i wonder why people always have to blame someone else when they cause a problem. example: i got the following note on the windshield of my car the other day:

Thanks! due to your idiot parking skills, i needed a can opener to get in my car – you left less than 6″ room between cars.

when i parked, i parked dead in the center of the parking space, with plenty of room on either side. there was a car on the driver’s side, which i parked with enough room for the driver (me) to exit normally, without squeezing. on the other side, there was nobody. no car was parked on the passenger side of my car when i parked. when i returned. the car that was parked on the driver’s side of my car was still there, and there was a car parked on the passenger’s side of my car, which had not been there when i parked, but was parked dead in the center of the parking space, with plenty of room to open the doors, so i’ve got to assume that the note was left by someone who parked crooked in the passenger’s side space and couldn’t get out, and they blamed me for their parking job.

why they decided to blame me is beyond my ability to figure out, but it’s a good thing they left before i got back, because if i had seen who wrote the note, i probably would have given them something to complain about… like a key down the side of their car, or a nice big door dent… 8/

via , posted this rant in …

Sermon for August 25, 2005
‘Listen up, you Christo-Fascist bullies’

——————————————————————————–
You Apostles Of Perpetual Psychosis — It’s High Time Somebody Called You Out.

…

Listen up,… every last one of you Apostles of Perpetual Psychosis — it’s time that you were called out.

The time is long past due the rest of us ceased our cowering and stood up to you Christo-fascists bullies. The hour has come round that we look you straight in your bulging, true believer eyes, and told you that we’ve had it with your smugness, with your blood-drenched crusades, with your victim mentality — and with the madness begot by this cracked-brain belief system of yours, which all began (according to your sacred delusions) more than two thousand years ago, when, at the behest of a wicked cabal, a mob of mammon-worshipping, blood-lusting rabble went on a cosmic killing-spree and murdered your god.

First off, let’s get one thing straight: No one ever killed anyone’s god (not Jews, nor Romans, nor Geeks playing Dungeons and Dragons) — Although it’s time somebody nailed you, you collection of conflated failures at Christian martyrdom, to a metaphysical cross of reality.

It’s high time someone told you outright that you must be suffering from holy water on the brain, if you think we can’t see you for what you are: a klavern of counterfeit prophets waxing psychotic for other cretinous hypocrites. Also, you can cease playing the persecuted party, whenever someone stands up to you — because we’re no longer buying that ploy. Remember, you’re the ones who threw the first, epitaphic stones. It was you who labeled us a mob of Hell-bound, Satan-pimping sodomist … Although — as much fun as that sounds — I must ask you, where do you get the unmitigated gall to make such insane claims? When did the golden light of the sun abandon its position in the eastern horizon and begin rising, each morning, from out of your silly, neo-Iron Age asses?

And tell me this, you medievalist simps, you delusional, retrograde dip-shits — how is it possible that you became privy to such timeless truths — that the mind of the “One True God” is available to you, and that God’s words and wishes resonate through yawning millennia to be understood only by you — and you alone?

Looking back on the rise of you Christo-fascist bastards, I’m mortified as to how it came to be socially and politically acceptable for you to bandy such vicious and demented assertions in the public arena, without them meeting with the derision they deserve … And don’t bother going into one of your pat victim-swoons over being called on it, because when you go so far as to claim that you alone have been bestowed with the secrets of boundless creation — and that anyone who chooses not to buy into your version of events will be condemned to the torments of eternal damnation — then you can bet your fatuous asses that your asinine assertions will be ridiculed. What in the blue blazes did you expect, for us simply to fall to our collective knees before you?

Yet, I fear that’s exactly what you expect from us.

Could I suggest an alternative idea? Would you simply let the rest of us be? Would it be possible for you to keep your life-defying delusions to yourself — keep them within the airless confines of your bigotry-riddled churches and the cramped quarters of your own minds?

If that’s the way you choose to spend the passing hours of this finite life, it’s fine by me. But when you start your habitual proselytizing, then you should be prepared to be told that a great many of us think your cosmological conceptions are a steaming pile of behemoth dung.

And, while we’re on the subject, for the longest time, I’ve been wanting to tell you this: If Jesus died for my pathetic sins — then he flat-out overreacted.

