How many balls could be juggled on the moon? The whole fascinating area of "numbers" juggling touches on the state of the art. Every interest group harbors a very small vanguard of practitioners who defines its outer limits. That hard working, confident handful of people blast right by the word "average" with just a little practice. With a few years of improvement, they begin to rival the reputations of legendary figures, eventually to become legends themselves.

 

The IJA contains its vanguard of standouts, who show us the way at convention competitions and during their unseen hours of private practice in the year between them. Two decades ago, they juggled seven balls; today they're trying seven clubs. Some work on eight, nine or ten balls. None has worked out on the moon yet, but the mathematics of 1/6 gravity presents a chance to juggle more balls than a juggler has fingers and toes. The next issue of JUGGLERS WORlD will feature numbers jugglers, and explain how and why they developed their skill.

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If you missed the original telecast on December 2, there'll undoubtedly be reruns next summer of Anthony Gatto's appearance on "That's Incredible!" The 8-year-old winner of the IJA 's Juniors division competition at the Cleveland convention was flown to California and the segment filmed in August.

 

His performance was flawless, and aired without editing, said Nick Gatto, Anthony's father.

 

Anthony opened the show with a three ball routine, tossing them finally into baskets he balanced on poles on his head. He returned later in the show to juggle four and five balls, three clubs, and five rings. For a finale, he repeated the five rings while standing on one leg and spinning a sixth ring on the other leg. He finished by pulling all six rings over his neck. At age eight, that's incredible!

 

The IJA hopes to obtain a videotape of the show so that all members attending next summer's convention in Santa Barbara, CA, can see it. Already. the IJA has received videotapes of the "ABC Evening News" and NBC "Today" show pieces about last summer's Cleveland convention.

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Once again, I find the final page the toughest to fill. Preferring editorship to authorship, I've postponed the writing of these Jottings until it was the last page on the drawing board. Editing, typesetting and laying out the information you folks send in is a challenge, thrill and honor. Creating my own words for the back page is just plain hard work! As a one­person, after-hours production, JUGGLERS WORLD can only appear with a lot of help. Take a minute to do your part and send me news, story ideas, photos, and other artwork pertaining to juggling.