Olivia Dunne Does Recovery Training Routine, Guy Falls Off A Mardi Gras Float & Verne Says This Is it
Big Little Brawlers finale!
Little did I know last summer when I showed up to Reset, the local bar with volleyball courts and enough space to hold a micro wrestling ring, that I would be watching eventual television superstars in action.
We had a blast that hot July night as Hot Rod & Lil Show flew around the ring. I remember Zach Presley and Disco Dom were there that night, too.
Now they're TV stars.
Last night, I sat down and watched TV history as Discovery finished its six-episode run documenting the Micro Wrestling Association, which is based in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, where the micros wrestle out of what looks like an old Rite-Aid building turned into a micro wrestling arena.
I won't ruin how the show ends, but I can say that Syko asks Pinky to marry him in a proposal that has the sports world talking.
What a run from the micros. The story development was fairly good, even if the producers focused too much on Syko and Pinky. I get that they need relationship drama to drive the show and Syko possibly cheating on his baby mama Pinky while he's out on the road will pull in the viewers.
Overall, I'd give the series a 4 out of 5. There were some repetitive storylines that allowed me to fast-forward, but the episode climaxes were perfectly executed.
My only worry is that the micros might be too big to return to Reset this summer. Fingers crossed we get one more year at the local bar where we can crush Busch Lights before they start showing up in the 10k seat arenas.
That's my buddy Diesel with the micros last summer:
REMINDER: I'M OFF THE NEXT TWO MORNINGS
I just wanted to save some of you the time you're going to put into emails. I will be off and not waking up to look at a computer on a Friday for the first time since last summer.
The last time I took off a day was early October and that was a Monday.
The point I'm trying to make is that I don't want to see your emails tomorrow. Don't send them. PLEASE.
Now, when I return on Monday, please fill up the inbox with all the stuff you've been doing and share your stories.
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com
Speaking of Tennessee, how are we feeling about this cold beer ban?
Someone tipped me off to this plan on Twitter. You can read the full bill language here, but the headline speaks volumes.
I remember back in the early 2000s when I lived in Pennsylvania and going to the grocery for the first time to buy a 12-pack. I asked some guy at Wegmans stocking shelves where the beer aisle was at. He said they didn't sell beer.
What?
Then he thought I was joking with him.
"In Pennsylvania, you have to go to a beer warehouse to buy cases of beer or to a hoagie or pizza joint. They'll sell six-packs," he said.
That's when I first learned states have wild beer rules. Now it sounds like Tennessee wants to get in on the wild beer rules business.
So you're telling me, if this passes, I can't go into a gas station to get a COLD 12-pack, but I can buy a bag of ice and throw the 12-pack into a Yeti – that's probably a bad example, I think there's still a Yeti boycott – and have COLD beer for a month before the ice melts? What am I missing here?
Someone help me out.
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com
Throwing a ‘BS Flag’ on Super Bowl LVIII
• Phillip in Nashville writes:
I can't believe no one in class has mentioned the BS the NFL put out at the end of Super Bowl regulation.
Jim Nantz says "We're going to start a NEW game."
The referee says "Gentlemen, we're going to start a NEW game."
Back to the booth and Nantz gleefully says "we're starting a NEW game."
Someone thought that phrase would add weight and drama to a SB overtime, but it's nonsense.
Did the refs get paid for working a 2nd game? Did the score revert back to 0-0?
Did they clear the stadium? Did the NFLPA agree to the teams playing 2 games in one day? Is SB LVIII listed as a 19-19 result? Where's the SB LVIX 3-6 result?
The phrase was just so unnecessarily stupid.
I've noticed (Comcast) that in the TV listings every Basketball game says Team A vs Team B from XYZ Arena in City. It was Team A vs Team B, the 4-9 A's take on the 11-2 B's in MNO conf play. - I assume money somehow is responsible for the change.
Love him or Hate him is there any doubt MLB is colluding against Trevor Bauer?
He's not listed on their Free Agent page. There are articles everywhere across MLB sites about how teams need Starting Pitchers, but none of them mention Bauer's availability. (It's the classic powers that be controlling the conversation.)
Even the local sites covering the Home Team are afraid to write about him in any positive way.
Is it possible to do the Icon of the Seas Royal Caribbean cruise ship without all the extras?
That's what a Wall Street Journal reporter set out to accomplish. This is the same reporter who just got back from a Vegas trip where she added ALL THE EXTRAS to the company credit card.
This time, Dawn Gilbertson's mission was to see what it was like on Icon of the Seas without hammering the $30 liquor milkshakes and the $50 zipline.
The final bill (for two) that customers would pay via Dawn's trip plan would be just a few dollars under $5,000.
How do people like Exotic Wood Mike and some of the other on here find niche careers?
• Randy in Chiraq writes:
Always lots to comment on but I wanted to opine on a few things:
- An all time great sports moment for me was Andrew Shaw's 3OT GWG to beat the Bruins in Game 1 of the 2013 Lord Stanley Cup Finals. I got a last minute call (six hours before puck drop), from a friend who said he had a face value center ice suite ticket with my name on it. $300 later and I was in. I asked the guy who was the connection for the ticket how. His response was, "don't ask questions". I let it go and was the only one suckin down cold ones at midnight when Shaw deflected the puck because everyone else doubted we needed more at last call, their loss.
