Holidays, visitors, visiting, presentations, homework, work; I could cop-out and pretend that any of these reasons were what kept me from writing another entry for so long, but I’ve decided to take the high road.  The truth is that I have recently replaced both of my hands with laser cannons, and it took me a while to figure out my new speech recognition typing software.

I would apologize, but it is really hard to remain humble now that I have laser-hands.

Anyways… 

     This summer I have been spending almost every other weekend visiting my girlfriend while she works in Tampa.  During this time I’ve been able to see pretty much everything the bay area has to offer, at least the sort of stuff advertised in the Entertainment section of the St. Pete Times.  Downtown Tampa, Ibor City, the Tampa Theatre, the surrounding metro areas: there are a lot of places within a thirty-mile radius to have fun.  But like most things in life, nothing is as good as it seems.  This past weekend confirmed that when I visited Tampa’s local haven for line dancing enthusiasts: The Dallas Bull.

That’s right… I said line dancing. 

     My girlfriend and I were going to take our tax paying, flipflop wearing, full-sets-of-teeth having, housebroken asses to a country western bar in what I can only describe as a “severely underdeveloped” part of rural Tampa.  Why?  Well, I wanted to meet some of her Tampa friends, and one of them happened to be celebrating her birthday at The Bull that evening.  Of course, I was expecting the worst, but I was delighted that nobody felt the urge to yell “Git-R-Dun” in my face while straining to remember the parts to their four-step dance.  That was the only moment of my evening that I can truly say I was “delighted.”  Was I ever amused?  Yes, on some sick level, a lot of it was quite funny.  (not fun, fun-ny)  Was I scared?  Well, not in the sort of, “man I think im going to get beat-up” kind of way.  It was more like the, “man I really wish i’d never seen the movie Deliverance,” kind of way.

     The building was in the shape of a large barn complete with a gift shop (I was shocked too).  There were multiple levels, large projector screens, two dance floors, and the top level has a large opening in the center so you can watch people dance in the main area.  If I hadn’t known that it was the local country bar, I might have been impressed.

     However, it was a local country bar, perhaps the localiest, countriest, barriest local country bar in the history of local country bar-ery!

     After entering, I would guess it took about five minutes to confirm every single pre-conceived notion I ever held about “southern fried” culture.  We found a couple of stools upstairs, and I managed to scribble down a few words and phrases that came to mind while surveying the bottom level of The Bull:

• Big Belt Buckles

• Skinny Legs

• Segregation?

• “This is a good place to pick up pregnant women.”

• Skoal.

• Tassels… on a shirt.

• “They shouldn’t let that big guy ride the mechanical bull!  He’s going to break it!”

• “…That’s a girl?”

     It was like a museum to every shameful white accomplishment in the last two hundred years.  I saw a man sip a beer on the left side of his mouth while holding a cheek-full of chewing tobacco in the right.  I witnessed a 200 pound woman seductively ride a mechanical bull on what had to be the slowest setting.  I saw two very pregnant women at the same counter ordering drinks between songs.  I stared at a man who was twice my size and twice my body hair fit into jeans that were too small for me to wear.

     In fact, that was one really common trait of all the burly Marlboro men that stomped around the bar that night: tight jeans… extremely tight jeans.  Jeans that defied everything physicists had previously stated about the universe.  I’m pretty sure that when they took them off after a long night of hoot-nannying, there were deep imprints left on their boots from the cuff pressing into them.  Most of the people who rode the mechanical bull that night had to have help getting on, because they couldn’t manage to separate their legs past shoulder width.  It was a spectacle.

     I didn’t really read to far into the situation, at least past the thought that these people just had really odd/uncomfortable fashion sense.  It wasn’t until I got home that I started heavily theorizing, but before I get into that I have to tell you a short story…

While sitting high above in our perch, we watched the crowd beneath us engage in what I assume was really high-quality linedancing. They seemed to know what they were doing. For those of you who have never seen it in person (and I pray to God that is the case), it is highly structured, and really has very little to do with the music that is playing. (I suppose that is alright, considering that the music that was playing wasn’t worth the blotch of tobacco stuck to the bottom of my shoe) It usually consists of a few legs kicks and foot positions while the upper body remains completely useless. People generally stare straight at the ground, and do not engage in any activity with anyone else around them. It might be the most anti-social dance ever invented. However, there is one tiny portion of linedance etiquette that exists outside of the normal structure.

