24 Comments

1. richard mcenroe:

Roger ó Clowns are evil and want to eat you. No, really, it’s true: rent “Killer Klowns from Outer Space” for the awful facts!

Jul 25, 2004 - 8:18 am 2. Charlie (Colorado):

You know, I think I like animals as much as anyone. Something that’s always struck me is that we have these relationships with animals that are generally very intelligent and very social — like elephants, dogs, parrots, cats* — because we give them something to do. We are interesting, and we provide interesting stuff, and we give them attention and rewards.

* note that “house” cats, domestic cats, gone feral, form social groups so long as there’s enough food to support a large population. In this they’re like lions, and unlike most other cats.

Jul 25, 2004 - 8:32 am 3. PeterUK:

Aren’t children a wonderful excuse to relive ones childhood.Madelaine is 24 caret cute.

Jul 25, 2004 - 8:33 am 4. OldManRick:

I too have enjoyed the circus for the last 10 years. I never saw it as a child but I started going when my oldest girl was 4 and my youngest a baby. We originally went to the Long Beach Area but Ringling has dropped that venue. Now we go to the Pond in Anahiem.

I would almost agree with you about clowns but in that last couple of years Ringling brothers has added a clown named Bello. Before you condemn clowns forever, you really need to see him. The others are bacially kindergarden stunts, but he can be really entertaining for adults. He is really half acrobat and half clown. If he wasn’t there this year, he should be there next.

http://www.ringling.com/explore/133/stars/bello.aspx

Jul 25, 2004 - 8:44 am 5. jbrown:

Wow, fun! The Circus!

And 800 iso on a digital camera? My digital only goes up to 400 but I can never go beyond 200 or the pictures fill up with rainbow colored snow. That is a nice camera!

Jul 25, 2004 - 8:46 am 6. OldManRick:

After further googleing I see we have the 134th edition of RBBBC here in Los Angeles. The featured clown is David Larible. I have seen him about four times and he is on the Disney Let’s Go to the Circus sing along. The difference between him and Bello is night and day. While Bello maintains the momentum of the show, I find David brings it to a halt. It must be the hair.

Rick

Jul 25, 2004 - 8:54 am 7. chuck:

Charlie(C)

Now you’ve done it, introduced cats into the thread. Here’s some info on feral cats I found interesting: a mouse contains about 30 calories, a cat needs about 300 calories/day (10 mice), so this translates to about 1 km^2 if I recall. This explains some things about cats. Here’s an interesting link I turned up Australian Cat Population.

Re Clowns, I always liked the Charlie Chaplin scene (in The Circus?) where the very unfunny clown routine is made hilarious.

Jul 25, 2004 - 9:45 am 8. chuck:

Charlie(C)

Oops, here’s the link. Forgot the closing quote. Australian Cat Population.

Jul 25, 2004 - 9:48 am 9. Knucklehead:

Every child should see a circus regardless of good, bad or indifferent quality and right, wrong, or indifferent “morality” – it’s as simple as that.

OK, Roger, here are you marching orders moving forward (in no particular order of importance): Take the kid to Disney World. Take her to see the Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall. Take her to a solid Broadway show (preferrably at least three) and take her to see something akin to the IceCapades (sp?). Take her to see ballet and opera and, most important, a good symphony orchestra playing a great classic program. Last, perhaps least (idunno), make sure she sees a top of the line sporting event. Then you may rest easy

Oops, sorry, I neglected one very important “event”… make sure you do battle with a school on her behalf – can’t neglect that.

Jul 25, 2004 - 11:53 am 10. Roberts:

That’s a really nice photo, Roger.

As for the PETA people, I’ve always despised them myself. Traitors to their species. When confronted with someone objecting to the circus, I usually respond that I too would like to see elephants no longer used in circuses … so as to free them up for me to BBQ and eat them.

Usually shuts ‘em up.

Jul 25, 2004 - 12:55 pm 11. Vexorg:

Those PETA wackos have already managed to get circuses banned completely from most cities around here. This area seems big on nanny-state types, it seems…

PETA almost makes the thought of cannibalism seem bearable…

Jul 25, 2004 - 12:59 pm 12. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

PETA members tend to be stringy and full of bile.

On feral species… The mongoose is a big nuisance in Hawaii. They are cute looking weasel-like critters that I have frequently seen in Kailua-Kona.

They were introduced in order to eat the rats that had been introduced accidentally. Unfortunately, the amateur ecology repairers didn’t realize that mongeese are daytime feeders and rats come out at night. Oops!

A friend of mine, a field biologist, once ate Wooly Mammoth steaks. He was in Alaska and they found a just uncovered frozen Mammoth. It was turned into dinner. Mammoth’s are mined in Siberia for the ivory.

