For those who don't know, I'm currently in Gunnison, Colorado, and will be until next Wednesday. I, along with 10 other physics students, are here using the observatory to study exoplanets (planets around stars besides the sun). On the side we are using the CCD's to take pictures of other astronomical objects, and also possibly studying a bit of cataclysmic variation.
CHRIST IS RISEN! Christos Voskrese! Christos Anesti! Al-Masih-Qam! Cristo Ha Resucitado!
Couldn't resist this one. This is a kid who has just had a procedure done at the dentist, and thus is simply pumped with medication.
Incidentally, this is the exact same way Jeremy acts in the morning and after drinking coffee (. . . . combined)
Well this is obviously the post about the competition, but first must come the last minute stuff that happened before the competition...
During practice Thursday night I quickly wrote down (yes, I brought a note card and a pen) my three (thank goodness it ended up only being three) double mini passes: stretch jump on, half turn, back full off; front tuck on, front full off; and stretch jump on, back strait, barani strait off. After trying each one out a couple times (I didn't do good with any of them. Sometimes it's the easy things that gets you) I moved on to trampoline. It took about a minute to realize that I wasn't near ready enough to actually compete those really hard skills. So I demoted myself from advanced to sub-advanced. The skills were all easy on sub-advanced. So I quickly wrote down my knew pass: back tuck, barani tuck, back pike, barani pike, pike jump, half turn, 3/4 front, half turn to feet, barani strait, back strait. Well, i didn't have enough time to practice the pass to realize that I poorly designed it. Doing a 3/4 front takes you way forward and then doing a half turn off of your back takes you even a little further in the same direction. The half turn also gets you facing a different way. So now the end of the trampoline is just behind you. But your next skill is a back strait - a diffucult skill to keep in the exact same spot. An easy skill if you have plenty of space behind you. So with that somewhere in our minds let's continue to....the competition! (a couple of dots and an exclamation mark can make something seem really dramatic...cool!)
So Rockwall is where it was located. Rockwall is over three hours away. I needed to be there before 8:30. I woke up at 4:25. The earliest time I've ever woken up. Once we were there the coach gave me some competing clothes, rediculously short shorts and a shrink wrapped shirt. It had been so long since I've worn anything like them. Somehow I don't think they helped. One thing I noticed when I came in (very easy to notice in such a small gym) was that there were no boys my age. In fact, there were only two boys, each one at least three years younger than me. I obviously had no competition. Mom said after the competition that I should have pretended that I was competing against the girls my age. They were also about the same skill level as I was. Now I know for next time. Anyways, Floor was first. One of the judges called everybody's names who were going to do it for a certain skill level. Well, at the time they were calling everyone who was my skill level...I didn't get called. Why? I don't know. So the people who were called went ahead with their six warm-up passes. I sat back and watched...slightly confused. About when they were all done with their warm up passes the judge that had called their names came up to me and asked,
"Are you Jeremy...?"
"Uhhh....I think..." ok I didn't actually say that, but anyways...
"Oh! I'm sorry. I missed your name. You're supposed to be doing the floor now."
"@#$%!" Highly dramatized....I'm not that bad...
The conversation eventually concluded that I would do my warm up passes in-between everyone elses real passes. It actually worked pretty well. So I went, messed up on all of them except for one, and even crashed once; then I was out of practices. My coach was thinking that I should try to slip in an extra one but I was afraid they were watching me to closely, and I didn't want any sort of deduction. So I started my real ones. My first pass was horrible. I did my front flip just fine, did my round off out of it and all, but I had to much power. What was next supposed to be a backhandspring turned into a whip thingy. My hands missed the ground, which threw off the rest of my pass. I did a backhandspring after my weird thing just to slow myself down and ended my pass right there. Somehow they gave me the score of something like a 8.0 and 8.1. That's really not too bad. Maybe the begining of my pass was just really good. So then I did my second pass which was fine. Next was double mini. I did my six warm-up passes, and then did my three real ones. Each one was way better than all of my practices. It made me happy. Oh, and then there's trampoline. It was horrible because they didn't have enough judges to judge floor, tramp, and double mini all at the same time. They just did floor and double mini at the same time. Once everyone was done with floor and d.m. they all went to tramp. Only one person competed at a time. It took forever. My group was last and I was the last one in my group. I was the last one to do something that day. I didn't like the pressure. Actually I think I was to tired to really realize what kind of a situation I was in. Well I went and didn't do to good due to the problemof the poorly designed pass I mentioned earlier (at least that's what I blame it on). The pass was going just fine untill after my 3/4 front half turn. I was supposed to do a back strait next but I was way to close to the back of the tramp. I went ahead and threw it hoping that I could gainer it (a gainer is when you do a back flip and end up going forward or doing a front flip and end up going backward). Well, by trying to gainer it my back strait looked really horrible. My head was out, my knees were bent, and even worse I landed on the edge of the trampoline...the metal bar frame. It didn't hurt, but it made a loud bang and I was the only one to watch. So most everyone saw it. What a way to end the competition. So we did the award cerimony. I got three golds.
