Rockin' Out Wisdom Lane

by Crazy Ivan


I can't really remember the last time I was this tired.  I also can't remember being this stoked in a while.

Just got back to the House of Skills from an incredible day with Animal and Maverick.  Our mission, if we chose to accept it (we did) was to play gym teacher for the day at Wisdom Lane Middle School in Levittown, NY.  We were going to give the gym teachers a break and spend the day teaching their students about Myachi.

So first the bad news:

• We would have to be up at 5:30 in the morning to make it on time.
• There were 9 classes and we wouldn't get a break of more than 90 seconds all day.
• Did I mention the 5:30 in the morning thing?
• Did I also mention no lunch break?
• I would have to be disgustingly late getting the Trick of the Day up.
• Apparently there's a 5:30 in the morning and it really sucks.

The good news:

• We were going to teach 350 people how to play Myachi.

Clearly, the good outweighed the bad so we woke up like the living dead this morning and drug our way toward coffee.  Google had cursed us with bad directions so we ended up driving in circles for a while and got there with about 35 seconds before the first class started.  It wasn't the best start to the day.

That would be the only bad thing that happened all day.

Our first class had about 55 students in it and they were mad stoked about the game the second they walked in.  Not a one had seen or heard of Myachi before but after 20 seconds of watching Mav and Animal throw down they were dying to get in.  They were an awesome group of kids.  Didn't go nuts or anything, did everything we asked them to do, gave back all our Myachis (this is a depressingly rare occurrence).

We started the class off by doing a 10 minute motivational speech about how the company started.  Seniority granted me this responsibility.  I told the Myachi story for a few minutes and then kicked it over to Maverick for a few minutes.

After that we lined everybody up, passed out Myachis and broke into three groups.  Each of us took a group and taught them the basics.  10 or 12 minutes of practice later we would hold a quick MYACH type game and select the top 3 or 4 tricksters.  Then my top 3 or 4 would face off against Mav and Animal's 3 or 4.

First we would narrow it down to a top 3 or 4 from within that group.  We did it by going down the list of basic tricks.  If you dropped, you were out.  When we only had 3 or 4 left, we'd turn to a best trick competition.

Now, there's no perfect way to do a Best Trick competition, but we've devised a pretty good one.  We'll let each of them take 2 or 3 tries at a combo.  Afterward we let the audience decide the winner by applause.  I'll admit that sometimes this degenerates into a popularity contest or a battle of the sexes but when somebody throws down an incredible trick that person always takes it.

That was the case in our first class where one dude showed some class with a perfect Under the Leg to switch Instep Kick.  No matter how good you are, you've gotta admit that's pretty good for 12 or 15 minutes of practice.

The class went so well that afterward I turned to Mav and Animal and said, "There's no way that all the classes will be that easy."

Turns out I was wrong.  Not sure what they put in the water they're pumping through those water fountains, but that might have been the coolest group of kids I'd ever met.  Usually when we do these things we get at least one class where everybody gets out of control and you get the kind of headache that reminds you that you had to get up at 5:30 in the morning.  But not with this school.

We had fun all day.  So did the 350 new Myachi Maniacs we met today.

I still don't like this whole 5:30 in the morning business, but the fun far outweighed the tired.  I can barely keep my eyes open now and it's not even 5:00 yet but I can't wait for 5:30 tomorrow morning.

Oh, didn't I mention that we were teaching the other 350 students tomorrow?

(PS If anyone from Levittown happens across this, thanks for making our day so awesome)