This is my first time using the Paint Drying option here. This basically just feels like a lounge area to discuss whatever is going on, so here goes. It’s noon December 5th 2024. My daughter came home yesterday from school, ate, and then went and in our guest bed, passed out, woke up, and then threw up. Now for all you parents of a typical child, which I am also, he now being 28. Something as simple as a throw up would just lead you to say to your child, what’s going on, how do you feel?? I see your question and raise you, Autistic and nonverbal. What does all this mean? It means I kept her home today (even though she pretty much seems normal now) and I’ve just been watching fight clips on my phone all day.

Those of you that know me, know I have a deep passion for boxing. I have for as early as I can remember. Watching Fights, recording fights, and inevitably building an absolutely massive boxing library with well over 40 years of compiling fight tapes. I’m not exaggerating when I tell you I recorded everything that related to The Sweet science from 1985 basically until VCR‘s became obsolete. And I still have all those fight tapes stored in a guest bedroom in my basement. I’ve mentioned this before, but I wanna say it again because I’m sitting here with a “maybe” sick child so what else am I doing? When I say everything guys, we’re talking in the 80s and 90s when you couldn’t just pull up a clip, I would set my VCR timer to record SportsCenter and all the other news outlets every day and any snippet or mention of something boxing 🥊 I kept. 

HBO BOXING 
USA Tuesday Night Fights 
ESPN Top Rank Boxing 
Prime Sports Fight Night at the Forum 
MSG Boxing 
Schlitz malt liquor boxing series
ABC, NBC, CBS boxing. 
Every Pay-Per-View purchased & recorded. 
Showtime Boxing 

I could legitimately go on and on. I even had my name and address listed in the back of boxing magazines to trade fight tapes. What I would basically do is take my pristine copy of something like Larry Holmes vs Michael Spinks 1 lets say and if you wanted to add that to your collection, I would make a copy of it in exchange for a fight that you had on your list that I was looking for. There was a whole bunch of us in the magazines back in those days doing this exact thing. Many years later, in the late 90s early 2000s I had a website, Boxing for sale or trade, as that’s what people were doing from the outset, and we purchased many a tape from one collector in particular, in the late 80’s thru the early 90’s. He wouldn’t trade because he had the largest collection, the dude literally needed nothing, we used to get 60 rounds for 60 bucks. I say we because me and the guy that I still speak about on here, that is my horror movie guy, was also my boxing guy, so we were both doing this together, compiling our funds and figuring out which fights we would order every month to fill in the gaps in our collection. Again it was a very different time, a time where we would just read in the magazine about some old Muhammad Ali fight or whoever, and we would see pictures of, so we would order it. Getting that tape in the mailbox, would be like Christmas morning to us every time, we would sit in our basements, his parents house or mine, remember we were both like 12/13 years old when we started on this ordering obsession. Watching those tapes we’d just hoot and holler, watching fights that were sometimes 10, 20 or maybe even 30 years old. And sometimes they were even older. Some came from old film reels that people transferred to VHS, we went to every length. Years later, I had gotten so invested, that I had people literally all over the world recording fights for me, all in different areas, they simply weren’t shown here. Like, I had a guy in the UK that would record fights off Pro Box Network and the other different channels over there long before you could access them here in the states, and then he would send them to me. That’s how I saw Lennox Lewis’s like first 15 fights. He wasn’t on TV in the USA until his 16th fight, against former Belt Holder Mike Weaver on TVKO PPV. 

What does all this have to do with anything? Well, I’ve been sitting in my basement, which is where my daughter has decided we were going to spend the day, watching highlights of Nate Diaz fights. If any of you actually made it this far, which I don’t blame you if you didn’t. You might be saying to yourself, Nate Diaz, that’s not boxing. You would be correct, that is MMA, or as many only know it UFC. The thing is Nate basically stood and boxed in all his fight so he’s a personal favorite of mine because of his style. I’m not even going to go down the 10 paragraph more rabbit hole that is my UFC adventure. Let’s just say I ordered UFC 1, from my home and I’ve watched all of those too. 

Nate Diaz, what a beast. Not a glossy unbeaten record, never really gained any major championships but what a fighter. What a personality. Him beating Connor McGregor in their first fight is still an MMA highlight for me. And he deserved the decision in the rematch as well, which he didn’t get.

Nate Diaz would’ve been an absolute MONSTER in the early days of bare-knuckle boxing. Back when there was no limit on the number of rounds, so matches would be fought to a conclusion. 

Being the exercise freak that I am I marvel over Nate’s Cardio!! His cardio is insane. I’ve never seen a guy who can take so much punishment and he’s always stronger at the end. He just relentlessly keeps coming.

Even when Nate Diaz loses, he wins. And he loses often, but he’ll always do something, and he’s always the stronger fighter at the end. He’ll shake up a champion and then laugh and point at him rather than finishing the show. Nate is Nate but a couple of the things he has (had) I don’t think you can train. 
A legendary chin. This can not be trained.
Also legendary cardio. This can be trained but also not to the level that he’s at, I believe there are some genetics involved. 

Anyway, back to YouTube.