Photo Week 43: Hanford Howl

Repeat Champs!

Hawaii 4-2-0

Photo Week 6: Ultimate Returns

I've started playing ultimate again more regularly the past few weeks. Last Saturday and Sunday, and then again this Saturday and Sunday. There are a few fun tournaments coming up this Spring, and I hope to be both in shape and also get my throws back to normal.

Ba-doop

This week was a lot of fun. Wednesday was a fun and productive day. I started out with a round of golf at Wayne, which has a great Monday/Wednesday morning deal of $14 for 18 holes. The backside is short, with four par-4's and five par 3's, which is one part of the cheap green fee.

I don't really consider this golfing prep for the Winter Gathering, but the more I hear about it, the more I want to make the trip down to Vegas. A spot at CK's place might seal the deal! We can toss the disc, it'll be grand. I think I was +17 over 14 holes, because I skipped a few holes on the backside to breeze past a clog of golfers. Averaging slightly over bogey for a round of golf is a great round for me, probably my best.

After golf, I visited five middle schools near where I'll be moving at the end of this week. I dropped off a substitute page with my picture and contact info, and a resume, and talked with a vice principal at one of the schools in regards to coaching opportunities. I was well-received at all of the schools, and I hope they'll call me up for subbing once the school year gets underway.

Wednesday night I threw a little shin-dig which involved six boxes of pizza and ended with me and three bikini-clad women in the hot tub trying to catch glimpses of the meteor shower through the clouds (we didn't have much luck). Good times.

Thursday was spent with Dr. Chako. First, we hiked Rattlesnake Ledge and had some good views, although a bit cloudy:



(Mt. Si, with the peak covered in clouds)

After our hike we hit Snoqualmie Casino and played some poker. I got reamed playing 4/8 and won one pot in an hour of 7-handed play, and I only won the blinds. Not only did I only win one hand, I had a lot of second-best hands, or best hands until the river, and then second-best hands. It was frustrating, and I am glad I set a stop-loss at $100 before I tilted the rest off.

I took a breather from poker and wandered the casino for a bit. The Snoqualmie Casino has a really nice setup, and as Dr. C pointed out, I think it is the first casino I've been in that has windows you can look out! The view is great north through the Snoqualmie Valley. I did a lap of the casino to see what games they spread, and I was looking for a Pai Gow table to waste some time at and hopefully not lose much money, and let Dr. C play more than just an hour of poker. I found a $3 blackjack table and played for about 20 minutes and only lost one hand. The dealer must have bust six times while I was there, and the whole table was loving it. I got out while I was ahead, and watched Dr. C go nuts on his last orbit at 3/5 no limit to just about double his stack.

We left the casino to get back to Seattle in time to play softball, but it started POURING when we reached Seattle, and we changed plans to racquetball instead. He whooped me in the first game, then I won the second game when he served to my forehand every point, then he won the third and fourth games handily. It is always fun playing with Dr. C, because I always learn a lot, and usually play up to him and get better--and then go whoop up on my friends the next week :)

This weekend was ECC/Spawnfest, a large ultimate frisbee tournament with some of the best teams in the world. One set of fields hosts teams from all across the world--Japan, Colombia and Australia were all teams I saw. At my set of fields were more local teams from Victoria to Portland. We went 3-1 on day 1, putting us in the bottom of the A pool. We lost our first game today to the #1 seed, and then lost our second game and headed back to Seattle.

4th of July Weekend (Quasi-Uber)

The time? 7:02pm, Sunday evening. I'm registered for two micro-stakes poker tournaments that begin in the next half hour, I'm about to fix myself a gin and tonic, and start writing about my weekend. Why don't you grab a drink, sit down and relax with me?

Finished making the G&T and found that one of the tournaments started and I missed the first hand. I would have folded, but the hand ended up being Q's vs. Aces, and the Aces turned quads... not a bad start to a tourney for that guy!

Music for the evening will be Dave Matthews Band, "Under the Table and Dreaming". I was big into Dave Matthews Band in high school, I went to three or four concerts out at the gorge, but then they became so popular with MTV and the frat crowd I was a bit ashamed to like the band. I've continued to listen to them, but on the sly. Tonight I break my silence: I like DMB still, go suck an egg if you think less of me now.

Music, check. Poker with lots of folding, check. G&T, check. Alright, I think I'm set to start recapping the weekend.

Friday marked the first of a three-day Potlatch ultimate frisbee tournament in Redmond, WA. I've been going to the tournament for the past eight or nine years, and when the 4th of July falls on Friday, the weekend, or Monday, the tournament is a 3-day affair instead of just two days. Three days makes the tournament stand apart from the other weekend ultimate tournaments in the summer, not to mention the 100 teams from all across the nation (and Mexico, and Canada!).



I decided to only play one day this year, for a couple of reasons. First, I've been wanting to go to Tahuya Day with Tessa and Jared for the last few years, and I have always picked Potlatch over Tahuya Day. Last year, I made plans to only play one day at Potlatch, then partake in Tahuya Day, but the weather was craptastic, and I would rather be playing ultimate in the rain than sitting in a lawn chair drinking margaritas in the rain, so I stayed at the ultimate fields. The other reason I chose to only play one day at Potlatch this year is because I'm fucking rusty! I play ultimate once every other week, and that just is not enough to be in shape or have consistent throws.

Poker update: knocked out of my first tournament when AJ on an AJ8 flop loses to a naked frush draw that gets there after the money goes in. Next tourney starts up in 7 minutes.

Friday ultimate at Potlatch was great. The weather couldn't have been better, it was around 80 degrees without much wind. We won all three of our games for the first time I can remember in a long time. I think my team a few years ago, maybe even last year, won all three games one day, but the team was a weird mix of really good college guys and crappy old timers like myself--so it wasn't a true Tacoma stink team--like this year! All of the games were tight, with the first going the distance at 16-14 in a game to 15 (a mini-Federer/Roddick match for the tennis lovers out there). The team was playing well, but I made a lot of throw aways, which was frustrating. The team didn't care much, because the throw aways did not lose us any of the games, but the throws I was botching are throws that I *can* make, but I wasn't making due to my rusty game. I should have holstered the cannon, but couldn't resist.

Our game schedule on Friday was such that we played a game, had a 2nd round bye, played a game, had a 4th round bye, then played our final game. The schedule kept us fresh, and even better than keeping us fresh, allowed me to pick up my motorcycle from the shop during our 4th round bye! I got a call from the shop at some point in the morning, and couldn't wait to get my bike! When I got to the shop, it didn't take long for me to pay and for them to wheel the bike around front and get me on my way. Before leaving, I noticed that they had not changed the front tire, which I thought we had agreed on. They did not bill me for it, but the front tire is just as old as the back tire that blew out on me a month ago, and it needs to be changed soon. I inspected the tire, and it still has some tread on it, so there is no imminent danger, but I am dreading taking it back to the shop now, after waiting a month for this fix.

I made it back to Potlatch for the last round, this time on the motorcycle. The ride back to the fields felt a little weird. Not good or bad, but just a little different. The clutch is still a lot tighter than I am used to, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. I am used to the clutch catching right in the middle of the release, but now it catches about 3/4'ths of the way when I release the clutch lever. This makes shifting between gears a lot faster, but it also makes the initial shift from idle to 1st gear a bit longer. Again, some good to it, and some bad, but now that the weekend is over and I have gotten used to it, I think I prefer the tighter clutch. The fact that the back tire has a larger diameter than the old back tire, and the new tread on the back tire vs. the worn front tire also affect the ride.

