by Crazy Ivan
You know you have a pretty fun job when people show up and do it voluntarily.
That actually happens quite a bit in Myachi. We'll just be jamming out at one of the stores and some Myachi Maniac will show up ready to spread the word. These maniacs come in all sizes... some are fourth graders who go to an after school Myachi club. Some are high-schoolers that have been playing for a while. Some are friends of ours in their twenties and thirties that just enjoy throwing down and getting people fired up about the game.
With that in mind, you'd think that finding new Myachi Masters would be relatively easy... and in a sense, it is. We've hired quite a few people over the years and while some of them have moved on to other things, we've never seemed to have a problem getting as many qualified Myachi Masters as we need at any given time. In fact, it seems like whenever we start having the "we really need to hire more people" conversation, a few prospective Myachi Masters appear out of nowhere.
If you've been to our spot at FAO over the last couple of weeks, you might have gotten a chance to meet one such prospect. Her Myachi name is Chill and she's been training with us for a little over two weeks now. She's already proven herself to be a competent teacher and that's 90% of doing the job well. She has a ways to go to achieve the skill-level one expects of a Myachi Master, but she's well on her way and has a huge athletic background to draw upon as she moves forward.
Next week, we'll be auditioning another prospective Master. He's skilled, sharp and supremely confident; all important qualifications for being a Myachi Master, but there's really no way to know how good somebody will be at this job until you see them doing it. We've brought on plenty of extremely skilled people who had all the outward qualifications for the job only to see them fail miserably when it came time to turn it on and be a Myachi Master.
There are some pretty common pitfalls that many would-be Masters find themselves in. The most common is probably what we call "internal jamming"... since most of the people we hire come from some kind of entertainer or skill-based profession, they're usually used to being the center of attention. But in Myachi, the person you're teaching has to be the center of attention. Sure, the crowd around you will go nuts when they see you doing a Matrix reloaded, but that'll never be as impressive as seeing a 7 year old stick a 360 for the first time. It will never be as exciting as watching three people who thought they couldn't do it all sticking an Under the Leg.
But for an entertainer, it can be weird to remove yourself from the stage. I know it was hard for me when I moved from juggling to Myachi. It was no longer about what I could do, but rather it was about what everyone else can do. I had to transition from the entertainer to the cheerleader, from center stage to center row. It was a weird transition, but it was a fun one. Because ultimately, watching that 7 year old hit their first 360 is way more fun for me as well as the audience.
There are other pitfalls as well. Some people who come from a sales background can't seem to get comfortable with the "soft-sell" method we use in Myachi. Myachi Man will tell you that in 13 years of doing this, he's never once said "You should buy one". That's just not how we operate. We're not selling used cars, we're selling skills. Our strategy has always been to play with as many people as possible and have as much fun as possible. We sell a toy and having fun is the best way to do it.
But some people who spent a lot of time as salesmen can't get the hang of that. If somebody isn't interested in buying a Myachi after they play, I never try to talk them into it. I just say, "Cool. If you want to learn a few more tricks, I'll be here all day." I invite them back to play some more, but I never say, "Are you sure? You're really good at this game."
There are other common pitfalls, of course. Like any other job, we occasionally get prospective employees who aren't punctual, aren't on task, aren't trustworthy, aren't dedicated... the kind of thing that all employers have to deal with from time to time. But we pride ourselves on having pretty good eyes for Myachi Masters. And that's evidenced by the fact that the average period of employment with Myachi (so far) is 2.4 years. That means that enough people stick around long term (and work out well) that the few who fail after a few weeks barely even register on our averages.
And this, of course, all leads to the big question. Where do we find Myachi Masters?
I'd love to say we have a method, but blind-luck isn't exactly a strategy. For whatever reason, solid potential Myachi Masters always seem to show up about the time that we need them. Mav and Kid met Chill at a trade show in Maryland and it turned out she lived close to the city and wanted a job. The not-yet-named trainee we have starting next week just happened by our stand at FAO and fell in love with the game when Noodles taught him.
But even going further back, you'll see that all the Myachi Masters showed up in ways like that. We've never put out a "Help Wanted" ad because we've never had to. We met Maverick at a trade show in Vegas. Bones was a maniac we wanted to hire even before he was old enough for us to do so. We met Lucky when we were in Vegas demonstrating at the FAO that used to be there. Monk learned the game from a friend and then sought us out to offer up his services. Bones brought us Bamboo pretty much fully trained and ready to go. Noodles' sister got him into the game and insisted that he come in and start working for us. Heck, even Kid and I started off as Myachi addicts and only became employees of the company later.
In many ways, we never recruit Myachi Masters, but in many ways, we're always recruiting Myachi Masters. And if you're currently a Myachi Maniac and hope to one day join the ranks of the masters, take comfort in the fact that all of us started off as Maniacs. The love of the game has to come first. If you have that, you can overcome anything else.
Showing posts with label myachi masters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label myachi masters. Show all posts
Monday, April 16, 2012
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Bones Overtakes Maverick!
by Crazy Ivan
It's no mistake that the title of this post is so sensational, but I'll spare you the suspense and let you know right away that we're not talking skills here. Bones is one of the most promising young freestylers in the world right now and there is a chance that he will someday overtake Maverick in overall Myachi skills, but Maverick is still raising the bar and there's a lot of catch-up to do.
But Bones has overtaken Mav in a different and very important metric. He's jumped ahead of him on You-Tube.
If you search Myachi on YouTube and sort by relevance (the default setting), the top rated video is the Myachi commercial. But right below that, you'll see the video below... a video that Bones shot with Bamboo in Monk's room and posted back in February of 2010.
For years we've watched this video creep up the ranks and while the skills he and Bamboo exhibit here are utterly dwarfed by what they can do now, the video has remained popular and has actually gained momentum over the last year. A few months ago, it overtook one of the most popular Myachi shred videos ever recorded, a classic jam from Maverick in Washington Square:
This video had enjoyed top YouTube billing for quite a while and still ranks at #3, right below Bones and Bamboo. It's an epic shred to be sure, but is equally eclipsed by Mav's current level of skill. I have a feeling that in both cases, the stars of the videos find the tricks that seemed hard back then quaint in comparison to what they can do now.
I should note that Bones' video hasn't actually overtaken Mav's in total view count. Mav still has an advantage of some 8000 views as of this writing. But that's increasingly irrelevant. If you search Myachi videos by view count, the top 9 videos have nothing to do with Myachi. Three of them are highlights of Japanese football phenom Ryo Miyaichi and the others are all but inexplicable. In fact, the only actual Myachi video that cracks the top 10 in view count is a 4 year old video of Caffeine demonstrating a 360, a 720 and some very questionable attempts at higher rotations.
I'm not sure what factors are figured in to You-Tube's calculation of the most "relevant" video, but i can tell you that this top honor is a source of pride within the House of Skills. We all ceck in from time to time to see where we're ranking. As of this moment, the top 10 breaks down as follows:
It's no mistake that the title of this post is so sensational, but I'll spare you the suspense and let you know right away that we're not talking skills here. Bones is one of the most promising young freestylers in the world right now and there is a chance that he will someday overtake Maverick in overall Myachi skills, but Maverick is still raising the bar and there's a lot of catch-up to do.
But Bones has overtaken Mav in a different and very important metric. He's jumped ahead of him on You-Tube.
If you search Myachi on YouTube and sort by relevance (the default setting), the top rated video is the Myachi commercial. But right below that, you'll see the video below... a video that Bones shot with Bamboo in Monk's room and posted back in February of 2010.
For years we've watched this video creep up the ranks and while the skills he and Bamboo exhibit here are utterly dwarfed by what they can do now, the video has remained popular and has actually gained momentum over the last year. A few months ago, it overtook one of the most popular Myachi shred videos ever recorded, a classic jam from Maverick in Washington Square:
This video had enjoyed top YouTube billing for quite a while and still ranks at #3, right below Bones and Bamboo. It's an epic shred to be sure, but is equally eclipsed by Mav's current level of skill. I have a feeling that in both cases, the stars of the videos find the tricks that seemed hard back then quaint in comparison to what they can do now.
I should note that Bones' video hasn't actually overtaken Mav's in total view count. Mav still has an advantage of some 8000 views as of this writing. But that's increasingly irrelevant. If you search Myachi videos by view count, the top 9 videos have nothing to do with Myachi. Three of them are highlights of Japanese football phenom Ryo Miyaichi and the others are all but inexplicable. In fact, the only actual Myachi video that cracks the top 10 in view count is a 4 year old video of Caffeine demonstrating a 360, a 720 and some very questionable attempts at higher rotations.
I'm not sure what factors are figured in to You-Tube's calculation of the most "relevant" video, but i can tell you that this top honor is a source of pride within the House of Skills. We all ceck in from time to time to see where we're ranking. As of this moment, the top 10 breaks down as follows:
- The Official Myachi Commercial
- Bones' Tough Myachi Tricks (Bones, Bamboo)
- Mav's Washington Square Shred (Mav)
- Myachi in NYC (Myachi Man, Kid, Big Dog)
- Myachi Sales 101 (Kid)
- Meeting Night (Everybody)
- Old Myachi Video (Myachi Man and Big Dog)
- Monk and I in tandem (Monk and I)
- Battle Paddle Promo video
- My 1st Collection Video
There are always a few shuffles and changes here and there, but we're all always looking to crack that top 3. Which leads me to the call to action. Do you have a favorite Myachi Master? Do you think Mav's video should be above Bones? Do you think Bones and Bamboo have earned the top spot? Do you think Monk's Myachi and Cup shred should make the top 10? How about Sack Center?
You can, of course, help to decide. I'm not sure all the metrics that enter in to it, but I'm willing to bet that you can influence the top 10 just by watching, liking and sharing the video that you think most deserves the top honor. If you have a blog, you can embed it. If you have a Facebook page or a Twitter account, you can share it. If you have a Google Plus account... let me know how that's working out for you.
Anyway, I'll be updating this top 10 standing from time to time and hopefully some new entries will find their way into the honored spots. If nothing else, I'd love to see both Bones and Mav make follow up videos to these classics.
Friday, March 23, 2012
Losing a Myachi the Right Way
by Crazy Ivan
Those of you that have been following this blog for a while will know that in the back yard of the House of Skills, we have a slack line wrapped around a tree and a fence post. It's basically a tightrope, but it's about as wide as a seat belt. It's got some bounce to it so it has some elements of a trampoline and some elements of a balance beam.
Anyway, it's one of the many ways that we challenge our skills from day to day and over the year and a month that we've had it, we've actually gotten pretty confident with it. Mav, Monk and I have even practiced freestyling with a Myachi as we traverse it. But interestingly enough, it wasn't until yesterday that we thought of another Myachi-related use for it. Turns out that the thing functions pretty well as a Myachi catapult as well.
We got the idea yesterday afternoon. It was gorgeous and Monk, Mav and I were all off so, of course, we were outside playing Myachi. An errant kick left the Myachi sitting over by the slack line so when I went to fetch it, I decided to do something cooler than simply toss it back.
I placed Monk's Suffolk Downs on the line and then grabbed it with both hands. I pulled it back a little, uttered "this probably won't work..." and let go. Much to my surprise (and bemusement), the sucker shot at Monk like it was coming out of a canon. Anyone but a Myachi Master probably would have jumped out of the way, but Monk stuck it with an MVP catch.
And we all smiled.
See, one thing we all share at the House of Skills is the desire to always go bigger. If somebody comes up with a new trick, we naturally fall into competitions over who can do the more complex version of the trick. If somebody gets a new toy, we're all looking to master it quicker than anyone else. And when you inadvertently discover that you can rocket a Myachi off the slack line, everybody starts seeing all the crazy applications of that at once.
