going home

so, i've recently made the decision to leave Ringling and get myself back to San Antonio, TX that's where i'm from see... i told myself when first starting this job that i'd do it for a couple of years or so - i knew from the start this would be a chapter in my life and not a career. i feel the itch of wanting to go back, to change - maybe back, but definitely change. maybe it's the nature of just about all of us here. being circus folk IS to be nomadic. it seems everyone here has bounced around a couple of times before landing here. who KNOWS how many back stories most of these people have?!

to wanna pick up and go every couple of years or so. i have a friend, Josh, who, as we who know do know, seems to just be in a different place every time we look him up. josh'd be good circus folk.



it's been a great ride, it's been fun, but i'm excited to do laundry in a full sized machine and not have to wait for my 10 or so neighbors to do theirs during the days outside of a run when the machines aren't LOCKED! i'm excited to cut my yard, to check my mail, drive my truck (though, not to pay for gas) to walk my dog, to bbq on my grill, to sleep in my full sized bed, to enjoy a day off NOT on a moving train - to be able to go to concerts because we're always working during showtimes and in arenas. you get the idea :)

it can sound like griping, sure. i was talking to a friend this evening on the phone, talking about the not so greatest points of this greatest show. yes, there are pros and cons, just as there are ANywhere. moving train - cool. tiny room? good and bad - it's cozy, need little cleaning though it needs it more often. interesting neighbors? good and bad. muddy train yards? eh.... free travel? good.

it really comes down to whatever you make of it, and the same can be said of ANything really. as my good friend, Dave once said - it's about just deciding what kind of life you want to lead.
this has been a great chapter, and i regret nothing - there are stories FAR too numerous to tell in the moderately (at best) updated blog of mine. G rated on up kinda stories. hit me up at my house over a beer or back at Eddie's over some of those DELICIOUS lengua tacos, and i'll be glad to tell some of them.

speaking of flies, it seems we're dropping LIKE them.
i think we've got about 12-14 performers out with injuries right now.



Rollo is one of our star clowns, he's one half of "Pepe and Rollo" (from Spain and France respectively) and they play sort of the sidekicks of Chuck the ringmaster as he battles with Tom Daugherty our Star clown for control of the ringmaster hat and, subsequently, the show. He also does (DID) this awesome part of the show where he played "What a Wonderful World" on the trumpet while balancing on his HEAD!

anyway, Rollo's out with a bad knee and may not return.
we've got a cossack horse rider out with a busted leg something.

two inner tube ukranians out with a bad ankle and wrist.

i think a couple of from our Henan troop are out. one, in particular, Wong Long had a BAD turn of events recently.



for some reason - no accident as far as i know - he's lost his SIGHT!
it was slow going at first, but now he's just about completly blind.
this kid's great too, very charismatic, everyone loves him - everyone's friend - great performer great showman.
here in Denver he had some doctor visits scheduled - and now he's already gone back to China.
i think there was something pressing up against an optic nerve in his brain that caused all this. (information when there're so many people around, it's like a HUGE game of telephone, who can really tell sometime - water cooler news when you're in the circus and everyone speaks different languages )

i hope he's alright
hope not too many more people get hurt

less than great

we're pulling out of denver here in a bit.
we did TWO weeks here and it felt so LONG. it's weird when you're in a city for less then a week and then do two.
it doesn't seem like much, but take away the train run and load out and suddenly there's all this time on your hands!

we played the Denver coliseum which..... isn't the Greatest of places - there's also the Pepsi center which is more modern and where the Nuggets (NBA team) play.

we got the coliseum, which, it turns out, is a converted Airplane hanger! you can still see the curved ceiling - and it looks like they just plopped old seats along the sides.
there's no second level - the place looks like the have rodeos there - i guess they must since they have horse stalls in the back

which stink

there's not a lot of space either there so most of the dressing rooms where "Curtains and Poles" (it is what it sounds like) with the few available rooms reserved for the ringmaster and start performers and such.