One of the fun new sideline games at Potlatch this year was a Dare game based on cards. How the game works is a deck (or two, or three?) was passed out on Thursday night before the tournament started Friday. The goal of the game is to find the next higher up card than yours and ask them to give you a dare. If they do not think up a dare for you in one minute, you get to swap cards with them--also, if you complete their dare, you swap cards with them. I never got a card, nor was I too interested in playing because of only being there one day, but a lot of my teammates were getting into the game and trying to work their way up the ranks. The two best dares I saw on Friday were one guy licking the entire length of field tape (tape is put down at Potlatch along the sideline), which was about 100 yards. He was on all fours crawling along licking the tape from end to end for a king! The other dare was a girl going for a jack, and she first had to get this guy and all his friends cold beers, and then make out with another girl of this guy's choosing. By the time I left on Friday, my friend Josh was up to a queen. I stayed to watch the showcase game between Team USA and Team Canada, while eating free pizza and drinking free beer. Team USA won 16-14.

I had such a good time on Friday at Potlatch that I was beginning to question my decision to only play one day, but I'm glad I followed through with Tahuya Day. I got up early and met at Tessa and Jared's for an 8:00am caravan down to Tahuya, WA. The weather was flawless, and I was on my bike for the second day in a row, and it felt great. The caravan down was fun, and I'm glad to report it was uneventful. We rolled into Tahuya right around 11am after a stop at the QFC for a hundred cans of beer and some ice. The guys cracked open beers as soon as we dropped off our stuff, and I got to meet Tessa's family and friends. Her dad grew up in the house, and I can see why he never left.



They've got a compound similar to my friend Marc's, where Tessa's parents own one house, her uncle owns the next one down, and her cousin owns the third in the string, right along the water. The porch is huge, and there were probably 20 of us up there sitting in the sun and shade drinking. We got one game of liar's dice in before the parade started up, and Brian put me to shame at the end game. We were tied at five dice each, to Ben and Erin's zero dice (noobs!), and he ran a clinic.

The parade was pretty short and sweet, which is the perfect kind of parade in my eyes. Tessa's dad partook for the first time in a while, and his family pelted him with water balloons and water guns as he rode by, like any good family should! Tessa's mom made a strong margarita, and although I remember thinking, "Wow, this is a strong margarita!" I still had a second one, which promptly put me to sleep after the parade ended.

I woke up to people taking pictures of me passed out on the living room floor, so I woke up by being the first to hop into the inlet. It took me a while to figure out what to call the body of water just off Tessa's back yard, and apparently it is an inlet. It juts off the Hood Canal, and apparently Bill and Melinda Gates rolled up one afternoon last Autumn and Tessa's grandmother, a house down, was out ready to yell at the trouble-makers and run them off, then realized who they were.

We spent the rest of the afternoon shooting off small fireworks and swimming in the inlet. At one point, all of the youngsters (i.e. under 50), hopped in the boat and Tessa took us for a ride around the Hood Canal--it was awesome:





Poker Update #2: Second tournament started, and I'm chipping up in this one. Just had AA in the big blind and it was limped 3 ways to me, and for the first time ever, I checked with aces in the big blind. I bet the flop and it folded around, so nothing extraordinary happened, but I sat there with aces and my option and wondered, "Have I ever checked in the big blind with aces? I don't think I have, let's see what happens."

Back to Tahuya. Beers, clams, steak, swimming, and fireworks. That, my friends, is hard to beat. I grew up shooting off fireworks with Marc at his cabin, and we would get pretty into it, rigging our own fireworks in our teens. When I hit college I grew a bit tired of spending mass amounts of money on things to just blow up (funny how that changes when you use your money instead of your parents'!). Jared and Reuben went nuts this year and spend $300 on mortars and all sorts of goodies, and I couldn't help but share their enthusiasm. I taught them a thing or two over the course of the day, but they had plenty of ingenious ideas themselves.

The two highlights of the night had to be Ben knocking over my tower of beer cans with a single roman candle shot, and when Reuben's huge mortar decided not to shoot up into the air, but instead exploded in the mortar tube and shot gravel shrapnel that cleared the house. I was 15ft from the shell and was lucky enough to turn my back on the blast just in the nick of time--I could hear the gravel hit the windows! That woke us up. A honorable mention would be Erin's early show of lighting a ground bloom and sticking it in a Corona bottle, which cracked the bottle in half. We tried to duplicate her feat numerous times and we turned another Corona bottle black, but couldn't break it in half.



Once the fireworks were done, most of the crew took off for Seattle, to sleep in their own beds, but Tessa, Jared and I stuck around and slept in the game room. The dozen or so beers since 11am found me with the sandman as quickly as my head hit the pillow. I was awoken in time for breakfast: bacon, eggs and whatever those breakfast rolls that start with a C are called--not cinnamon rolls. Polished that off with the help of some OJ, thanked Tessa and her family for the great hospitality, then headed out from Tahuya a different way than I came.

I rode north from Tahuya, and my word of mouth directions from Tessa's mom and dad weren't entirely clear, so I just followed the road along the water until it turned into a gravel road. I was a bit hesitant to ride on the gravel rode, given my nearly bald front tire, but the sign said only six miles, so I was hoping a return to pavement was the reward. Up until this point, I was still being very careful on my motorcycle, and riding still didn't feel quite right. On the gravel I was mostly in first gear, and the gravel road twisted along the Hood Canal for the six or so miles. I kept thinking I should stop and take a picture of the interesting road and forest, but there weren't any places to pull over and a few cars did cross my path on the ride.

For some reason, when the pavement returned, I also got my riding groove back. From being extremely cautious on the gravel road, I must have gotten a better feel for the bike. The road after the pavement came back was also one of the most fun roads I have ridden on. Between the start of the pavement again and Bremerton, I passed by every mile-per-hour turn sign from 10mph turns to 45mph turns, twice over. There were dozens of 20mph turn signs, and with proper balance on the bike, I was able to take them at great ease going 35mph--which gave me riding confidence back. After the first few turns, I was comfortable knowing the right speed to stay safe, so I didn't have to look at the speedometer while negotiating turns, which seems safer and the right way to do it.

I had a lot of fun on the ride back to Seattle. I got to the Bremerton ferry terminal literally two minutes before they started boarding, and as a motorcycle I got to hop to the front of the line, where only one other motorcycle was waiting. We briefly chatted and it turns out that he was coming back from Tahuya as well! Not bad for a town of 5,200, as of the 2000 census.

Poker Update #3: Second tournament, just got the addon for 11k chips at the first break, which is about 1.5k above the average stack. Got a ways to go, 550 runners left, 90 pay, $700 and change for 1st.

The ferry ride was nice. Since me and the other motorcyclist were the first vehicles allowed on, we also got dibs on seating in the ferry. I found a booth and zonked out once the ferry started moving. I woke up probably thirty minutes later when the sun started to shine on me and woke me from my slumber. We were in the middle of the body of water just west of West Seattle, and we had a gorgeous view of downtown Seattle:





I rode back up Hwy 99, spent a few hours at home taking a shower and talking to my Erin in Italy, then rode back over to Potlatch to catch the last few rounds of disc. I enjoyed the quick ride over the 520 bridge, and got to the fields just as my team got booted from the tournament in the D-pool quarterfinals. A team from my college was playing in the C-pool semi-finals, and I cheered them on, but they lost 8-11 in a tight game. The score was tied at 8-8 and there was a marathon point that must have lasted 15 minutes, whoever wins that point wins the game, and sure enough, that is what happened.

