Realm of the Imponderable

RDOC #95

Phew.. I haven't been updating for a while and for that, dear reader, I sincerely apologise. it's been such a happening few weeks that I clean forgot to keep this updated.

To begin where I left off, my road trip. Owing to some complications with the immigration department, (ie: the light years of red tape involved whenever any of us want to travel out of the US) we couldn't go to Canada and see Niagra Falls. It's a pity but we still managed to put together a nice trip up to the North Peninsula of Michigan. It's a very scenic place, not too populated and with a far more savage landscape. (not to mention the weather too!) Freshwater beaches (and they look like the sea cos' the great lakes are so BIG, fields of evergreens, deciduous forests with colours every shade from green to yellow to bright red and sometimes even burgendy. It's a beautiful place.



We visited this place called Tahquamenon Falls while we were there. Simply because we had it in out stubborn heads that we HAD to see a waterfall and this was the most convenient and scenic waterfall that we could find. While the river and the falls were really pretty, the weather wasn't. It exhibited 10 minute cycles of alternately sunny, snowy, haily and rainy weather for all the time we were there, and then some.





We also visited a couple of towns on the way there. The town of Soult Ste. Marie, right next to the Canadian border, was a nice quaint little town. A bit touristy but most of the shope were closed for winter. And mackinaw Brigde, the bridge that connects the Lower Peninsula with the Upper Peninsula. It was windy when we first went over it, (something to the tune of 70 km/h winds) and that was fun to drive through...


That's Mackinaw Bridge in the background.

'Yup.. it was a really fun trip. Driving around, stopping wherever we liked to look around and take photos, sleeping at random inns at whatever town we found ourselves in at night...

Last weekend I went to a juggling festival up in Midland. It wasn't a HUGE event; something like perhaps a hundred people in total, but the point was that you rarely have such a huge concentration of jugglers in one spot, all doing what they like to do. And in fact, there's some stuff you can do at juggling festivals that you can't do anywhere else. Such as Mass Combat and Club Gathering. (Combat is where each player is juggling 3 clubs and the idea is to disturb the other players and make them drop their clubs, while not dropping thir own. In Mass Combat you have like 20 players. Club Gathering is where you just catch clubs, shove them somewhere and just try to hold as many as you can)
So anyway, yours truly had to do another performance there too. In front of an audience who knows more about devilsticks than most other people. And that means:
1) When I do a complicated trick, they actually understand how bloody hard it is to do and they can appreciate the complexity. (good)
2) Most of the tricks that I can do have been done before, so alot of them will be "*yawn*.. I've seen that before..." (bad)
3) They can understand when I drop the stick. Cos' they know that you have to sell your soul to acheive circus standard flawless devilstick prowess.

And I've decided to try doing dual devilsticks now. After inspiration and also seeing the Dube vendor there at the fest. I think there is a similarity in the relationship between most women and clothes stores, engineers and hardware stores and myself and juggling equipment stores. All of us can't walk past them without buying something. Was actually tempted to get a fire devilstick but after giving it a try I decided I simply couldn't abide it's short length and ridiculously slow speed. I can understand the reasons for designing it that way, but I'd rather be fast and flashy instead. Maybe some other time..



Here's me doing one of my easier stunts with the devilstick.

Oh, and let me put up a little shot from the wedding reception I performed in:

RDOC #94

Another week. Boring boring classes and homework.
Wonderful happening weekend.
haha.. don't I sound really monotonous? Something like what you'll hear if you get my voicemail message if you call me...

Anyway, almost my whole weekend was devoted to Ring of Steel, from dawn to dusk of saturday and sunday. Not to say it wasn't fun. Just tiring. There was work party on Saturday, a birthday party gig on saturday night, normal practice on Sunday, and a wedding on sunday afternoon and night. Performances are fun to be at, both because I'm one of the people who haven't seen a lot of the works of the Ring members (so essentially I get to see the shows for free) and also because of the level of audience participation. Name me one place in Singapore where you can get a wedding with a renaissance theme where everyone wears a costume, and they willingly participate in an act that involves getting 5 people on stage to clobber each other with sponge filled socks.
Done thinking? Probably not anyway...

So we were hired to provide entertainment, both by mingling with the crowd, doing improvised comedy, some stage acts, fire breathing and juggling. So while I didn't have any fight scenes with anyone I did get a fair amount of attention time. (I refrain from calling it stage time because there wasn't a stage, just a dance floor. some of our members also did fire breathing outside pretty late into the party and they did a pretty good job of it, considering that it was their first gig doing it.

So, out client was very satisfied with our performances, our little tricks and gags (eg: Me and my friend go up to a table (preferably one with a fair number of female occupants) and he goes "Hey would you like to see my friend here play with his balls?..." now before they have a chance to run away I pull out my juggling balls and proceed to pull a few stunts for their enjoyment) and the performance of "Gutter and Ditch", a short play about two slimy scallywags playing one up on each other.

Birthday party was a little smaller scale, it was some boy's birthday and so his parents hired us to do a short lecture/demo on knights and fighting for the birthday boy and about 10 of his friends. Working with kids is tiring... Good thing our Meastro showed up in the nick of time to take charge of the show and avert a rampage of little 9 year olds. (Figuratively speaking of course)

Going to Niagara this coming weekend. It's fall break and we're bringing a bunch of people out to get a little fresh (read: Not Ann Arbor) air. Will post about that when I get back

RDOC #93

oopsie.. haven't been updating my blog for a while.. Lessee.. between Rennaissance Faire, homework, doing a web tamplate for Mr. Ben (AKA IT consultant for SSA), devilstick (and practicing for my performance on the 10th and the 30th of october) and Warhammer 40,000 on my computer... that leaves me with....
No time at all!

K... There's a couple of things that I really need to do like write a couple of letters, post two CDs to my brother, send my car for a checkup and stuff like that. (which, of course I haven't done)

Anyway Renfaire was a really intersting experience. Saw some jousting, tasted mead, talked to the Queen of Middle Kingdom, inflated like 1,000 balloons etc...
Yeah. It's something I would like to go to again next year when it happens.
Oh, in case any of you are clueless as to what I was doing there, I was manning a bunny fencing booth set up by the Ring of Steel. So mostly it was work work work for me with a few breaks where I went walking around to see the place.

I'm right now enjoying the fun of creating webpages without the use of Dreamweaver. Why not use it? Well, it would take about a week for me to get used to it, I have already gotten used to manually writing HTML code and I'm a bloody control freak. Dreamweaver tries to do too many things for you, and manually writing code gives me ABSOLUTE control. Muahahaha....

I've been requested to do a devilstick/ juggling performance next sunday at a wedding. Something that I'm uniquely suited to do in Ring. (well, mostly because I'm the only member who can juggle) I've been asked to do a performance at Halloween too. heh... I wonder what kind of a costume I'll wear for the. I wonder if a Zombie Lord/ juggler/ devilsticker combo would work...? hmmm
Probably not..

argh.. I need to get a jesters motley.
shouldn't be too difficult.. the US is the land of Mail order companies and there's tons of stuff online. It's just a matter of finding something I like.
Argh... we're all spoiled for choice...
Well, at least after I get that suit I'll have an extra source of pocket money back in Singapore. Just set up a hat somewhere and dress in my get up and perform...

Ok.. I'm crapping a little too much now..
Just went to a party last night. Yours truly was the unofficial drinks mixer. I succeeded in getting my host drunk. How nice... Needless to say, I'm quite skilled in the art of getting other people drunk while I'm sitting back and enjoying their antics. HAHAHAHA

K.. that was just a LITTLE too much information there....