Wrestlicious TakeDown Episode 3: I. Cannot. Watch. This.

Okay, so I finally decided to give the little upstart wrestling promotion, Wrestlicious, a chance. This project, started by lottery winner Jon Vargas, is an all women's promotion with a less violent outlook than the ChickFight tournament, less serious than SHIMMER Women Athletes and less, well, frankly insane (and awesome!) than Women Superstars Uncensored. Wrestlicious is a light hearted mixture of wrestling and sketch comedy. Now, after hearing this, I go in already a little bit nervous, but it could be cute and the episode I'm watching features Daffney, so I figure, what the hell, right? It can't actually be physically painful to watch, right?

I was wrong.

After the first couple of sketches (involving some woman named Leyla Milani, Jimmy Hart, of all people, and Madison Rayne), I decided to not totally ignore the building pain in my head and fast forward to the main event, a tag team match between Ghouls Gone Wild and Lacey von Erich and Madison Rayne. I mean, it's got Daffney in it, playing the role of 'Draculetta.' I mean, I've loved Daffney since she was bouncing around, giggling and screaming on WCW. The girl can act, and she brings a weird dignity to the silliest roles, like Shark Girl and a fake Sarah Palin. Heck, the original Daffney character was pretty ludicrous (anyone marking for David Flair is), and she has only recently developed the kind of complex, multifacted character you can really sink your teeth into (and boy howdy has she) in TNA. But, here nor there, this chick can make hopping up and down and chanting, 'Santa's gonna knock you out!' somewhat compelling, so I figure that this match can't be too bad.

I was wrong.

Not even the astoundingly awesome Daffney, who plays Draculetta to the absolute hilt (and the pretty cool Madison Rayne and the... well, she's trying, Lacey von Erich), can salvage this match. It's a mistimed disaster and poor Daffney/Draculetta--who is usually very athletic, for a pure brawler--seems to keep getting tangled up in the long, maroon dress in which they've inexplicably mired her. I fast forward to the end, watch Lacey go over, and say goodnight. Far from not causing me physical pain, this episode has caused me to have a heart attack, three strokes, diabetes and cancer of the kneecaps, all in twenty minutes. Since this episode was such an epic fail, in my opinion, and is the only one featuring my goofy, slightly countrified Gothic Goddess, I probably won't watch another. Maybe it'll improve?

Men and Ladies on the Internet 2: Formspring what the hell, now?

There are a huge number of social networking sites on the Internet, these days. Facebook is probably the most popular, now--it has absolutely exploded ever since it was opened up to the general public, and has become almost as annoying as its predecessor, myspace. Livejournal is a great place for the emo among us (if you want a great example check out CM Punk's old lj) and Deviant Art, too, is as much of a dramatic whinescape as it is a place to showcase your World of Warcraft fan-art. Twitter is a lot of fun--and a good way to engage with people in snips and snaps, although not as much as their blogs because it doesn't allow invested discussion--and I like to use it to network with people who share my interest in women's wrestling, both as appreciators and performers.

This networking has led me to an experience with a new website, called Formspring.me. One of the best current performers in female wrestling is the totally amazing Death Rey, Sara Del Rey. Although until recently I had only seen her in a match or two on ROH on HDNet, mostly hanging around with Castagnoli and Chris Hero, and as part of the Four Corners match on the SHIMMER Vol. 2 main event, I became very impressed with Death Rey's blog and twitter feed. Through a little bit of interaction with her, about whey, wheat and hemp protein, I have decided that SDR is a seriously cool chick. I was inspired to look up some of her other matches, considered classics by American joshi fans, and was impressed with those, too, and plan to attend any shows which she works that are within a reasonable geographic distance to my home base.