we, the band, got curtains and poles.

we always seem to get placed next to the Flying Casacres (our trapeze troop) either them and/or the nursery.

now, that's always tough because 1) lots of loud crying kids 2) we have to watch our volume and language more than usual. not that we're especially BAD, but we're still smelly dude musicians types.

so, not that much space there - all of our dead boxes (empty road cases) had to go back in the barn/horse area in the DIRT. and most had good layers of dust today when we loaded out.

the worst thing - FLIES, SO MANY STINKING FLIES in this place!

nice part was there were a bunch of tables and chairs set up near our pie car - that's rare. bad part - that's where the flies were.

haircut

i think i'm due for a haircut.

and what that means around here, for me at least, is that i'll be making a visit to Xu Pin.
He offered to cut my hair one day and i took him up on it. it turned out great and i saved some money.


Xu Pin and his brother are the coaches for the Chinese Henan troupe. They do the final act of the show - This great Swinging Pole act where they're flying upside down across moving swinging poles. This isn't them here, but this is pretty much their act and those poles look exactly the same as our guys'. heck, it may BE our guys! in this video the acrobats are MASKED, but the routine's a little different - all the same - this is pretty much it.





Xu cuts all the hair for the 15 or so guys on the troop and he's also on the same casual labor crew with myself, Li Pan Pan (one of the acrobats), Vivian (Brazilian dancer) and, as of late, Wages.






my story here wouldn't be complete without mentioning these folks. Along with Eli, Jeff, and Buda (the sound guys) these are my load out and load in people. These are the folks i'm pushing boxes, driving forks, and loading trucks with till all hours of the morning in some cases. It's been a challenge working together when there're so many languages involved, but we make it work.

For the most part, the Chinese all at least know two phrases : "Good" and "No Good" which kinda comes out "gooduh" and "no gooduh" This is about the extent of Xu PIn's english vocab, though he also knows "Box" and "Finished" "bye bye" and our names. We've learned some work specific words like how to say "Pull" or "Push box" and "Water" and "Finished" as well as some not so appropriate words! Between all that and rudimentary sign language and the occasional drawing, the jobs get done, and even some jokes get told and news gets relayed.

Li Pan Pan is younger, 20, i think, as is Vivian who speaks Portuguese. They get a long well and joke around a lot - Li Pan knows more english phrases, which is the case for more of the younger members of the troupe and he seems to like Michael Jackson as he is constantly singing into his pretend mic and mimicking spins and moonwalks across the arena floor. Meanwhile, Vivian knows her own set of english and understands most of my spanish as i'm slowly picking up some of her portuguese -
so between us all, somehow, all the speakers and microphones make it from one city to the next, and i think we have fun doing it.

forklift

so, tonight at load out a forklift backed over my foot




it hurt


nothing was broken


it feels alright now, i guess, maybe my ankle hurts a little when i MOVE it





i'm gonna put some ice on it and see if it hurts in the morning, i figure it

just might


we'll see

we're on our way to salt lake city now.
i've never been there. this'll be a little longer of a train run at 700 ish miles (from stockton, CA)
we're scheduled to be spotted tuesday at 3 pm

veterans predict we're spotted around midnight

Northwest Train Run

i love the train runs. everyone does - if there's anything we can pretty much all agree on is that. people may have their grudges with the job, and, for the most part, they're legitimate : long hours, weird hours. small rooms, lots of shows, and grueling load outs at the end of each week.







but, once that train starts moving it seems as if all is forgiven. it's the best part of the job hands down. it's one of the first things people ask about and it's one of the first things i mention. there's nothing else really that can describe it, or, i can imagine, can match it. it's just one of those things that there is nothing else like.




of course i suppose there's a lot of those. nothing else is like eating oysters or bungee jumping right?







there have been some great runs and some okay runs. of course the longer they last, the better. a nice long 2 day run is great, but they're usually about a day. the shorter ones are a little less than a day, and everyone now and then we get a nice long 3 day one.





this one through Oregon and Washington was one of the prettier ones, and my first time in this part of the country. great hills and trees and lots of tunnels which are a favorite around here.



