Item #45 - Go Surfing

One of my favorite arguments is the classic "what's a sport?" debate. So in an effort to encourage discussion in the comments, or in an effort to just piss some people off, here are Alan's 2 simple guidelines to what is and is not a "sport" - it must be objective, and it must be athletic. See the handy dandy chart below.

Rule #1 - There must be a concrete and objective scoring system.

So Rule #1 typically pisses off the following types athletes - figure skaters, gymnasts, cheerleaders, half-pipe snowboarders, divers, etc. Because if there are judges (as opposed to a referee or umpire), then I'm not buying it. The engineer in me thinks judging these events is like grading an English paper. Just too much subjectivity.  Maybe I'd be OK with it if you increased the sample size and instead of having 10 judges from different countries, you have 1 from every country in the UN. Either that, or have every competitor have the exact same goal, AKA, they all do the exact same routines. Everyone keeps doing triple axles. You fall, you're out. Last man standing wins. That's concrete goodness! Take your artistic merit and go back to the ballet, hippie.

Rule #1 Tough Call - boxing. At least, when it goes to a decision. A knockdown in which one man is barely alive and bleeding profusely is a fairly good indication of a winner. But with just 3 judges, and fights often getting split decisions, its too damn subjective to just pick a winner. And in the spirit of the previous paragraphs, I say bring back the early 1900's and have every fight go like 100 rounds so that there will always be a winner, preferably one with a handlebar mustache. The cock fights I saw may not have been humane, but at the end of each one, there was no question about who won.

Rule #1 Disclaimer - These people are ABSOLUTELY "athletes". 90% of female college gymnasts could kick my ass (please don't hurt me Lisa). But, these are "athletic competitions" to me, not "sports".

Rule #2 - An ample amount of "athleticism" must be exhibited

Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart once said about porn "I shall not today attempt further to define (it), . . . but I know it when I see it." Well, that's the same with the "athleticism." Darts . . . no. Billiards . . . no. Bowling . . . no. Poker . . . you're an idiot. Golf . . . now we start to see the gray. PGA Tour golf? No. It's no more taxing than being a hippie on a disc golf course. Playing 18 on the weekend, but while carrying your own clubs? Maybe, because now we're actually bringing a little stamina into the equation. Speed Golf? Hells yes.

Rule #2 Toughest Call - Baseball Pitchers. A lot of people can argue against golf simply saying the words John Daly

This man won 2 majors

Well, David Wells = John Daly. And CC Sabathia isn't exactly helping the cause either. But, since theoretically every pitcher has to "sprint" to a ball occasionally to field it, and every NL pitcher has to "sprint" to first base if they ever actually make contact, they just barely qualify. Sprinting is required in the sport of baseball, its just that some of these guys are really, really, really shitty at it.

Rule #2 Disclaimer - These folks may not be athletes, but becoming a pro at these "games of skill" is still near impossible. I like golf. I play golf several times a year. Yet, a few weeks ago, instead of walking 100 yards from the 15th to 16th holes, I walked 100 yards to the parking lot to leave early because I could've probably thrown a ball further than I could have hit one. I've gotten better every single year I've been playing soccer, however, I could probably play my 12 year old self right now at golf and win by maybe a stroke. It's embarrassing.

So to quickly summarize with examples:

Anyway, I kind of wanted to try a new sport during the last year, but the closest I came to that was the trapeze  and the unicycle. So I figured if I did one more "athletic competition", 3 halves would make a whole (I should be better at math). So I headed down to Narragansett RI for some surfing lessons with my friends Ryan and Sarah (Narragansett Beer, while arguably the best cheap beer around, is not actually made in Narragansett).

Surf Lesson #1 - Be an adult and don't stare at the instructor's metal peg leg. Yes, our surfing instructor had a metal peg leg . . .  and he was a bad-ass. And being someone who loves to break the tension by using humor as a crutch, I totally appreciated the fact that he made a joke about it before anybody every said anything (not that I expected anyone to say anything. But, trying to figure out the logistics of surfing with a peg leg may have made someone inquisitive enough to say something). But he absolutely made a joke about sharks getting his leg, and I absolutely enjoyed it. And to answer any lingering questions, I think his peg had a suction cup on the end of it (he didn't actually get on a board during the lesson).

Surf Lesson #2 - Learn to pop up on your board while you're still on the beach, and try not to look like a total tool while doing so. Lesson 2B is hard.

Lesson #3 - Show up with upper body muscles. Considering I hadn't lifted weights since sophomore of gym class when it was required, I did not pass lesson #3. This lesson I didn't expect, but I learned about it pretty quickly when we got out into the water. The hardest part of the day was a combination of timing the waves as they came in, and getting yourself up to speed to actually catch the wave. That meant lots and lots of paddling, and lots and lots of disappointment about not having enough arm strength to get your damn board up to speed as your watch a fantastic wave go by. Luckily, Bad-Ass Instructor Guy was there to occasionally give us kids a push. Thanks dad.

