MadFest HLGCBS

Congrats MadFest crew on another great festival!

Highs:

-I qualified 5 club back-crosses (super clean, all handles) for the first time. I fell in love with that trick after watching my first IJA video back in 1995. I never dreamed I'd ever be able to do it, so to have finally accomplished it and at such a great festival was amazing.

-The compliments on my performance in the public show. Thanks everyone :)

-Jerry Martin's song at Renegade. Absolutely brilliant.

-Joe Shower's routine at Renegade. Joe, you are enormously talented both as a juggler and comically. Keep it up man, can't wait to see where you go.

-Seeing Mark Faje perform all his best pieces in the public show. He's one of the funniest jugglers and best performers out there. Always a privilege to see him work.

-This exchange between myself and Joe Wooldridge at a chinese buffet. Warren: Huh, this is a weird fortune cookie, “There are coincidences.” Joe: I was just wondering about that!

-Passing with Chris LaRue. We worked on some pretty big tricks.

-Passing with Peter Kaseman. Two years ago when I first passed with Peter, I could barely keep 10 club double-double in the air with him. This time we ran it and 11 double-double, and even got 12 double-triple in the air for a few seconds!.

-Field ball on Sunday. Love this game! Always a good time.

-Having such a large contingent from Colorado. I think we had 10!

-Seeing such a large contingent from Rochester, NY!

-Staying at Melllonhead's place. Very good host.

-Kat's trained Cat.

-New snow tires on my car making the trip possible.

-Hanging out at Renegade. Even though there were some pretty rough acts in the show (to put it mildly), I had a blast. Got to hang out with a great crowd, drink some beer and eat some pizza.

-Meeting Matt Henry. Really nice guy and a great performer! Wish I'd gotten to hang out with him even more.

-Having food available in the gym. Even though it was overpriced, there were healthy-ish options.

-The location. The gym was fantastic!!! Absolutely love the space.

-Tony Pezzo's performance in the public show.

Lows:

-I missed a German wheel at the gym!!!

-Rough weather on the way home.

-Some of the renegade acts, and the behavior of some of us towards those acts.

-Despite MadFest being an amazing festival, there were portions that seemed a little disorganized. Most notably the workshops and games. People also involved in running it didn't seem to be as well informed about some details of the fest as they could have been.

-No Kevin McBeth OR Justin Sheldon!!! :(

Goals:

-Qualify 5 club back-crosses: CHECK

-Ten catches of 3 club alberts: Not this time

-Pass with Chris LaRue: Check

-Pass with Peter Kaseman: Check

-Deliver a good performance in the public show: Check

Crushes:

-Bekah Smith. Always a crush :)

-Mark Hayward: Great guy, a wonderful part of MadFest every year.

-Matt Henry: Looking forward to seeing you again!

Banes:

-My foot plus the gym floor. Loved the floor for juggling, but it was murder on my foot.

Surprises:

-Meeting someone from Boulder, CO that I didn't know AT the festival.

Looking forward to the next fest,

-Warren

Durango HLGCBS

Hey everybody!

The Durango juggling festival was a blast! Amazing job for a first year festival :) Here's my summary!

Highs:

-Getting to watch the public show instead of be in it. This was one of the first times I've done that in a while. I think I learned a lot from doing that. Getting the chance to analyze each act was great, not to mention just enjoy it!

-Passing with Jeff Lutkus!!!!!!!!!! Oh man, the first time him and I had passed in two years was Friday afternoon at the festival. We quickly found that we could still do any of the old tricks we tried, and in some cases were even better at them now. This bodes well for the future.

-Juggling outside. Just in general this was nice. All of Friday was outside, and Saturday morning was as well. I'd never felt this way at a juggling festival before, but I honestly didn't want to go inside Saturday afternoon.

-Field ball on Saturday. That was a great way to wake up.

-Car ride to and from Durango. This was my first time seeing that area of Colorado. I really need to explore this state more. The company during the car ride was also great.

-Meeting some more West Coast Folks. You're all pretty cool.

-Winning three of the games! 3 club cascade race with a club the long way between yours knees, huggling, and 4 ball 4 person relay!

-Denver/Boulder showing at the fest! At last count, I think we had 12 people there. That made me feel so proud of our group!

-Brad Weston's acting for jugglers workshop. He reminded me of a lot of things I'd forgotten, and taught me a lot of new stuff too. I'm looking forward to incorporating this into what I do on stage.

-The Mayor of Durango. I'm sorry everywhere else. Your Mayor is not nearly as cool. End of discussion.

-Juggling with Doug Sayers. Last few fests him and I have both been at, I've made it a point to get some advice from him. It seems to be paying off. Also, just being able to hang out with him and do some 5 club tricks is pretty cool.