I'll probably post a video of it soon. Dad recorded the whole thing (well, not the whole thing. just when I was going).
So, as mentioned in my previous post I have a gymnastics competition this Saturday. What's better is that I am no where near ready for it. Here's why....
I'm competing on floor, tramp, and double mini (scroll down to see a picture of a double mini).
Floor. For the floor I have two passes. For the first pass I will be doing Russian (a type of front flip), round-off, back-hand-spring, back-full, front flip. I've done this pass several times and it's not to hard.
My second pass is Russian, round-off, whip, whip, back-hand-spring, back-hand-spring, back-hand-spring, back-full. I just recently figured out that this is my second pass, therefore I have not had much time to practice it. In fact, I've only done it once...and landed my back-full on my knees - the other times I tried it = fail.
Tramp. Luckily for the trampoline there is only one pass; what mine is = ? Yes, it's true, I don't have it memorized yet. More than that I don't actually even know it yet and, therefore, haven't even tried it. I do know that there will be a 1 and 3/4 front flip, ball out; a double back; probably a cody (a backflip to your stomach, then backflip off of your stomach); probably a back-full (maybe even a double full) and most likely a barani or two (front flip with a half twist in between). In the pass there will be ten skills.
Double Mini. On the double mini there are anywhere from three to five passes - I don't even know how many. I don't even know what any of them are. Because of this I will be doing really simple things on it. stuff that I really don't even need to practice for.
So....I need to straighten out all of the stuff I listed within two hours...tonight. Yes, those to hours are my last two hours of practice before the competition on this Saturday. In order of priority I need to make better my second floor pass; make, memorize, and actually practice my tramp pass; and invent three (hopefully three, not five. I'll find out tonight) double mini passes that I can easily do.
Also...I bruised my knee (it's swollen and it kinda hurts) yesterday trying to do my second floor pass. With a hurt knee I am going to have to take it easy at gymnastics tonight, yet somehow manage all the previously listed things.
The Evil Cheri on Top. To top all of that off I'm pretty bad at waking up early. And competitions always start early...really early. And this one is far away...really far away. So I have to wake up even earlier to make up for the far awayness.....ON A SATURDAY! I could have made a video this Saturday. (oh, speaking of video I'll get whoever drives me to record the competition).
Good News! My coach said that it really doesn't matter what place I get for the double mini, just do it so they'll let me compete it at nationals. Sorry, no more good news....
Well, wish me luck! (hopefully you read this before Saturday)
Okay, so....
I'm pretty sure Jared and maybe Rachel have already blogged all about this....oh, well...
On youtube you will no longer find any of our future videos just by typing in the words "rovnys". Instead we wanted to make you have to go through all the trouble of typing TorchFireProductions. Capitalization doesn't matter and I think just typing in Torch Fire should work as well. Currently on our new account we only have two videos ("Red Window" and its bloopers "Red Window Bluegrass") which is pathetic. Don't Panic (Ok, in this case you're probably actually happy about that) because I currently have three in production. But, dissapointingly, it will feal like forever before you actually see one of them because I am to busy to work on them, and one of them requires my friend who is also really busy.
I'll keep you updated...maybe....
-Jeremy.
Oh, and I have a gymnastics competition this Saturday...you know...I'll just make another post...
The newest youtube video is up! Well, it actually has been for a while, but I just wanted to put it on here! :D
And the bloopers! Actually, they are longer than the video itself, but they are hilarious!!!!! Watch watch! Oooh, I just reminded myself of Southwatch..... Sorry, nevermind....
Well, since I'll be leaving to college once again Monday morning, here is a quick update before things start moving light-speed again.
My semester will be similar to last one except that
(a) I'll probably be doing reader's services on campus once a week (I pray that works out)
(b) I'll be studying economics and theology ("understanding the Bible") instead of politics and philosophy, respectively
(c) um, it will be spring. . . and I'll be on the other side of campus
What else to say?!? Here we go, all in one breath. . . James, I hope your birthday was great (we have your sister here right now, so maybe she can personally convey our best wishes [late though they be] personally, if, that is, she can be pried from the small tornado the girls are able to inexplicably create), congrats to those who have shown forth their surprising writing abilities, Joanna I hope your back feels better!! I need to watch treasure planet again (haven't seen that in millennia), happy trails to those in Mexico, happy, um, namesday (?) mom, happy flying to super-dad, yay for those able to fully appreciate the genius of the music in Zelda, Jeremy keep on makin' them videos, Ben be the conquistador of technology, Jordan keep on reading them finance books, Rachel finish that book (I'm curious for goodness' sake), and Rebecca get really good at hoola hooping.
wheeew. That was intense. Forgive me if I've forgotten anyone, I wrote this sorta really fast. Really really fast.
HAPPY SEMESTER EVERYONE!!
