Wasabi: M(s)+J = BLAST

[Wasabi]

I've been in a really big slump lately. I just can't seem to get any work done, have no motivation to play footbag, and my head hurts every time I wake up in the morning and go to sleep at night. I've stitched a bag in the past week, but I have no inspiration to start on any new projects; I should post a picture of it up soon.

My summer class is almost over, but I have a lot of paperwork that I have to cover within this week. A lot of late work. I'm not feeling the desire to accomplish such condensed material at the moment - which is pretty much a loathsome burden on me this entire summer session. There is no solid excuse for my inability to accomplish tasks. I'm just a sorry human being.

I guess I'm just feeling heavily depressed right now. I'm feeling really lonely, and I don't know what to do about it. I've been drilling a lot, attending NYFA sessions however I can, and trying my best to improve my game. I think I need to be in more intimate relationships; more solid and reliable friendships. Yeah, i could get a girlfriend, but the choices I have now seem to have me pinned into a risky corner. The only friends I have are those in NYFA and I guess stoners from Hunter College. Holding back from smoking has become a really huge challenge for me, and I always end up succumbing to peer pressure. I don't know - things seemed to have gotten somewhat complicated, and I'm the one that's making it so.

Btw, Mac keyboards suck balls. This post took me a good 20 minutes to type due to the stiff keys.

I'm going to hack just a bit, and hopefully I can get some work done.

[Wasabi]

Sported my back-up pair of Quantum02s. They are grey/white. I used the G-unit laces and they look pretty fly. I feel like I wasted a good amount of time playing in my now-retired pair of Quantums because of the poor (and slightly random) Brocka mod I used on them. Like, I have really good crank, so adding a Brocka mod would make me over-crank. I guess that's why I feel like my clippers suck. I didn't have an arch support to restrict my crank, and I guess I just feel like that's partly an influence toward my bad form.

But with these new pair of Quantums, I think the material on the inside tends to fold a bit every time I crank. I'm just speculating. This has nothing to do with form or anything. I just haven't played with a pair of shoes that I haven't modded with a Brocka mod.

Anyway, I had a pretty good session on Saturday. I dropped a ton, but I had 2-3 good strings on that day. I need to maintain my focus more. I kept hesitating on pdx. mirage set from my flip clipper. The set would come out perfect, but I would sometimes hesitate in the dex because I either think the set is too high, or that my dexing leg would hit the bag. Again, I have to focus more.

I tried doing a legitimate wanton set, for shits and giggles. I had maybe 3 or 4 very good, very high sets out of five attempts. It felt really cool. It makes me feel that I can quantum and wanton mid-string, that it feels much more comfortable than atomic sets in a way. BUt yeah, shits and giggles. It's nothing I should prioritize my sessions over.

I do way too much toe moves during my strings. Legover and mirage are the main focus in my strings. I really need to devote more drill sessions and actual freestyle sessions to clippers and clipper moves. I have to at least aim for 10 contacts with this discipline in mind.

I have to drill more at a comfortable pace as well. I never find a good time to kick, since I always somehow make up an excuse not to kick. Example: "When I go to a college, I'm far away from an available shower. I don't want people to smell my stinky ass sweat." Sometimes, I feel like I have so much time kicking at college, and kicking there elevates my mood to attract people to footbag, but I always have something in my head to reject the idea of doing so. Well, I did read a blog entry from Jay Boychuck explaining this very same scenario, and he says to just do it, no matter what. I really respect his optimism, so I guess I'll just find a place to solo and kick near my house. At least then I'll be able to walk home and shower.

Clippers are coming along. I still need work on my flip clipper. I keep relying on my strong side way too much. I also have to worry about my flip toe as well. I think it's being neglected from some simple concepts, like toe > ss butter/clip/whatever.

No real highlights concerning this post. Maybe next post.

Stoked for the NYFA shred symposium! Two weeks!

[Wasabi]

Kickybag isn't fun when you're full of guilt. I need to wake up.

I'm now sewing to fill out orders; sewing to contemplate life. There's way too much paperwork for me to stress over this wonderful summer. I can't think straight. I'm also love-strickened as well, which adds to my worry. However, I feel like everything is pacing itself accordingly, and I can sit back and sigh a bit of relief for myself.

The most important orders I have to fill up are Ken's and Benny's, asap. Ken in that he is my footbag idol and inspiration, Benny for the sanctity of our friendship through footbag. I'm way behind on orders, and I want to patch up whatever I can salvage through my time stitching.

Going back to the basics, in stitching and in hack.

List of orders, to keep track:

1 32 for Sergey - trade
1 32 for Julien Cote - trade
1 32 for Richard/Esoterik - discounted sale
1 32 for Ben Rea
1 mini 32 for Guydro -sale
2 all black/white spikes 32 for Lotus - trade/sale/whichever
1 bag for Erik Chan -trade
1 standard 32 & 1 mini 32 for Nathan Cope - sale
1 32 for Alf - trade/sale/whichever
3 32s for Lauren Silberman - sale
1 replacement 32 for Benny Kellman
1 spikey 32 for Drew Martin
1 32 & 1 12 for Andrew Dunford-Kownirk.
1 replacement spikey 32 for Shannon J. Koontz
1 bag for David Suscillo
1 32 for Ken Somolinos
1 32 for Ian Brill

[Wasabi]

Okay session today. The NYFA gang went out to kick at the Coney Island boardwalk because of the Siren Festival. It was a seriously hot and humid day at the beach.

I didn't like the surface personally, since I wasn't so used to it. I can't complain about it, though, since we all decided to go and kick there anyway. You just have to make the best of what you have and shred.

No real highlights. Had some pretty decent strings, but most of them had me dropping on the simplest tricks, like same side mirage, legover and clipper. I was too distracted by walking pedestrians and children; they kept walking into the circle. I made a small jab comment that I seriously want to kick a passerby mid-string if they ever enetered a circle, whether an adult or kid, but I was only joking. I don't want to be a violent person. However, there were a couple of times when I was in a string my hands flung and hit people that came too close to me; I guess I got what I asked for. Sure enough, they feigned ignorance because it wasn't my intention to hit them.

I just felt really exhausted and dehydrated. I also had a small headache during the entire session. It could be the direct sunlight or the ocean breeze. I was outside my element, after all, and that would be littered NYC sidewalks.

Umm... highlights:

-pixies felt strong. Magellan > pixie opp legover felt really cool. I HAVE to work on flip pixie, even if I'm under the strict discipline to work only on my downtime game.
-flip clipper felt pretty good, but flip butterfly is a different story. I don't know why.
-osii felt much better, and I was predicting the bag much better than usual in some strings. They are still a bit blind, so I need to spot them better.

I don't think I worked on anything new. I had the mentality that I wanted to kill all of the challenges that people asked of me today, but the environment had a pretty big affect on me. I need to devote a pretty good mid-week session to help spruce me up (one that is before the NYFA tournament that is). This time, I want to ease up and play well and calm next Friday, so that I don't injure myself for next Saturday. It should be easy enough if I pace myself.

edit: I'm frustrated with the girl that I fancy. It's complicated. It makes me want to chain smoke again. I'm trying to suppress the habit, but I feel like it's slowly eating me away.

[bdams19]

dont smoke! that shit sucks and it wont help any of your problems. girls are complicated and crazy; a lot of the time shit happens thats beyond your control so dont get too worked up over it. talking to someone else about the problem will help to provide an objective view of the situation and can only help. i'm pretty sure smoking a pack or two will not provide the same sort of assistance.

[Wasabi]

Well, instead of smoking cigarettes or tobaccy, I instead scraped whatever is left in my glass bowl/pipe and smoked that. Yeah, gooey resin. There are definitely two things to be said about my decision on the matter: 1) I'm gross for smoking resin and 2) this is one small step for me to actually quit marijuana. Of course, you can also see this as me relapsing on my habit for good ol' Mary Jane, but I'd like to be the least bit optomistic about it. Once the glass bowl is clean, it'll be clean for good. I doubt I'll be smoking any more out of it and adding even more resin into it. It's a dirty habit.