-The public show. All the acts were great, but a few stood out amongst the rest (to me): Brad Weston's was the only person (besides the emcee, Matt Hall) who spoke. His comedy is top notch as are his skills and especially his presentation. Bekka Rose's piece may have been one of the most effortless and elegant pieces I have seen in a long time. Poki is a hoopster, and usually I'm not a fan. 97 out of 100 hoop acts are the same, and boring. The other are real circus hula hoop acts, hoop acts a la Bob Bramson and Carter Brown, and apparently now Poki. His skill set was equivalent to that of your average highly skilled burner, however, his character on stage was constantly engaging, and he made very good use of his skills with the hoop. They were presented in an interesting and engaging way. Ember did a contortion routine, and again, I've seen so many, I don't really care anymore. However! She had such a interesting and wonderful character. I'd try to describe her character, but I just wouldn't do it justice. Actually, I think I'll try. Many contortionists try to look sexy, or graceful when contorting themselves. Ember took it in the exact opposite direction. She made her character look as awkward as possible while performing these bizarre moves with her body, but in kind of an endearing way.

-Renegade. ESPECIALLY the venue! It was at a bar! Why don't more festivals do this?!?!?!

-Saturday after party! Had a great chance to get to know Brad Weston and Kyle Johnson. Looking forward to seeing you both again soon.

-Raffle: I really like how they organized it at Durango. You'd buy your tickets, and then each raffle item had a jar you could put your tickets in. This meant that you could only win something you actually wanted! It basically made every raffle exciting, since anyone who won something, actually wanted it!

-Getting a bronze club from David Kha! I have been looking for one of these ever since I met Julien Rochat (sp?) at the Ecole de Cirque de Quebec about three years ago. David has started making them in the US, and I got one from him. Here's a plug for him. Check out his site, www.worldjuggle.com ! He's a really cool guy, wish I'd gotten to hang out with him a bit more.

-Matt Hall emceeing the public show: He has gotten so good at this! I was taking mental notes the whole time.

-The Major of Durango throwing out the ceremonial first pass for the public show

Lows:

-Not being in the public show. Even though it was great to be in the audience, it doesn't beat performing.

-Some parts of the games. Don't get me wrong, they were a lot of fun, however, there were a couple instances where rules were changed halfway through, or some results thrown out and parts of games re-done.

-Getting to the party on Saturday. Some organization would have been nice here guys. Instead of just getting the address for the party beforehand, we all met at house A, then we all followed someone who didn't actually know where they were going to house B (eventually we got there because someone else in the caravan was staying at B), where someone lived who actually knew where the party was (at house C). This took the better part of an hour. That was an hour I could have been happily drinking/at a party/having fun.

-Lighting cues in the show.

-Missing a good part of the day in the gym on Saturday. This was completely mine and Jeff's fault. We went to look for food, and found some far from the fest (in a pretty cool bar!) that took too long to get. Then, we get back and find out that just down some stairs from where the fest was happening, was a restaurant...facepalm...

Goals:

-Break 5 club bx record (nope)

-200 catches of shoulder pads (nope)

-Learn a new 5 club trick (almost, got one in progress)

-Pass with Jeff (check)

-Hit an alberalb (check)

Crush:

-Dominique; you're so much fun!

-Brad Weston; great guy, great performance, great workshop.

Bane:

-Can't really think of one here...

Surprise:

-How easy passing with Jeff was! We did some tricks better than before he left for Poland.

That's all! Looking forward to the next one :)

-Warren

Breaking through barriers (a.k.a. actually using my blog!)

A couple weeks ago I pulled off a 5 club 5 up pirouette for the first time (4 years in the making), then this past Sunday broke my personal best for 5 club backcrosses (2 years or so of work), and in addition, I've been learning my first new three club trick in years. Granted, I come up with a lot of crazy stuff with clubs, but as far as run-able patterns are concerned, I haven't progressed much since I got backcrosses solid with 3.

Its gotten me thinking about what is different all of a sudden. I'm in worse shape than I was a few years ago when I really put a lot of time into these tricks, plus, I really only get to practice once a week (at juggling club) on things that aren't performance related.

Its got to be a mental thing. Sam Malcolm recently let me borrow the book "The Inner Game of Tennis." It was a great read, full of lots of good insight. The strange thing about it though to me, is that most of it centered around not actively trying something, err...rather, not engaging your brain in such a conscious way about the trick. In other words, just let it happen. I have to admit (rather reluctantly), it remind me of Dave Nager saying to me "just do it" or "juggle better." I was skeptical that the book would help, because how do you change a behavior like that? Seems like it may have worked though!

