A Day In The Life Of A Peanut Butter Cup

Listen Up!
Well, this is the WJF4 blog. No word on other projects because I didn't work on them. But let me stop talking here, because we have a lot to get to.

Day 0-1: Arrival, Dietz, and the media.
Getting there was half the fun. Ok, so I left at around 2:00 to get to the Metro Park Train Station for my 3:00 train. For once, it's right on time. So we're on our way, we layover for about 20 minutes in Penn Station, and then the electrics go out while we're there. Just as I'm deciding to watch a DVD. So I think nothing of it, and we continue on our way. For the next hour the power is going on and off, then they finally let us know that the engine car pulling the train is failing. Wonderful. So now we're basically stalling and coasting our way for another half hour until the next station, where they unhook this engine, bring in a new one, and attach the cars onto this engine car. The entire process takes, oh, I don't know, about 1 FRICKIN HOUR. During which we had nowhere to go, the snack car was closed, and the electrics were gone because there was no engine. It was fun, let me put it that way...
So finally I arrive right at Union Station, where day one of the con is being held. This is on the 8th, before the on even started, and there was Thomas, Vova, Arash, Adrian, Freddy, and a few others just juggling in the lobby. I literally just walked off the train, put my stuff down, and started juggling. I would have juggled off the train, but I was carrying three bags, and the bags weighed about 30 lbs a piece, so I couldn't juggle them :P

So basically, I got there around 8:00 PM, and I just hung out until sometime around midnight or so, when Thomas, Laura Earnst, Markus, and someone else started screwing around with Thomas' abilities. We were just telling him things to do and he was nailing them first time. We even came up with a "footplant 360", where Thomas starts juggling, turns his upper body to face backwards (feet do not move), then do a 3 up and spin his upper body around (still with feet planted) to juggle facing backwards the other way. It's awesome, and we all want him to do it in competition to stick it to Jason. Fun times...

So then that day ended and I spent the night at someone else's, and then we come i n and now the gym is REALLY filled up. The rest of the day was a rush with me trying to adjust to the new thing for the next week, and then trying to figure out everything for the cops I'm running and JoJ. I sorted it all out though, and played combat against Adrian Pole. Awesome. So the rest of the day was pretty uneventful, except for the media report that was recorded earlier in the day, the played on the news later that night. There was a story about a drunk boat driver falling out of his boat and the boat continuing driverless in circles around a lake somewhere, and it got more air time than we did! At least they showed a clip of me doing a 1up 180 with 3 clubs, so it's not all bad.


Day 2: DVDs, Airflite Bouncing, and 4 person passing.
So today I decided to get all my DVD's bought, because I needed to buy them. So I did that, and I'm down another $120 or so. I got both WJF3 DVD's, the Jason Garfield DVD, the UK Open DVD, and 2 WJF4 shirts (one is for Steven Worthy). But that's enough of that, Freddy arrived in the gym today, just as we discovered that one of the three central pillars in the room served as a great surface for bounding things off of. We then found out very shortly thereafter that Airflites (specifically, mine) bounced very nicely. Freddy tried doing a 744 with the 7 off the pillar, and then one of the more awesome things was between Freddy and Chris Merra (I think). Freddy did a few 3 club things to start, then caught a scissor catch, then threw the caught one out, off the wall, and then Chris caught it in another scissor catch. Adrian got a video of it on his camera, and I'm gonna get it from him later. It was awesome. Then we found that Airflites also bounced off the floor well, so me and Freddy then tried to bounce one from me into Freddy, who caught it from 3 clubs into 4 clubs. It was insane when we got it. Bottom line, if you ever have a concrete floor or pillar, and a few Airflites, go for it. And now the first pillar in convention hall B of the Connecticut center has a bunch of dents in it, imprints in the dust where the clubs hit, and my Airflites have now got grey paint embedded into the plastic, and the handles are now slightly warped. Airflites do not break, they can only warp.

But other highlights of the day were when me and a bunch of other people were learning really complex passing patterns with 4 or more people, and we got a bunch of them working. I just wish I had video of them. Ss I'm tired, so I will write more tomorrow.

Day 3: Harry Potter, CVS, and the most Awesome Tricks Ever.
Well, today was cool as hell. I wake up and run out to the con as I did yesterday. I love having the con center attached DIRECTLY to the hotel, I don't even have to walk anywhere! Either way, so I get there, and the first thing I see is up on the white-board. Harry Potter at 10:00 PM. I've been wanting to see this movie, and I figure why not do it here, but that part comes later. So I arrange to go and get on with the con.

