In (Half-Hearted) Defense of my Punting

Let me begin by saying that Ashley is actually not exaggerating about how bad I am (for once). She might even have been too kind to me--"a few circles" is certainly an understatement. And I think I blocked the river twice. In fact, looking back on it now, I may just be the worst punter ever to stir the pristine waters of the Cam (fun fact: Cambridge = Bridge over the river Cam). Tourists gliding smoothly past us in the water on their guided punts pointed and took pictures. "Ha ha look at that silly girl, no one can be that terrible. She must be stationed here for our entertainment," I imagined them saying to each other, in their native languages. BUT I feel compelled to tell the whole story. You be the judge.

Defense: Part I: The Background

1. I have never been actively canoeing. The one time I have gone canoeing, I was the ballast, i.e. I sat in the middle and pointed out interesting sights along the way, such as ducks and boats shaped like Jersey cows. While this is of course as indispensable a position as any other, I did not get as much experience paddling the canoe as I might have. Ashley and Mahalia have both been canoeing; Patrick, M.'s friend from Clare College who got us a punt in the first place, is an expert punter. I was the true novice of the group!

2. I have weak arms. In taekwondo, kicking>>punching! The only thing I ever use my arms for is typing, and I type a lot, but no one can type their arms into buffness. To my knowledge.

3. I have poor eyesight and was wearing a raincoat with a ginormous hood. Every time I turned my head, the hood draped over my eyes. Plus, it was raining, and my glasses got all speckled. This made it even more difficult to steer, which is one of the reasons I accidentally punted us into a tree. Hey, the person who really suffered was me, since the others were sitting down and thus got a nice leisurely float under a beautiful willow tree, whereas I, who was standing, got smacked in the face by a wet branch.

Part II: The Circumstances

1. I started us off by popular request (Mahalia, Patrick, and Ash thought I should, I voted against), which just shows that democracy/majority rules really doesn't work all that well most of the time. It was very difficult to start, because the instruction I received was basically: "Punt." I didn't even know which direction we were supposed to be going (it was a 2 way river). So I just stuck the pole in and shoved, and it turned out I guessed wrong (the punter is supposed to stand at the back part of the punt), so I was told to make a 360 turn, which is KIND OF HARD, and so I tried to do it, and people kept yelling, "Turn! Turn!" at me, and I didn't know if they meant turn BACK or what, and then suddenly two or three other punts appeared out of nowhere, and there I was, rotating on an axis, trying to put all my weight into the stupid pole, and you know that part in the Sandlot where Scotty Smalls has to get the ball back in the beginning, when it's rolled by the Beast, and Squints yells, "We are WAITING..." Well, that's what I felt the other punts were beaming at me and I got all nervous. So then I crashed us into a wall, but that was good, because it let the other people go by, and then M., A., and P. pushed off from the wall for me and I got us going straight for a couple of seconds, and then gave the pole to M.

2. The stick/pole is EXTREMELY long and heavy. I thought we were going to harpoon a whale when I first saw it, or eat a very, very large shish kebab. 

3. The second time I tried, I was doing very well, actually, for a couple of minutes. Seriously, ask anyone. BUT THEN this Chinese guy came punting out of nowhere, leading a bunch of Chinese tourists, and I stared at his punting technique to try and imitate him, which was when we started heading for the willow tree, and then we bumped into him, which was my fault I admit, BUT THEN I straightened us out and we were about to head on our way when HE went wayyyy crooked and did a horizontal on us and completely blocked me, which was fine for HIM but not for me since I went careening into a wall again. Stupid guy.

Feel free to contact me for further defense points. I have to finish packing now, though, since we are leaving in an hour for the airport to go to Ireland! 

Punter out.