What makes this situation all the more unsettling is you believe these creepy, death-enamored myths are literally true. Instead, I suggest you try the following: Rather than attempting to commune with Jesus, the Virgin Mary, the Holy Ghost (or Casper the Friendly Ghost) or the Lucky Charms Leprechaun — why don’t you attempt to channel the departed spirits of Voltaire or H.L. Mencken? There will be no otherworldly conjuring (or con jobs) required to perform this miracle: simply go to the public library and check out their books.

Once there, you might want to stop by the science section, as well, where you could happen upon a few delusion-decimating tidbits such as the following: While your bible tells you that the earth is a shade over seven thousand years old, the actual figure is (approximately) 4.6 billion years. How do you account for the slight discrepancy of say … 4,599,993,000 years? And that number is derived when calculated against the approximated age of the earth — not that of the universe, which is estimated to be between ten to twenty billion years old. You can do the math on that one, all you reality-challenged Children of the Lord.

And those aren’t the only things in your bible that just don’t add up. In your Book of Joshua (10:13) it is stated that God commanded the sun to stand still in the sky … Really now? Pardon me … but how is it possible that this omniscient god of yours, who you believe created the earth and heavens, all by his divine lonesome, didn’t realize the simple fact that the sun doesn’t revolve around the earth?

Furthermore, he was apparently ignorant of numerous smaller details as well, such as, wherein Matthew (13: 32) he identified mustard seeds as “[…] the smallest of seeds.” How can it be that the creator of the universe could have had such an embarrassing lapse of basic knowledge on the subject of botany?

And what about the many other lapses in logic (flights of fantasy that are insane by any standard, with the exception of the sublime logic found in the idiom of cartoons) such as the one about the fellow who survived, for three days and three nights, in the stomach of a monstrous fish (Jonah 1:17) — and what was up with that wacky, talking donkey in Numbers (22:28)? We’re in Looney Tunes territory now, all you highly suggestible Idiots of God. Plus, in a cartoon universe, such as the one described in the Book of Exodus, why didn’t The All-Mighty, instead of leveling plagues and pestilence upon the guilty and innocent alike in Egypt, simply, drop an ACME anvil down from heaven on the head of Pharaoh and been done with it?

Which brings up the subject of the deplorable cruelty of your deity of choice. Ergo, isn’t this a lovely, little passage from Deuteronomy (32:23-25)? “I will spend mine arrows upon them … The sword without, and terror within, shall destroy both the young man and the virgin, the suckling also with the man of gray hairs.”

Then there is this lovely bit of divinely inspired baby killing and faith-based rape from Isaiah (13:9,15-18): “Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger … Every one that is found shall be thrust through … Their children also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes… and their wives ravished. Behold, I will stir up the Medes against them…. [T]hey shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb; their eye shall not spare children.”

Worse, your striving to make these pathological ravings manifest have resulted in tragic consequences. As is the case with your current, genocidal adventure in Iraq, where you believed the vengeful ghosts of the Crusades could be dispatched, dissolved in the beatific light flaring from the bombs that your holy (armchair) warrior, Commander and Chief ordered dropped from Kabul to Bagdad … In your madness, you believed you could make the citadels of the New Jerusalem manifest in Mesopotamia. Upon every bomb detonation, you were certain that the heathen hordes cowered before your righteous fury, that ghost and demon would flee back to Hell, and the wicked would trembled before your sacred fury. Now, of course, that all worked out just like you saw it in your head beforehand — didn’t it?

As we speak, your Armies of the Lord (who more closely reassemble a collection of economic conscripts) wince and stumble, blinded by blown blood and squalls of searing sand … The desert wind taunts you true believers; your visions of conquest evaporate, as the pitiless sun glares down upon the folly of yet another legion of hubristic Crusaders, who came to free the heathen hordes from their brutish ignorance — by way of relieving them of the confusing burden of their untapped wealth.

Of course, the only small recompense you ask from these monumental ingrates is unfettered access to their oil. And the only reason for that is: a purpose as exalted as yours requires a great amount of energy to sustain its radiant glory; such a selfless enterprise of holiness demands a few rewards for the long suffering Christian martyrs on the home front — because American’s God-kissed flocks of pious consumers must be permitted to sit, in perpetuity, high above the roadways of the land, serene within their over-sized pick-up trucks, SUVs, and RVs — their junk food-bloated countenances must never be darkened by want, doubt, nor self-reproach.

