Bear blog

Durham's new venue is really very good. Compared to the old one, at least. Big bright hall (made even better by the general absence of people all weekend), smaller smelly hall for unicyclists to get them out from under foot, canteen (which I'll admit to not venturing into, although I hear good things), grass and good weather for outside games, sit-and-watch-tv area for juggling vids, showers, 24 hour space. Kind of.

 

We got up at ridiculous o'clock in the morning to get up there at a decent hour because we were in Philip. It didn't take too long, considering the stops for poos and petrol. Lizzah was handily riding around the carpark looking like she needed a task when we got to site so she carted all our stuff into the hall for us. The Peats had ponced out and got a hotel room for the weekend. I was not impressed.

 

Alby and I cracked on and got some honest to goodness practice done. It's so nice to be able to juggle again after the summer break but the backs of my thighs aren't half feeling it. Eight clubs worked well, and we even managed to get a couple of reasonable video clips of it working which I may or may not post somewhere for people to criticise. The pattern looks better than it feels although I'm still gurning my way through it all.

 

During the games, whilst no one was watching, we tried again with seven club ultimates. Taking on board all the wonderful constructive criticism we've had over the past year ('floaty, like' and 'throw more accurately, and be better at catching') we finally got a semblence of a pattern going. It's still ugly and very very short, and Alby is desperately trying to keep his face out of harm's way, but it's infinitely better than it was on Monday.

 

We got our best ever run of six clubs back-to-back as well. A whole five (possibly six) catches. Unbelievable. The Durham air is obviously terribly beneficial to this sort of activity. 

 

In amongst the pwnage, we enjoyed the company of Tom and Dr Helen, Alby went mental on hammering people's backs for them, I used my unicycle (much to Barnesy's amusement as I wobbled my way round the hall), Miark threw things at me, I spectacularly failed to be good at four clubs but managed to acquire an impressive bruise for my troubles, I met The Missus who turned out to be very nice, and we went for a wander around the world's most shut town. The chippy didn't even open until 6.30. I mean honestly! We ended up having to descend on some poor woman's tiny little restaurant and watch her flap her way through more orders than I'm sure she'd previously taken in a year.

 

(To be continued. I'm going to bed.)

(Cross-posted to the Yahoo Group) 

 

I've just been down to the Brite Centre to talk to the woman who runs the room bookings there. She showed me round their hall and it was nice. Light, bright, airy. Tall ceilings, open space. Infinitely better than Mirage, at any rate. And I reckon it's big enough to get us all in there with suitable elbow room on a decently-busy night. (By decently-busy I'm talking ten of us).

 

But, of course, it comes at a price.

 

• The building shuts at 8 o'clock at the latest, so our session would have to start earlier than we're used to.
• The lighting was provided by spot lights in the ceiling and as I looked round at 9 in the morning whilst the sunlight was streaming in through the windows, I couldn't say whether or not they'd be annoying to juggle under.
• There's a booking fee.

Now, the usual rate is £8.75/hour, plus a 50% extra charge for being there after 6 o'clock. So lets call it £15 for an hour's session. But they do cheap rates for Braunstone groups. If I could wangle it that me or Pete paying for the session constituted us being a Braunstone group (and I reckon this is quite possible. The woman I talked to did seem open to a bit of negotiation) we get the cheaper rate of £5.75/hour plus the 50% extra after 6pm charge. So that'd be about £9 for an hour's session.

 

Which I personally don't think is too bad, especially on a good week. We'd be looking at paying a quid each or there abouts. Of course, the real question is are people prepared to pay significantly more than this if only a few people turn up?

 

Questions to consider then:

• Do people want a better space than Mirage?
• Do people mind paying for sessions at the above rates?
• How long do people want the sessions to be?
• Are people able to do an earlier session (if people want a two hour session we'd be looking at starting at 6pm)
• What day/s are good for people?
• Are we talking all year round with this, or just vacation times? The room would be good in summer at any rate because of all the natural light that gets in there. No need for dodgy ceiling spot lights.