Simple enough, I spend the first few hours just generally hanging out ad stuff. Planning the schedule with Laura Earnst about when we'll record JoJ because her competition is today. But nothing really noteworthy happened, at least that I can remember. So then comes the womens comp, which I was slated to help rally the competitors and organize them, but when I go up to Jason 10 minutes to the start, he says he doesn't need me for it. "Really? Uh, Ok then." and I watch Laura kick some ass in the comp, and then immediately afterwards was the freestyle competitions. Dude. There is a reason why I would never miss a freestyle comp at the WJF. Just a few noteworthy tricks were Dietz's db97531 back to a cascade and his 2 stage 720 in 8x6. Also, Vova got a 4 up 720 with 6 rings if I remember correctly, and Brett Sheets did the b666600 360 in the 5 CLUB freestyle, but that's just a few of the tricks we saw. Let me just say, it was pure madness.

So that finishes and then we run to do JoJ upstairs in the main foyer of the con center. We did the video section this time, and we hit a few snags finding power outlets and having to run all the way back downstairs to get a fresh memory card (I've already filled the 2 gig one), but it was an awesome segment, and it's well worth it. She's stoked about just kicking ass in the womens comps, and overall it's been the best segment so far. But you'll see it when JoJ releases.

After that, I then make the run to the local CVS that I've been meaning to do since getting here. I needed Mountain Dew, and bagels for breakfast. I decided to be the nice guy that I am, so before i left, I shouted on the convention floor "I'm making a CVS run, does anyone want any groceries!?" Needless to say, about a dozen people came up, so I made a system, since we had small manila envelopes there anyways, I said write your name and what you want on the envelope, and put the money in it. It actually worked out better than I thought. So it ended up being me, Dave McGaughty, Thomas Dietz, and another German (I can't remember his name right now) going to CVS, usign the shuttle to get there, and walking the way back. We ended up spending about a half hour there just looking for stuff for ourselves and others. CVS doesn't exactly have the same selection as Shoprite, but we managed to get a lot of stuff that everyone wanted. So that was awesome. The worst part about it though, was once we arrived, one of the guys who worked at the center decided to be a dick and kick me out for bringing in all of the groceries for everyone. Luckily, we'd already gotten rid of half and I got the idea to just go down to the attached Marriot (where I'm staying by the way) and leave the groceries as people specific baggage to be claimed. So luckily, that worked out alright. But that guy was still horrible, he even watched me walk out of the center and into the hotel to make sure I wasn't coming back with them. What an asshole.

But on to happier things, such as Harry Potter, which really isn't all that happy anymore. But I'll put my review in the next post of the actual movie. However, the trip there was one of the most insane car rides I have ever had in my life. I piled in with Arash into the car being driven by none other than Crazy Marty. We almost got killed at least 3 times getting there, dodging overflowing sewer pipes and manholes, nearly missing exits, and trying to get a signal on the Garmin the entire time. The trip back was the same way. Fun.


Day 4: Box Stealing, Wi-Fi, and Magic Tricks.
Today was actually a little bit slow. Not too much happened. I woke up, had some Combos and a Mountain Dew and headed for the con. There I chatted with the guys on the live webcam for a while, did some stuff, then came the first awesome thing of the day. "Crazy Marty" as everyone knows him, was watching me screw around with my boxes and passing them between another guy. The guy and I came up with doing tricks while passing all three boxes back and forth to each other, and we managed a few cool things. We only did horizontal tricks however, and when Crazy came over, he had the idea to do some takeouts. I then came up with the idea to do vertical takeouts from a balance, and we just kept building from there and also adding some acting to it until we got the above video. It was awesome and I've been showing it around the con for the past few hours. Then we both decided "This is too good of a clip to be put with something, we need to upload it to Youtube now." So we went out with his laptop to try and connect to the wi-fi in the con center and upload it. We spent about a good half hour trying and tinkering with windows XP trying to connect to the wi-fi points. Eventually we switched computers and uploaded the above clip, but man it was a pain. But either way, box passing and stealing kicks ass, and we also came up with an idea for an entire themed video that I'll be recording at Philly Fest this year hopefully.

Also the rest of the day after that was pretty ordinary, Thomas and everyone gathered after combat ended and started doing some card magic tricks and stuff, which is strange, but ok I guess. I just want to get to sleep right now, so I'll write more tomorrow.

