C-CUP '22

SAT 7/30 UPDATE: It's been a fun week, but something was missing. Maybe a formal sail this evening? Some entertaining events however, like Rhubarb trying to depart the T-dock, while still attached to the pier! This at a beam reach in a 20-25 knot west wind (see photo). It was blue flag at the time. Maxim-um screw-up.

SUNDAY 7/24 UPDATE: Our operatives got ahold of the secret questions for today's no talent trivia quiz (we've changed them just a bit so as not to give everything away). Here ya go:

1. Is T.rex your mommy, daddy, or none of the above?
2. How many flamingos does it take to lay an egg?
3. How many commodores does it take to drive off the competition?
4. Which animal male has the largest, um, weenie?
5. If the end of the world is coming, where will the asteroid hit?

Yup, those really are the questions, and they're not G-rated, although they might change if the wrong people see this before the event. Check back for more hints all week long!

Hoofer Sailing Club Commodore's Cup is here! Is this now a family event? There have been children present, possibly Youth sailors although I'm not sure because I am not teaching youth lessons this year. And 10 feet away? Guys with pitchers of beer getting sloshed. Hmmm.

In any case, C-Cup is your chance to play all sorts of fun games and be groped by the commodore! (if you're female, or maybe it doesn't matter). Several former commodores have already been spotted (see photo). The event could be called Criminal's Cup due to past commodores who have committed criminal acts--Lukas Duddleston '19, Matt Duerst '09, Mike Larsen '05, Nathan Salowitz '00, to name a few. There are others who have violated the law, though possibly not criminally, like Mills Botham '17 and others. We don't know whether Austin Suvari has gone astray yet, but there is still time! (Some other Hoofer employees have also committed crimes.)

Have any been charged or convicted? Not to our knowledge, although some Wis. Union employees have been. The problem is that many cops, prosecutors and judges are also corrupt (and others are incompetent), so laws don't get enforced. Or worse, they are used as a coercive tool to beat innocent people into submission. The old saying 'power corrupts' is a truism because as you gain more and more authority, you tend to be guided less and less by any moral compass.

This past Thursday evening, Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Il.) summed it up:

"Laws are just words on paper. They mean nothing."

It's an astonishing statement, especially coming from a lawmaker. At least he seems to be an honest one. In fairness, his full statement was: Laws are just words on paper. They mean nothing, without public servants dedicated to the rule of law and who are held accountable by a public that believes oaths matter more than party tribalism or the cheap thrill of scoring political points.

Was Kinzinger quoting straight out of the unpublished Hoofer Leader Manual?

In the absence of effective laws, people take their cues from animals. In many species, e.g. orangutans, the males do it with eachother while the females look on in confusion. Hence homosexuality is perfectly natural, or at least bisexuality is. Note however that in many cases the behavior is agonistic or domineering. Maybe that's why some Hoofer men become aggressive after approaching another guy and having been rejected. Male dolphins form alliances to keep competitors away from females, then rape the females themselves. Similarly, Hoofer leaders abuse their positions to drive off individuals they don't like, then try to monopolize women, boats, and whatever else they can. It is tribalism, cliqueness taken to an extreme.

Of course, not all commodores are crooks. Some (Matti, Pepe, JJ, and others) were more interested in having fun and partying than in embezzling money or slandering club members.

So as you make an ass of yourself this week, hoist one to them, the great commodores of the past!

Hoofers: Gangrene setting in

In recent months, I've heard from a number of people how great the sailing club is these days. The Badger Sloops are great! The instructors are great! The food is great! (uttered by a homeless person at a Friday social). The Techs are great! (that's actually true)

So just how great is it?

☉ The club is as xenophobic as ever. Still all white, still a feeding frenzy for paid positions (see screen capt), still slandering people as a way of asserting dominance. If you haven't heard any slander, it's because you don't rate the latest gossip, or maybe you didn't realize it was slander.

☉ We're treated like 5-year olds and ordered to wear our lifejackets. This is to teach us that it was very naughty of a Hoofer Sailing instructor to cause the drowning of a student in 2015. It's not that big a deal for us as instructors, but you feel for the general club members who have to share smelly old lifejackets every day.

☉ No more beer on the keelboats, not even with other consenting adults, some of whom are old enough to be your grandpa. All because a few drunkards took it too far and crossed the line. Well, and killed a couple of people.

☉ And (drumroll please)... The club's most experienced sailors managed to sink Sassafras a few weeks ago, one of the club's Tartan-10's (photo to right). Never checked the thru-hull fittings. Hence no surprise that the first storm that comes along sinks the boat, which may be a total loss due to water damage. We fragged Sassy's ass!

Hey Chicago, we need more keelboat donations again!

Hoofers' regular periodic conversion of keelboats into insurance money is so alarming that the original donor of Spray gave $5000 to the club so we wouldn't cash Spray in too! I think that's a first.

