If it's a bit quiet today that may be because everyone is at BBU 2013, Kinetic Fire 2013, Forchheim Juggling Convention, Ann Arbor Juggling Arts Festival, 3rd Annual Sturtevant Camp Juggling Festival, Bibasse, Schokon 3, ŻeLKa, 27e Nederlandse Acrobatiekfestival or Fiesta dei Folli.
Viewing all threads tagged #altern8, these threads relate to The Altern8 Juggling Club.
Simon & Kevin asked me to demonstrate the 5 ball start I learnt last week. Nice to know that something as simple as a foot lift can cause Simon to launch a ball across the hall. John, Sam & Laurence were doing a lot of feeding & did a better (or worse depending on your point of view) job of not taking out the skaters. Cat & Paul on the other hand were doing their best.
No TWJC next week because almost all of us will be at #bjc2013! Do any other UK clubs close for the BJC because there would be almost no one left? (I see York does).
#twjc
#dabhands does. #altern8 sometimes closes for Bungay.
At Altern8 on Monday, Chris brought in one of those "trainer" rola bolas - basically a skateboard deck with a cunning bit of elastic holding it onto the (bevelled) tube. I maintain that it was the bevel, and the inability of the tube and board to separate that caused my sudden uncontrolled floorwards exit. My hip has recovered now, and my elbow only has the slightest twinginess left. I should be okay for BJC. I should have known better (as Jim Diamond sang) than to go anywhere near any kind of rola bola anyway....
BJC is tantalisingly close isn't it!
My van is still in the garage, apparently the only thing stopping it passing its MOT now is a corroded brake pipe which they assure me will be sorted by tomorrow lunchtime - which just about gives me time to get it taxed by BJC.
It's cutting it a *little* fine!
# by Little Paul, 2013-04-04 17:35 BST Parent
I've got a backup tent, but that doesn't rhyme as pleasingly with "plan"
# by Little Paul, 2013-04-04 20:19 BST Parent
Having been promised "it'll be ready tomorrow mate" pretty much every day this week, were down to "having trouble bleeding the brakes as the bleed nipples are seized" If its not sorted by tomorrow lunchtime, I'll have it back off them stick it on the drive and go for plan b
And yes, I've got AA and J has RAC cover ... but it needs an mot before that's of any use.
Beginning to wish I'd never bought the bloody thing!
# by Little Paul, 2013-04-05 18:23 BST Parent
:(
Fingers crossed.
Does plan B involve J taking you in his car? Always good to have a back up man!
(yes I've been waiting most of the day to do that)
It may well do, but he may need to leave the spare quiche at home to fit me in.
Which would leave us without a backup flan
# by Little Paul, 2013-04-05 20:48 BST Parent
My Grandmother makes a great quiche. I'll see if I can bring her along as a back up Nan.
No backups required! I've got the van back from the garage! Yay! A quick trip to the post office on Monday morning, and I'll be all legal to drive up to BJC. Phew!
Unfortunately, the exhaust has now all but fallen off my Polo. I think it was jealous of all the attention the van has had this week.
Tomorrows adventure is "refactor the bed in the van" - I'm hoping the Mk2 version will have improved storage facilities and be easier to convert to/from the seating configuration. It'll be a stepping stone towards Mk3, but Mk3 involves a lot more work than I'll have time for before BJC...
Oh, and tonights adventure is to put the finishing touches to the siteswaphone. A siteswap validator (written entirely in asterisk dialplan logic) available on a public telephone number. Watch this space!
# by Little Paul, 2013-04-06 19:45 BST Parent
Yay!
I was going to ask if you were documenting the tranformation process but that would be a silly question.
Love the slide out bed/bench. Although I can't see anything that would hold the sliding section in place? In my experience vans vibrate while being driven!
Hmm. I don't appear to have documented the sink/cooker unit which I built about 2 weeks before Bristol. Might take some photos of that tomorrow before I dismantle bed Mk1.