If I get enough interest, then I'll go back to the woman and see about getting the reduced rate and find out what days we can get the hall (I did ask her this today, but she didn't have the necessary piece of paper in front of her at the time). 

 

I also got the name of the duty manager up at Braunstone Leisure Centre who I'm informed is the woman to talk to about booking rooms there. Will chase that up next week when she gets back off holiday.

I'm all Bungaylicious once more. It's a truly wonderful feeling. Being back at work today hit me insanely hard. It took me a good while to settle down to the fact that people were rushing about and looking harried.

 

This year's Bungay was nothing like last year's. I did altogether less sitting around in the big-top and much much more sitting around in the sunshine. Lizzy wasn't there this year to spur us into going off site and Doing Things. We didn't go to any museums, hug even one windmill, nor did I spot a single otter. Instead, I befriended a pony and marvelled at Alby's unicycling skillz. Pwnership commenced. Barnsey and I made the acquaintance of Milly and sat by the side of the road pondering upon such themes as fluffiness and friendship. We discovered a pub. A good pub. With food. Good food. It made for a couple of interesting evenings, watching LP struggle for breath and partaking of deep discussions about Books with Alex. Dave managed to choke down a couple of steaks. I reckon his body's getting on for about 40% beef by now. He'll be mooing next year.

 

But whilst we were terribly sociable and friendly in the pub, I barely spoke to anyone in the big-top all week. Such is the curse of sunny weather, I'm afraid. I decided quite early on in the week that I would be forsaking tent and cafe time for sunshine and afternoon naps. And I don't think I was the only one. The big top this year was actually used for juggling rather than sitting around. I probably went against the grain by spending less than an hour sat in the cafe all week purely because I wasn't interested in poker or board games, and the lounge was so inviting and fit for purpose.

 

The other thing about sunny weather is that it brings people with it. Lots of people. And whilst some of them disappeared during the week, by the last weekend it was busy. Super-mega-hella busy. For Suffolk anyway. We probably increased the total population of the county by 50%. Although having people around was a bit of a shock to the system they didn't really cause any major problems, other than having to get the toilets pumped at least twice and managing to trip over guy-ropes an unfeasable number of times. When you're all collapsed under the blazing glare of the sun, or snoozing in your tent, or wandering back and forth to visits pubs and ponies and supermarkets you don't tend to get too put-out by people. It would have been absolutely fine had Alby not turned up. I wouldn't have had to do any passing and therefore wouldn't have got grumpy at there not being enough room in the big-top for our gigantic patterns. Nor would Alby have wanged a ludicrously long and spinny club straight over my hand and into the back of some poor lad's head. He was very brave not to have cried. I certainly would have. I heard the 'thunk'.

 

I saw two owls, managed to stomach lots of beer without lemonade, ripped the piss out of Darren unmercifully for the whole week, laughed uproariously at and with Bri-Bri (just one Bri), saw Pirates in Norwich, played girly volley-club till a little bit of wee came out, made new friends, marvelled at burping prowess, ate lots and did very little to burn it all off, learnt new words (fo-sheesy!), re-affirmed friendships, enjoyed the feel of dewy grass between my toes at 8 in the morning, got sad when it was time to say goodbye, and generally had the best holiday ever.

 

I'm sat on my own in the library at the minute, gazing wistfully out of the window and thinking that it's a shame to have discovered what Real Life is, to then find that I only get ten days of it a year.  

 

(Photos to come.)

Qualified.

 

Get in.

We kicked it old skool last night.

 

Martin chose to wantonly forsake his wife and child to come and see us again. It was nice to know he's still alive and everything, but annoyingly his five balls is still better than mine.

 

Then because we hadn't got a room last week and it'd been a whole two weeks since we'd got the chance to throw things around, me and Alan were veritably mad for it and managed to drag out a couple of passable attempts at seven club three count and ultimates. It was a strain though.

