Nick "Houdini" Polini

[Asmus]

Nice highlights! I love Grifters.

Have you read the Vasek Klouda manual? There are a lot of pointers on stuff you are working on in there.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Long time no post. Bong slime blow ghost?

I took a few days off of footbag because my legs needed it but I also got to see Nadiah yesterday and Wednesday! I drove down to pick her up and she slept over my grandmother's with me. Yeah, I know that sounds kinda awkward, but my grandma is really cool and she left us go to have some nice personal time to ourselves, which was much needed. On my way to pick Nadiah up, she told me she had gotten me an expensive surprise. We arrived at her place and there was a package on her door step. I thought it was my gift and I was really excited to see what it was, because she had been talking this gift up for over a week We go over to the package and she says, "oh, this is for me actually..." So we opened up her gift to herself. It was a Tibetan singing bowl, hand-crafted by monks. We figured out how to use it and played with it for a while. It wasn't too hard to figure out and the ton it sang was absolutely astonishing. Hauntingly beautiful, if I had to describe it. So we took turns making it sing. I'm looking into getting one in the future. It was so awesome. Very peaceful to listen to. So we decided to play with that and wait to see if my package would come. About 30 minutes passed and we decided to go get gas for my car and hope the package would get there.

We go run and get gas, and return to the house. Still nothing. So we decide to head out and drive to my grandmother's place, where I'm temporarily staying. Nadiah told me that the package would be delivered by FedEx. While we're on the road, Nadiah says, "Wouldn't that be funny if we saw the FedEx truck pass us while we're on the road?" I agreed, laughed and drove on. We drive for about 10 minutes, the whole time, I was kind of keeping my eyes peeled for the FedEx truck... nothing. Then Nahds and I just kinda conversed and laughed about random shit and all of the sudden, she points and says, "There's a FedEx truck." My mind went blank and I did what came naturally... IMMEDIATE U-TURN. We knew this had to be the truck, because it is basically a straight shoot from where we turned around to Nadiah's house. However, we were a bit behind the truck, to the point that we couldn't see it. We finally arrive back at her place. No package. We decide to grab some food and then come back and by the time we came back, it should be there. Food was got. We went back to her place. No package. We decide to leave again. We drove a shorter distance than the last turn around spot and there's another FedEx truck heading toward Hamburg (Nadiah's town). I look at Nadiah with a blank stare.. She says that it is rare to see a FedEx truck on that strip of roadway unless it was delivering to Hamburg. We talked it over a bit and ended up deciding to not turn around. I would just get my gift when I dropped her off on Thursday. I was fine with that wait. Just then, a third FedEx truck passes us. IMMEDIATE U-TURN. YOLO. Drove all the way back. No fucking package. We decided to go off and go hiking at a nearby trail to kill some time. We killed some time there and saw some nice views of fall leaves dropping into a serene river with a really nice background of mountains. Totally worth the hike.

We head back to Nadiah's place afterward. No package. By this point, we had spent around 4 or 5 hours of our day chasing FedEx trucks around and waiting for the package. We finally decide to leave for good. No turning around this time. Fuck no, not this time. Even if we did see another FedEx truck pass us. We get about 10 minutes into the drive again and what the fuck biscuits passes us? A godforsaken FedMotherfuckingEx Truck. By this point, I'm basically going crazy. I compared it to the time where Matt Kemmer tried to explain Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo to me at Worlds this year. I think only Matt, Nate, Ivan, and Doug will understand this. Anyway, we decided to not turn around. We exit the highway and by this time, we were over 40 minutes away from her house. Nadiah gets a text and says the package was delivered a little while ago.

So, Nadiah spent those 2 days with me and we had a really fun time. On the way back to her place, I finally got my gift. And she sure was telling the truth when she said "expensive".





These were going for around $130 and that's how much she dropped on them. They are so sick. I still can't believe she bought them for me! My girlfriend is fucking awesome. Not just for this, but for a lot of things. Nahds, if you're reading this, (which I know you are, because you stalk my blog ) you're the shit <3 I wouldn't trade you for anything.

Anyway, sorry for that, but my girlfriend is seriously awesome. She also had a session tonight, practicing her basics. She's trying to get off work to come to PSU with me Nov. 1-3 to kick with the club and hang out and enjoy Halloween. Hopefully that comes through.

So I had a little session tonight, while Nadiah had her's. Basically tried to drill some stepping, because my sets have always been too high, so I figured I was putting too much effort into them. I was. I used to power off of my support leg and barely move my clipper. Now I use a tiny clipper set THEN beat the bag and dex with the stepping. Feels so much better and much less effort. Ripwalk x10 was easy, controlled and no higher than hip to bellybutton height. Also worked on Stepping ss Pickup> Smear bs. Made some huge progress with that link. Helped my Pixies A LOT. I basically did all the easier stepping tricks 5 times each side. Blur feels so much easier with this new stepping approach.

After that, I had dinner with my family that came over. Then after they all left, I went upstairs and played Dan Deacon's discography while I drilled ATWs and Orbits. Basically, I would play song 1 and do a ton of flip Orbits to that song, then song 2 would start and I would do a ton of strong Orbits, then song 3 would be flip ATWs, then song 4 was strong ATWs. Then repeat that. I got through 23 songs and his songs range from like 2 minutes to 12 minutes. And I know I had a few crazy long ones in there. But that was a lot of fun. I feel like my atws and orbits got SO MUCH better with just this session. I'd like to do this more often. My legs just knew how to atw and orbit at one point and I couldnt stop hitting them well. It was a nice feeling. Also, after that session, I had a great Fairy breakthrough on flipside. I could finally get them higher without much effort. Cant wait to test those out more.

Uh... This is a picture I took tonight of a moon but it looks more like a "W". I think Aliens moved it around while I took the picture or something. Either that or I blame global warming... or Obama:

[Matt K]

Fuck.

[C-Fan]

That looks like a picture of you when you were very, very young.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Matt and Ken, you both made me laughs. Thanks!

So I had a session today while Nadiah had her's where she is. We kicked together in spirit, it was nice. She was really killing it. 100 clippers bs, 100 toe stalls bs, 100 inside stalls bs, then practiced atws and orbits. hit 6 atws in a row on strong side. She's doing really well, it sounds. Cant wait to see how her game looks during PSU Shred-O-Ween.. Which I am EXTREMELY PUMPED FOR! Anyway, had some good stuff in the session.

Highlights:

Flip Flails! as well as strong. I honestly dont know if I've ever hit a decent one on flipside. Hit a few good ones.
Messed around with my new stepping sets.
Stepping Ducking is now different, but feels so much easier once I get it consistent! Pretty happy about that. Ripped Warrior bs. It actually looked like Evan's, I think. Excited to get better at them with the new improved method.
Ripwalk x10. Felt like Mathias Blau's. Bonginnnn
Ripwalk> Blur> Fear bs once then BSOS.. shuffle is feeling so controlled with my new stepping method.
Drilled Ripwalk> Ripwalk 10x bs, then Ripwalk> Blur 10x bs
Wanted to work on Drifters, because sometimes my drifter still fucks up my hip. I figured out why today. It's becasue I wasnt jumping side to side enough with my flipside. So I made a line and made sure I jumped over it when I did the Drifter. It worked so well. Drilled Drifter bs 10x each with this method. Much better on my Flip Drifter.
Drilled Spinning Ducking Clipper> Reverse Swirl> Spinning Mirage bs 5x each.
Drilled Gyro Diving Clippers bs a few times each, just to get a better feel for them.
Experimented with a new concept after that. Late Gyro Toe (Axle? or Snake? lol) Hit some cool new shtuff with that..
Spinning Snake (#lolscott) bs (probably my favorite from all of the ones I hit. Feels really sick and stylish) This is new on bs.
Ducking Snake (#lolscott) bs (new on both)
Spinning Ducking Snake (#lololscottlol) bs (new on both)
Also, messed with some Wauxpins. Toe op, Clipper far, then tried it ducking and came so close to an ankle roll but since my ankles are bendy, it collapsed to the outside and I fell.

