The Pirates of the Ring

Ahoy, me followers! It be International Talk Like a Pirate Day! Today's the day to bring out all o' those piratey words ye have picked up and shout "Arr" to the world! To celebrate the occasion, I have here a script o' sorts - I give ye, The Council of Elrond: Pirated Edition!

Captain Elrond: Avast ye seadawgs, mateys of old. Ye be summoned here to meet the threat o’ Mordor. Ye’ll unite or ye’ll go down to Davy Jones’ Locker. Each race be bound to this fate, this one doom. Bring forth the Ring, Nine-fingered Frodo. (Nine-fingered Frodo places the Ring among the pirates.)

Barnacle Boromir: Shiver me timbers, it be true! In a dream, I saw the starboard side grow dark but on the port side a pale light lingered. A voice was crying: ‘Your doom be near at hand. Isildarr’s Bane be found…Isildarr’s Bane… (He nears the Ring.)

Captain Elrond: Blimey!

Gandalf Greybeard: Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest. Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum. Drink and the devil had done for the rest. Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum…

Captain Elrond: Arr, never ‘as a soul spoken those words ‘ere, Gandalf Greybeard.

Gandalf Greybeard: I isn’t askin’ for your pardon, Captain Elrond, for the Black Speech o’ Mordor may yet be heard in the four corners of the Earth! The booty be altogether evil.

Barnacle Boromir: Belay that, it be a gift! Why not use this Ring? Long has me dad, the Quartermaster o’ Gondor, kept yer waters safe from the brigands o’ Mordor! Give Gondor the weapon of the enemy. Let us use it against him!

Arragorn: Ye can’t wield it! None of us can. The One Ring be answering to Scurvy Sauron alone. It has no other captain, savvy?

Barnacle Boromir: And what would a landlubber know of this?

Arragorn: Don’t do anything stupid…

Long-legged Willy: (Jumps up.) Arr, this be no mere landlubber. He be Arragorn, son of Arrathorn.

Barnacle Boromir: Arragorn? Well blow me down! This… be Isildarr’s heir?

Long-legged Willy: Aye, and ‘is granddad be the Captain o’ Gondor.

Arragorn: Sit down, Long-legged Willy!

Barnacle Boromir: Gondor has no Captain. Gondor needs no Captain.

Gandalf Greybeard: Arragorn be right. We cannot use it.

Captain Elrond: You have only one choice. The Ring must be destroyed.

Gangplank Gimli: What be we a’waiting for? ARRR!! (Gangplank Gimli attacks the Ring.)
Captain Elrond: Belay that! We can’t be destroying the Ring that way, Gangplank Gimli, son of Grog Gloin. The Ring was made at the world’s end. Only there can we destroy it! It must be taken up to the crow’s nest o’ Mordor and cast deep in to the sea. One of ye must do this.

Barnacle Boromir: One does not simply sail into Mordor. Its black gates be guarded by more than just bilge rats. There be evil there that does not take sleep. And the great deadlight be ever watchful. Not with ten thousand buccaneers could ye do this. It be folly!

Long-legged Willy: (Jumps up.) Have ye heard nothing Captain Elrond has said? The Ring has to go to Davy Jones!

Gangplank Gimli: (Jumps up.) And I suppose ye think ye can do it?!

Barnacle Boromir: And if we fail, what then?! What happens when Scurvy Sauron takes back his booty?!

Gangplank Gimli: I will walk the plank ‘fore I see the Ring in the hands of a scallywag!

Gandalf Greybeard: Do you not understand that while we bicker among ourselves, Scurvy Sauron’s power grows?! None can escape it! (They argue.)
Ring: Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest. Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum. Drink and the devil had done for the rest. Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum…

Nine-fingered Frodo: (Stands up.) I’ll be taking it! I’ll be taking it! I’ll take the Ring t’ Mordor. Though I do not know how t’ hoist the sails.

Gandalf Greybeard: (Goes over to Nine-fingered Frodo.) I will help ye on yer voyage, Nine-fingered Frodo, so long as it be yours to sail.

Arragorn: If by me life or death, I can protect ye, I will. Ye have me cutlass.

Long-legged Willy: And you have me pistol!

Gangplank Gimli: And me cannon!

Barnacle Boromir: Ye be carryin’ all our fates, lad. If this be the will o’ the council, then Gondor be seein’ it done.

One Eyed Sam: (Appears.) Avast! Mr. Frodo’s not goin’ anywhere without me!

Captain Elrond: Nay, it be nigh impossible to separate ye, even when he be summoned to a secret council and ye be not.

Merry Morgan and Pegleg Pippin: (Run in.) Wait! We be comin’ too!

Merry Morgan: Ye’d have to feed us to the fish to stop us!

Pegleg Pippin: Anyways, ye need sailors o’ intelligence on this sort o’ pillage…voyage… thing.

Merry Morgan: Well that be ruling ye out Pip!

Captain Elrond: A crew o’ nine… So be it! Ye shall be the Pirates of the Ring!

Pegleg Pippin: Great! What be our heading?


Yo ho ho, what a tale that be! Thanks to me dad for the original idea, and to me brother for namin', suggestin', and proofreadin' the script. Twas originally copied from Council of Elrond before being translated into pirate. Hope ye all enjoy, and fair winds!

Star Wars: Celebration VI - My Experience

So I said a while ago that my brother and I were going to Star Wars: Celebration VI! We went on Friday and Saturday and it was really really cool.

