All of the old posts from my old website bfooter.com.
My title makes it three times. Not sure what I mean? Go read Bill Simmons article “A Sports Guy can dream…” on how he would improve sports and the world. He’s got 33 good ones. I especially liked number 31. Can someone tell me the joke behind number 32? I got an idea, but I’m not sure. Enjoy!
I also watched this movie the other night. What can I say other than Will Ferrell hit another one out of the park. I’ll admit I’m not a huge Nascar fan. I typically only watch the very end of a race if I watch any part of a race at all. I’m a big fan of the classic movie (in my opinion) Days of Thunder. Rubbing is racing!
Warning, there are some spoilers below, but nothing major…
Anyways, I saw the previews. It looked good. I wasn’t disappointed. They cast everyone perfectly in the movie. His buddy, his wife, his manager, his owner, his kids, his arch nemesis, everyone. The kids have a lot of good lines, both when they are little terrors and latter on in the movie.
I’ve also heard that Nascar helped out with the movie and even offered some suggestions to make it even more over the top. I’ve heard one of their suggestions was to break to commercial in the middle of a crash. They did. It was hilarious. Gotta wonder how much Applebee’s paid for it though, throwing a commercial into the middle of the movie.
The racing scenes, although ridiculous, are well done. I’d try to put some lines in here, but there are so many, one can’t even remember them all.
Now the movie does follow what I call the Tom Cruise plot… Raw, gets better, gets girl, gets really good, crashes and burns, looses girl, has revelation, becomes good again, gets girl back. Cruise has made millions making movies (Top Gun, Days of Thunder, Cocktail, A Few Good Men, Jerry Maguir, etc) with this formula. Too bad he stopped making them (see my rants about the MI movies).
In closing, this is a movie I’m going to try and see again in the theatre (yes, I enjoyed it that much) and will be purchasing the moment it comes out on DVD.
You may remember one of my old rants about the Mission Impossible movies and how I feel that MI:2 is one of the worst movies of all time. Now 3 was better, but still completely over the edge in terms of plausibility. Now I’d like to send some props out to my favorite football columnists again, Gregg Easterbrook. Roughly half way down his column for this week he talks about his thoughts (and his sons) about the most recent MI movie and the others. In summary, he agrees with me (although I did find MI:3 entertaining). This is in addition to his regular coverage of all things football. Check his article out and watch for it every Tuesday.
Watched Descent (a movie) earlier tonight. Didn’t know anything going in other than the one sentence blurb on the theatre’s website. Basically, I watched it in order to kill time until Talladega Nights started. But back to this movie…
Basically, it stars no one you’ve likely ever heard of. And after watching, I know for a fact that I have no plans to do any spelunking of any unexplored caves ever. I leave that to others. Caves that have been well explored and host lots of tourists, I’ll still go through, but nothing unexplored. There is just way too many things to go wrong. I’ll get my adrenaline rushes elsewhere. This is much like after watching Open Water, I have no plans to go diving in Open Water in a large group. I don’t trust people’s abilities to count everyone that gets back on the boat and, although I’m a pretty good swimmer, I have no desire to swim out in the middle of the ocean.
Back to the movie again… For a horror type movie, it was actually pretty good. Nothing that makes you go wow, but there were definitely some spots that sent a chill through my body, and the first one lingered for a while.
About all I’ll say about the plot is 6 women drop into an unexplored cave and things go bad from there. A highlight… one women literally gets a blood bath.
Like I said, if you want to see a decent horror movie, this is probably worth going to. You could also probably wait till Halloween and rent it then as well.
On a side note, it looks like they are making a sequel to Open Water.
He takes the stage about 930/1000. Largest (by far) Pat Show of the year. Usually several thousand show up for this one.
As I had mentioned, last weekend was busy, busy by my own choice though. Friday after work I hit the water with John, Ronee and Jonah. Decided to put the boom on the boat and try some tumbles… Here are some action shots with some varying degrees of success.
Just stood up, face full of water
Practicing the slide for the first time…
This slide is a little better
Close up shot of a deep water start
Once again, face full of water and spray. Too far back on my heals.
More sliding… finally have good form.
Starting to spin just a little bit
Trying the tumble for the first time… form is actually OK.
One foot and face full of spray
Still on one foot, still too much spray
Really not sure here. Just a lot of spray.Saturday morning, woke up early and hit the water once again with John and Seven. My back was a little sore from the tumble turn attempts the night before, but I still did lots of footing. We even managed to share the bay with a weekend wally. He let us foot. Then he pulled his kid tubing, then he took off and we had the bay to ourselves. Between the night before and this morning, probably did 20+ foot runs. That’s lots of skiing in a short time. Lots of fun too.
