Boca Sunday

Sorry I didn't get this done sooner.  I should post more often so I remember to post.

Sunday we had Brian calling with Sharon King doing a few guest spots.  She did quite well for a newbie.  Cornbread, still in its truncated form, played.  We started off with very few dancers but it built up quite nicely.  I applaud Brian for allowing Sharon to get some practice in.

Because of the Orange Blossom and Snow Balls in January, there will not be a 3rd Sunday dance, plus the 4th Sunday dance at the Barnacle has been moved to the 5th Sunday, so I will NOT be putting on a 5th Saturday dance in January.  The next 5th Saturday after that is in April.  I may or may not put on a dance then, I haven't decided.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Chuck It, Let's Dance

Chuck Abell was our caller Saturday and did a very nice job.  Even the dances which were relatively untried were smooth and interesting.  If I continue the 5th Saturday dances, I will try to get Chuck to call one of them.

Pat & Anita Mason played with a new fiddler.  I understand that Lew Pollack has moved away and Anjie is taking a break from playing for the dances; they were both missed.

The third weekend in January is the Orange Blossom Ball weekend, the fourth weekend is Snowball, and the January Barnacle dance has been moved to the 5th Sunday, so I think I will hold off on trying to hold a dance in January.  That doesn't resolve the issue of whether or not to continue the 5th Saturday dances, but it does postpone the necessity of deciding.  Only four people raised their hands at the dance Saturday expressing interest in the dance continuing, so that was not encouraging.

Belated Post

Oops, sorry about this, folks.  I had a very bad weekend and things didn't get settled down until yesterday, so I forgot all about updating this.

There was a pretty good turnout Saturday.  Joe Bone played, Brian called.  There were no fatal breakdowns in the dances, so that was good.  It was like old home week, with several people showing up for the dance who had not been in quite some time.

I will probably skip both dances this weekend.  If anyone is interested in going up to the Melbourne dance next Friday, I'd be interested in getting a ride up.  I can help with gas if you stop by a Chevron station.  I've driven the whole way from here, up and back, but that was exhausting.

I'd still like to hear from the dancers about whether or not it's worthwhile continuing the 5th Saturday dance in 2016.  There are FIVE 5th Saturdays in 2016, and the first one is in January, so I need to decide soon.

Halloween

Thanks again to John Burnette for promoting the Halloween dance heavily.  Unfortunately, the turnout was about the same as the previous two attempts, just seventeen people.  But we had a good dance with SIX musicians playing and William Eagan calling.  The band called itself Stringulation.  Thanks, too, to the two new musicians who played for us, and to the two ladies for helping decorate the hall.

There is a fifth Saturday in January 2016, but I have not decided whether or not I want to continue with the dance.  We're getting enough dancers to pay for the hall but not much for the band, and not quite enough in my opinion for a really good dance.

We have a couple of younger people coming to Boca Saturday (younger than most of us, anyway), so if you know some younger people who haven't been to the dance before, Saturday is a good time to bring them.  The key to getting younger people coming regularly is to have other younger people attending regularly so they have someone to dance with.  I know that sounds rather circular, but that's the way it works.

Shameless Plug

Six visitors yesterday and 83 in the last month!  So on the off-chance that someone looks at this between now and Saturday, let me encourage, exhort, and entice you to come to the dance at the Davie Woman's Club on Halloween night.  We're going to decorate, William Eagan is putting together a special program of Halloween-themed dances, and John Burnett has been promoting the dance all over south Florida and the web, so it should be a good turnout.  See you there!

Elevenses

Greetings, greetings.

For those who did not go to the dance yesterday and haven't heard, the room where we dance at Michael's was double-booked yesterday, and we were bumped for a yoga class.  We didn't get into the room until 4, and while the band (Stepping Stones with Robin & Norman) and caller (John Rogers) were ready pretty quickly, and we went till 6 instead of 5:30, we ended up getting less than two hours of dancing in.  At least we had enough people either stick around or come back to get in a decent dance.

I was not able to make the announcement yesterday (because we didn't have any), but I have a caller now for the Halloween dance.  William Eagan is going to be calling.  The band is calling itself Stringulation, and there are going to be at least five band members because Ellen Stahl is going to play, too.  It may even end up being six!  John Burnett says that they may just skip the sound system altogether because they won't need it for that large a band, and the problems of mike-ing that many people are difficult to overcome.

It may not come to anything, but I am applying for a job in North Carolina.  If I get it, then I will discontinue the fifth Saturday dance unless someone else wants to take it over.

Post Number Ten

Is your tenth post an anniversary of some kind?

I see I had a couple of visitors yesterday, so my apologies for not having anything new to read.  Saturday's dance featured Southern Atlantic Muse (Kevin & Dorothy) playing and Brian calling.  We had an okay turnout, not great, but several regulars and several of our better dancers (not always the same) were not there.  I hope no one was bothered by the little kids; one parent was there at my invitation and her friends there at hers.  They liked the dance and want to come back, so we may have a new, younger, social circle become regulars, which would be GREAT.  And of course if the kids take an interest, we'll have a whole new generation taking up contra dancing.

Just a reminder to anyone seeing this who does not already know, HALLOWEEN is a 5th Saturday, and there is a dance in Davie at the Davie Woman's Club from 7:30-11:00 p.m.  I hope you will come.

Sunday's Dance

Hello, all.  Looks like I need to post sooner after the dance if I'm going to get any readership, eh?  There was a good turnout for a Sunday afternoon dance.  Stepping Stones with Robin and Norman played, Brian called.  For those who are only obliquely involved with the dance, you should know that Francine is looking for someone to take over hospitality for either or both of the Boca dances, so if you're interested, let Francine or someone on the board know.  (Hospitality means bringing a tablecloth, napkins, cups, and so on, and then cleaning up the table at the end of the dance.)

