[read aloud just before the game]

Hi, I'm Moog. You may have seen me in such films as "Redcaps Raw," "Trolling for Action," and "Sidhe-Male." Of course, that was before I lost my f**king arm. Anyway, mostly you know me as that annoying guy that does the gossip column "The New Angle." I think that's doin' pretty good, but people tell me, Moogie, you know, that damn redcap has you beat. He's got the bitter sarcastic thing down AND he gets to be on TV. So I thought, hell, I can be on TV. So here I am.

I'm here to let you lazy bastards know stuff you may find useful for dealing with your fellow kinain tonight at the Midsummer Night's festivities. It's all up on my site, but I'm supposin' not everyone can read.

First, a couple years ago, there was a bunch of violence on Midsummer. [gestures toward stump] I hated it. Lots of people did. So Count Dumas is making a little arrangement for us tonight, and reinstituting the ancient Oath of the Festival from the days when Seelie and Unseelie attacked each other on sight with mighty magics (and not just with beer bottles down at the bar when someone's said something he shouldn'ta). So no one is gonna get in tonight to the palace without swearing not to initiate violence of any sort, mundane or magical, against anyone else who's partyin' down at the palace. There's a clause that authorizes the use of force against people who break the oath, so in addition to loss of Glamour and all that other stuff that comes of oathbreakin', ALSO suddenly everyone in the place will be honor-bound to pummel your ass. Legal duels according to ancient form are okay though. I don't know why.

Those of you who are new to the area might want a quick history primer. Well, here I am, Moog the tour guide. Before the Resurgence, the Ogre ruled here with the help of Ouchytooth the dragon. He was a tyrant. Then Duke Asterlan came and cleaned the place up. People were pretty much happy to see the sidhe around here, strange as it might sound, just because the Big O was such a prick. Then a few years later Asterlan, hearing a prophecy that he was gonna find the way to Arcadia, went off on a noble quest, from which he has never returned. He left Duke Brendan in charge. Well, for some reason Brendan flipped out and decided that bringing a dragon into the Waking World was the best way to make people believe in faeries -- the ones that didn't get burned or smushed, anyway. The official version is Brendan tried to stop the dragon and got killed. Eyewitnesses, though, know that he was really trying to bring it himself, and the dragon used his body to come across. The dragon was killed by a giant Voltron robot, somehow driven by Cassidy the Clurichaun or something, who didn't survive the battle.

Count Dumas ap Eiluned -- just call him "Darth" -- runs the show now with the help of some jumped-up human of sidhe descent, but he has never accepted the title of Duke. Some people think that's because the ducal coronet is missing and it wouldn't be legal. I dunno. Title or no, though, he's the bastard in charge. Some people with wishful thinkin' say he's gonna step down soon, but he hasn't named any successor, so I doubt it. But I know his fellow Eiluned Countess Ava is itchin' to take over, and young Baron Sean of the Cross, House Fiona, is also a likely candidate, but he's got multiple personality disorder or somethin', I dunno. We'll see what happens.

Trouble is brewing everywhere. You all have heard about that assassination in Pacifica yesterday -- I'm surprised it didn't happen sooner. With High King David missing these two years, everyone's stupid. No one's keeping the peace, David's wife Faerilyth has no authority since David's sister Morwen and his ward Lenore won't acknowledge her right to rule, and some sidhe are just waiting to lord it over their fiefs without interference from some central authority. The unseelie want their turn in charge. Then there are all the commoners that want to get rid of the nobility altogether, and who can blame 'em?

It's been almost peaceful here, though; instead of violence we only have trash-talkers -- like that Lady Sorana, who has delusions of grandeur just 'cause her dad was Duke Asterlan, and she thinks commoners are a waste of Glamour. Oh, we did have that weird attack back in February when a bunch of Queen Mab's torchbearers were wiped out on the trod when they were bringing the palace here the ritual torches of Balefire -- that whole Imbolc renewal thing. The hearth at the palace was lit late, and some are saying that's a bad omen. I say people getting attacked by little girls and monsters is a bad omen, but I'm just a dumb satyr.

Anyway, that's enough from me; it's Midsummer. Go have fun, if you can call a night that begins with court fun. I just hope there's Eiluned jello wrestling tonight; that's always my favorite.