From a U.K. medieval reenactment mailing list. Some of these can be adapted to Civil War reenacting - I've noted them in red. Numbers 29 and 34 also apply to rugby! - Jonah

Signs that you're a reenactor


1) You go to a Catholic mass with your in-laws, and you spend the whole time admiring the garb on the priest and in the stained glass windows.

2) You have to find something else to wear on Halloween, because your kit just doesn't feel like a costume anymore.

3) Your coworkers seem a little concerned that you're planning a "period" party, and you're male.

4) "Dining room large enough for a dozen scribes and all their equipment" or "garden big enough to hold a battle practice" appears on the must-have list for your new house.

5) You can't decide whether to wear the Celtic kit or the Norman kit for a costume to your company's costume ball.

6) You go to the hardware store and ask for a drawknife for shaving rattan, only to have them explain that no one makes them any more.

7) Your "best china" consists of wooden feast gear and drinking horns.

8) The worst loss of your flooded basement is not the washer or the furnace, but the scrolls you were framing...

9) You plan your car-trip vacations around events happening in other areas and even pack accordingly.

10) Your mom gives you a book about chivalry for your birthday, inscribed with the words "chivalry will never die as long as there are hearts as true

as yours."

11) You're male and you see an attractive woman in a skin-tight black velvet dress, and your primary thought is "Wow!! What I wouldn't give for ten yards of that!"

12) You're babysitting and you wonder if they'd give you the curtains as pay

13) The gynecologist asks "When is your period?" and you answer "Early 14th century (or whenever)".

14) You go to a funeral and spend your time looking at the great pavilion over the gravesite and wonder where they got it

15) Cleaning your knives (and axes, and swords and spears) is not only an entire evening's work, but an entire evening's entertainment!

16) You start wearing your tankard and belt pouch around with your mundanes, because it's so darn convenient.

17) You don't think twice about inviting all your friends over to watch "Scourge of the Black Death" on the History Channel, and have no doubts that

almost everyone will come.

18) Your future husband's wedding garb costs more than yours, and has more trim.

19) "Two helmets, Anglo-Norman style preferred" appears on your wedding registry.

20) You've called your dorm ahead of time to ask if it's OK to keep swords in your room.

21) You realize you've used porta-loos more often than "flushies" recently.

22) A gift certificate at an upholstery store was one of your favorite birthday gifts this year.

23) The worst news you've had all year is that the leather store near you is closing!

24) You're disappointed that your British Literature textbook doesn't have Beowulf in parallel text.

25) You enter your lady's boudoir for the first time, and the first words to escape your lips are "Nice sewing machine!".

26) Costumed people going in to see The Rocky Horror Picture Show have asked you about your "funny clothes".

27) You're female and you've walked straight into a door on a Monday morning because you just expected the co-worker you're entering with to stop and open it for you.

28) After viewing this list, your mundane significant other chuckles for days, while you mutter to yourself "I don't see what's so funny about that."

29) You show up for work on Monday with the most INTERESTING bruises. (Or possibly a mail weave sunburn).

30) You get mail as a wedding present.

31) A man says "whoa! Nice legs! Hubba hubba!" and he's talking about your armour.

32) You rattle when you walk, because you're wearing a mail shirt under your shirt to save carrying it.

33) Street signs look like armour trees, round shields, war shields...

34) If you're bruised black and blue every Monday morning.... and you enjoyed getting that way.

35) You pick up the bin lid and automatically snap it up to a defensive position.

36) You're wearing mail to the office hidden under your jumper because you need to get used to moving round in it.

37) You sneer at sword fights in films because any fool can tell they're not within striking distance of their opponents

38) Dessert is served in stainless steel dishes, you start speculating on how easy they would be to beat into shield bosses.

39) You were asked to find a broom handle to work a jack with and couldn't find a broom but came back with a longaxe and a spear.

40) You can describe the tactics, strategy, weapons, armour and troops used in hundreds of medieval battles, but don't know why they were fought.

41) You read a book that involves the plague and can diagnose which of the two or three types of plague it is from the symptoms.

42) The decorating scheme of your home is "bookcase eclectic".

43) You take a medieval history course in college, and find out you already own the textbooks.

44) You describe your company's logo to the printer's shop using heraldic terms.

45) Instead of having dreams about being out in public with no clothes on, you have dreams about being at an event in mundane clothing.

46) You catch yourself thinking "'Gules, three chevrons or'. Nice tabard. Classic Anglo-Norman style, easily visible. Oh! I guess it'd better be

visible, he's a road repair worker!"

47) You go running up the stairs at work and reach down to hold the hem of your underdress up so as not to trip over it... and you're wearing trousers.

48) You dress your decorative lawn elves/animals in period kit matching your own.

49) You can cook an egg on a rock, but not toast in a toaster.

50) You can make a loaf of bread faster than you can program a bread machine.

51) You make all your own bread and you don't own a bread pan.

52) Your mundane friends wangle invitations for Sunday supper so they can sample the feast leftovers.

53) Your 8-year-old daughter gets a poseable Barbie for her birthday and you immediately see if she can assume all of the heraldic positions with an eye toward a future heraldry class.

54) A student greets you in a Monday morning class by asking "So, did your wife kill anyone this weekend?"

55) Your wife asks you "Do you want me to buy you some black tights for the wedding we're going to this weekend?" and you say YES.

56) Your friend invites you to a "dress nice" party, and you realize that your best looking clothes are your banquet kit.

57) Your friend tells you her new boyfriend works in a fabric store and your first thought is "How cool!"

58) The only time you can see your living room floor is when your van is packed for an event.

59) You buy a TOWN out of rivets.

60) Your bible study is going over the Armour of God... and they ask you to bring examples.

61) You see a mother tenderly picking a splinter out of her son's hand with a shortsword.

62) You pull out a wax tablet to write down someone's email address at an event

63) You buy a bottle of booze just for the neat pouch.

64) Your buying black walnuts and ferrous sulfate from a health food store means a new "dye" not a new diet"


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