Cursed With Ambition

Sand Dune Bocce

Believe it or not, this is the most fun activity on Earth.  Okay, second most.  Okay, third most if you don't mind the negative side effects of cocaine.  Anyway, as far as I know, this game does not officially exist and is only played in one place on the planet - in and around Port O'Connor, Texas.

Bocce is actually an ancient game that originated in Italy.  It is played on a flat court and resembles bowling.  There are 8 balls about 4 inches in diameter and a smaller ball about an inch and a half in diameter.  The basic premise to that each player or team is attempting to get their larger balls closest to the smaller ball to score points.  It is unclear how sand dune bocce came into being.  The godfather of the game might well be Tom Tyng, but the true origins of the game are sketchy.  The commonly accepted theory is that a more traditional form of the game was played on the beach and then modified by later generations of players.  The game was probably invented sometime in the mid-90's. 

Sand dune bocce differs from regular bocce in almost every way except for the equipment.  In sand dune bocce there are 4 sets of colored balls - usually red, blue, green and yellow - plus a small white ball, called the "jack" in regular bocce and the "melon" in sand dune bocce.  The basic premise is the same except that the "court" is an area of beach and sand dunes.  The scoring is pretty simple - the closest balls of one team score one point each.  So the maximum number of points per round is 4.  That is, if one team's four balls are closer to the melon than any of the other team's balls, then four points are awarded.  We play to 21, but those games can get pretty long.  Playing to 11 or 15 is probably better, especially if playing with women who don't understand the game and get impatient with it.  The only other rule is that you have to play while holding an alcoholic beverage, preferably beer, in the non-throwing hand.  The smoking of cigarettes or cigars is also encouraged while playing.

The true beauty of sand dune bocce lies in the terrain and location.  For one, you are on the beach.  And if you are on Sunday beach on Matagorda Island you can see the Gulf of Mexico on one side and Matagorda Bay on the other, especially if you are standing atop a tall dune.  You can also see the interior grassland and inland dunes of the island itself, with the lighthouse in the distance.  This is a fine sight, especially with a beer buzz.  The finer points of the game have to do with recognizing the type of sand you are throwing into.  There is very fine white wind-driven sand, hard flat wet sand and forgiving soft wet sand.  There are also the dunes themselves, which are of varying heights and contours.  Some have ledges or flat tops; some have vegetation on them that can impede the rolling of the balls.  So, each round is different.

The game starts with four people, two to a team.  One person is selected at random to toss the melon for the first time.  Whoever tosses the melon has absolute discretion where to toss it, but input from the other players is common and there is an unwritten rule to throw back toward the ice chests when running low on beer.  The person who chunked the melon goes first, then a player from the opposite team and so on until all eight balls have been thrown.  Another twist is that it is possible to knock the balls out of the way to remove scoring balls or to move your teammate's balls closer to the melon.

Accuracy of throw is the greatest mark of skill, but being able to read the sand and predict the action of the ball after impact is also important.  Changing the arc of the throw is the most important initial skill to master.  For softer sand, you can often get the ball the stick where it lands if you get high enough trajectory.  Lower arcs or a bowling type toss are better used for distance over flat hard sand.

Probably more important the the location and the game itself are the players.  Best to have friends whose company you enjoy.  One of the greatest things, though, is when you get an unknown element in the mix and bond with them through the game.  In any event, it is very hard not to enjoy no matter who the players are.  And if not, drink until it is enjoyable.

Gomals, Godals and Noffals -or- The Weirdest Post I've Ever Done

I'm giving the paddling and Safari stuff a rest for at least this one post.  I've got lots of stuff to write about, some I've already written and stored, but I'm close to Safari overload at this moment.  I haven't posted about the Barrier to the Bay race, which was the day after the Prelim.  Nor have I posted about the San Marcos River Clinic that Robo and I did last weekend.  Both are stories worth putting up here.  Later.

