I don't even really know where to start.
I guess I may as well just start on Saturday the 9th. I woke up sometime well before noon and got right to finding all my shred stuff (which is also the only clothes I ever wear anyways) and got organized for the ERIK CHAN BIRTHDAY JAM!
I ran downstairs (*i kept thinking 'holy shit holy shit holy shit fooootbaaaaaaggggggg!!!'*) and my dad fired me up some eggs and bacon
I love my parents! All fueled up I grabbed my backpack strapped on my ninja fire blades (lavers) and grabbed the car keys and I was off. I got a PM from Andrew from Toronto the night before and he said to come around 12:30 though I was pretty certain that the Brantford crew was coming around 11-ish. It turns out they came at 10:30 or so. They are so keen, I love it!I got to drive my mommy's new Subaru Forester. It is a gem to drive, I think I want to own a Subaru one day! Anyways, I pulled up to Front Street which is the main front side of Union Station, Toronto's central train station. Out front was a breathtaking sight. There were about half a bakers dozen shredders PLAYING FOOTBAG! Wheee!! This was gonna happen for real I kept thinking!
I pulled in at 12-ish and I saw a bunch of familiar faces that I was really happy to see again. And I am also starting to see why footbag grows on you so much, I feel like footbaggers really get to know eachother way better than people on any other kind of forums. We have such mature chatting on here and to add to it we post videos of ourselves physically growing together. It's unbelievable how much better so many people have gotten during the time I have been a part of this community, one of my favorite parts of this game is seeing my friends getting better and loving it as much as I do.
Ah shit, sorry I went off on a tangent.
I saw all the Ontario All Stars Johnny Superman and Jarrett Hutton and Atom(Smasher) and Adam Dexter and Jon Haber and Paul Toews.
WHOAAA!!! My mind blew up but I kept my composure (just take my word for it) and instantly ripped my pants off to prepare to bust. I had my short shorts and lavers on already, naturally, so I didn't have much 'changing' to do perse so I was ready to go. I perused the selection of bags that people brought. (Bag highlights for me were: Paul Toews' SuperChoice Lonn, Andrews bag (perhaps also a lonn?), my new emerging superstar footbag MAX CHOICINGTON (my new felix straight from nova scotia), and secret shredders bag but that's later)
So we started shredding. It was so fun to see other lavers whipping all over the place, footbag words were floating in the air to my delight aswell.
I don't remember hitting too much stuff there, that was really just warm up time. (Though I remarked then that I though Jarrett had gotten alot better.) They were all warm since they had been playing for a little while.
We were hanging out waiting for Erik (effing) Chan to arrive. I remember calling out "EERRRIIIIKKK CHAAAANNNNN!!!!" at one point but there was no reply.
At around 1 I called Camille, she informed me she wouldn't be coming till later and meeting up with us and that Andrew and Erik said they would meet us at Union at 12:30. So we played the waiting game and then we played hungry hungry hippos.
A short ways into the waiting game someone stopped to point out "Hey look, it's Andrew, Eli and Caro!"
(a collective)
What.... ? .... ?
Ok, so this was for real. Andrew showed up with Ellis Piltz and Caro Bourgoin. I'm serious.
They came down as a surprise for Erik's birthday.
I'm serious.
So we mobilized and headed out for University of Toronto campus to find a good spot to shred. I still had my car illegally parked at the side of the road so it was real convenient for hopping in and heading out. I hollered out that I was driving there and so anyone could join. I hopped in (no guests yet), fired up the Surbaru (so smooth) then in hops .... uhhh.. hole in brain ... uhh.. PAUL TOEWS (I think, wait.. no.. I don't know.. jon?) and his knowing the streets was good because I had no idea where I was going. And to my surprise Eli and Caro hopped in too.
'Delightful!' I cheerfully thought to myself. I pulled out and got the first direction given and off we went. That vehicle really moves smoothly, it feels so light at all times. Light yet attatched to the road.
We pulled in to the U of T campus and as we were pulling in through the main cobblestone pathway we came across Erik (effing) Chan!
I pulled right up onto the sidewalk and hopped out and shook his and Marita's and her friends' hands excitedly. They were real! They were here!
He seemed like a movie star to me man. He is such a truely nice guy and it's great to see him so happy with Marita (who is a splendidly nice girl).