Bridges, tunnels , large views, loops and bodies of water.

all good things

going away

last night there was a going away party for pie car melissa. we're in everett, WA now, and she's originally from portland, OR. most people seem to leave around their hometowns if it works out that way.

so when someone leaves there's usually a big sha bang in their honor - birthdays and going aways.... those are the big parties, and one or the other is never too far away.

she mentioned last night that as she was saying goodbye to people it felt like she was getting out of prison.

i've heard that same comparison made a few times. though i suppose a lot of people refer to their jobs as prison, right? that's not too unusual. now, i've never been in prison, so i can't really speak for that demographic, but i suppose i could see how a couple of things Might be similar :

small confined room
close quarters
community showers
dirt and gravel for a front yard
prison looking school bus

of course, all that could be college too, so i don't know...

it can be a very, very Very monotonous life. if you let it be.
just to BE out here isn't very hard at all - granted that a couple of things like space and travel don't bug you. but if that's the case, there's not a whole lot you need to worry about. there're busses that pick you up outside your room on the hour to take you to your place of work's doorstep. the bus takes you to the grocery store and brings you right back, and there's even a pie car at the building and the train for food. and that's it. that's all you NEED really, and for a lot of folk that IS all they do - and it's worked for them for YEARS. mail comes to you at the building. you don't have to cut your yard or re-shingle your roof.

sometimes the hours aren't great. the worst stretch for techs must be a six pack then load out (ending at sun up Monday a lot of times) and an overland right from load out to a pre-rig that same night or crack of dawn Tuesday for load in Tuesday.

it can be rough

in any case - people usually seem to be both happy and envious of those who "get out"

low profile

we went to the mall and movies today. we being, stilts Dan, Fulk, Ketchup, and dancer Vivian. this is a big deal now - going to the mall. going to anything, really is an event. things like going to a movie, or a bowling alley. even if there's a convenient store within walking distance it's a big deal. most of our time here, transportation wise, is dependent on the bus to and from the arena, and city transit once we're there.

anyway, thats not the point. this sprint phone guy at a kiosk started trying to chat it up with us, while we were looking at a mall directory. he started off asking about where we worked, if we all worked together, where we were from. i guess we kinda get that a lot depending on who we're with. as much as we try to just blend in with normal people, something about a group of us walking around just sticks out, i guess.

so this guy's asking about us, and as i was nearest i guess it was up to me to respond. he was asking about where we worked or if we worked together, and i side stepped the answer a bit. we don't really like mentioning that we're in the circus. i've noticed more and more as i've been here that i'm reluctant to drop the "C" bomb early or at all in conversation.

not sure why that is.... not everybody likes the circus, clearly, and in some cases the mention of it can be met with downright hostility... but that's not always the case.

usually, when it comes up, people can't believe it, and they want to know more, and that's nice, but i guess it's that we just don't wanna talk about it. i've noticed that not too many of my posts are about the show, and i know why That is.

we play a LOT of shows.... i can't overstate this... sometimes, it's as little as 5 or 6 a week, but usually it's 8 - 11 and it's a 2 and a half hour show here. since january of this year we've done over 300 shows. it's roughly 400 shows a year .... of the EXACT SAME SHOW (excluding missed cues and the occasional mishap, of course) if there's anything ALL of us here on the show can agree on is that when there's not show, we'd rather not even think about it. the monotony of that one element (the main element, i suppose ) is the thing that we all try and avoid. so, we go out, see this, do that. the train runs are fun and different. the market runs are at least to different stores....but the show stays exactly the same every .... single..... time...

and, this can be a little maddening after a while, and so i find myself doing things and enjoying other non-show things for NO other reason than they're simply NOT the show.

