Davenport Diaries, Tuesday-Thursday

[mamagotcha]

Tuesday morning, there was a pretty long line at the reg desk... the bottleneck was the photo badges, but the equipment was working and everyone was slowly getting their tags. I found out, much to my annoyment, that the programs were all still in their boxes, stashed under a table. I pulled them out and started passing them around to folks already in the gym.

This was the first day of workshops, so of course there were plenty of little changes that had to happen. Got those dealt with, and wandered the gym putting out fires (more water, garbage cans, tablecloths, change, booth fees, etc. etc. etc.).

Ack... I’m writing this just after the Championships show, and the gym is full of action... half the floor is taken with a game of combat, Tentmaster Tim Furst is calling for more acts for Renegade, the bar is open, and my brain is buzzing with the bits I want to write about the competitions. OK, we’re gonna just gloss over the last few days, pop in the highlights...

Had a moving conversation with Peggy, who has taken over Fergie’s stand (he pretty much sold out the first day) with Sean McKinney videos, shirts and the trophy. Seems she and Jason Garfield have had a parting of the ways... that guy seems to be burning bridges left and right.

First Flamingo Club meeting on Tuesday went well, nice group of gals gathered to discuss the Flamingo award. I’m starting to have thoughts about encouraging the IJA to split into men’s and women’s divisions and perhaps even skill levels instead of ages for competitions, but we don’t have that discussion now.

Individual Prop Competition was fantastic. Now I can look back and say that there was a lot of overlap between that and the Championships... it’s odd to kind of have the same competition twice. Anyway, Matt Hall walks away as the big winner, managing to best not only Jeffrey Daymont in boxes (he didn’t use his music) but Ryo Yabe in diabolo (both of them doing a relatively new style called “Excalibur,” where the diabolo is sped up and slowly brought so that the axle is vertical... they both did cool stuff but Matt pulled off a whip catch). Bill was the judges’ tally monkey for Prop Comp; and Dan Holzman decided not to show up so Scotty Meltzer filled in as director.

There was one good running joke he pulled off, let’s see if I can remember... “Judges, if Luke (Wilson) wins (the 3 club contest), he promises to use the money for food.” Later... “If Vova wins, he promises to use the money on a haircut.” “If Kevin (Axtell) wins, he promises to spend the money on weed.” and... “If Matt Hall wins, he promises to spend the money on Lisa.”

That night, Bill and I left the baby with Julia and went out to Granite City, a steakhouse, with Matt & Lisa, Athena Davis, Erin Kasper and her sweetie, Jeff, Kirstin and her husband (sorry, I didn’t catch those names, but it was a jolly group nonetheless!). We heard the entire Hawaii story, including the 94-year-old marriage licensor that Matt sweet-talked (in two languages), and even got to see the pictures. Erin and co. sent over a HUGE Shirley Temple (with about a dozen cherries in it) for Matt, and he not only drank it all, he followed it with a glass of excellent brewpub beer. The steaks were fantastic, and we left reluctantly because Matt had a judges’ meeting back at the gym.

Weddings seem to be a theme at this fest... not only did Matt and Lisa get hitched, we recently had the nuptials of Dan and Robin (Markowitz) Westacott, two of the friendly faces you see every year at the reg desk.

Later that evening, sitting on the gym floor with Lisa and knitting (Linc was sound asleep next to us), I learned of the recent wedding of yet another figure in the world of juggling. I’m not sure if it’s something that I should be announcing, so I’ll just give out a few factoids: he’s got (at least) one gold IJA medal, he was married about three months ago in a helicopter above Las Vegas, and she’s blonde. Wanna guess? Send my phone email: klsabin at tmail dot com.

Todd Strong (festival chairman and outgoing BOD chair) thinks we need to stage a wedding intervention and wants to set up an ambush marriage at one of the workshops. Seems that Kim, the newest BOD member, has been living in sin with Rob for years (these people teach our children! in the SCHOOLS!)... in fact, she’s worn out one engagement ring and is shopping for the second. There seems to be any number of folks in the IJA licensed to authorize weddings... stay tuned and find out if Rob does the right thing...

