The Blue Box Cafe and Deli

Elgin, Illinois' Dr. Who themed cafe.

Splendid Teapot Racing at the Steampunk World's Fair

This year, teapot racing was added to the schedule at the Steampunk World's Fair for the first time.

The quickly growing popularity of this sport was evident in the crowded boardroom where the Splendid Teapot Racing panel was held Saturday morning. This picture was taken at the conclusion of the panel, after some people had already left. Before that, it had been standing room only and two of the attendees stepped out into the hall, to make room for other people who were trying to enter.



I had the honor of being one of the panelists, along with the founding fathers of American teapot racing, Stephen Chapman and Daniel Lee Hawk.



The medals and trophies created by Lois Wallace:



The race itself was early (9:00 a.m.) on Sunday morning. On day three of a convention that includes late night activities, 9:00 a.m. is a difficult time. This past Sunday, the difficulty was increased by President Obama speaking at the commencement at near-by Rutger's University. People who were not staying in the host hotels, were redirected at road blocks. My family ended up seeing much more of the town and Rutger's than we intended, after receiving bad directions and getting lost. As a result, we missed most of the teapot racing, but Blaze and I were still allowed to race once we got there.

Daniel Hawk captured the whole race on video:



The main race was followed by the chaos that is Teapot Drag Racing. Many of the racers were on the same frequency, which caused them to go wildly astray and look more like bumper cars, except for Daniel Hawk's little teapot racer, which zoomed straight for the finish line.

My husband's video of the drag race:



James Hatton was the MC for the races. I don't believe he had ever seen a teapot race before. He had, also, been Master of Ceremony for the Speakeasy and burlesque show the night before, so he should have been half-asleep at an early morning event like this, but a true showman never lets the audience down. He kept things moving at a good pace, filled in the "dead time" created by the judges calculations, and kept the crowd laughing.



He was so excited about teapot racing that he became airborne:



The judges inspecting the racers:



There were so many creative entries!















Tallying the points:



The coin toss, because two racers were tied for first place:



The winners:





One person, who showed up with a racer at the panel, never showed up at the race. I had been looking forward to seeing his teapot racer in operation, because it both drove along the ground and flew, which raised some interesting new questions about rules. I don't know if he overslept or was lost some where in Piscataway, NJ.

There was a good turnout for the races, which increased in number as the races went on, but I have a feeling that it would have attracted even more contestants and spectators if it had been held at a more sensible hour. Personally, I'm a fan of teapot races at teatime.

More of the Steampunk World's Fair 2016

"People watching" was a big part of the fun. There were so many creative costumers!































Blaze and I attended The Queen's Tea, a tea party where we were able to try several kinds of tea and eat pastries. The hosts asked tea related trivia questions and the winners were given additional packages of tea as prizes.



The gift bags at each place setting were full of both single-size and pot-size tea bags for each attendee  to take home, so we left with a lot of tea.



Blaze and I were wandering aimlessly when we noticed a crowd of people and went to investigate. It turned out that what they were watching was a puppet show. Pineland Puppets has, very cleverly,  updated classic Punch and Judy shows by preforming them as the Joker and Harley Quinn.



This works amazingly well and modern children still enjoy the slapstick humor of the original scripts.
One adorable toddler came running up to watch while we were standing there, she stood watching for a minute, giggling the cutest, infectious giggle, and then pushed her way between two strangers to make room for herself on a couch, so she could watch the rest of the show.



Later in the day, Blaze and I were witnesses to puppet Joker and Harley Quinn meeting human Joker and Harley Quinn.



It rained off and on all weekend, but during one of the dry periods, we also enjoyed watching an aerialist perform.



And, of course, there was more music.

Frenchy and the Punk:

Saturday at Renninger's Steampunk Industrial Show

This past weekend was Renninger's Antique Center's Steampunk Industrial Show, which is very much like a steampunk convention without the panels, but with the added bonus of having many rooms of antiques to look through.



We arrived later than I had hoped, because our first stop of the morning was at Costco to pick up a refill of Blaze's anti-seizure medicine, since we had foolishly left that at home.

We all had a good time once we got there, though.



Blaze especial enjoyed himself.



We went to Renninger's steampunk event last year in January, as well, but this year there was even more entertainment, including the fire dancers from Phantasmagoria.

And what is better than watching people play with fire? People playing with fire during a The Cog is Dead show!











There were lots of vendors of steampunk merchandise.













There were also some very creative vehicles there.



Although we were too late to see it inflated, the Airship Diamler (shown here) does have an airbag, but the wind was so strong on Saturday, that it tried to blow away and landed on top of some people sitting at a near-by picnic table.

These next two were built by the people at the Time Bandits shop:






Renninger's in Mount Dora, Florida will be having another steampunk weekend in the Fall, Oct.17th and 18th.