Delirium

Cirque du Soleil’s new show, Delirium, is in town.  Four of us went to last night’s show …wow.  This is the third Cirque show I’ve seen, and I still can’t find words to describe them.  In talking about it afterwards (well, not so much talking as staring slack-jawed at each other) we all agreed:  You can’t explain one of these shows to someone who’s never seen one, you have to experience it yourself.

What I can say is it’s very different from what you’d expect from a “typical” Cirque show.  The other’s I’ve seen (Alegria and Corteo) were more “circus-y” with positively unreal acts of physical coordination, dexterity, and teamwork, all performed to a bed of original music.  Delirium is (for lack of a better description) the exact opposite.  It’s more a concert than a circus, where the music takes center stage and the circus acts (lesser in number, but not in intensity) augment the songs.  Truly outstanding.

This is a short-run show (only 2 nights) in cities across the US and Canada, and it’s opening up in more and more of them.  I know I’ve said it before, I’m going to say it again, and I’ll say it after every Cirque show I see:

Go … now.

Patents are meaningless

Either that, or the people in the US Patent Office bottomed out in the ennui department. John C. Dvorak caught this little ditty this morning demonstrating the breadth and depth of intelligence of our federal "intellectual property protection system". The patent owner's a fellow Minnesotan ... though I'm not certain what that means (if anything). I'm in the wrong line of work. To heck with trying to win the lottery, I'm gonna file patents for:

• Dangling the legs in the water creating sinusoidal ripples
• Riding a bicycle
• Walking a dog ... wait ... too obvious ... walking a cat
• Holding a pencil to apply graphite to a paper surface

Then I'll sit back, relax, and sue everyone for ... living