Later that night, the late shows started. Luke had, in my opinion, far and away the best act on the first night of the Renegade stage (they’re calling it the Midnight Show, but it has to start at 11 because of the liquor laws here in Iowa). He translated a piece written for the double bass into siteswap... he had to read aloud and at the same time juggle, keeping a regular pace and tone, while trying not to bobble either the balls or the words. The piece was called “Failing,” and dealt philosophically with the nature of failure and success, and Luke not only did a superb job of bringing the piece into another medium, he did a lovely presentation of it.

Wait... there was one other act that really made me sit up and take notice. Jay Gilligan did a (i think) 5 ball piece to a really wonderful bit of music and in a style reminiscent of Sean McKinney... the swooping dives to pick up drops, never stopping the pattern... I wish I could remember more of it.

Apparently my daughter was on the Renegade stage Wednesday night... something about a beer drinking contest, and she jumped on the stage with a bottle of chocolate syrup instead of beer, and chugged it. Everyone seems to be having a good time getting to know her, and I think she’s really enjoying her first IJA festival.

I didn’t go to Wednesday Renegade, and the Thursday version is starting right now... since I’m typing like a mad thing, I guess I’m not going now, either!

I haven’t done much braiding, just a few friends, but I have braided Greg Phillips face twice... the first time I did two long braids that stuck way out front, that bobbed when he moved his mouth. He looked just like a muppet! The second time, during the Bix thing, I did these loopy bits that look sort of like the bottom half of a daisy. At the Renaissance Faire, I call them “toeholds,” but Greg, being happily married for twenty-mumble years, didn’t think that was such a great idea. But he sure looked cute.

Let’s see, what else to share... Patrick McGuire is here, and looking fine as usual. He was working a very cool five ball bounce pattern earlier that would have two balls in parallel going to the left, two to the right, repeat... Seems there’s a restaurant in town bearing his name, but he swears he had nothing to do with it. He’s a bit bummed... he didn’t make finals, but he said that prelims judge Jack Kalvan took the sting out of it by telling him about it in a funny way: “You wouldn’t mind very much if you weren’t in the show tomorrow night, would you?” He took it well, but you can tell it’s a blow... now I’m all curious about what he would have done. Oh, well, at least he’s going to be in the Cascade of Stars show on Saturday (“I’m still a star!”).

Cindy Marvell, Carter Brown and Nicolas Flair (Lazer Vaudeville) arrived at 3 a.m. Wednesday (a day late due to bad weather). They have to leave at 6 a.m. the morning after their Friday night show, and do three shows at their off-broadway run. She says they’ll finish up the summer there and then take a break back in Colorado. She seemed tired (well, duh! she stayed up all night!) but very happy to be here. Haven’t had a chance to say hi to Carter yet... and I don’t know if I’ve met Nicolas yet.

There’s this wild bike here in the gym. Someone took the handlebars and connected a twisted belt between them and the steering mechanism of the bike... so that if you turn the handlebars to the left, the bike goes to the right, and vice versa. I’ve only seen one person actually able to ride it, and even then just for a short distance. Bill even had a hard time just walking the darned thing across the floor... it’s freaky.

This is the most connected fest ever... everyone seems to have wireless cards and laptops (and I’m happy to report this is an extremely Mac-heavy crowd). Gee, I remember how hard it was even two years ago in Reno to find a way to upload these diaries, now I’ve got access in the gym!

I guess I should talk a little about the champs shows, hm? OK, I’ll finish up with that and call us caught up for now...

I didn’t go to the Youth Showcase.... I knew I wanted to see the Juniors championships, and I didn’t think the baby would last through two whole shows. Bill and I stopped at the Chinese/Vietnamese place about a block from the theater, and Todd joined us. Linc was pretty squirrelly, but didn’t make too big a mess.

The theater is a gorgeous old Art Deco thing. Marble and gilt all over the place, brass and wood and velvet. Just lovely, a bit threadbare and worn here and there, but still certainly serviceable. We slipped in at the tail end of the Showcase, which seemed to be going well. Steve Mills MCed, and the crowd was enthusiastic. We chatted with Bruce Plott, the IJA house band director, during the intermission, and learned a bit about the musical juggling scene in the south.

The youth show was tremendous. Rick Rubenstein MCed and kept the pace moving well. I didn’t know I was going to write so I didn’t take notes, but you probably already know the outcome (a sweep by the mind-boggling Japanese contingent). There was also an act that started with a masterful display of DDR, and a Jack Sparrow lookalike.

