"How did you come up with this insane thing?"

That's the number one thing I hear. So now I'm gonna write it down and then I can just refer people to the website to look at it. But let's be honest. I'm probably going to run through the whole Mojo Kickball spiel with them as well. I can't help it. I love this game.

Anyway, like half the people in Austin, I am a web programmer (not a designer. I can't draw to save my life). And like most computer people, I am quite used to sitting in one place, for long, long periods of time in front of a computer, hacking out this and that. You know, like a Bio or something. Nevertheless, I decided that I definitely wanted to get some exercise, but was largely reluctant to pursue the normal routes -- jogging, exercise, going to the gym, etc etc. There was always the possibility of getting involved in a sport of some sort, but that posed difficulties of it's own.

First off, I suck. let's just get that out of the way. I don't have a lick of athletic ability. When I run, it looks like someone with their hair on fire, trying to break-dance. Needless to say when I played sports -- even the co-rec sports -- I would get yelled at for some damn fool thing or another. There's always some over-zealous, competitive jerk-wad who can't think of anything beyond winning the game. And he always wanted to get in my face. I don't know, maybe he was mad because he didn't make his Dell sales quota for that month, or his boat got dinged while he was getting drunk at Devil's Cove. Whatever.

And then of course there were games like softball and baseball leagues that wouldn't take you onto the co-rec leagues unless you could bring a female teammate with you. The reason - to fulfill these unfortunate policies that you had to have so many women on a team. What's more, there were even more policies for co-rec sports that had new rules stating you had to throw to a woman or have a woman bat or do something that just reinforced the notion that women were not as good as men at the sport. Hey, I suck. Why don't you make a rule that says you have to throw to me?

I remembered the days of recess, when I just went out to play. it didn't really feel like exercise, because I was having too much fun. So I started thinking about what a fun game would be like -- one where there was no need for these "separate but equal"-style policies, and of course, Kickball came to mind.

At the time I was considering this, Kickball had not become as dominant as it has now. Even so, I didn't really think that there was a big draw for just Kickball -- well unless you add a lot of booze. But booze could be a draw for going to the dentist office for that matter. Of course, the only problem with me getting drunk in the dug-out of a Kickball game was that, even though it would probably be fun, I probably wouldn't get much exercise doing it. So I started working out the details of a multi-ball kickball game. One where you would have to run around a lot.

I shouldn't have to tell you, that even adding one more ball into a regular Kickball game adds a degree of complexity that is hard to ameliorate with any additional rules. So it took me a while to flesh out all the initial rules. I started coming up with different roles and positions especially able to even out the game. Soon, the game started looking a lot less like kickball and a lot more like... well, I don't know... something else.

There was a lot of writing and re-writing. Some thinking, some deleting, and then more re-writing as I kept thinking of every aspect of the game that I could. On top of all this, I really tried to keep my main focuses intact.

1. Extremely inclusive of everyone
2. Active
3. Fun

"Being inclusive" wasn't as hard as I thought. There were so many roles and ways to play the game that there was no need to add "handicaps" to the game to accomodate for weaker players. Everyone is equal. In retrospect, I am somewhat akin to the idea that most sports were developed by jocks and for jocks. So naturally, there are a lot of aspects to most sports that simply favor one or two types of straight-up athletic ability --like lifting a heavy rock, or running to the fence faster, or maybe peeing while standing up. I don't know. But it's not as impossible as one would think to make a sport that draws favor from a wider base of skills. Heck, I did it on accident.

And because there is such a wide base of skills that are beneficial to Mojo Kickball (including using your brain), you never really know who's gonna be the bad-ass on your team. And no single person has nearly enough influence to swing a game. But as a collective, people can completely dominate another team, no matter how strong or fast the other team is. Well, ok. Maybe I exaggerate. I suppose if you were playing against the Superfriends, you would probably lose. There I said it.

So there it is. Mojo Kickball. I'm not looking to make money off of it. I just want you to play it and have fun.... and for it to revolutionize the planet. Is that too much to ask?