Tree Of Woe

Can you imagine a Spartan-style Ride of the Valkyrie playing here?

For those of you who appreciates great classic movies or if you are a Arnold Schwarzenegger fan, when you hear the words “Tree of Woe” your mind immediately snaps to the 1982 blockbusting movie Conan the Barbarian.  “Look at the strength in your body, the desire in your heart, I gave you this! Such a waste. Contemplate this on the tree of woe. Crucify him!” Thulsa immortalised the words “Tree of Woe”…. But, alas, this is not that Tree of Woe. It’s still a tree…well…kind of a tree.  More a bush, but it caused Pete some woe…

The Tree of Woe. That's Conan, not Pete.

The idea came when we watched 300… Where there was a mighty leap by one of the Spartans, getting some sweet, sweet air before lopping off a bloke’s arm with a scimitar-looking sword. It is highly unlikely to have such a massive jump if you don’t have a steady launch, so we contemplated this for a bit. How could we make Pete launch and also catch some sweet, sweet air before doing at least mildly entertaining at the end. Since chopping off one of our arms with a sword is out of the question, we came to the conclusion of using the Tree of Woe as the enemy. The hypothetical Persian whose arm gets lopped off in a great display of awesomeness.

We suited up and went bargain hunting. Before long we found some awesome mouse ears for Pete, as well as a sword. Okay, not a real sword per say….more like a crazy looking dagger thingy decorated in a gold handle and sheath. Not very big or intimidating, but it’d have to do. Returning home, the Tree of Woe beckoned Pete. He was mesmerized. He couldn’t help himself, it was as if in a trance…. Okay, not really, but he was excited to do this skit.

The hypothetical shield Pete launched from to slay the Tree of Woe

Since there was no Spartan with a huge shield to give him a boost as he leapt into oblivion, he clambered up a wall like a nimble cat in search of his next snack, and ripped out his sword. Okay, unsheathed his dagger. We were waiting in anticipation. This was going to be totally legendary. Pete stood on the wall, trying to keep his balance, his feet curling around the single brick wall like a vulture’s claws. As he prepared to do the intro, we mocked him and made some rather disturbing squawking sounds to emphasize how ridiculous this whole idea was. He did the intro. “I’m Pistol Pete, and this is the Tree of Woe!!!!”

Cue laughter and Ride of the Valkyrie playing in the background… “You can tell your Persian friends, they can go fishing!!” he roared. It was kind of weird, seen as there were no Persians or their friends anywhere near...  In fact, Google estimates that should you drive to Persia, it would take 11 days and 14 hours of constant driving to cover the insane 19 701,3 km to Persia.

And there he leapt! I must hand it to him, he caught some sweet, sweet air with that jump! He even arched his back, dagger above the head. He captured the spirit of Sparta magnificently! After what seemed like an eternity of awesomeness he smashed into the Tree of Woe. It was a ruffle of twigs snapping and laughter, with the dry leaves swirling about after impact. He was trapped in the tree, so we obviously had to help him out then. Roughly strong handing him out of the tree like a East Coast pimp, he got scratched pretty good!

The weapon of choice. The heroic dagger!

The dagger. The dagger was still clutched in his hand when we pulled him out of the tree. It’s remarkable he didn’t let go of the dagger mid air or on impact, but like a true hero he held it like a boss! He mumbled something. “It really hurts. It burns” he muttered as we admired the scratches the Tree of Woe gave him on his torso.

I think it must have hurt quite a bit, as he exclaimed “I’m on Fire” with a hoarse voice.  There was quite a fair amount of scratches on Pete, and he took it like a man. Even on his legs and thighs were some scratches where the Tree of Woe took it’s toll. Overall I think that the Tree of Woe went very well. His form was good, his landing was well planned and the execution was flawless. I might rate that a 9 out of 10.

He was a tad jittery afterwards, so we offered him some cold drink to add some sugar to his adrenaline fueled body. Drawing inspiration from this skit, Pete decided that it’s time to step it up, and is working on a brand new skit called Bed of Roses. As I understand the basic premise is to make a landing of cardboard boxes, true stunt style, top it up with some trimmed rose and thorn bush branches and pieces. Then he will apparently proceed to jump from and obstacle, onto the boxes. He says it’s going to be the roof  of the house.

Tree of Woe takes no prisoners.

If he looked like this from the Tree of Woe, just imagine what horrors the Bed of Roses has in store for him. It’s going to be legendary.

 

I guess that’s it then for today 🙂

 

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Stay awesome, & stay safe! – JV