Rick and the Stanford Juggling Research Institute (Martin Frost and Fred Piccioto) were joined by Vova (Vladimir Galchenko, but everyone still calls him Vova) to kill time while the judges debated. After they ran out of ideas, the DDR guy set up and managed to pass (barely) Max300 on Hard... pretty cool footwork.

Tonight’s show didn’t have quite the sweep aspect, but it was still a great show. I took a few notes, but I was juggling my phone (upon which I was typing the notes) and a very squirmy baby, and he made typing just about impossible after the intermission. So I apologize for my very skimpy coverage, and urge you to get your hands on one of the fest DVDs for full effect.

Oh, one very cool thing happened to me just as I was getting ready to leave for the show (right after I posted the first installment). An older gentleman approached me, asking about registration. It was all shut down, everyone being gone to the Champs show. He said he wanted to register for the fest, being the brother of one of the founders. Wow! It was true.... his name was Walter Joyce, and he's the brother of Bernard Joyce, who had died last year. The two of them, along with their two sisters, had juggled together as an act throughout the 40s. He was from Philadelphia, and met up with his daughter from St. Louis, and they came to the festival at the last minute. He even had a set of Harry Lind clubs to show us! I walked them down to the show, and Todd managed to very charmingly talk them into paying for their tickets (!). I quickly scribbled a note to the MC about Walter, and handed them off to some ushers to be seated. The MC did announce them, although I didn't see where they were sitting, and the daughter just now (four hours later) came up to me and told me how much it meant to her dad to be recognized by the IJA, that he'd reconnected with some old friends already and was very happy. That made me feel fantastic!

Another great thing that has happened is that Sandy asked me to take care of distributing the festival schwag... a really lovely red bag, big enough for a bunch of clubs, with the IJA logo and "Davenport 2005" printed on it. They're for the workshop leaders and other volunteers, and it's been a blast going around and giving folks these lovely bags, along with a preprinted "thank you" note I made for our workshop leaders. It's a great job, making folks all happy with their bag and a hug, and more than makes up for my crankiness about any glitches that have occurred over the last few weeks.

(Matt just ran past me... apparently the Renegade stage has been solid Japanese for the last hour, really hot stuff... might have to go check it out)

OK, quick overview... Lots of acts seemed to be reflections of the prop competitions... we need to work this out so there isn’t a lot of overlap in the future. Lots of track suits, not much costume. Many plain white thin clubs. Lots of flats thrown in with singles, doubles, of clubs. You will soon be seeing lots of diabolo excalibur. The theme from “Halo” is good for juggling.

You guys got the results, right? If not, here:
Teams
Entropy, bronze
Kikyo Brothers, silver
Jonglissimo, gold
Individuals
Cécile Poncet, bronze
Mark Kolbutz, silver
Ryo Yabe, gold

Also, Martin Frost was given the Outstanding Service award, and Kevin de la Grange was given the Excellence in Education award.


If you read this, you probably figured out how to email me (in that part about weddings). It’s midweek and I need to hear from y’all if you want me to keep doing this... Now I’m going to go watch the last bit of Renegade and then... sleep, sweet sleep!

Comments

[zdamiana.livejournal.com]

I'm certainly enjoying the updates, though you should take time and make sure you get to enjoy the festival first, and not worry about making sure you keep your readers up to date. After all, it's entirely my own fault that I'm not there.

Say hi to people for me, if you get a chance!

[mamagotcha.livejournal.com]

I’m starting to have thoughts about encouraging the IJA to split into men’s and women’s divisions and perhaps even skill levels instead of ages for competitions, but we don’t have that discussion now.

WHAT? Dude, it's bad enough that the WJF is doing that!

Apparently my daughter was on the Renegade stage Wednesday night... something about a beer drinking contest, and she jumped on the stage with a bottle of chocolate syrup instead of beer, and chugged it.

Not much of it. I only got maybe two gulps down before that one dude finished his beer and won the contest. LAST night was the chugging.

After they ran out of ideas, the DDR guy set up and managed to pass (barely) Max300 on Hard... pretty cool footwork.

He didn't pass, actually. He failed about a third of the way in, but had set it up so it didn't stop the song.

[mamagotcha.livejournal.com]

if it's not obvious, that last post was julia on my account...

[lunacow]

It's always nice to get your account of the fest. Like Z said, I hope you don't miss out on too much fun because of documenting it!