Last winter was nice in that we had very little snow—I was even able to run on my favorite track on New Year’s Eve, and was able to get out to the local greenway from time to time.
As we all know, this year has been very different—LOTS of snow, which has forced me inside on the treadmill. We bought a decent one a few Christmases ago, and I was able to split our cable and run it to an old TV, so we can watch pretty much anything, including programs we’ve recorded. And now that I figured out how to turn on the closed-captioning, you can follow any program without having to hear it, which was a problem over the sound of the treadmill.
That all being done, it’s still boring as hell to run on a treadmill. As such, while recently running, my mind drifted to—
Five Random Things on Treadmills
1. Drunk “Mythbuster” Adam Savage
Sadly, I run like that when I’m stone-cold sober.
2. The band OK Go
You never saw ABBA doing this.
3. A shrimp
And now you will be singing “The Final Countdown” all day. You’re welcome!
4. Horses on Ye Olde Treadmill
I hope they use it later to churn thine butter.
5. A slinky
Oddly compelling.
For the record, I wanted to add the clip from “The Simpsons” of Homer running on a treadmill while Scully and Mulder from “The X-Files” watch, but apparently, it’s not available anywhere. D’oh!
So now that’s about 10 minutes of your life you won’t get back. At least you weren’t on a treadmill watching it.
So like many of you, I spend way too much of my precious life clicking on random links across the intrawebz, which has led me to more than a few … interesting discoveries (which I won’t share here), as well as things I wish I could unsee.
As such, I came across this yesterday …
And yeah, even though it’s kind of cool that the kid can do that, I’ve always wondered about the practicality of devoting so much of one’s life to learning a skill—like beatboxing—that doesn’t appear to have all that many practical applications. I mean, yes, it’s entertaining, and possibly someone may pay you from time to time, but you can’t actually make a career out of it, right? Can you? I mean, occasionally you hear one or two on a song, but usually it’s a novelty. As good as this kid is, he’s not going to sell out Madison Square Garden or headline in Vegas. He might get 15 minutes of fame, but that’s not going to set up much of a retirement fund.
I guess the best-case scenario is that he uses it as a springboard for something more grand … I mean, someone some day has to replace Michael Winslow, right?
I’ve always thought we all have one unusual skill—either discovered or undiscovered—that we’re great at, you know, like how some people can flip their eyelids inside out or whistle through their nose or turn their tongue upside down. (For the record, both my sons can turn their tongues upside down, a skill that they absolutely don’t get from their stubby-tongued father, although they have another parent that just *might* be able to do this freakish trick … just sayin’.) As I’ve mentioned, I’ve always fantasized that my secret skill is being the greatest bobsled driver ever, even if I’ve never been near a bobsled.
As many of you know, I’m actually quite the trivia whiz, but outside of bar contests, game shows and writing occasionally witty blog posts, there’s not a lot of real use for this, either. *Sigh*
Still, I do believe we all have something that we can do well. But just because we’re good at these things, doesn’t make them worthwhile.
So here are
Five Skills That Although Entertaining, I’m Not Sure Are All That Useful
1. Frisbee champ – Now when I was young man strutting along the beaches of Milford, Conn., this seemed like a great skill to have for attracting women, although in retrospect, I’m pretty sure only me and my buddies Milo and Bobby thought this would work—one of us probably should’ve told the ladies to be impressed. (Not EVER heard in 1980s Connecticut: “Oh mah gawd—look at those guys with the big hair and high tube socks working that Frisbee—like, even though it has the sex appeal of Weird Al Yankovic, it makes me totally want to date them!!!”)
That being said, being able to fling a plastic disc around with some prowess, although fun, really isn’t going to make you a lot of money. Oh sure, there is the fledgling American Ultimate Disc League, but I’m pretty sure none of the participants are quitting their day jobs to play.
2. Yo-yo whiz – Sure, we all remember when the “pro” yo-yo team showed up at school to impress us with their cool tricks into buying yo-yos, but really, what “purpose” can you ultimately fulfill with throwing something on a string away from you and then pulling it back? It seems as though I should be able to come up with a catchy metaphor or something here, but the whole concept of a yo-yo seems so one-dimensional—okay, two-dimensional if you count “up” and “down” as separate dimensions—that I can’t even think of anything.
Okay yes, there’s a World Yo-Yo Contest (this August 8-10 in Orlando, Florida), but the prize for winning—usually around $300—isn’t quite enough to make a significant difference in your life, you know, unless you’re homeless. But if that’s the case then you probably don’t have enough cash for a yo-yo in the first place, probably choosing to “squander” your resources on frivolities like food.
3. Air guitar star – Again, another entertaining skill with its own world championships (Celebrating A Decade of Air”)! Winners usually earn amounts equal to what you might find in your seat cushions, although quite often they are presented with custom air guitars. Yeahhhh.
I would’ve embedded his performance here, but after about 26 seconds of watching, I was pissed that those 26 seconds were gone forever, Nordic Thunder’s bloodletting notwithstanding. I don’t think I’m the only one.
4. Skillet Tossing – And no, that’s not a euphemism. (Although it may be now.)
This activity—exclusively for the ladies—is a popular event on the county fair circuit, at least here in New England. Again, it’s not exactly anything you’re going to be able to retire in grandeur with once you’ve triumphed (at least at the Brooklyn Fair), but who can put a price on bragging rights and being allowed to fling a frying pan as far as you can?
Plus, it’s probably led to a love connection or two, right? I mean, what man can resist a sturdy girl who can toss a frying pan across a football field?
5. Punkin chunkin – The fact that I even know Punkin Chunkin exists as an actual activity is a testament to my own ability to surf through those “learnin’-type” channels (TLC, Discovery, History, Science, NatGeo, MTV Jams, etc.) on my TV and absorb pop culture—and in this case, it’s literally POP!, the sound made as pumpkins are launched into the Delaware sky (and smash thousands of feet away on the Delaware ground).
I can spend a few hundred words describing the Punkin Chunkin experience, but I’ll let this do it for me
That’s right—a bunch of engineering kooks try to see who can fling a pumpkin the farthest. That’s pretty much it, although since there are engineers involved, there are plenty of rules, parameters, specifications, guidelines and the like involved. But ultimately, it’s about who is the most skilled at shooting a gourd the farthest … just because they can.
Unlike some of the other skills here, there’s absolutely no money to be won for Punkin Chunkin; however, the majority of the proceeds (better than 70%) raised from spectator tickets and other sponsorships goes to support local charities. So I guess spending thousands of dollars and investing countless hours to craft the perfect device to launch a pumpkin at 400 mph through the air isn’t such a worthless endeavor after all!
