What kind of car are you?

I'm a Chevrolet Corvette!

You're a classic - powerful, athletic, and competitive. You're all about winning the race and getting the job done. While you have a practical everyday side, you get wild when anyone pushes your pedal. You hate to lose, but you hardly ever do.

Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

Ups and Downs

Ups and Downs of the early season
AUG 24, 2006
I swore to myself that I was going to practice what I preach and stay positive all the time about Cheerleading no matter what this year. I think that even Norman Vincent Peal would find that one to be a challenge.

Whenever you have tryouts in the Spring for Football Cheer, you hope to get 10-20 candidates that you can choose 6-8 great cheerleaders from. We had 4 candidates. Mind you, they're all great cheerleaders. Even though three were freshmen and one had quit before the end of basketball season last winter, I was going to stay positive.

But it seems like we got whittled away as time goes on. One freshman wasn't sure. Her guardians are her older brother and his wife. First her brother didn't want her to cheer, he wanted her to go out for a "real" sport like volleyball. Then her sister-in-law decided that she needed to babysit her younger sister everyday. So she's off the roster. Would've made a good flier too.

Then another freshman must have gotten in trouble at home of mouthed off or something, because her mom was thinking of not allowing her to cheer at all, but conceded to let her so long as she only came to two practices a week.

I was excited when a girl who cheered for years at Charter Oak-Ute transfered to BV and told me she was interested. But she was really just interested in basketball season. And then she ran into a mess with her transcripts so now she has to take a night class if she wants any hope of graduating.

But just when I was ready to get all negative and feel sorry for myself, I watched the 3 I had practice. They remember most of their stuff. They're really pretty good. Just 2 of them are as loud a a lot of whole squads. They have some fun ideas for 8-count dances. What the heck, 3 can be a good thing. I offered to scrap the first pep rally and they just about killed me- no way were they going to not have a first pep rally. Okay, well, alright.

Then this afternoon, a transfer student from Pennsylvania finally made contact with me and commited to this season. Not long after that another girl who'd cheered in junior high was hanging out in my room and I asked her (half in jest) if she'd come out and she committed right there!

Just goes to show, there's never a good reason to complain or give up hope. You never know what the next day holds. Other adults have their concerns about all 5 of these kids as far as attitudes or behavior goes. You never know. I've taken a chance on some kids and really been burned in the past. On the other hand, I've had kids who other adults would write-off and complain about and judge up one side and down the other who have turned out to be absolute assets, hard-working and spirited athletes who I wouldn't trade.

I really love these first three, I don't think anyone around here has known the fourth long enough to label her or put her in a box, and I've always had good interactions and great work from the fifth, so I'm actually looking forward to the season. Now between parents, transportation and jobs, who knows how often we'll actually be able to have all 5 work together- but I've resolved not to whine about it.

And we get one last season out of our Senior Mascot, Brett. We talk about theology a lot when he rides shotgun in the van to away games. Those conversations go a long way toward keeping me sane.

EIGHT junior high cheerleaders and a mascot. That rocks too!

Morningside

Christine works in a jumpline.

I was bummin' that only 2 of our Freshmen came to the annual Morningside College Cheer Clinic. 1- no idea what happened, 1-Junior didn't want to be late to softball practice, and of course, regular readers of this blog recognize the complexity of the situation so why whine about it... blah blah blah.

I HOPE that Megan & Christine had a good time and learned a lot. They certainly seemed to bond. That alone was worth the hassle.

Thrown Room

Thrown Room
http://www.metc.net/~bbollman/

This is the site for the christian rock band of a guy who was in my web programming class this week. He teaches at Elk Horn. He did all the graphics on their site- pretty awesome, huh?

They're playing at Christian music festival in Harlan tomorrow- Sat June 17 from 11am-after dark. If you're looking for something to do after baseball/sofball, go chek 'em out.

Future School Newspaper?

Here is the project web-site I'm doing for the xhtml programming class I'm taking this week. If you'd like to see that site, visit http://ted.mallory.googlepages.com/default.htm

Purpose

I've been writing something between class sessions (writing xhtml code- very dry)
It isn't done, but if it works out, I may try submitting it to some magazines. Let me know what you think-

Purpose Driven Cheerleading

A few years ago an upstart pastor from California, Rick Warren wrote a record breaking book called 'A purpose Driven Life.His preface is that everyone's life has meaning and he believes that both individuals and the Church can find mission and direction in Scriptural principles.In much the same way, Cheerleaders can be vitally important and have an enormous impact for the teams they cheer for, their schools, and their communities.Even at a public school, with the separation of church and state, squads and coaches can emphasize 5 simple purposes, even without tying them to any religion.Although, cheerleaders who's personal faith is important to them can certainly integrate these Cheer purposes with Warren's origional 5 Christian purposes.I think that if cheerleaders keep these 5 in mind, they'll be practicing "intentedness" which is one of the bricks in Coach John Wooden's "Pyramid of Success."Intentedness means being goal-oriented, having a target to strive for.