Friction and the weight of the bits of chipboard on the top keep the sliding section in place while driving - unfortunately at the moment the chipboard isn't secured - and the second piece of that *does* slide around while driving and makes an awful bang when it falls off the bed.
I've taken to driving with it in bed mode to minimise sliding.
The biggest drawback of the pullout design at the moment is that you can't stand in the middle of it to pull it out because the sink unit is where you would be standing. This means you're trying to pull it out from one end, while keeping it parallel so the slats don't bind up. This is annoyingly awkward.
Mk2 will still have the pullout section, but it'll be much shorter, and the seating configuration will be C shaped rather than L shaped. The large slidey pieces of chipboard will be replaced by lift up squares of chipboard attached to the frame with hinges - apart from the bit needed to fill in the "C" which will function as a backrest for the new bit of seating.
This should solve the slidey chipboard problem, and the pull-out problem - although it does mean a bit of a cut and shut job on the cushions!
Then I can box in the frame, and have lovely secure storage boxes for luggage and toys!
# by Little Paul, 2013-04-06 21:49 BST Parent
The usual hall at #Hastings is being used as a homeless shelter over winter so we had the run of St John's Church instead. While waiting outside to get the keys sorted everyone spent time congratulating Rob & Laura on getting engaged earlier in the month. Well done guys. After the correct key was located I managed to not burst into flames as I entered the building which was a result. The first thing we all did was have a good explore around the place. I may not be a believer but I still find old churches to be fascinating & beautiful buildings. Naturally I took the opportunity to juggle 7 balls from the pulpit. Rob & Laura did some front to back passing while sitting in the pews. I had left my skates at home because I didn't want to do any damage to the place but apparently the pastor was all for unicycling down the aisle so Kev dutifully obliged. I also managed to pull off my first ever bird fly over the valley with the kendama which made me very happy.
Anyone remember the Belgian Tournai Convention in a church in 1991? Juggling, sleeping, strange multi-person cardboard box games at night ......
Juggling in, out, over, under through (?) the pulpit. No flames there either.
Churches have height.
Nope, don't remember it at all :(
What were the cardboard box games & why haven't we played them at Hastings?
Occasionally York Jugglers (#YorkJugglers) have to move in to the church when the church hall is being used by somebody more important. It is alledgedly the tallest church in York so it has plenty of ceiling height, but sadly the fixed pews limit the available floor space. Josh filmed part of the new Shreddie Crunch video in the church.
Selby Abbey was quite successfully used as a one-day juggling convention venue for Chocfest 14 (#Chocfest14) and Chocfest 15 (#Chocfest15).
# by York Jugglers, 2012-12-10 00:07 GMT Parent
From time to time the Monday night juggling in Bristol has had to move out of the church hall and in to the church (not sure how recently they've had to do this though - it's been a long time since I was a regular)
It always felt a bit "odd" as if we shouldn't be there, but it's a nice high space.
I guess I'm another one in the "non-believer, but I really like the buildings" camp. As well as the interesting architecture, I find churches to be nice places for a bit of a sit down and a think (which I suppose, is one of their chief design goals) - I'm also rather fond of the ceramics gallery in Bristol Museum as well for the same purpose - probably because it's not very interesting so no one ever visits it ;)
# by Little Paul, 2012-12-10 14:07 GMT Parent
I've been going to #altern8 for 8 years, and that's never happened in my time. You must have a long memory. :)
Well I've not been a regular since I moved house 7 years ago...
The usual excuse was always that the hall was occupied for a show/panto, perhaps they're just not putting on as many of those as they used to :)
# by Little Paul, 2012-12-10 17:21 GMT Parent
Oh, they still do that, they just don't offer us an alternative. We either go down the pub instead, or just don't bother. :) #lazyjuggler
The last time they moved us into the church was when they re-decorated the hall, and it took several weeks to do so they moved all the evening events. At a rough guess I think that was late 1990s.