 

And after that I thought it was about time the unicycle came out for its six month inspection. Lizzy lent me out her shoulder for a bit and then I stuck my headphones in and got hardcore about it. And after about half an hour of huffing and puffing and getting mightily pissed off with it all I did a couple of lengths of the hall one-footed.

 

And then once I'd caught my breath Alan and I gave eight clubs a bit of welly and it wasn't too awful. But by then my arms were all weak and feeble and my legs were a bit wobbly and I was a big sweaty mess and it was time to go home.

 

The hallmark of a good Monday night is having to have a shower before bed. And fair tuckered out I was, n'all.

Most people seem to suggest that Chocfest is the best one-dayer of the year and I have to admit it's certainly up in the top three for me. We got there relatively early this year, despite having to wait for Darren to finish his crumpets. The young lad on the registration desk irritated me. But then young lads who frequent juggling conventions are apt to do that to me. And everyone cheered me up quite quickly after that. Barnesy sported a terribly fetching new 'do. Greg let me have a bit of a rummage through his stock 'cause he keeps providing me with duff clubs. Not that the quality of Beard merchandise is anything other than superb.

Alan and I hunted out and occupied the small gym with the intention of gettting stuck into seven club ultimates and/or eight clubs. And we didn't do badly. The ultimates clicked for the first time, even if it didn't look particularly pretty. It's quite a difficult pattern for someone who has trouble with the concept of 'floaty' throws. I prefer wanging 'em, personally. We had some of our better runs at eight through the day too which put Alan in a good enough mood to attempt six clubs back to back. I only wet myself a little bit.

Byjoty cleaned up in the games and provided me with chocolate buttons off the floor (albeit with a look of disgust), we had yummy fish and chips from down the road, and got to enjoy Dr Helen ranting around the theme of ethnicity.

I've decided to have a bash at scoring convention shows this year in an effort to provide myself with a reason to attend them. Observe:

• Good compere. New what he was doing. Didn't feel the need to fall back on clapping games. Was quick and efficient and funny. (+1)

• Digestive magic. Made me laugh. (+1)

• The Yorkie Bar Shits. Yet again their bit was well paced and entertaining for what it was (+1) but it was the same act they did last year plus a couple of pallets. I can't believe that kids that talented haven't progressed further in a whole year and I kinda wanted more. (-1) Unfortunately for them, I personally don't like them. They're young and tend to get under foot.(-1)

• Devil Stick Matt had a good bash but went on too long with stuff that wasn't all that thrilling to watch (-1). But he did do a couple of neat things and I took pity on him a bit. (+1)
  

• Dave Kelly had mad skillz, innit. (+1) And he managed to make his three ball stuff mildly entertaining. (+1)

• Jon Udry was the first person on the stage who actually looked like he was having fun. (+1) Plus, his hair makes him look like a golden retriever (+1). Poor music choice. (-1)
  

• The convention plugs were superb. Bungay was mentioned and I quivered with excitement (+1), and Miark was just Miark. (+1)

• The cake competition I'm never keen on. I could have forgiven it however if it hadn't been for the fact that it was supposedly a quick announcement. It wasnt. (-1) Personally, I'd be more than happy for them to dish the cake out with little signs to say who's is who's, announce the 3,2,1 places and have done with it. I don't really care what the judges thought of a cake some random I've never heard of made.
  