But yeah, enough drug talk. Here's a masterpiece that I finally finished today:



Probably the best bag I've ever made, construction-wise. There are no wrinkles on the bleedholes, each hexagon appears even, and the pentagons look like pentagons. No wrinkles and bunts. Just a straight, well-gathered footbag. I'm excited on starting a new bag right now.

Possibly going to watch the Dark Knight tomorrow. IMAX ftw.

[Wasabi]

The NYFA tournament went pretty well. I don't really have much to say, because I'm the type of person that likes to live in the moment, and it becomes a bit difficult (for me at a personal level) to keep specific details on what truly happens. All I can really say is:

-Helping in organizing the tournament was really tough, but the NYFA clan really pushed ourselves to make it successful. Kudos to Barrett for being the stoic alpha leader for the entire tournament.
-Ken going dropless on his routine was amazing! Words cannot explain on how I really felt when I saw it go down.
-Jorden Moir always impresses me with his shred and juggling abilities. I am always wowed whenever I meet him at any tournament.
-Matt Cross is always really cool and really chill. It is a pleasure to have him in NYC.
-Meeting a lot of new and old faces from various locales (in the name of footbag, of course) was the greatest treat for me the entire weekend.
-This is the one tournament where I kept muscling myself through into playing more and more. I found that one child-like fascination with footbag in this tournament, and even though my legs kept on saying "no," my mind kept saying "YES! GO GO GO!!" Even though I spontaneously pulled both my quad and calf muscles spontaneously on separate occasions on Saturday, I never felt better in playing footbag with people (I did drop a lot, and though I hate dropping, it didn't get to me too much this weekend).
-I get a serious amount of ADD when I get really tired, exhausted, and sweaty after playing. Without a shower, my condition only gets worse.

I just wish I had more stamina so that I can play 6+ hours of footbag. I guess I should hit the gym and cross-train just to work on that.

Today, David Beyers, Ken David, Brian Damato and myself played some footbag. I guess we were all sore to play footbag this evening, whether it be the NYFA tournament or from other things, but we all played well. I was really psyched to play, and I just tried to hit consistent bsos tiltless strings. To my surprise, I went beyond 10 tiltless contacts consistently in a lot of my strings, where I would just typically drop at my 6th contact. My mental game just leveled up I think. I reeeeeeeaaaaallly want to hit 20 tiltless contacts now!

I think to go for 20 contact tiltless strings, I should mix it up with magellan, pixie legover, smear and pdx. mirage, since I can hit those consistently (even mid-string, but on one side due to the pixie set)). However, in being firm and stoic to keeping everything downtime in my strings, I think I should try working pickups, illusions, and bubbas (clip-ss illusion?) into my trick variety so that I can be more creative and extend my amount of contacts. I could venture into ducking concepts, but I don't think I'm confident in drilling those yet.

I also hit frontside toe blur (again?). I'm not sure if it was clean or in good form, but Brian says it's legit. Maybe the wanton set was shoe-y, so I have to clean up my toe set. I didn't work much on my uptime concepts today, but whatever else I hit felt pretty good. Still, downtime was all I wanted to work on today.

[hacksterbator]

Waylon, you pretty much said what i wanted to, but was far too outraged to say properly say in Ken's sponsorship thread. That's twice that i've seen BAPers acting like that, and it's disgusting. They are supposed to be role models for the sport, and look at what they're doing... dispicable.

[Wasabi]

edit: This post was fueled by intense emotion and naivety on my part. Said user(s) of fake accounts have deliberately made me think ill of BAP because of irresponsible comments made by them against a fellow friend of mine in the sport, whom I respect dearly. They touched a sharp note into the persona of my being.

I apologize to anyone who felt aggravated and displeased by my poor conduct on such matters, but that is the result of someone with passion and dedication toward the sport of footbag. I am sure there were others like myself that have been fooled by these fake identities, but the truth of the matter is that this is the internet and you can easily fool anyone with just a username and signature.

I still highly respect the BAP in a lot of ways, and have made a lot of friends in the BAP. I still idolize some of the people in the organization and have made strong ties with them in my years in footbag, and I gratefully appreciate those very connections to this day. What a way to make my Tuesday evening dramafied out of such idiocy.

[C-Fan]

Whoa there! Deep breaths Waylon. Everything is cool. Back in 03, 04, and 05 I didn't really understand why people got so riled up about me declining BAP, because to me BAP didn't hold the mystique it does for others. I don't think people in BAP are all that different from any other randomly picked group of footbaggers, except that people in BAP were at one time considered good footbaggers by some in the community. It is naive to say that BAP as a whole is made up of assholes, or BAP as a whole is made up of angels. Look at the NBA as a comparison. Everybody in the NBA is an excellent basketball player. Some have been convicted of rape, assault, domestic violence, etc, while others have contributed millions to charity. You can't look at Mutombo and assume everybody in the NBA is out there building hospitals in Africa, but you also can't look at the behavior of Stephen Jackson or Ron Artest and assume everybody in the NBA is a thug either.

There are lots of wonderful people in BAP who I consider my friends. Tu, Ahren, Flash, Dave, Sebastian, Yax, Jon S, etc. etc. etc. There are also lots of people in BAP I hardly know. I don't think I've ever even met Paul Munger, and while I did meet Josh Casey at 99 worlds, we only exchanged "hellos." There are a whole bunch of European BAP members who I've never met either. I wouldn't be surprised if some became good friends of mine down the line, and if I didn't hit it off with others.

I guess what I'm saying is that you shouldn't judge BAP kindly or negatively based on the behavior of some or any of its members. I know people in BAP who are drug dealers, people in BAP who have gone to prison, and people in BAP who are sweethearts. The fact that they belong to BAP is neither here nor there, so I don't think its worth getting riled up over.

[Wasabi]

I took some time off from modified for a few reasons. One is obvious for my explicit outburst on some stupid online incident with a random unknown user denouncing a great footbagger and friend of mine in Journies to Tournies. I felt quite embarassed about it and I still do. The other reasons go to me posting way too much than I usually do due to boredom, and the immense start for the Olympics near the end of last week. My eyes have been glued for awhile, although I don't have the time to watch the 8am-1pm showcasing due to my busy schedule (mostly due to sleep since I now wake up around 10 in the morning these days).

I've been mostly solo kicking. I haven't gotten any highlights and haven't achieved or pushed myself too much into getting highlights lately. I've been feeling really tired lately and I think it could be my late sleep schedule (past midnight). I should fix this, but the Olympics have me on an iron grip I guess. For group sessions I've just been trying my best to get consistent tiltless strings, but I have yet to break the 20 contact mark. However, I've been slowly inching away at the 15 mark so it's been pretty swell. It's hard to not repeat moves when you block out pickups and rakes from your strings, but I think I should do more near and far concepts when I set from clipper.

I don't know. One of these days I really have to move out of my comfort zone and muscle it out.

I'm taking up stitching, but it is as slow as ever, maybe even slower. I put in a few panels into a 32, and then I just stop midway. I don't have the motivation to make bags at this moment, and it's really killing me and the people that are waiting for my bags. I guess my head is clouded over worrying about other things, and that has been prevalent for me consistently during the middle of summer. I think I'll do a couple of outside orders now and then do some for NYFA, just to mix it up.

I ignored my first user on modified today. Big whoop. I wish I can blotch out the username as well, but I guess you can't completely make a person nonexistent. If you get the pun there, you know what I mean.

I've been getting cravings for tobaccy and such, but I'm trying to will them out of my head like usual with cold turkey. Can't say it helps, but at least I'm not doing it.