Saturday night I headed up to Fox Lake to watch the Beaver Dam Must-Skis do a show at the Boathouse Pub. Not the best site for a ski show due to all of the docks and no beach, but a great place to watch a ski show. Great little bar and a fun team to party with.
After the show, went into the cool air conditioning of the bar and ordered up a pizza. Ended up being one of the best bar pizzas I’ve had in a long time. It was a simple, plain pizza, but it was delicious. The other kicker, the bar had Stella Artois on tap and they had the Golden Chalices to serve the beer in. Definitely a place to head back to.
Ended up partying the night away with John, T-Bell, Ma & Pa Bell and Marcy. Pa Bell did lots of karaoke while T-Bell also frequented the stage quite a few times. By the end of the night I had consumed enough liquid courage to also take to the stage and did my rendition of Ram Jam’s Black Betty. Here are some night to remember the night with… Luckily, there is no audio.
Whoa, Black Betty… Bam-a-lam…
T-Bell, Me & MarcyLots of random things from my inbox… Mostly from the worlds finest news source. All worth reading.
Sparrow Aviation blames glass for death… A while back I wrote about the birds that were flying into my windows. Well it turns out that I’m not the only one that views this as a problem. According to the fine reporters at The Onion, apparently sparrows view this as a problem too. Go check out this very good story.
WIKI. I’ve also seen articles about students that use the wikipedia as their only source of information for reports that they do. What they don’t realize is that the wiki isn’t always right. Now we have proof.
Nessie. Everyone remember the Lochness Monster of old. Well apparently, there really were Lochness monsters of old. I mean really old. They found skeletal remains of creatures that bear a very strong resemblance to Nessie down in the Australian Outback. So maybe Nessie is real? You can go here and come to your own conclusions.
Woods? Apparently Tiger thinks everyone let him win the European Open. You can read the official story over at our friends The Onion again.
Motocross. Ever get the feeling that the guys (and gals?) that compete in motor cross just might not have a firm grasp on the world. Well here is the articles that confirms that. Apparently, the one of the guys decided to keep going on his education and learned a little physics and now he realizes that the fact that he didn’t kill himself in his sport is a miracle.
Wired for Sight. Ever wonder exactly how much bandwidth is needed to transmit the data that your eyes interpret to your brain? No? Well apparently someone did because now we know. It is just a little shy of 10 Megabits. Not sure what 10 Megabits is? Most networks now are 100 Megabits and most wireless connection max out around 54 Megabits. Needless to say, we are all pre-wired with a pretty good network connection between our eyes and our brains.
92. Know what that number means? If you follow the Packers, hopefully the first thing that came to mind is Reggie White. He is being enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame this weekend. Here is a good retrospective on him. Check it out.
TMQ. One of the best parts of the pro football season, at least to me, is reading the very unique commentary of Gregg Easterbrook. He writes an article titled Tuesday Morning Quarterback, currently published on ESPN.com. Needless to say, he writes a very unique style of writing about football. For example, in the first article of the year he points out that in this year’s Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, he determined that of the 123 women portrayed in photos inside the magazine, 63 of them were wearing less than a complete swimsuit. He is always full of unique and interesting factoids. Go read the first article of the year and then stop back each week for more. Usually published late Tuesday morning.
Footstock. Finally, the sport of waterskiing got some real live press in a real live widely read publication. You can my rants about the lack of this earlier over here and here. OK, maybe it wasn’t live, but it was a widely read publication. The NY Times to be exact. It seems that the little town of Crandon, WI hosts an event worthy of the Times coverage. Crandon is the home of Footstock, THE endurance barefoot figure eight race to compete it. It features the largest cash prize and the most competitors. Why do the call if Footstock? Seems it is just as much a party atmosphere as the Woodstock was, but the party is about barefooting. Overall, it was a pretty good article, I just can’t get over the photo they chose to run at the top. The footer has just about the worst barefoot form one could have. Legs straight out, bent forward at the waist. Only time this position would really be OK is if you had just completed a ridiculously long run and were dead tired.
On your right, the Chuck Norris Bridge. Yes, that could be something you just might hear if you go to Budapest, Hungary on a tour. Seems they are letting the people pick a famous person to name the bridge after. Who new the Texas Ranger was that popular in Hungary? He is currently leading with 11% of the vote. I would have thought maybe the Mr. T Bridge would be a better choice. I Pity the Fools who get to live on Walker Way near the Norris Bridge. (That was just a really cheesy line so I could type in Pity the Fool… seems that is a made for TV movie coming soon.)