After a bit of fun with that, we realize that if you set the Myachi on the line and then bounce just right as you cross it, you can launch the Myachi fifty feet in the air. So we did that.
It was tough to get a proper launch, so we were taking four or five attempts between every successful launch, and each time we'd get one in the air, we'd stumble about trying to figure out where it was going to land as it pachinkoed its way through the tree branches above. In one extraordinarily unlikely bounce we all missed the catch and it landed right back on the slack line (which is about three inches across).
Anyway, as we're having fun with this, we're also doing the math. Every time the Myachi launches, it skyrockets upward and at an angle into the branches. But we can all see that if it were to somehow navigate the maze of boughs and twigs without hitting any of them, its trajectory would take it out of our yard and way up on top of the neighbor's roof. It's so striking that Mav even brought it up. He mentioned it to Monk because we were using a particularly yummy Suffolk Downs that Monk had gone to great lengths to break in.
"You know, if we keep doing this, you're gonna lose this thing up in the tree or in those gutters eventually," Mav warned.
Monk stopped for a moment and contemplated. There were plenty of Myachis in the house, but nobody else had one on them at the moment. He'd have had to run inside and by the time he came back, the mood might have changed and we might decide to play another game. "Forget it," Monk decided, "this is fun".
And I'm sure you can already guess exactly how this story ends. Within ten minutes of the warning, the Myachi finds a launch window that would have left a NASA scientist scratching their head and somehow manages to fly all the way up to the top of the neighbor's roof... the top of her three floor house. As in, there is no possible way we're getting this Myachi back.
And Monk's response? He shrugged. "I lose Myachis all the time," he admitted, "At least this one has a great story."
Those of you that have been following this blog for a while will know that in the back yard of the House of Skills, we have a slack line wrapped around a tree and a fence post. It's basically a tightrope, but it's about as wide as a seat belt. It's got some bounce to it so it has some elements of a trampoline and some elements of a balance beam.
Anyway, it's one of the many ways that we challenge our skills from day to day and over the year and a month that we've had it, we've actually gotten pretty confident with it. Mav, Monk and I have even practiced freestyling with a Myachi as we traverse it. But interestingly enough, it wasn't until yesterday that we thought of another Myachi-related use for it. Turns out that the thing functions pretty well as a Myachi catapult as well.
We got the idea yesterday afternoon. It was gorgeous and Monk, Mav and I were all off so, of course, we were outside playing Myachi. An errant kick left the Myachi sitting over by the slack line so when I went to fetch it, I decided to do something cooler than simply toss it back.
I placed Monk's Suffolk Downs on the line and then grabbed it with both hands. I pulled it back a little, uttered "this probably won't work..." and let go. Much to my surprise (and bemusement), the sucker shot at Monk like it was coming out of a canon. Anyone but a Myachi Master probably would have jumped out of the way, but Monk stuck it with an MVP catch.
And we all smiled.
See, one thing we all share at the House of Skills is the desire to always go bigger. If somebody comes up with a new trick, we naturally fall into competitions over who can do the more complex version of the trick. If somebody gets a new toy, we're all looking to master it quicker than anyone else. And when you inadvertently discover that you can rocket a Myachi off the slack line, everybody starts seeing all the crazy applications of that at once.
After a bit of fun with that, we realize that if you set the Myachi on the line and then bounce just right as you cross it, you can launch the Myachi fifty feet in the air. So we did that.
It was tough to get a proper launch, so we were taking four or five attempts between every successful launch, and each time we'd get one in the air, we'd stumble about trying to figure out where it was going to land as it pachinkoed its way through the tree branches above. In one extraordinarily unlikely bounce we all missed the catch and it landed right back on the slack line (which is about three inches across).
Anyway, as we're having fun with this, we're also doing the math. Every time the Myachi launches, it skyrockets upward and at an angle into the branches. But we can all see that if it were to somehow navigate the maze of boughs and twigs without hitting any of them, its trajectory would take it out of our yard and way up on top of the neighbor's roof. It's so striking that Mav even brought it up. He mentioned it to Monk because we were using a particularly yummy Suffolk Downs that Monk had gone to great lengths to break in.
"You know, if we keep doing this, you're gonna lose this thing up in the tree or in those gutters eventually," Mav warned.
Monk stopped for a moment and contemplated. There were plenty of Myachis in the house, but nobody else had one on them at the moment. He'd have had to run inside and by the time he came back, the mood might have changed and we might decide to play another game. "Forget it," Monk decided, "this is fun".
And I'm sure you can already guess exactly how this story ends. Within ten minutes of the warning, the Myachi finds a launch window that would have left a NASA scientist scratching their head and somehow manages to fly all the way up to the top of the neighbor's roof... the top of her three floor house. As in, there is no possible way we're getting this Myachi back.
And Monk's response? He shrugged. "I lose Myachis all the time," he admitted, "At least this one has a great story."
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
The Heart of the House of Skills
by Crazy Ivan
Kid and I stayed up late last night chatting about the brief history of the House of Skills. For many Myachi Masters, that represents the beginning of their involvement with Myachi, but for Kid and I, it only represents the most recent chapter. Monk had been with us for over a year when we moved to Forest Hills and Mav had already been on board for quite some time as well. Animal had been a part of things on and off for a while, but he started full-time Myachi employment only a few months before we signed the lease on the House of Skills.
So Kid and I were contrasting it, as we often do, with life in the Myachi Mobile before it. Obviously life it a bit more comfortable now. The House of Skills is about 12 times the size of the Myachi Mobile and it had fully functioning plumbing so there's that. There's also the fact that the House of Skills is big enough to hold all our stuff and still have room to play. There's also the foosball table, the ping pong table, the slack line out back and the presence of a real kitchen.
The Myachi Mobiles (there were two of them, after all), saw a few variations in residency as time went on. The very first tour in the very first Myachi Mobile consisted of Myachi Man and his buddy Goldie and that was it. Eventually Goldie left and Kid Myach and I joined in (along with some temporary stints by Big Dog, Butter and Animal). Throughout those years we never stayed in one place for more than a couple of months at a time. The Myachi Mobile was our home, but motel rooms, friend's couches and cabins occasionally augmented it.
At that time, to be a Myachi Master was to be in motion. It was a nomadic lifestyle that demanded the ability to live with very few possessions and with few constant friends. Of course, it's easy to make friends when you have Myachi to lubricate all your social encounters, so the lifestyle was as rewarding as it was demanding.
And then things started to change and NYC became an inferno of a hot-spot for us. Before long we had all but retired the Myachi Mobile and all gotten apartments in and around the five boroughs. Now, I think it's safe to say that even if you've never been to New York City, you probably know that it's one of the most expensive places to live in the world. It had the highest living cost of any city in the US by a pretty wide margin (San Fransisco is a distant second). So the House of Skills was born of necessity when it became too expensive for all of us to find places to live.
But the House was also a dream we'd talked about for years. Even when things were small, we foresaw a day when we could expand and hire a bunch of Myachi Masters. There was talk about eventually renting a "House of Skills" even before I joined the company. The concept of giving a bunch of Myachi Masters so much time in close proximity promised to revolutionize the game by creating an engine of unending challenges.
To that extent, the House of Skills has more than lived up to it's intended purpose. Whenever one of us comes up with a new trick, variations on it show up in a matter of minutes. New prop-adds and games show up on a regular basis and every record in the game is under constant challenge as the Myachi team relentlessly pushes the envelope of possibility. Two, three and four man tricks and games can be tested out as soon as they're conceived and there's never a lack of test-subjects when we examine new products and new series.
But the true heart of the House of Skills is in the variety of people who occupy it. A few people have come and gone, but even the past residence of the House left an echo of their skills. The unique blend of talents that each resident brings forever alters the overall make-up of the house.
Kid Myach was an athlete all through high-school and college and that has really defined him as a person. It also colors the way that he looks at the world and, more importantly, the world of Myachi. Competition is key and accuracy is his strong point (he's a basketball player and a golfer, after all). He brings a competitive nature to the House of Skills and often sees things in terms of team possibilities that the rest of us miss.
I bring something else to the table entirely. I never really played team sports and was always more focused on individual accomplishments. As a juggler, I spent countless hours perfecting odd nuances of skill with a myriad of props. My focus always was (and still remains) finding new variations in existing tricks. In the past that meant applying diabolo tricks to cigar boxes or contact juggling moves to poi, but now that I focus that lens on Myachi, it helps to keep the repertoire of known Myachi tricks ever-expanding.
Monk was a renaissance athlete in school as well. He had a sport for every season growing up and played volleyball at the collegiate level. He's also the most competitive person I've ever met in my life. But unlike Kid Myach, he also focused for a long time on an individual skill; flair bar-tending. Like juggling, this requires hours and hours of solitary refinement so Monk adds a strange synthesis of minute skill and athletic dedication. Where my focus is forever on expanding my tricks, his is ever on perfecting.
Maverick comes to us from a background in footbag. Like Kid and Monk, he was an athlete and focused on lacrosse, though he dabbled in a number of athletic endeavors. The one that eventually caught his eye was, of course, footbag. He proceeded to take this talent to a level that very few ever do. Combined with an astounding level of confidence, his skills quite-literally know no bounds. The tricks that scare off the rest of us are ready challenges to Mav and he almost always gets the best of them in the end.
Lucky comes from a background of performance. Theater, song and dance and are his primary loves and this adds a new flair to the game. While he's still catching up when it comes to Myachi-specific skills, two unschooled observers would never know that. What he lacks in technical know-how, he makes up for in the theatricality he adds to his every move.
While still only a part-time resident, Bones adds a strange blend of skills to the mix as well. Unlike the rest of us, Myachi is truly his first skill-based obsession. His introduction to juggling, advanced footbag, balance props and skill-toys in general is all seen through the lens of a Myachi Maniac foremost. This provides a strange "bottom-up" approach to new skills that none of the rest of us can match.
Even though they've moved on, Animal and Kore still left an indelible mark on the heart of the house as well. Animal's focus on yo-yo and string based skills (as well as his encyclopedic knowledge of pop-culture) can be seen in Myachi tricks and Myachi trick names, but his greatest influence was to the art of STWAKOJ, which he all but revolutionized with his larger-than-life persona. Kore's extreme-sport history and devil-may-care attitude helped to establish the very spirit of the House of Skills and it lives on every time a new longboard finds its way to our foyer.
The heart of the House of Skills is the people within it and as new people add their skills, personalities and aspirations to the game that heart grows ever larger. I suppose it makes for a pretty good microcosm of the Myachi Movement itself.
Kid and I stayed up late last night chatting about the brief history of the House of Skills. For many Myachi Masters, that represents the beginning of their involvement with Myachi, but for Kid and I, it only represents the most recent chapter. Monk had been with us for over a year when we moved to Forest Hills and Mav had already been on board for quite some time as well. Animal had been a part of things on and off for a while, but he started full-time Myachi employment only a few months before we signed the lease on the House of Skills.
So Kid and I were contrasting it, as we often do, with life in the Myachi Mobile before it. Obviously life it a bit more comfortable now. The House of Skills is about 12 times the size of the Myachi Mobile and it had fully functioning plumbing so there's that. There's also the fact that the House of Skills is big enough to hold all our stuff and still have room to play. There's also the foosball table, the ping pong table, the slack line out back and the presence of a real kitchen.
The Myachi Mobiles (there were two of them, after all), saw a few variations in residency as time went on. The very first tour in the very first Myachi Mobile consisted of Myachi Man and his buddy Goldie and that was it. Eventually Goldie left and Kid Myach and I joined in (along with some temporary stints by Big Dog, Butter and Animal). Throughout those years we never stayed in one place for more than a couple of months at a time. The Myachi Mobile was our home, but motel rooms, friend's couches and cabins occasionally augmented it.
