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I decided to devote a separate post to my impressions of today's Polar Plunge, apart from the pictures and videos of me in my previous post. In all, I wasn't too pleased with things. I hate to criticize a charitable event with many volunteer contributors, but my criticism will be constructive.
The main problem was with the tents. There were two heated tents near the plunging area for men and women to go into before and after jumping in the water. The tents were not labeled male/female, nor was there anyone there who knew which was which. Several people were standing by the tents, wondering which was which, until I unilaterally declared one of them to be the male tent. Since I was standing there anyway, I shared this declaration with several waves of confused plungers, until the designation became established.
Also, last year the guy tent (and I'd imagine the ladies tent as well) had a large tarp on the ground so people didn't have to stand on snowy, dirty ground. This year, there were two tarps nicely folded in the corner. I looked around for someone official to ask if they were to be spread out, but finding nobody, I went ahead and spread one of them out somewhat. Not all the way, since it was huge, but enough to make room for anyone who wished to use it.
Another point of contention is that there were no bleachers there, unlike last year. Thus, all the spectators had to stand in a ring around the ice, which kind of cluttered things up.
Finally, on a more trivial note, there were several categories of plungers, and the best contestant in each category won a prize. Local and state law enforcement officials did the judging, and they were horrible. Worse than the worst referees I've ever seen, and even worse than that French judge at the 2002 Winter Olympics. Here's Exhibit A: the Scantily Clad competition. These are the two competitors in this category:
While the guy on the left is not pleasant to look at, he is clearly more scantily-clad, and should undoubtedly have won the competition (note the looks of horror on the faces of the two people to his right). But alas, he did not.
Next was the couple's competition. The first couple was two guys; one wearing short Euro-shorts, and the other wearing shiny silver pants. They were reminiscent of Ace and Gary, and were quite funny. The next couple was two people dressed in Sith Lord robes and carrying light sabers. The final couple was some guy and his daughter. There is really no reason why Ace and Gary should not have won, but they were robbed by the Star Wars couple.
I did not see most of the costume contest, since I was in the tent after my jump, but I hear that some guy and his daughters, who were dressed like princesses, won that one. A princess, of course, is the most generic costume ever. Why not award someone who showed a little creativity? It seems like, in the case of the scantily-clad and costume contests, all you have to do to win is be a kid. Ridiculous.
I will add two things I liked about the day. This year, a platform was added at the jumping point, which made it easier to get a good takeoff with out slipping on the ice. Also, the participants were grouped by category, and the winner of each contest was announced immediately. These were two good changes from last year.
UPDATE: The father of the princesses WAS A COP! He even jumped in his uniform. So the judges gave the prize to one of their own. Completely unfair!
Since I did not jump, I was able to see all the jumpers in the first three competitions and I think the judges picked the winner not on who was the best, but on who they thought would want the prize the most.
ReplyDeleteThe scantily clad prize was a gift certificate for to the Persian Peacock. They obviously thought a teenage girl would enjoy that more than a hairy guy who obviously already has some interesting underwear to choose from.
The couple prize was a gift certificate for a night at the Anniversary Inn, a local B&B. The star wars couple, who were married last week, may have had more use for that then two teenage boys.
And the costume contest prize was a years worth of ice cream. I do think that Craig's was the best but there were several other good costumes that were more deserving that the princess sisters. But they were older, and who loves ice cream more than cute little kids.
But I second Craig, the costume judges were really bad. You don't pick a winner based on who wants the prize the most, you pick the best. And they might be able to do that more if they get prizes that appeal to a wider audience.