Hello, hi. So, yawr, are you bored by football, basketball, hockey, and whatever else sweaty people do while snapping towels at each other and comparing bicep size? Is this what happens in locker rooms? Okay. So how about we examine a few sports that are just on the cusp of greatness. Like seriously in the year 2050 everyone will be like, “What? Soccer? Huh. Let’s go play Crap Canoe!” Yeah, you probably don’t want to know what Crap Canoe is. Anyway, get ready to be simply amazed at what we humans have created to pass the time. Possibly they should have just downloaded a book on a Kindle, but whatever. We’re not here to judge.
Yes, we are.
Extreme Ironing
What The Hell Is It? Described as the “latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well pressed shirt.” Um-hm, yes, definitely. Once hanging from a mountain my biggest concern is always about pesky wrinkles in my linen suit all the way up there ass-over-head on the side of a boulder. Wrinkles be damned! I glare at you starched, pressed pleats with derision, derision I say! You are the bane of my existence! Bane! I’d shake my fist violently, but I’m afraid I’ll fall to my death here on this mountain.
Should You Ever Do It? Not unless someone is facing you with a cannon, or you’ve had one too many shrooms. This is a sport for your grandmother if she were a goofball dude with too much time on his hands who’s also crazy. Yes, that’s pretty much what this is.
Wife Carrying
What The Hell Is It? Started in Finland, a man must carry his wife as fast as he can through an obstacle course 253.5 meters long with one dry and two water obstacles. If dropped there’s a 15 second penalty, however, the winner gets his wife’s weight in beer. Finally! A place where beer is given to someone by measurement of human weight. Pssshaww on all those bottles, cans, and kegs…if you can’t drink the weight of one Finnish woman than, well, you’re no man at all! Seriously, your testicles are pebbles. Ball-N-Chain Beer is where it’s at.
Should You Ever Do It? I don’t know. This is sort of like asking if you should eat twelve bean burritos. You’d think no, but if you found out that doing so could award you an entire herd of buffalos weight in beer, you’d think about it, no? Probably. Nevermind that you could ignite your ass into the heavens to a much more spectacular result, whatever, the whole wife carrying thing looks like fun too! No.
Zorbing
What The Hell Is It? Well, obviously it’s for people who think hamsters live the high life. Really. You’re like super, duper jealous of hamsters right now. They get to run on their own little treadmill, sometimes they eat what looks like dirt pellets, or poo, who knows! There’s the whole eating their babies thing, natch. But mostly though, they’re good at doing things in a plastic ball cage! You should do this too, right? Right. Anyway, zorbing is rolling down a hill in a large plastic ball thingy.
Should You Ever Do It? Well, it looks a little light on competition. Where’s the drama with this whole rolling lazily down a hill in a ball? I’d like more action. Maybe put a jet pack or a boat rudder on that thing and speed that puppy up. I’d like more collisions, and perhaps a way to knock another stupid people ball into an ocean forever, like a game of BIG ASS BALL CROQUET.
Cheese Rolling
What The Hell Is It? Oh, dear lord. This is basically hurling your body down a hill. Yup, just throwing your body and all its vulnerable organs housed inside your ridiculous meat sack down a grassy, yet rocky, looking hill until you break a femur or give yourself a concussion, or just, well, die. Here’s the best part! You have to race to keep up with or possibly beat a wheel of Gloucester Cheese down the hill. Oh, HA! No, really, HA, HA! WUT? Oh, wait, apparently one wheel of cheese veered off course in 1997 and injured a spectator. That’s not funny…uh, sorry, that’s probably the funniest thing EVER!
Should You Ever Do It? Sure, of course you should. There’s nothing like proving you’re faster than a milk product than actually challenging said milk product to a race. You better hope you win, because how will you tell your friends that you were beaten by the cheese? You know the cheese will mock you. It’ll get all curd-y and sour and then where will you be? And you have to play fair, right? There’s no way you could actually cut the cheese, could you? That would be against the rules and stinky.
Bog Snorkeling
What The Hell Is It? In Wales, Bog snorkeling involves swimming through a 55-meter peat bog with a snorkel and flippers in the fastest time possible, because it’s either do this or let the Queen feed you to one of her Corgi dogs. No seriously, this is a challenging sport. Well, first you need to have a Bog, and I don’t know about you, but it seems bogs are pretty hard to find outside of movies with lagoon creatures, or in the United Kingdom where bogs just turn up under every windmill and bowl of haggis.
Should You Ever Do It? Well, if you can go back to a place where time forgot and actually find a bog, why not? It’s not everyday that you get to swim around in what looks like toxic waste bog sludge. I imagine having your underpants fill up with bog juice has got to be a sensation like you’ve never felt anywhere outside of a nightmare, so surely bring. it. on. “I’ll bog snorkel the hell out of that bog! However, if one of those long dead bog people show up, just know I’ll pass out on the spot. No, really, you’ll have to get me because I’ll probably drown. Just sayin.”
Chess Boxing
What The Hell Is It? It’s exactly what it sounds like! For eleven rounds players alternate between chess and boxing. Wins are determined by knockout or checkmate. How about just throwing all the pieces at your opponent while screaming “Bobby Fisher Couldn’t Beat Me….ARRRRGGGGGGHHHHH!” just before you bite the other guy’s ear off? No. Okay. I thought we were combining games here.