At that time, to be a Myachi Master was to be in motion. It was a nomadic lifestyle that demanded the ability to live with very few possessions and with few constant friends. Of course, it's easy to make friends when you have Myachi to lubricate all your social encounters, so the lifestyle was as rewarding as it was demanding.
And then things started to change and NYC became an inferno of a hot-spot for us. Before long we had all but retired the Myachi Mobile and all gotten apartments in and around the five boroughs. Now, I think it's safe to say that even if you've never been to New York City, you probably know that it's one of the most expensive places to live in the world. It had the highest living cost of any city in the US by a pretty wide margin (San Fransisco is a distant second). So the House of Skills was born of necessity when it became too expensive for all of us to find places to live.
But the House was also a dream we'd talked about for years. Even when things were small, we foresaw a day when we could expand and hire a bunch of Myachi Masters. There was talk about eventually renting a "House of Skills" even before I joined the company. The concept of giving a bunch of Myachi Masters so much time in close proximity promised to revolutionize the game by creating an engine of unending challenges.
To that extent, the House of Skills has more than lived up to it's intended purpose. Whenever one of us comes up with a new trick, variations on it show up in a matter of minutes. New prop-adds and games show up on a regular basis and every record in the game is under constant challenge as the Myachi team relentlessly pushes the envelope of possibility. Two, three and four man tricks and games can be tested out as soon as they're conceived and there's never a lack of test-subjects when we examine new products and new series.
But the true heart of the House of Skills is in the variety of people who occupy it. A few people have come and gone, but even the past residence of the House left an echo of their skills. The unique blend of talents that each resident brings forever alters the overall make-up of the house.
Kid Myach was an athlete all through high-school and college and that has really defined him as a person. It also colors the way that he looks at the world and, more importantly, the world of Myachi. Competition is key and accuracy is his strong point (he's a basketball player and a golfer, after all). He brings a competitive nature to the House of Skills and often sees things in terms of team possibilities that the rest of us miss.
I bring something else to the table entirely. I never really played team sports and was always more focused on individual accomplishments. As a juggler, I spent countless hours perfecting odd nuances of skill with a myriad of props. My focus always was (and still remains) finding new variations in existing tricks. In the past that meant applying diabolo tricks to cigar boxes or contact juggling moves to poi, but now that I focus that lens on Myachi, it helps to keep the repertoire of known Myachi tricks ever-expanding.
Monk was a renaissance athlete in school as well. He had a sport for every season growing up and played volleyball at the collegiate level. He's also the most competitive person I've ever met in my life. But unlike Kid Myach, he also focused for a long time on an individual skill; flair bar-tending. Like juggling, this requires hours and hours of solitary refinement so Monk adds a strange synthesis of minute skill and athletic dedication. Where my focus is forever on expanding my tricks, his is ever on perfecting.
Maverick comes to us from a background in footbag. Like Kid and Monk, he was an athlete and focused on lacrosse, though he dabbled in a number of athletic endeavors. The one that eventually caught his eye was, of course, footbag. He proceeded to take this talent to a level that very few ever do. Combined with an astounding level of confidence, his skills quite-literally know no bounds. The tricks that scare off the rest of us are ready challenges to Mav and he almost always gets the best of them in the end.
Lucky comes from a background of performance. Theater, song and dance and are his primary loves and this adds a new flair to the game. While he's still catching up when it comes to Myachi-specific skills, two unschooled observers would never know that. What he lacks in technical know-how, he makes up for in the theatricality he adds to his every move.
While still only a part-time resident, Bones adds a strange blend of skills to the mix as well. Unlike the rest of us, Myachi is truly his first skill-based obsession. His introduction to juggling, advanced footbag, balance props and skill-toys in general is all seen through the lens of a Myachi Maniac foremost. This provides a strange "bottom-up" approach to new skills that none of the rest of us can match.
Even though they've moved on, Animal and Kore still left an indelible mark on the heart of the house as well. Animal's focus on yo-yo and string based skills (as well as his encyclopedic knowledge of pop-culture) can be seen in Myachi tricks and Myachi trick names, but his greatest influence was to the art of STWAKOJ, which he all but revolutionized with his larger-than-life persona. Kore's extreme-sport history and devil-may-care attitude helped to establish the very spirit of the House of Skills and it lives on every time a new longboard finds its way to our foyer.
The heart of the House of Skills is the people within it and as new people add their skills, personalities and aspirations to the game that heart grows ever larger. I suppose it makes for a pretty good microcosm of the Myachi Movement itself.
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Life Without Animal
by Crazy Ivan
As many of you know, the Myachi family bid farewell to one of it's favorite sons a few months back. Animal, who has been involved with this company is some way or another for longer than I have, recently moved on to another job in another state.
Of course, things like this happen. People grow and their needs change. Animal fell in love and his need to be with the woman he loved was greater than his need to stay with the job he loved and when she moved we all knew it was only a matter of time.
And while Animal has left the company, he certainly hasn't left the movement. He's still one of the world's foremost Myachi freestylers. After all, it's not like you turn in your skills with your two weeks notice. Nobody can ever truly "leave" the Myachi movement, but it's even less possible when you have the Myachi glyph prominently tattooed on your forearm.
So we said goodbye to Animal the right way, with a big party and a lot of friends... okay, it was actually a big roast with a lot of friends, but it served the same purpose. He donated a bunch of his collection to future contests, gathered up his belongings (mostly graphic novels and limited edition action figures) and moved on to new things.
Over the intervening months, we've all had to adjust to a House of Skills that is, while a bit cleaner and a bit quieter, a bit less skilled and a bit less fun. Now don't get me wrong, Bones moved in to Animal's old room and he's mad fun (not as messy or loud though), but there are certain times when it becomes painfully obvious that Animal isn't here any more. For example, last night we were trying to remember the name of Jabba the Hutt's little pet rat and we had to Google it. If Animal were here, we could have saved those keystrokes.
Now, I joke, of course, but Animal is one of my best friends in the world. I've known him for 8 years and for a lot of that time we've worked and lived together... sometimes in a cramped RV. He's like a brother to me and there's something to be said for having one of your best friends as a roommate. There are at least a couple times every day when I wish he was still around. I'm happy that he's doing what he feels is best for him, as we all are, but one can't help but feel that tinge of selfishness when one realizes that a friend that was once always there no longer is.
Life without Animal is tough, but we're coping. It is kind of nice that we all got moved up in the "best Matrix reloaded in the company" rankings, but it is a small solace.
As many of you know, the Myachi family bid farewell to one of it's favorite sons a few months back. Animal, who has been involved with this company is some way or another for longer than I have, recently moved on to another job in another state.
Of course, things like this happen. People grow and their needs change. Animal fell in love and his need to be with the woman he loved was greater than his need to stay with the job he loved and when she moved we all knew it was only a matter of time.
And while Animal has left the company, he certainly hasn't left the movement. He's still one of the world's foremost Myachi freestylers. After all, it's not like you turn in your skills with your two weeks notice. Nobody can ever truly "leave" the Myachi movement, but it's even less possible when you have the Myachi glyph prominently tattooed on your forearm.
So we said goodbye to Animal the right way, with a big party and a lot of friends... okay, it was actually a big roast with a lot of friends, but it served the same purpose. He donated a bunch of his collection to future contests, gathered up his belongings (mostly graphic novels and limited edition action figures) and moved on to new things.
Over the intervening months, we've all had to adjust to a House of Skills that is, while a bit cleaner and a bit quieter, a bit less skilled and a bit less fun. Now don't get me wrong, Bones moved in to Animal's old room and he's mad fun (not as messy or loud though), but there are certain times when it becomes painfully obvious that Animal isn't here any more. For example, last night we were trying to remember the name of Jabba the Hutt's little pet rat and we had to Google it. If Animal were here, we could have saved those keystrokes.
Now, I joke, of course, but Animal is one of my best friends in the world. I've known him for 8 years and for a lot of that time we've worked and lived together... sometimes in a cramped RV. He's like a brother to me and there's something to be said for having one of your best friends as a roommate. There are at least a couple times every day when I wish he was still around. I'm happy that he's doing what he feels is best for him, as we all are, but one can't help but feel that tinge of selfishness when one realizes that a friend that was once always there no longer is.
Life without Animal is tough, but we're coping. It is kind of nice that we all got moved up in the "best Matrix reloaded in the company" rankings, but it is a small solace.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
The Birth of a Challenge
by Crazy Ivan
Of all the fringe benefits of my job, I suppose my favorite is living in the House of Skills. For most people, the idea of having 6 roommates would be pretty frightening, but when all 6 of those roommates are (a) your best friends and (b) into all the same weird stuff you're into, it's quite a plus. You just never know when you're going to walk in on an intense MYACH tournament, a 2 ball foosball match or a kendama championship.
And you also never know where the next challenge is going to come from. It could pop up at any second, so you kind of have to be on your toes at all times. A perfect example occurred a couple of weeks ago when Maverick and I were playing a little Myachi in the living room.
We were tossing two Myachis back and forth and freestyling a bit. I would have one and he'd throw me a second. I'd do a few 2 Myachi tricks and then toss both back to him. He's shred a bit, toss me one, then toss the other. I'd shred a bit and then toss one and then the other back to him. We do this quite a bit and it's usually in these types of multi-person freestyles that you usually see the coolest new tricks done.
This time was no exception. Mav had both Myachis and made to send them back to me, but he did so with a pass I'd never seen before. He tossed both sacks up in a Vertical Split and then, while they were hanging in the air, he balled up his fist and punched the lower one so that it rocketed toward me and then caught the other one on the back of his hand.
As soon as I saw it, I had to try the next toughest thing. So Mav tossed the second Myachi to me, I threw a Vertical Split down and hit them both, one after the other, with quick rabbit punches. Both careened back to Mav with pretty good velocity and we shared the grin that skill toy enthusiasts wear in light of a new challenge. If I could do two on the first try, after all, it seemed reasonable that we could a do three with a few tries.
So the challenge was as follows: Toss 3 Myachis up in a Vertical Split (for those not familiar with the basic splits, check out this video). While they're in the air, you make a fist and punch all three Myachis individually. And weak punches won't do the trick here. The idea is to make each punch a pass so that another person can catch it. When we did it, Mav was about 20 feet away from me, so I was trying to get a good 20 feet of distance out of each punch.
This is extraordinarily tough to do. Your punches have to be quick and accurate. They have to have enough force to send the Myachi flying and you have to be centered enough to get the Myachi to go forward instead of spinning off to the left or right. We realized as we were doing this that it would make great practice for martial artists and pugilists looking to improve the speed of their strikes. We had a lot of time to realize this, too, since it took us a few dozen tries to finally get it right.
Before we were done, Monk and Lucky had joined the game and we'd come up with a ton of variations on the challenge. We were doing splits where you'd punch one Myachi alone and then two together. We did ones where you had to hit the first two with straight punches but the third one with an upper cut. We did pummels where you split four Myachis and then trade off, right fist, left fist, right fist, left fist. We did splits where you'd punch one then hit the other two together with both fists.
An hour and a half later, we took a break to rest our sore muscles and we did so with the certain knowledge that we'd be revisiting this challenge several more times. It was just too fun not to do.
We didn't bother coming up with a name for our new challenge. After all, it wasn't a "trick" technically speaking, since you don't actually catch the Myachis that you punch. It also wasn't a "game" technically because there was no scoring, no winner and no loser. So it didn't really occur to us to name it.
