Last Day at 3 County Fair

It went by quickly it did. I am talking about this past 4 days. Five days ago we were in NC and now we are about to leave MA. We will be in KY in a couple of days to visit Princess Cynthia at school. Her teacher has asked that we perform for their class. So we need to be there on Thursday morning.

I have been working a bit with Belle and she is really coming along as a future star in The Kent Family Magic Circus Show.

We had our share of fans (or stalkers as we call them) at this fair too. The two little Princesses are hanging out here with a new friend or fan or both.

Adam and Elaine Burch are multi-generational circus. We shared the midway with them. I snapped a couple of pictures during their last show from the top of the bleachers at our stage.

The family takes a break during clean up to take in some grub. They were all packed up by sunset. We will pull out late morning or near lunch time to slowly work our way to KY.

It was a perfect day weather wise and in every other way. Eddie and I spent time in bible discussions. Victor and Jim worked on new routines. Miles cleaned the trailer out for loading. Mami and Sayako prepared meals. I took Titus for a walk around the fair and midway. A Carny gave Titus a stuffed toy.

Since our shows were back to back with the other acts we had to run fast sets so it got challenging sometimes getting everybody's routines in. Still we pulled BIG crowds and the bosses were happy. Word is we will be back in 2011.

A couple of people have asked about our general health. Eddie is just over Bronchitis and is doing fabulously. I have had a number of small spasms in my back but what else is new? Jim's toe is on the mend. he will loose the toe nail. Everyone else is great.

God Bless and Good night.

Beautiful Day in Northhampton....162nd show done.

It was a much nicer day today. Cloudy and comfortable....a bit nippy by nightfall.

We were presented this article by an audience member who came back to the fair after seeing our show yesterday to give it to us. She wanted us to have it. According to her we were the only picture of anything at the fair that made the paper. (We beat out rides, tigers and pig races not to mention the motor events in the grandstands. )

It was so nice that a person would come all the way back to the fair just to give us the article.

Another family (we refer to them in our loving way as stalkers) who had no intention of coming back day after day but did just to see our show. Their son loves our show and has become pretty good with the diabolo he bought from Jim.

I have been working with training Belle for next season. She is getting better and better. We work backstage and on stage in between shows. When we do it in between shows on stage we draw a crowd.

She IS cute.

Miles spreads Monkey love.

Jim and Victor Jr are working on a new routine. Not sure when it will be ready but they are working on it.

There are some really well made up and costumed clowns here. They are the Shriner's clowns. Very well done in make up and costume...they even have a clown car. Now I haven't seen their show (if they have one) but they stroll around the fair out of character but in costume. Their gait is that of your average middle aged man and they chit chat, complain, etc in normal voice and pretty much ignore the crowd much of the time I see them. Lots of circus rules regarding in public in costume in character. Odd. Imagine if you would, two average shaped, size, and build middle aged men walking and chit chatting. Now put clown costumes on them and you have these clowns. I bring it up because it has become a big topic among our group and we have overheard it among customers. One of them was in the audience watching the show and I gave them a shout out. When I said, "It's hug a clown day" he waved the kids off. I asked if they (the clowns) give hugs and he said no. In fact, while there he seemed to shun any kid that came near him. Strange.

Where is Alf...click on the picture to get a larger version.

Today we had very good sized audiences. They were good responders too.

Talking about the crowds I met a nice lady with a little toddler named Duncan. She and I chit chatted about the show and things lead to home school, politics, etc as topics. It was interesting how quietly and out of the way people have to be if they want to talk about things like that if they are conservatives. Being conservative in this town seems like an underground movement, scorned by the populous. Same for Christianity. It's a topic that is whispered. I did notice two churches on my way to the store this morning and the parking lots were empty. However, there was a good sized yoga class going on in a park square.

During the first show I explained that Princess Sayako was taking the place of Princess Cynthia because Cynthia went off to college after getting a 4.75 GPA and a full ride as a result. I then made a comment how Home schooling really does produce smart kids. Well, there were two families who were not sitting anywhere near each other) who got up and left in disgust. Their kids didn't want to go but the parents dragged them off. (I have enough experience to know when a person leaves the audience the general reason for the departure based on their actions and body language. ) Later I found out that around here Home School is misunderstood and scorned...considered a bad thing.