The finals was a rematch of the showcase game from Friday: Team USA vs. Team Canada. I didn't end up staying to see who won, but I did watch a few of the points with my Tacoma team. I found Josh and he was sporting a fluffy white baseball cap with the Ace of spades on it... I talked to him and found out that not only did he get an ace card in the Dare game, he got all four aces, one of each suit, which won him Five Ultimate shorts, a jersey, and the hat. I didn't realize Five Ultimate was putting on the game, but I told Josh I wasn't sure I even wanted to know what he had to do for those aces. He told me that his favorite dare was finding a woman, switching clothes with that woman, then serenading one of the girls who works for Five Ultimate in the other girl's clothes. Oh, and he had a zillion girl's numbers on his cast--so it looks like he had a good time this weekend, too!

If you see this man, run in the other direction.



Poker Update #4: Up to 19k chips with the average around 10k.

Hmm, running out of things to say about this weekend... it was fun! The weather is supposed to take a turn for the worse this week, but I'm still hoping to get out and hike. Also, take some resumes out this week to middle schools in the area to see what the job prospects are looking like for next year.

Well, I was hoping to do better, but the time is 9:29pm and I am finished with the weekend recap. I could keep on rambling with stuff while I play poker, but I may as well just finish this post off and call it a quasi-uber. Hope you all have a good week!

Active

I've been slacking. Big time. The majority of my summer break has been spent playing Super Baseball Simulator 1.000, World of Warcraft, and Team Fortress 2. I've spent a lot of time checking up on blogs and wasting plenty of time on Facebook.

But right now, I'm spent. I spent the last 2.5 hours running around at Greenlake playing Goaltimate. Goaltie, for short, is a sort of newage ultimate game with a big goal in the middle of the field, and is played kind of like half court basketball. There is a lot of running and cutting involved. Add to the mix that some of the best ultimate players in the world (both men and women from USA World's team), makes for one tired MHG.

Last night, I got in two hours of basketball with a friend from the teaching program. The church he goes to opens up their gym from 9pm-11pm Tuesdays and Thursdays. We had five on five going for the full two hours. I can't tell if I'm more tired from the basketball last night or the goaltie tonight, buy my dogs are barking.

Today may be the last in a string of 28 days in Seattle with no measurable rain. I am sitting out on the back porch with our two cats keeping me safe. Watson is on the flimsy back railing, and Ichi is sitting guard at the top of the steps. Also, my water bottle filled with Gatorade is keeping the flies away, apparently, because each time I go to drink some, I am greeted with a few new drowning victims.

Note to self: I still strive to write. Do I write on a new blog, or this one? Daily writing? 1000 words. go.

Three Day Weekend Hijinx

Three day weekend for me this week. I spent Friday morning up at Stevens and re-learned how to snowboard, day 17 up at the pass this year, not bad! The snow was slushy, and I stuck to groomers all morning, but by the end of the morning I was doing laps on the backside, which tired me out quick. My boots are a bit too big, and whenever I do a toe-side turn my heel comes up out of the boot, so I am putting all of my weight on my toes, particularly the big knob behind my big toe.

Once I tired out boarding, I hit the Foggy Goggle for a beer and catching a few March Madness updates. I caught one of my two championship-game teams, Pittsburgh, struggling against E. Tennessee State, which isn't a good omen for the games to come. My bracket is in shambles as of Saturday night, but at least all of my Final Four teams are still intact, which can't be said of half of my pool for picking Washington to make it to the Final Four.

Parents made it home Friday afternoon about 30 minutes before I got back from the pass. It was great to see them again and hear their fun stories from Arizona. It is sad not to have the house to myself anymore, but I also missed having them around. I can't make fun of them nearly as much when they aren't here goof-balling around to make fun of. We watched basketball until the last games of the day were over.

Andrew and BAM picked me up, and we headed up to Kenmore to one their college buddy Ross's house. We got a poker game going, and I cleaned house. Poker is easy when you get cards and hit flops. We followed up poker with Liar's Dice, and played a dozen rounds of liar's dice, which lasted until 4am. Liar's Dice just might surpass Quarters as the game kings play. I don't think I ever won a game of Liar's Dice, but I had a majority of my buy-ins paid for by side bets.

Alarm clock woke me up at 11am, nice and hung over. I didn't really drink that much the night before, but when my head hit the pillow on Friday night, I knew I'd be in for a rough morning today. Yes, indeed. I chugged cranberry juice and hopped on the motorcycle and headed down to Tacoma for the PLU BBQ ultimate frisbee tournament. Riding a motorcycle for the first time in a month, in 40 degree weather is one of the best hangover cures I have ever experienced. I felt fine on the ride, but when I got to the fields and changed into my cleats, I nearly toppled over because my head felt like it weighed 30lbs from still being hung over.

I just made a guest appearance today for a few games with the WSU team, and we won the last game of the day in thrilling fashion. Down 4-7 at the half, then 4-8 after the next point, we mounted a very nice comeback to win the game on universe point, 13-12. I stuck around for burgers and beer while watching the showcase game, then motored back up to Seattle.

Tomorrow I go help Marc install a hot tub at his place, watch more basketball, and yes, probably even drink a little more beer.

Hanford Howl, 2008

This weekend was an absolute blast. I attended the Hanford Howl ultimate frisbee tournament for the second year in a row. It is an all-weekend affair of fun, frisbee, and booze! Unfortunately, I missed out on an impromptu blogger home game at The Chako's residence, and I'm sure I would have had a blast.

I drove down to Tacoma to pick up Josh on Friday around noon, then we drove the 250 miles over to Richland, WA. The drive over was lots of fun. At first, I was perturbed because the Honda Pilot has an Aux button, but no auxiliary jack to plug an iPod into! The Aux button does nothing! Luckily, the Pilot has XM Satellite Radio, so Josh and I messed around with that for the entire drive. We found a rocking XMLM channel that played "liquid metal" from big name bands like "Lamb of God" and "Cattle Decapitation" raaaawwwwwwk! Another favorite channel was the comedy channels up in the 150's, including David Cross, George Carlin and a few other skits that had us rolling. The Fall colors were amazing crossing the Cascades, lots of reds and oranges made the hillsides look like they were on fire.

When we arrived in Richland, the Atomic Alehouse welcomed us with open arms and the drinking began with a sampler while waiting for the rest of the Tacoma crew to show up and check into the hotel. We made a pitstop at the liquor store, then waited in the parking lot while watching "License to Kill." Our team theme was James Bond (w/ Bond girls), so we were researching by watching the kick-ass movie. Eventually the rest of the crew came trickling into town and I honestly don't remember much else from Friday night.

Saturday morning marked the beginning of ultimate for the weekend. Instead of dressing up like Bond, how many of my teammates were dressed--white dress shirt, blank pants/shorts, bowtie--I dressed up like Jaws--tan pants, suspenders, white shirt and a metal mouth of first tinfoil, then duck-tape. During our first game I quickly realized I needed to change the metal mouth somehow, because breathing through my nose while running around on a frisbee field just does not mix. I ended up folding the duct tape over and being able to breathe through my mouth, which made running much easier!