What this has to do with circuses, I don’t know.

Jul 25, 2004 - 2:11 pm 13. michael ledeen:

It’s hard after Fellini…but there is certainly a touch of Giulietta Messina in Medeleine. what a star(let)!

Jul 25, 2004 - 2:21 pm 14. Cap'n Billy:

Every time I encounter a member of PETA I let them know that I’m also a member. As the conversation progresses I finally have to explain to them that my PETA means People Eating Tasty Animals.

Jul 25, 2004 - 2:32 pm 15. Skookumchuk:

When I was a little kid my Dad, who had quite a collection of antique circus posters, knew people in RBB&B. Guys like Hugo Zacchini, the Human Cannonball and a few of the Wallendas. And the great clowns like Emmet Kelly, who swept up the spotlight with a broom – sort of Chaplinesque – and Lou Jacobs, who led the other clowns in climbing out of the little car. We used to visit them on the circus train when they came to LA. Glad to know they are still around.

And your Madeleine is an A-100 cutie-pie.

Jul 25, 2004 - 2:37 pm 16. Kevin P:

To all You PETA fans:

There is a editorial in Sundays Los Angeles Times opinion section comparing the slaughter house employees torturing chickens in the slaughterhouse Of KFC to the Abu Ghraib prisoners.Now I think that those employees who were smashing the chickens about should probably be fired but I don’t think it quite matches up to Human torture.But I guess my thought process isn’t as nuanced as it should be.Maybe we should refer it to the World Court.

Jul 25, 2004 - 3:24 pm 17. Charlie (Colorado):

You know, Kevin, beyond the PETA stuff, I’m really getting tired of people who can’t tell the difference between kicking and stomping small critters — which, frankly, strikes me as not much different from torturing people — and pointing at someone’s peepee and laughing.

Anyway, Chuck, thanks for the link. The place where the social-feral behavior is most often seen is in “barn cats”, where there is an artificially high density of small prey because of things like animal feed storage.

Jul 25, 2004 - 4:23 pm 18. Starhawk:

kh,

Hey you left out going to a baseball game.

That is almost un-american.

Jul 25, 2004 - 6:19 pm 19. Kevin P:

Charlie:

I should have been more clear. I was not trying to say that the treatment of those chickens was good. Frankly I think it is sick. The problem I have is the equating of animals with humans.What those employees did should get them fired and fined.Torture might be too severe for the prison situation but if they did it on their own those soldiers should do some jail time. I am not for animal cruelty I just have a problem with making it equal to human cruelty.

Jul 25, 2004 - 6:22 pm 20. Terrye:

I live iin the sticks and here lately the city epople have decided that we can’t have animals [like dogs] running around. In fact a friend of mine had his dog taken from his property and put in the pound because it was not tied up. The guy owns 200 acres. That is right coyotes are running wild around here because farm dogs are tied up. I myself think putting a dog on a chain is cruel. They are also trying to pass a law to the effect that cats have to be restrained. I want to be there to see a county official try to load up a van of barn cats and live to tell about it.

Sometimes people just don’t have enough to do. They have to devote themselves to coming up with stupid crap for the rest of us to deal with.

Jul 25, 2004 - 6:22 pm 21. Jan Bear:

They need to import clowns from the Moscow circus. The funniest anywhere–and great gymnasts in their own right.

Jul 25, 2004 - 6:56 pm 22. Roberts:

I’m with you, Kevin. I don’t care for the abuse of animals but they are animals and not humans. And while I don’t agree with Charlie on the nearness of animal abuse and human torture, you are dead-on about the silliness of exaggerating the level of abuse at Abu Ghraib.

Jul 25, 2004 - 7:46 pm 23. Knucklehead:

StarHawk,

I would hope Roger would pick a baseball game for that “major sporting event”, but since he’s hooked on basketball, oh well… He’s converted from Leftism – I can’t expect a conversion from basketball as well.

But you are right… take the kid to a ballgame (a real one where baseball is played).

Jul 25, 2004 - 7:57 pm 24. Charlie (Colorado):

I dunno, Kevin, since torturing small animals is highly correlated with things like serial killing in later life …. I don’t mean that I think they’re crimes of equal seriousness, rather that I think they’re crimes that arise from the same moral flaw. Although I was a vegetarian for some years, I’m not one any longer, and don’t have any moral qualms about killing and eating animals. But causing them pain for the amusement value is something else.

Of such complexities is a 50 year old cowboy Buddhist capable.

I think you got my real point, though: equating what went on at Abu Ghraib with real torture trivializes torture.

Jul 25, 2004 - 10:04 pm

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