Merry Christmas all five of you that are reading this.

AWOL Kitty

I lost my Cookie today. I woke up this morning and Maya was yelling at me. Actually she was meowing at me very loudly. She was also poking me in the face. She somehow got out of the house and was no where to be found.

So I go looking around the outside of the house seeing if she was hiding under the steps or something. She was no where to be found. Oh by the way for those who have not read every post I have ever written Cookie is one of my black cats. She is five kinds of adorable. She was brought to me by some of the neighborhood kids. By the way they named her Cookie.

Any way I really have been half worried out of my mind. She is she a little cat. She is probably still technically a kitten. Actually I am not really sure when a kitten become a cat. I will have to look that up.

Anyway Maya was really darting from place to place in the house looking for Cookie. She was really bothered by the loss of Cookie. Well anyway she finally showed up hours later. The two cats are curled up together at the foot of the bed. So I suppose all is well that ends well.

Well be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Drunk People

It is another overcast and rainy day in the mighty city of Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh where the men are men and the women can drink them under the table. Well at least some of the women can drink the men under the table. I was sitting on the bus listening to Morning Musume and thinking happy thought about kawaii bunnies and kitty cats. I am serious if you listen to enough Momu you beginning think of cute cartoon animals. Anyway, I sitting here rocking out to girly music and this woman smack the daylights out of some guy. The guy cusses at her and she punches him even harder. She then proceeded to beat the ever loving day lights out of this guy. After several passengers and the driver wrestled her off of him it was clear that they were both drunk. Yet in his intoxicated state the man was no longer able to defend himself. Or he liked being beat up by women in public. Since I was listening to happy music this whole time the entire scene had a very strange sound track. In addition I have not idea what the fight was about. Still, the entire incident was made better by jpop.

It is hard to use the wifi on the bus so I will e posting this later. We are approaching Squirrel Hill. This is a great neighborhood for finding something to eat. For those not familiar with Pittsburgh it is also a Jewish neighborhood so the bagels are great as well. There is this thing going on now where folk have giant electric menorahs strapped to the tops of their cars. They then drive through the streets with the appropriate number of lights on. It is not going on at this moment. Still the caravan will be coming through here at any time. It is quite a sight. It is something I have only seen in Pittsburgh. For what ever reason I have not witnessed Canadians Jewish folks taking their giant Menorahs for a drive. Maybe it is because it is colder up their they do not want to get their giant Menorahs cold. Maybe it is just another one of those neat things that only happens in Pittsburgh.

On an entirely unrelated front I found a camera memory card on the floor of our church. It stuck it in my computer in an effort to figure out where it came from. There are pictures of a family I do not recognize. Maybe they were just in for the Christmas play and were not regular members of the church. Either way I have done my best to identify the folks on it. So it will get chucked into the lost and found with the hope that someone will get their memory card back.

Well that is it for now. Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice. And if you are driving around in Pittsburgh, remember, water freezes when it gets cold.

Missing Cookie

I lost my Cookie today. I woke up this morning and Maya was yelling at me. Actually she was meowing at me very loudly. She was also poking me in the face. She somehow got out of the house and was no where to be found.

So I go looking around the outside of the house seeing if she was hiding under the steps or something. She was no where to be found. Oh by the way for those who have not read every post I have ever written Cookie is one of my black cats. She is five kinds of adorable. She was brought to me by some of the neighborhood kids. By the way they named her Cookie.

Any way I really have been half worried out of my mind. She is she a little cat. She is probably still technically a kitten. Actually I am not really sure when a kitten become a cat. I will have to look that up.

Anyway Maya was really darting from place to place in the house looking for Cookie. She was really bothered by the loss of Cookie. Well anyway she finally showed up hours later. The two cats are curled up together at the foot of the bed. So I suppose all is well that ends well.

Well be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Drawing

My drawing is not coming along very well. I have been toying with drawing some of the clown in my Brigade as well as Cuddles. I can do an OK job drawing them head on. Drawing people in profile or on any other angle has been an incredible challenge for me. On some level drawing clowns is easier than real people. When it gets to coloring them you do not have to worry about flesh tones especially on the white faces.

Shadownights appears to be able to draw her people in any angle that she wants. Apparently talent does figure into drawing in a major way. I bought a book on drawing manga. It has several suggestion for dealing with my problem. They suggest drawing these guidelines that help you keep the proportion. I have just started trying it. It is going slowly but I think I am seeing some kind of improvement. Maybe some more practice will yield the results I am looking for.

Be safe out there everyone and keep your stick on the ice.

Twitting at Christmas Play. Jesus would be proud.

Accident near glenwood bridge. Folk forget water freezes in Pittsburgh.

