Warning: long wordy post, sorry.Sorry for the delayed report, after two full days of top talk my throat was so sore I couldn’t type.
Friday was a record setting day for visitors to UC for a top spinning gathering. It is always great to see familiar faces and great to meet new dedicated players. I always enjoy catching up with Mike, Austen, and Eli, and while at lunch we had a quick visit from Seth (Waxyaxle) before he left for a working trip to China. What a shock to have a stranger pop out of the stairwell and say “I’m a top spinner” and “I’m a friend of Mark Hayward’s” which made us suspicious (Right? Because who admits to that?
) , but Marcus Perry is one of us. Chris also magically appeared from the stairwell. My thanks go to Mike Hickerson for being the phone point contact which made it easy to find Don and David when they arrived. It also made it easy to know that Mark was in town. It was pretty funny when we were on the dock at the rendezvous point and recognize Mark’s car as he drives in, does a U-turn and drives away. Mike had a good laugh as I feebly ran after Mark up the hill where he briefly stopped to taunt me into running farther before speeding away, while Mike just got on his phone to tell Mark what he had done (still not enough incentive for me to get a phone but a rather compelling argument). Among the strongest memories is my relief upon finding Jim Neff safely here and comfortable waiting at the elevator in the building. It is amazing to me to have people travel long distances here for just a day to see how I make a toy. This interest in and dedication to the spin top from these players is motivational. I hope no one got too bored with all my jabbering on and perhaps more-than-you-wanted-to-know details. I appreciated all the great questions and genuine interest in my approach to top making. We carried on pretty late into the evening and with the approach of closing time for many eateries, several of the long distance travelers moved on to finish their drives to Miamisburg while the rest of us had a meal in honor of Mike Hout at Chipotle.
Saturday was a second great day. Don and David were already set up on the church lawn when I arrived. I really enjoyed our brief time as a small group. The time when the gathering is large is a great joy with so many things happening at the same time but the almost one-on-one moments are special in a different way.
I didn’t immediately recognize Joe when he arrived and walked toward us since the church and neighboring food pantry was a busy place for the locals, and perhaps I didn’t really believe such a spintop hero would travel from the Philippines to join us. But when it clicked in my head that “that’s Joe Mauk” it was pretty exciting. I could listen to Joe’s stories about tops and life all day. As small as the spintop community is there were a couple of remarkably small world moments involving Joe.
The group grew steadily with more and more activity on the church lawn. It is always great to see Mike Hout again. We were happy to see Kirk and Rachel arrive since we missed them on Friday. A fair bit of activity was happening in the street also with random classic cars passing, the annual motorcycle parade, a new tractor parade, and even a large solid top stopping traffic at one point. In this season of presidential politics, Mark was doing a bit of “stumping” that all sides can agree on. Congratulations to the new friends of Autograph: Don, David, Marcus, and Joe (anyone else I didn’t see?) and with his shoulder in good health, our favorite Miamisburg photographer/videographer Jay is so very close that next year he is a sure thing to join the club. Regularly, various unexpected objects (like a toilet seat) could be seen circling Jim.
After what seemed like no time, we moved over to the new venue near the river mixed in with the classic car show. The Mayor announced Mark Hayward Day with emphasis on the Miamisburg connection to Mark’s Guinness record, and the battle contest commenced. The advanced players spread out in the nicely shaded open area and resumed their earlier activities. The evening proceeded to disappear as quickly as the earlier parts of the day. The contest prizes were awarded and the clean-up/pack-up went smoothly. Note to self, Jim is very receptive to bad advice, but on the plus side we learned from a good humored, armed, Miamisburg police officer what the potential consequences of approaching an armed officer might be should one choose to approach him with a large rubber snake.
Primarily for Mike:
A note or two about the location change as Mike reviews his options for next year. The added distance from the church was of no consequence because there was ample parking for those wishing to drive their gear over and the few extra steps for walkers were trivial. The venue allows the battle contest to be up on a stage with an amphitheater enclosure. The large stage provides ample space for the kids and contest supervisors in contrast to the slightly tight quarters of the original site. The height of the stage puts the actual battle above the view of most of the audience but greatly improves the view of all the kids having a great time which is likely what interests the parents most. I didn’t pay attention to whether the cheering level was compromised by the lack of visibility of the battle itself. If I recall correctly, the stage had the access stairs in the center. A set of stairs on the edge(s) would allow you to invite the audience up onto the stage to view the battle if any spectators were interested, but that is likely out of your control. The sound was great and carried well into the car show and was quite sufficient to be understood over the revving engines and music where we were. The play area for the advance players was very nice. We could spread out much more and worry less about interfering with each other (Jim’s long range toys had plenty of space). Although the high temperatures this year were pleasantly lower than some previous years, we quickly noticed that the lack of buildings allow a nice breeze to improve our comfort level. The open-on-all-sides position of the advanced play area allowed car show attendees to wander among the players to watch and chat whereas the boxed in grassy area at the previous site held the observers on the perimeter and did not encourage them to join in. From the other point of view, the added pedestrian traffic took away some of our privacy and time with the dedicated spinners that we rarely see.
A few spinners left to endure a long drive home before the traditional evening meal at Bullwinkles. We did, however, have two additional spinners join us. Lynn, from Columbus, who knew Don and David from the RIT Juggle fest and did very well progressing through the various sized tops, and a man (whose name escapes me (sorry)) who is another small world instance for me since he once taught at Cincinnati.
We then moved to the Hall of Fame and everyone knows that what happens in the Hall of Fame stays in the Hall of Fame unless you are Austen, in which case you post it on Facebook.
For me this was another great event. So great that I think I heard someone say that Mark Hayward Day was even better than Jorge Alcoz Day. I guess any day that you can get two pieces of pizza for lunch is going to have an advantage over most other days. So many thanks go out to Mike Hout for hosting the festival and to all of the top players who came or contributed to its success. Great job everyone, give yourselves a dollar.