one day i was on a slow moving train riding through the western desert at 3 in the morning standing out in the vestibule with people named cricket and checkers. we were watching Dan, the stilt walker from Brazil, spit fire out of the vestibule window. in the moments after that, i saw the person named checkers run a prophylactic through her nasal passages, and subsequently out of her mouth. then there are days like today, where you simply wake up early for a split show day (mid-day or morning show and the usual 7:30) and gather some food to take to the building (whatever arena we're in). you go to a crowded bus that takes you off to perform a show that you've performed over 250 times in the past 6 months.

Old New york stuff

i ran across this while browsing on Youtube. Back in March when we played Madison Square Garden, they had this big fancy party thing at some MSG ballroom. For most of us, it was a chance for free food, free drink, and , at best, a decent DJ (there wasn't one).

But people got all fancied up, and that's always fun to see. So, i guess this thing called the
Barry Z show was there the whole time interviewing the big shots while we stuffed our faces.

Here we have Nicole Feld being interviewed by this "Z" guy. Nicole is the daughter of Kenneth Feld who owns Ringling as well as all of the Disney On Ice shows. He wears really nice pants.

Then he interviews Tom Daugherty who is the star clown here on the 138th edition. He is the foil to Chuck Wagner 's ringmaster. Tom graduated from Clown College back in the day and his name is known throughout the clown world. Chuck had various roles on Broadway - he's got a great voice and a huge personality. Both these guys have made quite a name for themselves outside of this tour and they carry the show well.

so check out the video i guess ...




i don't much about that Barry Z guy, but he scares me ... especially his hair.

hot

it's just plain HOT out here in the west. i guess that should go without saying when one realizes that it's all DESERT out here., but i mean HOT. in two weeks out here - mostly, Phoenix and Las Vegas - the lowest high was 106 or 105 i think. and the highest was 112!! that's hot!! i don't care if it's "dry" or not.

stupid

we just finished a string of really great cities - Colorado Springs and Las Vegas and are now in Phoenix.
Colorado Springs was great! the highlight of which was THE best train yard on the tour (from what i'm told) There was a park there, with GRASS and a playground, and a pool, tennis courts, and a basketball court. Right on the other side of the park was a beautiful college campus. In fact, one of the days there a bunch of our south americans played a game of futbol with some kids from the college on their soccer field. These type of opportunities don't come around often at ALL out here in train life. our world is navigated mostly by foot or by cab. A few folks have bikes and a few folks have their cars out here and they drive instead of taking the train runs, which, if i haven't made it clear enough, are THE best part of being out here .



So, anyway. the yard was amazing. We ad some great cook outs at the park. i got to play basketball, which i hadn't done in almost a YEAR, and during one of our cookouts Fulkerson brought out his new set of 4 congas, a djembe, some agogo bells, and claves and a few of us just had some fun as "Normal" folk were passing by.

That was the other unusual thing : there were just a bunch of locals, just normal locals walking around our train yard/their park. A train yard is traditionally a pretty isolated place - and in most cases it's a downright undesirable place to be. If we get some greenery, some flat space for a grill, and a little mart or convenience store that's within walking distance then it's gonna be a good week. but sometimes, it's really rocky and uneven right off the track, and in bad cases it's an isolated, not-so-great neighborhood where ya gotta watch here you walk.

then, there was Vegas. Vegas was cool. i'm glad of all my vices, (which aren't many, but ARE beloved) gambling isn't one of them. i lost $15 bucks at the slots and that was about all the gambling i had an appetite for apparently. i Did stay up all night and see the sun rise over Treasure Island though, and there's plenty of places to go exploring so it was never boring and i got to see my second ever Cirque de Soleil show, O, and that was pretty ok.