Just bought another s gomez mp3 i'm such a girl. Going to buy we will rock you toshore up my manlyness.

Working on sermon 4 Sunday. Don't like my illiatration trying to find another one

Parlimantary Procedure

I have been in a parliamentary mode for the last couple months. It has been very interesting. I suppose it really started off with my own clown troupe when we had to start considering how to incorporate ourselves. That was pretty easy all things considered. It was simply a long and drawn out process.

After that was the local COAI Chapter. For what ever reason that was a great deal of bickering over how things should be done. It is not as if the rules were unclear. They were just not being followed. There was some fighting and gnashing of teeth that made everything very exciting. We rewrote a couple of them and got everyone operating on the same set of rules and everything has been much smoother since then.

At the moment we are looking at my church’s bylaws. They are just a wee bit dated and don’t have anything really wrong with them. They just need tweaked a bit. This will probably be a bit anti-climactic. Still, it is important to look over one’s bylaws every so often. Not only does it keep them up to date but it reminds people what they are.

Tonight is the Trinity Choir’s Christmas Party. I have always had fun at this event. The food is good and the fellowship is better than the food. So this will be a good time.

If I think of it I may check in later. Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Christmas Party was great. Ate too much. Only place you get swedish meatball and collar greens

A follower complained that I am not a grupy clown. They were following me to see me swear. @&!=*#+ &=@#@& happy now?

Waiting for practice to start. This is the third most exciting part of my day

The word express does not really apply to thos place. It should be the Orient Siesta.

Waiting for chinese at Orient Xp in Oakland. I have it is edible. It's decor look lik a cheesy Mexican Place

Kid 3 pews up making funy faces @ me. I should hav been mature enough not to start making faces

What is with the Drugs?

I have been going through the spam filter on the old blog and there are adds for three different kinds of erectile disfunction drugs in there. There are also two adds for drugs that I think cure ailments that only women get.

I am amazed that people keep sending this stuff out. If I ever need any of those drugs I am going to make sure I use the ones that have not been spammming me.

Well just checking in. Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Odd I am having an ok time working in public. Odd for my ADD riddled self.

Working on the first book. Wish I was better at spelling grammer and typing

Why hasn't anyone written a clown text book? Must I do everything myself? There have been thousands of clowns before me someone should have by now.

I am missing the picture for the swan balloon. I need Smokey to sing me a song

I had a dream that Bob Newhart repaired my central air. The odd thing is I do not have central air

Watching MASH. So sad about Harry Morgan.

Just bought first song on internet. Naturally by S Gomez. I am such a girl.

Still working on balloon text. Please shoot me. Really shoot me the back door on the house is open and police responce time is slow

The Port Authority Wants You Dead

This is is going to sound mental. I was on a bus today. On buses there are the upright bars that you hold onto while standing up. I was on a bus that was missing two of the uprights. The upright in the picture was not connected at the bottom. I noticed this when someone grabbed the bar and nearly killed themselves.

The sharp edge of the bottom of the bar was taped off at the bottom so one did not cut themselves. So someone that works for the Port Authority saw this and figured they should duct tape it. By the way the guy sitting in front of the bar was nearly smacked in the head with a metal pipe. When someone complained to the drive he moved the pipe slightly and claimed it was not his problem.

Now these upright bars look like they are holding up the horizontal bar at the top of the vertical bars. I wonder what happens to the horizontal bar when only one of the four vertical bars is attached at both ends.

Well the Port Authority claims that they cannot pay their people and they cannot run all their routes. Still they can afford expensive down town office space and to leave themselves open to obvious law suits.

Well be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

I should take video of me on the phone and post it to the blog. I wonder how one does that.

Heading to chior. Pray fpe gospel music.

pointless stuff

I have noticed that every time I start to follow a famous person in the twitter a couple more people follow me. If that holds true I could have a million followers if I follow all the famous people assuming there are 500 thousand famous people on the twitter. I just started following tom Hanks to see if I get any new followers. I know it is a pointless thing. Still, I am getting the feeling that the whole point of the twitter is to be pointless.

Speaking of pointless. I am working on the balloon section of the basic clowning proficciency for the Brigade. Balloons are the most time consuming thing that we have to explain in our text. And frankly I have been doing everything else except for the balloons. There are so many pictured that need to be taken and resized and then you have to do the text to go with them. And if you find you need for description you have to go back and look at the text and take more pictures and so on. This is a real pain to put into the new smaller format books that we are using. Still that is the way that it had to be. We are using half the trees and it is better and cheaper in the long run for various reasons. Getting to that point has been a real pain though.