Overall, HSC is like a leg that has turned gangrene, then gets sprinkled with perfume and wrapped in a flowered sheet. Sorry, but that won't save the leg. One thing that's particularly nauseating to me personally is the mock seriousness at BOC meetings as young minds are schooled in the art of the steal.

Most of the old crowd is gone, but the ex-Advoosigator still lingers, attached to HSC like a 60-year old lamprey to a dying balleen whale, eager at the Youth program's return, and slandering those who done him wrong. He still likes to slip in a Mickey (figuratively speaking) with club leaders every once in awhile too, so watch out. A certain ex-commodore ambles by every so often in his button-down and baseball cap, seemingly lost. It's almost as if he doesn't recognize Hoofers anymore. Where's the beer? A few others from the good ol' days also resurface periodically.

There are some good people, of course, but they're trapped between the status (and cash) they enjoy as instructors or BOC and an urge to run screaming from this place. Most of the traditions are long gone. Mooning the Betty Lou horrified Union managers because it caused them to imagine dropping their own drawers, which would expose their tiny [CENSORED] and fat [CENSORED]. Since they never got a bid to join a frat and had to live in the dorms for four years (many years ago), they never learned how to have fun.

The good vibes are all gone, the whole renovation a farce. Thank you, Mr. Guthier, and Welcome To The New Hoofers! Where safety comes first, followed by sobriety, surveillance, and sycophancy.

And Shivjit. Apparently he is still doing keelboat lessons? OMG he is so clueless. He should have to re-certify his own skipper rating before being allowed to "teach" any more lessons.

Dangerous heat waves

Don't let the record high temperatures this week fool you. Lake Mendota is still very cold. Cold enough to kill you in 60 seconds unless you're wearing a wetsuit (or are 200 lbs overweight). The current water temp is 64°, but that's at the surface. The buoy is sitting out there in the sun all day. Ten feet down the water is still in the 40s, and shifting winds can bring that icy water to the surface.

A few years ago, lack of awareness of this combined with criminal negligence by a Hoofer Sailing instructor led to the death of a student after he jumped into cold water on a warm day. And that was in June. Cold water might also have been a factor in other drownings.

The air temperature in Madison varies wildly because it's a continental climate, i.e. not moderated by any large bodies of water. The only place in the US with more extreme temps from summer to winter is North Dakota (a horrid place if you've never been there). It's the opposite of someplace like Honolulu, where it's 80° every day and 70° every night, year round.

If you're out in a small boat and capsize, stay with your boat and try to get on top of it if you can. If you're on a keelboat, stay on board. Extra M.O.B. practice would be a good idea on all lessons.

--The HOI

Hoofers safe?

Abuse is rife in Hoofers and Hoofer Sailing Club, but it's unclear how widespread child sexual abuse is. The HSC Youth Program caters to children as young as 10, and every summer (pandemic notwithstanding) dozens or even hundreds of children are left alone at Hoofers to learn sailing--and potentially other things. Naturally those adults who engage in child abuse try hard to cover their tracks.

In many large organizations, child sexual abuse is apparently rampant. The Boy Scouts now have a $2.6 Billion trust fund for some 82,000 (claimed) victims of sexual abuse. Sadly, the Catholic Church is also known for molestation of boys, and you can bet other churches are not far behind. As far as grade schools, "herd immunity" may help to protect students in general from sexual abuse, but it is still a widespread problem in American schools. Most alarming, this includes assaults and harassment by teachers. Almost 10% of all children report having been sexually abused by a teacher in grade school [LINK2].

Thus it is apparent that in any organization where large numbers of children interact regularly with adults, there will be sexual harassment and abuse. After all, it's only natural to want to boink anything that moves and is cute. Given that cuteness is a highly subjective term, that means just about anyone is at risk of getting touched, groped, or worse against their will, and the younger you are, the greater the risk. K-12 schools in general may not lend themselves to sexual abuse, which benefits from alone time between mentor and youth, but HSC does provide some alone time out on the water.

Sexual harassment and abuse is well known among adult Hoofer sailors and typically consists of club officers groping women at the alcohol-laced socials or inappropriate touching on lessons. Male instructors and club officers (no names yet) are usually the perps, with one older Badger Sloop instructor in particular having admitted to touching young women on lessons.

Even if it was usually just "on the shoulder", the fact is that when an older man touches a girl or young woman anywhere, even through her shirt, it's a thrill for him. The woman may not even realize that this seemingly innocent hand on her shoulder is sending shivers down the spine of the toucher (and perhaps even further down) as he steps off the boat. Women, too, engage in sexual harassment including false reports about men they don't like.