Regardless of the reason why I've been able to make progress recently, its very exciting. I feel like I'm getting to the point I was at with 5 balls about 8 or 9 years ago, but with clubs now. Breaking through this barrier has really shifted my perspective on what I can do. A lot more seems within reach all of a sudden. I know for many 12-15 year old prodigies out there, these tricks are almost run of the mill. I started juggling in the era where just juggling 5 clubs on stage was amazing in itself! I never dreamed I'd be capable of half the tricks I do today, simply because kids my age at the time weren't doing them (well, maybe a few were...Adam Kariotis comes to mind, although he's a few years older than me I think).

Getting back on track, I decided that I wasn't going to count a 5 up pirouette until I hit it clean and held a stable pattern afterwards (no specific number of throws really, just a controlled pattern) with a clean collect. This reminded a lot of my friends as being very WJFish, which is fine. I have definitely been very influenced by the WJF and think a lot of the ways it regards technical juggling are very important. I didn't have this qualifier though because I wanted it to be WJF recognized or anything. I wanted to do it because I wanted there to be absolutely no doubt in my mind that I in fact did the trick. It was also a way to make it meaningful. I like setting concrete goals for myself, and I like setting the bar high. This way it really means something to me when I achieve those goals. Hitting that 5 up might have been one of the best moments in my life. I have never felt so proud of something I've done (and relieved!) Those of you who have watched me working on it for the past few years may know what I mean and why it meant so much.

A large part of the reason I juggle is to show off. That's fine, I'm a performer now, and I like being able to do cool stuff AND letting people know I can do cool stuff. However, that's definitely not the main reason I juggle. I'm addicted to progress. I cannot stand being stagnant. I always want to be improving myself somehow. It's why I initially went to grad school, and why when I dropped out, being a lab tech wasn't enough for me. It's also why I love juggling. If nothing else, there's always one more object. It's why I love performing too. Every show is a chance to do better. This also goes hand in hand with my need for instant gratification. Street performing is perfect for that.

It also makes me really happy that even though I'm pushing 30, I'm still getting better in a pretty significant way. Watching people who are older than I am and still improving has been hugely inspirational too (I'm talking about you Matt Hall!). I fully intend to juggle the rest of my life, and to keep improving in some way, shape or form.

Kansas City Juggling Festival HLGCBS!

Haven't done one of these in a while! Had a great time at this fest. First one that I'd gone to as mostly a spectator.

Highs:

-Getting to juggle just for fun more than I have in a very, very, very long time.

-Passing with Justin Sheldon! Holy crap this guy is amazing. Far better than he would have you believe he is. We rocked out 10 double-double pretty hard, and had a few nice little runs of 11 double-double.

-Winning the 5 ball endurance (with balls I'd never juggled, having not juggled balls at all that weekend). Came pretty close to my personal best.

-Watching Chad Lunders set another epic World Record

-Playing an amazing game of bocce ball with Rico (with Bekah and Ryan coming up with interesting variations for us).

-Performing my blockhead routine in the public show. It was very well received!

-Winning a $50.00 gift card to Infinite Illusions in the raffle!

-Finding out Infinite Illusions still exists!

-Hilarity with Bekah, Rico, and Eric.

-"Sing Muse"

-Watching Bekah NAIL her club routine in the public show

-Watching Sam Malcom NAIL 8 rings in the public show

-Finding time for a game of Go with Ryan Bradburn

-Eric juggling for a random girl sitting on the porch in front of her house while we were stuck in traffic and probably making her day.

-Field ball

-Justin and Greg's routine in the Saturday night show!

Lows:

-Poor Eric's car :( He got a flat tire on the highway on sunday. We pulled over near an exit ramp where a race that had drawn 60,000 people was letting out. Followed by having to go to two Wal-Marts in that traffic to find a place that had time to put new tires on his car (Wal-marts were the only thing open too since it was a Sunday afternoon).

-Not juggling much on Sunday due to intense tired + destroyed hands

Goals:

-New 5 club bx record (nope, but close)

-200 catches with shoulder pads (nope, but close!)

-Play Go with Ryan (check!)

-Set a world record (nope...but close!)

Crush:

-Bekah :)

-Sam Malcolm, for an great conversation on the way home from the fest.

Bane:

-Fingernails that I'd bitten too short. Thanks for all the band-aids and tape Rico!

Suprirse:

-Chad Lunders made it to the fest!

Austin Fest HLGCBS

Just got back from the fest, here goes!

