Blog is moving

Alright folks, so blogger is pissing me off big time. It used to be what I need, but blogger seems to think it is smarter than me, and in many cases it is, but it likes to edit my HTML when I'm not looking, and it doesn't work for me, so the blog is moving.
new address is
fenixcobbledick.wordpress.com

So, you have several choices now, you can go and subscribe to a feed of that blog, or you can send me a message with your e-mail address and I'll see if I can put you on an update list like I have been doing here. Everyone who is on the list for this blog will get put on the list for the updated blog.

NECCA day 1

So, we've had a couple days at NECCA to get acquainted with the space, and today we had our first rope lesson, but I'll get to that in a bit.

First, I want to show you where I live, because it is awesome.

The lake outside my house

Yep, that's Lake Pleasant, and it is well named, that's for sure. While I took this picture, I was sitting in a little wooden box on one side of The Bridge of Names

Every single one of those slats of wood has a name on it, everybody from Picasso to V. Van Gogh to Bob Dylan to MLK, JFK, and RFK (those three all on one slat) and a whole bunch of people who I have no idea who they are, but I'm sure they are all fascinating.

That's the whole 360 view from my little box, and I absolutely love it - it's where I go to eat my breakfast. I get to listen to the birds and the bugs and the wind and the water. It's about as serene a scene as one could imagine.

So that's where I live. Yes, it is awesome.
TRAINING
So we are in this big building that used to be a cotton mill, and aside from the circus center, there is a pottery room, a dance company, a toymaker and a whole bunch of other stuff.
Including this particular item.

This guy is up on a wall in the hallway outside of NECCA and his head/body (not including tentacles) are about as big as I am. I just thought he was way cool.

So in the actual studio, there are lots of cool things, like

ALL OF THE APPARATUSES!
Also, they have

German wheels! But I won't get a chance to use them, but still, cool to know they have them. Also, not pictured are Roue Cyr (Cyr Wheel)

So we did a rope class, and we went back to basics, which both Emilie and I needed a lot - anyone can teach you a trick, but only a true professional can point out the flaws in basics. So that went well, we will hopefully have video of us on the rope once we get a little bit more into it and start doing things that are interesting to people other than me.

In the meantime, while Emilie was doing her contortion class (that's what she's doing with Bill, pictured above - it's not a massage, it's contortion class, I promise) I went into the side room and got up to some shenanigans.

First of all, this is the coolest thing I've ever seen, and I need one in my house.

And by need, I mean as soon as I get a house, I am going to build one - looks pretty easy, just some screws in the floor, a couple tiny pulleys and some nice lengths of rope.

Also in that room, I was working on handstands and decided to film them for your pleasure, but also so I can see how I'm doing (it isn't exactly easy to look in a mirror while handstanding)

This is a weird little tuck thing I've been working on, it has a ways to go yet, but I'm well on my way.

I've also been working on a back bend while doing a handstand, and again, I'm well on my way, but still a long way to go.

So that's what's up in terms of what I'm doing, but while I was there, I had the pleasure of seeing some of the other people studying there do some of their things, including Aimee (my handstand teacher) and her flyer doing some duet work.

So that's all the updates and pictures and videos that I have for now, aside from the thunderstorm that we had to run through to get dinner tonight. I've never eaten dinner while literally dripping water before.

Ah well - we have this weekend off, then straps and handstands next week!

Changing House

So this weird thing is happening over the next month and a half - I have no house.
Over the past few days, I've been scurrying about in an effort to pack up all of my stuff.
In case you are curious, the pile of every single thing I own minus my bed looks like this.

Everything. Yeah.

So that's it, the totality of my stuff, and we put it all in the back of a Subaru and we drove that pile of stuff up to Portland. Then we put it in a magical place called Narnia, and there it shall remain until I return at the end of September to retrieve it.

Until then I'll be living in Vermont at school, at my parents' when I am in Tucson, and couch surfing with friends when I am in Eugene (only a week).



So I realized that this was the last of my college houses. Also, the last of my college desk, which I gave away today.

It served me well

'Twas a good desk.









So I managed to pack everything up, and as I did I looked back upon my work, and saw

So that's it. I have an empty room. The last picture taken in my last college house.