Learning balloon animals is one of the most time consuming things that we have to do in our group. It is also the only basic skill the has consumable materials. Thus it ends up being the most expensive skill over the long term. Well what can one do? It must be done.

The first book in the series is going rather well. It is odd it looks like it is going to be rather short compared to some of the later ones. I suppose there is so much that I cannot talk about in the first book it keeps me from rambling on. The rate things are going I may have the first chapter reasdy to put up on this blog by the end of the month. By the spring I could be deciding if I need to go looking for a publisher. I do not know how I feel about trying to publish something that i have been working on for so long.

WEll everyone be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Working on balloon section of ciriculum. More boring than cleaning elephag with toothbrush. Need some jpop

Not Coffee

I am not a fan of the Starbucks. IT is not because they are some evil corperation trying to take over the world. Granted I am not ruling that out. I had a cup of tea in one of their shops five years ago and it was not what I ordered. I wanted a cup of Earl Gray and it did not taste like it should.

When I told the person behind the counter that it was not earl gray they informed me that it was. They went on to suggest that maybe my palette was not refined enough to enjoy their special blend. Now I do not know if they had some special blend or what. Still Earl Gray has a certain taste and everyone should be in the ball park. Anyway, I have not bought anything in Starbucks since that day, until today. It is a rainy day in Pittsburgh and I am standing around waiting for someone. There is a Starbucks nearby. I figure I will go in and check my email and maybe the jpopasia.com. I figure I can get a hot chocolate. Well I am sitting here with my hot chocolate and it is bitter. I have added a jar of sugar to the thing and it is bearable. Still for three and half bucks I want wonderful and not bearable.

I can get two boxes of Swiss miss and be happier. I am debating if I should complain. I am sure if I do I will find out it is a special dark chocolate that is imported one ounce at a time on the back a specially trained sparrows.

Maybe I should just not go to Starbucks.

Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

I am a freak

I cannot find my keys half the time. Today I left the house once and had to return because I forgot the keys to the building that i was going to. Then I had to return because I forgot the lease for the new tenant to sign. Fortunatly I had been planning a stop so I had time to return to thr house twice.

Anyway I am sitting on the bus and someone is listening to the song Jesse's Girl without headphones. They were debating who was Jess's Girl. Right off the top of my head I told them that her name was Patty. They grumped at me because the song does not actually say that her name is Patty. Well I matched it on the youtube and there is a point where Jesse write who his girl is on a brick wall and she is inded Patty. I do not remeber the last time that I saw that video and somehoe I remember that.

I would go onto a quiz show and try and win some money. Sadly i am certain the catagory would be football and I would loose on a question like what is the home city of the Raiders. For some reason I think they are in Michgan but I am almost certain i am wrong. If I were on millionaire I would have to use my l lifeline on that question. I bet my brother knows what city the Raiders are in.

Well I am heading off to clown practice here eventually. So be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

I wonder of i can use this phone to fins wifi???

Knitting on bus. Some guy keeps staring at me. He must be in love.

One of the yutes from my clwn troupe is texting from my phone You know who you are

I want to win Kevin Spacy short vid con. Sadly i have no good ideas

Twitter, Vid Casts

I am at Tom's on the south side wondering about twitter. Well actually the place is now called Penny's. The name of the place has nothing to do with anything. Anyone from the area will know where I am talking about. And if you are not from the area you will not care about what I am talking about.

I have not figured out how people find out who to follow on the twitter. I figure that I could pick celebrities who interest me. Then I realised I do not really care what any famous people are doing. The only celebrity I am following if Neil Degrass Tyson. I think this of course make me a huge nerd. Well at least I am not following Willian Shatner. Oh and I am following John Cleese. Either way I hope they post funny stuff. Oh and I am going to follow Samuel L. Jackson just to see if he uses the f word on the twitter.

The next thing is the goal to have a lot of people following you? If it is I am up to three. I would tell you who the three of them are but they may not want the public know they are following some clown. If that is what you are supposed to do how are you supposed to get the people to follow you. Are you supposed to tell other people about the interesting people that you have found to follow?

On a side note. If you are reading this and you want me to ramble in shorter chunks of texts you can follow me on the twitter. I am Zeeppo on the twitter just like I am every where else.

I have to get one of those cords to get the pictures off my phone. Oh that reminds me. The Clown Brigade is thinking of starting up the vidcasts again. We would of course like to have the Yarn N'at vidcast going. That was a great and entertaining thing. Walt and I had a lot of fun doing that. We may have a couple of the young one from the Brigade as cohosts on that thing.

We also have to really rework Army Clowns. Being that we are no longer part of the The Salvation Army we should probably come up with a new name at least. We still have all the Salvo tradition just not the blue suits.

