Unbeknownst to many, YHC spent his small kid time in Hawaii… AB was just a barefoot Haole, speaking pidgin, surfing with an alien I thought was a dog, working as a private investigator, and flying around in T.C.’s helicopter. This beatdown was inspired by those days. . .
The PAX rolled in, totaling a dozen by the time Dilly rolled on… so we began Warmarama… a bit of a pickle since we only had 10 coupons. But, like a glorious Chesapeake Bay Retriever, Paradox broke out of the circle, leapt out in to the gloom, and returned with a giant black stick that would have to suffice.
Island 1: Hawai’i (The Big Island):
Constantly in fear that a volcano was about to erupt, YHC’s early visits to this island were always a bit nightmarish. We pay tribute today to this childhood fear with Volcano by the late, some-say-great, Jimmy Buffet. Hold Al Gore. Burpee on “I don’t know.” Tuck jump on “Volcano.”
Mom Jeans’ hatred of Jimmy Buffet during this segment was noted, catalogued, and will be weaponized in a future beatdown.
Island 2: Maui – the Man, the Myth, the Island
The trickster demigod was definitely present during this well-planned, expertly explained, and piss-poorly executed portion of your entertainment.
The plan was a Kola (which is the closest phonetic match to Dora, since there is no “D” or “R” in the Hawaiian alphabet). Pair up, one partner is Maui, pushing up the sky (coupon presses) while the other is his brother, tricked into pulling up islands from the sea floor(moving coupons). Then Flapjack, and 2nd partner takes over the presses while partner 1 moves the coupon back to the start. The explanation was much longer, murkier, and nobody in the PAX was clear on whether they were Maui, his brother, or themselves, so everyone was moving islands all over the ocean.
Admittedly, this part was half-baked at best. And so YHC went into full-on Dad/Tech Support mode (“Move!”) and just walked everyone through a new version: Walk backwards, with alternating sets of curls and goblet squats. A more well-planned Maui beatdown is guaranteed next time.
Island 3: O’ahu… choose your Poi, son!
One of my earliest memories was at a luau, learning about poi, a Hawaiian food staple. Hard to describe, it’s a fermented paste of pounded taro root. It’s like if yogurt and sweet potato had a baby. And then you ate out of that baby’s diaper.
Anyway, you typically classify it based on consistency: “one-finger”, “two-finger”, or “three-finger”, based on how many fingers are required to scoop it up.
So here, participants are asked to choose which poi they want. And like poi, with each added finger it gets more runny:
1-finger poi: Roll die, do 7x that many burpees and WWII sit-ups, with murder bunnying and bear crawling (least runny/no running)
2-finger poi: Roll die, do that many laps with 2x that number of blockees as buy-in for each lap
3-finger poi: Run/nur until you find the Run-Cajun-Run sticker on a lamp post; then 3 burpees and run back (most runny)
Without hesitation, Honeysuckle chose 3 and lead the other gazelles off into the unknown gloom.
Seeming the most innocuous, 2-finger poi proved to be the most difficult. Those were the real tough guys. . .who didn’t do the math first.
Enron and YHC were the only two bold enough to try the 1 finger poi, and were rewarded for our bravery by finishing first.
Final Thang: The Ring of Fire
The Ring of Fire is also a belt of volcanos surrounding the Pacific. So we did the typical Ring of Fire, but (Inner) “Circles” by Soul Coughing was played instead of the usual Johnny Cash song…
About 2 minutes into the ‘roid rage, YHC offered to stop the thang if anyone could ID the artist… and decided to mention “this is a 10-minute song, by the way.”
Only Popeye had even heard this song before. And so, a minute later, desperation set in, and Yankee Jeaux jumped up to check the phone and call out the artist to stop the torture.
The song was over anyway. YJ cheated, but YHC lied.
Pau.
COT and Yankee Jeaux prayed us out.
Something for my Llamas:
Nobody knew why that song by the Animals was played this morning amongst the Hawaii-themed music. YHC’s favorite volcano is Haleakala… which is Hawaiian for “House of the (rising) Sun.”
Another bit of trivia for you: The Hawaiian Islands were once called the Sandwich Islands, but the name was changed because it brought too much shame when Firehouse Subs was founded.
Tanks for coming out, bruddahs. Always an honor to lead. Great seeing the consistency of White Meat (that sounds weird) and that Ponzi is posting again on the regular. And some guy named Wilford Montana made my day by showing up (sans coffee) to join us.
SYITG,
AB
