Culinary Competition 2010

So for the past two days I have been at the State Basketball tournament of Highschool Culinary Competitions. I have been lucky enough to get to stay the night in Wichita, Kansas enjoying the festivities. What is even more fun is the fact that I arrived in this wonderful city at about 11:30 a.m. yesterday, only to find out I didn't actually have to do anything until today. So an entire day to myself in Wichitucky, oh what a day I had! My job is just the coolest job taking me to such great places like Pittsburgh, Council Bluffs and now Wichita- I go many more places but I am already feeling a little too braggy so I'll just stop there. So anywho, last night I was able to see all of the teams come strolling into the hotel already strutting their chefs jackets and pulling their coolers. I don't want to say I'm famous or anything, but I did get recognized a few times by students. They came running up to me wanting to talk about what they were making tomorrow, asking for suggestions, or any inspiration I could lend. So I thought for a second I might tell them what my dad told me before every basketball game,
"You will always miss 100% of the shots you don't take."
But then I remembered that I missed about 100% of the shots I did take, so I wanted to give better advice. So I told them the next quote that came to mind,
"Pain is weakness leaving the body."
Or in the theta world of keg races, "vomit is weakness leaving the body."
Well they looked pretty confused. I guess that quote didn't quite apply to culinary competitions. But then one student got it,
"Oohh K I get, so like when our backs start to hurt from leaning over the cutting board or burner, we just gotta keep going."
"Exactly." I said.
"Or like when we start to get blisters from practicing knife skills?"
"Now you guys are getting it."
So hell, maybe I did lend a bit of inspiration. At least the looks on their faces seemed inspired. That was until the KC Career Center team entered. This is the team who wiped up last year. They were good, and they knew it, what with their culinary scarves tied around their necks, and their little culinary berets. They looked the part. And the poor little culinary team I was talking to lost any sense of confidence they had. The team walked by us, and "accidentally" rolled their cooler a little too close if you catch my drift. But my little insecure culinary friends just kept their heads down, they didn't dare insult the boy pulling the cooler who just so happened to be the fastest fruit carver in all of Kansas! He could make a watermelon look like the Mona Lisa in minutes. They call him Curtis the Carver. That smug little bastard I thought to myself. I thought about sticking my foot out right in front of his black rubber Crock before he took his next step, but the thought of his 3oo pound body falling on the floor was a scene a little too violent for the situation. Let's just say I won't be too disapointed if Curtis doesn't do as well as planned today, I'm tempted to start the chant "overrated" when his turn is up here in about an hour.