Canberra, Australia via SCL - Daniel Boyle

[boyle]

I had my last kick today as a 32 year old. Birthday tomorrow, move on to 33. It's not a big one, like saying oh that was the last kick of x decade. Anyway, I had one pretty good run - it had flip ripped warrior and stepping ducking clipper on the other side. Obviously I was going for the bsos on the ripped warrior but didn't quite get there, funnily enough on the strong side, though that was mid run and the other was the first trick of the run.

Once I started typing this post up my body or mind decided I hadn't done enough kicks for the year and sent me back for another kick, while drinking some more beers. Maybe I was too many beers in, didn't have many long runs - did get pixie dso>butterfly>motion.

Here's a couple of clips from the 'gram

https://www.instagram.com/p/BYxPz5tHM4G

After a day of teaching (Kindy) at a famous skate spot. I also got the skates on and was going back to my teenage years, trying to do some footbag on skates. I remember being better at it long ago, but couldn't really do much this time around. The clip I was still in my school clothes.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BYuVMD_Ht9B

From my lunch break at work. You can hear the crazy wind in the background. Glad it didn't blow the phone over, which actually has happened to me a few times lately.

I have a vlog uploading now, it's number 25, it's from the road down to Melbourne and I'm planning to make another one from the time in Melbourne. I mentioned a while back that I would like to get to 50 for the year, but we'll see how foreseeable that is. I do have a bit of a backlog there.

I just remember also, in my second session I wanted to do a run of 32 contacts for the last day of 32, so I got there with a simple enough run and then decided I should do a big finishing trick, but midway through I couldn't decide if I was going for double spinning or just one spin, so the bag ended up on the floor after 31 contacts. Oops.

One more edit for good measure, it's a top post, so here's a painting.



https://artsearch.nga.gov.au/detail.cfm?irn=28937

I may have even posted something from this series before, but it's from the Ned Kelly series by Sidney Nolan. Nico loves this whole set of paintings and we visit the gallery quite a bit. When we went to Melbourne I took a few detours in order so that we could go and see some of this Ned Kelly stuff. Ned Kelly was a bushranger but ended up being quite a hero (though also ended up being shot at, and then hung). It's quite an interesting story - you could watch it with Heath Ledger as the protagonist, or even Mick Jagger...

[boyle]

Good evening.

I'm doing one of these night shifts. I always try and make a post over this night shifts, though I'm getting this in early, it's only one hour into the shift, so there's a long stretch going.

It was my birthday yesterday. I had a fun weekend. Due to working this night shift I was also able to spend a little extra time enjoying the weekend, though I will pay for that during the week in being tired I would say. We were going to go down the beach today, but settled with the river. We made a massive sandcastle and had a good time there.

I've been thinking I would like to put a footbag clip on Instagram every day for the next year. I think that's a fairly achievable goal. In reality I'm probably going to at least do a few kicks every day, and I'm probably going to at least check something on my phone online each day, so why not put them together.

Success so far.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BYzMl43nGVI - We went out for a short walk yesterday before some people came around. I was actually playing in a drain I wouldn't mind to try having a skate on, looks like some fun options there. I was planning to do a trick for each year, but if you watch this closely, you will notice maybe my counting wasn't so accurate (though at least I didn't drop one trick early this time). You will also notice I am wearing hiking shoes. I have been able to get a lot of tricks with these shoes, the clipper surface is really good. They are quite heavy, but they do the job and do it pretty well.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BY10Tlcndkc - this blog might just be a running commentary on what is wrong with all the videos. This one was from next to the river, playing in part grass, part sand. Except you can barely see the river and I go off the screen in the middle of the run. This project is going great so far!



That's not all, folks. A new vlog. Number 25. The previously promised footbag in front of a waterfall is in there. Around the 3:48 mark I believe. That was a good trip, I enjoyed it. I think Francisca is a bit disappointed there was not more relaxing along the journey, though that's not really my style on those kind of trips. We were able to meet up with a lot of friends and that was really great.

Caroline called me to wish me a happy birthday, and also mention she was at the airport to go to Europe. A little bit envious. Will be interesting to see what she gets up to over there.

[isirc10]

Post some stuff about it on here, I would love to do it myself, so if we can live it vicariously that's something! Caroline is going to fly to Europe in the next couple of weeks, so you will probably run into her at some/all of those events.

In terms of comfort - how is your German? That may/may not make much difference.

I'll definitely try to post some things up here. It's tough to get back in the swing of footblogging, but I suppose it will be a bit easier when I'm actually doing interesting stuff.

My German is very limited - I will take a 3-week crash course offered at the university when I arrive and will probably lean on google translate heavily the first month.

I'm enjoying your Instagram challenge. It will be nice to see more videos under #footbag.

[boyle]

My wife studied in Stuttgart many years ago (in German), she didn't know much German before going. I imagine the crash course will do you a world of good. Will your course be in German? I know many unis over there do there courses in English.

It's always great to see the writeups of other tournaments, particularly the smaller ones. Would be great to see some European adventures on here. How long will you be over there for?

[Muffinman]

Happy belated birthday

[boyle]

Thanks Erik!

[boyle]

I already failed in my quest to do a daily Instagram, but that was because I was in bed with a fever. So I'm simply going to pretend that never happen and continue on with it.

Here's a couple of recent ones.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BZFFZf1nB0A
https://www.instagram.com/p/BZC5ii-nM7s
https://www.instagram.com/p/BY_57W3nXtP

It's interesting in recent days there's been some more interactivity I guess you would say with people saying what they want, particularly this Trevor guy who I don't know, not even really "know online". And I generally don't use Instagram in that way, I just put a little video up there and then put another one up another time, but I guess there is a lot more capacity for interaction even more than people saying "cool trick man".

I've got a busy evening ahead, going to a work farewell and then to a concert to see Grinspoon. They put out their first album 20 years ago and are doing a tour to celebrate that album, by playing it. So that should be a lot of fun.

[boyle]

I went and played at the tennis courts today after dropping Nico off at daycare. Didn't really play for that long but it started up a day of doing lots of things. I went on a bushwalk and I saw three echidnas. They are a little bit rare, spiky Australian animals. They are usually pretty shy but these ones stayed around a little while.

The Grinspoon show was great. They played a certain album so I wasn't really surprised with what they played. We were right up the back though and there were a couple of posts obscuring the view, but it was still good fun. After the show I hung out with a friend for a fair bit and we talked a bit about the family life, buying houses, that sort of thing. Growing up. Getting real jobs.

The main thought I came out with is that it's really important, and pretty much what I have tried to do - is to keep doing stuff you like, but also involve the family in it. I was really glad, the next morning we went to meet some friends, well it's actually Nico's little friend from daycare, and they had a really similar attitude. I was going to write more but this computer is going crazy slow. Maybe some more another time.

I have been playing around with reverse swirls bailing to inside stall. Also doing a wrap with a spin kind of thing. That's a trick I was doing about 15 years ago but I'd like to play with that for routines.

[boats]

Reverse swirling inside is cool! I got Nick to hit reverse swirling symposium wiz about 5 months ago. It's like a Rev-up, but you do a symposium wiz instead of pic-up! Knuckles is my favorite Echidna!!!

[boyle]

That trick sounds pretty wild. That's like whirl bailed to inside stall isn't it? I don't think I could do that from rev swirl, though I have done rev swirl bailed into a guay.

I've been having short little sessions in recent days. Today the weather was just awesome. Hopefully tomorrow it's even better, I would like to have a longer session. I have been having on and off pain in my back lately but hopefully that has switched to off, haven't had too much trouble in the last days. When I was sick with a fever last week I was also really sore in the back so it was really difficult sleeping.

That illness didn't really keep me down to long. I tried to keep a positive mind/just pretend it wasn't happening over a couple of days of work last week because I wanted to be able to go out for the weekend and this time it just seemed to work. Obviously that's not always the case.

[boyle]

I haven't posted in a little while. I have been playing a fair bit and keeping on my daily Instagram post. I was thinking it would be awesome if it got to a new "phase" like something like "planking" went through. Newspaper headlines claim "the dangerous new trend - kicking a hacky sack on a roof with an amazing view"

Of course even in the dream situation I know they're still going to call it hacky sack, but that doesn't bother me too much these days. Also, that won't happen.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BZfn81ZnGpR

I was happy with this one from down the coast yesterday. I made an express trip down the coast, spent most of the day driving to spend about 10 minutes in the water. It was a bit cold. I also visited a few skateparks I hadn't been to before. It's school holidays now so a lot of places are a lot more crowded than I would like them to be.

I will just share one more Instagram clip. This is from a few days ago at home. I was playing around wearing superhero masks with Nico and tried a few tricks. I will just say it wasn't easy, and that was not the first take.

What I did get on the first take will be seen on my new vlog, which I left uploading before I went out of the house. On the way back from the coast I stopped at a park, and someone had left a ball behind. I took a shot from halfway on the basketball court and got it in. That's not usually how that kind of thing goes for me...Anyway, that vlog can wait for the next post.

I've been working on improving some parts of my flipside game. So things like blender>torque on the flipside. That sounds easy enough but there's plenty of parts of my game I have just let lapse for a long time so I'm trying to even things up a bit more. Even stuff like spinning osis>ducking osis rpt. That's something I have been working on as well.

I posted something on the Australian footbag group on Facebook asking if they wanted to do a jam sometime in the next few months. There were only a couple of responses but one was from a girl that I have never heard of that lives in Perth but she travels every now and then for work sometimes to Sydney, so hopefully we can line up a kick the next time she comes over. Also, might look at doing a Narooma or elsewhere on the coast jam early next year.

[Muffinman]

Nice motion sickness. Would love to see the big motion tricks on flip too, but good to see you working on flip stuff! Blender > torque is a sweet combo! My blenders are so bad haha

I noticed that you only did just regular osis on the one side. That's something that I struggle with a bit, but filming myself most of the time helps a lot to see the holes in my game so I can work to fill them in. I really want to work osis a ton because everything osis is amazing!!

[C-Fan]

someone had left a ball behind. I took a shot from halfway on the basketball court and got it in. That's not usually how that kind of thing goes for me...Anyway, that vlog can wait for the next post.

Nobody is interested in watching video of half court basketball shots in a footblog.

[boyle]

Well here is a boring basketball shot for you.



Next thing you know I'll be wearing basketball jerseys to kick in. Maybe a Canberra Cannons one would do the trick.

I have done a couple of good motion tricks on the flipside, I've done locomotion and I've done pixie motion. I've also been working recently on set + blender tricks on flipside. Didn't hit anything yet but came close to fairy ss blender. I guess the problem is a trick like motion sickness I'm hitting pretty regularly, whereas the stuff on the flip might be 1 in 50 tries or something.

My osis on the flip is not so good, but it's getting much better. I will try and do some more for the next video. Same thing, the strong one is very strong, that was one of the very first tricks I started out with, long ago, so it's had a lot more time to build the muscle memory. That's also why I've been pleased to get things like spinning osis>ducking osis rpt. That's really easy for me on strong side but a lot harder on the other side.

I had a pretty average session this morning at the tennis courts, but I did finish with a run of 19 ducking and diving contacts. They weren't all unique, and I was aiming for 20, but that's pretty close.

[boyle]

I didn't feel particularly well today, but I still got in a kick. On the run I put up on Instagram I actually did one with quite a few flipside osis related moves. Actually the run itself doesn't have that many, but that was a bit of a focus for the session.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BZmoc8knKYZ

The other focus, which followed on from yesterday, was working on ducking my atomic set. I've been coming really close to alpine atomsmasher, I have had it drop off my foot a bunch of times. Today I was also getting good height on my flip atomic set. It was generally hitting me in the head, which is getting towards ducking but obviously not there yet.

Normally when I'm working in the afternoon I will use the morning to do a bushwalk or something, but today I just went back to bed, wasn't feeling so well. Hopefully can get up to something over the course of the weekend, though working both days. I'm strongly considering another trip to the coast on Tuesday, which is the next time I have the day off.

[boyle]

An interesting day on the footbag front. On a few levels as well.

First of all - new trick (ss butterfly rev swirl). Had never really though to try this. I also hit the other day dimwalk rev swirl, which I actually hit 10 years ago and have never done up until now. Had a bit of a kick around while out playing with Nico, a couple of 30ish contact runs.

Next thing, Jeremy posted something that he had been called to go on a live TV show in Melbourne this week but he wouldn't be able to make it. He said they may pay for flights, so I put my hand up as a possibility. Could be cool, but maybe nothing will happen. In order to clear my schedule for Friday I am currently working in the middle of the night, after already working in the day. So if nothing happens I will go to the beach instead. That was actually my plan for the morning, but I will be sleeping instead. If I waked up with enough time I might go for a swim in the river. It will be cold and hopefully refreshing. There is one place that has a cool rope swing on the other side of the river. I went a few weeks ago and it was too cold to swim across, so we will see how that goes.

The third footbag related thing is that I have just been followed on Instagram by two young guys who do freestyle football but they've decided they want to take up footbag as well. Maybe there is some payoff to putting all these clips on Instagram. Most of the freestyle football guys I know generally have a footbag, but not many have taken up particularly seriously, why it was awesome to kick with Albert Hua down in Melbourne who has got right into it.

So an interesting day in terms of footbag. Not particularly interesting in terms of regular life. Just work and more work. Coming up to the halfway point of the shift, I've done pretty much all I need to do so just need to keep myself occupied until the morning...

[Muffinman]

Ooh. Sounds awesome. Good luck with the thing if it happens!
Also good job with Instagram. I'm new to Instagram. Do you tag stuff to get people to view your stuff? What's the strategy? I'm gonna start being more active mostly for art, but would be neat to post some footbag clips too now and then. How I do?

[C-Fan]

That sounds very promising about the new recruits, especially given their existing interest in freestyle foot sports. If even one pans out, then your instagram efforts have more than paid off.

[Tjuggles]

Good luck with the TV gig. Hopefully we will see you giving weather reports in Chinese next...

[boyle]

I don't think anything will happen with the TV. I haven't heard anything and I don't really want to rush down and back if they decide to contact me tomorrow. I was on TV plenty of times in Chile, but I have actually never been on TV here in Australia.

Here is one that worked pretty well over there, on the Show de Goles, which is a soccer show. It was as a promotion for the "Feria de Futbol" which was like a big kind of expo I went to a couple of times there.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPkNka6_0Yg&[/youtube]

I kicked yesterday quite a bit, I also rode up Mt Ainslie, which was quite a challenge. Straight into shred on the top of the hill, about a 25 contact run. I kept trying to hit the combo of phoenix>blurry whirl>mobius but didn't make it. Had gyro mirage a few times at the end of the combo, but that's not what I was aiming for.

Went and watched some friends play in a band tonight, it was all easy as it was close to home. Rode over, watched some bands, back home. All in the space of a couple of hours. They played a Radio Birdman cover which was pretty awesome.