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Brain Fart brain farts brain fart brain-fart brain-farts brainfart brainfarts LEO
Louisville Eccentric Observer parody lampoon satire Louisville Kentucky Kevin Gibson
kgramone@aol.com
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Brain Farts was a weekly humor column that ran
in the Louisville Eccentric Observer from
mid-2000
until the summer of 2002. It was, well, eccentric. And occasionally satirical.
And sardonic. Some liked it, some hated it; some
just didn't get it, and that's OK. There were times when I didn't get it either.
I've compiled
here some of the archives from Brain Farts for the enjoyment of friends, family
and anyone else who happens by. I also have written some new Brain Farts, and
added some links and other trivialities that you shouldn't be too concerned
with.
Unless you're as bored as I am.
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Brain Farts: Strength is as Strength
Does
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By Kevin Gibson
January 9, 2002 |
My
fiancee and I were sitting around with some of our geeky friends the other night
watching “The World’s Strongest Man Competition,” a Strongman event on ESPN
XXVIII, when someone said, “I wonder who came up with this event, anyway?”
At that point, enormous men in tight shorts were hoisting huge stone blocks up
facing sets of steps, one step at a time. The men would squat, grab the built-in
handle on the block and lift the block with a grunt to the next step. The blocks
were so big that, naturally, the men had to keep their legs apart so they didn’t
rip off the insides of their thighs. First one to get three to the top was the
winner, who usually collapsed in a sweaty heap. We laughed and laughed.
After we finished laughing, I revealed to my inquisitive friend the ugly truth:
These games were invented by people like me, those of us who were geeks in high
school, to make those people who picked on us look silly in front of their
friends and families on national television.
Have you ever seen grown men haul huge blocks up stairs in Spandex? It is one of
the silliest things you’ll ever see. I explained to my friend that the plan is
to, in the very near future, insert a new rule into this particular part of the
Strongman competition: With each passing round, each participant’s shorts must
be a little shorter. We’ll tell them it is to remove support in their thigh
muscles in order to make the feat a little more challenging; in fact, it will be
to merely make them look a little bit sillier.
Another key event involves tossing a slightly smaller block over a wall —
backwards. This is one of the most popular spectator events in a Strongman
competition because of the prospect that the block won’t make it over the wall
and will fall back down and land comically on the thrower’s head. As geeks who
watched too many cartoons as children, we can already imagine little birds
fluttering around the strongman’s head as he falls slowly to the ground.
We created sadistic events like “The Crucifix Hold,” which requires participants
to hold weights horizontally out to their sides just above shoulder height for
as long as possible. (It’s a riot when they go into the shakes!) And until
you’ve seen a grown man pull a semi tractor down a runway or tip over a car with
his bare hands in the name of sport, you haven’t truly laughed.
We geeks also made up events like The Tire Flip, The Log Press and The Farmer’s
Walk to provide even more comic potential. Look for The Butt Squeegee, The Hot
Wax Leg Glide and The Raw Hamburger Lift, coming soon.
E-mail the writer at kgramone@aol.com.
Please don’t tell his secret, or those guys will beat him up after school again
for SURE!
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