the strip was so much to take in. just lights, and lights and lights. and the place never slowed down. now, i've been to new york, and i gotta say las vegas really DOESN"T ever sleep! and when you're in these casinos it's difficult to tell what time of day it is, what with the tinted windows, and no clocks, and dizzying floor plans and WAY too many mirrors EVERYWHERE!!! I'd never SEEN so many mirrors!! and, of course since there were so many ... it looked like there were THAT MANY MORE !

we played at the Orleans Arena located conveniently at The Orleans Hotel & Casino. Michael Bolton was also playing there in the hotel's other theatre at the same time as we were. I didn't see Mr. B, but i didn't meet the girl who played trombone in his band, and his drummer as well - i guess that was cool. albeit, they were the GREATEST trombone player and drummer, respectively, on Earth. THOSE people's services have already been retained by the good people here at Ringling, of course.

Crowds were great the whole week - being in the same place to a hotel brought a lot of tourist of course, and being in a city with a lot of entertainers living IN it was a factor too. I heard the phrase "Vegas is Ringling's graveyard" apparently, a lot of ex-ringling people end up with stationary jobs here in vegas on some show. Eli (our greatest sound guy on Earth) is friends with the sound guy on Cirque's Ka show, and i believe that guy used to be circus on the Red show ...

so, i it was nice to play for other entertainers - the show can get so monotonous that it's cool to know there's an audience who's more aware of what's going into what we do than the average bear. not that we don't perform well for the general public, but performers know that performers tend to put a little bit more "paprika on the shish kabob" for other performers, if ya know what i mean!

so, some pretty exciting news from Clown Alley.
every tour, apparently, they design and produce and sell a Clown Alley t-shirt. Some resident clown with the steadiest hand will draw a design for the shirt, and they rattle it off and sell it to the rest of us , for a little buck and it's tradition.

now, i didn't get last tour's shirt for a few reasons: i came mid-tour so 1) they were all out of my size, and 2) it didn't really feel like my tour anyway, and 3) i didn't think that design was all that great. I ended up getting a left over XL freebie by the end of the tour, that i have YET to wear, but it's a keepsake, of course.

so, the point of all this
is that the new Clown Alley
t-shirt came out recently,
and i snagged some up
since they're so COOL

John, whose clown name is Squeak, designed the shirt. John is a first year clown here at Ringling come to us from Minnesota. He's got a knack for visual art and did a comic style design here where each of the Alley members are depicted as an appropriate super hero. Ketchup, for example, is Wolverine. Cuchi (real name Henry who is from Peru, and lives two doors down from me) is depicted as Zorro. There's also Luigi and his wife, Sylvia as Mr. Fantastic and the Fantastic woman. John drew himself as Spider-Man which i presume is his favorite. It's really a nice looking shirt and on the back is a handy dandy legend so you can match up your favorite clown to his/her super version.

and, of course, the blue rings on the sleeve and neck make it so stylish

ketchup & boo boo

"ketchup" & "boo boo" are the nicknames of two clowns here on the show, and good friends of me and my neighbor, John Fulkerson - resident Greatest Trombone Player on Earth.


Their real names, of course, are NOT "ketchup" and "boo boo." They are Akosh and Gabor, respectively, and are just two normal twenty-something guys who also happen to be clowns. We still CALL them boo boo and ketchup though, i rarely hear anyone call them by their real names except each other. their real names are Hungarian, because that is where they are from, Hungary.

now, boo boo has been here since november of 2003, i believe, and ketchup started his life as a ringling clown in december of 2006. their story is a lot like performers from other troupes in that they knew each other back home, trained together, and,though not in boo boo and ketchups case, performed together. they learned and studied their circus skills together at the Hungarian State Circus Academy.


i didn't even know there were circus schools until i got here ... i mean, i it makes sense and all, i wouldn't think there WEREN'T circus schools ... that sort of thing just didn't occur to me back in the "normal" world. here, we've got from left to right: ketchup, boo boo, sandor (pronounced SHAWN-dor who also went to the school with boo boo and ketchup) and ben, who's from america. (which, one finds out is just kinda bland after a while out here ... American's, that is.)