And that's about all there was to it. The longest I ever stood on the board was probably a whole 3 seconds, but considering the size of the waves and the minimal time they actually existed, I'll take it. So I spent a lot less time on the board than when I first learned to snowboard, but this time I got to walk away, instead of having to waddle away with a sore ass.

Item #44 - Run the Brooklyn & Manhattan Bridges

In #43, I went to NYC to go to a Mets game and finish out the 30 stadium tour. The game was at 1:00, and there was a Michigan game at 8:00 that night (why explore all that NYC has to offer when you can stay inside and give yourself multiple heart attacks watching a college football game!), so I had a few hours to kill in between. So earlier in the week, before heading down, I decided to keep up my running and at least spend 45 minutes touring NYC by doing a 5 mile run. I was staying with my buddy Aaron in Brooklyn, so I could do the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan Bridge on the same run. Convenient . . . until this news item came out:

U.S. security forces in high alert after the latest intelligence information said the militant group Al Qaeda planning to detonate a car bomb on the bridge or tunnel in the city of New York and Washington DC at the 10th anniversary 9 / 11 attacks, this weekend.

Just great. But rather than pick a different non-bridge-crossing route, or not run altogether, I said fuck it, and proceeded as planned. Because if I didn't run, I'd be letting the terrorists win, right? And after having been in NYC September 7-9 of 2001, I had always wanted a NY disaster story of my own (see Item #25). So maybe this was my chance. I could be running on the Brooklyn Bridge, have a bomb go off in the middle, breaking the bridge in 2, and then I would have to pick up the nearest child and sprint back to land as a hero, as the rest of the bridge continued to crumbled behind me. Or more likely, something would explode and I would curl up in a ball and start crying, as the children around me pointed and laughed, because I freaked out over an M80. Yeah, that's the more likely one.

The obvious spoiler to the story is that nothing happened. However, I did get a little freaked out on the bus ride down to the city. Right before crossing into Manhattan, less than 100 yards from the bridge (coming from the Bronx), our driver, who was either Arabic of Afghani,  pulled over to the side of the road. He didn't say anything. He just got up, went to the back of the bus and closed the door. My first thought? Well, we're dead.  We're near a bridge.  He's wiring up his bomb. This thing's gunna blow. But after a couple, I stopped being an irrational profiler, because our driver finished his poop break and got back to driving. A bathroom break with just a few miles to go wouldn't normally make sense, but thanks to the added security from the aforementioned threats, it took us another 45 minutes to get halfway down Manhattan to our stop. Our driver knew that. Your idiot author did not. So much for being a bad-ass.

Eventually I made it into Brooklyn and then to the Mets game. And afterwards, I took the following route, which proved to be pretty interesting for a threat-level-midnight kind of weekend.

A - The view from the Manhattan Bridge looking downtown and to the Brooklyn Bridge. Perfect time of day that lead to a postcard-esque view of the city. And "postcard" is an apt word as I certainly looked like a tourist trying to get on the Manhattan Bridge. There was only one pedestrian lane open, and there was a sign that said "bikes only." So I kind of puttered around looking for another path across, not wanting to be yelled at by the scary New Yorkers. Eventually I asked some lady on her bike, and she was perfectly nice in telling me that the bike path was the only way to get across, as I'm sure she then inaudibly muttered "pussy ass tourist."

From mile 1-2 I ran through Chinatown and its countless street vendors. Chinatown grocery vendors + big city smog/sewer/piss smell does not equal a pleasant running air. Somehow I made it through though without purchasing a live chicken.

B - 10 year anniversary of September 11? Of course I had to run by Ground Zero. The new tower was obviously not done, and the memorial wouldn't be open until the next day, but that didn't stop the area from being flooded by people, included a dude ranting and raving about the US and Muslims while in full traditional garb. I'm all for free speech and freedom of religion, but dude, have you met some of the people from this country? Sometimes common sense needs to prevail. That guy was basically asking someone to recreate the Die Hard Harlem scene for him.

C - Coming back across the Brooklyn Bridge. For a site that may have been target #1 based on the report mentioned above, this place was even more hopping than Ground Zero. You want to put a threat on our bridges? New York says "Fuck you, we're doubling on foot traffic on it." America . . . fuck yeah.

D - Shots from the end of the run, just outside my friend's apartment, looking at the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges. From just outside my apartment, I can see a Starbucks and a nail salon . . . I'm slightly jealous.

So I didn't get blown to bits (despite 1 instance of irrationally fearing it), but nor did I get to save my own life by showing off my wheels, running from a collapsing bridge. Eh, we'll call it a win-win.