Sandro Colacicco smokes dro, chops O’s, rides dirty, and his candy paint looks purty.
I’ve been doing some strange stuff recently–reading Lolita at odd hours of the night in seedy diners, cooking ethnic food in grotesque quantities, and perusing vintage porn (don’t check out the porn re-enactment of Hair). I also grew a goatee and bought black-rimmed reading glasses. Then I stared at myself in the mirror and realized that I looked like I had just attended a Vampire Weekend festival in a Columbia dorm room. Something was wrong…very, very wrong.
Then it hit me–sports! Deprived of football and baseball, my brain and soul have no direction. February college basketball hardly gets my blood pumping. The NBA? Give me a break, the playoffs don’t start for another two months. I stripped off my Verizon Wireless-annoying-guy-from-the-commercial-look-alike shades and stared at the stars: “Jesus, Buddha, even you, Muhammad, please send me guidance in my search for limitless entertainment in these desperate times.”
These are the unfortunate results:
Kabaddi
I’m not exactly sure how this sport works, but I do know that they play it in Bangladesh, which means it must be violent and vaguely involve subsistence farming.
According to the always-trustworthy Wikipedia: “Two teams of seven players occupy opposite halves of a field of 12.5m x 10m divided by a line into two halves. The teams take turns sending a ‘raider’ across to the opposite team’s half, where the goal is to tag or wrestle (‘capture’) members of the opposite team before returning to the home half. Tagged members are ‘out’ and are sent off the field. The raider must not take a breath during the raid, and must prove it by constantly chanting (called ‘cant’ or ‘dak’) during the raid.
Meanwhile, the defenders must form a chain, for example by linking hands; if the chain is broken, a member of the defending team is sent off. The goal of the defenders is to stop the raider from returning to the home side before taking a breath.”
Wait, what? Raider? Wrestle? Aren’t you breathing if you’re chanting “dak” into the air?
So I did a bit more research and it seems this sport is not really for indigent farmers who fantasize about trying on their wives saris. In fact, it seems most similar to a sport I play myself: rugby. Ultimately, it’s about a bunch of diesel Indian guys who get together, hold hands, and then try to tackle another jacked Indian guy who is not allowed to breathe. Awesome? I know. It’s like Slumdog Millionaire meets Murder Ball meets Hulk Hogan’s No Holds Barred.
Handball
Chances are you’ve probably come across handball and admittedly, it’s not that unusual. In fact, it’s an Olympic sport. In case you don’t know the rules, it’s basically a combination of baseball, basketball, and hockey. There are two hockey-size nets on either end of a gym floor, and players throw the ball (via a baseball, or-sling-like) into the opponents’ net. The only thing complicating it is that you can only advance the ball by throwing it or bouncing it to one of your teammates. Also, there’s a “key” which players aren’t allowed to enter. This results in a lot of sick jump-throws and dives while shooting. Sort of like Derek Jeter’s uber-obnoxious jump throw from the hole at short.
Now that you’re familiar with the sport, let’s start playing. Americans and even Canadians have yet to really embrace it, but we’re the ideal country thanks to our peerless “throwing” backgrounds. You think the world champion Russians played baseball or football growing up? Hell no, those Commies were playing cheese and periodically attempting to keep their children from entering the sexual underground.
So stop whatever you do in your free time and play some handball. Teach your kids how to play handball. Make yourself feel better about this commitment to handball and place a bet on TUSEM ESSEN to upset HSV HAMBURG in the Bundesliga. It’s a lock.
Extreme Ironing
“The latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well pressed shirt.”
Enough said. Just take a gander.
There’s something about the feeling of a well-pressed shirt that just makes me want to shave my fucking Goatee, jump-throw these ridiculous looking glasses at the first German person I see, and challenge these Starbucks-swilling nerds to a shirtless game of Kaddabi.
Back to normal.
Download:
MP3: Nootrac-“Extreme Croquet”
MP3: Cannibal Ox-“Iron Galaxy”