Our team, Moonrakers, went 4-0 on the day Saturday, and I scored a callahan in our last game of the day, which I mac'd to myself a few times before my fingers remembered how to close on the disc. Saturday was one of my best days of ultimate in a long time. I had really been looking forward to this tournament and played great all day long. In our third game of the day we were down 2-4 and called a timeout to collect our thoughts and try to stop the bleeding. We ended up taking half 7-4, then the game 13-6. It was a great timeout call, and for some reason I was keeping track of my personal W/L record (the points I played, and whether we won or lost the point). I was 9-0 that game, which I don't think I've ever done before. Ultimate has 7 people on each team, so it wasn't all me, but I don't think I made any mistakes and had a few D's to help our team through our early deficit.

Saturday night was fairly tame. Most of us were tired from running around in the scorching 65 degree sun all day. I took a nap, watched some Bond, watched the Phillies and Jamie Moyer's all-out performance. We got hooked on a Batman animated tv show for an hour, and were all pretty sluggish in the hotel room all evening. Somehow we made it to SNL time, and all fell asleep halfway through the show.

Sunday we had a first round bye, as the #2 seed in the A-pool of the 25-team tournament. We got to sleep in, which is always nice, and got to the fields around 9:30am. On Saturday, the weather was perfect--60-65 degrees and sunny. Sunday, however, the wind picked up and the temperature dropped. We got to watch Olympia and the UPS team (my alma mater) play in the first round, and the wind was wreaking havoc on both teams. The winner of that game was our next opponent, so getting to scout them out was a big advantage. I noticed that neither team was playing zone defense, which made no sense to me.

Olympia won the tight game and we played them in round 2. We set a nice zone against them and I got to play a lot of cup. They didn't get the disc past half-field for most of the game when they were going up wind, and we started to roll once our offense got accustomed to the wind, winning 11-6 at the hard cap. Our next game was against Resurrection, an older, wilier team, who called a lot more penalties than any other team we had faced--which I find takes a lot of fun out of the game, and is also much more present in higher-level ultimate. I took myself out most of the game, because I didn't enjoy playing in a hotly emotional game where lots of fouls are called. It felt like they had our number, but we fought back for a universe point, 7-7 at hard cap.

Surprisingly, one of our captains called out my name for our final point. We had a huge disadvantage, having to play defense and going into the wind. Odds were not in our favor, but we all vowed to try our best. I got the necessary D, stepping in front of a throw, then I raced deep. Dare tried to huck it to me into the wind, but the wind completely turned the disc over and it fell just out of my reach. We stepped up our defense and got another D, and worked the disc up the field. I made and cut and got the disc, then at stall 5 a pick was called, freezing the action on the field. When play reset, I wasn't confident enough to try and break the mark into the wind on a flick, so I turned back to dump the disc to Sean. As I turned back, my mark tried to deny the dump and Sean raced up the sideline. I was able to swivel back quicker than my defender and got the disc to Sean for the 8-7 victory! It was a blast to be part of the improbable win.

We played Bad Spirits in the finals. It was the Tacoma team's first finals appearance at Hanford, and we were playing the #1 seed. They were comprised of a few very good players from around the Pacific NW. Much like the semi-final game, we fell behind and the game was filled with penalty calls which just sap the fun out of the game for me. I played my share of points in the finals, and we ended up having another universe point at 8-8 for the championship. This time the odds were in our favor. We were defending, but we were going down wind and liked our chances. My number wasn't called this time, and Bad Spirits worked the disc brilliantly up wind for the score and the championship.

It was very odd not to be drinking at the end of a frisbee tournament. I am used to watching the finals and drinking a few beers at the end of a tournament, but this time I got to play in the finals. It was a fun experience, even though most of the 25 teams had already left the fields on their long drives home. We had some fun-spirited hecklers on the sideline from Suspicious Package, the WSU team, who heckled both teams evenly for all the penalty calls being made.

The drive home went quickly and I drove Josh and Stephanie back to Tacoma. Josh's new place has a hot tub in it, so we relaxed there for a bit and finished up another Bond movie. Josh has Rock Band 2 and will be getting Guitar Hero World Tour in the next few weeks, so I'm sure another trip down to Tacoma is in store. Overall, a great weekend, can't wait for next year's Hanford!

Spawnfest

Sunday evening when I amble around the house wishing I had a cane or a walker is usually the sign of a good weekend, and tonight was no exception. I did not play all that many points of ultimate at Spawnfest, but what I lacked on the field I made up for in beer consumed Saturday night. I drank the lion's share of our team's stash, which resulted in a (amazingly unexpected) hangover. The hangover crippled my play on Sunday.

I noticed, much like Potlatch this year, that my fun did not come from playing ultimate, it came from the people I play ultimate with. I had a great time seeing both familiar and new faces. Rob and Fionna, our pickup couple from the Ireland world's team were great frisbee players and a shot of fresh blood and perspective into the Tacoma team. Hanging out with Josh is always fun, and I won't soon forget his gold medal victory at 2am "testicle toss" over ZE GERMANS!! Kali, the Goddess of Death, who also played on my beach ultimate team a month ago, was fun to play with again--we share a love of playing handlers in zone-offense (thus not having to run).

Summer Break - Week 1

My first week of break started out with a bang. Monday I met up with a few classmates and we headed up to Lake Wenatchee for a couple nights of camping out under the stars. There were so many stars at night we had to turn on a light to make out the constellations. The lake was amazing and the weather was beautiful. We cooked steaks, played board games and even got in some Asshole (a drinking game where my true colors shine).

From Lake Wenatchee, I ditched my camping gear with one of my very awesome classmates and continued on to Winthrop, WA, where I met up with my parents at Sun Mountain Lodge. It is as swanky as it sounds. The motorcycle ride from Lake Wenatchee to Winthrop was a lot of fun because I had eight hours to travel what amounted to a four-hour trek. I stopped in the bustling town of Entiat for a big breakfast. I stopped at Lake Chelan for an hour of reading in the shade by the lake, which turned out to be 30 minutes of reading transformed into a 30 minute nap.

The nap recharged my batteries and I rode in to Winthrop with two hours until check-in time, so I stopped at the ice cream parlor in the middle of town. My family usually eats there whenever we go to Sun Mountain, and we usually get a round of putt-putt golf in, and my Mom usually wins. Unfortunately, we didn't make the putt-putt round this year, but I at least got to have some ice cream before their arrival (picture below). Winthropians know how to do ice cream. I spent another 45 minutes there eating ice cream and reading. From Winthrop, I rode nine miles to Patterson Lake, just below Sun Mountain Lodge. It was still sunny and 85 degrees when I jumped in the lake, but when I left the lake an hour later (more reading), clouds appeared out of nowhere, which made for my first arrival at Sun Mountain not in the sun.

Sun Mountain consisted of fine dining, deer 10ft from our back door, gin & tonic drinking, reading, pinnochle with the parents, sun bathing, billiards, ping pong and... golf! Golf with my parents is amazingly fun, and even giving my Dad three extra strokes each hole this year, I still retain the title as best male golfer in my family. I actually beat my Mom this year too, but that was a fluke.