In accordance with this self-referential lunacy, you sermonized that Satan’s earthly emissaries, such as Hugo Chávez, should be righteously slaughtered — because he and his ilk scheme to deprive American drivers of their God-given right to the oil, which, inconveniently, happens to be located beneath lands belonging to inconsequential people. Those brown-skin, oil hoarding wretches, down in Venezuela and their false idol-clutching counterparts in Iraq, Iran, and Syria, must be taught that God, seated upon his golden throne, scorns the sight of their iniquitous ways. The Kingdom of the Lord stands before us, you proclaim … If we listen closely, we can hear the voice of God above as he counts his money. Furthermore, the era of George W. Bush has brought a new revelation: If America’s plutocratic class had even more blood money — then the Baby Jesus would smile.

The Reverend Pat Robertson, Mary Fowler — and every last one of you Apostles of Perpetual Psychosis — listen up. Given the self-evident fact that your beliefs bring little relief to your own troubled souls and have, on the whole, served to engender tragedy worldwide, don’t you think it’s time you gave it a rest for while. In other words, this is a polite way of suggesting to you that you shut your pie-in-the-sky hole and take stock of the things you’re saying — because your utterances are becoming sicker and sadder, by the hour.

If not, you could, at least, in the words, of Tom Waits, “Come down off the cross — we can use the wood.”

by Phil Rockstroh, a self-described auto-didactic, gasbag monologist, is a poet, lyricist, and philosopher bard, exiled to the island of Manhattan. He may be contacted at: [email protected].

and

Posted 8/22/2005 11:01 PM Updated 8/23/2005 1:46 PM
By Gene Puskar, AP

Pat Robertson calls for assassination of Hugo Chavez
VIRGINIA BEACH (AP) — Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson suggested on-air that American operatives assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to stop his country from becoming “a launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism.” ‘We have the ability to take him (Chavez) out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability,’ Robertson said.

“We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability,” Robertson said Monday on the Christian Broadcast Network’s The 700 Club.

“We don’t need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator,” he continued. “It’s a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with.”

Chavez has emerged as one of the most outspoken critics of President Bush, accusing the United States of conspiring to topple his government and possibly backing plots to assassinate him. U.S. officials have called the accusations ridiculous.

“You know, I don’t know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it,” Robertson said. “It’s a whole lot cheaper than starting a war … and I don’t think any oil shipments will stop.”

Robertson, 75, founder of the Christian Coalition of America and a former presidential candidate, accused the United States of failing to act when Chavez was briefly overthrown in 2002.

Electronic pages and a message to a Robertson spokeswoman were not immediately returned Monday evening.

Venezuela is the fifth largest oil exporter and a major supplier of oil to the United States. The CIA estimates that U.S. markets absorb almost 59% of Venezuela’s total exports.

Venezuela’s government has demanded in the past that the United States crack down on Cuban and Venezuelan “terrorists” in Florida who they say are conspiring against Chavez.

Robertson has made controversial statements in the past. In October 2003, he suggested that the State Department be blown up with a nuclear device. He has also said that feminism encourages women to “kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.”

robert (bob) moog died yesterday… 8/

so i called the "free" counselling service, but after waiting on hold for a half an hour to speak to a receptionist to make an appointment with someone who is supposedly going to recommend that i see this "free" counsellor, i had to go back to work, so i never got ahywhere. i called the person who recommended this service to me, a friend of moe’s who said it was "an honour" to help me, but she’s on vacation until 11 september, so it doesn’t look like i’m going to get anywhere for a while. i suppose it would be easier if i didn’t have to have a job, but the people who have control over my life say that i’m not eligible to recieve disability benefits because of my work and how much i earn… which makes no sense whatsoever, because i originally applied for disability benefits last december, before i got my job, and i was unemployed for nine months before that, and i’ve only had sporadic employment since my injury… but these people, who don’t know me, are in charge of my life, and they say it is so, so it must be so. it’s a good thing i’m not as depressed as i was a couple of weeks ago, because if i were, there’s a good chance that i’d be suicidal by now.

