
Canterbury town is marked 'case unsolved' by the local constabulary, there are
still lampposts in Canterbury which fear Barnaby's tread for all sorts of
reasons and bucket sales have taken a steep dive on Friday nights in Canterbury
since he left. I have no idea why. Unfortunately I was only able to visit him
once a year while he breezed his way to a First Class Degree at the University,
and time prevents me from getting all the details of these wonderful stories
from his university friends, but I'm sure they will filter out in spite of
Barnaby's best efforts to supress them.
Barnaby liked Canterbury
After lots of drinking in places around Europe
we made his way to Russia, and whilst in Moscow he was arrested for the serious
crime of having very silly ears, bundled into an Ice Cream van painted grey by
a bunch of armed men in no discernible uniform and whisked of somewhere else,
where he was actually relieved to have men pointing machine guns at him,
because at least it was happening in a police station. I do believe he didn’t
plead ‘sandwiches’ in response to whatever accusations were made and was in due
course allowed to leave, underwear
intacto.
Later, on the Trans-Siberian railway
something similar happened, for it appears that they take silly ears very
seriously in Russia
Of course there were many more stories, but I
regret I have yet to hear them so I can't relate them to you. After his trip
across Russia , Barni made
his way to Japan via Vladivostok Mongolia Vladivostok
to Japan on some dodgy tramp
steamer and somehow got his friend Shean (who was living in Tokyo
I was only able to visit him once there, but
on several occasions during the course of my visit we solved world poverty,
invented cheap renewable energy and discovered the true origin of the universe
only to be completely unable to remember anything the following day! I am sure
that our inability to remember was nothing to do with our state, just the sheer
enormity of the ideas, but I will leave the judgement of that to those of you
who know either or both of us.
It was after that he met Satchiko, and
relatively recently that he got married. Barni and Satchiko chose not to have a
big wedding, opting instead to have a life which is to consist of one long beach party after another, which sounds like a good
idea to me, however impractical it may prove to be when they live in New Zealand
They are currently building the Last Homely
House in which they intend to spend their days. It is an absolute mansion! I
haven’t told them yet that I intend to take it over in my capacity as Tony,
Lord Of Evil and make it my own. I shall surprise them with the takeover one
day. Do NOT give the game away.
In conclusion, Barni was, and is, one of my
very best friends, somewhat less crazy these days, but still prone to odd
moments of insanity, with an unfortunate tendency to have it recorded! Ask him
to tell you about the older woman in Kaz' bar in Kyoto
