Rocket Jockey! (Journalism)

 Rocket Jockey was an amazingly fun game for early windows about riding rockets, for racing, soccer, and what was natural for the time, combat with grapples. Quite a fun game, I'd recommend looking it up.

     Ah, sports. In America, we're talking American Rugby, Football, Basketball, NASCAR and Baseball. Not that there aren't a good many other sports practiced, it's just that American culture as a whole doesn't seem to appreciate things like Volleyball, Track&Field, Ice Skating, Quake, Gymnastics, Skiing, Target Shooting, Starcraft, and Swimming anywhere as much, almost as if they're "weak" sports. A pity really, as those are the ones (football aside) that are actually quite fun to watch.

     Now, I myself rarely do actually play sports.
     It has something to do with the fact that I honestly don't find them all that fun to play. Sports come across as serious business, and I'm simply not all that serious.



     It does make it somewhat interesting, however, when my cat decides to step on my keyboard while I'm typing. when other students, more knowledgeable in the subject than myself, talk about sports. I've heard play-by-play recounts of major games in school, and the students who played in the games will recount the highlights from when they last played. This behavior does seem to decrease with maturity, though, as while the sophmores continue with this behavior, the seniors will talk about other things at lunch, at least.

       I decided to do some more research onto the sports/influence thing, and I came across something that caught my attention, and seemed obvious in retrospect. While people of all ages seem to gain health benefits from playing sports, this is only true if they enjoy the sport. Should they not enjoy the sport they are playing, or not succeed to their standards for themselves, then depression can result. When the kids playing are little, they can set some really high standards.

     Most interesting, to me, however is that almost half of the results on google's first page on a search for "influence of high school sports" lead to essays, published online. Not articles, not blogs, essays. for students. I think the issue hasn't been in the spotlight for at least a year or two, because that's not the usual kind of result for something halfway interesting.

    Back on topic, the story we read in class about the coach who tried to commit suicide did bring up one point which I haven't seen in the research at all. What kind of effect do the parents of the student atheletes have? Both on the kids and administration. I did see something on there being a "parent posse" around one coach's training sessions.

My apologies for the lack of humor in this piece. I tried, but some of the humor here's running a little weak. Oh yes, one last thing. If rocket jockey existed as a sport I would watch it from home. I REALLY wouldn't want to be in the stands.