But then a few days later I was at FAO and I met a couple of really cool guys that were crazy into martial arts. I was showing them some of the martial-arts inspired moves that we'd come up with like the Fu, the Ninja and the Mantis. One guy asked if we had a move called the Bruce Lee, so I showed them that one. His friend asked if we had a move called the Chuck Norris. I joked that we did, but nobody but Chuck was skilled enough to do it. They asked if we had a move called the Tony Jaa, and strangely enough we did, so I showed them that one as well.
And then one of them asked if we had a move called the Ip Man. Now, for those that haven't seen the movie Ip Man, there are only two things you need to know. One is that you should really go watch Ip Man (it's on Netflix). The other is that the hero in Ip Man punches really fast. So before I could formulate the words, "no, no Ip Man move yet", the challenge from a few days back occurred to me and I said, "As a matter of fact, we kind of do..."
So with that, a new challenge was born and named. We've been at it quite a bit since then (video forthcoming), but we've been having so much fun with it that I felt like I had to share. I know we've got a few accomplished martial artists reading this blog and I'd love to see where they could take this challenge. After all, we haven't even started adding kicks to it...
Of all the fringe benefits of my job, I suppose my favorite is living in the House of Skills. For most people, the idea of having 6 roommates would be pretty frightening, but when all 6 of those roommates are (a) your best friends and (b) into all the same weird stuff you're into, it's quite a plus. You just never know when you're going to walk in on an intense MYACH tournament, a 2 ball foosball match or a kendama championship.
And you also never know where the next challenge is going to come from. It could pop up at any second, so you kind of have to be on your toes at all times. A perfect example occurred a couple of weeks ago when Maverick and I were playing a little Myachi in the living room.
We were tossing two Myachis back and forth and freestyling a bit. I would have one and he'd throw me a second. I'd do a few 2 Myachi tricks and then toss both back to him. He's shred a bit, toss me one, then toss the other. I'd shred a bit and then toss one and then the other back to him. We do this quite a bit and it's usually in these types of multi-person freestyles that you usually see the coolest new tricks done.
This time was no exception. Mav had both Myachis and made to send them back to me, but he did so with a pass I'd never seen before. He tossed both sacks up in a Vertical Split and then, while they were hanging in the air, he balled up his fist and punched the lower one so that it rocketed toward me and then caught the other one on the back of his hand.
As soon as I saw it, I had to try the next toughest thing. So Mav tossed the second Myachi to me, I threw a Vertical Split down and hit them both, one after the other, with quick rabbit punches. Both careened back to Mav with pretty good velocity and we shared the grin that skill toy enthusiasts wear in light of a new challenge. If I could do two on the first try, after all, it seemed reasonable that we could a do three with a few tries.
So the challenge was as follows: Toss 3 Myachis up in a Vertical Split (for those not familiar with the basic splits, check out this video). While they're in the air, you make a fist and punch all three Myachis individually. And weak punches won't do the trick here. The idea is to make each punch a pass so that another person can catch it. When we did it, Mav was about 20 feet away from me, so I was trying to get a good 20 feet of distance out of each punch.
This is extraordinarily tough to do. Your punches have to be quick and accurate. They have to have enough force to send the Myachi flying and you have to be centered enough to get the Myachi to go forward instead of spinning off to the left or right. We realized as we were doing this that it would make great practice for martial artists and pugilists looking to improve the speed of their strikes. We had a lot of time to realize this, too, since it took us a few dozen tries to finally get it right.
Before we were done, Monk and Lucky had joined the game and we'd come up with a ton of variations on the challenge. We were doing splits where you'd punch one Myachi alone and then two together. We did ones where you had to hit the first two with straight punches but the third one with an upper cut. We did pummels where you split four Myachis and then trade off, right fist, left fist, right fist, left fist. We did splits where you'd punch one then hit the other two together with both fists.
An hour and a half later, we took a break to rest our sore muscles and we did so with the certain knowledge that we'd be revisiting this challenge several more times. It was just too fun not to do.
We didn't bother coming up with a name for our new challenge. After all, it wasn't a "trick" technically speaking, since you don't actually catch the Myachis that you punch. It also wasn't a "game" technically because there was no scoring, no winner and no loser. So it didn't really occur to us to name it.
But then a few days later I was at FAO and I met a couple of really cool guys that were crazy into martial arts. I was showing them some of the martial-arts inspired moves that we'd come up with like the Fu, the Ninja and the Mantis. One guy asked if we had a move called the Bruce Lee, so I showed them that one. His friend asked if we had a move called the Chuck Norris. I joked that we did, but nobody but Chuck was skilled enough to do it. They asked if we had a move called the Tony Jaa, and strangely enough we did, so I showed them that one as well.
And then one of them asked if we had a move called the Ip Man. Now, for those that haven't seen the movie Ip Man, there are only two things you need to know. One is that you should really go watch Ip Man (it's on Netflix). The other is that the hero in Ip Man punches really fast. So before I could formulate the words, "no, no Ip Man move yet", the challenge from a few days back occurred to me and I said, "As a matter of fact, we kind of do..."
So with that, a new challenge was born and named. We've been at it quite a bit since then (video forthcoming), but we've been having so much fun with it that I felt like I had to share. I know we've got a few accomplished martial artists reading this blog and I'd love to see where they could take this challenge. After all, we haven't even started adding kicks to it...
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
A Look Alike?
by Crazy Ivan
Alright, so I just wanted to throw this out really quick. I was at FAO the other day and I met a couple pretty cool cats that have been playing the game for a couple of months. They'd already met Mav, Bones, Metal, Noodles, Lucky and Bamboo, so they knew the bulk of the team. But they were having trouble keeping everybody's nicknames straight.
So as we're talking, they'll refer to "the guy with the big hair" rather than "Bones", or "the guy with the crazy foot skills" instead of "Mav". Anyway, as we're talking, I showed them the Swordfish and they said, "yeah, we saw that one."
"So who showed you that one?" I asked. I was assuming it would be Bones because he's one of the few people who teaches that particular move on a regular basis. But I was wrong.
"The guy who looks like Jack Black," they answered.
I got about four words into asking "What Myachi Master looks like Jack Black?" when I stopped, laughed and said, "You mean Metal?"
Alright, so I just wanted to throw this out really quick. I was at FAO the other day and I met a couple pretty cool cats that have been playing the game for a couple of months. They'd already met Mav, Bones, Metal, Noodles, Lucky and Bamboo, so they knew the bulk of the team. But they were having trouble keeping everybody's nicknames straight.
So as we're talking, they'll refer to "the guy with the big hair" rather than "Bones", or "the guy with the crazy foot skills" instead of "Mav". Anyway, as we're talking, I showed them the Swordfish and they said, "yeah, we saw that one."
"So who showed you that one?" I asked. I was assuming it would be Bones because he's one of the few people who teaches that particular move on a regular basis. But I was wrong.
"The guy who looks like Jack Black," they answered.
I got about four words into asking "What Myachi Master looks like Jack Black?" when I stopped, laughed and said, "You mean Metal?"
I still think he looks more like Silent Bob, but the comparison cracked me up...
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Life at the House of Skills
by Crazy Ivan
The other day I was on the phone with Myachi Man. While we were talking I stepped outside and started juggling the soccer ball that Monk always leaves on the patio. I'm terrible at soccer-juggling, but as I am the type that always wants to learn something new, I figured I might as well get some practice while I wasn't using my feet for anything else.
Myachi Man got an important call so he asks if he can call me back in a few minutes. "Sure", I reply and then hang up. With a few minutes to kill, I decide to hop up on the slack line and practice my two footed mounts (strangely, these are much tougher than one footed mounts). I kept this up for about ten minutes and then MM called back and we continued our conversation.
While I was on the phone with him, I went back inside where Animal was hard at work mastering a ring-spinning trick. I gave him some advice on that as I finished up my phone conversation and then headed upstairs to talk to Monk about a few things.\
When I got there, he and Maverick were challenging each other to do tricks with a little tin of mints. They were trying to do a Wolverine to a Stiff Arm to a Mantis to a Faceplant with it. Keeping in mind that it's round, less than half the size of a Myachi and weighs almost nothing, you can see where the challenge comes in.
Obviously, I hopped in on this. I note with pride that I actually got it on the first try, though I tried a few more times and couldn't hit it again right away. Monk and I talked business for a few minutes, but as we did Maverick abandoned the little tin and fetched a footbag from his room. Before I knew it, he, Monk and I were in a circle, hacking as we discussed scheduling changes and upcoming school events.
Once we'd cleared everything up on that end, I went down to the basement. I was itching to play guitar and since I was technically done working at that point, I spent the next half hour practicing jazz riffs.
At some point, it occurred to me that this is not how most people live. Most of the people I know have one or two hobbies that occupy their time. At the House of Skills, our hobbies tend to be hobby-collecting. In any given day, any one of us will probably be practicing at least half a dozen new skills. In any given day, at least one of us will learn a new trick or accomplish something we've never done before. On any given day, at least one of us will set a personal record and occasionally even a world record.
There are some disadvantages to having 6 roommates, especially when you live in the basement apartment and your roomies stay up late doing foot tricks and dropping juggling props. I think that living at the House of Skills would drive most people crazy after a few weeks. They'd tire of having to scoot around somebody on a balance board on their way to the fridge. They'd tire of dodging Nerf darts when they cut through the living room. They'd tire of hearing several voices erupt in excitement every time somebody bests a new challenge.
But for people like me (and here's hoping that's a very small fraction of the world's populace) there could be no better place to live.
The other day I was on the phone with Myachi Man. While we were talking I stepped outside and started juggling the soccer ball that Monk always leaves on the patio. I'm terrible at soccer-juggling, but as I am the type that always wants to learn something new, I figured I might as well get some practice while I wasn't using my feet for anything else.
Myachi Man got an important call so he asks if he can call me back in a few minutes. "Sure", I reply and then hang up. With a few minutes to kill, I decide to hop up on the slack line and practice my two footed mounts (strangely, these are much tougher than one footed mounts). I kept this up for about ten minutes and then MM called back and we continued our conversation.
While I was on the phone with him, I went back inside where Animal was hard at work mastering a ring-spinning trick. I gave him some advice on that as I finished up my phone conversation and then headed upstairs to talk to Monk about a few things.\
When I got there, he and Maverick were challenging each other to do tricks with a little tin of mints. They were trying to do a Wolverine to a Stiff Arm to a Mantis to a Faceplant with it. Keeping in mind that it's round, less than half the size of a Myachi and weighs almost nothing, you can see where the challenge comes in.
Obviously, I hopped in on this. I note with pride that I actually got it on the first try, though I tried a few more times and couldn't hit it again right away. Monk and I talked business for a few minutes, but as we did Maverick abandoned the little tin and fetched a footbag from his room. Before I knew it, he, Monk and I were in a circle, hacking as we discussed scheduling changes and upcoming school events.
Once we'd cleared everything up on that end, I went down to the basement. I was itching to play guitar and since I was technically done working at that point, I spent the next half hour practicing jazz riffs.
At some point, it occurred to me that this is not how most people live. Most of the people I know have one or two hobbies that occupy their time. At the House of Skills, our hobbies tend to be hobby-collecting. In any given day, any one of us will probably be practicing at least half a dozen new skills. In any given day, at least one of us will learn a new trick or accomplish something we've never done before. On any given day, at least one of us will set a personal record and occasionally even a world record.
There are some disadvantages to having 6 roommates, especially when you live in the basement apartment and your roomies stay up late doing foot tricks and dropping juggling props. I think that living at the House of Skills would drive most people crazy after a few weeks. They'd tire of having to scoot around somebody on a balance board on their way to the fridge. They'd tire of dodging Nerf darts when they cut through the living room. They'd tire of hearing several voices erupt in excitement every time somebody bests a new challenge.