Most of the questions on her formspring are pretty normal. They are about gossipy stuff, about wrestling matches she likes and/or about music and tv. Some are more personal but understandable, about who she might be dating. Some are... simply incomprehensible or not questions at all. A wide variety of them, however, are crude queries about bra and panties matches and nude photo-shoots. The whole situation seems to be making Death Rey, even a girl as tough as Death Rey, somewhat uncomfortable and I would hate to see it make her less willing to interact with those of us who find her awesome and respect her work. I keep asking myself the same questions that I did about the guy who inquired after (name redacted's) worn panties: who are you, why are you, and which the hell rock did you crawl out from under? Perhaps, in my career, I can do something to teach young men that this is not the proper way to approach a fine, foxy lady-person, or maybe I'm just rage, raging against the dying of the light, as Dylan Thomas would say. Either way, I feel like I'm fighting the good fight, somehow, by at least commenting on all this, and so I'll probably keep doing so. Guys like that just bring you down, though, and make you feel really terrible about the future prospects of the species...

ETA: As of this morning, it's good to see kitty's claws popping out a little more.

Other interests 2: One bad Cheerleader

Melissa Anderson, aka The Future Legend, Alissa Flash and Cheerleader Melissa, is probably the best woman wrestler working today... at least in my humble opinion, that is. To be honest with you, I believe that the Future Legend is better than most male wrestlers, and she proved it earlier this week with a win against River City Wrestling's Joey Spector when she became RCW's first female champion, and the first woman to hold any coed or male wrestling promotion's top belt. Anderson works a vicious style, which mixes occasional technical brilliance with aggressive, nasty brawling and power moves, and leaves her opponents reeling with an array of moves that draws on the Japanese, American and Mexican traditions.

For a short example of Anderson's style, check out http://tinyurl.com/39jqd8e. Her twitter is twitter.com/FutureLegendCF, and her official website is www.cheerleadermelissa.com. Her body of work, especially against arch rival and sometimes partner MsChif, is available on many of the SHIMMER and Chickfight collections, and I cannot recommend it enough. Watch this Cheerleader, ladies and gentlemen... she's hiding hard fists under those pom poms.

Strength and Deconditioning 1: Who I am and what I do here.

As a neophyte to intermediate power lifter, I spend way more time than any normal human being should thinking about how to pick up big, heavy pieces of metal. I say "normal" human being because, well, let's face it... an elite power lifter who can jack 650 pounds off his chest raw and squat 950 raw isn't normal in any way, shape or form... sometimes you begin to wonder if he's even a human being! My 435 on bench is nothing to sneeze at, though, and it's not the kind of thing you get by pissing around in the gym, talking about the great set of curls you just did in the squat rack (all while the huge, bearded, tattooed biker got behind you got angrier and angrier...). Although I'm relatively weak compared to really big power lifters, my raw bench and raw squat have been bigger than most I've encountered in commercial gyms and university gyms, or at least the university gyms which didn't cater to a nationally ranked Division I football program (where I can still at least hold my own, thank goodness).

What does this all add up to? Hopefully it puts me in a pretty good position to help other normal people, who maybe have good leverages but aren't complete genetic freaks yet, to build up their bench press and squat. I might not help you win any world records--hell, I haven't won any yet--and I can't help you to develop sexy six-pack vampire abs (who needs em!?!?) but I can promise that you'll grow bigger, thicker, somewhat leaner and a hell of a lot stronger if you follow my advice. I've seen a guy's bench press max jump twenty-five pounds in two and a half weeks using my protocols, protocols liberally cribbed from such enormous raw bench masters as Hugh Cassidy (who used back of sets to keep blood in the muscle) and Kenny Fantano, master of pressing from a dead stop to torment the CNS into responding. Now, the guy who I was coaching is a total beginner, and that means a lot for quick gains in strength, but that much growth in less than three weeks is pretty darned impressive.

So, as this little blog goes along, I'll put up my theories on lifting and training, eating (here's a hint... do a lot of it). I'll also review comic books (I'm a big ol' comic book nerd), and ramble about professional wrestling--mostly stuff like Shimmer Women Athletes but some other stuff. I hope anyone who comes across this enjoys, learns something, has her his life changed... any of that good stuff.