JugglePro is based partly on site-swaps, a mathmatical notation developed by several jugglers within the last few years to describe ascyncronous patterns (ones in which both hands are not throwing balls at the same time). JugglePro has even gained some recognition outside the art, being featured in a Wall Street Journal article on September 9, 1993.

 

In site-swaps, a number is assigned to each type of throw. For instance, each throw in a five-ball cascade is referred to as a "5," and each throw in a three-ball cascade is a "3." Handing a ball from one hand to the other is a"1".  So in a 5-3-1 site-swap pattern, you would start with three balls. (Determine the number of balls needed by adding the numbers, then dividing them by however many numbers you added: (5+3+1)/3 =3.) Throw the first as if you are starting a five-ball cascade, the second as if you were juggling three in a cascade, then pass the third ball from one hand to the other.

 

It was probably Bruce "Boppo" Tiemann's Renegade Stage performance in Fargo which started the site-swap comedy craze. His long, mesmerizing routine was designed to teach jugglers about this mathematical system. While juggling, Boppo called out the appropriate site-swap number for each throw of his patterns, a staggering feat when he began juggling six and seven balls in myriad ways.

 

Soon, parody acts emerged. One act featured a three-ball cascade in which the performer called out the site-swap numbers ­ nothing but 3's. One St. Louis woman playfully called out site-swap numbers during her flaming baton routine. When she spun the baton around her waist and chest, she called out numbers representing her measurements: 34, 26, 34. And even Dan Holzman couldn't resist a crack about "computer nerds" when announcing a site­swap workshop hosted by Carstens and his friend Boppo.

 

But Carstens, now in his first year of graduate school at the University of Florida at Gainesville, wasn't offended. He was just happy to see a mainstream

audience interested in "The Mathematics of Juggling," which is the name of a workshop he has taught at juggling fests in the Midwest.

 

Carstens' primary claim to fame in the world of juggling and computers is that he incorporated "multihand notation" into JugglePro, a system which comes up with patterns for any number of hands.

 

There aren't many juggling programs on the market, and JugglePro is apparently the only one that can develop and show patterns that use more than two hands. And why would anyone want to learn pat­terns that call for more than two hands?

 

For passing balls, rings and clubs, of course! Besides, Carstens quips, "What if there's a three-armed alien?"

 

Carstens got the idea for multihand notation, which he calls MHN, from talking with other jugglers on the Internet computer network. They discussed notation systems so much, in fact, that they had to set up a separate computer subnetwork to talk about them because "everyone got tired of us talking about that."

 

"I first came up with the notation and the mathematics behind it," Carstens said. "The computer program came out of a desire to see all of this stuff in action. It was a very simple program at first."

 

But the program has become increasingly complex, and although it has help screens for each function, Carstens acknowledges it's too math-oriented for the average juggler. The next update of the program, version 3.6, will be easier to use, he promises.

 

Despite having little free time, Carstens still is excited about his next juggling project: a book he jokingly describes as "Site Swaps for the Complete Klutz."

 

Cartens plans to write a section in the book about MHN, but the main writer will be Allen Knutson, a Brooklyn, N.Y., juggler who was half of the winning ball passing team in the numbers competition in Fargo. The idea for the book came from Greg Cohen, owner of Infinite Illusions in Tallahassee, Fla. Cohen plans to publish and sell the book, which will probably come with a copy of JugglePro, Carstens said.

 

"It should be something that (will allow) a juggler who knows nothing about notation to pick it up and learn the notation, and they should be able to look at any example of site swaps and know what it means," Carstens said.

 

Despite the fact that he has attended five IJA conventions and is solid with five clubs and seven balls, Carstens hasn't enjoyed the name recognition that some performers with similar juggling talents have.

 

That's because he only recently began performing. "I don't have any desire to become a famous juggling entertainer," he said. "I think it will always just be a hobby for me." He did, however, take two juggling jobs last summer, working as a street performer in St. Louis and then as a cowboy-juggler at Silver Dollar City, a Branson, Mo., amusement park with a Western theme. "I always wanted to have fun with juggling and I'm finding now that I can have fun with it and entertain people at the same time. And make money, because I need the money," he said.

 

He used the money to payoff his debts from the Fargo festival and to start pursuing his master's degree in electrical engineering.

 

Carstens was born and raised in Rolla, a small central Missouri town that is the home of the University of Missouri-Rolla and its mascot, the Miner. While attending the local engineering school, Carstens was one of the founding members of the Miner Attractions, the university juggling club.

 

If he's ever well-known, it will more likely will be for his work in developing computers that use photonics (light rays), rather than electrical signals. He's been studying the new field, which he hopes will revolutionalize the computer industry.

 

Carstens has gone a long way since teaching himself to juggle at age 11 after watching Gilligan (the one on "Gilligan's Island," not Jay) juggle three balls. He threw the balls in the air and they never came back down. But Carstens wasn't fooled. "Someone at the top of the set caught them," he said with a smile.

 

Gerry Tritz covers city government and crime for the Jefferson City News Tribune in Missouri's capital. He lives with Sid, his ball python.                                            ~O