The purposes of cheerleading:

Purpose 1: Spirit

Lets face it, cheerleading was invented to support sports.It may now be a sport in it's own right, but even with all the all-star squads and competitions, we should never lose sight of our primary function-to cheer on the ball teams. "Fan" is short for "Fanatic." This doesn't mean you worship football or the team. It does mean that you support, cheer for, draw attention to, and encourage the team that's playing.
THAT is Cheerleadings #1 role.

Purpose 2: Community (aka: having unity in common)

If there's anything adolescent psychologists think that teenagers are looking for it's identity, in particular- group identity. A mascot and school colors go a long way to do this. Regardless of race, gender, creed, socio-economic status, grades, cliques...whatever usually separates students, they all belong to one group- your school, and cheerleaders need not only to be a symbol of that group, but should constantly be trying to help kids feel included and valued in that community.Inclusion, not exclusion- As the school secretary listed them in Ferris Bueller; "The sportos, the motorheads, geeks, sluts, bloods, waistoids, dweebies..." they all should feel like they belong, and it's yourjob to help them feel that way.

If you are fullfilling the negative stereotype of the snobby, preppie, popular- basically either supperior or "clique-y," you're being exclusive instead of inclusive. In other words, you're not making people feel a part of something, you're making them feel even more alienated and unvalued. Cheerleaders are supposed to make people feel valued as part of the team, part of the school, part of the team.

The irony is that if you're being what so many people THINK cheerleaders are like, you're being the antithesis of what a cheerleader is SUPPOSED to be.

I think that building community fulfills America's motto; "E Pluribus Unum; from many, one." Baseball may call itself "America's Pastime," football, basketball and NASCAR may all vie for being the most popular sport, but only cheerleading has the deliberate duty to create a sense of oneness. All other sports may do that, but that's just being on the bandwagon. The cheerleaders are the people offering a hand to get you up onto that wagon.

Purpose 3: Discipline

You can't be an athlete without it. It never ceases to amaze me when cheerleaders are frustrated that football, volleyball and basketball "jocks" don't think of cheerleading as a sport or cheerleaders as athletes, but then the cheerleaders don't want to work very hard during practice.Coach Wooden's Pyramid calls this "Conditioning." Although, it certainly requires more of Wooden's bricks, on the first tier, it takes work-ethic or "industriusness.." On the second tier it takes discipline to develop self control, alertness, and initiative. On the third tier, it takes discipline to develop skill. But it takes personal and squad discipline to develop and maintain friendships, loyalty and cooperation- which help make up the foundation of the Pyramid of success. A discipline is either something you study, like Science, History, or Art. A disciplined scientist uses the scientific method, so does a disciplined historian, for that matter. A discipline may also be a regiment you follow, diet, exercise, physical or mental training. Obviously, faith traditions are disciplined. If one is a "disciple" or a follower of a religion, philosophy or a leader, you follow the teachings, principles or precepts of that tradition.Theoretically, Christians abide by Christ's teaching in the Beatitudes, Budists practice Zen, Muslums practice the 5 pillars, etc. etc.Athletes listen to their coach's guidance and the rules or guidelines of their sport and school.Like doctors "practice medicine", practice cheerleading so that you will be qualified to be a practicing cheerleader. It doesn't mean cheerleading is your religion, it means that you're working at being the best cheerleader you can be.

Purpose 4: Service

The legendary King Author had a beautiful motto: "By serving each other we become free."

Purpose 5: Be Contagious

Sounds like a disease, right? I teach my cheerleaders that there is a difference between being just another thermometer and actually being thermostat.

FYI, Warren's original 5: Worship, Fellowship, Discipleship, Ministry, and Evangelism

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Year's before Warren wrote his devotional, Business and motivational speaker Stephen Covey wrote a block buster best seller called '7 habits of effective people.'

7 Habits has essentially become a classic "must read" for business, civic and education leaders.

Habit 1 Be Proactive: Principles of Personal Vision

Habit 2 Begin with the End in Mind: Principles of Personal Leadership

Habit 3 Put First Things First: Principles of Personal Management

Habit 4 Think Win/Win: Principles of Interpersonal Leadership

Habit 5 Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood

Habit 6 Synergize Principles of Creative Communication

Habit 7 Sharpen the Saw: Principles of Balanced Self-Renewal

Online bubble wrap

You gotta try this:

http://www.urban75.com/Mag/bubble.html

what if?

Have you ever imagined a world with no hypothetical situations?

--
__________________________________
http://tedscolumn.blogspot.com
http://www.myspace.com/coachmallory

"The gospel is meant to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable." ~Garrison Keillor

Evolution of Dance

Here is a trippy video- this guy, in like 2 or 3 minutes dances pretty much every popular dance since 1955 till present day (except the Macarena, I think he must not like it)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMH0bHeiRNg&eurl

Did you know that it's Beautiful Women Month?

Did you know that it's Beautiful Women Month?
I know I'm a guy, but that doesn't mean I can't share some pro-feminist advice with you in honor of Beautiful Women Month. I want you all to know that every woman is beautiful:

"For attractive lips, speak words of kindness. For lovely eyes, seek out
the good in people. For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry.
For beautiful hair, let a child run his/her fingers through it once a day. For
poise, walk with the knowledge that you never walk alone. People, even more than
things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never
throw out anyone. Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you will find one
at the end of each of your arms. As you grow older, you will discover that
you have two hands; one for helping yourself, and the other for helping others."