So if you have have any idea for the Title of a Clown Vidcast let me know. I would like to hear your ideas.

Well that is all i can ramble about. Keep your stick on the ice and be safe out there.

No one killed stilting off to chior

Off to practie stilting.

Blogging Failures

Well I posted something with the phone. Apparently you can only send so much at one time with the text messages. I am sure this is something that every six year old knows. Even so it was a wonderful learning experince for me. Also I wonder how you do spell checking with the text message.

As some research I looked up text messageing on the internet. Apparently people use abbreviations so that they can put longer test into a smaller space. This is a fascinating thing. Apprently OMG mean Oh My God. that is an interesting thing. I am sure that everyone else on the planet already knew this stuff. Still it is something new to me.

Well I will be doing some research on the texting nomenclature. Perhapse I can find a book on all the abbreviations.

Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

onies worth then.

This is my first text on blogger. Iam heading home from practice. We had 4 people on stilts. I wonder of I am charged by the character? I should get my m

Random Stuff

The struggle to learn Japanese continues. Apparently I stink at learning languages. Well it is something to keep things interesting.

We had a great day at the CMU Juggling yesterday. All of our folks were on the stilts and even one of the CMU students praved the aluminium legs. I have some pictures on my phone that I cano get off at the moment. I will have to have one of the young people in the group get them off for me.

On the subject of the young people they are off from school today as well. I will probably be heading over to Homestead if the weather hold to give some stilting lessons. They are really doing exceedingly well. We are thinking of having a stilter in our routine for the Christmas pagent at the church. I am not exactly sure if it is a pagent. It sound more like some kind of variety show. Which is better that is something that is right up out alley even we are a Brigade and not and Alley. The clown folk out there know what I mean.

Well everyone be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice

Happy Thanksgiving

As is tradition turkey day is being celebrated at a Chinese Resteraunt in my house hold. Being a proud descendant of Stephen & Elizabeth Hopkins the wife and I had a tradition Tanksgiving with the Mayflower Society. This was at the always lovely Oakmont Country Club where they apparently hate cranberries ecause they did not serve any with out turkey and stuffing. Still other than that it was a wonder afternoon.

Well anyway that is one the reason we have our actual Thanksgiving at the Chinese Resteraunt. It is easy and there is no clean up. Also it is the only place that I can get Sushi and not bother those that are not into the eating of the fishy yuminess. This place also has the wifi so I can do the mobile blogging. Actually I can do the mobil blogging with the gizmo I bought from t mobile that does the internet. It is odd that the wireless internet is faster than the verizon at the house. Maybe that is why verizon tried to buy t-mobile recently, but I digress.

All of this does not have much to do with Thanksgiving though. My ancestors were of course thankful that they all didn't starve to death or the Natives didn't kill them for stealing from them. My thankfulness is more centered around my wife who has had a tough road the last couple years. She is past the cancer but still dealing with the bad heart. So I am thankful that she is still with us. I am also thankful for the prayers of all of those that have been praying for her. I am sure that has helped a great deal. Also on another note the hospital food locally has improved some over the last couple years. So sitting around in a hospital is not so bad if there is something to eat. Granted I am not the one being operated on so my wife might feel differently about it.

I hope that those who are reading this have something to be thankful for this year. Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Nearing the End

I am just about finished with the Long Scarf that i have been working on for the last week or so. It is a good strong one that will be able to stand up to the rigors of a good clown routine.

I am also considering making a flower stick for the grab bag thing at the COAI. i have some material that is not the colors that we usually use. So it might be nice to encourage juggling there with a juggling present.

On other knitting fronts i am trying to find a cable knit sweater pattern that i like. It has been a long time since i knit a sweater. It strikes me that i should knit one every once and while just so that i can keep up on them. I know there are folks out there that just love to knit sweaters. They scare me just a little.

On the sewing front it is time to make a new Apparatus bag. The current design is doing rather well except for the holes and the fading. There are also a couple folks in the Clown Brigade that are starting to juggle more items. So they are going to need bags as well.

Well that is it for now. Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

A Title Before

For those close to me they have had the please of my disorganized and messy writing. Literally there are hundreds of note book around my house. I just put up a set of three shelves to contain the note books that i am using at the moment. they are all filled.

Anyway the only published stuff that i have done is some clown text book type things. The only ting that I have not done is publish a work of fiction. It has been a long held aspiration of mine. Everything else I have wanted to do in life I have had the opportunity to do on one level or another.