When I got back from the store this morning and pulled into the hotel parking lot I noticed a college aged girl dress kind hippy-grunge, just lying in the middle of the parking lot. At first I thought it was a pile of rags then a head looked up. As I got out our eyes met so I asked, "Warm place to lay down?" She responded, "Oh, I didn't realize this was a parking lot (then she looked around and said) I guess it is."

Just then here sister or friend came out of the hotel and said, "Lilly why are you lying in the middle of the parking lot." I didn't wait to hear the answer.

We had more b-day fun for Olivia. We took a tub of ice cream put candles in it (they looked like little itty bitty ice cream cones) and sang Happy birthday day again.

As Mami cleaned up and got herself ready to head back to the hotel after the shows Eddie, Jim, Nick, Miles and Amelia were out in front of the banners talking and doing silly dances while a bluegrass sounding group played on the nearby music stage. It turned out to be pretty funny as we all created our own new dance steps. My only regret is we didn't video tape it.

Hard to believe we will have done 165 shows by this time tomorrow and we get a few days off. We are all looking forward to it.

Blessings to you all.

Dorris, our 21lb Flemish giant bunny died today. She lived very long for her breed, nearly 2 full years more than average. She played the role of Victor Jr in Boy to Bunny. She has not been performing for the last 2 weeks since we've noticed her legs failing to work (first sign of the end coming). Deloris, her understudy, will continue in her place.

A couple of Forgotten items:

First: My search for a good east cost donut (doughnut) may be over. While getting one at the store yesterday I mumbled something about there being no descent east coast donuts. I was over heard by a woman who, without looking at me, said, "Atkins Farms". They have a booth at the fair and they had donuts there. Alas they were cake donuts not doughnuts or raised donuts. But the man there said they did in fact have raised donuts at their farm and the farm is only 15 minutes away. We will try it one of these mornings.
Second: I forgot to mention something about the soda fountain in NC. (see the NC blog) The old woman who worked there was kind enough, but as I mentioned, she made everything from powders and mixes. Stopping every few seconds to check the instructions written on cards that were taped to the plastic sneeze guard around the soda fountain. After making our smoothies...pouring the premade mix into ice then using a blender to crush and mix the ice and mix, she asked, "How's that smoothie?" Her tone and body language was kind of proud, like she had made it from scratch. I only mention this because the whole scene keeps popping up in my head and I find myself laughing.
Update: Jim's toe is pretty ugly to look at but there is no infection and he is doing well, even doing the stilt walking and ladder stunts.

Photos from Princess Sayako

Jim strutting his stuff proving he is bigger than Sayako

My ugly kids.

Sayako meets Buttercup

Me

Study time

Once friends...now food.

Comparing ducks.

Practicing a new routine. We did this a lot and have added a bunch of new stuff.

OK, so he IS my son.

Titus feels Alpalca wool.

It is Maine.







The Wallnedas

Victor wants to be like Jim.

Sayako is in the show now.

Too much shampoo in th Jacuzzi tub.

Belle in travel postion.

Half day off ....for the kids...not for me ...sniff!

Stud?

Aplle Jacks in NC

Walking Belle...Manly!

Practices even in the pool. (NC)

Hippie to conservative in one hair cut.

Do you know the way to MA from NC?

Pigs in MA.

Tiger Show in MA

Day 2- Big Crowds-Boys Blow It- Rain

OK it rained today. Not a lot. But at the wrong time....right in the middle of our last show. We only had to cut a couple of things since most was done already. And to top it off the water caused a short in one of our power lines tripping the cfgi and we lost sound for a few minutes. Ugh. A shame too because there were a couple of hundred in the crowd. But we did get a cool rainbow out of it.

Belle sniffs around the stew pot trying to find anything that dropped.

Stew and biscuits for dinner. It's nice to have Mami along.

Getting ready for the triple volcano fire blow.

The blow.

Today started of kind of frustratingly for me. The boys decided that RV life wasn't for them, I guess, and showed up at the hotel. In SK and in NY we would have the 2 or 3 that stayed at the RV walk over to the hotel for Bfast and showers. But in those cases we either supplied our own Bfasts or we had suites or a couple of rooms so their coming was fine. But this gig we have one room and are at the legal and ethical limit of the number of people we can have in the room.