But for people like me (and here's hoping that's a very small fraction of the world's populace) there could be no better place to live.
Friday, September 2, 2011
Maverick; Renaissance Man
by Crazy Ivan
One of the things that makes our jobs fun as Myachi Masters is that you really never know what's around the corner. You might spend most of your days at FAO or at HQ or something, but once in a while a one of a kind assignment will land you in Australia or signing autographs next to Shaquille O'Neal.
One such unique assignment fell into Maverick's lap the other day. A friend of a friend who wants to help us promote the game found a great opportunity for us and called up the team to see if we could spare a guy to do a guest spot in a music video. They were filming the video in the city and wanted some people doing cool stuff in the background, and since Myachi definitely qualifies as "cool stuff", they wanted us there.
We bounced it around a bit and eventually decided to send Mav. He's got sick skills and the ladies can't get enough of him so we figured he'd be the right guy to represent Myachi in this venue. We got the time and the address and sent him on his way yesterday.
So as the time approaches, Mav longboards over from the store and pops in. The place is chaotic with a dozen people all doing different things at the same time so when he comes in, nobody knew right away what he was there for. The director glances over at him and sees the longboard. "The skateboard guy is here," he announces.
Before Mav can explain that he is, in fact, the Myachi guy, a stage hand pops up and directs him over to this small corner of the room. "This is your space here. Just do some cool stuff."
Well, Mav knew that this wasn't exactly why he was there, but he couldn't pass up on opportunity to do some cool stuff so he obliged. He did a few cross steps, a few crazy slides, a few ollie tricks and more or less exhausted his longboarding skills (or at least the parts of them that could be demonstrated in a small corner of a room). The cameraman nodded and gave an approving thumb up and the stage hand thanked him and made to send him on his way.
"But I'm here to Myachi," he explained.
The stage hand scratched his head. "What's Myachi?"
Maverick showed him the game and he just shrugged. "Don't know nothing about Myachi," he admitted and then got the director. "This guy's supposed to be here to Myachi... it's like a hacky sack for the hands."
The director was equally puzzled. He didn't know anything about it either so Mav quickly calls back to HQ. We give him the name of the guy who we'd talked to and, armed with that information, the film guys finally figured out who he was and why he was there. They penciled him in to go last among all the various skilled individuals that were there (including some street dancers, acrobats, etc.) so Mav killed time the way Myachi Masters kill time; he taught everyone there how to play Myachi.
Now, Myachi Mania is always fun. Get a big group excited about the game and then turn them loose learning tricks and you're in for a wild and crazy time. But this madness is increased exponentially if the people happen to be break dancers and folks who can fold in half backwards. Needless to say, it was evolved into an epic Myachi shred.
After a couple of hours they finally got Mav on film playing some Myachi (both with a Myachi and an iPod) and wowed the crowd with some of his patented foot tricks and juggles. By the end of it, even the director was getting Myachified. Mav gave a few Myachis away, directed a few folks on to the website and headed on his way to spread fun and joy elsewhere in our fair city.
Unfortunately, I'm not yet at liberty to give out details (like who the video was for) or anything, but I should be able to let everyone know in the near future. Not sure if the song will be any good, but thanks to Mav, I'm sure the video will be awesome.
One of the things that makes our jobs fun as Myachi Masters is that you really never know what's around the corner. You might spend most of your days at FAO or at HQ or something, but once in a while a one of a kind assignment will land you in Australia or signing autographs next to Shaquille O'Neal.
One such unique assignment fell into Maverick's lap the other day. A friend of a friend who wants to help us promote the game found a great opportunity for us and called up the team to see if we could spare a guy to do a guest spot in a music video. They were filming the video in the city and wanted some people doing cool stuff in the background, and since Myachi definitely qualifies as "cool stuff", they wanted us there.
We bounced it around a bit and eventually decided to send Mav. He's got sick skills and the ladies can't get enough of him so we figured he'd be the right guy to represent Myachi in this venue. We got the time and the address and sent him on his way yesterday.
So as the time approaches, Mav longboards over from the store and pops in. The place is chaotic with a dozen people all doing different things at the same time so when he comes in, nobody knew right away what he was there for. The director glances over at him and sees the longboard. "The skateboard guy is here," he announces.
Before Mav can explain that he is, in fact, the Myachi guy, a stage hand pops up and directs him over to this small corner of the room. "This is your space here. Just do some cool stuff."
Well, Mav knew that this wasn't exactly why he was there, but he couldn't pass up on opportunity to do some cool stuff so he obliged. He did a few cross steps, a few crazy slides, a few ollie tricks and more or less exhausted his longboarding skills (or at least the parts of them that could be demonstrated in a small corner of a room). The cameraman nodded and gave an approving thumb up and the stage hand thanked him and made to send him on his way.
"But I'm here to Myachi," he explained.
The stage hand scratched his head. "What's Myachi?"
Maverick showed him the game and he just shrugged. "Don't know nothing about Myachi," he admitted and then got the director. "This guy's supposed to be here to Myachi... it's like a hacky sack for the hands."
The director was equally puzzled. He didn't know anything about it either so Mav quickly calls back to HQ. We give him the name of the guy who we'd talked to and, armed with that information, the film guys finally figured out who he was and why he was there. They penciled him in to go last among all the various skilled individuals that were there (including some street dancers, acrobats, etc.) so Mav killed time the way Myachi Masters kill time; he taught everyone there how to play Myachi.
Now, Myachi Mania is always fun. Get a big group excited about the game and then turn them loose learning tricks and you're in for a wild and crazy time. But this madness is increased exponentially if the people happen to be break dancers and folks who can fold in half backwards. Needless to say, it was evolved into an epic Myachi shred.
After a couple of hours they finally got Mav on film playing some Myachi (both with a Myachi and an iPod) and wowed the crowd with some of his patented foot tricks and juggles. By the end of it, even the director was getting Myachified. Mav gave a few Myachis away, directed a few folks on to the website and headed on his way to spread fun and joy elsewhere in our fair city.
Unfortunately, I'm not yet at liberty to give out details (like who the video was for) or anything, but I should be able to let everyone know in the near future. Not sure if the song will be any good, but thanks to Mav, I'm sure the video will be awesome.
Saturday, August 13, 2011
The Only Reason I Need
by Crazy Ivan
Some times this job can be a tough one. The hours can be long (and hot), the venues can be grueling (and hot), the days off can be sparse (and still hot) and the weather can be hot (and humid). Most of the time it's easy to keep yourself fired up about playing with a toy that you love to pay with, but sometimes you can't help but reflect on how hard a job it can be.
This most often happens 58 days into a 59 day assignment with few days off and a lot of 12 and 13 hour days. Today, as you might have guessed, was one of those kinds of days. I've been wearing myself out everyday and the finish line is in sight so it was kind of hard to get fired up today. I did, but as the sun started to set I really started running out of gas.
And then I talked with one person, it changed the way I looked at my whole day, my whole week, my whole summer and my whole 8 year+ career with Myachi.
Now, first I've got to issue an apology and then lay down a bit of back story. See, the subject of this story (as I found out tonight) actually reads this blog pretty regularly so I'll feel bad if I embarrass him a bit. So sorry about that...
Now the back story. I met this dude about 6 years ago when he was at Dollywood with his nephew. They got heavily into the game, fell in love with it and bought several. This, of course, happens to me about a hundred times a day so I filed it somewhere in the banks of happy memories Myachi has provided me and carried on.
I ran into him again the other night and even blogged about it. He was the collector I talked about in this blog. He came back today so that we could do a few trades... I dropped the ball and only brought a couple of tradables with me today so we didn't get to do as much trading as I hoped (he did give me a sweet deal on the Straight Jacket I wanted, though).
He showed his collection off to a few of the real maniacs that were hanging out; namely Socks, Triumph and Jumpman (nickname subject to change with or without notice). We chatted a bit about how he'd built his collection over the years. Turns out he bought a big chunk of it from a Wolf, a maniac that used to be part of a Myachi Club I hosted early in my Myachi career.
But later that night, right before I left, I also had a chance to speak with his wife. He's had a series of surgeries on one of his knee and is looking at another in the near future. He's been largely immobile for much of the time over the past couple of years and I can only imagine how frustrating that must be. From what his wife told me, Myachi is one of the few things that keeps him excited and having fun. He can still play, of course, but he also keeps up with us online, collects and trades and enjoys being a part of our small community.
That obviously makes me feel really good about what I do for a living. But after I left and headed back to the Cabin of Skills, I had a thought that almost overwhelmed me. It was a complete coincidence that I ran into this guy. If we hadn't done Dollywood this year or if he'd decided not to come this year, or even come a week or two later, we might never have crossed paths. I might never have known how meaningful our impact on him really was.
And like I said before, I teach more than a hundred people a day. I've been doing so for more than eight years. If the school assemblies and camps where I've taught as many as a thousand people in a day balance out my days off and my significant time at the office I've easily taught over a quarter of a million people in the time I've been with Myachi.
Whose to say how many people I've impacted with this game or how impacted they've been? Perhaps there are dozens of other heart warming stories about Myachi that I'll never be in the right place to know of. Perhaps there are other people that were helped through a hard time in their lives by our game. Perhaps there are other people that have become lifelong fans of the game whose faces I've long forgotten.
I've listed a number of reasons why I love my job on this blog before, but in truth, this is the only reason I really need.
Some times this job can be a tough one. The hours can be long (and hot), the venues can be grueling (and hot), the days off can be sparse (and still hot) and the weather can be hot (and humid). Most of the time it's easy to keep yourself fired up about playing with a toy that you love to pay with, but sometimes you can't help but reflect on how hard a job it can be.
This most often happens 58 days into a 59 day assignment with few days off and a lot of 12 and 13 hour days. Today, as you might have guessed, was one of those kinds of days. I've been wearing myself out everyday and the finish line is in sight so it was kind of hard to get fired up today. I did, but as the sun started to set I really started running out of gas.
And then I talked with one person, it changed the way I looked at my whole day, my whole week, my whole summer and my whole 8 year+ career with Myachi.
Now, first I've got to issue an apology and then lay down a bit of back story. See, the subject of this story (as I found out tonight) actually reads this blog pretty regularly so I'll feel bad if I embarrass him a bit. So sorry about that...
Now the back story. I met this dude about 6 years ago when he was at Dollywood with his nephew. They got heavily into the game, fell in love with it and bought several. This, of course, happens to me about a hundred times a day so I filed it somewhere in the banks of happy memories Myachi has provided me and carried on.
I ran into him again the other night and even blogged about it. He was the collector I talked about in this blog. He came back today so that we could do a few trades... I dropped the ball and only brought a couple of tradables with me today so we didn't get to do as much trading as I hoped (he did give me a sweet deal on the Straight Jacket I wanted, though).
He showed his collection off to a few of the real maniacs that were hanging out; namely Socks, Triumph and Jumpman (nickname subject to change with or without notice). We chatted a bit about how he'd built his collection over the years. Turns out he bought a big chunk of it from a Wolf, a maniac that used to be part of a Myachi Club I hosted early in my Myachi career.
But later that night, right before I left, I also had a chance to speak with his wife. He's had a series of surgeries on one of his knee and is looking at another in the near future. He's been largely immobile for much of the time over the past couple of years and I can only imagine how frustrating that must be. From what his wife told me, Myachi is one of the few things that keeps him excited and having fun. He can still play, of course, but he also keeps up with us online, collects and trades and enjoys being a part of our small community.
That obviously makes me feel really good about what I do for a living. But after I left and headed back to the Cabin of Skills, I had a thought that almost overwhelmed me. It was a complete coincidence that I ran into this guy. If we hadn't done Dollywood this year or if he'd decided not to come this year, or even come a week or two later, we might never have crossed paths. I might never have known how meaningful our impact on him really was.
