Rob's Add Sum

[Mathochist]

Thank you for the encouragement, Jon. If I whip something up by worlds, it'll be just for you.

Umm, oh yea...

I hit motion first try ever back at Jazz Fest. It was from the opp. toe.

[Mathochist]

Dear world,
I hit blurry whirl, my 7th 5add. Fear not, Jon, as I swear not to abuse my newfound power, rather I shall use it only for good or for awesome.
-R

[Mathochist]

comments welcome

[janis]

nice move

[footjam_heger]

This move is awesome! One of the most stylish moves I know...
I think Kenny did that alot.

Props Rob! You gave me a good idea. In the future I'm gonna use this move. Voodoo has to be in my repertoire!

[Just call me hagesy]

nice move

i thought it was the, although i am probably wrong.

i

[Iron Clad Ben]

nice move

i thought it was the, although i am probably wrong.

First look for me I thought it was 'the'. But I watched it a few more times and I think the 2nd dex is kinda heely, but it's there. I say submit it to the online comps and let the community decide.

Props, irregardless, I've got a lot of respect for Voodoo. Being from New Orleans this had to be a dream move for you on some level. Was it your first six? You better believe XDEX counts on a move like this

BTW seeing this vid made me think of a freakin' sick concept I want to try... gyro merlin!

And yes, please feel free to visit. Austin City Limits would be a good excuse to come down, keep in mind the Houston tournament is the week after. Also as you mentioned the tickets for ACL are crazy expensive. I never go to the festival, it's overpriced and over-commercialized IMHO. South by Southwest is much better IMO, although that is starting to collapse under its own weight as well. There's a bunch of other festivals in Austin that are worth coming to town for, I'll make a list of them when I finally make a post in the J2T forum.

[Mathochist]

Thank you all for your comments; they are most welcome. I am convinced that the trick is the on the second dex. I forget which thread talks about it, but I've been reading up on the potential definitions of the one might adhere to. I like the least forgiving one: that the foot on a dexing leg should never be above the bag, like mine clearly is for the majority of my descent. So, while I'm stoked, and I mean stoked!, to be in the ball park here, I'll definitely work on cleaning that one up.

Ben, you're right about it being pretty cool to be a New Orleanean hitting voodoo. I actually hadn't thought of that, although what I'm really dying to hit, for the same reasons, is zulu warrior. I don't know for sure that stepping zulu butterfly is actually called that, but it should be, and it'd be a heckuva tribute trick to hit.

So thanks a ton, gang, for indulging me in a little prop fishing. It's good for the ego.

More to come.

[Mathochist]

Gee stinking whiz, it's been about two weeks since I last kicked anything, and I'm about to go nuts. Work has been a bit atrocious lately, exhausting both physically and mentally. The hours have been long and harder than in recent history, so that when I'm not at work, I'm too pooped to shred. Oh, I did do one demo for this girl I've been hanging out with, nothing big to report from that mini sesh. Other than that, my scant moments of free time I've numbed myself by means of internet surfing and Guitar Hero.

So I'm about beyond stoked about my trip to East Coasts this coming weekend. Actually I'm coming up early to see some sights. Then it's shred, spike, and chill until Monday. I can't wait to hang out with all my east coast people from all the other comps I've been to: those Rochester kids, NYFA, everyone else. Oh, and Cory and Eric and John and Toan and Yves and his Quebequas from the net side of things. Oh and last years retiree. This is gonna be sweet. I don't care how out of practice I am or stressed out from work I've been, I'm going to have a blast.

[C-Fan]

you're right about it being pretty cool to be a New Orleanean hitting voodoo. .

Yeah, as a New Yorker I felt especially proud to be the first New York shredder to hit Big Apple.

Good meeting you at East Coasts, hope to see you at future tournies.

[Mathochist]

Ok, so my brother moved in with me for a couple of months. I have all this Tulane detail (health ins. & financial and such) to square away. I've been working a ton to justify the week and a half I'm about to take off of work. This has left little time for footbag, especially the work part, since I do a lot of standing/running for 8-10 hours as a valet, leaving my legs pretty pooped.

That said, I did finally start training my routine last night. I'd been choreographing it in my head for a while, trying to keep it something I could do with 0-2 drops, but man my stamina's been low lately. I hope I can get it back up for worlds. I think I can. I think I can.

The good news is that where I'm lacking in stamina, my form, on both sides, is better than ever. I had two weak side firsts last night: pdx drifter & sumo, both super clean. I footed blurry drifter both sides too, so I'm feeling like I'm only two or three sessions away from hitting those.

I think I left my net shoes at Chez Pete & Vince, but I've been a lazy bastard about callling them to find out. I think it's too late to ask them to mail me the shoes with worlds less than a week away. I hope my net game hasn't died completely.

So I'm as psyched as anyone about going down to Orlando for this event. I can't wait to see all my people. I'm talking about all the Rochester flakes who missed ECC. I'm talking about all my Czechs and other Europals I haven't seen in a year. I'm talking about Tom effin' Mosher (dude I'm bringing my PT Cruiser in case you start to miss yours.) I'm talking about the slew of west coast people I still need to meet. I can't wait to kick with y'all.

[Mathochist]

I think I'll buck my trend and actually contribute to my blog with a timely update. Worlds was a total blast of course and I'm lingering all I can.

Highlights:
I met Kenny Shults and John Stalberger.
I kicked in a circle with Peter Irish and Scott Davidson.
I met Carol Wedemeyer and we chatted for like half an hour.
I played 9 square, singles and doubles.
I made it to intermediete freestyle finals.
I took third place in intermediete net, both singles and doubles.
I did exactly the correct amount of partying.
I watched Jon Schneider shove some shuffle into his game.
I got in copius amounts of chill time with said Jon.
I saw the Red Rocket rock it.

Yea, on that note, routines leapt to a whole new level this year. Many many were dropless. The choreography was great. Jim Penske surprised me with an awesome routine that reflected his huge style and still had a pretty big level of showmanship. I thought Vasek's song (a techno Mario theme) was a bit awkwardly edited, but the run toward the end with the invincible star music struck me like only a Vasek run can. Dan Ednie is my new daddy. Newly BAPtised DC did three dropless routines, a feat not achieved since Kenny Shults in 1989 (which, come to think of it, can't be much before David's birth.)

Lowlight:
My finals routine was as embarrassing as it was last year. I do like the routine I choreographed quite a bit, so I just need to rehearse the shit out of it for my next events.

Umm, that's it for now. Pics to come!

PS: John Haber says hi.

[Mathochist]

Worlds Pics

[mosher]

Such great pictures!

I think the dual behind the head guitar hero shot is great.

And I am glad to have more pictures of peng and me.

Thanks Rob!

Also, it was fun spending more time with you, you're still funny, keep it up.

[HG]

great to meet you rob! You were stylin' every day, and your routine was sweet

[Mathochist]

Being in Sam's worlds videos was super cool, even if i wasn't shredding anwhere in them. It's nice to think I'm becoming a recognizible part of the footbag community.

I am being spanked by grad school.

As such, I'm too busy to start Tulane's footbag club, so I just joined their in place juggling club. So I'm a juggler now too, although I do far more poi spinning in my off footbag club time than juggling, even though I am slowly adding to my 3 ball repertoirte.

Mostly I just wanted to do an update post to brag about Voodoo. I saw Rage Against the Machine, Lez Zeppelin, Dumpstaphunk, and the Smashing Pumpkins. Dumpstaphunk I can hear anytime, but man that's the best music for me to shred to, I swear. The other bands just plain rocked my socks. And best of all, I hit voodoo on my last two of three attempts. Each hit felt much cleaner than the one in the video above, although neither was recorded so we have only my feeling to go off of here. And voodoo aside, I had some nice long strings.

I'm starting to proceed in footbag the way I got to expert in guitar hero: dragging ass. I was so hesitant to play hard that I was totally nailing medium before even attempting hard. Similarly, I'm getting happier and happier just to have long strings in footbag, even with tons of bails, just to keep my control. I'm sure I'd rather bail than drop, and I still drop planty anyway. I'm just gonna keep playing to my ablilities.

[C-Fan]

Being in Sam's worlds videos was super cool,
.

Yeah, the best was seeing you in that suit in the background. Adds a touch of class to the community. It's like: "look at that room full of sweaty teenagers. It looks like a fight club." Then the camera pans to follow the run, and you come into view in the background: "Is he drinking a mint julep?"

I am being spanked by grad school.
.

Sucks pretty bad, doesn't it?

[Mathochist]

I still play footbag!

Although, I modify admittedly less than I'd thought I should. The details of my life are quite inconsequential, albeit I keep quite busy.

Jorden's quote that it's never a bad time to drill fundamentals has inspired me to do that, so I haven't hit much that's big lately. However, I think that those of you who know me can look for longer, more crowd-pleasing strings. Oh, yea, and scary monster. I'm also working on derivatives of that, at least one of which I'd like to name. I know some of us think that there are too many tricks unnecessarily named, but I think it's fair for each of us to aspire to contribute uniquely to the sport and call dibs on some recognition for it. That and I've long been of the opinion that there needs to be a trick called Trogdor. So there.

[C-Fan]

I think unique downtime components should be named, especially when they have unwieldy long names.

You coming to Adrienne's tourney next month? It'd be cool to catch up.

[Mathochist]

So this is the time of the year when I get all excited about Jazz Fest and write up some blog entry about how everyone needs to come down and join me for kicking and jazz and other such fun. Happily, I can say this year that one of y'all is in fact doing that. Jon Schneider's coming down for both weekends, and I guarantee that he'll have a blast.

Because of Jon's visit, this is going to be a bigger Jazz Fest for me than ever before. Further pushing the excitement envelope is the lineup this year: Robert Plant, the Raconteurs, Stevie Wonder, Billy Joel, Carlos Santana, Sheryl Crow, Jimmy Buffet, Widespread Panic, Elvis Costello, Randy Newman, Bobby McFerrin... the rest of the list is at www.nojazzfest.com/.

My perennial Jazz Fest conundrum is that because it's such a footbag conducive environment and it means so much to my footbag persona (it's where I started), I've always wanted to host a footbag jam to go with it. But invariably I kick all day inside the event, to such an extent that organized kicking on top of that would be overkill. That said, I'd like to extend the same invitation to the community that I do every year: come on down. Mark, Andrew, Jon and I will be kicking up a storm. The music and food and art and crowd will be unforgettable. Contact me soon enough and there may be crash space for you.

It will be during the last weekend of April and the first weekend of May, in New Orleans, Louisiana.

I can't wait to share this experience with you.