This ducking wauxpin attempt could have been a hiatus-initiater for some players. I am seriously so thankful for my crank. I will never take advantage of it. It's saved my ass so many times. Whrling Swirl twice, Pdx Whirl, Barfly, and now Ducking Wauxpin. Shit, this has even happened multiple times while hiking, at least twice, due to slipping on a rock or my Nikes having odd surfaces that give too easily... None of these mess-ups ended my game even for a day, at least not for ankle injury. After tonight's mess-up, I realized that I would have been out for maybe 7 or more months (assuming injury took a month to heal).

I wish I could give some of my crank to others though. Anyway, really starting to feel footbag for real. Seeing my density go up every time I play, also feeling my consistency go up. Stoked for Shred-O-Ween!

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Ivan is going to be better than me soon. Need to step up my game. That kid will be doing Ripped Warrior next week at this rate. If you haven't checked out his blog, check it out then say "Fuck." because his highlights are madd silly. Watch out for Ivan "Incinerator" Iakimenko. He's a triple threat: Great at stitching bags, playing footbag, and he's good at math.

Anyway, this bit of drilling I did was partially inspired by him.

Highlights:

Got some more repetition on Fog bs. Ivan hit it bs today, first time each side. I realized I suck at Fog, so I hit it 10x bs. Got a little better at it tonight. I noticed that every time I do a flip DLO or Eggbeater, I think to myself: "Great, I have to make a flip Legover catch." And I end up messing up that legover. After re-reading some of Vasek's thoughts in the manual, I thought to myself, "Well, you know what, isn't this just an example of a "block" that Vasek talks about?" So then I tried to trick my mind a little bit by talking out loud, saying stuff like: "I have 2 strong side legovers." "Both legovers are strong side" "I have no flipside legover, because both of them are great and they are both strong", etc... after a few chants of positivity, I attempted the flip Fog. Most of the time, I would hit it right away! I think before tonight, I hit around 5 other flipside Fogs. I added 10 to that tonight, using a little mind trickery and positivity. People should give this a try and let me know how it works out for them.
Drilled some Blizzards bs. Finally, that second dexterity is feeling more welcoming and homey. I'm starting to like Blizzards and Illusions in general!
I also tried to incorporate some tips Vasek gives on Doubles Spins. Set the bag behind you... HOLY SHIT does this ever work! I hit the dopest DSC I've ever hit before. It actually just kind of HAPPENED! I could have hit Ripped Warrior out of it if I wanted to. It was so perfect in every way. If Anssi saw it, he might have even nodded once.
Wanted to drill Double Spinning Clipper, but I figured that wouldn't be the smartest way to do it. I remembered that I learned Spinning Toe before I learned Spinning Clipper, so I tried to do a bunch of Double Spinning Toe stalls bs. It just made more sense this way. Got a bunch of them on each side, so I feel like that helped a lot. I think if I keep practicing these, in the next few months, I'll be able to throw down DSC bsos in any run. I also want to get batter at Spinning Gyro Clipper. That trick is Styles McFly'les.
Easiest Spinning Gyro Mirage (one side only :/ ) I've ever hit. Not worried about it. I know this trick will be so easy sooner or later.

I am close to knocking a few things off of my Master List. Still need to work on a lot though. Close to crossing off Stepping, Rev Swirls, Blenders, Torques, Whirling Cloud Kicks, and Fairy sets. Still need work on those though. Some more than others, but I think these will be the first ones to get knocked off. Whirls, Inspins, and Drifters are close to being close to being knocked off.

