DLG Ice Factory and the Reverend Butter put on an invitational ice carving competition in Houston on January 10th. The event was well organized and well attended despite some mildly unpredictable weather. I was privileged to compete as one of the “Seven” and was glad that I went. Here’s a photo gallery on this site and here are some other links about the event: khou.com slideshow, Houston Chronicle article, chron.com photo gallery, blog video.

    This event was similar to past events in Lewisville (near Dallas) put on by Dean DeMaris of Ice FX. Dean didn’t hold his event during the holiday season this year, but the Magnificent 7 event was a nice substitute right after the new year. Both events have so far been invitationals that provided carvers with an appearance fee and provided food and lodging, which eliminates a lot of the financial risk for the participants. On the other hand, prize money has been mostly winner take all (or nearly all).

    The Magificent Seven event tried to work in sevens wherever it could. There were seven carvers each carving seven blocks of ice, which in total is about seven tons of ice. Each carver had seven hours to complete his piece. They even got me room 711 at the hotel. (Bubin was probably in 777!) However, the event missed out on the rare 7/7/07 opportunity of about a year and a half ago, but maybe the Reverend Butter could make up for that by having a $7777 first prize next year? (this year’s prize was $2000)

    The carvers present included myself, Buddy Rasmussen, Rich Bubin, Ben Rand, Dan Rebholz, Robert Childers, and Vegas Iceman (that’s what he wanted to be called!). All but two in this list have carved at Olympic events and all were a threat to win the single top Judges Prize. Since I was well aware of this, and also pretty tired from my overnight drive from Mobile/New Orleans, I opted to leave the other Magnificent Six to compete for the top prize while I sold out for the only other prize: People’s Choice.

    My strategy for the People’s Choice award was simple: an obnoxious attitude and almost no plan except to be flexible. I actually only really carved six blocks, because the first thing I did was plop one block down on its side and inscribe: “YOU TELL ME WHAT TO CARVE!” I then carved each of the other six blocks, one by one, while each stood on top of the inscribed block. The subject of each carving was determined mostly by the audience and partly by what I felt like carving more. A lot of the ice ended up as snow on top of the audience (or on me) and the kids especially loved it! During the event, I carved: a snowfilled Hello Kitty! face, a horse head, an angel, a miniature Houston Texans logo, an electric guitar, a dragon, Snoopy (a.k.a., Joe Cool), and finally, a speed carved lion, because I wasn’t really paying attention to the clock near the end. Fortunately, for me, several of the requests matched up with designs that I’ve recently added to the site (horse head, dragon, angel) so they were fresh in my mind. Carving Snoopy was also fun, because I was able to borrow a smaller wood version that Buddy Rasmussen had just happened to bring. (I’m guessing the requester got the idea from the mini-Snoopy) The People’s Choice prize was determined by a count of paper tokens that the audience members dropped into a box in front of each station. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t check the boxes a couple times during the event to see if my strategy was working!

    In the end, the strategy did work and I won People’s Choice while Rich Bubin got the $2000 Judges’ Prize. I walked away with an additional $250, a really cool chainsaw from that nutter Butter (see below), and that pretty satisfied feeling you get when a plan comes together. It was a fun time and a great event (the Reverend even did a carving performance after the event, as if he didn’t have enough to do!) and I hope they have it again next year.

my brand-new Butterized gas saw that I won as part of the People’s Choice award

    One last thing: the bucket incident. You know you’re about to go off the deep end when the Reverend Butter asks you to bring it down a notch. I guess the best I can say for myself is that I didn’t start it. I can only hope that it’s finished, but I’m sure I won’t know for some time.

    While I was happily carving away on my first piece, early in the competition. I was rudely interrupted by a blast of water to my face that came from the crowd. I looked up to see Dan Rebholz walking by and shouting something about “I’ve got your back!” Apparently, Dan had taken it on himself to “defend” the crowd from the playful snow blasts coming off my tools. I shook it off and tried to ignore it, but after Dan walked away, I unfortunately announced something along the lines of “Just wait till payback time because I’m going to use a bucket!” Dan obviously didn’t hear what I said, because a short time later, I saw him wandering around behind my carving station, VERY CLOSE TO MY BUCKET OF WATER! I guess it was “Put up or shut up” time! After that, there wasn’t much thinking involved, I just grabbed the bucket. He saw what I was doing and started to run off. Now there’s no way that I’m going to catch Dan while I’m trying to lug along a five gallon bucket of water, but that’s when fate sealed the deal. Dan slipped and fell and I delivered as promised. But much to my surprise, soaking wet Dan was not happy! (Not so surprising in hindsight, though) I think he briefly considered destroying the horse head carving I was working on, but then probably realized that it would just score me some sympathy People’s Choice tokens. He stomped off, complaining that there was still six hours to go go and he was already soaking wet! At that point, I considered his point of view, but as I was already pretty soaked just from carving, I wasn’t too concerned about Dan dying from pneumonia. But it was pretty clear that I’d upped the ante too much and I later went over to Dan with a half-full bucket and offered him a free shot. He declined then, but it’s not very comforting that the line goes: “Revenge is a dish best served COLD...” Better watch my back!

P.S. Dumping buckets of water on Dan Rebholz is an extremely risky and hazardous activity that can easily result in death or serious injury. Do not try this at home!