You may be asking what has got me all wound up in a book. To my knowledge I haven't mentioned any books on this blog for years. I stumbled upon Clifford Simak's "City" last Friday at the library and picked it up. It had me hooked all last week until I finished it this morning. It won the 1953 International Fantasy Award for Best Novel. It is about Man, Dogs, Robots, the past, present and future. It is a great book, and although I have not read much science fiction, after seeing some of the author's who praised this book (Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Gene Wolfe, Allen Steele), and actually recognizing a few of the names--I think I might check out Simak's "Way Station" next.

Friday morning I took off early from Sun Mountain and experienced quite possibly my most enjoyable motorcycle ride to date. It is hard to top a few of my rides around Tahoe in the first months of motorcycle ownership, but my ride on Saturday comes as close as possible. From Winthrop, I rode West across the North Cascades Highway, then up to Vancouver, B.C. for the World Ultimate and Guts Championships. I had been looking forward to riding the North Cascades on my motorcycle from before I bought it over a year ago. When I was in my teens, I dreamed of renting a fast sports car and driving the North Cascades Highway for a birthday. Doing it on a motorcycle did not creep into my mind back then, but now that I have done it, I can't imagine a more fun way to experience that road. The weather was perfect and I never got stuck behind any slow vehicles in the 100 miles from Winthrop to just outside Burlington. The North Cascades Highway itself is a beautiful 2 to 4 lane highway which is the north-most passage across the Cascades in Washington. The road is closed during the winter and the speed limit varies between 50-70mph, but the majority of the ride seemed to be on 35-45mph advised turns. 35-45mph advisory signs are aimed at semi-trucks, but on a Kawasaki Ninja 250, with a little leaning, I can take those turns at 60-70. The ride was everything I hoped it would be, in fact, I was not even listening to music as I made the ride. I've become accustomed to listening to my iPod on any ride longer than 20 minutes or so, but I wanted to take this ride in with all my senses, and I'm glad I went with the music of the road instead of the iPod for this section of highway.

Customs was slow. Why don't they have an HOV/Motorcycle lane at customs? I guess it might take just as long, with the additional passports to check, but I waited about an hour getting into Canada at noon on a Friday. I also thought the speed limit in Canada was extra slow prior to this trip, but I was averaging 70mph on Canada 1, heading West into Vancouver. The km/h meter on my bike is cut off by the mileage ticker, so I know I was going somewhere between 40km/h and 140km/h, but I'm not sure what 70mph translates to.

I got a bit lost in Vancouver, trying to find University of British Columbia solely on my memory of a googlemap I scouted out the night before. I crossed a couple of bridges and was stuck in traffic on the second bridge when a guy on a scooter zipped past me and barely missed smacking into the stopped truck in front of me. Guy turns around and says, "Nice day for a ride!" The guy turns out to be an 80-year old dude with a white mustache and decked out in full leathers--riding on a scooter with flame decals. We rode together for a while along the coast, chatting at stop lights, until I finally asked him where the hell UBC is! He said he was actually heading there too, but just taking the scenic route, he'd be glad to show me the way. Sweet!

Then another image popped into my head. The old guy in Family Guy who is on Chris's paper route. "Hey there, muscley-arm! Why the long face? Do you like popsicles? There's a freezer full of them in my basement! Why don't you run down and grab a few?"

It freaked me out. But, true to his word, he showed me the way, which involved crossing another bridge. I made it to UBC just in time to see my friends play against Japan in the semi-finals of the World Ultimate Frisbee Championships. Those Japan guys are speedy, but they just could not match the skill and intensity of the USA team. Not to mention the height difference--that didn't help Japan one bit. I got a couple sweet shots of Sam catching the game-winning score at the end of this post. We went out to an all you can eat sushi place after their game and we ate so much sushi they eventually booted us out, taking a loss I'm quite sure of.

I was tired, full of food, and no place to sleep. Room at the Sockeye house was full, but I knew a handful of other people in town for the tournament, but had no way of getting in touch with them. I made sure I got a room number for Will before I left the fields. He was staying in the UBC dorms, so I made my way to The Rits and found the place with some help. I walked around the building a few times with no way of entering until I spied some people coming down the stairwell and I rushed to the entry, getting there just before the door closed behind them. I made my way up to 209, knocked--no answer. Balls. Walked around some more, scouting out the dorm, looking for a lobby or a place I could catch some Z's... when I ran across a magical dojo in the middle of the dormitory.

It was crazy. There were sliding paper-pane doors, just like the ones you see in Japan, or at least in movies about Japan. The "please remove shoes" sign was posted outside, so I slipped off my motorcycle shoes, slid the screen to the side and walked into the dimly lit, matted room. The low table occupied the middle of the room, but nobody else was in the room and although the mats were hard, I slid the screen closed behind me and used my towel as a pillow.

I woke up the next morning with the sun and walked over to the ultimate field. The clock outside a coffee shop said 6:45am, and the first round wasn't until 9am. The guys final game wasn't until 4pm, but I lasted the entire day at the field to see them lose to Canada 15-17. It was an amazing day of ultimate, and although I considered leaving earlier in the day for Seattle, I enjoyed the gratuitous amounts of ultimate watching.

It would have been a perfect weekend if not for one thing...

the ride back to Seattle last night was horrible. Wearing a long-sleeve t-shirt and a motorcycle jacket without the rain liner, I rode the 150+ miles from Vancouver to Seattle in a rain storm, half of it in the dark. I didn't think I would make it, especially after taking a wrong turn at the US border and heading East for 15 unnecessary minutes. I stopped in Bellingham drenched to the core, hands frozen. I sat in a booth at Denny's, knowing that if I took any of my clothes off, putting them back on would be 10x worse. I ordered a cup of hot chocolate, a bowl of vegetable-beef soup, in attempt to warm up my core before another 80 miles on the highway. I felt great leaving Bellingham, it wasn't raining and I was warm. Before I made it to the freeway, the skies closed at it poured--just POURED. I gritted my teeth, breathed through my nose to keep as much warm air in my mouth, and tried to think warm thoughts as I froze my way home.

I crawled up the back steps in Seattle, teeth chattering and skin blue. I stripped down and rolled into the hot tub. It stung at first, and then I realized I still had goosebumps. I was in 100 degree water and had goose bumps... that's not right. After soaking for a good 45 minutes I felt like slush and zonked as soon as my head hit the pillow.

Week 2 Outline:

Bachelor Party Tuesday night at Lake Tapps.
Camping Possibly?
Lake Cavanaugh party on Saturday.

I don't think it will beat week 1, but I'm going to have fun trying :)

Photos from week 1 (chronological order):

Brokeback Beach Ultimate

In the final game of beach ultimate down in Seaside, Oregon last weekend, I gratuitously laid out for a frisbee and somehow landed on my spine. It hurt. The six-hour motorcycle ride home did not help the bruised spine. I'm not really sure what to do other than "take it easy." Do I lay down? Is sitting OK? Oh well, time heals all wounds, right?

The beach ultimate trip was a lot of fun, but could have been better. Princess Leia and I did not gel whatsoever. When she was open I would make a bad throw, and the times I made good throws she would completely misread the disc and drop it. One of my "good" throws even hit her in the back--which is pretty darn hard to do when she knows the disc is coming to her. We finished 6th in the "winners" bracket, and we played savage most of the weekend (i.e. no subs).

Playing on the beach was both fun and frustrating. We had a constant 10-20mph wind all weekend, which made throws incredibly difficult, and our team did not have the best handlers in the world. Our team only had two people who had ever played beach ultimate before, so the simple act of running on the sand took us a while to get used to. You can't lead people as far as you are used to, and jumping is nearly non-existant. Laying out for frisbees is a lot more fun though, because if you can avoid landing directly on your spine, laying out on sand really doesn't hurt (I've got to work on this in the future).