• The raffle was relatively quick but really, you should have a cake competition *or* a raffle. Not both. (-1)
  

• Dan was a skinny white man in a black vest playing with white bounce balls to vaguely European sounding music. (-1) It was a very 'meh' routine for me. (-1)

• Maxlastix was doing something I've never seen before (+1) and it happened to be stuff that was both entertaining and cringingly wrong. (+1)

• Tom started off his routine with no music again which makes him either arrogant or stupid after the reaction he got last time. Either way it put me immediately in mind of his Leeds act and I lost all impetus to be impressed. (-1) On the other hand, it was mercifully short. (+1) I really was bored by it though. (-1)

• Dave had the best music of the night (+1) and has perfected the art of looking to the audience for affirmation. (+1) He touched his nose/is my friend. (+1)

• Sean Blue is a white man in a black vest with three white balls. (-1) My initial reaction to his ball spinning, however, was "Shit!". (+1) Unfortunately, I hate shows to finish on ring acts just because I can't get excited about them and I like to leave a show feeling impressed. He should have done the ring stuff first and ended with the spinning three balls on one hand thing. (-1) His ring bit was long and arduous and I don't take pleasure from watching grown men make shapes with circles (-1)

Chocfest's show scores +4.
Very impressive to be that far into positive figures. The bar has certainly been set for the year.

Juggling this week was rather good. I set out meaning to do some hardcore unicycling. But that didn't happen.

 

Instead, Alan and I went mental with many many clubs. We got seven club three count looking a lot more presentable. Then we very nonchalently ran triple singles. Exceptionally well. Then for a laugh we tried seven club singles which in the past has always looked hurried at best. But last night it was the more luxuriantly relaxed and laid back pattern ever. I was most surprised. As was Alan, judging by the look on his face.

 

So after that, we thought it'd probably be best to have a go at eight. And that worked too. For ages. I nearly collapsed.

 

But by that time Alan was knackered. Old man that he is. But Jay stepped in and confused me by throwing The Highest Doubles In The World for a while. But he made seven club three count look really good. And made me laugh by throwing quads at me.

 

I suppose I should feel bad about having committed myself to riding and then not bothering. But I'm an eight club juggler now. I can do what I want.

Pete got invited to a stag do and I didn't. This makes me sad. Pete got to go to a lap dancing club and get boobies jiggled in his face. I didn't. This makes me *very* sad.

 

But, on the plus side it meant that I got to have a whole weekend to myself doing exactly as I pleased. It was rather good. I read a couple of books and played Emperor until the wee small hours. And I ate pizza and chips and fish fingers and I didn't have to share it with anyone.

 

And then on Sunday Lizzy came round for lunch and we went to Fundango where we discovered that Rod is still alive and sporting a new, terribly attractive hair do. We played with clubs and laughed at languid hula-hoop men. I got a bit better at bouncing once Rod deflated my wheel. Peachi took a picture of my admittedly impressive 'I'm making poo' t-shirt. I rolled around on my Heelys for a bit and laughed when Lizzy tried it.  Lizzy got into the finals of Death By Peg, not because of any innate skill (although she *was* the person who started the whole pegging thing. Goddamn her), but because, as Rod mockingly pointed out, she was the only one taking it in any way seriously. Bless.

 

And then we came home. And we had sausage and mash with lots of gravy. And then I felt sleepy so I went to bed. And that was the end of my fabulous weekend.

We went up early to Northern-land this weekend so we could see UDC in all its glory. It was certainly a sight to behold. We handled not-so-stolen goods and I got to play with a banding machine. And we shifted and carried for a bit and Miark kept me entertained with his scary toys. It was very nice. And then we all trundled around Stockton for a bit, collecting unis and goal posts and trying to find food. Very nice.

 

Then Saturday we got up ridiculously early because Roger and Connie had to go and stick up signs around Durham. But then everyone decided that we didn't need to go with them so we sat for a while and Pete started building a wheel. Then we took the rather round-the-houses trip to Durham via the Stockton Transporter Bridge. It was fun. There was a fat man who talked to us and looked perturbed when we told him where we were going and he tried to tell us we were going in the wrong direction.

 

The first person we saw at the convention was Barnesy. Pete pipped the horn and he scowled back at us. A nice welcome. Then we pootled around in the unicycle hall for the rest of the day. We found out that the floor was rubbish for heeling on because it was all rubbery. We watched Connie do silly things. We played on Darren's new 20" and reached the communal decision that his new posh seat was essentially a bit rubbish. I stole Miark's 'buff' somewhere along the way. We ate chips and Haribo and spent a lovely day.