Well anyway usually I start with a blank note book and write several chapters. As i mentioned a couple of entries ago I have been working on a series of books in a story arc that goes over a couple thousand years. Anyway the first book in the series revolved around James Booth's parents. His father is the General of The Salvation Army. I would say more but it really messes up the story if you know more. The major plot elements of this story all get mentioned by James as he recalls his young life in latter stories. So I have not done much with this story, actually nothing.

Then it comes to me that the book should be named The Last Great General. I have never had a good title for something before i have spent a couple month working on it. In fact I have several things that are simply numbered and do not have a title at all. Heck i don't even have a name for James Booth's father. Since he was talking about him he always called him Dad or Father.

Well for some reason that was all very impressive to me. Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Various Random Things

For the first time since I started this blog I am bothered that someone might be reading it.It is odd because I have been sure that there are not very many people reading it. Anyway I am knitting stuff but I cannot post it because it is going to be a gift. I looked over the stats for this thing and the two of the top ten referring sites to this one are frequented by clowns. So I do not know if the clown that might get the thing is the person reading this page. At least one of the potential people is fairly computer savvy. Well I suppose I should not post any picture that would ruin the surprise.

On another note a long time absent person has popped up in a comment on the blog. I am pleased to hear from them. Jamie was a nice lady that knit with Walt and I back when we meeting at a local bookstore before it went under. The brigade an Church have been taking up a lot of my time so i have not had time to hang out in knitting groups. Sadly the only groups that I truly felt a part of were the ones that I started. bee Hive Knitting was great before the Bee Hive became a bar. And knitting at the Jo Beth's was also nice before it bit the dust. I have even considered starting a new knitting group here on the South Side. the only rub is coming up with a place to meet. the South Side has some nice restaurants but there are no longer any coffee shops other than the chain that does not need me to mention it's name for you to know who they are. Sadly I think that the chain that shall remain nameless is part of the reason there is not a coffee shop on the South Side. There is a Caribou Coffee maybe I will call them about starting a knitting group. the other sad thing is that Walt will probably not have the time to come to the knitting group. He was always great fun at the knitting groups.

Well on the clown front we have been working on stilts recently. This is also thanks to Walt because he acquired the stilts. This is Cadet Miller up on a set with Apprentice Brimage keeping an eye on her. In her first go she was able to stay up for 22 minutes before she got tired and she was able to walk on her own.

In another odd turn of events I was elected the President of our Church Choir. Granted I was the third choice, the other two refused. Still, I hope my keen sense of parlimentary procedure will carry the day. You would not think it so but I do have a way with rules and order. So that will be an interesting little adventure for 2012.

Well be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Bad Blogger Struggles

I continued to struggle with being a bad blogger. maybe it is because i am not of the generation that is good with the blogging. Or perhaps i am simply not a chatter person.

Anyway The knitting of a long scarf and the continued Adventure of the Booth and Jefferson Family have been occupying my time.

I will not go to much into the long scarf because it is going to be in the present swap at the COAI meeting. So I cannot go into color or pattern. I can say that it will e loved by the clown that ends up with it.

I am getting very close to finishing the book that I have been working on. It is early in the story arc for the series. I am even not horrified by my crummy grammer and spelling. I do have to admit that the computer is finally getting to the point where it can deal with my lousy spelling. it is even marginally helpful on the grammer front. And heck ebooks have come to the point where it might be an option to deal my obsesive need to keep all control over what i am writing.

The story is set around the young Evangeline Booth. She is ten years old in the story and had what looks like magical control over technology. She of course is a time traveler who has been altered by powerful alien technology. Her family and future Husband are fresh off their adventure with the ancient race. Her future husband has been the target of evil time traveler so her adult self has been protecting him. Her future husband has become enchanted by his future wife even though he is a nineteen at the time. Evangeline has always loved John, her future husband, this is complicated by their ages in the story.

In the story they must save a planet full of former slaves that have been hiding out from their former master. They are of course the modern descendant of the ancient race that the Booths and the Jefferson had lived among. the antient race has given the Booth and Jefferson and Booth families the military hardware to end the crimes against their future selves.

This is complicated by the fact that they cannot radically alter the time line because they are also fighting with the evil time travelers. James Booth , Evangeline's father, is the Chaplain on the Uss The Sullivans. The Sullivans senior staff is killed in battle leaving Booth the Captain of the ship. Booth has to get to save the alien colony. If he can he use the as a cover to aid in the abolitionist movement that is starting to gain traction.

If he can hold the colony for two weeks a relief fleet will be able to push the pirates and slave traders completely off the planet. Of course Evangeline does some rash things.

I very pleased with the story arc that I have laid out. I figure it will take around thirty books to write the multi generational tale. The issue is that i have not been very happy with any of the individual parts I have written thus far. This books is four or five books in and i am happy with it.