Should You Ever Do It? It’s just discrimination that’s all this is. Do you see sport knitting and sumo wrestling? How about bread baking and competitive fencing? Until there’s equality for all incongruous pastimes, I think we should stand in solidarity and not support Chessbox. It’s about the principle.
Outhouse Racing
What The Hell Is It? Oh, America. I knew you wouldn’t let me down. Somewhere in Michigan on Jed Clampett’s homestead Outhouse Racing was invented. Do you want to know more? Of course you do. The outhouse is set up on skis and must have a toilet paper dispenser and a toilet seat. What, no blue water? But all those flushes could go to waste. Three teammates, two pushers and a rider, attempt to guide their bathroom on skates to victory. This is pretty much the end to civilization. We might as well just sign up for the apocalypse now, because some higher life form is looking at us and saying, “Look, Pa, they got their commodes zipping down a hill for no goddamned reason at all.” Please tell me you win something interesting for playing a game with a shit-potty. Nope, looks like it’s all for bragging rights.
Should You Ever Do It? If you Hillbilly Handfish you already know how to do this. It’s just a matter of applying one skill to the other, I guess, or the two are nothing alike…whatever. I can’t think about this too much. It hurts.
Pillow Fighting
What The Hell Is It? Well, it’s an underground female-based sort of thing, think mud wrestling, and Jell-O wrestling, and other types of leery dudes looking at girls wrestling. The website says ‘women who are proud of our strength and not afraid to let loose. We fight with pillows because it lets us be creative, do something different and go a little crazy.’ Uh-huh. Anybody else think there’s probably a whole fetish site, or seventeen, dedicated to this? I’m not checking to see. Also, there’s a Pillow Fight League that saves a crime riddled Metropolis from a dastardly group of thugs called the Insomniacs. Mixelplix! No, apparently they hold these “empowered woman” pillow fights at erotic festivals, and at their cousin Corey’s house in Lancaster, Ill. from the looks of the video.
Should You Ever Do It? Hey, what you do in your basement full of dudes, two pillows, knee pads, and spandex is totally your thing.
Giant Pumpkin Kayaking
What The Hell Is It? At the Annual West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta [REGATTA!] in Oregon, 600 to 800 lb pumpkins are hollowed out and raced around a lake. Sooo, after you throw out all the slimy, gross, so very much yuck pumpkin pulp, then you’ll slide your Croc covered feet and body into the husk of the pumpkin to go kickin around a river in hopes you don’t fall out of the huge pumpkin that really wasn’t built to be a boat? Got it. This seems like the most optimal use of our time and all those pumpkins! We should de-pulp various other things like melons or people. “Let’s race grandpa, he’s not busy today. Grandpa’s a kayak!” Er, okay. This is that silly State Fair stuff that’s probably a great community booster. I won’t hate on it too much. Well, unless you actually do try and race grandpa.
Should You Ever Do It? Well, how Linus didn’t sue for copyright infringement is a bafflement — sure, if you’re ever in Oregon, and you’re attending a Giant Pumpkin Regatta and Bill Walker has pulled a hamstring and can’t compete, you should probably grab his Crocs and give it a go. Pauxatawny Phil, the weather predicting groundhog and another inexplicable tradition in this insane country of ours, would probably agree that pumpkinicide isn’t a real crime, much like he has no freaking idea how much more winter we’ll have! Lies.
Unicycle Polo
What The Hell Is It? It debuted in Portland, Oregon by a group called the Unicycle Bastards. Oregon is just full of winning and wonderful ideas! In this game you perch your buttocks atop a unicycle and then swat a ball around. Seems simple enough, right? Well, the rule book asks players to engage in “frequent and colorful swearing,” the consumption of “one alcoholic beverage prior to every match” and “urination in approved restroom facilities.” I’m guessing a non-approved restroom facility has trained unicycle pros hiding out randomly waiting to give competitors advice on how to win. Unicycle terrorists, they ruin everything.
Should You Ever Do It? Obviously if you have the coordination of an old-timey gentleman with a handlebar mustache or a circus bear, of course you should do it. And when you do, up the difficulty. Start juggling bowling pins just to throw it in the faces of Tom, Jack, and Bo-Bo the bear. You can’t be stopped. Win! Win! Win!
Quidditch
What The Hell Is It? Hogwarts, Muggle, Brambleberry, Goosenfluffer. I don’t know. I’m not well versed in the dialect of Harry Potter, but this is where this thing comes from, as if you didn’t already know, nerd. “The game, adapted from the mythical broom-flying sport of Harry Potter, began as an intramural sport at Middlebury College.” Now more than 400 colleges can boast of students running around holding broomsticks between their legs and attempting to hurl balls through round hoops. Yes, well, aside from the connection to porn, it’s a pretty popular college sport, and by sport I mean, totally fictional thing college kids do that makes it okay to dress up as wizards and such.
Should You Ever Do It? I’m not sure what my response would be if I were on a college campus and I came upon this and I asked my guide, “Hey what’s with all the brooms, balls, and hoops?” and my companion says in a bored fashion, yet reverently, quietly, “Oh, that. It’s Quidditch. Harry Potter’s greatest game.” It’s not like I can respond with, “Oh, sure. We often played, Indiana Jones: The Temple of Doom at my college.” and then fist bump. There’s no point of reference, so I’ll maintain my original thought. “Bwwwaahaaahaaahaaa. All you guys are super, duper popular.”
Were you amazed, if that really means appalled? Okay, great. Don’t try any of this stuff at home! The Business Insider has a few more I just couldn’t cover. Enjoy!