- I too have been considering a career change like our friend Zach R and respect the responses of do hard things and just jump. A question that I have to the community is how do people like Exotic Wood Mike find niche careers like that? Having been stuck in the corporate hell hole for 18 years, I find it fascinating that those types of jobs exist.
- The last thing I wanted to pipe in about is the hidden gems. The mrs and I visited friends in Panama City, Panama and ended up staying at Surfers Paradise in Santa Catalina on a whim. Its about a four hour drive from Panama City, the power is spotty and you may have to find restaurants that have a generator should the grid go down (not at all uncommon). ALso if you know just enough Spanish to order tacos, you can get some loca 18 y/o to take you around to nearby uninhabited islands for pretty cheap.There is a great little dive restaurant/bar on a dead end road that I found a Chicago flag sticker (pic attached) on... would be a GREAT place for someone to drop a TNML sticker.
Also, a quick cheers to Michael S on the Used To Be A Pizza Hut mention, great blog.
Kinsey:
Like Randy, I'm all ears on how Exotic Wood Mike found his niche career. I have to assume there's an incredible story in there somewhere. We just need EWM to sit down and give us a couple of paragraphs.
I'm also interested in guys like Brandon C. and how they end up at Russian defense contractor trade shows where they could be poisoned at any moment by the KGB.
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com
Club volleyball IS WILD!
• Dale P. has been through the wars and lived to tell us about it:
Been a reader for many years. Enjoy reading the column every day.
Have felt like responding many times, but usually forget or too busy. Too busy means going to the gym coming home, doing a few things around the house, or not, and all of a sudden, it’s 4 in the afternoon, never seem to get around to writing an email, but today is the day.
Well, I have been contemplating responding to the travel ball discussion, with my experience with girl’s club volleyball. And Mark B. from NorCal set me off.
Working my way to 69 years at the end of this year, so my story includes three daughters in club volleyball in the 90’s and early 20’s, now I have a six foot 13-year-old granddaughter following in her Mom’s footsteps.
The old days, live about 120 miles north of Los Angeles. All tournaments were in LA or Orange county. Tournaments were usually at a school gym, no cost to park or get in the gym. Usually involved at least one night at a hotel. Club costs were, about $3,000 per girl. For many years we had two daughters playing and for two years had all three. We thought it was expensive. Extra fun part, the tournaments were on different weekends for each daughter. So do the math. Through all this, did have one daughter receive a volleyball scholarship to a small college. She loved the school and still misses playing VB. Not able now due to a blown ALC. But scholarships are very rare. Based upon my observations of the current club, approximately 400 girls, maybe 4 or 5 scholarships per year.
Current times…club fees are around $7,000, plus miscellaneous stuff. Private lessons, $50 for an hour if multiple girls in lesson. Usually, one private a week. Additionally, she goes two to three times a week to a gym to improve her vertical, quickness, strength, etc. $60 a workout. Still travel to LA and Orange County. Mainly the south OC. Still need hotel rooms, and they are not cheap down there. As Mark wrote, the tournaments are in "private" gyms, $20/parking and $15 to $20 per person to get in the gym. So, all of a sudden, these numbers add up to real money. (Sure my wife is slipping our daughter a few hundreds now and then, but no visual proof)
I could go one, but this is probably enough. Have many thoughts on the good and not so good of club and travel ball.
Included two pictures one sunrise, our home in Montana and one sunset from our family trip to Hawaii.
Recently took a motorcoach trip around the whole US of A and spent time in the UP of Michigan and visited many of the places you have mentioned in the column. Great time and we have a great country. Let’s pray it survives.
• Dan from the Midwest says:
I have read every single edition of screencaps since it was first published in 2020. I always write emails to you in my head, but have never actually typed one out until today. What compelled me to finally pull the trigger? Not a request for more Hannah C. Palmer (although I would like as much of her as you can fit in the column), but girls volleyball (and youth sports in general).
My 13 year old daughter plays volleyball. Yes, it is expensive with the clubs and lessons and tournaments and such. Yes, some of the weekend tournaments can be draining, especially when you are there late Sunday night.
But volleyball is one of my favorite youth sports. It is indoors, and it is fast paced. Every single serve is going to result in a point for one of the teams. That makes it fly by. It is a fun sport to watch.
For any readers who are involved in youth sports, the best advice I can give is to only do it for what it can do for your child in the present. If you signed little Colton up for youth baseball so he can get drafted, you are doing it all wrong. Do it for the present. Keep them active. Let them meet new kids from other schools that they otherwise would not meet. Let them compete, and work, and win, and lose, and be on a team, and have a difficult coach,
See, Joe, few things in life are perfect. So I view everything through the prism of do the pluses outweigh the minuses? Girls volleyball is expensive and time consuming, but the pluses outweigh the minuses. So we will continue to do it.
Thanks for a superb daily column. It's the first thing I do at my desk in the morning.
############
That's a great way to end this edition. Again, I'm OFF the next two days. SeanJo will handle the column.
Go have a great day.
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com