these 4 guys do an old school muscleman routine for pre-show. all they need are some handlebar mustaches and dumbbells that say ACME and it'd be complete.

they're just regular guys though, that's the thing about everyone out here - sure, there's a couple of eccentric people, but most are just people doing a job .... that happens to be in a circus. boo boo is really interested in hand balancing and practices that and his hat tossing and catching it on his head all the time. he also loves music and has started taking piano lessons from me. we meet on sundays in between shows and he's got some skittles already.

now, ketchup is more of the party guy. he's the guy yelling down the hallways, with his sideways speech. he'll just knock on your door and stick a cup in front of your face when he's ready to socialize and it's hard to ignore a ketchup when one's in the room. and, true to his clown nature, he's ALWAYS laughing. this guy just loves life, good food, and good friends. i recently flew home to visit my girlfriend, and he gave me ten bucks for the cab ride to the airport... "just in case." well, as fate would have it, i would've been about 10 bucks short! he's a good guy, and we both thank you, kecthup!
his background is mostly in russian bar where he was a catcher.

here's ketchup performing with his old troupe in 2006

on the first and every other trick, ketchup is the one facing the woman.

as you can see, it takes quite a bit of strength to do this. and, as you can see, ketchup's a bulldog. he's basically a hungarian wrecking ball who also happens to be a clown. now he's never one to pick a fight, but he's a good buddy to have walking back home to a train yard from downtown at 3 in the morning, i'll tell ya that much.

so, that's ketchup and boo boo. two of my neighbors, and two of my friends.

getting through a six-pack

so, a few cities ago during a six pack - that's 3 shows on saturday and 3 on sunday - me and Mullen, the greatest saxophone player on Earth, made a video.

see, a six pack can be a mind numbing monotonous experience - or it can be done before you knew what happened . either way it involves being at the arena from 9 ish in the morning until 10, 11 ish at night.

it's mostly mentally hard, just psyching yourself up for each show, trying to put fresh energy and attention into something that by now, we've done, EASILY over TWO HUNDRED times! this year.

on a sidenote - we had an absolutely HORRIBLE 1st show the other saturday .... i think - (after a while they kind of all run together) or maybe it was the 2nd show of the day, can't quite remember now .... anyway, the point IS that is was HORRID.

we, the band were all Over the place, people looked tired and dis engaged. the clowns looked ragged and bored. star clown at a slow pace. animals missing tricks. motorcycles not working - awkward transitions as a result of ... my point is, to all those at that show or any like it ... we're SORRY, we do this DAY in and DAY out, and although we're usually pretty good about showin' up for the big dance with our A-Game each and every time .... sometimes.... it just ain't in the cards ... it's not you , it's us.

ANYWAY

in between shows we get about an hour or so off in which people eat ... practice .... nap ... internet ... music ... tetris.

all of these are favorites of we blue unit band members - except for the Practice one. (that was a little joke, see? :)


Mullen likes to play around on GarageBand a lot - he really gets into it collecting jam packs with different instruments and whatnot. so we're there sitting, eating and he's going through this new pack of Orchestra Samples and plays this Orchestra Hit sound ... you know, like M.C. Hammer used to overuse back in the day or one that accompanies the sudden scare "Boo" in a horror flick.



well, Obviously and ACTUALLY, this would LITERALLY get my attention and make Mullen and I roll over laughing and do this video . . . and get me asking why "Da Hammer" didn't cross over into horror movies.