Roommates not quite moved out yet

I suppose I'd say I'm happy with the way things in Eugene turned out. It was a tough road, and I'm gonna miss Eugene a lot, that's for sure, but as I sat on my pile of stuff, looking back at the room - my life in Eugene is all packed up, and I'm ready to move myself to Portland and start again, bigger and better.







So now I am arrived in Massachusetts at the house I will be living in for the next three weeks.
It is a gorgeous place in pretty much the country, and not only that, but we are living on a lake.

Yeah, a real lake

So the water is nice and warm and swimmable, the walk around it takes about an hour (I'll do that at some point and let you know how it goes) and the place is just crawling with frogs, which I did not get a picture of yet, because by the time I found one standing still, it was too dark.

So Emilie and I are sharing a room, and it's a pretty tiny one, so it will be a challenge on our part to co-exist in such a small space for three weeks, something we've never had to do before.

What you see there is pretty much it - I am standing with my back up against the wall looking out at the door and window (which has an amazing view of the lake).

It should be an interesting time indeed.

Emilie has her first class tomorrow (contortion) and then we are gonna come back home and try that swimming thing. Our first class together is on friday, and it will be a rope class, and we are both incredibly excited for that.

So that's all the news from the front for day 1 (amazing that all of this happened inside of 24 hours)
I'll be back on friday afternoon most likely with more pictures, maybe some video of walking around the lake, and updates about the school.
Until Friday,
Hobey Ho, and so we go

And The Adventure Begins

So tomorrow I go to Portland, and the morning after, I get on a plane to go to the east coast. I will be living in a house in Massachusetts and attending classes at NECCA (New England Center For Circus Arts) in Vermont.

So, in keeping with my history with this blog, I will be posting travel updates - basically what I've been training on, how I like the city, and because I think it will be more prevalent this time, the country.

So this is my adventure blog, stay tuned over the next three weeks for my training - any pictures I've got will show up in this blog. Any video I've got will show up in this blog. In fact, anything remotely interesting that happens to me over the next three weeks will show up in this blog, because aside from training and exploring, I will quite literally have nothing else to do.

So, won't you please join me?
GERONIMO!
~Fenix

What I do for a living

So I often get the question "dude, so I get that you do 'circus,' but what is it that you do?"

So here, and now, I am going to tell and show what I do for a living.


First of all, I get invited to perform at festivals. I don't get paid, but I do get to go for free, and sometimes, if I am very very lucky, I get to perform with famous people. And sometimes, I get to perform with people like Lindsey Stirling.

And sometimes, they let me do it on silks.

So that's some pretty cool perks of my job. But what is it that I actually do.
Well, basically, I get on stage, I do 5 minutes of work, four times a night, and do stuff like this:

Now that is just one piece. I call it my zombie piece. There is a video of it somewhere, but I don't have it yet.

I also perform my Crystallize piece

Yep, all of that in one place.

I also regularly do a rope piece that I am amazed that we don't have pictures of it yet. I'll work on that.

So yeah, that's my job.

Religious People

Anyone who knows me knows that I am very anti-religion, and for many atheists this is the case. Many of us are atheists not only because we do not see evidence for a supreme being, but also because of the interpretation of such a deity (or deities) has done so much incredible evil in this world.
I don't think religion is evil, but I do think the world would be better off without it. Supernatural belief in general can go, I'm not picky about having a deity or not.
This is not that uncommon of a view, it really isn't. As much as you think there may be a huge religious majority, and there is, 13% (source) of over 311 million is still 40 million. That is forty million people in this country alone who do not believe in a god.
But get ready, because here comes an uncommon opinion.

I don't like religious people.

Not all religious and supernatural-believing-type people. The wiccans in general don't piss me off except when they spout their supernatural stuff. The new-agers annoy the crap out of me when they try to tell me about something ridiculous. In general, however, people who subscribe to mainstream religion (abrahamic, basically - be it any sect of christianity, catholicism, islam, judaism) are people who start on my shit list.

Listen, I want to be very clear about this. This has nothing to do with your belief in a god that I don't believe in. Seriously. Well, it has a little bit to do with it, but only because of the fact that you call yourself a christian, or a muslim, or a jew. I don't think your belief in God is a correct or even prudent one. I think it is childish and misguided and foolish and false and I am going to do everything in my power to convince you of that fact - but none of that means I don't like you. So when I tell you that you are on my shit list from day one, I want you to understand it is not because I think you are wrong.