# by Richard Loxley, 2012-12-11 14:00 GMT Parent
At #Altern8 on Monday, I misheard something that Richard said (though neither of us could afterwards work out what was actually said), which made me imagine a new product:
"Rubik's shoes", anyone?
Is it time for the obligatory xkcd reference?
http://xkcd.com/457/
# by Dave Cheetham, 2012-07-04 01:26 BST Parent
Maybe it was an anti-littering message - "Rubbish. Whose?"
# by Dave Cheetham, 2012-07-04 07:47 BST Parent
He was almost certainly talking about inexperienced marsupials.
"Noobish Roos"
# by Little Paul, 2012-07-04 08:12 BST Parent
Are you sure he wasn't talking about the colours in the photos of said marsupials - the "Roo pix hues".
# by Dave Cheetham, 2012-07-04 08:44 BST Parent
*groan*
# by Little Paul, 2012-07-04 10:42 BST Parent
All good... but none of you have addressed the idea of what the concept behind "Rubik's Shoes" might be.....
Come on, we could be onto a fortune here....
Platform type shoes with Rubik's cubes as the heels/soles ?
Shoes patterned with brightly coloured squares that move around ?
Boring lace ups as worn by Hungarian Professors ?
Last night was excellent at #TWJC as we were joined by a large contingent from #HCC which swelled our ranks considerably. As we will be imminently moving to a new hall & will need to offload a lot of our excess stuff (watch out for an inventory soon) it was commented that, "the vultures were circling".
Andy brought along a Jacob's Ladder & tasked us to hold one end then pull it up & catch it in a neat stack which was a nice kendamaesqe challenge. Andy said he has managed to pull it off once. I came pretty close. Simon managed it on his 3rd attempt. & his fifth. Andy was also bemusing people with the cork trick where you hold a cork in between your thumb & the knuckle of your index finger in each hand then have to pull them apart using the tips of your thumb & index fingers. I broke out a trick I learnt from a magician at a Christmas party when I was about 8 that has served me well for many years where you hold your hands palms together & hold a stick on top with your thumbs, then without letting go or crossing your arms you use a 'magic twist' to finish with your tumbs underneath the stick. I enjoyed taunting the otherwise highly coordinated jugglers who couldn't work it out.
Then Andy showed me another trick that worked on pretty much the same principle & I couldn't work it out.
We re-worked out the 4 club zap zap zip pattern that we picked up at BJC2012. Simon has discovered an interest in siteswaps & has even descended to the point where he pulled out a piece of paper with a load of numbers that he was working on. One was 654 [SIC] so there is hope for him yet.
Thank you Hastings for a great night, see you on Friday!
On Monday at #altern8 , I managed a couple of your tricks for the first time. http://www.kendama.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,24.msg3497.html#msg3497
Good to see people are still working on some of the patterns from the Zaps workshop I ran at BJC.
654 was actually the second pattern in that workshop (although I refrained from mentioning siteswap at the time to maintain interest from the oldies!)
James
# by jamesfrancis, 2012-05-03 14:58 BST Parent
I missed the workshop, but I did see a couple of people passing zap zap zip [or (4-1.5)p(4-1.5)p1] at BJC. Last week, as my finger's not been 100% (and so I wanted to avoid higher throws), Alex and I tried 552 as well as trying 55244 with the 4s as flips. That seemed much trickier, but then it was time to home.
Any other zap patterns worth trying other than 5 and 645? I think I tried 756 a few years ago. Might be time to try it again.
825 and 852 are both very doable
67525 and 75625 I would also recommend with 5 clubs
With 6 clubs 756, 75756 are the easiest.
When you have learnt those come back and I will find you some more!
# by jamesfrancis, 2012-05-04 00:08 BST Parent
For the causal enthusiasts...
825825
852852
6752567525
7562575625
756756
7575675756
#causals #passing
I had to double take when I read "casual enthusiast" there!