My game has been exciting me lately. I can feel that I'm getting closer to a level up. Still really stoked for PSU Shred-O-Ween! Jackson will be riding up with me too. I'm gonna see if Jeremy and Drew wanna come up, as well.

I wanna leave off with a great quote I heard today from someone who is really in touch with life:

"Sometimes you have to meet the worst people and go through the worst experiences to become one of the greatest people who goes through some of the best life experiences. It is when you meet negative people and situations that an opportunity arises to either be like them or not and vice versa with good situations. It is this contrast that allows us to shape who we want to become and because of this, we should learn to appreciate everything that comes our way." ~N.R.S.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Dude. Wow. I just had a session and for the first time, I actually felt like I was like "good" at footbag.

Highlights:

Stepping Whirl BSOS
Ripwalk> Sidewalk> Stepping Whirl *rpt!
DENSITY. Runs like Blurry Whirl> Twirl> Whale Tail> Smear> stuff, and Blurry Whirl> Spinning Whirl> Blur> Atom> Far Blink, Blurry Whirl> Whirl> Tomahawk> run I was going so dense. It was AWESOMEEEEE!!!!!!! I wish I could remember some other junk, but I can't recall much of those dense runs, I just know It felt like I was that bag's best friend.
Ripped Warrior> Sidewalk> stuff> other Ripped Warrior> more stuff
Pdx Illusion> Toe Blur bs
Flip Fog> Pixie Clipper> stuff> Strong Fog> Dimwalk> run
Flip Blurry Whirl> Twirl> run.. Strong Blurry Whirl> Twirl> run
Blurry Whirl> Spinning Whirl BSOS
Footed Fairy far Twirl! Gonna get this soon. No rush though.
Noticeably improved tricks: Whale Tails, Blurry Whirls, Spinning Whirls, Ripwalks, Flip Fairy, Atomics, Fogs, Pdx Whirls, PDX BLENDERS (they are finally with me. I didn't miss a single one I tried today on either side), and Stepping Duckings (this has all been stuff I've been concentrating on drilling recently and I'm so happy that it's all paying off!)

I'm so glad I practiced not bailing to Osis, lame zooms (gyro clipper and spinning clipper), and Butterfly. I replaced a lot of this with Pdx Whirls, Spinning Butter/Osis, Gyro Butter, and stepping shuffles.

At least 10 contacts without bails is now comes almost automatically.

I am right where I wanted to be for PSU Pumpkin Jam. And I still another week to get a little further. But basically, I wanted to be right where I am and I would be pretty happy with how I was playing. This sport really pays off when you put in the time.

[bluevampire101]

So... I've been meaning to comment on your blog for a while now, but this post just made it. Yay!

Long time no post. Bong slime blow ghost?

We head back to Nadiah's place afterward. No package. By this point, we had spent around 4 or 5 hours of our day chasing FedEx trucks around and waiting for the package. We finally decide to leave for good. No turning around this time. Fuck no, not this time. Even if we did see another FedEx truck pass us. We get about 10 minutes into the drive again and what the fuck biscuits passes us? A godforsaken FedMotherfuckingEx Truck. By this point, I'm basically going crazy. I compared it to the time where Matt Kemmer tried to explain Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo to me at Worlds this year. I think only Matt, Nate, Ivan, and Doug will understand this. Anyway, we decided to not turn around. We exit the highway and by this time, we were over 40 minutes away from her house. Nadiah gets a text and says the package was delivered a little while ago.



They are so sick. I still can't believe she bought them for me! My girlfriend is fucking awesome. Not just for this, but for a lot of things. Nahds, if you're reading this, (which I know you are, because you stalk my blog ) you're the shit <3 I wouldn't trade you for anything.

Anyway, sorry for that, but my girlfriend is seriously awesome. She also had a session tonight, practicing her basics. She's trying to get off work to come to PSU with me Nov. 1-3 to kick with the club and hang out and enjoy Halloween. Hopefully that comes through.