 

The Durham peeps had handed out money off vouchers for food at the pub down the road. Everyone was in there before the show and I think I might have been the only one who actually got what they ordered. Lots of complaining and refunding. Jolly good.

 

Now then...the show...

Jay ticked all the boxes for compering. Well done him. He even bigged-up Leicester at one point. We're the place to be, apparently. And once again, the acts were all decently entertaining. Ady's first performance was good considering the look of abject terror on his face. Aww. Connie's sumo wrestler thing had potential, certainly. And I liked her talking through her mad skillz for everyone. Grant did his Bungay stuff to much acclaim. He was good again, and I found myself bopping along to the music n'that, but the Bungay atmosphere just wasn't there. Sigh.

 

In fact, for once I don't have anything bad to say about the show. Nice little tables to sit round. A couple of good heckles. No whizzy poppy floaty annoying things flapping about the place. An exceptionally quick raffle. No sitting around. It's finally happened. I have nothing to complain about. 

 

Instead of driving out into the middle of nowhere and crashing on Mini's floor like we'd planned, we went for the rather more sensible option of paying out for a hotel room for the night. Oohhhh it was worth it. A TV and a decent shower. Luxury. We got to Mini's at about half twelve the next day and sat around for a bit before other people arrived. Then we went up to Hamsterly Forest and pratted around in the undergrowth for several hours. We lost Barnesy for a bit. We launched a thoroughly comprehensive search party but he'd disappeared. He caught up with us later looking extremely pissed off and unloved. But we did try. Really, we did.

 

I surprised myself with my bitchin' mad muni skillz. Mini commented that I'd got better. It's the holding the seat that does it of course. We rode about seven miles up to this really quite impressive skillz loop that all the bikers were being complete wusses over. Dark Tom whizzed down it in about a minute with no discernable trouble. Mini, Pete and Barnesy seemed to have fun falling over and messing about. I found it hard enough trying to walk it so I didn't bother riding anything. It was all slightly scary. But all jolly good wholesome fun. We finished the day with a decidedly reasonable Sunday lunch at Mini's local and then off home we toddled.

 

My legs are killing me. 

Took a road trip to Crawley at the weekend. It was the anniversary of our first trip in Philip and was thusly terribly exciting.

 

I spent Friday night watching Dave peg his tent out with our griddle pan. Thwack, Pang, Twonk! Then I went wild and had half a shandy whilst I opened my brithday present from Darren and revealed my lovely new 'I'm making poo' t-shirt. Very nice, thanks D. And then after that there was a lot of sitting around not doing anything. Tried talking Miark around to putting on a treasure hunt (I think by the end of the weekend my constant pestering was begininng to have an effect. Maybe.) We met Greg's best friend Harvey and had a cuddle. I also got to show off my mad skillz at holding things while Darren put his new wheel together.

 

Next morning it rained. And rained and rained and rained. I got woken up by Harvey jumping up into the van for a cuddle after Pete had taken him for a walk. Then we all gathered in the van whilst trying to pick up the energy to head off to Tesco's for food. Against Darren's better judgement, we managed to bundle five people into his Mini. D got a bit grumpy at the fact that we had to move his bottle of water to get Miark in. That and the worry that we might be getting his interior all dirty with our shoes. Not that he's anal or anything.

 

Met up with Rod later on and had a good go at wheel walking. I think I might have made a bit of progress. My unassisted attempts seemed to go slightly better than they had at Millstreet. But only slightly. Rod, on the other hand, was zooming off and around one footedly in a terribly annoying manner. I fell off onto my arse at one point and everyone laughed. Grrr. I got my birthday glow balls from Greg and put the batteries n'stuff in all by myself so that they're extra special. Had a bit of a go with them after the show that night. They work. It's all good. Then Pete and I took Harvey for a walk through the woods. Or rather Harvey took me for a walk and Pete ran after us, snickering. It was fun. I want a dog that I can take for walks all the time, and throw things for and brush and show off to people. Sigh.

