13 Mar 2009
Posted in People, Travel at 8:54 am by alby
Well we made it.
Me and Mats finally got up to Edinburgh after about 6 hours of driving – most of which was fine but for one lorry that I’m quite convinced had a very sleepy driver. He was wandering somewhat scarily during a 50mph stretch. I got past him and could see in my mirror that people were avoiding him somewhat. Hopefully someone shopped him. We didn’t have phones to hand.
[edit: it deserves noting that young Mats was getting very impatient to get to Edinburgh - could hardly contain his excitement as we got nearer. For some reason or other.]
Anyway finally into the city to find that my intended route was totally screwed up as the centre is having a tram system installed. Damn.
So I was taken on a wild trip around the city’s funner nearly central roads but memory of pubs got me vaguely right and then I was here at Rosie and Tom’s place without much of a hitch.
Straight out for curry as Tom, poor lad, had been starving for ages, to a new place just at the end of their road.
No-one in there, no menu in the window. Is it open?
Turned out to be so and we were led to a table near the loos.
Then the fun started. First he brought beer, yay! But he managed to tip the tray so much that one bottle fell off, broke a wine glass and sprayed Rosie with beer.
Next he gave Rosie Tom’s meaty starter and vice versa.
For the mains he gave me pilau rice and called it mushroom rice. Tom had ordered plain rice and got mushroom rice. Oh at this point he knocked another beer bottle over. Oh yes and I ordered something called a Charsada Lamb Karahi. This was supposed to have lamb rolled up and stuffed with mince but in the end I just got a lamb karahi.
But the food was good, ish.
Not sure that’ll be a place they’ll return to but the entertainment was good.
Now got to get up and find where to get a visitor’s parking permit to keep the car near the flat. Otherwise I’ll have fun moving the car every 4 hours or so. And that’s not really in my plan.
Have fun.
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11 Mar 2009
Posted in Life, People at 9:55 pm by alby
Tried to contact my liftee to the Scottish JC today.
This is the exchange wot took place:
me – “Can you get into town about 1 tomorrow? I’ll meet you by the Holiday Inn.”
Reply – “Who is this?”
me – “Your bleedin’ taxi to Edinburgh. Who d’ya think?”
R – “What?”
me – “Hello my name is Alby. I know you and your girlfriend and we are going to the Scottish Juggling Convention tomorrow. You asked for a lift.”
R – “Oh you must be after my son. He must have used my phone. I’ll pass on the message.”
Very well done everyone involved.
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10 Mar 2009
Posted in Juggling at 3:34 pm by alby
Here
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09 Mar 2009
Posted in Juggling, Reviews at 7:26 pm by alby
Well Friday and Sunday were nice.
Friday evening was spent with a wide variety of lovely folk including the ever lovely out-of-towners db, Suzanne, Tom D and Mamph at a new-to-us curry house in Leicester.
And it was alright. I liked my meal and enjoyed the company. A good evening.
Sunday was spent with db and Suzanne doing very little but cooking a very large roast dinner which was remarkably well received (if I say so myself).
But what about Saturday?
A load of us headed over to Notts for the NAJC again.
So far we’ve been to all of them. 1 was good apart from not having a stage for the show. 2 was good AND had a stage, 3 was ok but was back to not having a stage again – cue whinging from me and others – but was redeemed by having Silvia hooping and Wes and Peter shocking us with wonderfulness during the show.
So what about the 4th one?
After Bath last weekend it seems more apparent how important a stage and more space is. The main hall at Notts is a little cramped and the uni has removed the comfy chairs and put in standard student accom furniture instead – not as nice, at all. But to be fair there are a couple of other rooms that they used for workshops and the atrium space is lovely – high and light and blissfully free of cheesy music. We spent a lot of time there passing (another new record, whoot) and watching db and some young diabolo turk showing off to each other and being as good as we know db and an occasional young turk can be.
In the afternoon we headed out for dinner at a local carvery and had ourselves yet another good meal. Really a bad weekend for my losing a bit of weight thing.
And then back to the show.
Being honest I don’t think we expecting wonders but it turned out to rank in my least enjoyed show in ages. I’ll leave the ranting to Clurb though.
Problems: 2 of the acts were seen last week at the Bath con. 1 of the others (at least) was at BoB. I know we go to a lot of shows but 3 acts repeated within a month was quite poor.