As I ponder the story arc I am reminded that I have never actually tried to write the first book in the series. Well there is a kettle of fish I probably do not want to kick over.

The continued warping of my cultural preferences continues. the young people in the group have got me listening to Selena Gomez. She can sing an there are no two ways about it.



Well be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Knitting and Other Relevant Things

Anyway as the title of this blog might suggest there is some knitting in my life from time to time. Something that long time readers of this blog will know is that knitting is a useful skill for clowning. You can make all kinds of things with a couple sticks and some yarn. Well this is one of those things. This is a lap blankest made from some red caron acrylic yarn. At least I think it is Caron. the label has been lost to the sands of time from our various moves over the last decade. There was enough of it to make a nice little lap blanket. There really isn't a pattern. I made it until I ran out of the yarn that I had.

The actual pattern it out of one of the Vogue Knitting Books. The knitters out there will know the ones that i am talking about. they might even know what book I am talking about. As I type this I looked across the room to see a pile of knitting books. They have been displaced by a reorganization of my library that is incomplete. So I am a bit too lazy to go through them and figure out which book it came from. I know that a good knitting blogger would have the pattern on had to share it. Still, I never claimed to be a good knitting blogger.

On other fronts the strange growing pattern of the Brigade continues. With the Brigade office half way put together we have around six cadet clowns here on the South Side Slopes and several more interested. They are mostly young people but it is a wider age range than the last couple time we had a membership jump. We have a couple seven year old a couple teens a a couple in between. There might even be a parent or two in there.

On another odd twist over everything I am starting to like Justine Beiber and Miranda Cosgrove. At least I think hat is how their names are spelled. The computer does not agree with me. In addition there are some Japanese band that Miss McBride from the internet has suggested. So not only do I have the musical tastes of a teenage girl they are the tastes of a Japanese teen age girl. Yep that is normal for a man of my age. I blame being exposed to Bob Dylan at a young age for my musical mental issues.

Well be safe out there everyone and keep your stick on the ice.

Juggling Clubs in Pittsburgh

When you look for a juggling club in Pittsburgh five clubs come up. All of them are no longer meeting. Some have not met for several years. The other thing that come up is the Cuckoo 's Nest which is the local magic show that also sells juggling equipment. Towns have the size of Pittsburgh have had juggling clubs that have been meeting for years. It boggles my mind that we are unable to put something together in this city.

It has gotten to the point that i am looking into starting a juggling club.

I have spent a couple days randomly looking for some kind of internet juggling network. Sadly i have found a couple websites that appear to be ignored by the people who made them. Apparently jugglers are the only people that do not like to talk to one another on the internet.

I will keep you posted if anything interesting happens. Don't hold your breath though.

Making Juggling Batons & Number 10

It is two in the morning and I am cutting out pieces of vinyl to make a juggling baton. At Tuesday practice Apprentice Brimage {There are five Brimages at this point} used a juggling baton for what I think was his first time. He did rather well so I am making him one for him to practice with.

On an interesting note his favorite type was the kind that I use. This is the one that Walt and made three years ago. This has become the most popular stick that we have been making for ourselves. This will be the fourth or fifth one we have made for a member of the Brigade. I have also made a couple for people outside the Brigade.

The particular stick is your basic two foot long flower stick. Apprentice Brimage has requested that it be red and black. I think that it is going to be an attractive stick. The nice thing about making the same kind of stick is that you can be sure of the balance. One of the people in the Brigade wanted a rather special stick that was longer and had head that we had never used on a juggling baton before. The sad thing was that it took me three attempts to get something that had the right balance.

On another subject an interesting question as possed to me. If you could choose a handful of people to make immortal who would they be? I am pondering a list of ten people. For a place to start I think I am going to choose the Emperor Charlemagne.

He was an enlightened leader who believed in education in a time when the average King was a brutal dictator by modern standards. I think we would be living in a more enlightened and interesting world if the Holy Roman Empire had not fallen apart.

Well be safe out there everyone and keep your stick on the ice.

Slacking Off Again

As has become my habit of late I have been slacking off on the old blog. I am not really convinced that anyone is actually reading this. Still even if they are not I must do my part to pollute cyber space.

Recently I have been trying to resurrect some part of my fire juggling act. Frankly I have had no need of it for the last five years. There is a group of folks that do various forms of fire performing in Frick Park Thursday Evening after dark. The last couple weeks i have been hopping on the bus right after choir practice and going over there.

I did notice that someone was taking pictures with a camera. this is video from one of my attempts with a fire stick that I just built. It is incredibly heavy and i am not in love with it yet. Still it is a thing and I have been giving it a shot.