I want you to understand that when I say that you are on my shit list from day one, it is because of your label. You have this label that you use. You call yourself a christian. You call yourself a muslim.

Then this christian pastor goes and says something like "let's gather all the gays and lesbians and put them inside an electric fence, because that way they'll die out"



Yeah. That happened. Anyway, so this pastor comes out and says something crazy and us militant atheists add it to the "Horrible ideas created in the name of God we are glad nobody used" list and move on. But this weird thing happens when we pass this on to our religious friends.
This is a set of the typical responses to asking a religious person about this type of event
"Oh, he's not a real christian"
"I don't believe that"

Awesome, congratulations, you have a sense of morality. Good for you. Pat yourself on the back.

But here is what strikes me as odd. Many atheists see this type of thing and get angry, we see this and have a very strong emotional response to it. This man is standing up and saying how we need to put all the gays and lesbians and queers behind an electric fence and let them all die off because they can't reproduce. I don't care that this is a stupid idea because gay people are not born of gay people. Seriously, that is not what upsets me about this video.

What upsets me is that you don't care.

What upsets me is the fact that you see this man standing up there, standing in front of all those people, all those minds, and using the name of a belief that you proclaim to be a part of, and he is saying these hateful, ignorant and wrong things, and you know they are hateful and ignorant and wrong, that is why you don't believe them - but why does it not enrage you?

Why does it not infuriate you that someone is standing up there saying that they are a christian and that this is what christianity means, when you know they are wrong?

So if you are a religious person that stands up against this kind of idiocy, great. I am glad to hear that. But there are so many people out there who see something like this and just let it go without seeing any need to stand up and say no. Even the people in the audience of that sermon aplauded. I'm not saying that the fact that you didn't aplaud is not commendable. Again, good on you for having morals. But saying that you simply don't agree with his idea is idiocy as well. You know who else rounded up the gays. You know, and I know I don't have to remind you, because I know you know. Would you ever suggest that saying "I don't agree with that" is enough? No. It wasn't enough. We went to war against that idea. The idea that certain people should be rounded up and slaughtered was such a repugnant idea to us that an entire nation still deals with the fallout of an idea that was fought and defeated nearly one hundred years ago.

So why does it not enrage you when someone claiming to be of your belief system says something like this.

There is a great quote that sums this up very nicely. It was from an episode of Stargate, which, while not a great show, had its moments.

So here is the scene. Context: the Ori are these crazy powerful beings posing as Gods, the priors with the crazy eyes are their missionaries, they also have crazy power. And spaceships. Anyway, their believers have no idea the Ori feed on their belief and are just power hungry jerks. Interdimensional power hungry jerks.
In many ways, the believers are just like so many of us, they just believe, and the message in Origin (their book) is mostly a positive, loving, "Ori will bless you" sort of message.

But then this happens.

A little later, our Tomin goes back to talk to the Prior.

I always loved this scene, but never really figured out why. Recently, I watched the episode again, and realized why I loved it so much: this never happens. I never see the good people, the people who I know are good, kind, moral people, stand up and fight against the tyranny that pervades their leadership. I want so badly to see that anger in your eyes when someone claiming to stand up for your beliefs says something incredibly hateful, ignorant and wrong, and I don't understand why I don't see it.

What do you think you are doing, young man?

So when I started doing fire arts when I was younger, I knew it was dangerous. I knew I was going to get burned, and I was ok with that.
But then I go and get a burn like this:

And after all these years of fire, and burning myself, and seeing others' burns, and getting rope and silk burns, this is my reaction upon seeing this thing in the mirror after it happened:

"OH MY GOD! IT LOOKS LIKE A BUNNY RABBIT, THAT IS SO CUTE!"
no, not "damn, that is a pretty gnarly looking burn"
not "man, that really sucks, that is gonna hurt tomorrow"
but "it looks like a bunny rabbit, that is so cute"

I've been doing this too long...
Anyway, off to work, where I get to perform aerial three nights in a row - I've got lots of bandages, don't worry.