Must-ski Lounge? Well, that’s it for today. Check back soon for some a recap of my adventures from last weekend. Tried a tumble turn, did an obscene amount of skiing over the course of 12 hours, and went to watch the D2 State Champs put on a show at a great little bar in Fox Lake, WI in weather that was way too hot. We partied till late in the night and had way too much fun.
This past weekend the Mad-City Ski Team, of which I’m a member, competed in the Wisconsin State Show Ski Tournament. It takes place each summer on the 3rd weekend in July and has always been held in Wisconsin Rapids. It is currently held on Lake Wazeecha, about 5 minutes east of Rapids. I think that the red sand beach on Lake Wazeecha is truly the best show ski site that I’ve skied on. Finally, the Wisconsin State Show Ski Tournament is the LARGEST water ski tournament held anywhere in the world. More people take more ski runs than at any other tournament anywhere.Show Recap
Saturday morning Mad-City took to the water about 945. We had ideal conditions. Not too hot, calm winds, sunny. The sun was shining on Mad-City.
The Red Sand Beach of Lake Wazeecha – Filling Up for Mad-City
Ready for the showOur show started off with a bang, 6 backfooters made their steps (of 7) and 5 made it through the show course. Then our opening pyramid came through, a 4-2-4 and made it back to the beach losing only a couple in the corner.
Cory skiing in so comedy can be scored, barely makes his starts… blames the shallow waterNext up, montage ran smoothly, Mark made is back deep, face down in the sand, which is always a good sign. Cake made his air chair pass and Paul nailed his wake board pass like he never has, started with an air rally, then two a scarecrow, another invert and then a final scarecrow as he went past the dock.
Cake doing a front on the sky ski in montageThen our One Act Show cruises through the show course. Lake side, we start with a shoe skier doing overhead 360s. Next up, a 3 high pyramid, top two tiers consisting of all 9 year olds. Next to the pyramid, we have a couple doing doubles holding a back drape. Finally, show side, we have two guys hitting the ramp, one doing a gainer and the other a front flip. This is a hot act.
The ladies of Mad-City then did their ballet opening dance and hit the water 21 strong, nobody swimming. Both passes were good and they hit the beach clean, hand in hand and running. Music started up for their ending dance which the crowd loved. The 5 ladies toe-tapping on the bars brought the crowds to their feet.
The Ladies of Coyote Ugly hit the water… the Mad-City Girls Ballet Team
Then our first jump act hit the water. We did our rendition of the hangman which we call the Plagerizer. We have one guy do a front flip over two guys, one doing a front flip and one doing a heli. The whole jump act was clean and quick.
The PlagerizeerNext on the water was our star swivel act. We have 4 of the best swivelers in the state with 11 state championships between them. Overall it was a good swivel act, just not that much I can say about a swivel act. After swivel we do a quick transition to Big Act, which this year was a BIG ACT. 51 people strong. 7 staggered trios, 5 star swivelers (Amanda did a good job sneaking in to join the 4 swivelers on the beach). We also had a good size toe turning line and conventional doubles. Big act was clean and received a standing ovation. First standing O for a big act I’ve ever seen.
Trios landing, Conventionals coming in behind themNext on the water we have our second jump act, lost a couple jumpers on a their jumps, but still a pretty clean act. Then we go into a little fill where Adam talks about the need for announcers to have a little respect for themselves. Here he rips on Brian from RAJ for wearing a mullet last year, Rob from the Waterbugs for dressing up as a superhero and not sure who from the Webfooters dressing up with elf like shoes with bells (Adam made his own). Not a great fill, but we have more on tap, plus it is long enough for us to setup our ending pyramid.
We put up a 4-3-4 that came through the show course with the theme from Superman blasting in the background.
Our Ending PyramidThis is followed up with our boat driver intro… give the skiers a little time to reset for the next acts.
The drivers of Mad-City… They make us a ski team instead of a swim team. Finally, one of the true highlights of the tournament. Adam. Evolution of Dance. Mad-City style. Some of you may have seen the Evolution of Dance video circulating the net. We took that, cut out a bunch of songs and added in a bunch of Mad-City and show skiing related songs. Adam cut a rug as I spun the tunes for what turned out to be the highest scoring act of the tournament. I know Adam spent a lot of time practicing it and I know I spent a lot of time preparing to play the music.