Oh yes and there was no stage again. From discussions it seems that the decision has been taken that a stage isn’t worth the money. Frankly an appalling decision (if true). I don’t care that it’s expensive – if your audience can’t see the show then it’s not worth putting a show on.
And the cost? Last year I was worried that we priced Lestival too high at £7.50. This NAJC was £8. £8!
So can I review it? There has been some discussion (again) about whether a non-participant can pontificate about shows as we are unable to appreciate the terror and hard-work.
Bollocks to that – I’m comparing with something else that costs £8. Let’s say, for the sake of argument, seeing a movie at the cinema (and I’ve included taking some off for the day part of the admission).
Both a movie and a show can be good or awful. I don’t recall people being told they can’t slag fillums off unless they’ve made a fillum before.
So the show.
Oh dear. Lots of pretty colours and occasional ideas but really not very thrilling. Some good juggling from Tom and Will, Luke H (but I agree – less emo would be better) and that was about it.
Pole spinners made the cardinal error of thinking that twinkly lights makes anything look good. They also made another basic error of thinking body moves work for an audience when you can’t really see the performers. Just, no.
The less said about the kite bit, Rossi, inappropriate heckles and the skater(although it must be said that he did move intriguingly oddly at the beginning), the better.
Not an enjoyable show. Really not.
I think it’s extremely telling that not one person I spoke to afterwards was very happy with what they’d seen. And so far nearly 2 days after the event there are only about 5 people who’ve said anything about the event online at all – this just never happens (and one of them said their “bane” was “the show”). But I suppose people are worried about sounding negative in public.
So a waste of our time really. I do hope there weren’t many people whose first taste of a jug con show was this one.
NAJC has always been a must-go-to. But I fear that it has completely lost its way and it’s now the one” gettable-to” one day con that I think I could happily avoid and not worry that I’d missed something good.
A crying shame.
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01 Mar 2009
Posted in Juggling, Reviews at 3:41 pm by alby
It’s already Sunday afternoon. It hardly seems like yesterday since we (me, P and C) were in Bath at a juggling convention.
The 1st juggling convention in Bath (“a small township an hour or so to the west of London” – according to one Australian I used to know). Err no the second, or maybe the 3rd. Could have been the 4th but never mind; it was a convention.
(I remember going to a 2 day convention in Bath towards the end of the 90′s – most memorable bit was a bunch of kids in the show who we all thought were going to be rubbish but we’d have to applaud ‘cos they were kids. They came out and did some stunning acro and acrobalance – most impressed – wish I could remember who they were – they got a roar of appreciation at the end – very very good indeed)
The usual early start followed by a decently long drive. First job was to fill up. My car has a 60l tank and it took 58.98l to fill it. I think that’s the nearest to empty I’ve ever had it. The colour of a narrative is in the detail, I always find.
But the day was onto a good start – we drove the scenic route avoiding motorways where possible and ended up driving through the Cotswolds (past the Slaughters). Top drive it was.
Once there we marvelled at how hilly Bath is and how it was not what we expected at all.
Venue was easy to find with Sat-Nav so no dramas apart from it shouting “turn right” so I did only for it to tell me off for turning right.
The gym was good too. Decent size, lit well and warm. And amazement of amazements they had an audible and understandable PA system. I actually managed to get abut 90% of what was said on it. Stunning achievement that – at least it shows everyone else that it IS do-able.
So the day was spent throwing things and chatting and swapping news and talking to germans (met another echt cool Deutsche (?Lily?) – I really do like Germans).
More to the point me and Clurb got 2 new records yesterday. Our best day in ages – 34 passes of 8 clubs and 14 of 7-club ultimates (for those interested Clurb counts her catches so that’s 14 catches for her in 7c ultimates and 34 catches for her in 8c). We also had a go at 9c but the less said about that the better.
Us 3 had promised ourselves a good meal out at a convention this year. A few years back we’d had a stunning meal at Leeds in a thai place and we wanted to at least equal this. And we reckoned Bath would prolly be the place to find a decent restaurant. And so it proved.
Void was going to be compering the show so couldn’t take pics so he’d asked me to instead. I’m not used to show photos but I said I would. Now what would be good, I thought, would be to buy a remote for my camera so I just sit and watch the fun and just keep pressing the remote so not having to fret about the camera on its tripod. We found a camera shop and I bought one. Whilst there I also asked for a recommendation for a good restaurant – we’d seen a good looking Morrocan place but the camera shop man told us that there’s a Jamie Oliver restaurant in Bath and here’s how you get there…
Wandered up there to be greeted with a small queue and gorgeous smells coming from the kitchens.