Every now and then (and I assume this is only attempted by the most advanced dancers in the world), A person will randomly spin in place during a change in facing, and then immediately fall back into the proper step-order. It seems to be up to that individual when and how this event takes place. The best I can guess is that this is how a young man or woman can signal to the opposite sex that they are special. “Hey, I spun in place during the dance… I’m edgy. The others aren’t like me. I have skills… dangerous skills. Why don’t you come by the ranch and we can make some babies.”

     Getting back to my original point, the people who frequent the Dallas Bull were some of the biggest, clumsiest, oafs I’ve ever laid eyes on in my life.  These people breed strong.  They could have probably built a pyramid in half the time the aliens took to do it, but I doubt a single person in that room could tell you how many sides it has.  However, I couldn’t help admiring the sheer grace that some of these men and women demonstrated while they spun their way into my heart.  Some of them made professional figure skaters looks like total hacks.  Maybe it looked so lovely because each beautiful and precise twirl was surrounded by a legion of cavemen, but these bastards had finesse.

     One that really stood out was a man dressed in a black shirt & jeans, along with black boots, a black cowboy hat, a black bolo tie, and I’m willing to bet a silky black thong.  We dubbed him, “The Gunslinger.”  He was the best spinner of the night, in fact, he probably spun more than anyone else.  As a result, it created some sort of vortex that drew in all of the available vaginas in the immediate area.  Needless to say, he had skills… dangerous skills.  I couldn’t figure out how he could revolve so effortlessly, and so lightning-fast.  This thought is what led me to my theory.

     As I stated before, the jeans these people wore were tighter than anything Spandex had ever dreamed of.  They were basically leg-girdles.  I don’t even want get into my theories on what they did with their penises to pacify the Wrangler Vice-Grip Crotches.  At first, I just passed it off as a silly fad, but after some hard thinking I think it might hold the key to their magical spinnability.

When you think of the best spinners in the world, what do you think of?  

     The first thing I thought of was a tornado.  It’s a funnel-shaped whirling wind mass that is powerful enough to destroy anything… but not exactly graceful.  My next immediate thought was a spinning top.  A timeless plaything favored by children around the world.  It takes little effort, but can spin forever on a dime.  Now we’re getting somewhere…

     According to 4physics.com, “The way this all works through is described by Newton’s Laws of Rotation. While this can get pretty complicated in detail, there are some circumstances where the object will spin in a very simple manner. The object’s spin about the rotation axis gives it an angular momentum, which will remain constant until some outside torque works on it.”

Here’s a nice picture that illustrates the point…

 

 

So… if a top’s shape is ideal for Newton’s Law of Rotation, then something mimicking it’s shape should be almost as good right?  Like perhaps, a fat guy with really skinny legs?!?!?!

 

The similarities in dimension and shape are astonishing. 

Here is an updated model that I have already sent the editors of 4physics.com along with a copy of this article:

 

I guess to summarize my theory, it all boils down to the old Darwinian Survival of the Fittest; or in this case, fattest.  It has allowed for only the best spinners (most “top-like”) to breed within the linedancing species. 

There… I’ve cracked the conspiracy.  I’ll make sure to post a photo of my Pulitzer when it arrives in the mail.

Jesus, that was a long tangent…

     Anyways, we didn’t spend much time in the bar.  The drinks were really expensive (especially considering the $10.00 cover charge), the music was bad, and the whole freak-show aspect wore off after about an hour.  The Dallas Bull is not fun.

     I would apologize to those whom I might have offended, considering the amount of jabs I took at the country western culture.  However, I doubt any of them made it down this far.  (They would have had to read about a thousand words before the first picture came up)

Expect another entry after this weekend… Yeehaw!!!