Jubilation.

March 22, Anthem, Arizona.

Ekaterina made soup and she brought us a pot of it. A week ago she had promised Fridman some soup when they were backstage during the show and then forgot about it and ate it all with Vasily. Today was payback.
This is the exciting news of the day, plus the fact that the circus sponsor sold such an amount of tickets the last stand had to be added in the tent to make sure there would be enough seats. General admissions tickets can be for any day, and if everybody shows up at the same time you have to be prepared to accommodate them. All the stands are not put in each time the tent is raised; the decision is made anticipating the kind of crowds likely to show up in a given place. Anthem is a small town about 35 miles north of Phoenix, and the strong sales came as a surprise. The location probably helps; we're in the local community park, what looks like a brand new park in the middle of housing developments, and a lot of people stroll by, jogging, pushing strollers, walking their dog. It was 4 o'clock when they went to work adding the stand. The show starts at 7:30. The tent was more than three quarters full, a good show.
The whole town looks like it was founded yesterday, at least what I could see of it driving in and from the look of the housing developments around us. The one across the street is called Jubilation.

Photo 1
Raising the tent.

Photo 2
Recipe for Russian soup:
potatoes
beets
black pepper
Russian contortionist.