I hopped back in the car and we circled around trying to find a spot. There was a wedding on so most the usually empty spots were full. We found a nice illegal one and left the car there. We went back to where Erik was and I tore off my pants again.
Shortly after our arrival the walking posse showed up at which point I pointed out the obvious huge advantage our horseless carriage provided us.
We all started warming up and doing our thing. Here was this big ass posse of shredders. In fact, the biggest posse that has ever assembled to shred in Ontario EVER! I really feel that that is a huge accomplishment because it was thrown together on such a whim and it drew together alot of shredders that represent various areas of Canada's growing scene.
Johnny and I had another stupid challenge that was roughly parallel to the flower jumping in sensibility. Starting on one large cement block you had to walk on the tops of meter high bike rack poles. These were straight up poles with semi-rounded caps on them. They were about 5 feet apart and I think there were around 8 so it was quite a journey to the other large cement block at the other end. We tried several times making it to the 4th or so each time. Johnny had one close try where he made it to 6 and fell trying to get to 7 and almost smashed himself on the sharp corner of the block. I wound up making the full walk and hopped off the last block proudly. (For the record I also cleared the flower bed and sealed it once
)Shred began! Circles formed and people warmed up. This was all so exciting.
Also, right now I just realized how FlexThis can post such long posts, there are just so many frigging details to cover. I havn't even gotten to the shred!
Ok, so it was somewhat windy outside so some people were bitching
. I said to use a small heavy bag and tough it out but they wanted to be whiny babies. Before moving inside I ventured across the street to where Eli and Caro and Erik and Johnny were circling. I felt bad because I made it the fifth dude and that's harsh. I just reeaally wanted to get to play with those people. They were shredding with a Mike Wilson bag. It was super plush and squishy like a Carol. The wind was kinda being annoying and it would interrupt shred now and then. I felt unsure what to do when it was tossed to me and I dropped the toe stall (I don't get passed to that often) and then pick it up. I felt dumb passing it to Johnny because I knew he would just pass back, but I had all these people that had been playing for years and years and years (I remarked to Eli as we were walking along a street later that night that he had been playing 12 times as long as me) and I was afraid of doing stuff wrong I mean... they've been in infinity billion more circles than I ever have and I figured everyone knew the 'correct' way to do things. I self-served without passing to Johnny or anything once or twice after dropping the toes and then stopped and asked if that was kosher, they said it was cool. I need to play with more people more. I need a bigger club. I commented that it would be amazing to have weekly club meetings with that many people. Sigh, one day. It was so cool to actually be in a circle with those people.. seriously.. I can't even describe what it was like to be so close to these superhero's of mine.
----
When we were drving over to the jam I remember I kept looking in the rearview mirror because I saw that sitting in my backseat were two people that I had had as background on my computer and who I had frame-by-framed before and there they were sitting in my car.
----
We moved a few hundred feet away to a relatively inactive building and went up to the second floor. It was well lit and it had thin carpet over cement floors, perfect! We all dumped our stuff off and a few of us were sorta wondering if we would get kicked out. (no pun intended)
It was a real cool place with big dramatic stair cases and a big open multi story room next to us. A third or so of the walls were glass. Also on a few occasions the bag got kicked down to the lobby and a passerby or the shredder that kicked it had to go down and get it.
Again circles formed and shred ensued. What commenced was probably one of the coolest experiences I have ever been a part of. It was uninterrupted pure fun for hours and hours!
I got in a one liner that I thought was really funny (I love myself). Andrew had been playing really well I thought (He has improved alot since world's) and that was despite having longer than usual shorts on. Earlier in the day I encouraged him to roll the waist of his shorts up a roll or two to get the angles of the legs better for dexes and to create a bigger window. Then later on I said to him (somewhat unintentionally)
Me: "Hey Andrew, want to know why you're playing so well today?"
Him: "Why?"
Me: "Because you Rolled Up The Rim To Win!"
You really really have to be Canadian to get that one!
Johnny would do crazy stuff like.. 9 atomsmashers>rubberman>9 atomsmashers
Erik is the most fluid and controlled player I have ever seen. It was incredible when he would do long all ducking/diving strings. I had seen him play so much in his movies it was amazing to watch it in person.
