A Mudshow Season

Still no computer. We've been out for nine days and lost two dates to weather. We're in central Arkansas. Jumps mostly short. Business good. Matt Marguchi our composer leaves today. He'll be missed. His trumpet has been the bedlat thing about the show. Adkins AR today. Warm, grass lot.

Opened in Valient, OK on Tuesday. Sunny, soft lot. 30 mile jump. Good business.

Wednesday jumped 165 miles to Wilburton. Three trucks stuck in morning. Blown engine in 24 hour man's house. Assorted other problems... Then we lost shows to weather. Trying again today. Overcast, cool, damp. Gravel lot.

My laptop is dead, so updates using iPod touch will brief.

Monday March 22nd. Hugo, OK. Warm, sunny, light breeze.

Lost the first day of the season to a wet lot. Hope to catch it later in the week.

Sunday. Hugo, OK. Still in WQ. Snow last night and today. Warming now and everything a sea of mud. Hoping to get out early tomorrow and to get on to lot without too much damage to put on first shows of the season. We shall see.

HA! Let me amend the weather a bit! YESTERDAY was warm and sunny. TODAY it's raining, and the forecast is calling for 2-4 inches of SNOW starting this afternoon. Tomorrow's high temps will be just above freezing. Though the forecast looks good on Monday, when we actually open. May or may not jump out of WQ ahead of Monday depending on whether that puts us into mud rather than waiting for things to dry out.

Saturday March 20th. HUGO, OK. WQ. Warm, sunny.

Some of the working guys arrive today. Matt Margucci who composes the original music is here. We'll move CM Circus out this afternoon and tomorrow for the Monday opening. First jump around 25 miles. I anticipate internet only rarely for the first 3-4 weeks, so I'll post updates covering all jumps as I can.

Wednesday March 17th, 2010. Freeville, NY. Soft ground. Sunny. 60.

Off tomorrow to Culpepper & Merriweather in Hugo, OK. Arriving Texarkana Friday night. We jump out of Hugo WQ over the weekend. Another mudshow season, just circuses have awakened and taken to the roads in spring since the flatfooters around Somers, NY invented this thing of ours 200 years ago. I'll post updates and routes whenever I can find an internet connection.

And so it’s March. Maybe not yet close enough to any serious semblance of the equinox to recite the words of the immortal poem:

Springs has sprung
The grass has riz
I wonder where the birdy is?
They say the bird is on the wing
Absurd
The wing is on the bird.

But the Kelly Miller Circus is open in Texas in the Valley, and Carson & Barnes, and Culpepper & Merriweather prepare to decamp Hugo, OK. Looking out the window there’s still a pile of snow five feet tall behind my motorhome, and eighteen inches of the once-white-stuff in the yard. There’s ice in the driveway. With the melt however, crocus will come.

Thusly, it’s time to think about another circus season, and to pack the bags, and to fire up the blog. It might be another couple weeks before the miles, the weather, the lots, and the jumps become a part of the daily conversation, but soon enough we follow the arrows.