Clowen Happening

Well there is not a lot going on here at the old Clown Cave. We are getting ready for some events which is always nice. We have a parade and a visit to a hospital that we have not visited before. That is always an interesting thing for me. I am not sure why I enjoy visiting a new hospital so much. Maybe they are like trophies for Humor Therapy.

I was doing the math and I figured that I have visited 97 Hospitals, Nursing Homes or rehab institutions as a clown. This new one will be the VA in Aspiwal which is just outside Pittsburgh to the north if you are keeping track. It is a nice hospital that is much larger than I thought it was. On Monday after the parade we are taking more than half the Brigade out to go and visit the folks there. Actually I think I will be the most clowns that we have had in face in a long while. We have mostly been doing small institution where we only need two or three clowns to cover the place.

Also on the up side of this show is that it will be the first show for two of the members of the brigade. this is an important first step for any clown. Also a Parade is a great first show for an inexperienced clown. You just walk around and wave at people. Also it gives you a good feel for having a large crowd watch. It is also one of the few kind of shows where you can interact with the public in a completely controlled way. People do not chase you around or demands balloons. So it is a nice low stress thing.

I have continued to work on the instructional booklettes for the clown brigade. I know that it needs done. Still it is a slow and painful thing. There is so much work that needs to be done. And it is going to take years to do. And being at the start of that endeavor is a daunting thing. Well it is something that needs done.

I am thinking of taking a few hours over the weekend and going on another musical safari on the Jpopasia site. Basically I start with one song and after I have listened to it I go to one of the recommended songs at the bottom of the page. A year or two ago I would spend hours a week going from one song to another. Well it is something t do.

Well just checking in You all have a good evening. Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Some more Randomness

I have been watching a bunch of movies this weekend. I started off with Run Silent Run Deep a Cary Grant Movie. I then watched most of the Die Hard Movies. I really happen to like the new one where they are running all over the place to trying to stop a cyber terrorist. It is high implausible still it is entertaining to watch a bunch of stuff blow up. I think I am going to finish up by watching some of the Yamato Movies. They are on the internet so it should not be that hard to find them.

On other front I am still working on my singing. My Choir Director has told me that I have to work on my Phalsetto voice. I have been singing X Japan songs to practice this. My biggest problem is that I have a hard time changing back and fourth. It seams to be easier to go up rather than down. And apparently if you want to be half way decent at singing you have to be able to go up and down. Well it is a process. So the fat that I am incredibly bad at it right now might actually be a good thing.

The kittens are a week old and still squirming about. A couple of them are just starting to open their eyes. They mother is very protective of them and does not like letting us play with them. It is a wee bit annoying because they are incredibly cute at this stage in life. My other cat Maya is not liking the kitten very much. She is a runt and has been the baby in the house for the better part of the last year. Also Maya is my cat and the mama cat is my wife’s cat. So there is a strange bit of tension there.

I am still working on the basic booklets. I am expecting that will take the better part of six months to get them all into some kind of shape. On the up side of that I am ahead of most of the clowns in the Brigade on making these learning materials. So if I get these done that will give the more seniors clowns in the Brigade something to work on for a while. The nice thing about some of the more advanced proficiencies is that there is a lot off stuff that has been written on magic. So I am not reinventing the wheel here. I am just putting a few things together.

I think I also need to spend some time cleaning my desk. I had organized a couple weeks ago and it is full of junk again. Actually it would be easy if it was full of junk. I could just throw away the stuff that I did not need. It is full of all the stuff that I need to do these various projects. After the cleaning I am going to take a picture of my desk. There is a thread in the Forum of Jpopasia about what your desk top looks like. I think they are talking about something on the computer. I think It would be sarcastic and funny to go analog on them with a picture of my actual desk top.

Well everyone have fun out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Lydia and her Kittens

This is Lydia and her five kittens. I had to turn up the flash so that you could see them all. Without the flash it looks like a really angry Russian hat.

Random Stuff

This evening we are having a Master Class here at Clown HQ. This is when we work on advanced skills such as walking on Stilts, unicycling or really hard balloons. Tonight we are going to working on Balloons and possibly the script for our next stage show. These are always fun and I enjoy them. Since it has not started yet i do not have pictures of the class. Maybe i will edit this thing and put them in latter.

On the Musical front i am stiff having my adventures with my church choir. I found a nice on line radio station that has been helping me out. http://www.live365.com/index.live It is mostly contemporary gospel music like our choir is doing.

This is a picture of my cat Maya. She is a adorable and always trying to type on the keyboard when am typing. She is not doing it right now. Still she usually does.