What I really wanted to post about is the best science fiction plot I've ever come up with.  This is my idea, and I've never seen anything like it anywhere else.  Not to say it's not out there; I just haven't seen it.  Frankly, I'd be surprised if someone else hasn't already thought about it because it's pretty simple.  I expect my brother Matt to point me to the book that's already been written using this idea.

The basic premise is that there is a race of sensient beings - they could be aliens or highly evolved humans - and, get this, there are THREE sexes instead of two.  You could call the sexes anything you want, but not male or female.  I came up with gomals, godals and noffals just for the title of this post just now.  We'll refer to them as "M's," "D's" and "F's" for short.  Here's how it would work:  M's breed with D's to make D's.  D's breed with F's to make to make M's.  M's breed with F's to make F's.  The breeding by D's and F's produces offspring of those sexes, but M's cannot produce their own.  Of course, you could change up the combinations for all sorts of interesting dynamics.  The one I gave here is the simplest.  Here it is again:

M+D=D

D+F=M

M+F=F 

Imagine the stereotypical behavior of each sex.  Since M's cannot produce themselves, they might be cold and sullen.  Maybe they feel like they are used as the breeding tool of the species.  Maybe they are rarer than the other two sexes and are highly sought after so they hide in the forests and have to be hunted.  Or maybe they are exalted and special bejeweled cities are created to house them.  For, without them the species can't survive.

What if D's and F's hated each other and sex between them was rare?  Wouldn't that be something?

I imagine that the "battle of the sexes" in my little universe is much, much more hostile than in our world.  Then let's throw in some homosexuality!!  Also, the sexual organs and sex acts in this universe would have to be different that what we know.  Let your imagination run wild with this one.  Think of the vulgar slang and jokes they could have!!

"Better to be dead like a bump on a log than red like a pesicle on a Noffal!!"  HAHAHAHAHA!!

Or, "What do you call the secretions from a Gomal's urega?  Bearing grease."  HAHAHAHAHA!!

How about, "What's the difference between a Godal's verja-nu and a flaming odorizer?  You can get close enough to the flaming odorizer to stick it up your ass!"  HAHAHAHAHA!!

The possibilities are endless.

Safari Training Update: The Texas River Marathon aka "The Prelim"

This past weekend Robo and I participated in our first races together.  On Saturday we did the 38.35 mile Texas River Marathon, so called "The Prelim" because your finish position in that race determines your starting position in the Safari.  The Prelim course runs from the FM 236 bridge over the Guadalupe River just south of Cuero to the Riverside Park boat ramp in Victoria.  This section of the river is relatively tame.  There are numerous sections of fast current, a few sweepers, gravel bars and two sets of rapids that are large enough to have names.  But compared to the upper section of the San Marcos, it's a piece of cake.

We arrived in Victoria Friday night around 10 and we had some last minute rigging to do on the boat.  I had spent nearly every waking hour over the previous two weeks refinishing the boat to get it ready for these races.  Almost every evening I would rush home from work, change into grubby clothes and head into the garage to work on it until well past midnight.  When we got it, the boat was in pretty rough shape.  There were gouges and scratches on the hull and lots of runs and bubbles in the epoxy from poorly done repairs or refinish jobs.  The epoxy was flaking off of the wood gunnels in spots and it was all pretty badly UV damaged (susceptibility to UV damage is probably the foremost weakness of the epoxy).  And that was just the exterior hull of the boat.  Inside the boat there were gobs of dried adhesives and foam residue.  And a lot of the rigging for the rudder pedals and cables, jug holders, paddle holders and pumps needed to be reworked.  My plan was to sand the entire hull smooth, recoat the hull below the waterline with a graphite infused epoxy coating and recoat above the waterline and the gunnels with fresh clear epoxy.  I was also going to do a lot of rigging inside the boat as well.  I had never done any of this before, so I gathered as much information as I could from other racers, the company that manufactured and sold the epoxy and on boatbuilding websites.  Before I started I had a pretty good idea of what to do.  But there is only so much you can learn from reading.  You just have to do it to really know.

I got all of my supplies and materials together and started the most difficult and time-consuming step:  sanding.  I used an electric pad sander and it was very loud and dusty.  I had good safety equipment:  goggles, ear plugs, a respirator, gloves, long pants and sleeves.  I estimate it took me around 24 hours to completely sand the hull.  What made it even more challenging is that I had to stop sanding around 9 every night so as not to piss off the neighbors.  As it was, one of my neighbors came over twice to ask me to quit because his sick baby was trying to sleep.  Whenever I had to stop sanding I would flip the boat over and work on the rigging.  I cut a new jug holder out of minicell foam and glued it in, replaced the rudder cables, replaced the foam extensions on the rudder pedals, repaired one of the pump bases, replaced all of the zip ties holding the wires and hoses for the pumps, replaced the wiring, built battery packs for the pumbs and made a way to secure them, removed probably close to half a pound of old glue and residue and a lot of other things.  Finally I finished sanding and I was able to start the coating process.  I was really looking forward to the coating steps because I knew that the boat would start coming together and I would be able to see the results of my work, but I was also a little scared because I had never used epoxy before and it is difficult to work with.  The main reason is that it has a short "pot life," meaning that once you mix the resin and hardener together you have a short time to apply it before it starts setting up.  In my case, I bought the slow hardener so I would have about 20 minutes per batch to apply the coating.  I was starting with the graphite bottom.  The graphite bottom coating is just regular 2 part epoxy with graphite powder added to it.  The purpose of the graphite coating is so that the bottom of the hull is tougher and more resistant to scratches and gouges and it also slides more easily over logs and rocks.  The coating dries glassy, but you have to sand it down using sandpaper of varying grits until you get down to 400 or 600 grit sandpaper, which is almost like polishing cloth.  That makes the bottom really slick.

I measured the hull and traced the contour of the area that was to get the coating.  I taped it off with masking tape and covered the rest of the boat with masking paper.  I cleaned the hull of dust as best I could.  Then I was ready to start mixing the epoxy.  The epoxy was expensive and I was worried about screwing it up.  You have to mix the resin and hardener in an exact ratio.  Then you've got to hurry to apply it.  I read the directions over and over again and laid out all of the tools I needed so that as soon as I started mixing I wouldn't waste any time.  I measured out the resin, added the hardener then the graphite powder and mixed it.  It was so black that I thought I could actually see the mixture sucking up light.  I poured it into my small paint tray and used my high quality foam roller to start putting it on the boat.  I hustled and used up my first batch with time to spare.  I had coated about 2/3 of the hull with it.  I mixed another batch and repeated all of my steps.  I then used a foam brush to "tip" the uncured epoxy, which smooths out any runs and takes out any air bubbles.  The finish was almost perfectly smooth and it looked awesome.  I was really excited and I couldn't wait to apply the clear coat.

It takes about 24 hours for the epoxy to fully cure, so the next night I sanded the new coating so I could apply the second coat.  You have to sand it to create surface area on a microscopic scale so that the coating with stick better.  You have to be careful not to sand off the entire coating, though.  I probably sanded too much off.  I mixed my expoxy, this time in one large batch instead of two, and started applying it.  I got about 3/4 of the boat covered when the epoxy started setting up.  I should have just stopped and made up a new batch to finish the job, but I didn't want to waste any.  I tore up a roller with the thickening mixture and had to quickly change it out.  The epoxy was going on in lumps and clots and looked like hell.  I ended up using a putty knife to scrape some of the bigger chunks off before it dried.  I tried to tip it smooth as best I could, but it was still lumpy and uneven.  It wasn't the end of the world because I knew I would be able to sand most of it smooth.

The next evening I sanded the graphite coating again; this time with three different grits of sandpaper all the way down to 400.  It got late on me so I had to quit using the electric sander and actually finished the last two hours by hand.  It was hard, hard work.  But damn it looked good.

The next evening I masked the boat to coat the gunnels and the hull above the waterline.  At the last minute I decided to restain the gunnels with a rich walnut stain.  I was going to have to wait for it to dry before putting on the epoxy, but it was worth it.  I'm glad I did, because it really made the boat's appearance a whole lot better.  I let it dry for an hour or so while I got some dinner then I started getting ready for the clear coat epoxy.  This step was a  more delicate because this was a clear coating and any mistakes were going to be very noticeable.  I learned from my mistakes on the graphite coating and only mixed enough epoxy to do half the boat.  As soon as I started rolling it on, I knew that the boat was going to be beautiful.  Carbon fiber has a metallic checkerboard appearance and is very attractive with a clear coating.  It looked exactly like I thought it was supposed to look.  I mixed the second batch of epoxy and applied it just like the first.  I tipped it with the foam brush and I couldn't stop walking around looking at it.  I had outdone myself.

The next day was the Friday before the race.  I got home from work, pulled off all of the masking tape and paper and put on the 4" red and white boat number decal, "8321."  With the decal on and the shiny clearcoat, graphite bottom and newly stained gunnels the boat looked magnificent.  I nearly cried it looked so damned good.

We loaded it up and headed for Victoria.  Robo and I did some last minute rigging, securing mesh food bags and securing the wires for the pumps then we went to bed.

The race was to start at 9, but I wanted to be at the starting line at 8 because I knew it would take us a while to get sign in, get our gear situated and get the boat launched.  Plus, I knew the starting line was going to be a clusterfuck of 70-plus teams doing the same things.  Of course, somehow we got a late start.  It took a while to get the water jugs filled and drinks mixed with our high-tech powdered endurance fuel.  Plus, just getting your body ready takes a long time.  You've got to apply Desitin to your ass, body glide everywhere that could chafe, put on nipple covers, take electrolyte pills and Advil, put Vitamin E on your hands to prevent blisters...there's a lot of shit.  We got to the starting area a little before 8:30.  We were panicky because we were running late.  We went down to the sign in to pick up our t-shirts and sign the waivers when we overheard people talking about their team captains.  Oh shit!  Our team captain is my fiance' and she came to Victoria with me for that specific purpose.  In an effort to try to be accomodating to her I told her she didn't need to be at the starting line so she could sleep in, which was totally fucking stupid on my part.  The rules required a TC and I knew that.  Why wouldn't they need to be present at the start?  Frantically I called her.  She didn't answer so I called my parents' house where we were staying.  My mom answered and I told her that we couldn't start without our TC.  My Mom and Dad brought her in record time.  As it turned out, the race officials were too overwhelmed to check out everyone's TC, so we could have started without her.

We got all of the gear secured in the boat and hauled it to the river bank.  The race director called out over a bullhorn, "Two minutes."  There was a line of boats trying to launch.  We were panicky about getting in the water in time.  We put the boat in facing upriver.  Just when we both got seated the starting siren when off and all of the boats lurched forward with paddles churning up the water.  We were faced the wrong way and there was a tree sticking out of the water preventing us from turning.  To make matters worse, Robo got tangled up in some fishing line hanging off of the tree.  It seemed like it took FOREVER to get untangled, get turned downriver and take off.  In reality it was probably less than thirty seconds.

The good thing about starting slow or near the back is that for at least a while you are overtaking and passing boats.  It feels good.  It feels like you are winning.  During the first hour or so we overtook a dozen or more boats.  I chatted up a couple of people I knew.  We traded intros with some other teams as we paddled alongside.  Things were going well and we settled into a manageable pace.  I figured it would take us 6 to 6-1/2 hours to finish the race, so we didn't want to start out too strong.  Eventually we came upon our first decision to take a left or right channel.  The right channel was pushing current right into a sweeper, but the left channel was longer.  We chose to go right and fight the sweeper.  Big mistake.  We went from about 6mph to dead zero as we plowed into a large branch sticking out of the water.  We had done something similar before and had dented in the nose of the boat.  There was no way we hadn't damaged it again.  I got a sick feeling in my stomach.  All that hard, hard work on this beautiful refinish job, and for what?  Just so we could go fuck it all up?  Man I was upset.  But we paddled on.

We passed a couple more boats over the next couple of hours, but everyone was spreading out.  At some point we had to pee and I went first.  We were going to try out our new pee cups.  It didn't work so well.  First of all, the cups are only about 8oz. and apparently I have about a 14oz. bladder.  Cutting a piss off in mid-stream hurts!  Then, when I was done I went to dip the cup in the river to rinse it out and we were going faster than I realized and as soon as the cup hit the water it was ripped out of my hand.  I didn't know what I was going to do if I had to pee again.  I started paddling again and then Robo tried to pee.  The EXACT SAME THING happened to him - the painful mid-stream cutoff and losing his pee cup in the river.

We came upon the first set of rapids that everyone said were the biggest obstacle on the Prelim course.  Since the water was so low, all of the boulders were sticking well out of the water and the channels were clearly defined.  It was a little bumpy going through, but no problems.  A guy in a solo boat who had gone through right in front of us had capsized going through and we passed him as he was gathering up his gear and emptying his boat out.

For most of the race a tandem female team had been about 75 yards behind us and staying right with us.  I knew who they were and they were strong, experienced paddlers.  They called their boat She-Ra.  I set the goal of not letting them pass us.

Eventually fatigue started setting in and we decided to switch over to single blade paddles.  Single blading is easier on the body, but you also lose about 1mph.  My strategy was going to be to single blade to recovery or until the She-Ra got within 40 yards, whichever came first, then switch back to the faster doubles and finish out the race that way.  The She-Ra made up ground on us over about 30-45 minutes.  I was close to calling for the switch when out of nowhere we ran up on a submerged gravel bar and came to a stop.  "Get out of the boat!" I yelled.  I got out immediately to drag the boat back into the channel.  Robo was a little more sluggish either because he wasn't sure what to do or because of fatigue.  The She-Ra passed us right as we got back in the boat.  I called to switch back to the doubles.  The girls saw us switching back to the faster paddles so they knew they had a race on their hands.  We caught up to them and ran neck-and-neck.  They would get a little ahead, then we would.  We dropped back and drafted them a bit.  Then I saw an advantage.  There was another split in the river.  The right channel looked shallow with slow current while the left channel was narrow, but deeper with faster current.  There was a sweeper hanging over one section of the left channel, but I thought we could avoid it.  I used the rudder to turn us into the left channel as I asked Robo if he saw what I was doing.  He said he did, although I'm not sure he agreed with the move.  If we got hung up in the sweeper it was over.  It turned out to be the right move because the current propelled us and the She Ra slowed momentarily as they raked a gravel bar.  We came out slightly ahead of the She-Ra.  From there it was just a back and forth sufferfest.  They would get slightly ahead, then we would.  Eventually, they just had too much and we dropped back about ten yards.  When we were about half a mile from the finish I asked Robo if he had one more push, but he shook his head no.  Good thing too; I didn't have much left either.  So we came in about thirty seconds after the She-Ra in 19th place overall; 4th in Tandem Unlimited class in 5 hours 41 minutes.  The full results are here.

All in all we did better than I expected we would for our first race.  I didn't like getting beaten by the She-Ra, but they are a good team so there should be no shame in that.  I figure we lot as much as 2 minutes by our late start, hitting the stump and running up on the gravel bar.  That probably would have been the difference between finishing before or after the She-Ra, but losing 2 minutes to mistakes for a rookie team is still a pretty clean race.