Ms I 1999
By Jabber
Friday morning

On the way over to the Veterans Memorial, we carpooled with a gentleman who
had rented a minivan.  Along for the ride, among others, were the famous
GeneX, Linda McLaughlin, Tre', Oriole99, and myself.  It was quite ironic in
that I was telling Linda the story about seeing her at the NPC Nationals and
when she got only 5th in the tall class of the fitness competitors, how I
let out a boo that the whole crowd heard.  She said, "Oh yeah, I heard that
on the tape!"  Small world, no?  Linda looked great, sporting straight hair,
and covered up, except for her incredible and large calves showing for all
who just took a "casual" glance at her.

This year, there were two major differences from previous years in event
structure.  1) They put the Fitness event together with the Women's
bodybuilding event, and packaged the Men's bodybuilding event (does anyone
actually go to them? :-) ) separately.  I personally like this idea as a) I
think those who like Women's bodybuilding probably would also like women's
fitness, too (although we all have our favorites as to which we prefer
more), but not necessarily Men's bodybuilding, and b) if you only like the
"big" women, some of today's fitness competitors are getting "big" enough so
you can get your fill of "big" women (I know I'm that way).  2) They put the
Fitness and Women's bodybuilding prejudging right in the Expo, and NOT in
the Veteran's Memorial Auditorium.

To me, the jury's still out as to if that's a good or bad idea.  When I
first arrived (other than seeing a now massive April Hunter - life's good
:-) ), when I saw the arrangement where it was standing room only for the
prejudging (there was a token amount of seats), I let out a couple
expletives.  But afterward, I did start to gravitate pretty darn close, and
recalled some of those expletives as very close pictures were obtained.
Plus although my back started to go out from all that standing and being on
tip-toes, my calves probably looked "almost" as good as Linda McLaughlin's
from all the calf raises I did to get some decent pics over other's heads.