This may also be a test of posting from my (android) phone...
# by Mike Armstrong, 2012-05-05 20:26 BST Parent
Why are some of those lines going backwards?
I suspect I have not come across this notation method before....
The arrows represent causes of throws not throws. A cause being a prop hurtling toward that hand on a beat.
In 4 hand siteswap a 2 represents a zip/hand across/1 in vanilla siteswap. To do a zip the hand you will be zipping into needs to be empty, which means that you need to have thrown whatever it was holding the beat before hence the backwards arrow.
855 and 885 are also fun - splitting your attention between the heffs up there and the zaps down there can be challenging.
Yes both fun, but both very difficult and hence left off my original list. Incidentaly I find the 7 club pattern 885 easier than the 6 club 855.
If you can find a couple of good passers, 855 feeding 2 885's is excellent!
# by jamesfrancis, 2012-05-07 15:36 BST Parent
So, hows about a thread where people just chat and post replies often about their practice sessions?
To be honest, I just feel like talking about juggling more and want to chat about it, share and read other peoples experiences and everything all in the one place! I know you can create threads for bigger things and stuff, by why not have a topic based on random juggling discussion?
For example, and to start,
Today I spent quite a bit of time outside in the sun juggling, mainly practicing 5 balls and working on patterns to help out with 5 balls, 55550 55500 50505 5551 552 etc.
I feel like i'm progressing quite well as now once warm I can flash 5 about 8/10 attempts and have had runs of 8 balls a few times, with 6 and 7 feeling not much harder than 5 once warm.
With 4 balls I worked a fair bit on both sync and asyc 4 ball fountains, getting some of my longest runs yet! While also starting to try half showers, reverse fountains and pistons- which I had a nice run of too :).
I also spent a fair bit of time improvising with 3 balls, trying some clay motion juggling, behind back catches, low fast patterns including factory (which was pretty cool done really small), mills and shower. With a bit of time trying to improve my over the head juggling, backcrosses, 441 and 531 patterns.
Was a pretty long day of juggling but a great session all in all. There were a few frustrating moments, but mainly pure fun!
Dylan
I went to #Altern8 on Monday, played a little diabolo - mostly working on my slack and string-figure stuff.
Usual 5-club practice, managed to get my self-imposed target of "at least one run of 50+ catches per session" (68, since you ask).
Self-certified myself as kendama 3rd Dan again. (Training hard for 4th Dan exam this summer). Also ran the BKO advanced tricklist with 12 misses.
A usual day at the office for me. #actualjugglingtalk
Nice work on the 68 catch run with 5 clubs!
Do you always count your runs when you're working on 5 clubs or film and review them?
I generally count when trying something new or when I set myself a goal like yours and try to achieve it- though I find sometimes it can be distracting, sometimes helpful depending on the pattern.
I used to be right into diablo when I was young but never really got that great, it could be something I get into in the future though, but for now my spare time at home is for juggling =P.
I always count 5 club runs as I'm doing them. Some people seem to find that distracts them, but I've never had a problem with it.
I go in phases with counting catches. I can go for years not counting throws then decide it's a good idea and count everything. Then at some point decide that counting is getting in the way and swap back to not counting.
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-04 16:41 BST Parent
Not the void, but I've got into the habit of counting strongly enough that I tend to count almost everything that I'm learning. With things like 7 balls/5 clubs I sometimes have to concentrate not to count and distract myself. I don't think it makes things much harder for me anymore since I'm so used to it, but I do worry it might have an affect on my patterns - I only count throws from one hand and wonder if this is why some of my patterns tend to be a bit lopsided.
# by Brook Roberts, 2012-04-04 14:31 BST Parent
I'm also in the habit of counting. For me, it's anything with 5 or more objects. I generally count up to 10 then start again, only sometimes managing (or bothering) to keep track of the number of tens. Something that interested and amused me recently was the realisation that I'd starting counting in eights instead of tens. Took me a while to realise that's because I've been learning eight count based dancing stuff lately!
