How many objects can one person juggle?
It all depends on what you mean by "juggle". Like elements with
high atomic numbers, juggling patterns with high numbers of objects are
unstable. As many as 12 objects have been juggled very briefly; see the numbers records at the
Juggling Information Service for more details.
As for our club, there are a number of five-ball (even five-club)
jugglers, and you might see the occasional attempt at seven balls or
seven rings.
It should be pointed out that there's more to juggling than numbers,
and that many great jugglers have never been numbers jugglers.
Do you juggle fire? (Or knives, or chain saws, or some other
scary-sounding prop.)
Night-time fire juggling is a beautiful sight to behold, and we do
sometimes juggle torches, but our current meeting places aren't really
appropriate for it. Please remember that juggling torches is dangerous;
don't try it without learning about the necessary precautions. Eric Bagai's Fire Safety for
Jugglers page is a good starting place, as is The JIS's torch-juggling
page.
Knives have showed up on occasion at meetings; they are specially
designed for juggling and have an edge that is cut so that it looks sharp,
but isn't actually. On the other hand, even these juggling knives could
do you some pretty serious damage if you got hit by one. Before
attempting something that might be dangerous, please do some research,
learn the technique from someone with experience, and think hard about
what you're doing.
Contrary to the impression one might get from the TV, getting better at
juggling doesn't just mean juggling more and more dangerous objects. (But
we admit it has a certain attraction.)
How do you do that?
It might not be as hard as you think; see our section about learning to juggle.
Why do you do that?
Who knows?
Do you know any good juggling jokes?
No, but you can read a bad one if you'd
like.