part of the reason i’d probably be suicidal is because of the fact that there’s still no solution in sight concerning my lack of workshop space. moe and i had a "discussion" about it earlier in the week, but what it came down to was that moe wants me to be looking for something more like a shed than a workshop. she suggested a 10×10 foot metal shed with a ceiling that slopes from 8 feet to 6 feet, with no floor, insulation or electricity, which would be almost useless, and when it wasn’t completely useless it would be a major annoyance. we got into a fight because she couldn’t understand why it would be almost completely useless as a workshop, and i was unable to say why it would be because of the fact that, for some reason probably having to do with my injury, i can’t express myself in the way that i used to. before my injury, i’m sure i would have had plenty of explanations for her, but now all i can do is gesture, make unintelligible noises and cry… and mostly the crying is because i know what i want to say, but i am unable to find the words to say it. all i can say is that something is going to have to happen soon, otherwise i am definitely headed for another bout of extreme depression, for which there is no solution in sight.

i managed to make it through one whole week without writing any complaints about majid and his computer idiocy, but that’s primarily because of the fact that his computer idiocy has been limited to his personal computers, and not the ones that i have to use. there’s a pretty good chance that he’s got the sober virus, or something like it, on at least two of his personal computers, but that’s probably because he hasn’t run virus scans on them since before i started working for him. i’m holding my breath, waiting for his virus to latch onto my windoesn’t machine, at which point i’m going to demand a 300% pay raise to do computer and network troubleshooting for him as well as typesetting.

also, it’s been another week of nothing but spam, and that in copious quantities. it’s a "good thing" the government passed the CAN-SPAM act last year… my spam quotient has risen by almost 50%, i hate to think what it would be like if CAN-SPAM hadn’t passed… 8/

this one is the skin of Ebeneezer Squeezer, The Holy Snake…

testing the ability to create new avatars

i wonder how i ever managed to get into the rehab center when i did… if i were trying to get in as an inpatient now, i’d be out of luck. i called them today at the recommendation of the doctor who treated me when i was an inpatient, 2 years ago. after being transferred four times, each by a person who said something along the lines of "we can’t help you at this number, but let me transfer you to a number where there are people who can help you", essentially what it comes down to is that if i don’t have any insurance, they can’t help me… so, my options at this point are 1) forget about counselling and deal with the depression as best i can on my own, or 2) accept counselling from the people who provide it for free as a service to the "down-and-out", winos, drug addicts, derilicts and other ne’er-do-wells. i’m sure the second option is full of well meaning people who will very likely help me somewhat, but i can’t help thinking that i’d get much better counselling, and much better treatment in general if i had insurance…

one step closer to normalcy… i now have an ethernet hub installed, which means that i now have a network: i can share information on one machine and access it from another machine. i also have internet access from all machines. this may sound ordinary, but it’s not. i’m still surrounded by boxes, i don’t have all of the shelves installed, i don’t have a workshop space set up, i don’t even know where i’m going to put my workshop, i still hate my job, don’t get paid enough and i have no insurance(!!)

so i’ve got internet access from all of my computers… whoopee… 8/

well, i’m still going to search out some kind of treatment for what might be PTSD, but things are a lot better today… today majid got the very clear and definite message that indesign, whether for windows or mac, is probably not going to be the best decision for our shop, and i didn’t even have to do anything. first, it turns out that both the black and white laser printer slash copier, and the colour laser printer slash copier, both of which are machines that cost multiple thousands of dollars to replace, are old enough that the manufacturers don’t make drivers for either windows XP, or mac osX, and have no plans to make them in the future… second, for some unknown reason – but apparently confirmed by adobe tech support – indesign CS2 wants documents that you are working on to be local, and not on the network… if it’s on the network, something bad happens to indesign, and it shuts itself off with no warning… precipitously… to be specific, it crashes, and not very gracefully. previous versions of indesign apparently don’t do that (i’ve tried it with indesign CS and 1.5 on both mac and windows and have had no problems opening documents over the network), and all of the documents that we work on are on the network… and quark works over the network with no problems… i REALLY wanted to say "i told you so" to majid, but i somehow kept my mouth shut… he was fuming… he spent 4 hours on the phone with tech support and he just bought the software, so now is definitely the time to find major flaws in it… hee hee…