So the boys coming to have hotel supplied bfast and showers would be like stealing. So it was arranged before we left the night before that the four guys (Jim, Miles, Ed and Nick) would shower and eat at the RV. There was food. And the RV had a full hookup. Nick was the only one who showered at the Fair. The rest didn't and all four showed up for b-fast. Not good. Their arrival meant I had to take them back and so my morning schedule was fried. But to assure more comfort for them I drove them to the store and got fresh towels and their own choices for bfast food. By then I had to rush back and get the rest of the family to get them to the fair as well. I was pretty angry and later laid in to Jim verbally pretty hard. I lost my temper with his answers. The air was heavy and eggshells were walked on by all until later in the day.

Time lightened the atmosphere and all was good.

Shifting the subject a bit: we have seen very fedw churches in this town. The fair folks tell me Sunday will be the busiest day. That is odd as it is the slowest at most fairs. But, and this is our own thought, since people won't be at church why not the fair, right? In NC there was a church on every corner. Here there are a couple of Museum like cathedrals but we haven't seen a single regular church. Nor are any church groups at the fair. That is a first for us to experience. The lack of churches does seem to explain a few things for us, though. I will leave that there.

Huricane Neal skirted the states but it brought light rain here and there. Out here it was during our last show. We had a huge crowd and as the sprinkles turned to showers most of the crowd fled under whatever cover was nearby. Still about 60 stuck around and we finished the show. During the heavier rain a power cord caused the cgfi to blow and in the end we traced it to one of the cords leading to a speaker. We changed it out after the show.

I invite you all to visit my facebook page: Victor Kent as we have a ton of pictures from Cousin Sayako's camera that show life on the road.

Made it to MA! Three more shows done! Some on NC.

Here is a photo Mrs Cole of NC sent to us of Princess Sayako doing Cynthia's sword Suspension.

After doing the show in NC we got a short night sleep and hopped in the RV and Van and started a trek that would take nearly 17 hours and cover 8 states. It would, for the most part be a pretty uneventful trip except that it was Olivia's Birthday, she turned five and 25 miles from our final destination we would hit a dramatic traffic jam.

Olivia would not want on her bday. We had a cake and presents and phone calls came in from Cynthia and her grand parents. It would, in fact, roll into today too. First, let me tell you about the cake. In an earlier blog I mentioned I bought a cake the day before her bday in NC. We would finally get to eat it in what Uncle Eddie would call, "a Chinese Fire drill cake eating party". Since we were on a cross country 850+ miles drive with little time to spare we stopped at a rest stop in NY, jumped out of the vehicles and (finding a picnic table) sang "happy birthday", took pictures, and cut the cake. Then we all took our pieces of cake and jumped into our cars and took off. The whole affair took less than 10 minutes. Olivia thought it was fun. It is definitely a story to remember.

I had bought her presents a few days earlier when we were in ME. She wanted a Zoozoo pet with a Mohawk. That is what she got...in fact, she got two. She gave one to her brother. (She noticed it had a tiny flaw in the hair and so it was not worthy and Victor got it.)

We were less than 30 minutes from Norhthampton, MA when hwy 91 became snarled in a pretty bad traffic jam. A really big accident had North bound lanes completely blocked. I used my smart phone to find an alternate route and off we got. If we had waited it would have taken over an hour to go through the detour the troopers had set up. We got out and around and ended up on a back road the cars from the detour would be also redirected to. So we were bumper to bumper for another 45 minutes until we were dumped back onto 91 just past the crash. We were so glad to see the hotel when we got there past 11pm. As some of you know Titus doesn't handle stopped traffic or stop lights well. He whined and cried so we entertained him with silly songs like "Great Green Gobs", "On Top of Spaghetti", etc. Even Sayako in here broken English joined in. It was loads of fun.

Here is our set up at the 3 County Fair. We will run the banner line a little longer tomorrow. It was humid and we were all tired to run the whole line today. Hurricane Earl (turned out to fizzle in comparison to the news warnings) did provide much humidity for us up here. The cloud cover kept the sun from making it unbearable.

Where is Alf here in Asheville at the New Life Community Church?

Uncle Eddie and Miles belt it out as they sing Happy Birthday.