Hah, and same goes for Caro and Eli!!
Man can they bust!
I had fun circling with everyone. Billy from Toronto and Camille wound up showing up eventually to join in the shred. I had met Billy this summer when I ran into him and Paul T at a wakeboard contest completely randomly. That day we shredded away while wakeboarder bra's watched in amazement as Paul made it go behind his head before the super jester stall (they missed the pixie part of the pheonix
)Jon Haber is proving to be a very good influence on my game. He has been playing a bit longer than me and so he is hitting tricks that I plan on hitting or I am trying right now. So he is a few steps ahead of me down the learning curve so it's great to play with him. He has been putting light pressure on me to try out guiltlessness and that pressure is working well.
Also, Johnny and Jarrett from Brantford are really good to straight up session with. They both are good sources of trick tips and advice and both can spot the errors in the tricks I am trying which really helps to hammer out a kink in a trick. And they are great fun guys to boot!
I hit a few new things I think. stepping whirl both sides and atomsmasher>paradon both sides. I probably hit lots of other stuff that I am happy about but I will just leave those in the confidence banks and I won't vent. (I hear this is working well for David Clavens)
Lots of crazy stuff went down of course. I can't remember any specific tricks, everyone is so much better than the last time I saw them. Johnny puts on the Johnny show as usual and blows minds everytime he gets the bag.
Jarrett and Eli had a pretty long sock session which was sweet. they were trying big dexing stuff. (I showed Eli some of my frantic attempts.. which I can't believe in retrospect.. how thrilling of a sport is this?!
)As the day got later we wrapped up the shred semi-reluctantly, there were people who just couldn't put the bag down and give it up. That's integrity!
We packed up our gear and stretched and all that and headed out. Once we reached Young Street we sadly parted ways with the charming Brantford Boys. I really really honestly like every damn one of them so much. They are genuinely nice guys that are so much fun to hang out with. They are funny and a good solid crowd. I eagerly await each chance to shred with them!
We hugged goodbye and headed to get some dinner.
Before going into the restaurant a few of us went into a head shop that Jon was excited to visit. Jon was purchasing some rolling papers and the dude working the desk was undeservidly rude to Jon. He was just being a jerk with his tone and stuff. Oh well, I am sorry for harshing cheech's mellow.
Andrew, Jon, Myself, Caro, Eli, Erik and Marita wound up at a Thai restaurant. I got one of the two English named dishes (Andrew got the other) Chicken with Penut Sauce. (I felt like an idiot when I had to look back in to remember the name of it when it was in English)
I remember that Marita didn't finish hers and I was still hungry and I wanted it soooo bad but I didn't know if she wasn't done and I didn't know if Erik was going to have any and so I didn't ask for it and it went to waste
)The food was delish and the chat was sparkling. They all got milkshakes and I was jealous but I resisted the urge to get it. My meal kicked ass anyways and my iced tea from a can couldn't be beat by any silly mango milkshake.
When dinner was done and the bill was paid we left the restaurant and Jon and I parted ways with the posse and headed to my car.
We got there and found it incredibly ticket free despite a day in an illegal spot. We procrastinated leaving for a little longer and kicked the bag around a bit and passed to the left a little too.
We hopped back in the Subaru to take Jon to the bus station because the night was finally over.
OR WAS IT!!!!!!???
Yes, the frigging story goes on!!
We got there at 10:30 and found out that his bus home wasn't until 11:30 which meant that we had time to bring our dream of shredding in the big open bright area in the front of the Eaton Centre to fruition!!
The spot was great for shred so we hurried over. In this spot playing for 45 minutes we would have been witnessed by several thousand people.
We had several comments about how we were the best Hacky Sackers they had EVER seen!
One dude named Dave came up and joined us for a while. He was blown away by our ninja skills. I told him to check out footbag.org. I should really go see if he did.
Anyways, after shredding right up until 11:20 we took Jon to the bus terminal and he headed out.
I drove home with a huge smile on my face listening to some delightful classical music sailing along the highway all the way to my bed in Oakville.
I can say with confidence that this will always be one of my most favoritest days ever. It was all just so incredible and surreal.
Thank you to everyone that played any part in this weekend, it was all so fun.
(To Come Tomorrow.. Shred with Jon in Guelph from today.)