Day 5: Sleep, Thumbs, and Connecticon
I think it's not that less is happening, just that I'm getting used to all the stuff and sensory overloads that happen each day, and now it seems like everything is less and less interesting. There were a few good things though. First being my not deciding to wake up until 10 minutes before the competitions start and almost not making it in. That was fun. Then after that came a nice big game of combat that I started. I think it was like the 20th round or so, Malte Peter comes in, and he bashes me right on the f'n hand. He hits my thumb right on the nail and pulls it partly away from the skin, allowing it to bleed everywhere, and to hurt like a bitch too. So I was out for about 5 rounds, then I realized that it was also bleeding under the nail. Good times. I go back and try to nurse it, but after 3 or 4 rounds, I stopped playing altogether for a while.

By this time, when I decide to go over to the webcam, Connecticon, the role playing convention taking place on the next floor, has swung into high gear, and now we have literally got for every one juggler, at least 7 people in costumes walking around in the lobby out in the con center. That was an interesting thing to watch indeed. I've got a plan to crash the other con with a bunch of jugglers sometime tomorrow. But that's another matter.

So the advanced comps were today, and I honestly have no idea where it can go. Stuff like Arash's harder routine with more drops vs Thomas' easier one with less drops. It's going to be interesting tomorrow. But the advanced comps were really short and small comparatively. I remember thinking that WJF3 had to be the worst WJF of the string, I think this one takes it as the worst, despite the fact that now I know what I'm doing.


Day 6: PX3 City, JoJ, and Organizings
Well today was the last day of the convention, and I'm left without a room to stay in until my train tomorrow at three, so I'll just update this. Wait, scratch that thing about not having a room, one of the jugglers just passed by and gave me a berth. Ok, well either way, back to what happened in the past. I missed recording the volunteering segment of JoJ yesterday, and the schedule today is PACKED. I got the OK from Jason to record in the empty arena, and there was about a half hour difference after the beginners comp and before the Extreme comps when I could record in. Since Krizzly was busy passing and I couldn't get anyone else, I got Sky. Yes, the audio woman who kicks ass and is at pretty much every convention anywhere. So we recorded that, and I think it looked good, but I just skipped right past beginners didn't I? Ok, so I had a blast about a half hour before the beginners comp started, because Arash said he'd judge the point values for the moves in the morning, but 30 minutes before the comp starts and I can't find him anywhere, so Chris Merra said he'd do it. Sure enough Arash walks in about 10 minutes later, when everything is done. Now, I wanted to stay as hands off as I could with the judging, and I did. I don't even know my own move scores (which was something I originally wanted to avoid in the concept for the beginners comp, but realistically this works better and easier for everyone involved). So we finish, people start piling in, and I start announcing the intro and everything, then hand the mic over to Chris, who said he'd also announce everything else for the comp, and run off to the back to prepare to compete. I'm actually pretty confident, I know I didn't walk around that much, but I did drop a lot more than everyone else, however I think I had harder tricks than everyone else besides Jack Denger. We'll see what happens. Either way, it was fun to compete, and then I close with another thing on the mic, then go do JoJ and come back again for the Extreme Comps.

The Extreme Comps were the most fun of all, because I'd spent so much time practicing for, organizing, and generally stressing about the beginners comp, that I'd completely neglected to even think about the Extreme comps. So I'm sitting there announcing things on the mic like an idiot, literally making things up as I go "Uh, yeah. You get three tries. Yeah that sounds good." Fortunately the competitions were funny enough on their own to make up for the lack of preparation. Especially having Laura Earnst and Rob Crites being the official pelters for 5 ball concentration. What was even more awesome was Thomas getting 560 catches and Rob just trying whatever he could to get him to drop, and ended up balancing clubs on Thomas' head and poking him to finally get him to drop. Second place had only about 280 catches. That was insane.

Then as everyone was coming out of Extreme, we noticed that someone had stood a bunch of everyone's PX3's on their ends and left them that way. PX3 City was born. It was more awesome than anything. Everyone just came in and started stacking their props and making towers and stuff. There were at least 3 or 4 major towers being built, but I really stole it from everyone when I made Peden Tower. Just look at the picture here. I too 3 Airflites per level, put a ring between the levels for stability, and built it up as high as I could. We actually got it to 5 levels, but it only lasted for a minute and I couldn't get my camera out fast enough. It was insane, and I actually had to stack 3 chairs in order to reach to the top to put up the final ring. Coolest thing ever. I've got more picds of the entire city up on Facebook.

So then came the awards banquet, which I finally decided to go for pictures instead of video, so now all my pics are from there. Thomas won overall, again. And now I'm tired and want to go to sleep, so I'm gonna head up and catch my train tomorrow, so I'll end this now before you get too tired of reading. SO that's my trip to WJF4, and I hope you enjoyed it even a tenth as much reading it as I did living it.

A Week In The Life Of A Peanut Butter Cup ~ Reeses2150