I'm not sure why anything on the left or right diagonal throws everyone off, but that certainly seems to be the case.  Otherwise the dance went well.

I'd like to see 25+ people at the Halloween dance, so please come and please bring someone.  If that someone happens to be single, female, and attractive, and you'd like to introduce her to me, so much the better.  If you or someone you know is interested in me, you pretty much have to point it out to me; genius and social skill are inversely correlated, generally speaking.

Octopost

Saturday's dance was well attended and we had good music with Cornbread playing. Brian did a fine job calling. I wasn't feeling too well, so I didn't have as much of a good time as usual. Thanks to everyone who expressed concern, but I was fine about three hours later. It was good to see Cliff there even if he didn't dance. If you didn't get here from his newsletter and want to be on it, you can write to cliffpbc@gmail.com. Happy Birthday to Ted. I forgot to mention it to Brian, but Ted turns 70 this week. The Davie dance is this Saturday.

Lucky Number Seven

Hi, folks. Apparently I'm now getting some readership thanks to Cliff's newsletter, so thank you, Cliff.

We had a pretty good dance last night at the Davie Woman's Club, though we could have used a lot more dancers. It was my fifth time calling a dance, and I still need a great deal of improvement, but the dancers were pretty patient, anyway. I called several dances that we used to do all the time up in Indiana but that I have never or rarely seen down here in Florida. As expected, the Pattycake Polka had everyone laughing, and even those sitting out thought it was a great little dance. I also called a couple of simple square dances; no feedback on those, so I don't know how they went over. I had hoped to call a circle dance and a Sicilian circle, but we really didn't have enough people for either. Thanks to Pot Luck, our band, with Lew Pollack, John Burnett, and Linda Frank for playing. They were pretty patient with me, too.

Next 5th Saturday dance will be Halloween night; John Burnett will return with two new musicians who have never played a contra dance before, so it should be interesting. I will decide then whether or not the 5th Saturday dance will continue; we had 18 in May, 17 last night, not great turnouts. It's possible the oncoming storm kept some people away, so I'll hope for 25+ for Halloween.

Post the Sixth

Not sure what to write this time around. We had a good turnout for a Sunday afternoon, and a caller we had not had before, John Rogers, so that made it interesting. Southern Atlantic Muse played. The only new people were a couple that Andrew brought. We had several people show up that had not been to a dance in ages, including Dom and Barbara, so that was nice. Several of our more contentious dancers were NOT there, so that made it more easy-going. And Heidi was back running the door, so that was a good thing. I did get the chance to announce the fifth Saturday dance which is rapidly approaching now, and the Halloween dance as well.

Five and counting

Yesterday's dance was not very well attended, but we had some good dancers and some good dances anyway. Southern Atlantic Muse played and Brian Kushner called. I'm trying not to post negative commentary on here, but organization and preparation were sorely lacking last night. The beginner's lesson is supposed to run from 7:00-7:30 and the dance start at 7:30, but the dance didn't get going until almost 8:00 p.m. That was partially due to a lack of dancers, but also because no one was ready to go. I arrived at 7 and there was no one there to take money. I'm also trying not to generate unfavorable comparisons, but I do want to make "my" dance on the 5th Saturday different enough from the existing dances to get people to want to come out. How? By instructing the callers and musicians to make the dances a little simpler and a lot faster. Personally, I find faster dances more exciting than more complicated dances. So I'm going to push for faster dances. I believe that those who come to the 5th Saturday dance will find that I am correct and that "my" dance is more fun and exciting than the other dances. Notice that this does not mean I will avoid the other dances. Contra dancing is my main social outlet and the more opportunities I have to go, the better.

Round Four (a little late)

Sunday's dance went fairly well with Cornbread playing and Brian calling. Two of my favorite dancers were there, but I won't name names. Brian announced my upcoming dance rather than having me do it. I don't know if that's good or bad. I took ten flyers for my own dance to the dance, but I think the only two that were taken I gave out.

Sunday Boca Dance

A pretty nice dance Sunday, with the very different Pat Tsar calling. She called a bunch of dances that the other callers just don't do anymore, like the Virginia Reel, a Sicilian circle, and a dance from 1780. We could have used some more dancers and Pat really needs to speak up, but otherwise it went well. The 1780 dance of course was a proper dance, but no real reason it couldn't have been switched to improper with a much better "feel" to it. I announced the August and October dances once again, and made the point that I need people to show up, but because several people were making announcements, I didn't say as much as I had planned to. The band was Kevin and Dorothy, Southern Atlantic Muse.

Post the Second

Yesterday's contra dance was at Boca Raton, with Joe Bone playing and Brian calling. I always appreciate Bob Murphy's fiddle playing. Brian tried a new dance he had written last night, which didn't work perfectly, but I give him props for trying something new. Since he is our caller for most of the dances, it's good that he tries to find or create new dances for us. Only thing I didn't like was being tied to the same partner for two dances.

Joe Zang was kind enough to say about the 5th Saturday dance that it was a lot of fun. I don't know how far his voice carried, though.

I'm typing with the phone instead of the tablet this time. Better, but still not good.

Round One

Hello. Since I'm writing this before I have any followers, I'm not sure what I should put.

First off, let me warn anyone who doesn't know my politics, I am slightly to the right of Genghis Khan. While I will try to make this about contra dancing, not politics, when politics impinges on the dance as it sometimes does, I WILL have something to say about it. If you are a liberal, you will be offended.

We had 18 dancers Saturday at the first ever 5th Saturday dance. That wasn't as many as I had hoped but perhaps more than I should have expected with just two weeks' notice. The band (Pot Luck) and caller (William Eagan) did a nice job. I am encouraged enough to try doing a regular 5th Saturday dance. The next one will be in August.