And like I said before, I teach more than a hundred people a day. I've been doing so for more than eight years. If the school assemblies and camps where I've taught as many as a thousand people in a day balance out my days off and my significant time at the office I've easily taught over a quarter of a million people in the time I've been with Myachi.
Whose to say how many people I've impacted with this game or how impacted they've been? Perhaps there are dozens of other heart warming stories about Myachi that I'll never be in the right place to know of. Perhaps there are other people that were helped through a hard time in their lives by our game. Perhaps there are other people that have become lifelong fans of the game whose faces I've long forgotten.
I've listed a number of reasons why I love my job on this blog before, but in truth, this is the only reason I really need.
Thursday, August 4, 2011
A Lucky Break at Dollywood?
by Crazy Ivan
So before I even get started, I should explain that "Myachi plans" aren't like regular plans. We plan things out meticulously and well in advance and then we change the plan 37 times before it comes to fruition. Once it does come to pass, we often change the plan as we're enacting it so very often we are really planning for the sake of improvising with a great deal of forethought.
When I say there's a plan, there should be a little asterisk next to it and underneath the statement there should be a line of fine print like a used-car ad that includes the words "Plans subject to change without notice. We offer no guarantees on stated plans. Void where prohibited." (and as an aside, aren't all things pretty much "void where prohibited"?)
To make a long story short, the information I'm about to divulge is not exactly set in stone. It may make way to a new plan tomorrow or even yet tonight. But as the plan stands, it's pretty cool.
See, when we first came down to Dollywood, Kid Myach drove down with us in a van that carried all our displays, signage and the first bit of product we sold. So in order to go back to NYC, we'll need the van. Kid Myach would normally drive down, but he's on a whirlwind tour of tradeshows at the moment and won't be able to make it down.
After juggling a few things, we have a plan, and it includes a lucky arrival here at Dollywood. And I mean that in the double entendre sense that we're lucky that a dude named Lucky is arriving at Dollywood.
You may never have heard of him before, but this dude is heavily into the game. Monk and Animal met him years ago back when they were at the FAO Shwarz in Las Vegas. He had awesome skills and worked as kind of an unofficial Myachi Master back then. We've stayed in touch through the years and he recently decided to join the team and move to New York. And now he will (probably) be coming to Tennessee.
I feel a bit bad even writing this, since as far as I know, Lucky doesn't even know this yet. He might actually find out that we need him to come to Tennessee by reading this entry and that would be hilarious. But maybe not the best way to break the news.
Anyway, that means that if you're in the Knoxville area, you have yet another reason to come back to Dollywood and see us one more time during Dollywood Nights (August 8th-14th 10 am to 10 pm). You'll get to meet the newest member of the Myachi team, a soldier who is already well on his way to earning the title "Myachi Master".
So before I even get started, I should explain that "Myachi plans" aren't like regular plans. We plan things out meticulously and well in advance and then we change the plan 37 times before it comes to fruition. Once it does come to pass, we often change the plan as we're enacting it so very often we are really planning for the sake of improvising with a great deal of forethought.
When I say there's a plan, there should be a little asterisk next to it and underneath the statement there should be a line of fine print like a used-car ad that includes the words "Plans subject to change without notice. We offer no guarantees on stated plans. Void where prohibited." (and as an aside, aren't all things pretty much "void where prohibited"?)
To make a long story short, the information I'm about to divulge is not exactly set in stone. It may make way to a new plan tomorrow or even yet tonight. But as the plan stands, it's pretty cool.
See, when we first came down to Dollywood, Kid Myach drove down with us in a van that carried all our displays, signage and the first bit of product we sold. So in order to go back to NYC, we'll need the van. Kid Myach would normally drive down, but he's on a whirlwind tour of tradeshows at the moment and won't be able to make it down.
After juggling a few things, we have a plan, and it includes a lucky arrival here at Dollywood. And I mean that in the double entendre sense that we're lucky that a dude named Lucky is arriving at Dollywood.
You may never have heard of him before, but this dude is heavily into the game. Monk and Animal met him years ago back when they were at the FAO Shwarz in Las Vegas. He had awesome skills and worked as kind of an unofficial Myachi Master back then. We've stayed in touch through the years and he recently decided to join the team and move to New York. And now he will (probably) be coming to Tennessee.
I feel a bit bad even writing this, since as far as I know, Lucky doesn't even know this yet. He might actually find out that we need him to come to Tennessee by reading this entry and that would be hilarious. But maybe not the best way to break the news.
Anyway, that means that if you're in the Knoxville area, you have yet another reason to come back to Dollywood and see us one more time during Dollywood Nights (August 8th-14th 10 am to 10 pm). You'll get to meet the newest member of the Myachi team, a soldier who is already well on his way to earning the title "Myachi Master".
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Why Ivan Lost...
by Crazy Ivan
Got a message on You-Tube today that brought up an interesting question that hadn't occurred to me before. The inquiry came from a person who wondered why I never won anything.
I'm not talking about Academy Awards or anything (although I think that Meeting Night should have at least been nominated). But rather, they noticed after watching a number of Myachi videos that whenever I'm pictured in competition with another Myachi Master, I always lose.
To be honest, I'd never noticed it before. The first example comes from the early days of Myachi when I filmed a "fight scene" against former Myachi Master Big Dog. When we choreographed the scene, we knew that one of us would have to lose. Since I had a pretty good fall and Big Dog's Mohawk made it all but impossible for him to do a plausible dive, we set it up so that he defeats me with a Pendulum at the end.
But unbeknownst to be, this began a trend. Later, Monk and I would write and film a parody of SportsCenter called "Sack Center". In that video we filmed several competitions and I was a participant in two of them. One was a game of Fu against Animal (which I lost) and the other was a game of MYACH against Monk (which I also lost).
There were different reasons for both of my losses. When we set up the Fu battle between Animal and I, we actually filmed about seven points and I won 4 of them. But all of my points came quickly in the round and a few of Animal's came at the end of more dramatic exchanges. In the end, we decided to present it as a three round bout and we used the two best rounds (both of which Animal won) and the most dramatic round that I won (which was still super quick).
As for the MYACH battle against Monk, well... I just lost that one. Monk is unbelievable at MYACH and it wouldn't have been very realistic to set up a match where he lost so I'll just have to satisfy myself with having gotten a few letters off of him.
Lest you think this trend only carried over to a couple of videos, I also managed to recently lose a match of Myachi Arm Wrestling to Bones and post it on You-Tube. I could point out that before we shot the video, in my effort to get Bones to do the video, I enticed him with "I'll let you win...", but that being said, he would have beaten me anyway. Bones is a deceptively strong dude and he represented the surest challenge at the cabin.
With four losses and no videos of me actually winning games, I suppose one could be forgiven for thinking I just always lose at Myachi games. There is the one counter-example where I beat Unknown in a game of "Faceoff", but until Unknown reaches the rank of full fledged Myachi Master, I still haven't defeated a Myachi Master on camera.
I suppose much of it is that I'm the one that's usually filming, editing or choreographing the stuff. It would be pretty arrogant of me to choreograph a game that I win by design. I guess most of it is probably just coincidence, but part of it could be that our team of Myachi Masters just keeps getting so much better (at everything).
Got a message on You-Tube today that brought up an interesting question that hadn't occurred to me before. The inquiry came from a person who wondered why I never won anything.
I'm not talking about Academy Awards or anything (although I think that Meeting Night should have at least been nominated). But rather, they noticed after watching a number of Myachi videos that whenever I'm pictured in competition with another Myachi Master, I always lose.
To be honest, I'd never noticed it before. The first example comes from the early days of Myachi when I filmed a "fight scene" against former Myachi Master Big Dog. When we choreographed the scene, we knew that one of us would have to lose. Since I had a pretty good fall and Big Dog's Mohawk made it all but impossible for him to do a plausible dive, we set it up so that he defeats me with a Pendulum at the end.
But unbeknownst to be, this began a trend. Later, Monk and I would write and film a parody of SportsCenter called "Sack Center". In that video we filmed several competitions and I was a participant in two of them. One was a game of Fu against Animal (which I lost) and the other was a game of MYACH against Monk (which I also lost).
There were different reasons for both of my losses. When we set up the Fu battle between Animal and I, we actually filmed about seven points and I won 4 of them. But all of my points came quickly in the round and a few of Animal's came at the end of more dramatic exchanges. In the end, we decided to present it as a three round bout and we used the two best rounds (both of which Animal won) and the most dramatic round that I won (which was still super quick).
As for the MYACH battle against Monk, well... I just lost that one. Monk is unbelievable at MYACH and it wouldn't have been very realistic to set up a match where he lost so I'll just have to satisfy myself with having gotten a few letters off of him.
Lest you think this trend only carried over to a couple of videos, I also managed to recently lose a match of Myachi Arm Wrestling to Bones and post it on You-Tube. I could point out that before we shot the video, in my effort to get Bones to do the video, I enticed him with "I'll let you win...", but that being said, he would have beaten me anyway. Bones is a deceptively strong dude and he represented the surest challenge at the cabin.
With four losses and no videos of me actually winning games, I suppose one could be forgiven for thinking I just always lose at Myachi games. There is the one counter-example where I beat Unknown in a game of "Faceoff", but until Unknown reaches the rank of full fledged Myachi Master, I still haven't defeated a Myachi Master on camera.
I suppose much of it is that I'm the one that's usually filming, editing or choreographing the stuff. It would be pretty arrogant of me to choreograph a game that I win by design. I guess most of it is probably just coincidence, but part of it could be that our team of Myachi Masters just keeps getting so much better (at everything).
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Reasons Why I Love My Job #1
by Crazy Ivan
For those that are new to the Myachi Blog, I should start by mentioning that I've had a running series of blog entries since this thing started where I list some of my favorite parts of the job. In the past they've had titles like Reasons Why I Love My Job #63, Reasons Why I Love My Job #106 or Reasons Why I Love My Job #22.
But since I've been at Dollywood, I've been constantly reminded why I loved this job first. As many of you know, Dollywood was my first Myachi assignment and it was through my hard work and dedication that first summer that I earned the title "Myachi Master". And there was no question that I wanted to earn that title. I knew from my first day with Myachi that I wanted to do it for the rest of my life.
So I'm not going to assign some random number to this blog. This is, in at least two senses, the number one reason why I love my job. And it's pretty simple. It's the people I meet.
This summer, I've already met more incredibly cool people than I can possibly list. Punisher, who dominated our golf contests for a while and thought of a ton of cool challenges off the top of our tent. Taylor and Zach who chilled at the booth all day for a week and a half helping us spread the word and convincing their dad to win them nearly a full series of sacks. Blackout, who comes back after a week jamming like he's been doing this for months. The mad cool martial artist I met the other day who was tossing the Myachi in the air, doing a standing backflip and then trying to catch it (and he got so close...). Gabriel, whose enthusiasm made the whole last half of my day worth waking up for all by itself. The little two year old who kept tossing the Myachi from his palm and was too cute to dissuade (he tied for the win on a contest, by the way. The guy he tied with was a mad cool juggler that stepped in against a bunch of kids that had been practicing all day).
And that's only people I've seen in the last couple of days. There are literally hundreds of names that could be added to that list.
There is no question that the best thing about Myachi is the people. The people I work with are the coolest group of individuals I've ever met (and possibly the coolest ever assembled), but that only scratches the surface. The maniacs I know through our online community, the maniacs I know from the dozens of places I've demoed, the maniacs I've met at the hundreds of parties, school assemblies and private events we've done and, of course, the new maniacs I meet every day.
