'Yes, it hit me with the orange end...'

SO!
What a summer it has been. Cornwall was, as always, the best two weeks of my year. This year, however, came with the added bonuses of extra added circus kids, new equipment, and quite a spectacular new injury.
So, first things first, as the 'Trewan Crew', we gained an extra diaboloist (Sp?), who was lovely and pretty decent, skill-wise.
The new equipment came in the form of Matt's new fire staff and his knackered, spray painted fire diabolo. SO, the first night was spent running around in the dark trying to find somewhere off site to set things alight, and not get thrown out by the elusive Matt Hill. Needless to say, this failed epically, we got very muddy, nettled and wet. The next night, Jack bit the bullet and went straight to the owner of the site, who, at, I'm sure, about 83, said we could use the main field, as long as we didn't tell people to sod off if they came to watch. This was fine with the show-offs (here's looking at you Mr Butterworth) and, strangely, he didn't seem to bothered about the potential to set things on fire...
So followed many nights of fire circus, without too many major incidents (I'm not even going to go into the 'gay chicken' mishap), until the night Tom left to go home, and I decided I wanted to increase my fire staff skills. Completed one neck contact spin with no problems, but one end went out. Fine, let's resoak it says me. Tried it again, and, well, let's just say I held it in the wrong place and Jack happened to be filming it...

The trials and misfortunes of my four ball fountain

OK, so I wrote this blog about a month and a half ago, and have only just realised that, in spite of my computer crashing half way through writing it, it did actually save. It's still mostly relevent so I'll post it anyway.


Someone please explain to me why, although perfect on their own, my two in one hand throws are so bloody inconsistent when done at the same time?

My left throws are, for some reason half the size of my right, and, quite frankly, dangerous to the health of myself and others when thrown off course.

My right throws start well, but end up diverging into eratic high throws, getting further and further into the middle of the pattern and colliding with the left ones.

I could understand all this if I'd only started to learn four balls a few weeks ago, but it's been 7 months. And I'm getting a bit frustrated now.

On the uphand, my backcrosses are getting more consistent by the day, and I can now do two in a row. My Mills' mess finally looks good, my Windmills now go both ways quite smoothly (and safely), and I can now do Reverse Cascade without injuring myself, HURRAH.

Muddled Up Arms

Just a quick update and brag is called for I feel, as I now have a week of guilt-free juggling ahead of me. I finished exams yesterday, so I know I can juggle freely without feeling as though I really should be doing something else. I can also get away with more drops, as nobody's in the house to tell me to shut up.
Alas, back to the grindstone on Monday, so I will have to make the most of it.

However, in the last, say, half an hour, I have managed to finally grasp Mills' Mess, after having to look it up because I was sure it was too good to be true and I was getting it wrong. I have also managed to get my clockwise Windmill down to a half-decent height, and lose the eratic pattern it had fallen into, and made a start on anti-clockwise. By the end of the week I hope to get that down to a less violent and dangerous speed and height, and also try and start on Chops.

I also realised, a week or so ago, after reading Tom's blog on the neglection of simplicity, that, although my Mills' Mess and Windmill were almost getting there, I couldn't do a simple underarm throw with my left hand, thus stunting my development regarding Chops and a decent Mills' Mess. So, having spent several hours practising underarm throws, I think I'm getting there.

The conservatory window has feelings too...

This is true, as I found out last night whilst trying to teach my best friend some simple diabolo and juggling stuff. Paul was one of the original people to motivate me into learning to three ball cascade, but there, and a few columns tricks, is where his skills pretty much end. So, having overtaken him in the tricks department, I took it upon myself to drag him into my garden at 9:30 on a Friday night to teach him to diabolo. Within half an hour, he'd learnt some simple speeding-up techniques, Cat's Cradle, and some Magic Knot stuff, managed a completely accidental Whip Catch after watching me do it, had his first ever diabolo strop by throwing my sticks at my conservatory window, and trashed half the bushes in my garden. I then tried to teach him to ball pass, but that didn't go according to plan due to the lack of natural light and decent balls...
But last night left me with a sense of pride that I can actually inspire someone to become so enthusiastic about learning things. And trying to teach someone things that I've only recently learnt myself has let me look at them from a different angle, and I spotted some little things that I don't do that would probably help me to complete the tricks better and more easily.
So anyone reading this that would like to learn some simple circus tricks, let me know.

So, you take one ball...

Disclaimer: This blog is all the fault of Nathan Lawrence.
All complaints must be sent straight to him.

SO. The intended, and intended is the key word here, purpose of this blog, is to
a) Log my progress as a juggler/diabolist/general circus kid;
b) Try to find like-minded people;
c) Be just like any other juggler on the face of the planet, in being competitive, big headed and pretentious.

I suppose the start of a blog is already fulfilling point c).
But yes, I was inspired by my good friend Nathan 'Nay-FUN' Lawrence, in creating this blog, to attempt to motivate me and my friends in becoming better at the things we love to do, to boast about things I have learnt, and to share anything 'cool' and circus related that I happen to stumble across during my many hours on this computer.

Futhermore, I was going to have the URL the same as the title, as it is my Messenger name, Youtube name, and favourite doodle on my English Language notes, but Nathan got there first, for which I shall never forgive him.

A Brief History of my Circus Skills.
Brief being the appropriate word. I spent all of my Year 11 study leave last year teaching myself to three ball cascade, and since then it has snowballed. I now have a small catalogue of simple 3 ball tricks, as well as the ability to juggle three clubs, and successfully complete several quite easy but impressive tricks with a diabolo without losing limbs/eyes/friends. I went to the British Juggling Convention in March with a load of my circussy friends, and fell even more in love with anything and everything to do with circus skills, and have since spent too many hours juggling and too few actually working. But at least if I fail college I can run away to the circus.