Ants, and other comments on creepy crawlies

Last night I performed the puppet show of The goat in the chili patch for the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library. I changed my mind about the ant puppet I'd made, using instead a truly icky plastic ant I painted red:


The choice of the paintbrush to show scale isn't random. I used the paintbrush as a rod for the ant, so my fingers wouldn't be visible. It worked. The daughter of one of the librarians last night noticed that I used a paintbrush, so I told her how I look around my house in search of useful stuff when I'm working on a show. This was as she was helping me pack up. She said, "I like helping famous people." I love that.

I've had some funny additions to the show. On Tuesday in Hiawatha, as I was explaining that removing the animals from the old lady who swallowed the fly (via an opening at the top of her back) was a delicate operation requiring a surgeon's hand, a young boy asked, "Did you scrub?" Yes, indeedy. Then last night in Topeka, at about the same point, two girls (ages around 6 and 7) started making beeping noises. "Ah, the hospital monitors are working well."

When I tell The goat in the chili patch, I ask the kids which animals came to tell the goat to get out of the garden. The usual suspects turn up--pigs, chickens, sheep. Sometimes they suggest tigers and lions. It works just as well. In the puppet show with stage, I even put a lion puppet in.

This is a good summer reading theme. I'm a bit tired, having done 33 shows since May 30 (yes, some days have more than one show), but I'm still having fun. That's key.

Improv with puppets

I wish I had a picture of the baby puppet and Maynard the Moose doing improv together at the Cape Girardeau Storytelling Festival last weekend. Of course, Willy Claflin and I were there as well, but the puppets did all the heavy lifting.

To begin, Willy asked the audience for a problem and an animal.

Problem: Tattoo removal.
Animal: Marmot.

It turned out to be a tattoo of a chicken, on the marmot's head. First the marmot tried to scrub the tattoo off. Then he went to the zoo, where the elephant worked on it. Then he went to the dermatologist, who used a sanding block.

I thought the baby could have come up with a better last choice, but it seemed to go over well. It was our first try ever at this kind of improv. I wonder if we'll get another try at it later this month, at the Mid-Missouri Storytelling Festival.