April 15, 2015

Hodgepodge of Miscellaneous Things

  • Arm Problems - They have gotten worse. I tried feeding multiball yesterday, had to stop after a few minutes. Once again I tried doing it left-handed, but it was like trying to catch smoke with a ball pickup net - not too successful. So for the afterschool program this week there will be no multiball - they'll hit among themselves and with the robot. Meanwhile, I've cancelled all my private coaching this week, and I'm pretty sure I'll have to do so next week as well.
  • USATT Lists - I spent more time yesterday working on the following four lists for USATT. The plan is to dramatically expand on these, but first we need to know where we stand. I think my lists are almost complete - I'll likely post them sometime soon, probably on the USATT web page or in USATT Insider, and request info on ones that are missing. I still have to visit all the sites on this list of State Games to see which have table tennis.
    • Regional and State Associations
    • State Championships and State Games
    • Team Leagues - currently I know of ones in LA, NY, DC, Austin TX, and Rochester NY.
    • Training Centers
  • MDTTC Media - Yesterday Montgomery Magazine came in to do a story on us. They interviewed me, Crystal Wang, Derek Nie, Ryan Dabbs, and Coach Jack Huang, and took lots of pictures. They took a lot of semi-staged pictures of Ryan, where I'd put a ball up in the air and he'd smash right into the camera lens - they came off great! We've had a lot of media coverage over the years; it's on my todo list to compile them all for a new MDTTC Media page.
  • French Translation of Table Tennis Tactics for Thinkers Book - I finalized a news release that hopefully will be published by ITTF and perhaps other places. You can get it in English or French, in paperback or kindle - buy it now!!!
  • Update on Allen Wang's Fund-raising for his School Club - they just reached $1000! Special thanks to Tigran Tsitoghdzyan ($50), Joanne Logar ($40), Tom McCann ($40), Anonymous ($40), Amy Wang ($20), and Anonymous ($10) for raising an even $200 since my blog post on this yesterday. The goal is $1600, so keep those donations coming!
  • Science Fiction & Fantasy Writing Workshop - This summer I'm taking my annual vacation at "The Never-Ending Odyssey" writing workshop, July 24 - Aug 1 in Manchester, NH. This will be my eighth time at this workshop. As part of this I have to critique stories by other attendees. I've got a stack of eight stories, averaging about 20 pages each, which I have to read and critique. This is only round one - there'll be two more rounds of stories. I'll have three stories critiqued as well. We spend nine days doing critiques and attending workshops. This is my idea of fun.
  • USATT Bylaws - Yesterday I finalized five bylaw proposals, which will soon go to the Board for a likely vote in June. (I don't plan on spending huge amounts of time on bylaws, but I wanted to get these five done.) I'll post the actual proposals later. Briefly, they involved:
  1. Removing the word "advisory" from the descriptions of our committees, since I believe they should also be allowed to implement - the board can create rules and guidelines for them without being so restrictive.  
  2. Allowing committees to have some administrative function, which are currently not allowed in the bylaws, though in reality some already do.
  3. Allow some committees and task forces, in special circumstances, to have more than five members. The current bylaws limit them to five.
  4. Removing term limits for committee members and extending the tenures for chairs. We keep losing some of our most valuable and experienced people because of these limits.
  5. Changing our Mission Statement - more on that later.

National College Championships

Here are a series of articles on the U.S. College Championships held this past weekend. (The first article is from the Clarion-Ledger in Mississippi; the other four are by Andy Kanengiser.)

How to Play Against Pips-Out Rubbers

Here's the coaching article by Ioanna Papadimitriou.

USA Finalist to Host 2018 World Veterans Championships

Here's the USATT article.

2015 National Junior and Cadet Team Trials Prospectus and Entry Form

Here's the info. It will take place at the U.S. Open.

Big Island Table Tennis Association Receives Major Awards

Here's the USATT article.

World Championships Media Guide

Here it is! The Worlds will be held April 26 - May 3 in Suzhou, China.

Custom PingPong Company Uberpong Grows from Austin, Texas

Here's the article from Startup Magazine. "David Lowe moved to Austin, Texas and created Uberpong – a company that would bring style and customization to table tennis with a mission to change the face of the game."

Ask a Pro Anything - Ai Fukuhara

Here's the video (1:26) as we test to see if she can look at Adam for ten seconds without laughing.

Zhang Jike "Punished" By Having to Crawl Under the Table

Here's the picture - and it looks like he's all tangled up with the net. In China at the elite levels (including the National Team) it's a common practice where the loser of a match has to crawl under the table - incentive to win!

Crazy Sidespin Counter-Smash

Here's the video (24 sec, including slo-mo replay)!

Hopes Kids Try to Return Fingerspin Serves

Here's the video (2:04) as the kids line up and attempt (mostly unsuccessfully) to return the infamous fingerspin serves of Coach Jonathan. Sol Schiff of the U.S. used such serves to dominate table tennis for a time back in the 1930s before they were made illegal. And now I'm going to have to learn these serves so I can challenge our kids like this to receive them!

How to Draw a Cartoon Table Tennis Player

Here's the video (72 sec, though he finishes the drawing 36 sec).

Got Milk?

Here's the picture, with Jorgen Persson the face for Swedish milk.

Ping-Pong Cookies?

Here's the picture.

Cooking and Pong

Here's the video (36 sec) as a chef attempts to cook while bouncing a ball on his paddle in this ad for Karbonn Mobile phones. (What's connection? To illustrate that the phone can multitask!)

Teddy Bear Pong

Here's the video (3:20): It's man vs. Teddy Bear. May the better mammal win.

A Horrible Progression

  1. Donkey Pong
  2. More Donkey Pong
  3. Donkey Kong Pong
  4. Underwater Pong
  5. Underwater Donkey Pong (yeah, I did this!)

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