• Mood: happy

Best Buck in the Bay 2011: I touched a goat!

This weekend was the Bay Area Gay Rodeo; bovil and I organized a cabal (The League of Evil Geniuses rides again!) to sponsor 4 of the award buckles this year.

We were also *finally* persuadd to attempt the "easiest"* of the 3 camp events: Goat Dressing (we sponsored those buckles for 6 years); after the rodeo contestants have their round on Saturday, the audience is invited to try their hand at it. The object is to catch a goat, put a pair of underwear on it, and get back across the starting line before the goat kicks them off. In the the community contest, best time wins buckles on the spot for that team.

I'm sure A will post much optimized versions of these soon with his other rodeo photos, but I wanted to share with y'all. Thanks to Bryan for shooting while we were in the arena.

Get Ready, Get Set... bovil and I at the starting line; Announcer Doug Graff has just astonished us by remembering our tale of The Little Hoax That Could and introducing us as "the Westercon Boys"...

GO! For the record, this is the first time I've attempted running on anything but a treadmill since I started wearing the 5-Finger shoes and learning barefoot-style running. According to observers, I'm really speedy (I know I can hit close to 10mph on the treadmill in them). Also nice to note, my stride felt really strong and stable even in the loose/weird soil of the rodeo arena).

Step One Steal Underwear Touch Goat My job: catch the goat and pick up its back end so bovil can thread the (hot pink?) y-front briefs over its legs.

Step 2: _________________________________________________ in theory, he grabs the goats feet and the briefs should just slide right on. So much for theory

Step 3: Profit Finish dressing goat You have to get the briefs all the way up over the tail for it to count

Run, Forest, Run! The timer doesn't stop until you get back across the starting line. I look like I'm trying to take off. We ended up with a respectable time in the middle of the pack (17.something seconds; the winners were well under 15 seconds)

*It sounds like the easiest because goats don't weigh as much as cattle. It actually has one of the highest injury rates in the rodeo because people are stupid about running across the arena. The contestant version (best time over two days) has one of the highest cash prizes all weekend because so many cowboys and cowgirls are willing to try it, as opposed to, say, bull riding.