Rocket Fuel

Yeah, it's that classic story of a kid getting in way over his head and setting something on fire.

When I was in middle school, more precisely 8th grade, I had a fascination with rockets.  My aunt found out about this and sent me a couple model rocket sets for Christmas I think.  Bottom line is I received rockets in some way shape or form.  But they weren't just any rockets, the used an electric shock that ignited the black powder inside which propelled the awesome contraption toward the sky.  Like every other kid my age I pretended like I knew how to work it, I mean after all, I had set of tons of rockets before.  (Yeah right.)

It was a beautiful Spring day and I decided today was as good a day as any.  I went to my middle school, set up in the baseball field, and prepared for complete epicness.  I'm more of a learn by doing type of guy so I set up the cords to the launch platform, walk out the cords until I'm a safe-ish distance away, and hit the button...  Nothing happens.  Then I remember, I forgot to put the batteries in for the launch button.  I put them in and prepare again to see something awesome.  Again, I've never done this before and I'm kind of by myself, in the middle of a field surrounded by a bunch of dead grass, on a warm Spring day.  I count down from 10. 9. 8. 7. 6. 5. 4. 3. 2. 1.  Button pressed and I watched as the rocket shot up into the air.  They weren't lying when they said it would go about 200 feet.  Then it dropped, and as it got closer to the ground, I realized that in launching the rocket the grass was set on fire.  Crap, fire!  And it's spreading quick.  So I jump to action, literally, I ran to the fire and jumped on it.  After jumping around for a good five minutes the fire was out, the rocket was destroyed, and I had melted the soles of my shoes.  It was at this point that I decided, maybe rockets aren't for me.

That day I walked home empty handed thinking to myself, I need new shoes, that was awesome, and mom can never know.  I quickly moved on to something new, I think it was skateboarding.

Grenade

You might be thinking, "Grenade?, did he blow something up?"

The answer to that is, NO!  At least not intentionally but that story is for another time.

This story is about a sport I enjoy a lot.  It's ultimate Frisbee.  For those of you who don't know the object of the game is to pass the Frisbee down the field to eventually get a touchdown.  There are many different ways to throw the Frisbee and my personal favorite is called the hammer throw.  It's basically like throwing a football, or over hand pitch fast ball, but you have to angle it just right so it flies smooth, flattens out and drops into the receivers hands.

I'm a co-captain on a team called the Spartans, we have fun, even if we lose (which happens a lot).  Mac is our captain.  Together we have created a play we like to call the Grenade.  It only happens on a throw off  though.  We get the Frisbee, and in a burst of adrenaline and speed, Mac takes off towards the in zone while I hammer throw the disc straight to him, and for some crazy reason he catches it 95% of the time.

Case and point, our team was losing horribly, we wanted to score one more time in the last ten seconds of the game.  The other team threw the disc, and our teammate caught it and tossed it to me.  It was time, and in that last ditch effort I chucked the Frisbee as best I could knowing as soon as it left my hand it might just  make it to the in zone.  All the while, I couldn't see Mac running to the disc, little did I know he was in the in zone running around a group of guys and he slid in to catch the disc at the last second.

We still lost, I'm not even sure if we got the point or not, but I won't forget how awesome it was.  Don't worry I'll get to the story of when I caught a field on fire eventually, if not next.

Friendly Golf Cart Ride

Today I was reminded of the first time I had ever ridden in a golf cart.  Not really sure how old I was but it had to be around ten years ago.  I was with my buddy Cris at his grandparents house for a party.  We had been goofing off all day playing in the pool and eating food when he gets the idea to take the golf cart for a spin.  He asks if we can take it for a ride down the street and we got the okay.  We were warned by his mom not to do anything stupid.

He gets in the drivers seat, I'm in the passenger seat and we start riding around.  We hit the road and start to cruise and everything was nice, until he decided to swerve really quick.  I know what your thinking, I fell out of the seat and got hurt.  No!  At least, not yet.  Instead I slid towards the edge of the seat and Cris goes, "Did I scare you?"  I answer with a, "No."  As I'm adjusting my position by lifting myself up.  As I did this he decided to try again except this time, you guessed it, I fell out of the cart.  Instead of falling out and dropping to the pavement I decided to hang on.  Stupid move on my part.  I thought he would stop.  I was dragged for a few yards, cutting up my back, busting my big toe open, cutting my arm.  It hurt bad, so finally I let go as he realizes what happened and turns around to get me.  Did I mention it was a pool party so I was shirtless, wearing swim trunks, and bear foot at the time?  Yeah.  I get back on the golf cart and we ride back, the whole time thinking of an alibi for why I'm so cut up so that his mom wouldn't find out.  I put on a shirt which covered up the cuts on my back and arm, and when asked about my toe, explained that I tripped when I tried jumping into the pool earlier.

As far as I know his mom still doesn't know about it.  It's still fun for us to joke about.  A lot of stories of me getting hurt happen to have Crisman in them in one form or another.  I'm guessing the same goes for him, after all what good is a friend if you can't egg them on to do something stupid in the first place.  Right?