In other Hoofer-related news, Chancellor Blank stare is finally leaving, as she should have long ago. One big problem with hiring a person as a figurehead is that they actually have to take on responsibility. Among her failures, the UW has steadily dropped in national rankings since Blank stare became chancellor in 2013. In her defense, the UW was already starting to slide before her arrival.

The Packers: Hooferesque

NOV 8 UPDATE: As the A-Rod fallout continues to spread, entertaining videos of him getting slammed by various sports and TV personalities are here and here. Also, at right is the new "Hoofer highball," invented by none other than Green Bay Packers QB Aaron Rodgers. WARNING: Not recommended to prevent or treat Covid-19 or anything else. Use ivermectin only on the advice of a doctor!

NOV 5 UPDATE: Today A-Rod tried to cover himself by spewing more lies. Then he compounded those lies with even more lies, e.g. by claiming he's allergic to the vaccines. It's all very Hooferesque. And instead of getting vaccinated, he's been taking ivermectin, an anti-parasitic drug for farm animals that's useless against viruses. He's also worried about the vaccine affecting his sperm count. We're worried about that too--as in, it's scary to think he might reproduce. The world has enough idiots already.

November 4— For those who weren't already aware that Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers, a.k.a. A-Rod, is an A-hole, he just tested positive for Covid-19. The kicker is that he lied about his vaccination status back in August, before the start of the football season. In August he said he was immunized. Hehe, that would be immunized, not vaccinated. Clever boy, or not. Ever since, he's been going around un-masked, hugging other players, attending crowded parties, etc--to help demonstrate his supposed vaccinated status.

Anal-Rod's actress girlfriend Shailene Woodley is a big fan of "homeopathic medicine", which is what A-rod chose instead of vaccination. This goes to show the depth of harm caused by ignorance, which usually comes from a lack of education. In A-Rod's case the ignorance, which can spread like a virus, is compounded by duplicity. How does someone get to be a lying douchebag in the first place? Maybe Wis. Union management can shed some light.

For those who aren't sure what homeopathic "medicine" is, here's a great quote from Woodley, who is not a doctor:

"I first heard about the benefits of eating clay from a taxi driver."

Notice how the dishonesty (and/or ignorance) is woven right into the construct of the sentence, as if there actually were any benefits. In reality, eating clay is a medical condition where the affected compulsively eat non-food substances. It's kind of like chewing on your fingernails, only much worse.

Today Ass-Rod punted when asked if he deliberately misled everyone (read: lied) when he claimed in August to have been vaccinated, er, immunized. Wanna bet that when he finally responds, he'll claim that he thought homeopathic treatment was the same as vaccination? Of course he will. He's a sleazeball, just like Packers Head Coach Matt Lafleur who condoned it.

And that brings us to Hoofers. Is it inevitable that people in positions of authority will be dishonest douchebags, or is it the position itself that turns them into that thing..? After much discussion and beer, our opinion is that it's mostly sleazy individuals or wannabe crooks who are drawn to positions of authority in the first place.

Everyone else would rather be sailing.

Hoofer Staff Suspected of More Thefts

Are UW/Hoofer staff at it again? In the past, student Wis. Union employees have been caught stealing money in the Rathskeller, and Hoofer staff have committed various crimes including theft and fraud and embezzlement, among other things.

To try to deter ongoing criminal behavior, Wisconsin Union management installed hundreds of surveillance cameras throughout the building. Cameras are ubiquitous in commercial areas like Outdoor UW and the Rat. In the small Outdoor rentals area alone (photo), there are no fewer than five surveillance cameras, with more in the hallway.

Blanket surveillance serves two purposes. For one, it deters theft and other crimes, for obvious reasons. Secondly, it allows Union managers to spy on persons of interest, individuals they don't like, cute girls, etc. Many Wis. Union managers are pervs who would do that. They'll argue that surveillance is necessary given the Rathskeller thefts and past thefts from Hoofers of outboard motors, tools, equipment, etc. that were probably committed by employees. In the Rathskeller thefts scandal, several students were handcuffed and dragged away, prompting some 20 other student employees to quit in protest. Naturally they didn't like the idea of being handcuffed themselves and taken away in front of friends and other people. Hence we can assume that everyone who quit was also stealing from the till.

At Hoofers and Outdoor programs, the situation is similar. What's to stop an employee from pretending to ring up a sale, then simply pocketing the money? It doesn't work when someone uses a credit card, but plenty of people pay in cash. T-shirts and other items disappear, and no one really knows or cares what happened.

Except Big Daddy, who is watching on a dozen surveillance cameras. Hell, they could probably create a 3D model of you, the coverage is that good. Not coincidentally, some of the cams provide a good look down a bikini, too.

So why did the Union remove its webcam of the Terrace? Hoofers also used to have a webcam that you could use to check the flag, see if there was a sloop avaliable, check lake conditions, etc., but not anymore. Surveillance is only for those in authority. The rest of us get surveilled.