It really doesn't matter how much I sweat, how long the hours or how hot it gets. When your job is to hang out with cool people and do something cool while meeting other cool people, it never really feels like work.
For those that are new to the Myachi Blog, I should start by mentioning that I've had a running series of blog entries since this thing started where I list some of my favorite parts of the job. In the past they've had titles like Reasons Why I Love My Job #63, Reasons Why I Love My Job #106 or Reasons Why I Love My Job #22.
But since I've been at Dollywood, I've been constantly reminded why I loved this job first. As many of you know, Dollywood was my first Myachi assignment and it was through my hard work and dedication that first summer that I earned the title "Myachi Master". And there was no question that I wanted to earn that title. I knew from my first day with Myachi that I wanted to do it for the rest of my life.
So I'm not going to assign some random number to this blog. This is, in at least two senses, the number one reason why I love my job. And it's pretty simple. It's the people I meet.
This summer, I've already met more incredibly cool people than I can possibly list. Punisher, who dominated our golf contests for a while and thought of a ton of cool challenges off the top of our tent. Taylor and Zach who chilled at the booth all day for a week and a half helping us spread the word and convincing their dad to win them nearly a full series of sacks. Blackout, who comes back after a week jamming like he's been doing this for months. The mad cool martial artist I met the other day who was tossing the Myachi in the air, doing a standing backflip and then trying to catch it (and he got so close...). Gabriel, whose enthusiasm made the whole last half of my day worth waking up for all by itself. The little two year old who kept tossing the Myachi from his palm and was too cute to dissuade (he tied for the win on a contest, by the way. The guy he tied with was a mad cool juggler that stepped in against a bunch of kids that had been practicing all day).
And that's only people I've seen in the last couple of days. There are literally hundreds of names that could be added to that list.
There is no question that the best thing about Myachi is the people. The people I work with are the coolest group of individuals I've ever met (and possibly the coolest ever assembled), but that only scratches the surface. The maniacs I know through our online community, the maniacs I know from the dozens of places I've demoed, the maniacs I've met at the hundreds of parties, school assemblies and private events we've done and, of course, the new maniacs I meet every day.
It really doesn't matter how much I sweat, how long the hours or how hot it gets. When your job is to hang out with cool people and do something cool while meeting other cool people, it never really feels like work.
Friday, July 15, 2011
Split Challenges
by Crazy Ivan
The other night we're all sitting around munching on fine American cuisine (Hot Pockets) at the Cabin of Skills. I'm waiting for mine to cook, Bamboo is sitting at the bar by the kitchen, Bones and Kore are at the dining room table and Rush is on the couch. Pinky was in bed by that time, which is why we were forced to resort to eating Hot Pockets.
Rather than take a bunch of time to describe the layout of the room (which is an essential part of this story), I decided to go the quicker route of drawing up a terrible looking map on Paint:
So in order to keep myself entertained while I'm waiting (for 3:30 on high), I decide to start throwing splits. I've got two Myachis in my pocket and I toss a split where one goes to Bamboo and one goes to Kore. It's a near/far split where both still have to go forward, so it was a fun challenge.
Of course, in this cabin you can't do a throw without it becoming a game, so I decided to try to hit every combination of two people in the room. With Bamboo close and Rush so much farther away, it became a serious challenge. It took a few tries on a couple of combos and we decided that the ceiling was too low for me to get the Rush/Bones split, but I got all the others in a few tries.
And then, of course, everyone was in on it. We had so much fun that I forgot all about the lava-temperature pepperoni and cheese that was waiting for me, freshly nuked.
If you've never done it before, try it sometime. It's best if you have two friends that are into the game (or at least have a descent catch), but you can even try it alone. Set up two golf targets and try to throw into both of them at once. The key to the split, of course, is that both Myachis have to come off the same hand.
Pop Shove Its, slow Heel Flips, Hard Flips and a few other unique hand motions will allow you to split into any two locations in a room with a little thought and a lot of practice.
And if you have trouble visualizing what I'm talking about, don't worry. A video is coming soon.
The other night we're all sitting around munching on fine American cuisine (Hot Pockets) at the Cabin of Skills. I'm waiting for mine to cook, Bamboo is sitting at the bar by the kitchen, Bones and Kore are at the dining room table and Rush is on the couch. Pinky was in bed by that time, which is why we were forced to resort to eating Hot Pockets.
Rather than take a bunch of time to describe the layout of the room (which is an essential part of this story), I decided to go the quicker route of drawing up a terrible looking map on Paint:
 |
| On Second thought, I shoulda just described it... |
Of course, in this cabin you can't do a throw without it becoming a game, so I decided to try to hit every combination of two people in the room. With Bamboo close and Rush so much farther away, it became a serious challenge. It took a few tries on a couple of combos and we decided that the ceiling was too low for me to get the Rush/Bones split, but I got all the others in a few tries.
And then, of course, everyone was in on it. We had so much fun that I forgot all about the lava-temperature pepperoni and cheese that was waiting for me, freshly nuked.
If you've never done it before, try it sometime. It's best if you have two friends that are into the game (or at least have a descent catch), but you can even try it alone. Set up two golf targets and try to throw into both of them at once. The key to the split, of course, is that both Myachis have to come off the same hand.
Pop Shove Its, slow Heel Flips, Hard Flips and a few other unique hand motions will allow you to split into any two locations in a room with a little thought and a lot of practice.
And if you have trouble visualizing what I'm talking about, don't worry. A video is coming soon.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Welcome to the Cabin of Skills
by Crazy Ivan
Tonight, the Cabin of Skills lived up to its name more than it has up to this point. Don't get me wrong, I brought a number of toys so there's been plenty of juggling, hacky sacking, diaboloing and cigar boxing, not to mention endless hours of Myachi playing.
But tonight was a bit different. Long time maniac and forum favorite Digit came over this evening and brought his roommate, who is a pretty impressive juggler. He also does a little diabolo and was looking for some new tricks to try.
I obliged, of course, and taught him a few of the tougher basics. I also gave him a few new tricks to work on in three and four ball juggling. There was one point where Bamboo was juggling, Bones was juggling one ball and two Myachis, Kore was jamming and Digit, his roommate and I were all throwing down diabolo tricks.
So, sure, this has been the Cabin of Skills since we got here, but if you measure things by skills per square foot, it was definitely at its apex tonight.
Tonight, the Cabin of Skills lived up to its name more than it has up to this point. Don't get me wrong, I brought a number of toys so there's been plenty of juggling, hacky sacking, diaboloing and cigar boxing, not to mention endless hours of Myachi playing.
But tonight was a bit different. Long time maniac and forum favorite Digit came over this evening and brought his roommate, who is a pretty impressive juggler. He also does a little diabolo and was looking for some new tricks to try.
I obliged, of course, and taught him a few of the tougher basics. I also gave him a few new tricks to work on in three and four ball juggling. There was one point where Bamboo was juggling, Bones was juggling one ball and two Myachis, Kore was jamming and Digit, his roommate and I were all throwing down diabolo tricks.
So, sure, this has been the Cabin of Skills since we got here, but if you measure things by skills per square foot, it was definitely at its apex tonight.
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Myachi Fireworks Show
by Crazy Ivan
Don't have much time to blog, but I mentioned the other day that we'd purchased a bunch of really awesome fireworks for the fourth. I've received several requests for a bit of video to back it up, so I had Rush post the video below on You-Tube.
Keep in mind that this is just the "grand finale" of our show... We'd been firing off massive bottle rockets, fire fountains and mini-mortars for a solid twenty minutes before we sent this up. You'll see two giant bottle rockets, a mortar and an "Apache", which was a 16 shot monster that we wished we'd bought twelve of.
For those that live in the firework lenient states, this won't be that big a deal. For those who live in the majority of the country, you'll be amazed at what is legal in Tennessee:
Don't have much time to blog, but I mentioned the other day that we'd purchased a bunch of really awesome fireworks for the fourth. I've received several requests for a bit of video to back it up, so I had Rush post the video below on You-Tube.
Keep in mind that this is just the "grand finale" of our show... We'd been firing off massive bottle rockets, fire fountains and mini-mortars for a solid twenty minutes before we sent this up. You'll see two giant bottle rockets, a mortar and an "Apache", which was a 16 shot monster that we wished we'd bought twelve of.
For those that live in the firework lenient states, this won't be that big a deal. For those who live in the majority of the country, you'll be amazed at what is legal in Tennessee:
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Myachi Arm Wrestling
by Crazy Ivan
So the other day I'm talking to Rush about my favorite Myachi games and I mentioned Myachi Arm Wrestling. Much to my surprise he just responded with a blank stare and a quick "what's that?"
I thought it odd that I'd never shown the game to him before so we played a quick round. Then it occurred to me that Rush is a regular reader of this blog and if he'd never heard about it, I must have never blogged about it. So last night I went back through the blog and confirmed it. And it surprises me since it's one of my favorite Myachi games.
One reason is that it's so simple to explain. Two competitors face off. They stand so that the outside of their right feet are touching and then place the backs of their right hands together with a Myachi in between. The object is to touch your opponents palm to his or her leg using the strength of your arm. Obviously, they're attempting to do the same to you.
It's a real full arm work out and when you get good at you quickly discover that much of the game is just about redirecting your opponent's energy. To demonstrate the game, I talked Bones into playing a quick round with me while Rush taped it. Seemed like the only real way to explain the game:
Couple of quick notes. If the Myachi falls, the round is over. If it was clearly one players fault, that player loses. If it was a mutual thing, the round is a scratch and you simply play again. If, during a battle, the Myachi gets twisted in such a way that it will be difficult to keep it up, you reset, place the Myachi back where it belongs and start again.
So the other day I'm talking to Rush about my favorite Myachi games and I mentioned Myachi Arm Wrestling. Much to my surprise he just responded with a blank stare and a quick "what's that?"
I thought it odd that I'd never shown the game to him before so we played a quick round. Then it occurred to me that Rush is a regular reader of this blog and if he'd never heard about it, I must have never blogged about it. So last night I went back through the blog and confirmed it. And it surprises me since it's one of my favorite Myachi games.
One reason is that it's so simple to explain. Two competitors face off. They stand so that the outside of their right feet are touching and then place the backs of their right hands together with a Myachi in between. The object is to touch your opponents palm to his or her leg using the strength of your arm. Obviously, they're attempting to do the same to you.
It's a real full arm work out and when you get good at you quickly discover that much of the game is just about redirecting your opponent's energy. To demonstrate the game, I talked Bones into playing a quick round with me while Rush taped it. Seemed like the only real way to explain the game:
Couple of quick notes. If the Myachi falls, the round is over. If it was clearly one players fault, that player loses. If it was a mutual thing, the round is a scratch and you simply play again. If, during a battle, the Myachi gets twisted in such a way that it will be difficult to keep it up, you reset, place the Myachi back where it belongs and start again.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Reinforcements Arrive
by Crazy Ivan
There was a time when I was invincible. I was impervious to injury, tireless in my efforts and resilient to any malady. I shrugged off illness, I laughed off pain and I tackled every passion with an almost singular focus. There was a time when I was, in a word, indefatigable.
That time was called "young", and it is a seemingly distant memory. Don't get me wrong, I was young pretty recently. I'm even now just learning that I'm no longer young. As Gallagher once said, "we spend half of our lives learning to do stuff and the other half realizing we can do that stuff anymore."
My recent trip to Dollywood has been rapidly showing me just how many things are falling into that latter category. I did this exact same assignment with a much smaller and less experienced team when I was, myself, far less experienced. I worked open to close and didn't take a single day off in 57 days. I took a half day once when Myachi Man was here and I hiked up a two mile, 1800 foot trail in the Smokie Mountains.
And that was when I was young.