Anyway, I'm sort of worried on how I'm going to get to Funtastiks by the end of this week. I don't want to miss it, but I'm not sure what my plan would be when I get there. Should I make a ton of bags to sell? Should I go to have fun? Should I compete? Or should I not go at all? I'm not considering the latter, but it's a possibility.

[Wasabi]

Played some chinlone on Saturday. Actually, the NYFA crew and some supporters for Burma hacked around takraw balls all around Union Square. We hit a couple of pedestrians. It was cool.

The bounce off of the takraw is really cool and I love kicking this thing. It really challenges me to kick with my inside just right to set it up straight. Pretty wicked. I might need to invest on a pair of shoes with a flat inside, like Nastase Milleniums in my size or something. I had to rely on my ankle to kick it on my strong side well, so that was bad though it wasn't really that big of an issue that day. I tried to do cool fliers with it, but I think the only thing I could do was flying cross-body toe kick, and the takraw didn't set up straight at all.

At the end of Saturday, a couple of us got free takraw balls for making the evnt so successful. I got one for free, and I think it would be really cool to kick with in 2-square or Net. I am totally bringing this to Hackrifice!

Sunday was an okay session. I felt pretty sore from kicking around the takraw ball the day before, but I was excited to play. John Goode and Bryce Ledner showed up to our session. It was pretty cool. John has some amazing ducking mirages in his repertoire of moves. I think he can hit Assassin no problem both sides. Bryce sported his Quantum03s and played pretty well; his clippers are looking good, and if he schools them like crazy they will be monster. Also, a couple of old faces showed up like Dan Kramer and Rukain : Dan is one of the founding members of NYFA and Rukain used to kick with NYFA but stopped and just picked up kicking the bag recently. Drew, Barrett, Stan and Bruce showed as well - Barrett forgot to bring his G-units, Stan didn't bring his stuff and Drew injured himself as he started to warm up. However, those of us who were ready to kick kicked out our session pretty well.

During shred on Sunday, I tried to keep my focus, breathing and form straight and calm throughout most of the session. I felt really good, and kept myself aware to keep my back straight at all times. Magellan and pixie legover felt really controlled; I was able to link them repeatedly without any fear of an awkward pixie set. My flip clipper had me agitated in some parts of the session, but I knew that it was just my form that was pushing me back because of how my clipper leg would just hit my support leg sometimes, and that sucked. In the next session I do, I think I will dedicate all of my shred only to my flipside, especially flip pixie.

Also, my eggbeaters and toe blurs felt really sloppy. I think I just had too little stamina to control them into my strings.

Just received my black Quantum03s in the mail today, Monday afternoon. I fitted them with my bare feet, with the stock insole in place. They felt just about right. I think they're okay, but for some reason I have an aesthetical distaste for them. I think it's the awkward look of the shoe's leather toe strip encompassing the toe of the shoe that looks awkward. The ends of that strip just looks too long on the instep of the shoe, but looks sharp on the shoe's outer region. It looks drastically different from my Quantum02 model, which is the complete opposite in a way (or rather, the strip itself isn't supposed to be so long and should be cutting short on the clipper surface to allow a flatter clipper surface). I guess it isn't a big deal in a way, but I'll see about other people's reviews before I make the decision to exchange them or not. They're pretty fly regardless of this.

There might be a midweek session happening. Can't wait.

I'm sewing a mini pumpkin 32 right now. It's just a black and orange 32. It's for Stan Sagalovskiy. I might fill it with some tungsten because it's so small and he doesn't want lead in it. Pics coming soon.

[g00d33]

No Assassins for me yet But soon

[Wasabi]

I like when NBC showcases a spotlight of a specific moment, montage, or segment about a certain player, Muse is the music of their choice. "Knights of Cydonia" and "Starlight" are some songs I've been hearing, and it has rejuvenated my love of the band.

BMX is somewhat silly to have in the Olympics. I don't know why, I just think so.

Volleyball and Beach volleyball are intense. I really want to see the USA dominate in Men's Volleyball and on both Men's and Women Beach Volleyball. I saw the Women's Volleyball team for the US, and they weren't very impressive surprisingly.