Overall, the ultimate and the motorcycle ride to and from the ocean was a weekend well spent. We hit Seattle at dusk on our way back, and the city sunset was amazing looking out towards the Olympics from I-5 just south of the city.

Potlatch 2008

I'm feeling very neglectful of this blog only posting once a week. Fun things are happening, such as the first 3-day Potlatch in four years, motorcycle riding, trips to the pool, and yes... even a bit of WoW. Potlatch threw my body for a loop. Waking up early, drinking, running, diving onto my ribs and knees for frisbees for three straight days was a shock.

The team I played with was an odd mix. Half old timers and half PLU college players. Playing with the female college players was a blast, but a few of the male PLU players were a bit too intense for me. You're playing ultimate frisbee, not football, chill the fuck out! The weekend was amazing though, our team had a weed-whacker blender on our sideline. We blended margaritas all weekend long, and by the end of our second game I was three sheets to the wind.

We created a kick ass game for our opponents to play after our game of ultimate. It was a relay race, so their team divided into three teams of five people each. First part of the relay race is hurdles, where one runner from each team has to jump over four hurdles, comprised of my teammates, then run back to the start. Next is a frisbee throw to a teammate in a hula hoop on the other side of the field. The receiver has to stay inside the hula hoop and catch the pass. Next part is a beer shotput, where a teammate shotputs a beer to their partner who is wielding a spear. The spear wielder stabs the beer and drinks it--first team done with their beer wins.

The highlight of the weekend had to be the last game on Sunday, when the spear-wielding lady got hit in the leg with the shot-putted beer. She collapsed to the ground, more out of laughter than any injury, but she hobbled over to the beer, missed it on her first few stabs. She really concentrated on her next stab--so much so that when the spear pierced the beer can, the beer sprayed directly into her eyes and she was on her ass again from the force of the beer spray and her embarrassment.

About halfway through the first day of the tourney, we decided to start decorating a huge spear with whatever we received from other teams throughout the tourney. Beer cans, bottles of liquor, American flags, streamers, clothes, hats, hula hoops... you name it. At the end of the tourney we gave the huge spear to Scotty for getting the team together.

Here are a few photos I took from the weekend~

Spring in Seattle

Home--pretty much sums it up.

I'm not sure why I hadn't really felt it since moving back to Seattle last August. The last eight months I've mostly spent my time re-acclimating myself to my home town. Everything is different through older eyes. Everything seems smaller than it once was, which is depressing in a way.

Riding the 1200 miles up from Tahoe on my motorcycle, behind Dad in the Explorer, I had lots of time to think about my future. I knew living with my parents was going to be bittersweet. I love my parents, and love living with them, but I'm also ashamed to say I'm 25 years old and living with my parents. Somewhere in the middle of Oregon, I remember tackling the pros and cons of living with my parents, and I had this great vision of walking down to a local pub with my parents for dinner. We would buy a pitcher or two of beer, play some pool, and have a fun and relaxing evening together.

Last night, we did just that. The three of us played a game of shuffleboard (shuffle-puck?) and on the first throw of the evening, with no warm-up, my Mom rolled the puck down the sandy counter and it stopped perfectly along the back edge of the counter for a 4-pointer. We didn't roll another 4 all night (although I think I did manage to knock her 4 off the board). Dad and I got a game of pool in after dinner, and he was confident that I would sink the 8-ball out of turn. This is usually a good bet to make, but somehow I managed to sink it AFTER hitting all of the solids in--there's a first time for everything!

Today was another one of those perfect Spring days in Seattle, where everyone and their mothers go outside to catch some rays. Greenlake was popping again this Saturday, and I got in a good three hours of ultimate. John from my teaching program was out at the field with his pregnant wife and her sister who is a beast at ultimate. The four of us headed to Baskin Robbins after ultimate, and I got a triple-scoop Chocolate Mouse Royale. Dear God it was good. I hadn't had Baskin Robbins for years, and I was ecstatic to find my favorite flavor still intact. I actually feel like I am throwing my money away if I buy any other flavor of ice cream at Baskin Robbins, because Chocolate Mouse Royale is THAT good. Dark, rich chocolate, filled with little shavings of hard dark chocolate--come on! How am I not gonna eat that?

Speaking of pregnant wives, when I got back to my cell phone after ultimate, I received a picture message of Marc's baby, Claire. I love that name, and he is the first of my friends to have a kid, so he got to snatch the name before any of us... bitch. Congrats, Marc and Sarah :)

I got a few games of Magic in with Tyler, then the two of us headed to Marshall to hoop it up. Tyler hasn't shot a basketball in six months, but he still won the first game of 21. He retired on top while I hopped into a game of 2v2. My teammate was the other guy playing 21 with us, and seemed to be pretty decent... until we started playing 2v2, doh. We started off ice cold and he threw up a number of air balls. I think the other team scored 5 points before we sunk our first bucket. We were down 5-10 and 6-11, then I caught fire. I remember thinking "alright, time to get hot." 8-11. 10-11. 12-11. It feels so good to play bball when your shot is falling, and it was raining 3's at Marshall this afternoon. We finished them off when I faked a 3 and drove baseline to lefty in a rare layup (I don't make layups... ever).

Life is good.

Seattle is still different in my mind than the daily view I take in, but days like this connect the past to the present. I remember the sunny spring days down in Tacoma (close enough), where ultimate frisbee out on Todd Field played out from about 3pm to 8pm. The players would come and go, and the girls bathing in the sun would do the same. In Seattle, I remember plenty of sunny afternoons in Springs long ago, playing basketball and baseball games until dark.

Spring might just be taking over as my favorite season. I've always said Summer, but with Spring you've got these rare, amazing days that are my favorite. You've also got the anticipation of Summer. With Summer, you've usually always got nice days, but you look forward to a wet Fall, Winter and Spring.

Today is almost over, and I'd rate it 5/5 on spirit, 5/5 on body, and 2/5 on mind. Time to go read!

BPP Week 18: A Favorite Thing

"A Favorite Thing" themed blogger photo project week, eh? You guessed it, more ultimate photos:

BPP Week 17: Photographer's Choice

I half-assed it again this week, but at least I've got something? Saturday was such an amazing day, and would have been a perfect day to take pictures, but I couldn't stop myself from running around outside and hanging out with friends. I got more ultimate in on Sunday, and brought my camera. I sat out for about 10 minutes in my 2 1/2 hours of lazy play, but I snapped a good 80 pictures of the chill, Sunday ultimate game:



Next week: A Favorite Thing--I should be able to give this next week more effort.

PLU BBQ: The Nalgene Ninjas

The PLU BBQ is an annual college frisbee tournament, put on by Pacific Lutheran University, in Tacoma, WA. I went to the University of Puget Sound, also in Tacoma, and fierce rivals with the PLU Lutes. Up until my senior year, I didn't really like PLU--I'm not sure why, other than everyone else around me at UPS seemed not to like PLU. Then my senior year at UPS, I started playing in a pickup frisbee game at PLU, and met some really cool men and women.

Both PLU and UPS were not any good at frisbee when I attended UPS, and the guys I got to know from PLU my senior year started up the tourney in 2003 to add a fun tournament for teams who weren't in the top tier of ultimate frisbee colleges on the west coast. In 2003, there couldn't have been more than 6-8 teams. This year, we were the 24th seed... out of 24 teams.