also, i went over to gunnar’s today after work, and he got me really stoned, so i’m feeling a lot better than i have for a while…

i’ve been feeling REALLY depressed recently. it seems as though my life is getting exponentially more difficult on a daily basis, and i simply don’t have the energy to keep up any longer. i live in a tiny house that only has enough space for me to unpack about a quarter of the stuff that i currently own, and the rest of it, and most of moe’s stuff as well, is stacked around me in boxes, in the bedroom, in the dining room, in the living room, in what passes for my office (which was supposed to be my workshop as well, but there isn’t enough room), and in both of our unheated, uninsulated sheds outside. in one of the sheds – the more waterproof of the two, but that’s not saying much – i have three or four stacks of boxes that contain books and papers and suchlike, and my drill press and band saw (along with a bunch of other stuff), and i’m afraid that if i don’t move them to a less damp environment pretty soon (thank god for the relatively dry weather we’ve been having so far), they’re going to be a growing mass of mold and rust by the time i finally get around to doing anything about it.

and the reason i live in a house that is not big enough is that i was unemployed for 9 months immediatly prior to my moving here, and then when it was settled that we were going to move here, i got a job, so now i have to work 9 hours a day, plus at least an hour and a half commute each way (and that’s if moe gets off work on time, which she frequently doesn’t), and when i get home i’m SO EXHAUSTED that i barely have enough energy to take a shower, much less do the myriad of other things that have to be done, like mowing the lawn, or unpacking boxes, or dealing with incense orders…

then there’s the fear that i’m soon going to be living in a place that could very easily turn into one of those places… you know, the ones that have boxes of moldy books, and piles of dirty dishes, and dirty laundry, and animal filth everywhere, and nobody who cares enough to do anything about it, and you wonder how it is that people can actually live that way…

then there’s my job itself… to say that i hate my job is a simple, but understated way of putting it. specifically, i hate that my bosses have so much control over me and what i do for 9 hours a day, five days a week, and yet they know practically nothing about the nuts and bolts of the business they are in. i hate the fact that when i get frustrated, i have even more difficulty than usual in talking, when it’s essential that i be able to communicate clearly and effectively, especially when i get frustrated. i hate that i have an easier time showing people something than i do telling them about it, especially when those people are my bosses, and they have very little time to be shown things that don’t really concern them anyway. i hate that i am the only native english speaker in the shop (greg doesn’t count, because, although he was born in the united states, he’s black and from new orleans, so he might as well be a non-english speaker), and even when i am not frustrated, simply saying something is frequently a challenge. i could go on for days…

i have my computers sort of set up, but i can only use one of them at a time, because i haven’t had the energy, time or space to attach them to the ethernet hub that i bought last weekend. i have to make an invoice for dr. howard for the business cards i made for him four months ago, but i can’t, because that’s on the other computer. i have an incense order that’s been sitting on top of a stack of boxes, half filled, for a month and a half, and there’s no telling when i’m going to get around to ordering the rest of the incense so that i can fill it. i’ve got to take out the trash and the recycling – AGAIN – for all the good it’s going to do. i eat lunch because i get a lunch break, but i have not eaten breakfast or dinner for a long time (a month and a half?), because there’s no food, and even if there was, i’d have to cook it before i could eat, and then i’d have to clean up afterwards, and i just don’t have enough energy to commit to doing that. i’ve got to take a shower (for some reason, after my injury, my sweat stinks even more than it used to). and somewhere in there i’ve got to get enough sleep to make it through another day just like it tomorrow… which NEVER happens…

utter exhaustion…

really, i’ve had a rough week with majid and his PC/indesign fantasies, which are getting more unrealistic and more idiotically single-minded as time goes on – apparently his friend mike, who owns a minuteman press in downtown seattle, said that he made the decision to go with PC and indesign two years ago, when indesign was first released, and hasn’t regretted it… but he’s not a designer or a typographer, he’s a business owner, and there’s a good bet that if you asked his designer(s), you’d get an entirely different response… and it is my guess that he would experience less overall chaos if he made the decision to go with any platform and application combination and stuck with it for any length of time – but that still doesn’t mean that he’s getting things done the most efficiently, or the right way. alhthough he hasn’t fired me yet, i’m officially looking for a new job, because he probably will eventually, and if he doesn’t i’m going to walk out on him as soon as i can… 8/