I cut a lot of the meat, the bulk of it out, but yeah. I really liked those parts. The shoes are dope. And by dope, I mean awesome. Because who am I to use "dope." Sorry... I'm a wannabe. And also! I think I get the buffalo bit! Because I was told about this!

I very much hope that Nadiah is able to come to PSU

Uhhhh...... Since I usually skip over people's highlights because I usually don't know what they are, I'm just gonna say a generic:
Awesome and keep up the good work (because I bet that's what it is anyway, except 10x more better and excited than that, but since I do not have experience or knowledge in the subject it seems rather inferior to most replies).

But yes, anywho, see you for the Halloweenie weekend! (Yes?) And hopefully Nadiah too! And and and.... YEAH! Keep being awesome doing awesome things with awesome tricks and making progress and breakthroughs and being... enthusiastic.

I hope all those "awesomes" made this post-worthy-ish.

EDIT: P.S. I hope these Jeremy and Drew can also make it, because I'm sure they are some cool people to meet! (get them to come!)

[Nadiahhh]

Hey Nick! Good Job! lol

Also,
April is soooooooooooooooooo coooooooooooooool!! ^^^^^^^^^ lol I will try to make it to PSU! It's looking good so far!

[krustykrakk]

Nick, I knitted you a pair of beef socks. I hope you come to PSU soon.
Nadiar, there are some cows near my current location.
Also, aside from typing Laos when trying to type also, here's a picture of operatic punk rocker Nina Hagen. Let's here it for Nina Hagen.

[Matt K]

Stop.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

April: Thanks! Glad you finally posted! And you're a footbagger, you're allowed to say "dope"

Nahds: Yay! Glad you're back into it I'm excited to kick with you at PSU in a week <3

Matt: Fuck you jizz hoes.

Ben: Thank you. Now I know.

Haven't kicked but I did put together a few sessions of footage. This is when I was doing those 10 contact no BOP bail runs.

Critiques welcome

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bqo4GJ-q9g4[/youtube]

This is 2 weeks ago, and I think my runs look a lot better than this now. We'll see.

[C-Fan]

I like your ring of leaves set up. Very pretty. Do you have any outdoor spots which aren't on asphalt? I find that stuff so hard on my legs, not to mention how quickly it eats up my shoes.

I like your density idea a lot. I think I'll dedicate my next session to be BOP-free.

[boyle]

Were those leaves originally there, or did you shape them into your own footbag leaf circle?

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Thanks Ken and Dan, Well, uh... both lol they had fallen on the driveway and I started to rake them away but then I realized I only needed a circle to kick in. So I made leaf art I tried to make a star but it looked terrible.

Just had a super mini session but git a lot accomplished.

Highlights:

Drifter work... coming along better than I thought.
super good barrages bs with the initial dex being a blazey sorta deal. I like these. Going to use them more.
Pdx Blender> Ripwalk bs!!! It happened so easily! Matt, that ones for you.
as I was stringing, I would always try to bail from toe to op muted swirl but it kept dropping, so I found that hole and did some initial patch up work... blur> toe muted op swirl bs 5x each
Barfly> Rev Swirl bs several times
dense runs kinda just happened again. Really took me by surprise again. Spinning whirl is now a bail on bs


I really like where I am in footy right meow.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Talked to Hogan on the phone for a while about life and footbag and junk. Then after the call, we both went and played some footy.

I just drilled some stuff and also ganked a drill from Matt.

Highlights:

Gyro Clipper> Gyro Mirage 20x bs
Gyro Mirage> Toe Spinning Clipper 10x bs
Gyro Mirage> Toe Inspinning Clipper 3x bs I got tired.

Definitely noticed some great improvement in Toe Spins and a little in Toe Inspins.

Thank you to you and your demons and everyone else we know. Happy holidays and to all a healthy unsalted cracker diet.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

If you put babies in the river, do they become rabies?