The Tacoma pickup team, under the guise of UPS Alumni, grabbed the last spot in the tournament, and we were placed in the final spot of the C pool. Captain Josh thought this might have been an under-seed, and when we went 5-0 on Saturday, I finally had to agree with him. The second point of our tournament was another Callahan. Two in two weeks! I didn't score the Callahan this time, but it was off of my pull, and Anders intercepted the first pass for the defensive score. In our third game of the day, I jumped out of the end zone and Greatest'd a disc to Sean for a score. Two weeks in a row with a Greatest... that's a little silly, especially because Sean threw the greatest to me last week.

We made quite the run from seeded dead last to eventually succumbing to the University of Washington team in the semi-finals, tying for 3rd in the entire tournament. The Tacoma team had ten old guys playing, and we had won three games earlier in the day, making our weekend record 8-1. UW had 3 byes and had about 15 young guns that quite simply ran us into the ground.

Sean was coaching the UPS team, and they had a bye in the 4th round, so he played with us and made the most amazing lay-out D, without actually getting the D. The guy he was guarding scored, but Sean flew through the air and landed face-first into a 2'x5' perfectly placed puddle. It was the funniest thing any of us saw all day. He got up and was completely soaked. I gave him a big hug and I'm pretty sure Will got the lay out on video.

Jerry was up to his old shenanigans. We had a nice D, and I was trying to slow us down a bit (commonly, when your team gets a D in ultimate frisbee, the instinctual thing to do is pick up the disc right away and throw it--which leads to rushed throws and usually turnovers). I hollered for Tom pick up the disc, since he was the furthest from it, giving us time to set up. Tom starts walking to the disc, and the rest of us set up in a stack.

All of a sudden, Will starts cutting to the back corner of the end zone. I don't know why he is cutting, because Tom is a good 20ft from the disc still. Then I see Jerry running up to the disc and he steals it before Tom can get to it--and promptly hits a leaping Will for the score. It was hilarious because I don't think anybody besides Will saw Jerry sneaking in to steal the disc from Tom, and it worked perfectly, because the other team was just as confused as we were. Tom sulked off the field, silently cursing out Jerry--which made the moment that much better.

Somehow I lost not one, but two of Josh's nalgene water-bottles this weekend. He offered me one Saturday morning, and I gladly accepted it, only to leave it at the fields Saturday night. Sunday morning rolls around and Josh has a third Nalgene for me to use, and once we lost our game to UW, I couldn't find my Nalgene for the life of me. I searched up and down the sideline for the water bottle, with no luck. Must have been ninja'd. Sorry Josh, I'll get you two Nalgenes next weekend.

The weekend was a blast, and I had a bunch of fun playing on a team that I still believe was out-matched physically in almost every game we played. Our strategy and experience played a HUGE role in our success, and it was fun to be a part of the "old men" team... even if I'm only 25...

Ultimate Frisbee 101

Seven on seven, can't move when you have the disc, and the field is setup like a football field with two end zones. A simple and fun game, that can get extremely complex when skill, weather and strategy are factored in.

In baseball, the rarest two things are the triple-play and a perfect game. In Ultimate Frisbee, the rarest plays are the "Callahan" and the "Greatest."

(YouTube examples of the Callahan and Greatest plays are below. The second video starts out as a slide-show, but eventually gets to an amazing--AMAZING--greatest)

A Callahan occurs when, as a defender, you intercept a pass in the opponent's end zone. It counts as an automatic score, and is so rare because you have to push the opponent all the way back to their end zone, and then intercept a pass in that end zone. If you think in football terms, the only way it would be possible is if one of the defensive linemen bats a ball up in the air, or a defensive back intercepts a screen pass in the end zone (which I've never seen). Unlike football, you can't intercept the ball at the 20-yd line and run it in, because in Ultimate Frisbee you can't run with the disc.

The "Greatest" is aptly named. It occurs when the frisbee is sailing out of bounds, and someone on the offensive team jumps from in-bounds, catches the disc, and while still in the air throws the disc back in-bounds, where a teammate catches the disc. You can probably imagine the rarity of this play. The disc has to be sailing out of bounds, but close enough that someone on your team can reach it by jumping, which is rare. That person then has to be able to jump and throw the disc in the air--which not everyone can do. Then on top of all that, the throw has to be decent enough to catch, and there has to be a teammate around to catch it! I've witnessed countless almost-greatests, where someone jumps, catches and throws the disc in the air, but there is a defender there to smack the disc down.

Yesterday, I caught a Greatest and scored a Callahan.

I had an absolute blast at Slog in the Bog this year. It is a one-day ultimate frisbee tournament--the first tournament of the new season. The Tacoma team I played with got placed in the "A" pool, so we had our work cut out for us. The #1 team in our pool was comprised primarily of Shazam members, and Shazam has won the National Championships two out of the last three years. We took Shazam to "Universe Point," which is a sudden death, winner-take-all point to end the game.

Now, Shazam wasn't taking this tournament too seriously, just out to have fun and start getting in shape--but they've still got very athletic and skillful players, so our team was very happy to give them a run for their money. Yesterday our team went 1-4, but we played three teams that have consistently been better than our team, and we lost those three games by a combined four points (two games we lost on universe point, and we lost another game by two points).

After the tourney, we all headed down to Federal Way and partied it up with some Guitar Hero, quarters and Mario Party. It was good times, and I can't wait until next weekend and the PLU BBQ!

Unfortunate Revelation

I'm still reeling from that last post. I woke up this morning wondering why the hell I blogged about what was happening during my entire Friday. I felt like Randy Newman in the episode of Family Guy.

This clip isn't from the show (again with the copyright!), but it is at least the audio of the scene I'm talking about:



Probably not going to do the half-day post again anytime soon.

This weekend has been absolutely perfect weather-wise. 55-60 degrees and sunny in February--I'm still shocked. I've gotten motorcycle rides in both days this weekend, including a sunset-catching ride over to Alki with Princess Leia last night. I tossed the disc a bit yesterday, and after talking with the princess before our ride, it turns out that I missed about four hours of pickup ultimate with her and friends--damn! I was jonesing for some ultimate, but luckily for me I checked out the pickup locations today and found a game down at Montlake that was starting right as I found the website.

I hopped on the motorcycle and rode down to Montlake, and ended up playing in a very relaxing, wide skill-range, and very friendly game of ultimate for nearly three hours. It was exactly what I needed. We cheered before every pull, usually just something silly like a quote from a movie line. We did one from Juno: "We're not mature enough for this!" and quite a few cheers with respect to the sunny February day. I've got Slog in the Bog coming up in two weeks with the Tacoma team, so getting out and running around until I was exhausted was perfect. I also got my first layout of the season, which was a freaking sweet left-handed full-extendo grab near the endzone. I'm still picking leaves and twigs out of my underwear. CK knows what I mean!

Also, after we finished playing and all of us were walking back to our vehicles, two of the "attractive young women" ultimate group saw my motorcycle and demanded rides next week. The ninja is finally paying dividends!

Sadly, this weekend wasn't all hot tubs, girls and motorcycles, like last weekend. On to the unfortunate revelation part of this post...

I think I may be allergic to cats.