Since it seemed weird to me that my last several posts have just been me talking, I got Captain Rex to recap part of it for me! Take it away, Rex.

Captain Rex: Thank you sir. Once Arda and her brother got in the convention center and picked up their badges, they headed right up to the exhibition hall, where the 501st Legion was holding their Troop-Athlon. It's a competition we sometimes have amongst us Clones, and these Stormtroopers I keep hearing about (there were a few other troopers, Bounty Hunters, and even a Jawa involved as well).

Anyway, each team has to complete various challenges while in full armor. Now I don't mean to complain, but this stuff we got has its problems - lack of peripheral vision and maneuverability just a couple. Actually, they had this saying there, something like "Can't see, can't sit, can't shoot." Now again, I'm grateful to the Republic for the armor we have, and it has improved, but...well, I suppose that saying they have is pretty accurate. You get used to it though, and once you go through all the training on Kamino you tend to forget about the shortcomings a lot of the time. Until one of your brothers walks straight into a door, but that doesn't happen too often.

I'm getting off track - a few of the challenges were the Ewok toss (one team member tossing stuffed Ewoks to another), using a Death Star bowling ball (keep seeing this Death Star around - wonder what it is) to knock over pins with Representative Binks drawn on them (I must admit I got a chuckle out of that. Arda'll be mad if she found out though), and riding a segway through a short course. The crowd seemed to enjoy it, and I'm sure some of these guys will be hearing their fellow trooper's opinions on how they did in the barracks.

The course where both the Troop-Athlon and Droid Races took place.

Thanks Rex! (Heh, I think he had more fun than he's letting on.) Next, a bunch of the girls from The Lakehouse Forums met up - it was so cool to meet online friends, and somewhat surreal as well! We hung out for a while, then went to a special Her Universe cupcake party we had been invited to. There were some TCW cast members there which was really cool - I was too shy to say much, but I was with my friends as they talked to Dee Bradley Baker and Matt Lanter, and I saw Dave Filoni (should have tried to talk to him - he's so cool!) and Tom Kane (also saw Ashley's husband David Eckstein, but didn't realize it until later). Then toward the end, we all got to talk to Ashley herself! I've heard people say she's really good at remembering people, but I was surprised that she recognize me from our brief meeting two years ago at the last Celebration! Her support of TLF has been amazing, and it was so nice of her to spend time with us. After the party most of the TLF girls went to wait in line for the Clone Wars premiere. I waited with them but ducked out to join my brother, who had gone to a panel called the Obscure Character Face-Off, before the show started, and after a bit of hanging around the exhibit hall, called we it a day.

On Saturday we didn't go to too many events, but it was still fun. The first part of the day I spent doing photo shoots with the TLF girls. There were a bunch of neat props in the exhibit hall that we posed with - a random Stormtrooper joined us for a couple pictures as well.

My brother and I spent the rest of the day in the exhibit hall, 501st room, droid builder's room, and just looking around, me taking random pictures once in a while. We did get to see some TLF friends one more time before saying goodbye, which was nice. Before we left, we did a bit of shopping - he got a volume of Star Wars Tales and I bought a Her Universe shirt and a couple Jedi Apprentice books (only $5 for two of them!). There were also these Galactic passports that you could take to the different publisher booths and get them stamped - that was pretty cool. Then we basically wandered around a bit before heading out.

Meeting and hanging out with my online friends was definitely the highlight of my weekend. It was really neat to see people I knew from online, and that includes others like costumers and SW celebs I had seen pictures of. When I went to Celebration V, I didn't know or know of too many SW fans so now it was really cool to have friends there and recognize people from the internet. And like last time, there were a bunch of great costumes and it was so fun to watch everyone! I kind of wish we could have seen more panels, but it was still an awesome weekend and I'm so glad we were able to go.

And now for pictures! Here are some others I took:

There was a small collection of items from Rancho Obi-Wan, including the Great Holocron! My Jedi-obsessed self was really excited to see this - I didn't even know a real version existed!

As I was taking a couple pictures of this mannequin, I start to hear heavy breathing behind me. Really heavy breathing. So I turn around and there's a live Vader standing over me saying, "She's taking pictures of a mannequin, for crying out loud!" Whoops, didn't see you there, my lord...

Just cool. I love Star Wars fans.

In the droid builder's room - R2D2 and Leia's message!

This was in the Rebel Legion area. I want one of these!

Also in the Rebel Legion area. It's so cool how you can imagine you're in the galaxy far, far away there, like this seemed like it could be from the rebel base on Hoth.

Bail Organa! I was so excited to see him - his costume was awesome and he really looked the part too. He said to vote for him in November. Guess who my write-in candidate for Senator is...

One more from the Rebel Legion area - should have leaned on this and tried to sell some death sticks.

Yes, this was in the exhibit hall, and yes, I had to take a picture of it. What an awesome Gandalf mold!

One last shot from the doors of the convention center with a bunch of Sith taking pictures together. Seeing this makes me really miss this place.

Oh yes! And I promised to show you the Jedi costume I was making! I give you, the headless Jedi-man!...girl...person...(ok just look at it):

I wore it Saturday of the convention. It still needs some work (I finished the sewing only a night or two before the con!) but I'm happy with how it turned out and it was fun to wear.

So there is my somewhat long, hopefully entertaining report of Star Wars: Celebration VI! Thank you all for reading, and may the Lord and the Force be with you!