FUNNY SPORTS QUOTES \ Source: examiner.com

BADMINTON QUOTES

Badminton grows in popularity with Bay Area athletes

Rackets swung swiftly, propelling white-feathered shuttlecocks across the taut brown net as Howard Bach, a former badminton world champion who will be representing the U.S. in the Olympics this summer, scored one point after another at a competition in Menlo Park.

Bach, who grew up in San Francisco, is the strongest athlete at the Adult National Championship, considered the Super Bowl of badminton, hosted for the first time ever in the Bay Area this weekend.

The championship, many badminton aficionados said, is a testament to the growing popularity of the sport in the Bay Area. Mike Yang, owner of the Golden Gate Badminton Club, which has locations in Menlo Park and Emeryville, said 88 players entered the competition this year, more than double the regular number.

“There is a lot of talent in the Bay Area,” he said. “Now there are more professional clubs that help the sport to grow. It used to be very hard to train in the Bay Area.”

Until two years ago, local athletes had to use the gym at UC Berkeley or go to Los Angeles to train. However, the demand by the large local Asian population who enjoyed the sport led to the launch of three clubs, including a new one in Burlingame that opened in February, Yang said.

He said he has seen a huge growth in interest from local Asian athletes, but Americans have been slow to enter the sport because they are still not very familiar with it.

Bach, who will head to Beijing in three months, said he hoped badminton would get more exposure this year because the Olympics are hosted by China, where badminton is one of the most popular sports.

Since badminton became an Olympic sport in 1992, no American has been able to win a medal — something Bach, 29, is hoping to change. In 2004, he competed in the Olympics, but did not win a medal.

“The Chinese are strong, but until you finish, it’s hard to say who is going to win,” he said. “The main key is that someone has to carry the torch and keep winning.”

FUNNY SPORTS QUOTES \ Source: en.wikiquote.org

Image: elviscostello.info

BOWLING QUOTES
from the Coen brothers movie "The Big Lebowski"

The Big Lebowski is a 1998 film about an amiable unemployed slacker, The Dude, and his close friends, all fond of their nights at the local bowling alley, who are drawn into a Chandleresque plot involving the missing younger wife of a millionaire namesake.
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They figured he was a lazy, time wasting slacker. They were right . . . . . Fuck it, Dude . . Let's go bowling.
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[in response to a thug holding a bowling ball and asking what it is] Obviously you're not a golfer.
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Smokey, this isn't Nam, this is bowling. There are rules.
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You brought the fucking Pomeranian bowling?
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Answering Machine: Mr Lebowski, this is Bill Salinger of the Southern Cal bowling league. We received an, uh, an informal complaint that a member of your team - a Walter Sobchak? - drew a firearm during league play. If this is true, of course, it contravenes a number of the league's by-laws and also article 27...

