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What's with the big fiddle?

Well, I am also a musician and I love to play upright bass. So, it's more than likely that at some point during a festival day you will see me carrying this big fiddle around, trying to sit in with other musicians ;-)

Who is that masked girl?

Well, that's Jayna all bundled up while we were up in Minnesota for a show.  She's into knitting and (along with others) passed the bug along to me (I crochet, though).  I made the scarf she's wearing.  Cool, huh?

Is that a chainsaw?

Yep, and it's being wielded by my friend and fellow performer Dextre Tripp.  This was taken on that same Minnesota trip (see above) and at the end of the show, Dextre leads everybody outside the theater to do a juggling stunt with an apple, a machete, and... a chainsaw.  It was a bizarre sight for a man in a shirt and tie, with a chainsaw, in a snow flurry, in downtown St. Paul.

Is that a nail?!

Well, yeah...  That's friend and fellow performer Geoff Cobb who works as a professional sword-swallower. Yes, the nail is real and yes it is going in his nose and yes it's disgusting!  Can we move on, please?

Nuns?!?

One of the funniest acts working today and dear friends Hey Nunnie Nunnie.  They sing, they tell jokes, they wear habits...  You know, the usual...

???

Not a science experiment gone wrong, it's a new very talented acrobatic juggling troupe called Barely Balanced!  Check 'em out!

"I'm curious..."

...if we're on this earth to help others, why are the others here?
...if somebody with multiple personalities threatens suicide, is it a hostage situation?
...would a fly without wings be called a "walk"?
...if you see a turtle without a shell...is he homeless?
...when an agnostic dies, does he go on to the Great Perhaps?
...if you tickle a cow, does milk come out her nose?
...if a man stands alone in the woods talking, with no woman around to correct him is he still wrong?
...if love is blind, why is lingerie so popular?
...if white wine goes with fish, do white grapes go with sushi?
...who's cruel idea was it to put an 'sp' in the word 'lisp'?
...where are we going again? And what's with this handbasket?
...why is the alphabet in that particular order? Is it because of that song?
...wouldn't it be a bad idea to play leap frog with a unicorn?
...if humans evolved from monkeys and apes, why are there still
  monkeys and apes?
...don't you think that no matter who you are or how popular you
  become, the size of your funeral is going to depend on the weather?
...if you let a smile be your umbrella, wouldn't you just get a mouthful
  of rain?
...if all the world's a stage, where does the audience sit?
...Why don't you ever see the headline "Psychic Wins Lottery!"?
...Why is a boxing ring square?
...Why is it called lipstick if you can still move your lips after you use it?
...Why is what doctors do called "practice?"
...Why is the third hand on a watch called a second hand?
 

What the....????

What can I say?  It's no wet t-shirt contest, but it's one funny show!  The Washing Well Wenches, splashing to a theater near you (they don't actually know where you live, but they will stalk you).

Dude, calm down...

The London Broil Show... Jugglers, friends, and just off-the-wall weird!

No real reason for posting this photo, I just like belly dancers  :-}  You too? Then check out www.magic-hips.com

Have you seen me?

Collaborations come and go, but here's one for the books.  Yours truly was involved with the music score for a movie!  It's The Lost Princess and it was produced by friends of mine you might know as Don Juan and Miguel through their "rennie" productions company Blind Dog Entertainment.

Here's something fun, Bret took the superhero personality quiz and his results are below:

 Your results:
You are Spider-Man

Spider-Man 65% The Flash 55% Green Lantern 55% Iron Man 55% Superman 50% Supergirl 50% Catwoman 50% Wonder Woman 40% Hulk 40% Robin 35% Batman 25%

You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky and have great power and responsibility.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Quiz

"Key? What key?"