I count in 4s and 16s. That is, it goes One (two three four) Two (two three four) Three (two three four) Four (two three four) and then it repeats.
This is (I think) because I am a software developer.
It is completely ridiculous and I have no idea what the point is.
you mean you don't count just in hex or octal?
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-04 16:39 BST Parent
No and I don't start from zero either. Bad software developer!
You do count using unicode characters though... right?
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-05 14:32 BST Parent
I find it's pretty difficult to hold down the ALT key while juggling.
You don't have enough Ctrl of your pattern?
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-05 16:47 BST Parent
I tend to count in 8s as well for some poorly understood reason.
I think it probably goes back to when I was DJing all those years ago, and got used to thinking in terms of 2 bar phrases which repeat twice to make a 4 bar phrase - which seems to be how a lot of the dance music I was playing is structured.
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-04 16:39 BST Parent
I also count catches, but I don't know why. I always recommend to anyone who asks me to focus on making the pattern smooth rather than counting how long it lasts.
Often I will start off a pattern, start counting, then get halfway through & question why I am counting such awful out of time, out of place, over spun throws, then I will focus on straightening everything out, then I might start counting again, but I *always* restart counting from 3.
I actually did some juggling yesterday. Inspired by one of the IJA Tutorial Contest entries, I spent some time working on a trick I've tried a few times over the years and never made any progress with.
The tutorial I watched broke it down in a way I'd not thought of and it made a little more sense than it ever has before.
I'm not going to tell you what trick it was though, wouldn't want to give away any clues as to how my judging process is going ;-)
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-04 16:43 BST Parent
talking of the tutorial videos - I've decided to start deducting points for hipsters with stupid facial hair.
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-04 19:01 BST Parent
You're a funny one =P.
I just hope my facial hair style at the time wasn't 'hipster' =d.
That's awesome that one of the tutorials was able to help, there's some really good ones in there =].
I definitely see myself using a few at least throughout my juggling but will probably still watch other ones too. When learning something new I feel as though I always want at least two opinions on how to get started/learn it. I also sometimes like to read an explanation also.
Although if a tutorial is very clear and states exactly what to do I'd go back to that one and watch it a few times while learning.
Anyone else have a similar habbit for learning new patterns/tricks?
P.s. It hardly matters if judges give away stuff now, the submitting period is over so there's nothing we can do to change our tutorials now =P. But I guess it's funner it all being a secret until the very end!
Also this brings me to another questions, once the judging is over and the winners decided, would the judges (or at least some) explain how they decided on their top ten? I think it'd be fun to hear how everyone's done it and the differences between different peoples favourites and why- though I believe this will be in the eZine?
Anyway, that is all for now =].
Dylan
The judges have been asked to pick their top 10, and to make some comments about those 10 saying what they liked about them and why they picked them - so there will be some info around that. As you say, I expect that'll all be on the eZine.
I've voted now, but I'm still going to keep the details secret. Partly because it's more fun if it's a surprise, but partly because based on the reference number the voting site gave me last night - I'm the first judge to make it as far as voting, and I wouldn't want to influence the other judges at all!
# by Little Paul, 2012-04-05 08:14 BST Parent
Yeah I reckon it's better keeping it to yourself until the announcement =] surprises are awesome and I reckon everyone would prefer it like that =]. Was there a deadline for the judges or just in their own time?
It seems like a much better system this year though, much more fair than just peoples votes- which would basically be a popularity contest.
It's going to be fun to see how close the judge's top tens are too (although I guess they'll kinda stay anonymous) =P.
Even if you try not to just vote for your friends, there are too many tutorials for most people to watch anyway before voting, so I'm sure most people who voted last time didn't watch half of them anyway.
# by Brook Roberts, 2012-04-06 18:30 BST Parent
Subscribe to Small Talk via RSS 1 article per branch (updated every 24 hours) 1 article per post