Also on the up side. the last installment of Monroe is on the internet. It is a British Medical Drama that i have been watching. That is one of the best things about the internet is that youcan watch television from other countries with out having to go there. I am not sure that i would go to another nation just to watch television. Still it is nice to know that i do not have to.

And of course the best British show is coming back Dr. Who. I cannot tell you how much i have enjoyed the restarted Doctor. I loved Sylvester McCoy and Tom Baker. i was always sad to see them go. But now the new series actually has money to do stuff. The writing is still good. Only now you do not have to imagine what the monster was supposed to look like. it is rather nice.

Well I have probably rambled on enough or now. If you love the Doctor Post.

Hmmmmmm

I would just like to tell everyone outside the United States that only the news Media thinks Donald Trump has a chance.

More Who

I cannot express how excited I am that the Doctor will be back on the tele soon. So here is a we bit of the Doctor Who Goodness.

The New Show

Once again it is time to work on the script for the Clown brigades next show. We are working tirelessly to bring the script together so that we can start rehearsing.

This year we have vowed that we will use on sixty percent recycled jokes. We have also vowed that we will make up at least three new jokes for this show.

Pictured to the left is our Brigades newest member Dave Jefferson taking a shot at making sense of the script that I have written. There was much groaning and he only broken down in tears once at how bad it is. Never the less any progress is good progress. Oliver the computer Squirrel even helped with a couple jokes. For those keeping track Oliver is the Squirrel that lives in my Tandy Color Computer Three. He runs on a little wheel that powers the computer instead of electricity because i could not find a new power supply to replace the old one when it burned out.


By the way bellow is some random Bagpipe rock and roll awesomeness

New Yamato Movie

This is the title song from the new Space Battleship Yamato Movie. I am still looking for a subtitle version of the movie. Sadly there is probably some goffy issue with the people that made thade the American version of the Animated series.

Movie Time

This made me very happy to find this little gem on line. This is an updated version of one of the Battle Ship yamato movies. It is really great. Sadly the goof ball that own the rights to this series in America will not dub this movie. And frankly if they did they would probably ruin it anyway

Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

Rambling on

I am still working on several knitting projects. I have a run of the mill long scarf that is being made in red heart varigated. I am not sure what it is going to be used for. Still you can never have enough long scarves sitting around. I also have a purple baby blanket that is in the making. The folks that are getting it do not kow they are getting it. On the other hand they are neither of the people that read this blog so they will not know. I will throw up a picture of it when it is finished. It is about half way done now. So there is still some work to go.

I am also hoping that the first 2011 Apparatus Bags will be done some time this week. The up side with them is that a smaller version of them has been tested with the younger members of our group. And since it has survived with them the larger version will be sound. I am hoping that this is the bag that we can all get in the next year or so. It would really be great if we all had the same bag.

Well this may not be exciting to you all. Still I am happy about it. Be safe out thee and keep your atick on the ice.

Hmmmmmm

For the third time in the last half hour I have walked to a different floor in my house to get a book. When i get there I have retreiveed something other than the book.

I knew you all would be intererested in this so I had to share.

Be safe out there and keep your stick on the ice.

True Grit

I just watched True Grit Today. It has Jeff Bridges instead of John Wayne. I am going to have to rent the John Wayne version to remeber all of the details of that movie. This one struck me as fairly different. It was darker and more violent. i suppose more violence was only to be exspected.

John Wayne's Cogburn was also lovable on some level. Maybe it is just bcause John Wayne never really played a bad guy. Even when he played the anti hero it was still like he was the hero.

Jeff Bridges played the anti hero in this one. There were times that you began to wonder if he was worse than the criminals he was chasing. I do not preffer a remake to the original very often. This may be one of those rare occassions though.

Juggling Clubs

I am getting truely annoyed with the Juggling clubs of Pittsburgh. For some reason by the time they advertise where and when they will they break up. Someone just emailed me about a club that pactices in Oakland. I went to the place and time they were supposed to meet and there was no one there. When I Yahoo. juggling Pittsburgh half he links are back to this blog or the Brigade's blog. I find it hard to beleive that there is not a single group of people that are juggling in Pittsburgh.

I did read about something in the Post Gazette in Sewikly. I read about that the week end that it happened. I emailed the person who was supposedly running that and they never got back to me. There is also some kind of club that appears to be an after school activity in the middle school. So even if I wanted to trek out there strangers would probably not be welcome. It is little wonder that i cannot get some of the clown that i know to think that juggling is important. The juggling world does not appear to think that it is important.

On other front i have sent another email to the Internation Jugglers' Association. They usually do not reply to me. Well this will be the thid person that I have contacted. Well we will see how that goes.

Be safe out there and keep you stick on the ice.