Wobbly chairs and tables too. It was here that I discovered that the remote needed to be pointing at the front of my camera. Bugger. Just no use to me at all – and by this time the shop would have closed. Nuts – wasted cash that.
But then the food started coming. We started off with bread and olives. I drooled at the bread even before tasting it but my word it was nicer than I think I’ve had ever. The tasting was only accompanied by moaning sounds and looks of “is this for real?” between us all. What a start.
Main meals were next with steak for Pete, pasta for Clurb and some “flash steak” thingy for me. More sounds of moaning and shots of “bloody hell is this gorgeous or what?” between us. Even the chips (rosemary salted) were nicer than any I’d had (but could maybe have done with just a touch less salt). Unsurprisingly there wasn’t much in the way of food left on our plates after this course.
We were now in a quandary. We had about 15 minutes before the parking ticket ran out but we all wanted dessert. Our waitress was a star, understood our concerns and brought pudding and bill at the same time. Dessert for me was homemade ice-cream and sorbet (sigh), P had some orange cake thing (“groan”) and Clurb had chocolate stuff (dribble).
But then we had to run. A shame that we had to finish such a good meal in such a rush. Next year guys! Have another Bath convention – we’ll be there, just expect us to vanish mid afternoon alright?
So back to the event.
The show was starting soon and I got let in to set up camera and such.
Slightly late start but the venue is good if a little small. As it was it just held everyone – but only just. There were maybe 5 seats left. If it does happen again then seating will be tricky if it grows in numbers of attendees.
Void was compering and managed a slight show line-up well with one or two good gags and some well timed fumbles.
Now I remember few names, sorry:
“Tom Cruise” (an in-joke apparently) was on first doing angsty white boy in black shirt juggling – the variant here was that he used stage balls rather than silicons. Decent enough start even with the over-angstness of the piece.
Someone and Will S (Hexagonic) did a club passing thing next with some solo stuff from “Someone”. Droppy and a bit shaky at times but it had some good stuff in there too.
They were followed by Frau Professor Doktor someone – she was actually the german lass I met earlier in the day but looking just so unlike her that I found it hard to believe they were the same person. Some nice manipulation and talkyness but could have had a tad more juggling in at the end. And the answer was obvious. “Will I catch the next ball?” “Uncertain”.
Then came someone from a local bar doing what I’d heard earlier in the day as “Bath wear”. (“What’s a bath wear workshop?” I wondered. That was the 10% of the PA announcements I didn’t quite get.) Zippy and spinny stuff with good catches and body work. Nice.
This was followed by the most pointlessly long intermission I’ve come across at a convention. 30 minutes was way too long for a short show – I didn’t hear a good word about this from anyone I spoke to during the interval.
Then someone else whose name I didn’t get doing very speedy club juggling. More perfectly decent skills.
Then another professor, this one mad rather than confusingly uncertain. This was Bluecat doing staff (x3) and poi and contact with some over acting and then being dragged off stage by one of the over-staffed St John’s ambulance bods. Best heckle of the night too was when he changed from one prop to another, again. A little girl said loudly “Oh not again”. Good giggle followed.
Then came a secret act – this was a contortionist abusing her spine for a few minutes. Too long and too painful for me but she’s clearly very bendy, well done.
Final act was Vux. I’ve seen him a few times doing some mad diabolo stuff but he was on today with a 3 ball act. So the show was bookended by men with 3 balls doing similar stuff. Nice routine, harder but not very different from the first act and a bit droppy.
So in summary.
I reckon that was the best event so far this year (I know there’s not a lot to choose from yet but bear with me). Good day venue, good show venue, wonderfully close to some exquisite food and a great drive to get there. The show could have done with a touch more variety and maybe some bigger name acts. The day was only £6 though so stick a couple more quid on the price next year and get a storming headline act.
I’d even say that the venue might be big enough (with the other spaces nearby) for a BJC (assuming there’s decent size theatre in the area – I can’t believe there isn’t).
Long drive back and a great day ended. Wonderful time in the main. Thanks guys and girls of Gravity Vomit.
Pics here.
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