Anneville Days and Violent Assault

The Foley residence - on Main Street in Annville

Rich still has ice hockey in Palmyra near Harrisburg every Sunday, and we've become very attached to the homeschool group there, especially the aforementioned Foley family. Most weekends lately have turned into giant slumber parties with tons of good food and games, the kids sleeping on the floor, and the adults staying up until the wee hours watching Friends, Freaks & Geeks, and playing board games. It's a nice respite from the isolated little town of Washingtonville, but makes for a bit more driving than we expected.

Last weekend we went down for park day on Friday, followed by an excellent meal at Batdorf on Main Street. Saturday was the Anneville Days festival, but I neglected to bring my camera. Main Street was closed to traffic and filled with vendors selling everything you can imagine, including lots of funnel cake and kettle corn. A Barbershop Octet (maybe there were closer to 10 or 12 of them) walked around entertaining the crowd, and a blues band jammed away outside of a storefront. Our friends the Foleys had a vendor tent for their business The Wellness Point, and we ate really tasty Mediterranean food served by the local Greek Orthodox church. 

Oh yeah - and I got yelled at. I had stopped in front of the Pennsylvania Free Thinkers booth to read their bumper stickers when a kindly Christian gentlemen informed everyone in the vicinity (at the top of his lungs) that "You Don't Love Anyone But Yourself!!!" and that I was "Filled With Hate!!!" I had no idea that standing in the street reading bumper stickers made the details of my personal life so transparent. Consider me informed, and may the love of Jesus fill your heart too, Deacon Whoeveryouwhere. That was a first...

Another first was to come later that evening. It turns out that a while back, Dr. Mark filled at the last minute as the physician for a local wrestling club. I don't mean the full-nelson, everyone wears headgear and competes for trophies wrestling. I'm talking about the paint your face, set people on fire, smash your face with a folding chair type of wrestling. Now Mark's their regular go-to physician, and he convinced me and his buddy James to tag along that evening. For Mark's benefit, let me say at the outset that he only does this because they pay him, though I suspect he takes some primal glee in seeing people get smashed in the face with folding chairs. I mean, who doesn't? 

What followed was unlike anything I have ever witnessed on this planet. Let's just say there was a lot of spandex, faux-drama, folding chairs, extreme mullets, and way, way, way, way too much exposed, middle-aged, Cheet-o eating, male flesh on display. Most of these guys were HUGE. It took me a good 20 minutes at the beginning to really absorb what was happening (about halfway through a match by Rob Noxious and someone who was probably named I Killed Your Mom or something). Death metal music raged while these guys beat the living daylights out of each other with anything they could get their hands on. No wonder they can't operate without a physician present. 

Alice Cooper is somewhere weeping softly

Yes, that's a folding chair, which was not even the highlight of
the "Barefoot Thumbtack" match. I wish I was kidding.

I'm not sure what they're doing here, but it should probably
be reserved for cable television

This match had eight guys going at once. 

Mark, what have you brought me to? WHAT HAVE I
EVER DONE TO YOU???!!!!!

I can't count the number of times I uttered the phrase, "Well, that's something you don't see everyday." Half the time it was in reference to the audience. These people were more into it than the wrestlers (who appeared to be friends behind the scenes, despite the fact that they had just tried to claw each other's eyes out with barbed-wire wrapped billy clubs.) This is a mock-umentary waiting to be made. Money In The Bank.

The best part was when a wrestler named the Rebel (or was it Rockin' Rebel or Rebel Rocker? Either way, this guy is apparently, A Rebel) got thrown from the stage and Mark was frantically summoned to make sure his ribs were intact. "No doctor, we don't need you to look at the million thumbtack holes in that guy's back, or the spot on the back of this guy's head where he was creamed with a folding table. But The Rebel stumbled into the ropes. We fear he may be hurt!"

Now, I don't want to spoil things for any of you who are still under the impression that pro-wrestling is real. But as Mark is trying to assess whether or not the guy has actually punctured his lung, the wrestler mutters, "Play it up, doc."
Hilarious.

Actually, most of the punches and throws were so obviously staged that it's hard to even get into the spirit of this (at least for me), but the chairs, thumbtacks, and street signs were for real. Oh, did I not mention that they were hitting each other over the heads with a Stop sign and a Do Not Enter sign? It sounded like thunder crashes inside the building. I'm not sure if the signs are the cause or effect of the brain damage.

"Well, that's something you don't see everyday."

ANYWHO, I promised several people I would chronicle this event here, but now that I have done so, LET US NEVER SPEAK OF THIS AGAIN.