Highs:
-Performing in the Public Show on Friday. Felt like it went over really
well.
-Noah's walking globe. ENORMOUS.
-Meeting Arsene! I got a chance to chat with him Saturday before the show
while we were running tech. He's an incredibly nice guy.
-Learning a new trick from Jim Mackenzie.
-Seeing Brett Sheets!!!!!!
-Seeing the rest of my Houston friends and seeing that Strake is still
producing some crazy good jugglers!
-Food in Texas always rocks.
-Hanging out with Alex Chimal on Sunday for a while.
-Staying with Nathan Peterson the whole weekend.
-Having one of my childhood friends get to see me perform Saturday night.
-My 5 object workshop being well received on Saturday (thanks to everyone
who
came!)
-Mine and Reid's team workshop going well again.
-Running back to the gym to make it to Renegade in time while eating a
burrito
with Jen Slaw (hilarious).
-The show. Great line up and everyone was very cool, laid back and easy
to
work with.
-Coming up with a couple new three ball tricks on Sunday at Nate's after
the
fest.
-Making a lot of new friends and seeing old ones.

Lows:
-Renegade performance friday night. Mine and Reid's performance was off
that
night. Oh well, it happens. We'll get it worked out.
-Not seeing that Jen dropped Saturday night during her performance and not
getting a ball to her in time. Really not cool of me.
-Bekah not getting to come :(
-Not getting to see the flaming idiots perform. I had no idea before I
got
there that they were performing there for a whole month! If I'd known
that I
would have found a way to stay an extra day or so to see them.

Goal:
-Be happy with my performance and workshops (check).

Crush:
-Noah's walking globe
-The crew from Tulane. You were all really cool and I wish I'd gotten to
hang
out with you more. You should start a festival so I can come to it. I
love
New Orleans and would like an excuse to visit again :)
-Cane crew. Also, you're all insane.

Bane:
-My timing on getting food. I always seemed to be rushing to eat just in
time
before I had to do something.

Surprise:
-Brett Sheets!

Thanks again everyone for a great fest!
-Warren

Christmas, New Years, and 5 club 5 up pirouettes

I've gotten some interesting perspective having worked in the biomedical, retail, and entertainment fields over the holiday season. My approach and feelings about the holidays seem to be largely dependent on what my job is. In retail, I dread it. I'm paid very little and work very hard in a field I don't plan to advance in. In the biomedical field, I was happy because I'd have time off. In the entertainment field, I'm looking forward to it because I've got significant money coming my way, and I'm doing something I enjoy and want to advance in.

In other news, I'm absurdly close to hitting a 5 club 5 up pirouette. I've been working off and on at this for a few years now. It has become a very meaningful goal for me. I've been juggling for 14 years and consider myself to be fairly talented. At 28, I'm not making progress by leaps and bounds anymore, but I'm still getting better. Striving for this trick helps remind me that I am improving. Somewhere between 5 and 7 years ago, I thought I had peaked in ability and gave up for a little while. Somewhere along the line, I started to get more confidence in my skills as a juggler, and picked up Matt Hall as a kind of inspirational figure (as someone who is constantly improving and older than me). Anyway, I'm going to hit this trick. Sure, its something that many people hit on a regular basis and don't think much about, but to me, its going to be huge. It also makes me appreciate what I can already do since (and I'm not trying to sound egotistical or anything) many of the tricks I do on a regular basis are probably a really big deal to others.

The Universe, Lannie's and the Bovine.

If you haven't watched this yet, you should. The video takes the viewer from the Himalayans on Earth, through the known universe and back. It gives so many interesting perspectives. One I really enjoyed was seeing just how much of the universe we haven't looked at yet. In addition, I don't think I've ever seen a video or diagram pull off the "look how small we are" idea quite as well as this does. It's also just a beautiful video to watch.

Smirk performed at the final late night Magic Underground last night at Lannie's. The show is moving to a prime-time slot on Wednesday nights. One thing this means is the show will be 18+ instead of 21+. I for one, will be happy with the move to Wednesday nights. Reid and I have developed a lot of good material over the past few months as a part of this show, however we need to clean it up a bit. Playing to a late-night crowd has caused us to play a little more blue than we should considering we want to play to a general audience. Overall, I hope the show continues to grow and succeed.

In other news, my run as the Improv Hootenanny host has been extended through July 2011! I'm really excited about this, as well as the opportunity to work with a producer beginning in January. I like the hoot, a lot. That being said, I think there are some changes that need to be made.

Smirk promo video

I've been off and on editing a promo video for a while for Smirk. Watching Doug's new promo video has prompted me to put some more effort into one again (there are some things in it that I really like, and some thing in it I think could have been done better, or things that it needs).

I need to just buckle down and get it done. I was this way when working on Superior Juggling, and when I finally got it done I was very proud of it and happy with it. I've got a pretty good idea where I'm going with this video, but would like to know what people would like to see in a promo video.