This might not be a big deal to a lot of people, but I have grown up with cats, and they are by far my favorite animal. I remember using Sally as a pillow when I was younger. I don't think being allergic to cats will stop me from having them around, as long as the allergy doesn't get incredibly sensitive. I hadn't noticed the allergy until this weekend, when Watson insensately kept climbing up on my chair and swashing his tail around my face. I couldn't stop sneezing. I've only had short-haired cats for the past three years, and the four years before that I was in college, with no pets around. Watson isn't quite a fluff ball, but he's got plenty of hair. The past few weeks, when I thought I was sick, are probably due to all of the cat fur I have been too lazy to clean up around the house. I'm going to give all the furniture a good clean tonight, so hopefully the constant sneezing and runny nose will go away.

Dangle Wrangle 2007

I got back from a Guitar Hero rockin' trip down to Tacoma this morning at about 1am. The drivers in Seattle are crazy around midnight. I got to drive the new Saab, and that thing has some getupandgo! I would be motoring along with the speed of traffic, assuming it was around 65-70, and I'd look down and be going 80.

The drive back from Tacoma was pretty funny. I'm not the craziest driver out there, but unless I'm distracted, I usually follow the "Nine you're fine, Ten you're mine" cop slogan when driving. I came across an unmarked cop car about five miles outside of Tacoma, and slowed down and trailed it from a ways back. Not a minute later, this car comes zooming up two lanes to the right of me, and passes a semi on the right side (semi was in 2nd lane, crazy driver passed in far right lane). The unmarked cop car swerves from the leftmost lane across three lanes of traffic and passes the semi on the right as well, then proceeds to ride the crazy driver's ass for a good quarter mile.

So I'm wondering if the cop just didn't get a gun on the driver, or if the unmarked cop car is even a cop at all. The car looks identical to a cop car, but it doesn't even have the little bulb of a side mirror that gives away all the other cop cars. I couldn't see a big antenna anywhere either. The crazy driver slowed WAY down after recognizing this "cop" swerved across three lanes of traffic and was riding his ass at 90+ mph.

I kept my distance for the 20 or so miles I trailed the "cop." What was funny is that at least six other cars came ZOOMING past me, and then would practically screech their brakes once they saw the "cop" car. The cop led our little pod of me and crazy drivers, all driving 65mph and exchanging glances at each other in between glances at our speedometers and the road.

If that dude actually wasn't a cop at all, that would be hilarious!

Today was also a bit crazy.

As much as I wish I could be in Vegas with the other bloggers, that just wasn't the smartest option for me. So instead of cooping myself inside all weekend, I headed down to Tacoma yesterday and played in the Sixth Annual Dangle Wrangle frisbee tournament. It is an all-men's hat tournament (which follows yesterday's all-female "Chick Flick"). I played in the tournament three or four years ago, and we had a very solid group of guys and won it. I wasn't planning on playing this year, but I haven't gotten out as much as I wanted to this last month--and wasn't going to Vegas--so I signed up earlier this week.

The best part about Dangle Wrangle is the mandatory spike rule. Spikes are usually considered bad spirit (think touchdown dance but with a little more taunting and less crowd play). For Dangle Wrangle, if you DON'T spike the disc, you don't get the point. The Tournament Director split us into 8 teams of action heroes, ranging from Clint Eastwood to Chuck Norris.

My team was Wesley Snipes. Boo-yah! Although not a very big action movie like Demolition Man, Blade, or Double Impact, my favorite Wesley Snipes quote has to be from "White Men Can't Jump." Woody Harrelson and Snipes are betting money on 3-pointers, and Woody needs to make the last one to tie Snipes. Snipes walks out in front of Harrelson and shakes his butt from side to side and says, "The wind moves the ball six to eight inches." Harrelson misses, and Snipes grabs the cash and scoots.

So yeah, I brought out that spike. Other favorites today were using the frisbee as Blade's sword, and slicing down everyone else on the team who became vampires after the score. A spin on that was that the vampires take Blade's sword, then promptly get their hand chopped off from the kick-ass fingerprint verification on the sword (best part in the movie!).

We played against the Jean Claude Van Damme team and brought out some obscure references, like "Sonic BOOM!" because Van Damme played Guile in the Street Fighter movie.

But my favorite... has to be... the cheer we did for the Steven Seagal team. One of the guys on my team knew the Family Guy episode where Seagal fights the baby seals, snapping many baby-seal necks in the process.

"You bastards come into our village, kill our fish, pollute our water... I'm going to send you back to hell where you came from!"

The worst part about today's frisbee tournament would have to be the fact that we were playing on a frozen tundra, and in the snow. I've never played frisbee in the snow, at least not organized frisbee. It was fucking cold! Ah! But that reminds me of my Beowulf cheer where after scoring, I took my four layers of shirts and sweatshirts off (which took longer than I anticipated), and screamed:

"I... AM... BEOWULF!!!"

Then I played a couple points with no shirt on, in the snow, to prove my manliness... like I know my good friend Beowulf would have done.

Facebook Poking Spree

Facebook was all the rage this weekend, well, besides Ultimate and drinking and hot tubs and pools and saunas... and hacking the zombie ball... and heckling. But I do remember at least an hour in there spent looking at funny facebook pictures. D-Tran and Younger both tried to get me into the site a few months ago, but I resisted. Toss in a fun weekend where strangers became friends, and I'm all aboard!

Younger's friend invite was somehow still active from like June, so she's my only Facebook friend right now. I just went to Josh's page and poked a dozen or so people I recognized. I'm not sure if poking is what I'm supposed to be doing, but it seemed fun at the time. I couldn't poke Will, and I'm not sure why Will is unpokeable. Is that his super-power?

I wasn't about to get charged the ten-cent text message to verify my account as a real person, so I happily typed in the two account verification words every time I poked someone--laughing all the way to the bank! Some of the words were pretty funny, and could possibly be harbingers of doom for certain facebook individuals.

For instance, I believe Dylan's two-word account verification code was "vacate Bridgeport." Dylan, get the fuck out of Bridgeport, you're doomed! Sarah's was "value meditation." So she isn't a social sleeper, she was just deep in social meditation most of the weekend. Josh's was a fitting "(something) organized." And I think Andy's topped the cake: "Holla Back!"

Tom White

I love frisbee tournaments. They are fun, and I love them...

...almost as much as I love Tom White.

What's that? You don't know Tom White? He might just be the sexiest ultimate frisbee player alive (or dead). I tried to get him in my bed this week, but he slept with Josh instead:



I may have liquored him up a little bit that first night, but it was all in good fun. Notice the cans of PBR and Rainier--ultimate players' drinks of choice. Josh didn't have as much fun in bed on Friday night as he anticipated, so he decided to "BAM! Step it up a notch!"



Our Zombie drink consisted of 1 bottle of dark rum, 1 bottle of light rum, 1 bottle of gold rum, 1 bottle of 151, a splash of pineapple juice, and three body parts (guesses?). Soon afterwards, Tom was almost under my control me.



By the end of the day, I could barely hold myself back from his chiseled Ned Flandersesque buttocks. Too bad for me, Tom White is a zombie-whore, and I think this guy got to him first:



I don't remember much else from this weekend outside of longing for Tom-Tom, but I do remember meeting some amazing ultimate players for the first time and reuniting with some old Tacoma friends. Wynne may have won the best costume contest, I can't verify the win, but is this last picture not the creepiest picture you have ever seen?



I came. I saw. I had butt-sex with Tom and came again! conquered.

Night!