In the film Mullen is pretending to look for me to tell me i'm late for the show and should hurry here Mullen plays this Great "spooky movie, low cello" sample that worked out really well.- i dismiss him at first, (or ... pretend to, really - i'm not REALLY talking on the phone with anybody) but then the sudden jolt of realizing what's going on HITS, i mean .... it just hit me - exhausting, really. :/ Mullen did the narrating, camera work, AND sound effect all himself, and i'd just like to take this chance to say what i great job i think he did. Great Job, there Mullen!

it's somewhere around 2 in the morning, i think.... i am in philadelphia. (i JUST checked my dvd copy of the Movie philadelphia starring tom hanks and denzel washington to check my spelling of the city's name) i just got to my room from load out. since i've been here i've tried to make it a point NOT to call my room "home" when referring to it. i didn't just get HOME, i got back to my ROOM. but, earlier i told a friend i'd call ... "after i got home." i find recently more and more THAT'S what i say.
we are connected back up (the train had been spotted/parked in two "cuts" for this yard) are are awaiting rolling on. this is one of the most exciting times of our week - a train run.

anyway, i'm sitting here ..... right now....
on a train

i live on a train. this is where i live. a train is what i live on.




my room, my things, my self and my soap .... are on .... a ...... train.

living is a thing that i do ...
and i'm doing that thing on .... a train. on a circus train.

this is real. i am in the circus and i live on a train . there's a clown 2 doors down! that is a true thing

that tom hanks movie , that we discussed earlier, .....

is on this train here .... with me ..... where i'm ... doing my living



me.

i live ...

LIVE




on a train

pie

birthdays here on the circus are a fun event - there's a tradition, i've found out, for the clowns to "pie" you on your birthday. as you might imagine, when it's your birthday it's in all of your friends and co-workers best interest for you to get pied. so, of course, they're all in cahoots with the clowns.
now, if your hush hush about it, then it can lie under the radar, but that's difficult because the Clowns have spies and people on the payroll that you may not even KNOW about.
and since everyone knows about it, of course they're on guard so it's quite an occasion when it gets off successfully.


it was right after a show, i think on a 3 show day, and right as i came off of the bandstand Amber (prop, now lights) walks right up to me and strikes up some convo. This was new, but i stood there, and i slowly realized that she wasn't talking about ANYthing. a change in the wind, a quick glance, but too late. Right from behind, Squeak the Clown pied me. He pied me good, he pied me hard. good thing i had glasses on.




most times, if it done right, it's a complete surprise, i, at least, realized what was going on a split second before. not poor Wages. Cricket the Clown got right as we lured him out of the dressing room. As his bandmates, it's our responsibility to ensure a public pie.

touring 101

i'm constantly amazed at how this show runs. i'm speaking specifically about loading in and loading out. setting up and tearing down all of our things, putting it on the train and moving to the next town to do it all over again.. to come in on opening day and see the whole thing set up is easy to take for granted. we finish our last show for a city on a sunday night around 10:00 and sound check in the next town is usually around 2:00 pm on that very wednesday.



now, load out usually takes anywhere from 6 to 10 hours depending on how easy or hard the building is to get out of. (where the loading docks are and how many there are is usually the biggest factor) so a load out will finish in the wee small hours of a monday morning, then we drag ourselves back to the train for a much earned shower and sleep and a wonderful train run. load in will be in that tuesday starting in the morning - around 6 or 7 and last into the night.






now, there's a small crew that doesn't do the train run, but instead do what's called an "overland" which just means that they go by bus to the next city, ahead of the train. (we realize that both train AND bus do indeed go OVER land, but that's just what we call it, so there)

the purpose of this is to do what's known as Pre-Rig. department heads and whoever signs up to help or is needed (i'm not entirely sure the exact personnel, i think it rotates week to week...) all go on the overland for pre-rig which leaves right after load out.