~Audrey Hepburn

Five tips for a woman....
1. It is important that a man helps you around the house and has a job.
2. It is important that a man makes you laugh.
3. It is important to find a man you can count on! and doesn't lie to you.
4. It is important that a man loves you and spoils you.
5. It is important that these four men don't know each other.

God's Cake

This was forwarded to me by a former cheerleader. I thought it did an excellent job of giving a person perspective on life's ups and downs-

Sometimes we wonder, "What did I do to deserve this?" or "Why did God have to do this to me?" Here is a wonderful explanation!

A daughter is telling her Mother how everything is going wrong, she's failing algebra, her boyfriend broke up with her and her best friend is moving away.
Meanwhile, her Mother is baking a cake and asks her daughter if she would like a snack, and the daughter says, "Absolutely Mom, I love your cake."
"Here, have some cooking oil," her Mother offers. "Yuck" says her daughter.
"How about a couple raw eggs?" "Gross, Mom!"
"Would you like some flour then? Or maybe baking soda?" "Mom, those are all yucky!"
To which the mother replies: "Yes, all those things seem bad all by themselves. But when they are put together in the right way, they make a wonderfully delicious cake!

God works the same way. Many times we wonder why He would let us go through such bad and difficult times. But God knows that when He puts these things all in His order, they always work for good! We just have to trust Him and, eventually, they will all make something wonderful!

God is crazy about you. He sends you flowers every spring and a sunrise every morning.
Whenever you want to talk, He'll listen. He can live anywhere in the universe, and He chose your heart.

Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while we are here we might as well dance.

Guilt, hypocrisy, and the Cheer Aesthetic

Guilt, hypocrisy,
and the Cheerleading "Aesthetic"
Sep 1, 2006 ( I changed the post date to June, because I thought this one was pretty controversial and I want to honor Boyer Valley, and frankly, protect myself from any readers who might be offended by any of the content of this post- please be remember: This is not an official BVCS site. The views expressed here and the links provided here are not necessarily those of the school, it's administrators or board. This site is the sole responsibility of Coach.)

Rena spoke to me in private, but I just as well make this issue public- because I'm the only one who it makes look bad. She didn't understand why I let Sasha on when we didn't have a uniform to fit her when another friend of her asked me a couple of times the first week of school, but I told her that she couldn't come out because we didn't have enough uniforms.

The most correct answer is, I barely thought about it so, obviously I look like a jerk.

The best answer is, Sasha cheered in junior high and knows what she's doing so we won't have to spend a nightmarish amount of time teaching her everything from the ground up. And I feel pretty connected to Sasha, no rapport with this other girl. I don't know why Sasha didn't come out in the first palce last Spring, but she wants to get active and hopes cheer helps her with that. Every year she's shown enormous amounts of school spirit and purple pride, coming to away games and wearing outlandish outfits. So I didn't even think twice (although for the sake of the other girl and for fairness, I should have) when Sasha asked me.

The hard, ugly most brutally honest answer is that I have serious reservations about the other girl, some for her sake, some for mine, some shallow ones for the squad and program. She's got stellar grades, but my perception is that she has a severe lack of coordination and rhythm. My conversations about her with collegues leads me to believe that she also lacks social skills and experience that would help her be a cheerleader. These are both things that my own daughter struggles with, so I feel like I'd be labeling or prejudging someone unfairly. She did approach me herself and that takes courage itself, so presumably she she has either the guts (or at least the obliviousness) to perform infront of hundreds of people. And yes, she's kind of heavy-set. I've never let that stop me from recruiting, let alone permitting girls from cheering in 13 years. Hell, I'm way over weight myself. Cheerleading is a very brutal fishbowl- the whole school, sometimes the whole community are looking at you and talking about you.

Year after year mean, insensitive smartassed boys make fun of cheerleaders. This is a season where you could say we have more bases then flyers. I will bend over backwards to make sure these girls we have feel good about their self body images. Every cheer coach needs to be aware of eating disorders. It's not fair, but its real. So yes, as cruel and unfair as it is, part of me wants to shelter this girl because she's really sweet. And at the same time, I know that other squad memebers might, former cheerleaders would, and members of the student body most certainly would complain or criticize her/us/me if I had let her join.

This makes me feel like an absolute monster and I'll never be able to make it right or make it up to Rena or this girl- especially when I've been whining about not having enough cheerleaders or having a squad that is in such constant flux. But I'd remind Rena, and any other readers, that we had 3 candidates come to tryouts last Spring. Neither Rena, Sasha or this other girl were among them. Jessica was, but her goofy brother/guardian thinks that that cheer is sissy and won't let her be on squad.

You kow what they say "you go to the war with the army you have, not the army you wish you had." Unfortunately, I'm kinda making this up as I go along. I never want to be unfair or hurtfull, but that may not be possible. So, if I have to legislate an official policy it's this, that if you're willing to work you can- IF YOU'VE EVER CHEERED BEFORE. That's the policy for now, but next season you still have to try out.