Circus schmircus.

OK... so I promised my daughter the next time a circus came to town, we would take her. Wouldn't you know it, one showed up a week after that promise, so we packed her and her cousins into the van and down the road to the sports centre where it was held.

The whole thing felt like a warm up act. When the "hoop girls" were going at it, all I kept thinking of was Letterman's "Is this anything?" segments. Later, the ringmaster noted that their big award-winning act had actually appeared on Letterman. Hmm.

Now, I am not trying to belittle the acts these people perform. They do stuff I could ever accomplish, but then, I wouldn't actually try to balance four or five chairs on top of four champagne bottles on top of a table, then climb up on top of that mess on my hands. That, among many of the other things that the acrobats, jugglers and stunt performers presented were quite entertaining.

But I did object to the very base hucksterism (crappy "Circus Toys", special "Circus colouring books" and really lame inflatable plastic spiderman) and the between-act audience "participation" (badgering).

I balked at the $16 per adult entrance cost, too, but in hindsight, it costs $10 to see a crap hollywood film and $25 to see a decent local play or live concert. So I am not going to bitch about that. But I am going to distract my kid next year until they leave town.