my right arm has been more than ordinarily tired, to the point where i actually have to look at it before i can get it to do anything… like typing… this has already taken about twice as long as it would have ordinarily, because of misspellings and backspacing and extra spaces and suchlike… it looks like more acupuncture is in my future. my next appointment is next saturday, just before chris goes to bali for his honeymoon… i’m hoping he’ll pick me up a pair of gongs while he’s there.

and that’s not to mention the cirque performances, which are going extremely well, although it looks like tonight will be the last night we ever perform in seattle, because the mayor has decided to raise the rates for our safety permits from $800 for six nights to $866 per night (which we can’t afford)… hell we’re lucky to make $800 in six nights… so the probability that we’re going to start performing on the road has just increased exponentially.

now i have to go and get some "stuff" which will make my continued survival more bearable, and an ethernet hub, so that i can have all of my computers online, rather than the lame one-at-a-time feature that i’ve currently got… and then i’ve got another cirque performance which will get out around 1:00 am, whereupon i’ve got to go home and sleep so that i can get up and get ready for work at 5:30… oy! 8/

yet another review of the cirque de flambé show… now this is more like it… although it’s not as good a review if you’re not in the band, but i’m in the band, so this is an excellent review…

Friday, August 5, 2005

Flambe’s latest gig passes silliness torch

By Misha Berson

Seattle Times theater critic

Cirque de Flambe’s “In the Shadow of the Giant” will be at Magnuson Park from today through Sunday, featuring a variety of flaming and incendiary devices.

Uh-oh. The goony clown’s pants are on fire.

And — whoopsie-daisy — the fabulous Mademoiselle Mimi’s tres petite dog Fifi didn’t quite make it through that flaming hoop intact. She’s just a furry little pile of ash now.

All this can mean only one thing: The circus is back in town. Or, more specifically, Cirque de Flambe, the Fremont-based pyromaniac troupe, is at it again in Magnuson Park.

If you’ve never been to a Cirque de Flambe show, here are the basics of their latest blazing pratfalls show, “In the Shadow of the Giant.”

There is a ringmaster/authority figure clomping around the parking lot/playing area on stilts, whom the rest of the anarchic characters love to hate.

There is an enthusiastic live band (the rather grandly named Fremont Philharmonic), which specializes in deranged oompah and snake-charmer music. There is a large contingent of brave and blasé firemongers, The Flaming Fromaggios, who do a lot of juggling and other fiery shticks.

And, as the ringmaster emphasizes, the audience must “suffer the little clowns, because they know not what they do” — wisecracking, firecracking clowns, whose express purpose in life is to burn things up and be annoying.

If this sounds an awful lot like previous Cirque de Flambe productions, it’s no misfire. (Hey, they’re not trying to reinvent the Roman candle in every show.)

The experience is, as ever, funky, silly and funny — if your idea of fun is watching a Tin Man-style robot get attacked with blazing bazookas.

Some bits are cool, some get boring. Many are stupid beyond belief. But every now and then there is a truly dazzling act in the cheerfully ragged and strangely lovable extravaganza.

Such as? Take the double-Dutch rope-jumping bit. How do they jump around those fiery strands of rope without getting scorched? And though it goes on forever, the flaming-hips routine, with flaring hula hoops, is quite impressive.

Kids in the audience are reminded more than once not to try this sort of stuff at home.

And there’s a safety crew on hand at all times, in case a fiery stunt gets carried too far.

Sitting on bring-your-own chairs or blankets, however, you won’t find much cause for worry. Just remember to dress warmly (the breeze off Lake Washington was very chilly the night I attended). Pack your own snacks along with the comfy seating. And don’t forget to bring the kids — anybody’s kids.