August 14, 2005 during a show at the NY Renaissance Faire:  This was a show where Jana and I perform our latest illusion "Metamorphosis". In this illusion, I am handcuffed, tied in a bag, then padlocked inside a packing crate. Jana then climbs on top, raises a curtain, counts to 3, and then suddenly I'm on top and she's inside. I always have a kid in the audience hold the key to the padlock and the key is attached to a rubber duckie to make it bigger and easier to handle (ie: not lose). So, in this show, we had just done the switch and I jump down off the box to bow and then ask the kid to throw the key/duck back to me - which she does - at about knee level. This throw turns into a ground ball that rolls perfectly and quickly UNDER the stage! My career flashed before my eyes: The only key to unlock the crate and let my partner out was now way up under the stage out of my reach and I had no spare! On top of that, it was a particularly hot day (heat index with humidity put it at about 110 degrees!). I was beside myself. Time was running out. Then it hit me - send a kid to get it! I quickly sent an eager 5 year old up under the stage and he recovered the key/duck and I was finally able to get Jana out! All turned out well, but you can be sure that I've got a spare key nearby from now on!

"Big deal" as described by Jayna

So Bret learned this really difficult trick. I say difficult because I've tried it myself, and would believe it to be totally impossible except for the fact that I've seen him do it. The man has learned, with the help of five days off a week, to shoot a rubber band, so that it comes back. Why?, you ask... I don't know, but hey, I think it's cool. Anyway, during the Carolina Festival in Oct. of 2005, a kid in our crowd did not find this trick so impressive. After Bret announced he could "shoot a rubber so that it comes back", the kid yelled... "Big deal, shoot it straight up!" Bret and I had not thought of this.....
 

"She's ALIVE!"

So my partner, Jayna, and I are performing a show during 2005's Arizona Ren Fest. This particular show finishes with a stunt called "The Box of Death" where Jayna is closed up in a box, then 14 steel blades are inserted into the box in such a way that it seems impossible that she is still in there. At the end of these shows, we accept monetary donations to come up onto the stage and look inside the box through large cut-outs in the top. This is an old side-show stunt that I saw performed a couple of times 2 years prior and decided it would be a good thing to have in the show. It's been going over extremely well! Well, at this one show, there was a 5 year old boy in the front row who started coming up on stage to look as soon as he realized this was a possibility. His mom pulled him back, gave him a dollar, saying "he wants some money first". During all of this I am still telling the audience how the process (coming up on stage, making a donation, taking a look) all worked. As soon as this enthusiastic little fan got a dollar in his hand, he immediately came up on stage again before I'd finished talking. Well, no sense in stopping the boy, so I held out the bucket and instructed him to put the money in. Once he'd done that, I let him go up to the box by himself to look. He walked behind the box - I'm convinced he thought Jayna was hiding behind it. Not seeing anybody there, the boy went up on tip-toes, and looked inside. Now, Jayna is in the box and still on mic so the audience heard her say "Hi kiddo" to the boy. The boy's eyes got really big, then he looked up - basically at the audience - and yelled "She's ALIVE!" The audience roared with laughter at this. I could not have planned such a thing and have it come off so well. Kinda makes me wonder, though: just what was he expecting to see?

"Rise!"

This happened during a show at the Arizona Renaissance Festival in 2004. It was my last show of the day and, due to overcast conditions, the crowd in the festival had started to dwindle. Suddenly, about halfway through the show, I hear a helicopter approaching (ah, Renaissance). I realize quickly that it is a medical chopper that is sometimes dispatched to the festival in order to quickly expedite somebody who is in need of medical attention. This naturally raises concerns in my audience, and this concern is furthered along by the fact that the landing site cordoned off for just such a thing is located literally within 200 yards or so beyond the fence right next to my stage. So, with the audience distracted so, I quickly inform them of the nature of the helicopter and its pending location in proximity to where we are. The helicopter lands, and of course the blades continue to turn while they are loading. I start resuming the rest of my show without dialogue (which no one could hear anyway). Soon, I start to hear the chopper's engine and blades speed up for take off. Suddenly I get an idea. I walked over to the edge of the stage closest to the fence, wait for what I felt was the right moment, then with as much over-the-top drama as I could muster, I raised my hands slowly towards the fence and screamed "RISE!" Sure enough, just a moment later and the helicopter ascended up into the air and out of sight, to a standing ovation from the audience. Eat your heart out, Copperfield

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