happy birthday juggling festival mania!!

this past friday was my birthday and i've officially turned the ripe ol' age of 23. i suddenly feel like an adult, albeit a very immature and silly adult. i've been living alone in a big-ish city without anyone i previously really knew well for almost 8 months now. i've made a huge new host of friends that i love and adore. i'm living in my yurt alone, which is more of a challenge than it seems. i am financially independent. i have had a job for more than 6 months (the longest yet!). i'm organizing a massive free fun event (see ballyhoo.sprockettes.org for more info). i volunteer every week at a neat non-profit in town called the 'independent publishing resource center' and i am really happy to support such an amazing organization.

bottom line: portland has been treating me overwhelmingly well.

since i spent my birthday weekend out of town my fabulous friend marc surprised me with a scrumptious carrot cake at our friend's weekly crafty potluck this past wednesday. everyone sang to me and i felt truly thankful for the amazing new circle of friends i have stumbled upon. we wasted the night away eating cake, spraying stencils, laughing by the fire, and generally enjoying each others company. totally delightful!

on friday i drove up to bellingham for the bellingham juggling festival which perfectly coincided with my birthday this year. it was such a treat to celebrate with all my old friends that know me better than i probably know myself. dave and kelsey were my ride up, and it was dave's birthday as well! as we were riding up we eyed mount st. helen's (which erupted on may 18th 1980) and we both realized that we hadn't ever viewed the mountain that marks our birthday on our actual birthdays before. (sorry that was a bit confusing).

as we pulled up to the exit i wondered how we were going to find our posse of juggling fiends when i suddenly spied two suspicious characters stapling a sign with an arrow and the word "JUGGLE" upside down to the stop sign. it was indeed the juggling jollies on another jolly van adventure! i hopped out and the weekend began! first stop: biodiesel. second stop: super mario's burritos. final stop: the gym for juggling!

we juggled the night away until the renegade show began (for all the non-jugglers, the renegade show is a juggling show for jugglers that often entails tons of heckling and debauchery.). luke was the mc and he was his perfect hilarious self. after each act the audience judged the performance by yelling out which veggies and/or fruits should be tossed in the juicer for the performer to drink. the juice generally induced scrunched up and puckered faces, very entertaining.

river and islando started off the show with a totally absurd act titled, 'acro stallions'. it began with river and islando entering the stage in 70's style wrestling singlets and their hair in spiked mohawks. OH, but not your typical mohawk. river actually shaved (yes shaved!)a horseshoe shape into the top of his head. he calls the look 'anarcho-clown'. it's totally horrible. betsy and i stared at the thing in disgust for a good hour in jules' kitchen later that night marveling at how absolutely horrendous his haircut is. worst cut ever...guaranteed. the boys proceed to do very suggestive acro poses while a voice-over of their thoughts plays in the background. words cannot describe how hilarious this act was. it will hopefully be posted on youtube soon.

janelle (from seattle) also did an acro piece with mary lou, who was belting out laughing the entire time. their signature move was called 'the squishy squashy' and yes, it was as absurd as the name suggests.

next up after the renegade show was flaming combat, yes you heard me...FLAMING COMBAT JUGGLING!!! usually combat is played with clubs. each player has 3 clubs and whoever is left juggling at the end wins. in order to knock down opponent's clubs people will run into each other, throw triples in order to swipe at other clubs, kick, etc. this version was played with flaming torches instead of clubs, which is totally insane. the competitors were: dave clay (wearing his captain freedom outfit), jules (with a motorcycle helmet), river (in the motorcycle full body leather suit and a motorcycle helmet), emily (from olympia), john (seattle), matt (beernuts), and a few other brave ones. it was a raging success. captain america (dave) took the event with the most wins. each time he won he yelled out outrageous things like, "that ones for freedom" and "america...fuck yeah". it was awesome.

things wound down and the jolly van musical horn tooted, signaling it's exit home, this time with ME behind the wheel. it was my first time driving the 15,000 lb., 22 foot long monster, and it was really fun! we almost got pulled over (or thought we were going to) because i played the musical horn (accidentally set at a super loud volume) at some folks on the sidewalk right as a cop car passed us, he then quickly turned on his lights with no one in front of him. luckily he sped off and we chunked on down the road unscathed.

saturday was great. we attempted rather unsuccessfully to cook vegan and gluten-free (rowen was in town too!) donuts in the jolly van, which remained illegally parked outside the gym THE ENTIRE WEEKEND! we're convinced it has a built in 'police invisibility shield'.

i learned burke's burrage and constant take-outs with balls, 4-2-3 with clubs, and a few other things i'm sure that i can't remember on the spot! kelsey, emily, and i also worked on 3-person walk-around (NOT the walkabout) with 3 clubs. we laughed a lot trying to incorporate a hat. everyone covered each other's eyes with dave's over sized hats and progressively moves down the gym floor throughout the game.

charlie brown was also there! an amazing juggler, great at hat tricks and cigar boxes. a huge pile of women (kelsey, emily, bekka, me, and someone else i'm forgetting...) started playing with hats. sylus taught us a bunch of tricks and then we were blessed with the AMAZING skills of charlie brown, who is a great teacher as well as an amazing performer.

the open show was great. nanda wowed the crowd first. crystal MCed! followed my another man from seattle who has all purple juggling equipment, but isn't in the stanford research institute... dream and vern were great. daniel was very funny. dave clay has gotten SO much better on stage and people loved his performance. charlie brown did a quick bit and rhys finished it off. it was the best open show i've seen in a while, which is amazing because in general the bellingham fest is still a little baby.

19 burritos were ordered from super mario's for dinner! totally crazy considering super mario's is just a little taco truck in a cigarette store's parking lot.

beers were drank, juggling skill declined, and we all giggled the night away.

next day i finally passed clubs some. first with christopher (from lopez island) and reid, and then with betsy (who is turning into a juggling star. she got mills mess in about 30 minutes earlier that weekend). there was a massive influx of acro. i watched a few 3-highs (with harness rigging). this one was amazing: jules in a thigh stand on vern with ukoiya standing on jules shoulders. totally crazy.

at 4 the gym closed and we all escaped to 'cody camp' where ukoiya and islando live. we made sushi and tempura while folks simultaneously played a serious game of bite the bag. i believe that vern took the game with one phonebook and 12 national geographics. river pulled out his laser temperature gage, which shoots a laser when you pull the trigger and then the gun displays the temperature of the object in a little window. it developed into a 'who's ass is the hottest' game very quickly. i believe that misha (from nanda) won with 87 degrees! then we all partook in a giant dance party while dave (guitar), islando (drums), and a random roommate on the piano jammed in the living room.

river, being the magical creature he is, had built a fire for the sauna while dinner preparation was underway, and after our bellies were full to capacity all of our worn out bodies migrated to the sauna for a good sweat session. i jumped in the homemade swimming hole and scrambled back to the warm sauna a few times before our portland crew had to skedaddle home. it was really hard to say goodbye to such an amazing group of people that i love so much. this weekend made my such nostalgic for the days of the jugglefarm, which today i feel like i took for granted at the time.

thanks so much to everyone who was at the festival! i love you all with my whole heart and miss you too much already!