Children just lap up Cirque de Flambe. Think about it: It’s like their wildest dream come true. A whole bunch of people playing with matches (as well as lighters, dynamite, cherry bombs and other incendiary devices) — and getting away with it.

another review of the cirque performance from the weekly (weakly?), from someone who is not as critical as joe adcock, but i personally feel that joe’s review was better… oh well…

Fire?
Shadow has a little spark.

by Lynn Jacobson

Seattle’s friendly band of firebugs, Cirque de Flambé, is back with a 90-minute revue of pyrotechnical circus acts performed in a lakeside parking lot in Magnuson Park. Directed by Burning Man vet Maque DaVis, In the Shadow of the Giant (ends Sun., Aug. 7; 206-770-7602) is framed as a sort of showdown between a tyrannical ringmaster and his mischievous clowns.

Aside from a few tasteless bimbo jokes, the show is perfect for school-aged kids on summer vacation. First, there’s the thrill of staying up late (it starts at 9:30 p.m.); then, the excitement of periodic explosions, flaming jump ropes, and fire leaping out of performers’ mouths. And what kid wouldn’t love to see two clowns running around with sparks shooting out of their butts?

Children are also more likely than adults to forgive the show’s amateurish aspects: numerous dropped props, in expert physical humor, and clunkily ad-libbed lines. According to Cirque’s Web site (www.cirquedeflambe.com), it’s an all-volunteer circus, and, to be blunt, it shows. Many of the cast members are no doubt graduates of Cirque’s Fremont-based workshops—enthusiastic, but still learning their trade. If you go expecting to see performances on a level with what you’ve seen at Cirque du Soleil or Big Apple Circus, you’ll be disappointed. Of course, the ticket prices ($10 children, $20 adults) are about a third of what you’d pay for entry-level Soleil tickets, so it’s a fair deal.

No denying the show is a feat of organization and engineering. The onstage cast numbers over two dozen, and on Sunday night, there looked to be at least that many people offstage handling fire effects and safety. The brassy Fremont Philharmonic, led by Fred Hawkinson on trombone, oom-pah-pahed bravely throughout, despite high winds off the lake and clouds of gnats attracted to the lights. And the audience, half of whom forgot their lawn chairs and blankets, sat gamely on the cement, huddling against the chill. None of this mattered a whit to the kids, who were transfixed, fireworks in their eyes.

a review of the cirque show by a person who reportedly hates shows like that… it’s not universally good, but if i didn’t know anything about either the show or the reviewer, i’d be tempted to go and see it anyway…

Tuesday, August 2, 2005

Cirque de Flambe’s antics can be blazing amazing

By JOE ADCOCK
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER THEATER CRITIC

Playing with fire combines risk and thrills. In the case of Cirque de Flambe — “flaming circus” in permissive French — the risk is self-indulgent sloppiness. The thrills derive from uniquely sensational feats of skill and daring.

Some of the Cirque’s 27 performers juggle fire. Others swing it around on ropes and bars. Some play jump rope (even double Dutch) with flaming ropes. Others spin flaming hula hoops. Providing non-pyrotechnical thrills is Primary Element: three clever acrobats who twine and combine like rubbery Lego pieces. Their accomplishments involve extraordinary strength, flexibility and balance.

For a literally blazing finale, the cast members whirl exploding fireworks up and down and around and around.

The 10-member Fremont Philharmonic, masters of fluctuating rhythms, supplies admirable musical backup. Sometimes the tunes are subtle and insinuating. At other times they are swingy and nostalgic.

The Cirque has been a Seattle institution for eight years. The current production is called “In the Shadow of the Giant.”

A dozen clowns play out the archetypal clown thing: one, the giant, tries futilely to impose order. The rest succeed in creating chaos. The whip-cracking ringmaster, on stilts, fawns on the glamorous skilled performers. He bullies and denigrates his fellow zanies. His rebellious minions retaliate with weapons ranging from a 1940s foundation garment (worn by a buxom “nurse”) to a chainsaw (watch out for those stilts).

The clowning often involves failed pyrotechnics. The stunts are not uniformly ingenious or funny. Whether they are amusing, they do go on and on. A clown with his pants on fire or a blazing stuffed toy dog are among the striking but unduly extended bits.

It is easy, however, to feel affectionate indulgence toward the Cirque. The lame stuff is harmless. And the effective stuff is amazing.