The world may never know...

Speaking of rabies, I had a session tonight. Nahds and I kicked in spirit together.

I just drilled a bunch, so did she.

Highlights:

Pdx Mirage> Toe Muted Far Swirl 10x bs.. finally figured out the approach to the swirl. Hit a ton of them separately on each side. So happy about this because this commonly ends up being the motion that I bail to off of toe in my runs but I rarely hit it. So that should change soon.
also got gyro mirage> toe far muted swirl bs 1st time each. Yeah!
Pixie Clipper> Revup 5x bs
Fairy Clipper> Revup 5x bs
drilled a bunch of bubbas bs

Really happy with those toe far swirls now. This will be dope bail soon I think.

[boyle]

No more maybes, the baby's got rabies.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KHwuOtcALQ[/youtube]

This is a cool combo: gyro mirage> toe far muted swirl

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Dan: Yeah, I think that looks so sick. I hit the rpt of that before. Should be able to do it better now since those are both pretty darn dialed in.

Hello humans beings that play footbag..

I guess I kicked a little too hard too many days in a row last week, so I took a few days to have a nice little break. My legs felt great today and I got some cool highlights from the sesh, so I'm pretty happy with that.

Highlights:

Inspired by Ken: Spinning Whirl> Pdx DLO BSOS (I even did a Pixie trick out of the first DLO)
Drilled Infinity Swirl> Hand catch 5x bs These feel so much easier. No clue what changed.
Riptide bs lolz I think this is dumb to boldify, but it's my first time on flip and my first actual hand catch on strong lol I could never catch the damn bag. I r no good at baseballs
DOD Swirl BSOS! Fuck yeah. First BSOS.. SO happy about this. also hit it about a TON of other times during the session. Super easy 5 add on each side for me now. Dont ask me what I did to get better at it because I have no clue. They just happen now.
Toe ss Revup BSOS! In a Jon Schneider voice: "Yeah baby!" haha This was such a good feeling, plus I rarely see anyone hit this. So that makes me cool?
Blurry muted Twirl (last time I planted) only one side though. Tried it flipside and almost really fucked up my back. Not ready yet.
Toe muted op Swirls are pretty reliable now, and they're a good bail for me so that's dope.
Smog bs haha I suck. They're so hard for me on flipside.
Dragster (Drifter Dragon)> decent stylish run
For Ivan: Blurriest bs (2nt time ever hit on flipside. Wow. Couldnt believe that. Could have stepped out of it on flip! Not so much on strongside :/
Gyro Revup 1st try on strongside. Forgot to try flipside.
Revup> Fairy op Dragon BSOS (Stolen from Nick Landes)
New bail that I never knew I was so consistent with: Inspinning Osis. So much easier than Inspinning Clipper. So I'm gonna be doing some of these now.
Stepping ss Reverse Swirl bs, first try each. that felt cool.
Ss Swivel bs (best one I've ever done on strong side, and 2nd one ever done on weak)
Also hit Reverse Swifter on one side.. eh. And I footed a dream trick.. eh.

Also, in other news, I've gotten so much better and stronger with pull-ups. I can now do 10 easily. I usually do 10 hands facing forward then a bit of a break, then 10 hand facing away, every time I walk underneath it. I've done about 50 or 60 today. Also started doing crunches and since I have a better start on my abs, I can actually feel the crunches doing something. So pretty happy with that.

Still excited for Pumpkin Jam! Also excited to see Nadiah! I'm picking her up on the way. I also have a surprise for her She has no idea. Well.. maybe now she does. ALSO! I have a funny footbag trick-related costume in my head. Just have to get a few cheap things first.

Anyway, that's it. uh... bye.

[Nadiahhh]

I am so proud of all of your accomplishments
You're doing great! Keep it up, hun!


Love you <3 <3 <3 *~*

P.S. I am also very excited to see you, too. <3