We have it on good authority (from our Swedish pal) that Kubb is played after barbeques all over Sweden, all summer, by blond, blue-eyed Viking descendents mellowed by generations of complacent city dwelling into thinking that lobbing blocks of wood towards other blocks of wood is an electrifying way to spend an hour or so. Okay, we might have added on a bit there.

Garin throws the first toss:

Matt lobbs a stick towards Time Out’s blocks (which isn’t nearly as dirty as it sounds):

Theresa, Colin, Joey, Garin, Hollis and Max share a laugh at the other team’s paltry throwing:

And Alan, free Sparks in hand, shows how to win through creativity, by hiding a block behind the untouchable King:

Okay, so we didn’t keep it there. But we won three straight games anyway.

Matt, Theresa and Hollis demonstrate how the game is won:

You can view all the pictures here.

Threadless, after the drinking session at the Clipper afterwards, we hope you’re on your guard for some heavy competition both on the field and in the bar…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flip_cup

Go directly to bar. Get RESPONSIBLE.

Who knew the express train was so express? Instead of paying attention to the local versus express train, some of our team members (Hanly and Marlina, ahem) hopped onto the D train in prep for a game of Kubb.

Hanly “Isn’t that our stop.”
Marlina “Yeah, I guess we’ll get out at the next one.”
Passing the Natural History Museum…
Hanly “Hmm, I guess we’ll get out at the next one.”
Marlina’s jaw starts to drop open. “Um, how far is this going to take us?:
Hanly “I think we’re going to Harlem.” Hanly jumps up to check the map. “This takes us to 125th st.”
Marlina “Uh, I guess we’ll transfer back downtown.”
The braniac duo head downtown on another D train from 125th street back to Lincoln Center to hop on a B train. The next B turns into an express train and the girls quickly decided against boarding. A half hour late to the field and cameras everywhere filming, wait for it, wait for it, Night at the Museum…2, Kubb begins.

There was a very definite uphill/downhill advantage going on at the field but The FADER still managed to lose to L’Oreal in the dark despite the final game with an uphill advantage. There were several questionable side-swing throws coming from L’Oreal but L’Oreal asked FADER to excuse the throws due to inebriation. One of FADER’s hardcore competitive players began to argue and walked away to avoid confrontation and punches. (She is easily riled.) Fair? I think not.

We did have our moments of brilliance with Matt nailing a Kubb or two and our moments of idiocy with Suzan, get the dog out of your hands and focus moments! Cara proved her athletic prowess as usual. Marlina and Gabe rallied to play soccer to let the true competitive and athletic skills unleash. Kaela glared at struggling teammates and Hanly took off her Sauconys to get a feel for the grass.

We capped off our night outside the museum by watching bugs drawn to the lights sizzle to their death.

This past week was amazing. Aesop Rock was on point.
Sean’s photos are incredible.
Jelmer and Brandon were great as matching Olympic swimmers.
We had some special guests from northern California including the captain of the UCLA water polo team. Man, that kid had an arm.
This week is going to be the best ever. It has to be because it’s the last week ever!
BE THERE! YO LA TENGO!
Super Hero costumes encouraged, but you must have the courage to back them up on the court.
I urge everyone to check out http://www.bkdball.com/dball.html and keep up to date.

Down 2 games to nuthin, Heeb decided to dance the Hora and suddenly their luck changed for the better.We’re not saying there is a god (or that said god intervenes in games of KUBB) but it’s hard not to be amazed by Heeb’s stunning victory!

That’s right, after suffering his near season-ending hamstring injury, Johnny was back and a full XRT team was ready to take this game by storm. 

With the return of Johnny Mars, Venus didn’t stand a chance against Team XRT.

After finally figuring out that the game wasn’t pronounced “cub”, we grabbed our Kubb sticks and went to work with two big comeback wins against Venus Zine. 

This proved to be the first victory for Chicago’s Finest.  Now even finer with one actual win!

You see the shot above? That killed a man! Which much to our chagrin did not earn us any bonus points… but we did get a really great picture of a frozen high-five..

L’Oreal may have played a nearly flawless game, but we’re blaming it on the beer..

First Class

Who in the what now? Team Shark Attacks fell to the undefeated Total F*cking Nightmare Storm during the Kubb matchup. We had no idea was Kubb was. All we knew was that it looked like an item that you could buy in Ikea next to the frozen Swedish meatballs.

Turns out it was less annoying than Bocce Ball and more fun than Cornhole. If Kubb is truly a Viking game, then I should of prepped by playing a good ‘ol fashioned round of Crossbows and Catapults.

Team Shark Attacks unsure of the murky water ahead

Rannell throws a mean wood.

Can you handle the flash AND the pressure, mr. photographer? CAN YOU?!?!?!?

Clayton makes a big play. Lizelle is the only one somewhat interested.

If I’ve learned anything from Lost, it is to throw together or die alone.

[ed. note: wtf, Shirtless Tom! What’s a shirt doing in this picture?]

Well, we had yet another rain filled Sunday at McCarren Park Pool but as always we still had a blast.

Cub Scouts represented and played even better than the Care Bears at times.

The line up was cut at the last minute from 4 bands to 3 due to a travel issue, but the three that played were good. I can always relate to the lyrics “I put some whiskey, in my whiskey”.
Some of the females that played dogeball this Sunday were the hottest of the summer and according to that female vote Ben H@ynes wins hottest male.

This next weekend is going to be huge.

The only Hip Hop line up of the summer rolls through featuring AESOP ROCK!
See you there.

There are some smartypants teams in our San Francisco Office League. No, not you Revolver/Midheaven SLOTH!

We’re thinking those liberal know-it-mosts over at KQED and Hyphen Magazine probably played their fare share of educational video games like Number Munchers and Oregon Trail (well, the hunting part was cool at least) and to this day, likely don’t even BOTHER with spell check.

Yeah, so… we’re going to even the playing field and do an ALL PICTURE EDITION of last week’s game of KUBB (pronounced KOOOOOOOOOOOB).

For those of you who DON’T know, KUBB is an ancient Viking game, similar to lawn bowling, only much more BRUTAL.

The goal is to knock down the other team’s pins. The winning team then gets to burn down the losing team’s village.

Here goes. If you guys INSIST on narrating events, feel free to leave some illuminating comments and/or post yer own recap.

More pics (and even less words!) below: