Seven Hour Fuel

The roster for the trip down to Jersaaay ended up being myself, Thomas, Meg, and our faithful driver Stiggles. After making a stop at Remie's we didn't even get lost on the way and got to my cousin's around 6, and by 630 the dinosaur food was a-flowing. Stiggles and my cousin escaped briefly to pick up a 30-rack of Silver Bullets, and by 830pm I don't remember.

I do remember struggling with Dominos online ordering, and I had to have my cousin talk to the dude on the phone so we could get enough pizza. That pizza was delicious.

I remember again around 1030 only for Stiggles to pass out at 11 despite the fact that we were supposed to stay up all night on Friday so we can actually stay up all night on Saturday. Regardless, Meg went to bed around 1 and Thomas and I went to be around 2.

I woke up about a million times because the basement was colder than outside was and I slept on the floor. At some point, Stiggles moved from his couch and I leaped at the opportunity to sleep on a cushioned surface.

The next day we awoke around noon, and my other cousin showed up at roughly 2 to take Meg and I to Ihop, but after a missed turn and Jersey not allowing you to make a left turn we ended up at White Manna, a White-Castle esque establishment with lines out the door. We eventually got our order and boy was it delish lish. However, I immediately regretted my decision, as these burgers had roughly a million onions on them each, and I texted reinforcements for Tums.

I returned to our sleeping place and found no one except a Burger King bag full of trash and feared for the worst. Fortunately, Stiggles and Tom just decided to become Dinosaurs and go back out to Sonic.

Eventually, 7pm rolls around and we depart. We stop at CVS for supplies -- I came in looking for 5-hours and some powerbars, but left with 7-Hour Fuels and some nut/rasin/oat bar thingies. I downed a 7-hour in the car ride over and mentally prepared myself with some Eminem in the car.

We arrive at nearly the exact same time as the other car, which carried Rob Ben Tricia and Danielle. They had my care package, and we went inside to register and all that stuff. They had discs and jerseys on sale for $5 and some other team was selling discs as well. I picked up two discs and a jersey and after being placed on the yellow team began getting geared up for way too much Ultimate.

Stiggles and I were on the same team with Nick from Marist, and we were matched up against Chetti for the first round. After getting down a quick three everyone on the team figured out their roles and we cruised to a 3 point win.

Game two was against some team who were not very good, and we won by like 5. I don't really remember much -- I don't think we trailed.

We had a third round bye, so I bummed around and heckled a bit and drank a lot of water.

In our last game of the first set of pool play we won by something like 9. At this point we were really clicking, but unfortunately Nick, after playing three games with a dislocated shoulder, had to check out. This didn't prove detrimental at the time, but we knew that we'd miss his legs at the very least.

This is where the report gets really shady, since all I know about my next two games is that we won by over ten and I threw a lot of blades for points. I also shut down a black guy until his team yelled at him to clear out of the end-zone.

After going 5-0 we played the 2nd place team in our re-seed pool and our lack of legs showed ( we were down three total subs). We kept it close most of the game but they pulled away at the end and took it by 4, giving us our first loss of the night.

We got ten or fifteen minutes before the single-elim bracket went up. Again, we went down early but kept in it until the last ten minutes of the round when they pulled away and we were handed our second loss of the night which knocked us out of contention for the championship. At one point my legs just could not move any faster.

We could have played a few more games get into 5th place, but most of the team did not seem interested. The crew waited out for Ben and Tom to play out another round, and then we jacked some pizza and soda and headed out. I somehow stayed awake the whole ride and even showered when I got home.

I personally played the best Ultimate I have ever played, and I ran a surprising amount. I even heard that someone on an opposing team said "I have never seen a fat man move like that". I can only imagine what 6 weeks of not smoking will do for me. Stiggles also played extremely well; neither of us dropped a disc until our seventh game, and both of us were making solid throws and decions.

That's all the recap I have the desire to write. The tournament, while fun, was not something that leads to in-depth analysis.

Time for some din-din and napping.

This body is a temple.

So much for dry season.

This weekend was a veritable eel breeding ground, although in retrospect I'm not sure we should have expected anything but. It was practically the perfect storm of eels: 21st birthdays, drinks that are blue but claim to taste like orange, and people on the frisbee team. In fact, I'm pretty sure we got out of this weekend relatively unscathed.

Three hour practice the next day was three hours long. 'Nuff said.

I apparently injured my hip, but it should be good enough for Vitamin I to get me through Nocturnal.

I ended up sitting for the game against Marist, showing up 30 minutes late (had to watch LSV go 17-0) but actually showing up exactly on time to see the game start. We went down a quick 7-1, rallied three straight, and ended half still in contention at 8-4. 2nd half was much of the same, and we ended up losing convincingly, 15-6.

Same problems as always -- we drop an unreal amount of passes. Decision making with the disc was better than usual. Not to say it was perfect, far from it, rather it was an improvement for many people on the team. Playing indoors against only each other showed, as we lacked the aggression (especially in the air) needed to come down with discs that inevitably float for longer than they should.

We straight up don't have an offense. We can't play conservative if no one can catch. We really don't have a zone offense. Stack-wise we have the age-old problem of never cycling back in the stack. Zone is a much bigger problem, as the people downfield literally have no idea what they are doing and thusly we are forced to swing among our handlers a million times. Speaking of which, if our gameplan in Zone O is to swing it a million times, we need to swing it before the cup settles, since that is how you actually tire them out AND you are giving your wings more opportunities to get open.

We are getting more athletic as a whole, but we clearly do not present enough, if any, matchup problems for any team that we need to beat to get to regionals. Being able to "run with Marist" is a fine goal if all of our players are fundamentally sound, but seeing as the dropsies are still in season I don't think we should really be patting ourselves on the back for being able to run for 21 points.

There should never be a point on a windy day where we do not call out our potential zone offense line, as getting blindsided by a "surprise" zone is basically just asking to turn the disc over. That is an inexcusable mental error.

People are so afraid to make excuses that they don't want to list reasons why we played so poorly today. It is not an excuse if you attribute the correct amount of blame to it and take something away from it. Chalking up the entire loss to drinking for two nights and writing it off is an excuse -- understanding that drinking the night before a game is a hindrance to your play as a whole is a reason.

A lot of the lines called today seemed jumbled -- too many people who play the same position out on the field at once. These lines need to be sculpted. This is somewhat a product of the lack of specific roles for many players.

We need to play outdoors.

We need to get back to the fundamentals that we never actually learned.

We need to decide on what we are going to run (both offensively and defensively) and commit.

I'm not playing until Nocturnal, and hopefully the time off will help my hip enough that once we move outdoors I'll be fine. I'm pretty beat up all around, and I bet a week off would do a lot of people on the team some good right now.

Don't forget to drink water before you go to bed at the very least.

Revelations

It has become clear to me that this isn't our year.

No one wants it nearly enough for us to overcome everything. No one.

We started trying too late. We pushed back our deadline too many times. We got our recruits in too late.

I think we need to get bageled a few more times before we actually want it.

Indoor Blues

My blagging has been lackluster lately. Since a new challenger for best blag in the universe has entered the arena, I gotta step my game up.

Indoor has only gone downhill since the first practice. The intensity has stayed pretty high, but people are getting grumpier and grumpier and injuries are becoming commonplace. I'm attributing my injury to it, but it occurred on the first day of indoor so I'm not sure how much merit that has. Regardless, someone is going to get hurt going into the boards or bidding and I cannot wait to move outdoors.

I mean, constantly getting open under is fun for a (long) while, but when the only way you can score is through ten-thousand little passes you eventually end up on the wrong end of a 99% throw. Every other house has a big-play threat, be it Huckindor with everyone, Hufflepuff with Ed Too-Tall Jones, or Satanclaw with Mitch. Creeperin, without BJC, only has a short game, and a mediocre one at that. Our throws outside of me and Hazelnut are average at best and even I am coming down with a case of the dropsies (4 today that I can remember).

Right now our two n00bs are a liability, but I think if they keep on showing up they have a pretty high ceiling. Both clearly have no problem leaving their feet, and Kevin today cleared out really well. They've both played sports before so they know what goes into being on a team and seem to be picking up concepts pretty well. I think they will play much better outdoors rather than inside, as knowing how to clear the fuck out of the lanes is a lot more important when six people are trying to use them rather than two. We gotta get them to a party before they figure out we're weird.

Huckindor won 20+ games today on the back of Brad getting back to how he played in his prime last semester, Ben getting jacked and running forever, and Kool-Aid just tooling on people. Kool-Aid in particular is playing well this semester -- I think he's starting to understand what he's doing, plus hes getting some ridiculous hands and is getting his athletic ability back. He's going to be a force to reckon with come sectionals.

Huffle is looking pretty good too. Andy is playing out of his mind and is even learning some discretion with the disc. Tom is starting to play to his height a bit more and his hands are starting to grow some glue on them.

I'd talk about Satanclaw, but there's not much to say besides MC is old and Mitch and A.Pinn are still really good. Oops, I forgot that E.Herbst isn't hurt anymore. Did we really give them all these studs?

We thankfully ended up getting a sick freshmen class, with multiple players showing leadership qualities and dedication. GUNX might be here to stay.

I'm gonna do high weight on Tuesday. high rep on Wednesday, indoor on Thursday from now until I inevitably have a conflict.

I can't wait to move outdoors for practice, as that means I can finally do some cardio without doing something ridiculously boring like running for funsies. I can barely play Magic for funsies and you expect me to run?

I think I'm gonna start the brownie plan in the beginning March (rather than exactly a month before sectionals), as the limited material that I've read suggests that the earlier the better, although after being a month removed from smoking (I've only found material for smoking cigarettes, so while I would presume the damage to my lungs is less, I cannot be sure) your lung capacity increases 30%, so that is the bare minimum I suggest to anyone currently on the "smoke everyday plan".

That's all I got for now. My plan is to create a fire for frisbee by creating a fire for blagging, but if that doesn't pan I'm just gonna have to suck it up and play like I know I can.

Word.

P.S. Channelfireball is buying Goyfs at 80. L. O. L.

"I've always been a big fan of playing full games that have one tweak to emphasize a certain idea. For example, if you want to work on moving the disc off the sideline quickly, make a count of six be a turnover. Alternatively, if you want to work the sideline, make any dump throw before stall seven a turnover. Small changes like these seem silly and contrived when you first try them, but work very well if they are implemented correctly and limited to a specific goal."

-- http://www.the-huddle.org/issues/16/the-extra-defender/

I went to indoor today. I learned a few things:

1) I can get open under
2) Ben is a lot harder to cover than Charlie.
3) Hasbrouck gives me heartburn.

Yesterday

I went to the gym. My quads were tired.

Today I threw for two hours. I am tired.

Happy?

Facebook just changed

Facebook just changed. I like it better after the initial "WHAT THE FUCK"

Didn't do a real workout today, kinda just did whatever I wanted but I made sure I was either drinking water or lifting weights the entire time. Power Cleans are going to be the new fad -- You heard it here first.

Not a lot of numbers, only three Satanclaw, one Hufflepuff, two Huckindor. AND A FULL 5 CREEPERIN.

EAT IT.

All I'm sayin'.

Gym

The fire is close, but I'm not sure if it matters if I keep going to the gym.

No fire means no good blagging, though.

I just want to play more mini.