 

Alan turned up at some ludicrous time in the afternoon meaning that he couldn't make the most of the carparkiness and ended up having to pitch his tent on the teeniest bit of grass in the world. I met Carla, the bendy girl, and was horrified firstly by how bendy she actually is, and secondly by how she will happily pop things out of holes purely for the attention. Silly girl.

 

We went for a slap up meal at the Harvester down the road on the square roundabout. I had a whole shandy this time and coped very well. We had a really nice waitress called Clare. She liked the fact that I knew how to spell the name correctly too. Alan asked her to have a sit down but I don't think she was allowed. She didn't take notes of what we wanted either. She just remembered it all. And there were six of us. She was really good. Although she did forget to put sour cream on Darren's potato. But I still liked her. I didn't get to eat pudding cause none of the boys wanted any. Bah. Then we wandered back up to the theatre just in time for the show, and to meet Roger's sister and brother-in-law who were very nice indeed.

 

Now. The show. Everyone's going to have a rant about this so I'll keep it short. The acts were all cool and funky. I liked the pole act although it was perhaps a little too long. Zach Turner was very good, naturally. There was an absolutely fantiastic aerial act involving a man in ludicrously high platforms and an air hostess being stuffed bodily into a suitcase. Supremely entertaining. Maksim was good. There was funky acrobatics to ooh and aah at. There was the joy of seeing what started off as a Jazz Poi act pick itself up out of the doldrums and turn into a nice little bit of three club juggling. It made me realise how much of a dearth there is of good female juggling performers around. It's all very well watching lithe and lovely young girls flinging themselves about doing acro and aerial stuff, but occasionally all I really want to see it a woman showing that she's competent at throwing and catching stuff. Luke Wilson made the correct choice in deciding to do his exciting and stylish BUC act rather than his flat and lifeless EJC act. Even the whip act which I hadn't held up much hope for was entertaining.

 

So the only thing to complain about was the compering which completely mullered the atmosphere of the show, and incidentally freaked me out majorly by flashing willies and weeing on people's props. I wouldn't have minded so much that their skits were numerous and dull (although I will admit that they did have one nice idea with sticking their hands in bags, n'that) but they simply didn't do the job they were paid for. Not only did they not add anything to the show they actually ruined the atmosphere. There was an audible slump in excitement (and shoulders) whenever they appeared. They screwed up quite a few people's entrances because the audience didn't know when of if to clap. But what *really* annoyed me was the fact that they didn't introduce anybody. I spent the entire show going 'oooh! That was great. Who was it?' In fact, no. What *really* annoyed me was that they did actually manage to introduce themselves. Not impressed, at all. If I could remember their names I'd suggest that no one booked them again. Ever. 

 

We managed to miss the fire show. Yey! And sat chatting until we got kicked out of the theatre. Then we wandered for a bit. I learnt the words 'umbra' and penumbra' and used them for a bit. We were all terribly entertained by watching Roger try to pull a couple of girls who looked young enough to be his children. I dunno whether he was successful or not. I hope so, seeing as he put in so much effort.

 

When I woke up on Sunday it was raining. Barnesy and I wandered around looking for people and found them inside. I passed with Alan for a bit, relatively successfully. We didn't pwn triple singles though so something is very wrong there. After that I went to practice hockey skillz with Rod. Others joined us. I managed two or three decent swipes of the ball without falling off, although dribbling is still quite beyond me. Darren played rough and barged me off my uni onto the spiky gravel. And then smacked me round the head with his stick. And spat on me. He didn't even apologise. I've got a nicely mullered right leg now. Then it rained some more and we decided to go home. But then we spotted that Philip had dropped some oil so we stopped and Pete sorted that out. And then we really did leave. We got back home about five o'clock and collapsed.

 

Very nice, indeed.