FUNNY SPORTS QUOTES \ Source: billsworthlessobservations.blogspot.com

SPORTS HUMOR
Thoughts on Lawn Darts
June 24, 2006
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As best I can tell, the lawn dart was invented in the late 1970s or early 1980s. Some engineer was forced to go to a Saturday afternoon picnic and realized around 11am "an oversized, cartoon-like, horseshoe is actually not designed for flight, its no wonder it is hard to get around that post".
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By 4:30pm, the lawn dart was born. And by 11:17pm the local news was reporting that "a heavy, finned, metal object - sort of like a missile - should really not be thrown into the air, especially in a populated area, by somebody who had been drinking beer".
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Here is the part that gets me: lawn darts were banned by Consumer Product Safety Commission on December 19th, 1988. I realize some people were hurt, even killed, but let's examine some of the things that were never banned:
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Horseshoes - I don't have any proof to back this up, but I would be shocked if somebody wasn't, at the very least, knocked out cold by a horseshoe thrown in a game. Horseshoes remain legal in the eyes of the Consumer Product Safety Commision.
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Horseshoes - I am absolutely certain that horseshoes have caused serious injury when attached to a horse's foot and kicked into a person's head. I suppose the actual problem is:
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Horses - the horse is pretty much a recreational item in our society. Horses are beautiful, sturdy animals (with incredibly soft noses, I don't know why, but that sticks with me). They are also just a little smarter gerbils, and getting kicked by one is a little bit like getting kicked by a Buick. Yet horses remain legal in the eyes of the Consumer Product Safety Commision.
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Vending machines - people are killed every year while rocking vending machines back and forth, eventually tipping them over. Late one Saturday night when I was in a college dormitory I gave somebody I had never met before a bag of microwave popcorn because I could hear he was trying to tip a vending machine that took his money while he was trying to buy popcorn. I may have saved his life that night, but one thing is for sure - I fell asleep sooner because I gave him the popcorn and he went away. Yet vending machines remain legal in the eyes of the Consumer Product Safety Commision.
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Archery Equipment - If you take a lawn dart, make it longer, sharper, and make it a projectile that is launched from a mechanized device horizontal to ground, you get a bow and arrow, which Ted Nugent uses to exercise birth control on the deer population. Yet archery equipment.... may actually be regulated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. I'm really not sure. And yes, I have been to a family picnic where archery was involved.
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So what am I trying to say? Am I trying to get lawn darts un-banned? No. There are a couple of reasons - first, I simply don't care. I've never found myself at a backyard barbecue really upset that there were no lawn darts - it is a vaguely athletic endeavor and I am almost certainly bad at it.
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Secondly, there was a booming market for pre-ban lawn darts on eBay, but it looks like they too may have banned them now (but there is actually a lot of funny t-shirts and bumper stickers about them being banned, which just points out that nothing I do is actually original). I have a policy that when people can actually make money selling really stupid things on the internet, I don't fool around with that.
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Am I trying to ban Horseshoes, Horseshoes, Horses, Vending Machines, and Archery Equipment? No. Life is dangerous, and you just have to use your best judgment, weigh risks carefully, blah, blah, blah....
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Am I trying to gently point out that almost any household item used in a careless fashion could be harmful? Yes (Note: for more benign objects you may have to replace "careless fashion" with "stupid fashion" or even "stupid, idiotic fashion"- for example you can hurt yourself with a knife just being careless - but to hurt yourself with a CD case you would have to be stupid, perhaps idiotic).

Mostly, I'm just trying to be funny. If you read this please send an email to:
billdaniels@nc.rr.com
with an honest comment so I at least know somebody was paying attention.

"...and hey, be careful out there."

FUNNY SPORTS QUOTES \ Source: themanitoban.com

JIM CARREY

Image: entimg.msn.com

SPORTS HUMOR

Canadians are funny (2003 article)

The whole world knows it. Canadians are funny.

In fact, comedians are our largest export to the United States - I suppose we have NAFTA to thank for that.

It's been well documented that Canadians are hilarious. Just look at Canada's resume: Mike Myers, Jim Carrey, Leslie Neilson, Dan Ackroyd, Rick Mercer, Eugene Levy, Bruce McCulloch, Martin Short, John Candy - impressive list, n'est pas?

It's actually a secret ploy to invade Hollywood. First the government will send in the comedians, then the submarines we bought from... oh wait... how about them war canoes?

Here's another list: SCTV, Second City, Wayne and Shuster, the Royal Canadian Air Farce, CODCO and This Hour has 22 Minutes. Maybe we should send these troops in with the canoes.

So, what is it about Canadians that makes us funny?

There is the theory of the winter wasteland; where besides hockey, beer and sex, Canadians sit around and tell jokes. With the winter so long, Canadians are bound to get the art of joke-telling, and thus humour, right.

Or maybe Canadians just have it easy: we're an old British Colony, with a French minority; living next to the Americans ... it's a comic's dream. Think of the material! "So a Canadian, a Brit, an American and a French guy walk into a bar ..."

Canadians are not really pretentious, and we're definitely not as bitter and sarcastic as the Brits.

Where else but in Canada can the saying 'keep your stick on the ice' make sense?

Hell, our sports are funny!

Hockey: bunch of grown men in body armour and skates chase a cylinder on ice.

Lacrosse: bunch of grown men in body armour and sticks with cages on top.

Curling: Ah, the lazy man's sport. In what other "sport" can you grab a beer between ends?

So it pretty much comes down to that, Canadians are funny ... well, just because Canada is funny.

Unless you live in Toronto.
In that case, everyone just seems to make fun of you.