Our show doesn’t end there though, it keeps on going (Keep On, Keep On, Keep On…) Next act on the water was our ending barefoot act. First through the course was Cake and The Kid coming through behind the jump and looping around to come through the show course back footing. Chasing them is our barefoot pyramid. Didn’t come through the show course, but still sweet.
Finally, our ending combo-ballet-swivel act takes to the water. Our guys do a little dance on the dock and take off to make their ballet run. Following them in the ballet pattern is our girls ballet-swivel line. 37 people in the act behind two boats. The hit the beach and danced. Our show ended with the crowd standing on their feet.
Guys ballet hits the water.
The girls in the combo lineOne of the cleanest shows I’ve ever seen.
Weekend Recap
The weekend started long before Saturday morning. Thursday afternoon I arrived in Rapids. Managed to arrive just in time to watch Ann swivel and saw her ski a clean swivel routine. Next up, I watched team jump. Didn’t track the scores on paper or anything, but listened to them and tried to track them in my head. Watched the Mad-City jump team hit the water and ski our Jump I act cleanly. Didn’t expect that as our team (entire team, not just the jumpers) had been a swim team of late. Heard their scores and thought they had the lead. Watched the last teams jump and was pretty sure they had won. Wasn’t positive though. Mike Imhof did a nice job announcing from behind the speaker with our cut out of Adam sitting center stage. (I even heard a few comments from people who though it was Adam announcing.)
Our Team Jump Announcer
Team Jump: four man front flip… clean!Thursday night I hit the bars with Imhof, Ari and Tristan. Hit the Crazy Horse and had a good time. Nothing special, nothing wild though. I’ve come to the conclusion we need Cake in the house to get everybody motivated to really party hard on Thursday night.
Friday came way too early. Hit the site ’bout noon, ate some lunch, watched some shows. Caught the Must-skis show and thought they did a very good job. They had lost a lot of members from last year and weren’t expected to really compete. But with a clean show, they put themselves in the running.
After the show, went back to the hotel to regroup and then headed to the team meeting down at Heilman’s cottage. Now you may have a hard time believing this, but I’ve only really tried turkey a couple times and never really like it. They had some turkey in a Nestco, and was it ever good. Ending up eating 4 turkey sandwiches, any one of them which was way more than the total turkey I had previously consumed. I now have the recipe and will be trying it out on my own sometime.
Show walk through went well, although were still some sound/announcing/fill parts that we never really practiced… Heard from New Mike, he wasn’t going to be able to make it to head out, but was planning on being at the show…
Went back to the hotel, relaxed and got ready for the show the next morning.
Saturday, woke up bright and early and arrived at the site at 630. Prepped for the show. Show went well. Then did some R & R. Many hit the beer tent. I did a little, but mainly just for the camaraderie, I’m just not a big daylight drinker… Plus there is the fact that the cops more or less stake out the roads around the park at the end of the day.
John and Bugs at 2:24pm
A common scene in the beer tent… empty pitchers!!!On the way back to the hotel, picked up some more Spaten and Stella and a Little Caesar’s pizza. Ate, washed up, drank, drank and then drank some more (Spaten and Stella go down so easy). The bus for our now annual bus tour of Rapids picked us up at 930. Hit the first bar and just didn’t feel that welcome. One of the bartenders offered someone a case of beer if we got back on the bus. Next bar was better, but way too crowded for my tastes. The last bar was the best. We had the bar to ourselves more or less and partied hard. Dancing, foosball, bubble hockey and more dancing. We had a couple trailers from Badgerland and the Waterbugs joining us and it was ll good. Lots of fun, lots of drinking and safe rides home for everyone. Truly the way to do it.
Tristan, myself and Ari
Tristan, Seven, Brad, John and me
Libby and Me on the Bus
Me and LisaSunday morning came way too early. And I mean way too early. I stumbled out of bed to the shower to try and bring some life back in to me. I tried waking up the others in the room per their request, but no dice. When I got out of the shower, the neighbors across the hall were nice enough to be pounding on the door. Still no movement by the others, finally I just let them in and they managed to wake everyone up.
I managed to get ready and made it down to the site in time to catch Janesville. Brief review of their show, pretty clean skiing, phenomenal barefooting, intros need some work and the boat patterns weren’t good (saw way too many people getting pulled through rollers). After watching their show, I thought we had them beat, but I knew it was close and could go either way.
