Progress in the past six months

Like happens to most blogs, my enthusiasm for writing on this one faded after several months. It faded so much, in fact, that myself and my three (3!) readers have had absolutely no action happening on this page for more than six months. So here is a brief summary of my juggling life since then:

• Practiced with little bean-bag-like balls, which were really helpful for training 4 balls.
• Purchased 4 sil-x balls, plus one additional small orange-sized ball
• I visited the Katacomb in Berlin
• I attended the European Juggling Convention in Munich, where...
• I met other jugglers! This was really cool, as before summer 2010 the circus kids at Kalamazoo and the gang in Beijing were basically the only other jugglers that I knew, and aside from Federico, Gus, and a few select others,I was one of the more skilled jugglers I knew. EJC was great because it allowed me to see and meet other people who were better than me, which provided some great inspiration and motivation.
• I bought a 75mm acrylic for contact juggling and...
• I´ve begun to practice a little bit of contact juggling, mostly playing with isolations, but a tiny little bit of body rolling and stall point practice, as well.
• I am getting ever closer to achieving a five ball cascade. In a recent practice I was definitely in a beautiful state of "flow," achieving upwards of 20 catches before the pattern fell apart.
• I have decided that the five ball cascade will be the beginning and end of my career as a numbers juggler. I have decided that I will focus on three balls, highlighting how...
• My juggling has become more and more "dancy." This is influenced in great part by my specific physical background, but also because I took some breakdance, locking, and popping classes while I was in Beijing during 2010-2011. After a friend made a comment about it, I have decided to actively embrace this, trying to combine various body movements with three ball juggling.
• I´ve begun to think of myself as a "low-level Stephan Sing combined with a low level Komei." I obviously have a long ways to go, but I like both of these styles a lot, and I hope to grow to do something like that in the future.
• Box variations: I like the box pattern, and after a workshop at the EJC on variations, I have decided that this is a series of moves that I am interested in learning.
• I have also decided to save up money to potentially go to more juggling conventions in the future. Which ones and when I go will, of course, depend on available funds.
• As a way both to keep track of achievements and to motivate myself, I have started to train for and record some specific moves, with the goal of repeatedly breaking my personal records.

The Umbilical Brothers

Last night I spent some time at Federico's home and he showed me a show that the Umbilical Brothers did. It was a fantastic performance; one of the best shows that I have seen in a long time. The movement, the creation of the show, the personal dynamics, the acting and the physical and vocal skills showed by the performers were all excellent. I found a few clips of the show online, but if anyone has the chance to see the full thing I would highly recommend it. Not all of these clips are from the show that Federico showed me last night, but they are all great.

http://www.pinoy24videos.com/video/c36cc4a2e182ae9/The-Umbilical-Brothers-Dog-Tricks
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xokylxD78o0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xokylxD78o0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EHp4vr8yio&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImJMbexul5g&feature=related

A February juggling session

Since the Spring Festival break, which was great for my juggling, I have hardly practiced at all. However, last night at juggling club was great. Not only were there a good number of people there (including some cute girls), my practice felt pretty good. I had some good runs with my penguin catches, Gus showed me a fun and goofy looking variation on some basics (involving arm 'juggles,' 'circles' and 'pumps'), and my four ball fountain is coming along very nicely. It was great to juggle to good music again as well. I listened to a lot of Seeed and it felt great to juggle while and moving my body to the music. I tend to do a lot a little dance-like moves when I drop or when I am in between practicing moves, which adds what feels like a wonderful smoothness, playfulness and flow to my practice.

Juggling Practice

I am amazed at being able to see and feel progress over the course of just a few days. Amazing what practicing every day will do, huh? Especially today, my 5 ball cascade was feeling better. I am clearly still a long ways away from having it solid, but it feels really good to be able to see such progress. My 4 ball shower is coming along really nicely too, as I am regularly getting between 10 and 20 catches in a single run.

The cross hand machine that Gus showed me is improving too. I still can't get more than two or three really sloppy cycles in a row, but that is two or three more than I had a few weeks ago. It is a really fun move that looks really cool, so I am excited for getting that move clean and neat someday.

On the downside, by back tosses are pretty horrid at the moment, and I don't know why. Shoulder tosses are getting better though, so maybe with some more practice I can add that to the group of moves that I can comfortably do.

How I am going to use my vacation

I officially am off from work for just over a week for Spring Festival. I am not gonna be doing any traveling, so I am gonna try and spend some time every day juggling. Today went well, and it was my first time using the JuggleFit app for tracking progress in juggling moves, and I think that I will try to continue to use it. It makes for an easy and convenient way to keep track of how many tosses I am able to achieve with certain moves.

As far as specific moves, my 4-ball cascade is making good progress, and although my backcrosses weren't feeling so good today, I did some playing around and experimenting with a few little miscellaneous things. I starting working on rolling the ball on my left arm. I have been able to roll it along my right arm for ages, but it isn't a skill that I had practiced ambidextrously, so that will be a nice addition to my repertoire. The cross-arm-catch robot that Gus showed me (whom I believe he learned from Komei Aoki) is coming along nicely. During this week I want to keep working on those moves, as well as improving my claw.