6 am - finish load out
9:15 - bus from New York to Philadelphia (where i'm at now)
3:00 pm - pre-rig in Philly.

so, essentially, anyone crew member doing an overland is almost working/up for 2 days straight just about every week! :/
that's a little nuts - they are put up in hotels (since the train isn't there) and i think, they're given a meal allowance.

still - crazy.

finally get some sleep on monday night, get up to load in for usually 12 or more hours on tuesday.

simply nuts

itchy

the odd thing about living on a train is that, from time to time, it moves. it's a mobile home in all senses of the word. even more so than what we're used to knowing as mobile homes. i've actually lived in mobile home a couple of times in my life - interesting times, great stories, but it Didn't move, not once.

now, the interesting thing about living on a train for an extended period of time is that, if it Doesn't move, it feels .... well..... weird.

we played East Rutherford, NJ, then NYC, and today we're loading into East Rutherford ... again. The train has been spotted in Seacaucus, NJ which is a 10 minute amtrak ride into NYC and a 15 minute bus ride from our engagement in East Rutherford.


so, we've had no reason to move for the past 3 weeks or so, and we're going to be moving until this upcoming Sunday night/Monday morning.

now, if a train doesn't move, then it's just like any other place that people live in and doesn't move - and really, considering the sizes of our quarters and general change in living conditions, the MOVING is the coolest thing aBOUT this place.

no train runs apparently manifest itself in humdrum, agitated, weary circus folk.
guess i've gotten used to to those weekly rides and wonderful sleep. maybe i could suggest that just once a week in those cities where we play this long - they could just take us out for a quick lap ... you know, just so we can keep our heads on straight.

New York City

so, now we're here in NYC and it's a pretty exciting thing to be playing in Madison Square Garden. we just loaded in today and despite the rain and a little cold - i'm pretty pumped. this looks to be a hectic schedule and there'll be all eyes on us because NY is our biggest market for the tour.

the Times is supposed to reviews us, and from what i'm told, that's a big barometer for how the rest of the tour will go.
a crazy piece of trivia, is that, as of the middle of March we've already done ONE HUNDRED shows !! that's crazy to think, but it's true. so, the difficulty now is that the show is starting to run on auto - speaking for myself i suppose and no one else, but i imagine it might be similar for others. the show is definately running more smoothly now, and people are hitting their cues right on - and it's that exciting part of a production where the show kind of starts to become what it's going to become.

all these things are great, but it's part of the job to make the repitition sound fresh i suppose. i'm excited about the city - gotta see some broadway shows and i'd like to go to the Met. the empire of course, but i've noticed that the statue isn't that high up on my wish list - i suppose if there's time sure ... we'll see - either way i'm sure it'll involve as little sleep as possible.

birthday continued

after recouping from the Super Karaoke madness we drove up the mountain. the air was crisp, our spirits were high, our bellies were full and the windows were down.

check out the christmas trees! ->









John and Kevin took us up these two trails, Lost Cove Cliff and Harper Creek Falls. Now, they're both from here and these, we're told, are the best trails taking into account time available and the hiking comfort of the group.



firmly confident that our day will be a good one, and that our guides are trustworthy and knowledgable of the mountain- we press ahead

now, i forget which trail we took first, but i do know that the first one wasn't as steep as the second one. it was a relatively easy walk - don't get me wrong, we were breathing heavier than is usual and were definately sweating, but it was a good - you feel your whole body working, kinda way.

after treking up the narrow, leaf covered, slightly moist, sometimes tree root riddled path, we got to our first great view.
there was this waterfall and we came out from our trail at the top of it where we enjoyed a relaxing moment.

we all laid on our bags with a shirt covering our faces and just breathed in the scene.
after going back down, we went back the other trail which was significantly steeper to climb though the payoff was great at the end.

halfway-ish up this beast was an apple orchard albeit dead for the season, it was a nice break spot seeing as we were pretty out of breath by then. But, of course a steep climb means a great view and that's nothing less than what we got!

Sure, the walk was rough and slippery in places. Sure, there were times when we wanted to turn back, thought we could climb no more. True, I had doubts that my legs would last, but it was that faith in our comrades and knowing that no one is going to admit outloud that THEY'RE tired that kept us pushing forward. And, in the end we were on top of the world!