Don't know what to expect this week, personally. Maybe some solo shred, maybe not. Session with NYFA is a weekly thing for me, but I've been sewing footbags whenever I can. My interest is swaying as usual. My social life is nonexistent - partly because of the Olympics and partly because of my summer vacay ending regretably fast.

[Wasabi]

Just started sewing three 32s. The patterns look epic, and I might end up keeping one for myself (probably because the colors look way too girly to sell, and the combination in of itself are my favorite). But, regrettably, my pace has come to a halt after having snapped or severely pinching the nerves on both my index and middle finger on my right hand. These are the fingers that I primarily use for sewing, handwriting, and using chopsticks, so everything just feels awkwardly hard for me to do. So far, the pain is minimal, and my hands feel sort of sore, but I'm doing fine. I just had to bandage the joints on my fingers with tape and whatever.

I find out that I play pretty well in the first hour or so, but die down after an hour or more of play. I want to see if I can extend my focus and stamina by 30 minutes more, so I'm taking note on how I sleep, what I eat, and how long I give myself to digest before shred. Also, how much I hydrate myself during shred.

I can pixie after doing magellan and smear. That's been a pretty prominent highlight for me for the past two weeks. I usually get frustrated from not getting a good set from my second pixie. I'm glad that I'm progressing in my concentration and patience in my links. I'm not doing a lot of stupid shit like I used to do back then.

I also found out that I completely obliterated the use of butterflies in my game. Kind of weird. I have to dedicate a drill session for butterflies soon. And whirls and pickups.

Equipment-wise, I have my Quantum 03s still in its original box. I haven't worn them since I first got them. I plan on exchanging for a new pair soon, because I don't like the looks of it somewhat. I took a good look at Bryce's pair, and Brian Damato's pair this past weekend, and my pair definitely has some weird qualities on the clipper area. I'm going to e-mail Daryl to see what I can do about it sometime this week.

Gotta set up plans for Funtastiks. Hopefully I can hitch a ride with Ted.

[Rabbit]

if that bag is too girly ill buy it for ash, lets see a pic

[Wasabi]

Cool picture. Both bags are available for sale and for present orders, give or take. But I do want to save them just in case I need to sell bags this weekend at Funtastiks.

I went digging in my closet and I found a pair of size 9 Blue Twill lavers in mint condition. I guess I forgot about them. I'll see if I can put up a topic in the "For Sale" section to see if anyone wants them.

[Rabbit]

can i get the one on the right?

[Wasabi]

Yup. I'll be at Sheep's Meadow for shred on Thursday, around 5 pm. Bring $30 USD.

Forgot to mention this in my post before, but I need more lead filler. I keep forgetting to resupply myself with filler at Ballistic Products, but maybe Adrienne can hook me up with a bottle of lead shot at Funtastiks. I texted her, and I'm just waiting up on a reply at the moment.

If I get enough funds from selling at Funtastiks and Hackrifice, I think I can buy a lot of Tungsten as well. I can make some dope bags with that stuff.

I also need to go to a Michael's to get some more glass beads.

Classes begin on Wednesday for me. Hopefully this will be the last semester for me. I have to get working on my incompletes and setting up for graduation and whatever. I haven't filed the paperwork yet for my graduation audit yet, so I'm expecting a tough time against Hunter college. Oi.

edit: I'm also really excited to actually work a job without worrying about academia. I'm almost reaching the brink of feeling really liberated from the school system finally. Finding an apartment and living independently could be tough for me, but I can sustain any challenges along my way. I just keep thinking about whether I should make that big leap of moving somewhere outside of Queens, NY - maybe to Canada and become a Canadian citizen. It may be wishful thinking, but it's a possibility. I'll have to see what type of attachments I have here in NYC first, besides NYFA.

It's a lot to think about, and I can't help but stay awake because of it.

[Paulsator]

Hey Waylon, see u at sheeps meadows...