Plenty of Nothing

Vasaloppet

Today is Vasaloppet, the annual 90 kg cross-country ski race between Sälen and Mora in Dalarna, Sweden. It commemorates a legendary escape made on skis by the future King Gustav I in 1520. When you win the Vasaloppet a local young person in folk costume chases you down the home stretch and plays ring toss with a large wreath and your head. Or tries!

Canada Games Oval Map

Bleachers

Dock Ellis' LSD/Benzedrine No-Hitter

Baseball has the best stories.

Hideki Matsui

New York Times photo

Tranquility Base As A Baseball Diamond

It's Apollo 11 Week at Plenty of Nothing.  Here we have a US Geological Survey map comparing of the Tranquility Base landing site to a baseball diamond.  As you can see, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin pretty much stuck to the infield, except for that one ramble into centre field by Armstrong.  In addition to the first walk by humans on the moon, 1969 saw the Mets win.  Source: Talcott Mountain Science Centre.

 

AIDS Ads

I stumbled upon these two AIDS awareness ads while googling for Swiss hockey pictures.  The top one puts the case for protected sex as well as can be imagined.  You just wouldn't play hockey naked.  The abrasions alone!  The bottom one, though, makes naked fencing look such fun that it could start a trend.  I wonder if there's still time to get it into the Beijing Olympics?  Douglas

Ladies Scottish Climbing Club

My brain must have been installed backward because I still don't get why men are so much more interested in men's athletics than in women's athletics. Women have been engaged in organized sports for over a century, and doing amazing things from the beginning.  As an example I submit this photo of the Ladies Scottish Climbing Club, taken in 1908.   (And stolen by me from www.johngill.net.)  Douglas

Oddly Appealing

Gymn class for me when I was this age was all about trying to avoid field hockey. Handing frustrated adolescents field hockey sticks and letting them have at it was hard on the ankles.

There's something very appealing about these two forms of weightlessness.

Heather

Pull Over, NASCAR!

Rocket Racing League!  Yee-haw!!!