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Last night we did our first Phoenix Swords show of the year. It totally broke the record of coldest show ever.
For the last 9 years the title has been held by the New Year’s Eve show on the frozen lake in New Hampshire. (http://phoenixswords.atthefaire.com/galleries/2005/2005_new_year/index.html )

But, this show totally broke that record. Over the last 298 shows, we’ve only done 8 that were below freezing. And, this by far the coldest:

It was a night time show, so my wife and I didn’t even start getting ready until the sun was going down.

It was a pirate themed festival at a pub, so we had to dress as pirates. My wife looked much more piratical than I did.

Then, we set off into the night.

We were being joined by our Consulting Advisor Jeff’s people out in western MA. He has a sword study group at one of the colleges there and had some students willing to supplement out numbers.
They seemed nice. We did get together for a small bit of practice before the actual show.

Then, over to the pub in question. We were being paid in food and drink. But, got to sit inside to eat it, which was nice.

Our performance space was a snowy lawn next to the pub.

Not a frozen lake, but still slippery. But, we’ve had worse.

A lot of these photos are from video capture, so I’m not sure how good they will be. But, it’s what I’ve got.

The two students did their sword fight first. They had never performed in from of an audience before. All things considered, they did fine.

Then my wife and I did our sword fighting. The audience seemed to like it when she (pretended) to hit me in my face with her shield.

Then, we switched to fire stuff.

My wife set herself on fire and ate fire. The late night crowd at the pub seemed to really like this.

My wife did not give them the finger with both hands, no matter what the video might suggest.

(She’s actually holding the torches she was using…)

You know that question of "what happens if you set your fuel on fire?" Now we know.

I entertain the crowd while my wife puts it out.

It was only one jar of fuel. Once the first flash was over it wasn’t bad.
Or, so I think. I was facing the crowd…

Then fire swords. They do make a fire ball when you hit them together.

The whole show was only 10 minutes long. But, asking a bunch of pub goers to stand in 6F/-14C to watch you longer than that would have been very mean.

OK, OK. Animated GIFs…