The rest of Sunday was a long day of waiting. Caught the Rapids show and loved it. Way small, but lots of fun. Once again, they had people ski on stuff (a half barrel and a “crapper”), the jumpers dropped their doubles and trios girls in the water when told they could go jump, and the little girl that was pulled at 6mph behind the triple rig for what seems like forever. The show course and button loop pattern takes a lot longer when you going that slow. And the triple rig needed all 450 of it’s horse to pull the little girl weighing 36 pounds though the show course.
345 HP using every ounce of power to pull a tiny listtle girl.
Want to drink and ski? Go ski on a half barrel… You’ll have plenty of beer.
Ever have an upset stomach and still want to ski, just go skiing on a crapper.Finally, the last show finished up, and the wait for the awards was really on. D2 was announced first. Congrats (once again) go to the Must-Skis for winning pick up boat, sound and 1st place overall in D2.
Now on to D1… Mad-City won Best Ballet, Highest Scoring Jump Act, Dock and Equipment, Pick Up Boats, Boat Driving, Comedy and Audio Presentation (Adam, Cory and I). The ‘nuts won best trick skier, Webfooters took home most original act, RAJ took home best bfoot act and best male and female skiers.
Adam, Cory and I => Best Audio PresentationMad-City took 1st, followed by RAJ in 2nd and the ‘footers in 3rd.
The Results – numbers may not be exact, but everything should be closeAfterwards we headed to Lake Sherwood Lodge for food, drinks and celebration. About 10pm I pulled out the video I received from Beth’s dad that day and we watched the show. Most seeing for the first time. Everybody loved it…
Joey, Paul, Libby, Bugs, Russ and Ann
John and Libby, not sure what they are doing?
Seven thinks he can dance
Bugs
Last ones at Sherwood… Libby, Bugs, Paul, John, Seven, Laura & MeI headed home about 1am, arriving home about 230… Overall, a very long weekend, but lots of fun. Looking forward to doing it again next year. But first, Nationals in August.
Here are some old shots of me jumping from a month or so ago. Just testing out a new photo tool…
Yes, I know I promised a recap of this past weekend, and it will be done soon. I just want to do the weekend justice. Here are some random thoughts and observations to hold you until I get the update done…
Bartending Big Brother – So I saw an article a while back that is sure to make every bartender just ecstatic. Turns out someone invented a little chip that measures that tilt and duration of pours from bottles to track how much alcohol has been dispensed. Together in conjunction with the point of sale system, it knows if the bartenders are making the drinks correctly and ringing them all in.
The Most UN-PC Movies Ever – Found another interesting article about the most politically incorrect movies of all time. I agreed with most of the list. Blazing Saddles and Team America are on there along with There’s Something About Mary. I thought it made for a funny read. Go check it out.
56 Inches of Delight – Here’s a TV that I’d like to have… I’d like to find my HDTV by the football season, just don’t think it’s going to happen that quick. Maybe by Christmas. This is a TV that I’ll be looking at. Looks sweet!
Window Replacement – The building I’m in at work is undergoing some renovations to make it a little nicer to work in. The other day we got an email about what would be going on and here is a quote from it:
The windows to be replaced are identified by the orange paper taped to the inside of them. Please don’t be alarmed if someone removes a window while you are sitting next to it or in a conference room. It’s legit as long as they put in a new one.
I couldn’t help but laugh. It’s only legit as long as they put in a new one.
Funny Money in Monopoly – Now I’m not talking about Microsoft’s control of the PC universe, I’m talking about the board game. Seems that keeping track of money using paper money just isn’t fun anymore. So they updated the game to use electronic debit like cards. All your money is kept in a little plastic card using an electronic reader. Now, this is pretty neat, but isn’t part of playing board games about learning things. Monopoly was always good for learning to track your money and budget it, making change, etc. and they completely took it out of the game. What about scamming the bank and hiding money or stealing from the bank… They too have been taken out of the game.
Switching Teams – Turns out Ms. Patrick, that chick that drives cars really, really fast decided to stay in the Indy Racing League, like I thought she wood. She is switching teams (pun intended) and I wish her the best of luck. I just didn’t pick her new team correctly.
Finally, congrats to the bicyclist named Landis. Seems after having a really bad day and falling 8+ minutes off the lead and everyone writing him off, he decided to come back, kick but and take names. He truly had one of the most remarkable comebacks ever. Not going to link to a specific story because there are thousands about this on the net. Go find one yourself.
Sorry in advance for the lack of pictures, you’ll get plenty in my upcoming state tourny recap!!!
Mad-City Wedge 