So, there I was, a young kid growing up in the 60's in the sand dunes of NE Florida. Hardly explains a ren addiction, does it? I mean, sand castle building, oyster digging, mullet netting, kite fkying, dune buggying, gator skulking, surf board waxing pine flats hardly qualfies as the most genteel of environments to develop an addiction to the likes of recorder music, Shakespeare, sackbut and bodhran playing, wearing tights and plumed hats...you get the idea. But wait...does it now?? I may be old, but I'm slow...St. Augustine is the answer...it is a renaissance era city right there in the middle of the redneck riveria. I grew up playing on the ramparts of the Castillo de San Marcos. My heroes were Ponce de Leon and Don Pedro de Menendez. I smile as I realize that I grew up loving the ren era because it literally existed right there in my back yard.

Huzzah to all my fellow history geeks, whoever you might be.