Olivia's Cake. Turns out she only likes icing. Like me she doesn't care for cake much. But she was very grateful . Tonight at the hotel she had chocolate ice cream and was VERY grateful

Jim poses with a couple who watched our show and had good things to say about it.

OK...what is Golombki?.....

.....Cabbage rolls!

Across from us are racing pigs and the Adams' Tigers. They and their cats are nice.

There is one more note I have to make. I dropped the boys off early at the fair and left the girls and Titus at the hotel to get more rest. Then I ran around town familiarizing myself and picking up supplies. I found my bank, the grocer,the Wal-mart and the liquor store. It was when had finished running around I got a panicked call from Miles that James had whacked his big toe with the sledge hammer and was in bad sorts. James took the phone and eased my worries by telling me that though he totally ripped his toe nail off and smashed the skin up a bit his bone was fine and he didn't need medical help. The fair manager took him to the first aide station who bandaged him up but he didn't need the emergency room. I have been warning the boys about setting and loading while wearing flip-flops. Well, today the warning became a rule.....no flip flops. Steal toed boots might be a good idea too. In spite of the injury Jim did the shows and did stilt walking.

Northhapton, like most of MA, is a blue state area. It is liberal and there is a big homosexual presence. It was obvious by the rainbow flags and the people the moment we got into town. It is also a college town. Outside the town is rural and a bit of ag. So in many ways this place is similar to New Paltz, NY where we performed last year. As many of you know I use humor in the show and just what kind of humor (political, edgy, slap stick-ish, etc) is decided after I have had a chance to get to know the people and do a couple of "test" shows. Well, the crowd is very responsive but they take jokes about being Democrats coldly. However, jokes about Republicans are welcomes heartily. So no more of that. They don't seem mind "gay" humor, probably since I am from California. All other jokes are fine.

People drive kike maniacs here. And they will wait for a close to the store parking place a long long time to avoid parking way away from the store. The Wal-mart parking lot is tiny and the store is really strangely laid out. Even though the parking lot is less that a 1/4 of a football field in depth a lady actually waited (blinker on) the entire time I was in the store to get a parking place close to the front of the store. I parked way out 25 yards from the front of the store, near the street, where few cars were, and was in and out before she found her spot.

All three shows went well and more than 20 people came and saw all three shows...that makes them offically stalkers. A good term with us, unless I have a lawyer next to me.

Oh, another note. The pig race announcer sounds exactly like Joe Peski. So when he is talking it sounds like "My cousin Vinny" across the midway.

Early Report

Since we will be doing an evening program and then turning in as soon as we get back to the hotel since we are taking off for New England again at 5am I will give a brief report of the day.
Today was supposed to be a half day off. But I think in my heart I knew that wasn't going to happen. An Innocent walk with the dog lead to a series of fortunate events. First I found a dog groomer right across the street and Belle needed a bath and touch up grooming bad. So there she went for an hour. I also found a barber next to that so I sent up an appointment at 2 for Nick and Miles. I also found a bakery next to that and got apple jack (a pastry) and some fudge cookies for the kids. I also found a great cake for Olivia who turns five tomorrow.
Turned out the hotel hasn't washing machines so Eddie and I drove down to the next town (A Mayberryish place) and did five loads of Laundry. While waiting I found another barber and got my haircut there. The place reminded me of the place I got my haircut when I was a boy in the 70s. Same faded wall panelling too. The barbers were very nice and very country. I got the history of the area and small talk about Cali and other stuff.
Before the barber, however, we found a drug store with a soda fountain. My disappointment was the soda fountain is a modern thing. It was sterile plastic. There was even a really high sneeze guard and the seats were just a tad too low for the counter. All the "fountain" offers weren't from scratch but from mixes and powders. So our peach smoothie was a a syrup added to ice in a blender. It tasted fine but it was phony.
On the drive back we stopped by a very modern grocery store which seemed out of place in the hills. It was big and fancy. The clerk, however, was good and old fashion. Her name was Granny and she could talk the ear off a wooden Indian. She had stories and opinions about everything and when I tried to get a word in edgewise I failed... she was a champion in gab.
Our show tonight will be a Christian Outreach in type and will be at New Life Christian Church in Asheville.