Now I'm a mere 10 days into this stint and the 13 hour days are starting to take a toll on me. I'm actually going to be taking a day off tomorrow, a scant 130 hours of labor from the start. My body is sore, my brain hurts and anybody who follows the trick of the day videos knows that my voice has all but given out on me. I still managed to massage my old guy pride with the fact that I outlasted the younger guys when it came to needing a day off, but I didn't come close to my goal of making it all the way through the summer like I used to.
Since I'd overestimated my youthful invincibility, this realization also comes with the side effect that we don't have enough help to cover Dollywood. If my oldness is going to have me doing crazy things like "days off" (whatever that means), we realized that we were going to need more help at the Wood.
The first thing we did was stuck Rush on a plane. I'm not sure exactly why Myachi Man chose Rush, but perhaps he got a deal on passenger per pound and simply chose the lightest guy. But that wasn't quite going to do the trick. We needed a genuine Myachi Master to replace a Myachi Master, and while I have faith that Rush will one day earn his way into the fourth generation of Myachi Masters, he's not there yet. He still has much to learn and being at Dollywood will certainly speed up the rate of his progress, but it wasn't enough.
This put us in an awkward position because Animal, Monk, Maverick and Noodles are needed in New York. Not only do we have the two biggest toy stores in the country to worry about, but we also have a few summer camps we're doing this year, a bunch of special events and the typical Myachi amount of birthday parties, Mitzvahs, graduation parties, etc. We couldn't afford to deplete our resources there. And it's not like there are any Myachi Masters just lying around.
Or perhaps there was...
In addition to Rush, we also welcomed Kore back to the ranks today. He'd been in Florida for the last few months and had been all but cut off from the Myachi world, but when he saw the Myachi symbol in the sky and heard the Myachi communicator crackle to life, he answered the call. He knew that a Myachi Master was needed, so he came to the rescue as one would expect from any legitimate superhero.
So the team at the Wood grew, I get to rest my voice for a day (as well as this ridiculously old ankle of mine), we have Kore's sense of humor at the Cabin of Skills and we have Rush's youthful enthusiasm to young up the crowd and fire up the rest of the team. What was looking like a great summer keeps getting all kinds of better.
There was a time when I was invincible. I was impervious to injury, tireless in my efforts and resilient to any malady. I shrugged off illness, I laughed off pain and I tackled every passion with an almost singular focus. There was a time when I was, in a word, indefatigable.
That time was called "young", and it is a seemingly distant memory. Don't get me wrong, I was young pretty recently. I'm even now just learning that I'm no longer young. As Gallagher once said, "we spend half of our lives learning to do stuff and the other half realizing we can do that stuff anymore."
My recent trip to Dollywood has been rapidly showing me just how many things are falling into that latter category. I did this exact same assignment with a much smaller and less experienced team when I was, myself, far less experienced. I worked open to close and didn't take a single day off in 57 days. I took a half day once when Myachi Man was here and I hiked up a two mile, 1800 foot trail in the Smokie Mountains.
And that was when I was young.
Now I'm a mere 10 days into this stint and the 13 hour days are starting to take a toll on me. I'm actually going to be taking a day off tomorrow, a scant 130 hours of labor from the start. My body is sore, my brain hurts and anybody who follows the trick of the day videos knows that my voice has all but given out on me. I still managed to massage my old guy pride with the fact that I outlasted the younger guys when it came to needing a day off, but I didn't come close to my goal of making it all the way through the summer like I used to.
Since I'd overestimated my youthful invincibility, this realization also comes with the side effect that we don't have enough help to cover Dollywood. If my oldness is going to have me doing crazy things like "days off" (whatever that means), we realized that we were going to need more help at the Wood.
The first thing we did was stuck Rush on a plane. I'm not sure exactly why Myachi Man chose Rush, but perhaps he got a deal on passenger per pound and simply chose the lightest guy. But that wasn't quite going to do the trick. We needed a genuine Myachi Master to replace a Myachi Master, and while I have faith that Rush will one day earn his way into the fourth generation of Myachi Masters, he's not there yet. He still has much to learn and being at Dollywood will certainly speed up the rate of his progress, but it wasn't enough.
This put us in an awkward position because Animal, Monk, Maverick and Noodles are needed in New York. Not only do we have the two biggest toy stores in the country to worry about, but we also have a few summer camps we're doing this year, a bunch of special events and the typical Myachi amount of birthday parties, Mitzvahs, graduation parties, etc. We couldn't afford to deplete our resources there. And it's not like there are any Myachi Masters just lying around.
Or perhaps there was...
In addition to Rush, we also welcomed Kore back to the ranks today. He'd been in Florida for the last few months and had been all but cut off from the Myachi world, but when he saw the Myachi symbol in the sky and heard the Myachi communicator crackle to life, he answered the call. He knew that a Myachi Master was needed, so he came to the rescue as one would expect from any legitimate superhero.
So the team at the Wood grew, I get to rest my voice for a day (as well as this ridiculously old ankle of mine), we have Kore's sense of humor at the Cabin of Skills and we have Rush's youthful enthusiasm to young up the crowd and fire up the rest of the team. What was looking like a great summer keeps getting all kinds of better.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Hanging Out With Myachi Masters
by Crazy Ivan
One of the coolest things about being in Pigeon Forge is seeing familiar faces. Pinky and I actually lived in the area for several years before I met Myachi Man and took to the whirlwind adventure that has been the past 8 years. We have a number of old friends that live nearby and there are plenty of Myachi Maniacs in the area that I'm just as stoked to see.
Among the many I've seen is our good friend Digit. He's a guy I met at Dollywood when he was 13 and he was already a skill toy protege. He was a performing magician already and he was pretty proficient with devil sticks and knew a bit of diabolo. There was no question at the time that he was a Myachi player in the waiting.
He got hooked on the game back in 04 and we've stayed in touch ever since. He came to NYC a year ago and we all hung out at the House of Skills for a bit and now I've had a chance to return the favor. We're in his home town so he hung at the cabin with us tonight.
While we were hanging out it became very obvious that there are certain things about hanging out with a Myachi Master that are different than just hanging out with normal people. The foremost of them is the fact that when any object has to be transferred from one place to another, it is thrown (unless it's value it above $400). We don't hand things in Myachi, we throw them. And we don't just throw them, we throw them in creative ways such as under the leg, blind behind the neck, out of a slingshot, etc. What's more is that we expect them to be caught in a similar manner.
Another nuance that one picks up on quickly when chilling with Myachi Masters is that everything becomes a challenge. At one point tonight, Bones does some weird trick with a roll of paper towels so we all immediately had to try and see who could do the coolest variation of what Bones did. Every time someone would mention a possible trick with anything, we will all start trying to do it. And because there was an extra diabolo and set of devil sticks in the house, the skill challenges ranged well beyond Myachi.
And lastly, one of the things people have to get used to about hanging out with Myachi Masters is that we're pretty much always working... or at least as much as one can apply the word "work" to a profession that consist mainly of playing with toys. While Digit was here I had to film and edit the Trick of the Day, check my emails, finalize everything with Rush's twice delayed and once cancelled flight in from NYC, check Myachi's YouTube inbox and update Myachi Man on today's sales. Basically, the whole time he was here I was on the computer or the phone... but it didn't stop me from doing some cool stuff with the paper towels.
One of the coolest things about being in Pigeon Forge is seeing familiar faces. Pinky and I actually lived in the area for several years before I met Myachi Man and took to the whirlwind adventure that has been the past 8 years. We have a number of old friends that live nearby and there are plenty of Myachi Maniacs in the area that I'm just as stoked to see.
Among the many I've seen is our good friend Digit. He's a guy I met at Dollywood when he was 13 and he was already a skill toy protege. He was a performing magician already and he was pretty proficient with devil sticks and knew a bit of diabolo. There was no question at the time that he was a Myachi player in the waiting.
He got hooked on the game back in 04 and we've stayed in touch ever since. He came to NYC a year ago and we all hung out at the House of Skills for a bit and now I've had a chance to return the favor. We're in his home town so he hung at the cabin with us tonight.
While we were hanging out it became very obvious that there are certain things about hanging out with a Myachi Master that are different than just hanging out with normal people. The foremost of them is the fact that when any object has to be transferred from one place to another, it is thrown (unless it's value it above $400). We don't hand things in Myachi, we throw them. And we don't just throw them, we throw them in creative ways such as under the leg, blind behind the neck, out of a slingshot, etc. What's more is that we expect them to be caught in a similar manner.
Another nuance that one picks up on quickly when chilling with Myachi Masters is that everything becomes a challenge. At one point tonight, Bones does some weird trick with a roll of paper towels so we all immediately had to try and see who could do the coolest variation of what Bones did. Every time someone would mention a possible trick with anything, we will all start trying to do it. And because there was an extra diabolo and set of devil sticks in the house, the skill challenges ranged well beyond Myachi.
And lastly, one of the things people have to get used to about hanging out with Myachi Masters is that we're pretty much always working... or at least as much as one can apply the word "work" to a profession that consist mainly of playing with toys. While Digit was here I had to film and edit the Trick of the Day, check my emails, finalize everything with Rush's twice delayed and once cancelled flight in from NYC, check Myachi's YouTube inbox and update Myachi Man on today's sales. Basically, the whole time he was here I was on the computer or the phone... but it didn't stop me from doing some cool stuff with the paper towels.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Bones' First Myachi Trip
by Bones
There are probably not enough words in the English dictionary to express the excitement I felt when Crazy Ivan told me Bamboo and I were going to Tennessee to play in one of Myachis first homes, Dollywood. He told me "Its going to be terrible, long days, sun overhead all day on black top, no fun at all" I said I was in with no hesitation. I passed the phone to Bamboo and he had the same response.
The wait until we started our journey flew by and before we knew it, it was 6AM and we were on our way. I rode with Kid Myach which was epic in its own right but that's a different story. I was a maniac before I became a Myachi Master so I had read all there was on the Internet about Myachi. The big three in Myachi, Myachi man, Kid Myach, and Crazy Ivan were all my inspiration once I discovered Myachi. Not just because they have the coolest job in the world but because they worked hard for what they believe in. I remember meeting Crazy Ivan and actually being star struck. Kind of silly, I know, but you have to be silly when your going to play with a toy for 10 hours. Everyone thinks the motto for Myachi is " It's all about looking good and having fun." In reality it's "Good things come to those who work hard."
So now I am miles away from home far up in the Smokey Mountains, away from everything I've ever known, ready to work hard. I am not sure why because I can't imagine anything better than this but Myachi always finds a way to surprise me.
There are probably not enough words in the English dictionary to express the excitement I felt when Crazy Ivan told me Bamboo and I were going to Tennessee to play in one of Myachis first homes, Dollywood. He told me "Its going to be terrible, long days, sun overhead all day on black top, no fun at all" I said I was in with no hesitation. I passed the phone to Bamboo and he had the same response.
The wait until we started our journey flew by and before we knew it, it was 6AM and we were on our way. I rode with Kid Myach which was epic in its own right but that's a different story. I was a maniac before I became a Myachi Master so I had read all there was on the Internet about Myachi. The big three in Myachi, Myachi man, Kid Myach, and Crazy Ivan were all my inspiration once I discovered Myachi. Not just because they have the coolest job in the world but because they worked hard for what they believe in. I remember meeting Crazy Ivan and actually being star struck. Kind of silly, I know, but you have to be silly when your going to play with a toy for 10 hours. Everyone thinks the motto for Myachi is " It's all about looking good and having fun." In reality it's "Good things come to those who work hard."
So now I am miles away from home far up in the Smokey Mountains, away from everything I've ever known, ready to work hard. I am not sure why because I can't imagine anything better than this but Myachi always finds a way to surprise me.
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